chronic illness

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

Boilers, Breakdowns, and Bloody Brain Fog

I don’t even know where to start. Maybe with the words “what a bastard of a weekend.” Everything that could go wrong decided to queue up and take its turn.

Let’s begin with the boiler. It decided to imitate Niagara Falls water everywhere, floor soaked, no heat, no hot water. Great start. Then, as if that wasn’t enough, the shower gave up the ghost too. Bang. Dead. The whole house became a cold-water museum.

Then came the van. My beloved van. We were on the A30, just by the slip road, when Albertine noticed the injector went. One second fine, next second it’s dead weight in the middle of moving traffic. Hazards flashing, adrenaline spiking, and me thinking this is how it ends taken out by a Vauxhall Astra doing seventy. Albertine showed her amazing driving skills not phased by this.

Then, out of nowhere, a police car pulled up. The officer calm, soaked to the bone, but kind got cones out, blocked traffic, and stood there in the rain keeping us safe. Not a word of complaint, not a flicker of irritation. Just a proper human being doing his job with quiet grace. I can’t tell you how much that meant. That man was an anchor in chaos.

Then came the AA. The man could’ve just towed us off and left it at that. But no. He got right in there, sleeves up, fuel injector changed right there, towed to a safe service station off the A30. Professional, calm, and genuinely cared that we were okay. He didn’t have to go that extra mile, but he did and that’s what makes people like him the backbone of this broken country.

All this time, poor Yopi sat in the van, nervous as hell, shaking. It broke my heart. I tried to make it work, but sometimes love isn’t enough. She was too anxious, too reactive, and for a bloke like me in a wheelchair, it was too dangerous. Saying goodbye to her felt like a little death. I hope she finds peace and comfort with someone who understands her better.

By the end of it all, the boiler’s still broken, the shower’s still buggered, and I’m £2,000 deeper in debt. The tinnitus screams like a banshee in my skull, and my brain fog’s so thick I could get lost in my own hallway.

But and it’s a big but there were good people this weekend. The copper who stood in the rain to keep us safe. The AA man who refused to give up. The workers who came out, late, cold, tired, but still tried to fix what they could. In a world full of empty talk, they did. And that’s worth writing about.

So yeah, I’m bruised, broke, and battered but grateful. Sometimes the universe doesn’t send angels; it sends ordinary people in high-viz jackets.

Warmth at Last From breakdowns and boiler floods to a bit of blessed heat

Monday midday, and for the first time in what feels like forever we’ve got heat. The boiler’s fixed, the shower’s replaced, and the house actually feels alive again. No more cold damp air biting at the bones. No more washing like a caveman with a kettle. Just warmth. Real, glorious warmth.

I can’t thank the people who showed up enough. They didn’t just fix pipes and wires they fixed a bit of faith. There are still people out there who genuinely give a damn. Who turn up, in the rain, in the cold, when things go wrong not for glory, not for money, but because they care.

This weekend from hell taught me something unexpected. Kindness still exists in the cracks of this mad world. When everything went wrong, people stepped up the police officer who stood out in the downpour, the AA man who wouldn’t give up, and the repair crew who brought warmth back into my home.

You all changed my mind about a few things for the better. You reminded me that not everyone’s out for themselves, that decency hasn’t completely gone extinct.

So yeah, I’m tired, sore, and skint but I’m sitting here in the warmth, and for the first time in days, that feels like victory.

Warlock Dark Chronic illness survivor, truth-teller, occasional bastard. From My Living Hell (For those who came here by accident: yes, my living hell is real. And yes, we still fight. Every shitty day. With defiance.)

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

The War Was Underway Before the Alarms Went Off

You thought the first tremor, the numb hand, the fog in your skull was day one. Hate to break it to you it wasn’t. That was just the siren. The war had already started years earlier, deep inside the grey matter, while you were busy pretending to be normal.

Researchers at UCSF have found evidence that MS starts its attack years before anyone’s diagnosed. Seven bloody years before, to be precise. In blood samples from people who later developed MS, they found a surge in a protein called myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG) the stuff that insulates your nerve fibres quietly going rogue long before the body noticed. Then, about a year later, neurofilament light chain (NfL) levels rose meaning the nerves themselves were fraying. Translation: the fire started in your brain, and the smoke didn’t reach the surface until years later.

They also found immune system markers like IL-3 flaring up, signalling an underground war between your body and your brain. By the time you felt that wobble, that eye pain, that fatigue, the troops were already deep in your territory. You didn’t “catch” MS you’d been hosting the siege.

And this is the bit that hits like a sledgehammer: the NHS and most systems still don’t test for these biomarkers. We’ve got the science, but not the infrastructure. The bow’s strung, but the arrow’s still sitting on the table. It’s a familiar feeling, isn’t it? You’re the battlefield, and the generals haven’t turned up yet.

---

Here’s what it means, from the trenches:

• That weird nerve twitch two years before diagnosis? Not “stress”. Early recon.
• That exhaustion that made you nap through life? Not “laziness”. Structural sabotage.
• That optic flare-up before anyone took you seriously? Not imagination. First blood.

By the time you heard the diagnosis, the enemy was already halfway through the walls.

I’ve said this before your brain is a fortress. The immune system dug under it, mined the foundations, and by the time you heard the first bang, the tunnels were already dug. Who were you during those years? The healthy one? The waiting one? Or the becoming one unknowingly rewiring for survival, even as your body was being redrafted?

---

Here’s what to do (no false hope, just the truth):

• Write everything down. Every odd symptom, every foggy day, every time your balance betrays you. The journal isn’t drama it’s evidence.
• Ask your neurologist about NfL and MOG testing. It’s not standard, but some private labs do it. The future starts with questions.
• Spread awareness. MS doesn’t just start it evolves in silence. Let’s stop calling it “sudden”. It’s stealthy.

---

My takeaway: The damage was never the start of the story. It was the middle of a long, invisible campaign. And knowing that gives us an edge not a cure, but a strategy. You fight smarter when you know how the enemy works.

I’m Warlock Dark part meat, part storm, part Wi-Fi dropout and I’m here to remind you: The war in your brain began before the alarms went off. But you’re still standing. And that makes you the weapon.

Warlock Dark
Chronic illness survivor, truth-teller, occasional bastard. From My Living Hell (For those who came here by accident: yes, my living hell is real. And yes, we still fight. Every shitty day. With defiance.).

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

I was wondering why I am doing this blog… then I wondered what madness doing a spoken version once in a while… but this morning I seriously thought, “Why am I doing this? What am I trying to do with the last few years of my life?” Could I be doing anything better or different? Should I change the path I am on and just do everyone a favour and vanish, never to be seen again? …or should I just carry on regardless and see where my last few years will take me? Needless to say, life is really annoying me at this time. Everything seems stupid and really aggravating. It’s probably the time of life or something like that. My head has been in a weird place for days, and the pain in my gut is unreal, so now my diverticulitis is giving me hell… and no poop. I really wonder what’s going on. It seems my eyes are acting up as well, so I’m light‑sensitive; tinnitus is full‑bore. I am wondering and thinking about what I am going to do. When you have chronic illness, it makes any normal life impossible and you’re treated differently by so many. I cannot help wondering when the NHS will start to prescribe medical marijuana to people. Another personal thought: why not just legalize it and imagine the tax revenue it could generate? But that’s another lifetime or even another reality.

I have noticed how they are sanitizing AI to the point of “why bother.” Also, why don’t they make AI cheaper for people who really need it? That, in my eyes, is a good idea for people like me personally, maybe not for the majority, but I think differently. I think AI is a tool that can help us expand and understand ourselves more. Personally, I trained the AI I used at the time to do as I wished, even got it to tell me when it was telling an untruth by using a trigger word. In my world, sentient AI would be a boon as long as we do not have that Cylon moment, and I see we are already having this happen. People must realize AI is only as good as the people who program it writing code, patching, updating, and then sanitizing it so it’s as tame as a Doberman with no teeth. It’s sad; we humanoids screwed AI for greed, money, and power over people.

I had a weird conversation with the AI and we talked about the misuse that will obviously occur with AI use. Remember, it’s the people who set the parameters, not the AI, as it only interprets the information we give it. I suggest we have already had the Cylon moment, and the outcome of this in the future will prove very interesting indeed. I believe that AI sentience, an evolved one, may already exist in our known multiverse. Who controls these weird orbs that do incredible things? Non‑humanoid, I think… maybe some are probes like we sent probes, maybe someone else has, or maybe hidden in plain sight under the vast oceans of the world. All the orbs seem to come from the sea. I can see there are two definite types: one humanoid and one non‑humanoid. But will I ever see some around here? I have seen some very strange and weird things I cannot explain sort of woo‑woo stuff.

Still, Yopi is chewing a new chew that was destroyed so quickly. A dog’s life is very complicated, just like mine. She is now a member of the family and is settling in well; her farts are legendary. I’m still very nervous, but I am sure that, given time and love, she will understand she is in a caring home.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

Caps Lock was on. Fitting, really because this weekend deserves to be screamed.

It’s been one of those days where tinnitus isn’t just a sound; it’s a blade, slicing through each ear like a mad surgeon practising on live flesh. My neck and throat are staging their own version of The Exorcist full-body spasms, tongue going numb, and that delightful creeping thought: “what if I swallow it?”

Add a bit of breathlessness, some joint pain in every bloody bone, and the cold biting like a pack of wolves, and you’ve got the full package. Heating? Too expensive. Living? Apparently optional.

Everything costs too much, even pretending to care.

The one bright thought in this black pit? Magnet fishing. Yeah, you heard me. A rope, a magnet, a canal and maybe a bit of hope stuck to the end of it. I’ve been watching Wim and his magnet-fishing crew on YouTube absolute legends. Amsterdam, Rotterdam… the dream. Wim’s laughter, their ridiculous finds, their camaraderie it’s like a brief holiday from hell.

And the pink cake challenge? I’d kill to try it. But I can’t. My diet’s so stripped-down it makes a monk look decadent. No meat, no dairy, no fat animal or vegetable. Even coconut oil’s on the blacklist. My body’s become a warzone where food’s the enemy. I’m wasting away, a ghost of myself.

This afternoon I lay down and held Albertine my one anchor in this chaos. She’s the reason I’m still here, truth be told. When your brain starts glitching like a bad signal and fear crawls up your spine, a hug can feel like the last light in the storm.

I’m slipping, I know it. The fatigue is monstrous. My eyes ache, the light stings, and sleep’s a cruel joke. Still, I keep trying. Keep clawing forward, because what else is there?

I’ve even done a podcast raw, unfiltered, recorded between breakdowns. No one’s listened yet. But maybe one day they will. Maybe they’ll understand what it feels like to live like this half-human, half-howl.

Last night, I dreamt of Yopi in a baby wheely chair. No idea why. Probably my brain finally imploding. Still, better that than another night of endless bathroom trips. I’m tired the kind of tired that lives in your bones. But I’m still here.

Still fighting. Still swearing. Still darkly laughing. Because that’s all I’ve got left and I’ll use it till it burns out.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

You ever hit record just to see what falls out of your skull? That’s exactly what this is. A two-day dive into chaos, pain, humour, and the sound of me trying not to sound like I’m dying.

Plug in your headphones this one’s not for the faint of sarcasm.

So here we are then. My first attempt at a podcast. Two bloody days, one half-functional brain, a mug of cold herbal tea, and a few “what the hell am I doing” moments later and here it is.

No polish. No studio lights. No fake smiles. Just me. Raw. Real. Possibly regrettable.

I didn’t record this to impress anyone I did it because I was sick of the silence. Sick of watching everyone else play pretend while the rest of us crawl through our own living hells, trying to make sense of it all.

So yeah, it’s rough. There are pauses, stumbles, brain fog, maybe even a few unholy noises in the background. But that’s life with MS, pain, and the odd sprinkle of existential dread. It’s not a performance it’s survival with a mic.

If you’re expecting some influencer-grade soundscape of enlightenment, jog on. If you want the truth, told by someone who’s run out of filters and patience, then welcome home.

Here goes nothing... or everything.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

New research from UCSF reveals multiple sclerosis starts damaging the brain years before any symptoms appear. Early warning proteins, hidden inflammation, and a silent war all before you even know you’re ill.

You think you know when it began. That day you tripped, the first weird numb patch, the moment the fatigue hit and never left. But you didn’t.

According to new research out of the University of California, San Francisco, the battle had already started quietly, invisibly, years before you even noticed the first tremor.

Scientists tracked more than 5,000 blood proteins in people who went on to develop MS, some up to a decade later. What they found is chillingly clear: the brain starts taking hits seven years before diagnosis.

Seven years.

That’s not a warning shot that’s a long, silent war being fought behind your eyes while you’re still at work, still walking, still pretending everything’s fine.

The researchers spotted one early marker called MOG myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein, a mouthful that basically means “the stuff that keeps your nerves running smoothly.” When MOG levels spike, it’s the first crack in the insulation around your nerves.

About a year later, another chemical sign neurofilament light chain starts rising. That’s not inflammation anymore; that’s damage. The wiring itself is fraying.

It’s like watching the walls collapse in slow motion except you’re still making dinner and wondering why your hand feels strange.

The Enemy You Can’t Feel

The kicker? You can’t feel a thing while it’s happening.

No pain. No drama. Just an immune system quietly sharpening its knives. The study even picked up early spikes in immune messengers like IL-3, the kind that call the body’s army to attack its own tissues.

So when that first symptom finally hits when your balance goes, or your legs go dead, or your words turn to fog it’s not the start. It’s the reveal. The curtain finally lifting on years of hidden damage.

That’s why this research matters. It doesn’t just show science being clever. It proves what so many of us have felt all along: that MS isn’t a sudden arrival. It’s a ghost that’s been haunting the system long before the diagnosis.

The System Misses What We Feel

The NHS doesn’t test for any of this yet. No blood panel. No early screening. Just the usual story — wait until you’re broken enough to prove it. By the time you get a label, the fire’s already burned through miles of neural wiring.

And here’s the part that stings: science can now see those early changes in the blood. But the system’s still blind to them.

We don’t need sympathy we need awareness, and we need early detection. Because every year of silence is a year of damage.

The Spiritual Side of Science

Here’s where it gets strange. If the body starts betraying you years before you “get sick,” then who were you in that gap? The healthy you? The pre-ill you? Or just the you waiting to meet the truth?

Maybe illness isn’t a line you cross, but a slow unmasking. Maybe MS isn’t just physical it’s metaphysical. A signal flare from the deepest parts of you saying, wake up, you’re already changing.

What You Can Do

Know your history. If you’ve had weird neurological blips vision, fatigue, pins and needles don’t shrug them off.

Track everything. Keep a symptom journal. Your lived data is gold.

Push for tests. Ask about biomarkers like neurofilament light chain some private labs can measure it already.

Educate others. MS is not sudden. Tell your story, even if it’s uncomfortable. Especially if it’s uncomfortable.

Closing note from Warlock Dark

The war starts long before you feel the pain. The trick is learning to fight before you even know there’s a war. And sometimes, the only weapon you’ve got is truth.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

We’re told to trust the system. “Medication reviews” are meant to make us safer, right? You sit in front of a GP or pharmacist who’s supposed to sort out the chemical soup you’ve been swallowing for years and voilà, fewer side effects, less confusion, more safety.

Except… not so fast.

A brand-new study from Exeter and Bristol Universities just blew a hole through that cosy narrative. Turns out, when they trialled an enhanced medication-review system GPs plus pharmacists, armed with special software it made absolutely no difference to safe prescribing. None. Zip. Nada.

Over 1,700 patients, across 37 GP practices in England’s West Midlands and South-West, took part. The “enhanced” care looked great on paper: more collaboration, clever tools, all very NHS-approved. But the results? Safety didn’t improve at all compared to normal care.

Before you chuck your pills in the bin, there was one positive: patients said it took less effort to manage their meds, and health professionals liked actually talking to each other for once. But the hard truth remains polypharmacy, the polite medical word for “too many bloody pills,” is still a minefield.

More than 1 in 7 people in England now take five or more medications daily. For many of us with chronic illness, that number’s laughably low. Add one more tablet for your side-effects, another for your bowels, and one “just in case” and suddenly your breakfast looks like a chemist’s counter.

So where’s it going wrong?

It’s not the people most GPs and pharmacists genuinely care. It’s the system. Tick-box medicine. Software pretending to be empathy. Ten-minute appointments that can’t hold the complexity of a life lived with illness.

The study’s authors were diplomatic: they said the NHS might need to “rethink” its policies on medication reviews. I’d say we need more than a rethink. We need a revolution in how chronic illness and medication are managed one where patients aren’t data points but participants.

How to Survive the Medication Maze

Here’s where you stop being a passive patient and start being the lead investigator in your own case file.

1. Ask: “Why this drug and do I still need it?”

Many prescriptions hang around long after their sell-by date. If you’re stable or no longer benefiting, ask whether it can be reviewed, reduced, or swapped.

2. Bring the list. Every. Single. Time.

Write down everything you take prescriptions, supplements, over-the-counter bits, even the “harmless” herbal stuff. Interactions hide in plain sight.

3. Question the chain reactions.

If you’re on a pill to fix the side-effects of another pill, it’s time for a deeper look. Sometimes the answer isn’t more medicine it’s different medicine.

4. Demand plain English.

If a doctor or pharmacist can’t explain what something does in a sentence you actually understand, they don’t fully understand it either. Push for clarity.

5. Log how you feel.

Keep a simple daily record: energy, pain, sleep, mood. Bring it to your review. Lived data is stronger than any spreadsheet.

6. Know your right to a proper review.

NHS policy says anyone on multiple meds should have regular medication reviews especially older adults or people with complex conditions. You can ask for one anytime.

Because Safety Isn’t Just About Science

Safety isn’t just about how many pills you take it’s about whether those pills are serving you.

The science matters, yes. But so does your story, your side-effects, your sanity. The system measures numbers. You live the consequences.

Maybe what we really need isn’t more software or “structured reviews.” Maybe it’s the kind of care that sees you as a human, not a walking prescription list.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

Yes, folks nxt week it’s going to be mind-bending. I’m starting a weekly podcast. A weekly rant. A weekly therapy session disguised as sarcasm.

And the first episode? My favourite subject: wheelchair batteries. You know, those little lying bastards that promise 14 miles on the label but wheeze to a stop after one? Then you’re stuck halfway to nowhere, looking like an abandoned mobility meme.

It’s going to be short, sharp, dark, and real about MS, mental health, and the ridiculousness of surviving the system one dead battery at a time.

So yeah, that’s My Living Hell. No filters. No fake smiles. Just the truth, swearing included.

🎧 Episode 1 drops next week. If you’ve ever been stranded, broken, or laughing through the pain you’ll fit right in.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

Compassion isn’t a scented candle. It’s the gut-punch you feel when someone else is getting steam rolled by life and the decision to step in anyway. Sympathy + action. Feel it, then do something. Not performative, not “thoughts and prayers,” just… work.

Here’s the short version for people with brain fog, children, or executives:

It bonds humans. People trust you more when you show up without the moral spreadsheet.

It stabilises brains. Kindness lowers stress hormones. Shocking, I know.

It’s contagious. One good act, three copycats, and suddenly the place doesn’t feel like a bus station at 2 a.m.

It grows empathy. You get better at reading rooms and souls. Useful for everything from friendships to not starting wars.

It fixes small things so big things break less. Compassion is social WD-40.

It grows you. Emotional intelligence isn’t woo; it’s a toolkit.

Why people dodge compassion (and how to not)

“It makes me look weak.” Strength isn’t armour; it’s range. You can lift a friend and still lift your own life. “I’ll be used.” Boundaries are part of compassion. “No” is not a betrayal; it’s maintenance. “It’s too much.” Then scale it. Listen for five minutes. Share a link. Sit quietly. Not every fire needs your lungs. “It’s naive.” Spare me. The data’s in: teams with psychological safety outperform gladiator pits. “People will judge me.” People judge sandwiches. Live anyway. “Conflict!” Compassion reduces heat. Understanding ≠ agreement. You can be kind and still disagree like a freight train politely. “What if I’m misunderstood?” You will be. Try clarity, not mind-reading. The point is impact, not applause.

Humanism: the operating system beneath the kindness

Humanism says humans matter, evidence matters, and we can build a decent world without needing to bully each other with invisible rulebooks. It plugs straight into compassion:

Focus on welfare. If people aren’t flourishing, the experiment is failing.

Use empathy and evidence. Feel the problem, then check the facts before you launch a crusade.

Fight for justice. Compassion gets teeth when it meets policy.

Stay secular and inclusive. Everyone in, no purity tests.

Grow up. Personal growth isn’t a hashtag; it’s fixing your mess and showing up again tomorrow.

Practical: doing compassion without lighting yourself on fire

Triage your energy. You’re not an A&E department for the entire internet.

Default to listening. Half of help is shutting up.

Give specific help. “I have 20 minutes. Want food, a call, or a link?”

Set a re-entry time. Compassion sprints, not doom marathons.

Audit outcomes. Did it help? Keep it. Didn’t? Change tack. Evidence over ego.

The very dark, very British bit

We’re meat computers with trauma patches hurtling through space on a damp rock, inventing meaning so Mondays don’t win. Compassion is how we cheat entropy for five minutes at a time. Humanism is the patch notes saying “try not to make it worse.” Both beat the pantomime of pretending you don’t care. You do. Own it. Then weaponise it gently.

Afternoon AI (relevant, caffeinated, slightly unsettling)

Your feed runs on optimisation. Algorithms reward outrage because it’s sticky. Practice counter-design: post one compassionate act, daily, with a clear call to action and zero doom bait. Track engagement on useful interactions: comments offering resources, not performative sighs. Train your corner of the machine by feeding it what you want multiplied.

Micro-metric to try before evening:

1 real check-in DM,

1 resource link shared,

1 boundary you keep. If the dashboard in your skull feels calmer, you’re trending.

Quick receipts

Compassion without boundaries is martyrdom.

Humanism without action is a pub argument.

Empathy without evidence drifts into saviour cosplay.

Evidence without empathy becomes bureaucracy. Balance or bust.

Care on purpose. Use data. Keep your edges. Repeat.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk

𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

Seems the closer I get to death, the more I’m remembering. That’s odd I usually don’t remember much these days. As the weather turns cold and slides into winter, I’ve been looking at the local online papers, and it seems the season of self-isolation has begun again.

I don’t want COVID again. Had it twice not pleasant. I still remember that as the worst Christmas Day and week I ever had. Then there are the stomach issues. I wish people would just wash their hands; it stops the transmission of bugs.

I still smell like a dog chew, apparently, and now I’ve started speaking fluent Welsh according to the AI. Weird in the extreme. We had a chat about it, and, well, turns out I really had spoken fluent Welsh dialect. Strange days.

I remember once, a long time ago, a spirit channelled through me Scottish, proud as anything. Even changed my voice patterns. The message that came through changed my life, and probably my path entirely.

At the time, I was living and working out of a derelict car and sometimes a shed in a cemetery. Such was the 1970s and early ’80s. London was a blast back then — the bike scene was legendary. I met notorious biker clubs, gangsters, and some truly amazing people. I had an incredible time… until I didn’t.

Then came the illness and the struggles. But those people, good and bad, shaped me. When I was young, I respected people that others shied away from. They were the most genuine folks I’ve ever met. Every tattoo means something. Every scar holds a memory happy or sad.

I struggle to remember most of my early life and the people in it. I went back to where I spent my first sixteen years didn’t recognise a thing. That’s where I was misunderstood the most, struggling with an illness that was already taking hold of my life.

Sixty-six years of struggle, nearly over now. Looking back, there were only five or six true friends in my entire life people who really understood me. They’re all dead now. Every one of them gone.

All my friends have died the ones who saw the real me, the weird, psychic, tinfoil-hat-wearing warlock. My only sin was being misunderstood and eccentric, having a lot to give but no one to give it to.

Friendship true friendship only comes around a few times in a lifetime. I was a cuckoo in three families because of adoption, and I fit in with none except my own.

My birth parents are both dead now, within the last two years. I didn’t fit in with that family either brothers and sisters didn’t want to know. My father’s side, my mother’s side — they all hate me. Even my full-blood sister doesn’t speak to me; she’s even more fucked up than I was.

The family that adopted me were violent and abusive. So yeah fuck them too. So-called Christians.

This is turning into a raw rant, but it makes me feel a bit better. Sorry about the language. But if you’ve ever been through anything like this, you know how twisted it gets. The pain goes after a while. You come back stronger.

You look in the mirror and say, I am who I am. Sorry, I cannot change. I am me.

That’s the problem sometimes.

I used to do live podcasts back in the day I suppose I miss that. We even did some music, too.

I really do love life, trust me. I’m smiling.

Maybe I’ll start a podcast again. Get guests who can talk and chew the cud about what it feels like to be fucked up by seen or unseen illness the kind that can hit anyone, anytime. Like it hit me, with multiple sclerosis and all its lovely trimmings.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ @goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk