Axolotl Questions T-Shirt

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Being a bigger girl has royally screwed me over, mentally. So much so that I really don’t use the Axolotl Questions T-Shirt What’s more,I will buy this word “fat,” although I’m working on “reclaiming” it because I love seeing other plus-size people use it so freely. But being bigger, fat, plus-sized, I’ve heard the stories of medical stigma surrounding obesity. And yeah, growing up, I remember my pediatrician telling me I was 40 pounds overweight when I was in the fourth grade and playing four sports at once.That notion—“Well, you’re eating right, doing everything well, and you still need to lose about the weight of both legs”—truly, honestly, made my brain rewire itself. I remember that one of my nightly prayers (yep, I was Catholic, too, and unaware that I was gay) involved praying I’d be thin.But anyway, real ostracization didn’t set in until I was diagnosed with a condition called idiopathic intracranial hypertension (IIH), previously called pseudotumor cerebri. Basically, my brain produces too much spinal fluid because it thinks I have a brain tumor. It’s rare, and when untreated or too far gone, it can lead to blindness. For me, it means I have chronic headaches, sometimes migraines, and papilledema (intracranial pressure, which is what alerted my eye doctor to send me to more doctors about this).That’s a long-winded way to say that when I was 25 years old, I ended up at my first neurologist appointment. It was all fine and dandy, but it turns out that this disorder is linked to obesity or overweight patients. Weight loss is a typical “treatment.” But honestly? IIH, as a disorder, is so rare and under-researched that I’m personally convinced that the recommendation to lose weight, which is offered as an overarching treatment, might just be another symptom of medical obesity stigma (outside of severe cases). But I digress.Regardless, my first neurologist was reasonably nice to my face. When telling me about the weight loss recommendation, he didn’t seem to push too hard, other than encouraging working out and eating well. However, one of the medications used to treat the disorder can sometimes include weight loss as a side effect because it reduces appetite, which he mentioned a little enthusiastically. I don’t know, looking back, if I heard it that way because my internalized fatphobia was rearing its ugly head from the depths of my soul. Or if he did say it like that. But, you’ll hear more from that buried monster in a bit.An MRI and a lumbar puncture (LP), formerly known as a spinal tap, are two of the final tests to determine whether someone has IIH. The MRI scans to make sure there really is no tumor, and the LP measures the level of spinal fluid pressure. Mine was high, as I expected. A normal opening pressure is 15 or so; mine was 28. They removed all the excess fluid and sent me home, telling me I’d be back to normal in three to five days.I couldn’t leave my bed or work for about two weeks without getting an extreme headache and experiencing nausea. Almost a month later, I could barely do any physical activity because of lower back pain. My neurologist advised me to drink water and coffee—because that’s good for headaches?—and to take Aleve because that’s good for inflammation when I had back pain. I found out later that there are fairly standard pain reduction procedures when a severe headache follows a spinal tap—an epidural blood patch, for example. Basically, I suffered more than I should have.So, months after that horrendous lumbar puncture, I was not a happy camper. I had an appointment with my neurologist, and we talked more about further treatment, including weight loss again. Mind you; I loved my body at this point. I’d worked insanely hard for years to love how I looked, how I am. Weight loss or working out to lose weight had not been a goal of mine for a few years, and I was active, especially right before the pandemic. So all of this talk of weight loss was grating. But to appease him, I said I’d like a referral to a nutritionist, to look for some potential oversight I didn’t know of.And that’s when it all went to hell.

Axolotl Questions T-Shirt, hoodie, tank top, sweater and long sleeve t-shirt

Jen Schwartz, mental health advocate and CEO of Motherhood Understood, first experienced perinatal depression a day after giving birth. “The biggest red flag was that I was having scary thoughts about wanting to get hurt or sick so I could go back to the Axolotl Questions T-Shirt What’s more,I will buy this hospital and not have to take care of my baby,” she says. “I had no interest in my son. I thought I had made a huge mistake becoming a mother and I couldn’t understand why I was failing at something that I believed was supposed to come naturally and that all other women were so good at.”According to the World Health Organization, about 10 percent of pregnant women and 13 percent of new mothers will experience a mental disorder, the main one being depression. Without appropriate intervention, poor maternal mental health can have long term and adverse implications for not just these women, but their children and families, too. In most cases, however, women may not be aware of the help available or even that they might need it.“Most of the time, they mistakenly think they are failing at parenting,” says Wendy Davis, executive director of Postpartum Support International (PSI). “They don’t realize they are going through a temporary, treatable experience that many others have gone through.”To find out more during World Mental Health Awareness Month, Vogue speaks to a range of global mental health experts and women who have experienced perinatal depression.“Perinatal depression is the experience of depression that begins during pregnancy [prenatal depression] or after the baby is born [postpartum depression]. Most people have heard of perinatal depression, but what’s equally common for mums to experience is perinatal anxiety either separately, or with depression,” explains Canadian therapist Kate Borsato. Perinatal depression does not discriminate. “Some people are surprised when I tell them that I experienced postpartum anxiety, because of my job as a therapist for mums. But mental illness doesn’t really care who you are or what you know.”While anyone can experience it, there are some known risk factors that increase women’s chances of developing mental health difficulties in the perinatal period. According to Australia-based social worker and founder of Mama Matters, Fiona Weaver, these include a “previous history of depression or anxiety, those who have limited support networks, have experienced birth or pregnancy trauma, infertility or who may be genetically predisposed to it.”Symptoms differ for everyone, and may include feelings of anger, anxiety, fatigue, neglecting personal hygiene and health or surroundings, fear and/or guilt, lack of interest in the baby, change in appetite and sleep disturbance, difficulty concentrating/making decisions, loss of enjoyment or enthusiasm for anything, and possible thoughts of harming the baby or oneself.

1. Length is measured from the highest point on the collar down to the bottom hem. 2. Width is measured across the body of the shirt under the armpits, one way. 3. Sleeves are measured from center back to hem.