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I've missed you guys...
8 years ago
General
Hi all,
So, it's been a week since my "Alive" post, which is the deadline I set myself for posting this journal up, knowing that otherwise I'd try to rewrite it a half-million times.
I've missed you guys.
The short version ? Things went suddenly further south in 2016, and I got whisked into surgery. It's been a year and half since then. The recovery was hard, and complicated over and over again, but now.... now I'm well. Well enough to look back at the last 5 years and be amazed at how incredibly resilient hoomans are as a species. I look back now, with the benefit of being able to see how ill I was, and I'm gobsmacked at how crazily optimistic I was, how determined to survive, to get better, to even be an artist. We hoomans don't give up easy, and at the worst of times, we do whatever mental gymnastics we need to to convince us to keep on going.
I kept going. And now I'm well. And I've missed you guys. There's an artflood impending.
Again, if you're expecting work from me and *haven't* heard from me, please please drop me a Note. There are TWO people I haven't been able to get hold of, and I'd very much like to pop you an email, discuss your commission, and see if I can make it up to you. Please get in contact.
The longer version [/u]
This bit contains a lot of real-life details. If you just want to know what's happening with the TF Clinic etc, skip to the next header :)
If you've been following me for a while, you probably remember that there have been a lot of "I'm ill" then "yay, I'm well now" posts over the last 5 years. From where I'm standing now, I look at those posts and I'm amazed that I honestly ever thought I was well during that period. Honestly, I didn't know what well was anymore. I just hoped that every improvement was the Big One.
What I had was an autoimmune disorder – Graves Disease. It turns out that autoimmune disorders have a pretty wide range in severity, and that turned out to be half the problem. I was sent to a half dozen clinics intended for people with less debilitating conditions than mine. I'd spend 6 months in one, being told to 'bear with' the treatment, before being shuttled off to the next. They changed my medication over and over, which half the time made me feel great as the dosages overlapped then had me crashing down hard after a couple of months.
Eventually, I was told : “There's probably no cure for you. You may have to accept that this is your life now.”
And I thought, “No.”
Just no.
In that moment, I knew with an absolutely unemotional clarity, as simple as a fact, that I wouldn't live like this. One way or another. I would keep fighting or I would give up completely and take my own life.
So, I went with fighting.
My parents helped out. We got together the money, and I went to a private specialist.
Four months later, I was in surgery.
My partner has prodded me to post this photo, though I don't normally share my squishy human self on FA. He feels it's important, that it captures the moment, that I'll be glad to have shared it later. He's often spot-on about these things, so....
[WARNING : Photo of my human self. Don't click unless you don't mind squishy pink hoomans]
Morphine Me...
I got cut...
The months that followed were agony. I had caught a nasty bug in the hospital, then after that it was migraine after migraine. My body couldn't cope with the changes, and I spent months with different parts of me taking turns to complain. After that, my immune system, compromised by the drugs and isolation, had to face the little colds and flus of the last 5 years... all at once.
But gradually, slowly, things got better.
My muscles had atrophied, but with physiotherapy for the worst and determination for the rest, I began to win back my strength.
And now, I'm alive.
I'm alive, and I'm back.
I wrote some journals, shortly after my surgery, trying to make a note of how I had truly felt, before it faded in my mind. I was going to share some of them, but I've decided that's not for this journal. They're a bit horrifying, in their way. In them, for example, I talk about how I had to focus 100% of my attention just to raise a cup of tea to my lips. I talk about how I had to 'budget' emotions – because feeling emotions (even happiness) took energy, energy which I also needed to eat food, go to the toilet, things like that. I talk about how in order to have a conversation with someone, I had to let my arms and legs go slack, not having the reserves to both think, talk, breath and sit up all at once. I was in constant, constant pain.
And these were things I just took for granted. They'd been that way for so long, I hadn't even realized they weren't normal.
And the horrifying, wonderful thing is, during that period ? I honestly kept trying to get back to arting. I kept telling myself I was lazy, or depressed, that I could do it if I just *tried* a little harder. I don't judge myself for that. It was what kept me going – the delusion that I was getting better, the refusal to give up, is part of the wonderful crazy that keeps hoomans ticking.
So what makes this time different ?
I wasn't sure either, so in May 2017 I determined to get back to artwork. The long months of re-training my hand, the ongoing recurrent illnesses, all of it took its toll. I held a part-time day job for a while, lost it, got kicked in the metaphorical balls by depression long deferred from the illness, got up again....
Somewhere along the way, something, suddenly, woke up.
About October, I stopped having a fever/flu every 2 weeks.
About November, I was drawing (even just a little) every day.
About December, I realized that my hand no longer hurt when I held a pencil.
I experienced, for the first time in 6 years, that wonderful space an artist can fall into where I fell in love with a piece and just kept going... and going... and going.... without having to fall over, rest, shiver, or shake.
Come Christmas 2017, I decided to give it a shot – I set a deadline. The ultimate test – if I could manage the stress of working to a deadline, I could be back. If I could finish a certain amount of pieces and be ready to return, I should. If I missed the deadline, it was okay, but it was something I'd have to face.
The deadline was February 2018.
Well, hi :)
So what now ? What about the TF Clinic ? Patreon ? [/b]
I've decided to do one thing at a time. I want to get the Clinic up and running, not only 'back up' but actually running the way I wanted to run it back when I was far, far more ill than I realized. But doing everything at once is a recipe for disaster. I want to test my limits, find out how much I can do, and do it only once I know that :)
I have a part-time job at the moment. I'm a Life Model ! I love it, far more than I ever thought I would. It's casual work, with unpredictable hours, but it makes a little food money and I spend my 'paid' days hanging out in Art Colleges, talking with art teachers, soaking up 'art' like a sponge and, the moment I get home, I squeeze.
I've decided that this year, 2018, is the year I'm going to dedicate to trying to make this 'being an artist' thing work. I'm going to throw my all at it. So expect to see some formulation of the TF Clinic later in the year, but if it has to take longer to do it right, I'm afraid it will. But it's not dead, that I can promise.
'Convention Season' in Europe is mostly March to May, so for now I'm focusing on preparing for that. But I do want to get a Patreon up and running again, and I have plenty of ideas for rewards. Again though, it depends on what I manage over the next two months. If I'm certain it's doable, you all will be the first to know :)
On that note, conventions I'm attending (yup, I'm serious about throwing myself into the art thing this year :) )
- March : JFTW (Bristol, England)
- April : Furrnion (Madrid, Spain)
- May : Confuzzled 2018 (Birmingham, England)
Are you open for Commissions ?
Not at the moment. I still have a few more 'old' commissions to finish before I'll take on more, and with JFTW a month away, I might only start taking commissions again then. If my desk clears before that though, I'll definitely post on FA.
Anything new ?
I've started sculpting, so expect to see some of that turning up on my page, and as Patreon rewards-as-and-when. It started out because I wanted an 'art break' – something arty to do when my eyes needed a rest from drawing, and I fell in love. If you'd like to see what I'm up to, here's a wee look at a work-in-progress.
I'll be offering custom sculpts at Conventions in very limited slots when I'm open again, so pop by early if you'd like to snag one.
Anything else ?
Thank you, you wonderful, crazy, bouncy, furry/scaly/fuzzy/feathery/morphing people. The Notes of concern, the comments of encouragement, I have missed you all. I can't wait to share more art with you.
I'm sorry for going away.
Thanks for being here when I got back :3
~ Dat foxydragon / Urbanvixen / 'Kim'
So, it's been a week since my "Alive" post, which is the deadline I set myself for posting this journal up, knowing that otherwise I'd try to rewrite it a half-million times.
I've missed you guys.
The short version ? Things went suddenly further south in 2016, and I got whisked into surgery. It's been a year and half since then. The recovery was hard, and complicated over and over again, but now.... now I'm well. Well enough to look back at the last 5 years and be amazed at how incredibly resilient hoomans are as a species. I look back now, with the benefit of being able to see how ill I was, and I'm gobsmacked at how crazily optimistic I was, how determined to survive, to get better, to even be an artist. We hoomans don't give up easy, and at the worst of times, we do whatever mental gymnastics we need to to convince us to keep on going.
I kept going. And now I'm well. And I've missed you guys. There's an artflood impending.
Again, if you're expecting work from me and *haven't* heard from me, please please drop me a Note. There are TWO people I haven't been able to get hold of, and I'd very much like to pop you an email, discuss your commission, and see if I can make it up to you. Please get in contact.
The longer version [/u]
This bit contains a lot of real-life details. If you just want to know what's happening with the TF Clinic etc, skip to the next header :)
If you've been following me for a while, you probably remember that there have been a lot of "I'm ill" then "yay, I'm well now" posts over the last 5 years. From where I'm standing now, I look at those posts and I'm amazed that I honestly ever thought I was well during that period. Honestly, I didn't know what well was anymore. I just hoped that every improvement was the Big One.
What I had was an autoimmune disorder – Graves Disease. It turns out that autoimmune disorders have a pretty wide range in severity, and that turned out to be half the problem. I was sent to a half dozen clinics intended for people with less debilitating conditions than mine. I'd spend 6 months in one, being told to 'bear with' the treatment, before being shuttled off to the next. They changed my medication over and over, which half the time made me feel great as the dosages overlapped then had me crashing down hard after a couple of months.
Eventually, I was told : “There's probably no cure for you. You may have to accept that this is your life now.”
And I thought, “No.”
Just no.
In that moment, I knew with an absolutely unemotional clarity, as simple as a fact, that I wouldn't live like this. One way or another. I would keep fighting or I would give up completely and take my own life.
So, I went with fighting.
My parents helped out. We got together the money, and I went to a private specialist.
Four months later, I was in surgery.
My partner has prodded me to post this photo, though I don't normally share my squishy human self on FA. He feels it's important, that it captures the moment, that I'll be glad to have shared it later. He's often spot-on about these things, so....
[WARNING : Photo of my human self. Don't click unless you don't mind squishy pink hoomans]
Morphine Me...
I got cut...
The months that followed were agony. I had caught a nasty bug in the hospital, then after that it was migraine after migraine. My body couldn't cope with the changes, and I spent months with different parts of me taking turns to complain. After that, my immune system, compromised by the drugs and isolation, had to face the little colds and flus of the last 5 years... all at once.
But gradually, slowly, things got better.
My muscles had atrophied, but with physiotherapy for the worst and determination for the rest, I began to win back my strength.
And now, I'm alive.
I'm alive, and I'm back.
I wrote some journals, shortly after my surgery, trying to make a note of how I had truly felt, before it faded in my mind. I was going to share some of them, but I've decided that's not for this journal. They're a bit horrifying, in their way. In them, for example, I talk about how I had to focus 100% of my attention just to raise a cup of tea to my lips. I talk about how I had to 'budget' emotions – because feeling emotions (even happiness) took energy, energy which I also needed to eat food, go to the toilet, things like that. I talk about how in order to have a conversation with someone, I had to let my arms and legs go slack, not having the reserves to both think, talk, breath and sit up all at once. I was in constant, constant pain.
And these were things I just took for granted. They'd been that way for so long, I hadn't even realized they weren't normal.
And the horrifying, wonderful thing is, during that period ? I honestly kept trying to get back to arting. I kept telling myself I was lazy, or depressed, that I could do it if I just *tried* a little harder. I don't judge myself for that. It was what kept me going – the delusion that I was getting better, the refusal to give up, is part of the wonderful crazy that keeps hoomans ticking.
So what makes this time different ?
I wasn't sure either, so in May 2017 I determined to get back to artwork. The long months of re-training my hand, the ongoing recurrent illnesses, all of it took its toll. I held a part-time day job for a while, lost it, got kicked in the metaphorical balls by depression long deferred from the illness, got up again....
Somewhere along the way, something, suddenly, woke up.
About October, I stopped having a fever/flu every 2 weeks.
About November, I was drawing (even just a little) every day.
About December, I realized that my hand no longer hurt when I held a pencil.
I experienced, for the first time in 6 years, that wonderful space an artist can fall into where I fell in love with a piece and just kept going... and going... and going.... without having to fall over, rest, shiver, or shake.
Come Christmas 2017, I decided to give it a shot – I set a deadline. The ultimate test – if I could manage the stress of working to a deadline, I could be back. If I could finish a certain amount of pieces and be ready to return, I should. If I missed the deadline, it was okay, but it was something I'd have to face.
The deadline was February 2018.
Well, hi :)
So what now ? What about the TF Clinic ? Patreon ? [/b]
I've decided to do one thing at a time. I want to get the Clinic up and running, not only 'back up' but actually running the way I wanted to run it back when I was far, far more ill than I realized. But doing everything at once is a recipe for disaster. I want to test my limits, find out how much I can do, and do it only once I know that :)
I have a part-time job at the moment. I'm a Life Model ! I love it, far more than I ever thought I would. It's casual work, with unpredictable hours, but it makes a little food money and I spend my 'paid' days hanging out in Art Colleges, talking with art teachers, soaking up 'art' like a sponge and, the moment I get home, I squeeze.
I've decided that this year, 2018, is the year I'm going to dedicate to trying to make this 'being an artist' thing work. I'm going to throw my all at it. So expect to see some formulation of the TF Clinic later in the year, but if it has to take longer to do it right, I'm afraid it will. But it's not dead, that I can promise.
'Convention Season' in Europe is mostly March to May, so for now I'm focusing on preparing for that. But I do want to get a Patreon up and running again, and I have plenty of ideas for rewards. Again though, it depends on what I manage over the next two months. If I'm certain it's doable, you all will be the first to know :)
On that note, conventions I'm attending (yup, I'm serious about throwing myself into the art thing this year :) )
- March : JFTW (Bristol, England)
- April : Furrnion (Madrid, Spain)
- May : Confuzzled 2018 (Birmingham, England)
Are you open for Commissions ?
Not at the moment. I still have a few more 'old' commissions to finish before I'll take on more, and with JFTW a month away, I might only start taking commissions again then. If my desk clears before that though, I'll definitely post on FA.
Anything new ?
I've started sculpting, so expect to see some of that turning up on my page, and as Patreon rewards-as-and-when. It started out because I wanted an 'art break' – something arty to do when my eyes needed a rest from drawing, and I fell in love. If you'd like to see what I'm up to, here's a wee look at a work-in-progress.
I'll be offering custom sculpts at Conventions in very limited slots when I'm open again, so pop by early if you'd like to snag one.
Anything else ?
Thank you, you wonderful, crazy, bouncy, furry/scaly/fuzzy/feathery/morphing people. The Notes of concern, the comments of encouragement, I have missed you all. I can't wait to share more art with you.
I'm sorry for going away.
Thanks for being here when I got back :3
~ Dat foxydragon / Urbanvixen / 'Kim'
I am honestly so happy to hear you are on the mend. I had been worried about you.
But even when you were deathly ill you were still you, you still lived half for yourself and half for others and you were there when i needed you most. I am so thankful that you got the help you needed and I'm so thankful you have beaten this horrible illness. You are an inspiration.
I'm sure I'm not alone in saying we all missed you, your friends, your fans and your patients ;p
Welcome back Urbanvixen :)
Thanks Jow.
And I know how hard it was not to pester me about this journal and just let me take care of it at the speed I'd set myself XD Thank you for both your incredibly restraint, and your amazing support. Muchluffs
Looking forward to seeing more from you and best of luck with all you have planned; but most of all, glad that you're in the best place you've been in for these past years! All the best!
Looking forward to spending time with you at act at least!
Moco
I have no idea what ACT is though.... Typo, or am I being daft ?
Misdiagnoses are very depressing in a disease. You think that's it, and then it pulls you away from your feet underneath your legs.
Welcome back, sir. I hope it's all over now and you're just going to get better. Unfortunately, in the case of an autoimmune disease this is never known. If your own body is the greatest enemy, there's never an end to combat.
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
german original
Das was du die letzten Jahre durchgemacht hast, das würde man seine schlimmsten Feinden nicht wünschen.
Fehldiagnosen sind bei einer Erkrankung sehr deprimierend. Man denkt das war es, und dann reißt es einen wieder die Füße unter den Beinen weg.
Willkommen zurück. Ich hoffe das es jetzt alles war und es für dich nur noch aufwärts geht. Leider weiß man bei einer Autoimmunerkrankung dies nie. Wenn der eigene Körper der größte Feind ist, gibt es nie eine Ende des Kampfes.
I'll keep my fingers and toes crossed for good health. But at least, as long as I keep my workload to an amount that means I can fall over for a week if needed and not miss a deadline, I can get back to doing what I love. That's so much better than it was 4 years ago, so I'm considering that a Win :) Big things in small blessings :)
Looking forward to see you again at ConFuzzled this year. I'll make sure to come by and say hi at your stand.
I don't have my own stand this year so I might be hard to find (A computer error on CFZ's end meant my Reg on the 2nd didn't get activated until the 16th, and they're not willing to move me up the list since there's so many others waiting :( ) buuut I will be in there somewhere thanks to the lovely Crazy-husky. If you can't find me in the Den though, do come say hi in the bar :)
I'm curious about Furnnion, mainly because Google can't find any results. Is that a typo or a super-secret convention?
It's here : https://www.furrnion.org/
See you at CFZ !
I wish you a bright future and one that I'm eager to see you craft according to how you want it.
Though I am wondering, how did a surgery help you get rid of this auto-immune disease, did they cut out a certain glans or similar? Sorry if intruding too much into personal space, just confused there a bit.
Keep up the fight and good luck with you arting out. **thumbs up**
Yes - the particular tissue that my body was rejecting was my thyroid. Once the thyroid was removed, the whole-body freakout started to slow down and eventually stopped. I'm now on hormone replacement medication for the missing organ, which is a lifetime thing, but it's a life I've got back so I'm happy :) This was an usual extreme of Graves Disease, but not unknown, which is why it took a private specialist to spot it.
The reason I avoid saying "autoimmune thyroid disorder" online is because there are a whole range of thyroid disorders, some of which are pretty common, so I hear a LOT of "Oh, I have a relation/friend who has exactly the same thing !" I know they mean it well, and I have complete sympathy for anyone suffering any illness, especially chronic, but so far it's never been 'the same thing' XD People are familiar with organs like the stomach, so they know that a 'stomach ulcer' is a different kettle of fish from a 'stomach perforation', but they're not so familiar with the thyroid so they tend to 'lump' all the disorders together. They always do it well-meaningly, so I don't like to correct people as it comes off as rejecting their (very welcome) well-wishes ! So I thought for clarity I'd just refer to it as what Graves Disease is - an autoimmune disorder, and leave the organ out of it.
I still *have* Graves Disease, but without an organ to be offended by, it won't be a problem for me unless I get pregnant :) (Because then you have to watch out for it getting offended by the infant's thyroid gland)
Hope that answers your question a bit :)