Thursday, January 21, 2016
A knot in my stomach: the story of Slimband
I had to do some digging, and before long I found out about the dark side of Slimband. Basically they implant a band that squeezes your stomach so you can't eat normally. It's about as healthy-sounding as tying your throat shut so you can't swallow.
People have suffered all sorts of complications like perforation and internal bleeding when the thing "slips" (see cautionery article, below)as well as a complete inability to digest food, and in many cases there is little or no weight loss. The cost of the procedure is $16,000.00. I don't think this company does much if any real research on results, or if it does they don't publish it. But people seem to be so desperate, and obesity is getting so bad. Why are people so addicted to food? Does no one ask this? No, just tie a knot in your stomach and hope for the best.
Ray Baker, a doctor in the addictions field, once said to me, "An addiction is an addiction is an addiction." Food, sex, drugs, alcohol, gambling: all have the same root. If you don't start off with trauma, you end up with it through the repercussions of your seemingly-unbreakable habit. It's not uncommon for the addict to leave one pattern behind, then turn to another: switch from alcohol to gambling, or drugs, or sex, or even food. Ray called this "changing seats on the Titanic".
I know all about this stuff, having experienced it through my own body and soul, and I have touched on it before on this blog. Turning off the tap in your stomach won't do it, nor will wiring your jaw shut or taking aversive therapy to tell yourself you really don't want to eat. If the underlying crap isn't addressed, you won't have any lasting success. But we're a drive-through culture of instant gratification, which is a huge part of the problem to begin with. Conventional weight loss through dieting and exercise is too slow, too messy, and too likely to unmask the hellish conditions which caused the overeating in the first place.
When I was growing up, there was a woman down the street who was completely stigmatized and had no friends because she was a "fat lady" who weighed something like 250 pounds. Now that seems almost svelte. What happened? What we used to condemn as gluttony (one of the Seven Deadly Sins) has become a relatively cheap, semi-acceptable drug, and no one is asking why so many people have to resort to it to make life bearable.
I was shocked to discover that Slimband (and I keep seeing it as Slimb - and . . . and WHAT?) is considered a remedial process,"an option for failed gastric bypass procedure in obese patients". Nowhere in that glossy, upbeat ad is botched/remedial surgery mentioned. A great many of these "patients" are refugees from the bariatric surgery industry, a fad fostered by such wildly popular TV series as TLC's My 600-lb Life and presented as a nearly-always-successful quick fix. The couple of cases per season where it fails are presented as the fault of the patient and their rotten, uncooperative attitude. One wonders if they have been coached to fail so the show won't seem too unrealistically positive. Nowhere is reality more distorted and manipulated than in "reality TV".
But the remedial surgery aspect of Slimband which is even spelled out in some of their ads (though perhaps only in medical publications) frightens me. If it was such a failed mess the first time, how is Slimband going to help?
One of the most bizarre things I found in my poking around on the internet was a blog recounting a woman's disastrous experience with Slimband, in which she told us she had lost barely any weight, had no support and was constantly uncomfortable. Then she pulled the biggest switcheroo I've ever seen:
The folks at Slimband are trying to help me, as a patient but are doing a very poor job of it so far which is why I’m so darn upset. I got my band de-filled, but now I’m not getting enough follow up or any of the other fancy post op support options they were promising me when we still thought I would be helping the company. I feel totally abandoned again and have no idea what to do or who to talk with to get this band shit figured out! So frustrating! My dietician is trying her best, but she seems limited in her abilities to assist me in my journey. And I’m gaining weight. This make me PISSED TO THE EXTREME.
Despite the vitriol and frustration I have just unloaded, I think that if they just brought me on board, let me figure out where they’re going wrong, how to fix it, and then DO IT they could be a great company and be able to help so many people, past, present and future. A company with a good reputation is going to do very, very well in today’s social media world and bring in the big bucks. I’m trying to balance my desire to fix something broken and make it succeed with my desire to help all those past patients like me that don’t realize that THEY DESERVE BETTER.I've seen it before: first, bust down the product and get everyone onside with complaints of their own, then subtly (or not-so-subtly) turn the ship around and get it sailing in the opposite direction, specifically for personal profit. The post was actually a bizarre sort of job application, offering Slimband her resume as a possible new pitch-person who would counter all the negative press (some of which she wrote herself). If Slimband was the problem, she was the solution. If cash registers still rang, I'd be hearing: ka-ching.
http://www.plexuspoint.com/plexus-slim-reviews/
I would have been shocked, except it's a ploy I've seen before with Plexus Worldwide, a supplement company that promises weight-loss miracles and is good for man or beast. The blogger ranted and railed against it, saying it had utterly failed her, along with every other weight loss scheme she had ever tried. Nothing worked, they were all useless, and most especially Plexus which also cost her an arm and a leg. It was weird, though. Throughout the rant there were these statements that almost seemed to be defending Plexus. In fact, they couldn't be anything else.
Update: June 22 !
You can now find out if Plexus Slim is specifically right for you.
Just choose the right answers for the 6 questions below & find out if Plexus is right for YOU...
The questionnaire, when filled out, takes you to the Plexus site. Then, even more strangely, she began to hint subtly that there WAS a way out of the weight loss dilemma, and that she had the answer. All you had to do was click on a link taking you to a site which also went on for pages and pages.
https://www.fitfinally.com/truth/
I'll relieve the suspense right now, folks. It's an ad for her book. A book which purports to provide that one true miracle that will help you beat this problem once and for all. Never mind that every week, if not every day, we see another example of the One True Religion, that awesome Secret that will make us all look slim, youthful and desirable, not the quivering piles of fat we are today.
(For more ranting on this subject, I covered it thoroughly here. But I guess not thoroughly enough.)
http://margaretgunnng.blogspot.ca/2015/11/in-pain-any-kind-of-pain-shut-fxxx-up.html
Conclusions. If a new miracle is coming out every day, if not every hour, then obviously somebody is not getting the message. Slimfast is a huge, impersonal corporation that uses a surgical chain-saw to fix people's profound emotional pain. They're selling hope, a fragile commodity that slips away in the face of hard reality. If you stuff your face to the point that you can barely walk, you are an addict. Addiction is a minefield, and there is no easy way out. No way out AT ALL, in fact, but there is a way through. Each bomb has to be defused as you come to it. If you don't, sooner or later it will all blow up in your face.
Chief surgeon at Slimband weight-loss clinics resigns after probe reveals ‘significant history of complaints’
National Post/Files Dr. Patrick Yau helping to perform a surgery in 2001. Yau has resigned as chief surgeon at Slimband weight-loss clinics after Ontario's College of Physicians and Surgeons ruled his care of a patient was below standards.
The chief surgeon at Canada’s most prominent weight-loss surgery clinic has resigned from the company after Ontario’s medical regulator received what it called a “very troubling” succession of patient complaints about him.
The College of Physicians and Surgeons concluded in one recent ruling that Dr. Patrick Yau of Toronto-based Slimband waited unduly long to operate on a patient suffering acute pain from the “gastric band” installed around her stomach. His response to the excruciating complications failed to meet the profession’s standard of care, the agency’s complaints committee said.
The eroded band was eventually removed by another surgeon.
The decision, not released publicly but obtained by the National Post, also cited a “significant history of complaints” alleging the surgeon had acted unprofessionally, including three others being considered at the same time as the delayed-treatment case. It said the college had also conducted a broader “registrar’s investigation” of his practice.
Related
Leading weight-loss doctor accused of trying to ‘stifle competition’ by filing advertising complaints against rivals
Thick to thin: Gastric-band weight-loss clinic denies allegations of putting patients at risk
“In light of the college’s decision, Dr. Patrick Yau has stepped down from his role at our clinic,” Lisa Borg, Slimband’s chief operating officer, said in an emailed response to queries about the physician.
Ms. Borg declined to elaborate. Neither Dr. Yau nor a lawyer who has acted on his behalf could be reached for comment.
With extensive advertising on TV and the Internet, Slimband is the most visible of a string of private clinics across the country that offer weight-loss operations, and has described itself as the busiest. Dr. Yau says he has performed over 6,000 gastric-band surgeries, more than any other physician in the country, usually with “excellent results.”
A 2012 National Post report, however, quoted malpractice lawsuits and former Slimband employees who raised questions about whether patients signed on following a persistent sales effort were adequately screened, sufficiently warned about possible complications or provided sufficient post-operative care.
The company said at the time that patients are fully informed of the risks and receive post-op service that is the best in the industry. It also cited customer surveys that showed the vast majority of patients were satisfied with the results, their lives changed “in ways they never dreamed possible.”
‘Am I going to have to live the rest of my life this way, or am I going to die because of this?’
Like most of the other private clinics, Slimband implants a liquid-filled band around the stomach, creating a small pocket and a narrow opening to the rest of the organ. The pocket fills with food quickly, making the patient feel full much sooner than normal.
In the case recently decided by the college, the patient had the operation in 2008 and did “very well” initially. But on July 10, 2012, she complained to Slimband about sharp pain and difficulty eating that seemed related to the implant.
Dr. Yau saw her a week later and did a “de-fill” of the liquid in the band to make it looser, but the pain continued, according to an independent expert’s report to the regulator. In the ensuing two weeks, she repeatedly went to hospital, with scans eventually showing the band had started to erode, a problem that can lead to dangerous internal infection.
On Aug. 4, Dr. Yau and a colleague tried to remove the band, but were unable to do so, and said they would wait a month for it to migrate to another position where it could be more easily taken out, the college ruling said. As the pain and discomfort continued, though, the patient found another weight-loss surgeon, Dr. Chris Cobourn of Mississauga, Ont., who removed the band on Aug. 10.
Dr. Yau told the regulator he treated the patient conservatively because she was not in acute danger and he wanted to avoid the potential of unnecessary complications. When her problems persisted, he acted expediently, the physician argued.
Aaron Lynett/National Post/Files A Slimband clinic in Toronto. The company has described itself as the busiest weight-loss clinics in Canada.
The independent expert, though, said the patient’s problems demanded “a precise and quick” intervention, while Dr. Yau exhibited “no feeling of urgency.” His “surprising” approach failed to meet the profession’s standard of practice, said the expert, a conclusion the complaints committee adopted.
The patient said in an interview she felt abandoned by the health-care system as she struggled with “incredible” discomfort for a month in 2012.
“Because I was in so much pain, and not able to get treatment, it felt extremely scary, it felt hopeless,” said the Toronto-area woman, who asked not to be named. “You begin to think, ‘Am I going to have to live the rest of my life this way, or am I going to die because of this?’ … It was horrible.”
The college’s complaints committee issued a written caution against Dr. Yau, and said he had been ordered to undergo a remediation program.
The committee said it could not rule on the patient’s allegation that he had behaved in an uncaring and unprofessional manner, but added that the surgeon “has a significant history of complaints” before the college regarding his professional communication.
“In short, the committee is very troubled by Dr. Yau’s communication and what appears to be a sustained pattern of issues related to unprofessional behavior.”
The decision also said his practice had been subjected to a “registrar’s investigation,” a broader review that can sometimes look at a doctor’s treatment of several patients. That probe led to the order that he undergo remediation and continuing education.
National Post
tblackwell@nationalpost.com
And as the kicker, a tiny excerpt from the many, many post-surgery blogs I found.
Welcome to the wonderful world of lapband life.
Welcome to the wonderful world of lapband life.
I had weight loss surgery, and having had the lapband 2 1/2 years I am very familiar with being “stuck”. It can happen at any time, for any reason. I have eaten dense protein like chicken or steak and it went down just fine. then later that day I have attempted to eat Greek yogurt and it doesn’t want to go down. With the Lap-Band, restriction can vary from day to day, moment to moment. That is why I call my band a psycho band, lol.
What I usually do when I am stuck is to take some Papaya Extract. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.
Coke is another option. Although carbonated beverages are generally frowned upon with most weight loss surgeries, this is an exception. The acid in it can break down the protein. It’s usually going to go down…….or come back up. Either way, it’s a plus. Staying stuck is not a good thing!
Fluids in general can sometimes dilute it and push it on down. Since I am now used to following the “band rules” and not drinking with meals or for 30 minutes after, I wouldn’t do this initially because I thought I needed to wait 30 minutes after it finally went down to drink. Don’t hesitate though, if you’ve been stuck for more than a few minutes, take a drink. It may help.
I just think this looks really cool.
SOME OF THE MOST POPULAR FAIRY TALES HAVE BEEN RETOLD IN MANY WAYS, ACROSS DIFFERENT CULTURES, OVER THOUSANDS OF YEARS
Little Red Riding Hood descended from the ancestral story known as The Wolf and The Kids in the first century
Dr Jamie Tehrani led a research team which studied 58 different versions of the Little Red Riding Hood story which found that the original story could date back to 600BC.
Each version varied by number and gender of the main characters, the ending and the type of animal or monster which became the villain.
Some stories suggested the young girl outwitted the wolf and escaped.
Other were entitled differently depending on what part of the world the version was from.
The Wolf and the Kids has been frequently told throughout Europe and the Middle East, while another, The Tiger Grandmother is popular in East Asia.
Little Red Riding Hood descended from the ancestral story known as The Wolf and The Kids in the first century.
It branched off in the early 1000s to become more similar to the storyline which we all know.
However, an African version also originated from the same story and then independently evolved to become similar to Little Red Riding Hood. In Japan, China and South Korea, it became known as The Tiger Grandmother
It evolved as a spoken story in France, Austria and Northern Italy before being written down by French author Charles Perrault in the 1600s and was later retold in its most familiar form by the Brothers Grimm, 200 years ago.
Dr Tehrani said: 'This is rather like a biologist showing that humans and other apes share a common ancestor but have evolved into distinct species,
'This exemplifies a process biologists call convergent evolution, in which species independently evolve similar adaptations.
'The fact that Little Red Riding Hood 'evolved twice' from the same starting point suggests it holds a powerful appeal that attracts our imaginations.'
Despite being passed down the generations orally, Beauty And The Beast was first written in 1740 by French novelist Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve. Her version was chopped and rewritten by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont, who published it in Magasin Des Enfants.
The story has been retold, with the very changes few changes to the plot, all over the world.
In 1992 Disney released the film in the UK and it remains one of the most popular fairy tale cartoons to this date. It has also been produced as a show in theatres up and down the country.
The German Rumpelstiltskin story has had many variants even within the United Kingdom.
In England the protagonist was known as Tom Tit Tot, written by Joseph Jacobs in English Tales. North of the border, in Scotland, Rumpelstiltskin was known as Whuppity Stoorie and was published in Rhymes of Scotland by Robert Chalmers.
The tale was collected by the Brothers Grimm in the 1812 edition of Children's and Household Tales.
Source: Ancient Origins
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
My Little Marble Hall
The Old Turf Fire
Oh, the old turf fire and the hearth swept clean,
There is no-one half so happy as myself and Paddy Keane;
With the baby in the cradle you could hear her mammy say
"Wouldn't you go to sleep, Alanna, till I wet your daddy's tay."
"Oh the man that I work for is a richer man than me,
But somehow in this world, feth, we never can agree;
He has big tow'ring mansions and castles over all
But sure I wouldn't exchange with him my little marble hall."
"I have got a house and a tidy bit of land;
You would never see a better on the side of Knocknacran;
No piano in the corner and no pictures on the wall,
But I'm somehow quite contented in my little marble hall."
O the old turf fire and the hearth swept clean,
There is no-one half so happy as myself and Paddy Keane;
With the baby in the cradle you could her her mammy say,
"Wouldn't you go to sleep, Alanna, till I wet your daddy's tay."
There is no-one half so happy as myself and Paddy Keane;
With the baby in the cradle you could her her mammy say,
"Wouldn't you go to sleep, Alanna, till I wet your daddy's tay."
I heard Catherine McKinnon sing this, ages and ages ago, on Don Harron's TV show. Harron was known mainly for his braying, hole-y-sweater-wearing, rural alter ego, Charlie Farquarson, a quintessential/stereotypical Canadian long before Bob and Doug came on the scene. He and McKinnon were married, which seemed like a strange match since she was cultivated, gorgeous, and sang beautifully.
The only thing I remembered about this song were:
- the tune;
- the "little marble hall"; and
- "wet your daddy's tay", which I assume means refill his teacup,but which COULD mean other things.
I also assumed the title was My Little Marble Hall, and it wasn't, so it was - well, not exactly hard to find, though it took thirty seconds instead of five. Little Marble Hall didn't work, but when I entered the line about "tay" it took me right to the song, not to mention the sheet music.
The only thing I remembered about this song were:
- the tune;
- the "little marble hall"; and
- "wet your daddy's tay", which I assume means refill his teacup,but which COULD mean other things.
I also assumed the title was My Little Marble Hall, and it wasn't, so it was - well, not exactly hard to find, though it took thirty seconds instead of five. Little Marble Hall didn't work, but when I entered the line about "tay" it took me right to the song, not to mention the sheet music.
The wonders of the internet.
This is deeply Irish, and I must find out more about it. Here I go.
OK, right away I find variations, including a version that really makes a lot better sense in voice. The first version seems to switch back and forth: it's the wife first, speaking of "myself and Paddy Keane", then a sort of weird shift to second person: "you could hear her mammy say", then back to mammy: "wouldn't you go to sleep. . . ", THEN obviously switching to the voice of (we assume) Paddy Keane for the rest of the song as he boasts of his tidy little home, made (most incongruously) of marble. Just calling it a "hall" is strange, but maybe it made sense in old Ireland, or maybe it was originally a different phrase altogether.
Here's another version that makes better grammatical sense:
OK, right away I find variations, including a version that really makes a lot better sense in voice. The first version seems to switch back and forth: it's the wife first, speaking of "myself and Paddy Keane", then a sort of weird shift to second person: "you could hear her mammy say", then back to mammy: "wouldn't you go to sleep. . . ", THEN obviously switching to the voice of (we assume) Paddy Keane for the rest of the song as he boasts of his tidy little home, made (most incongruously) of marble. Just calling it a "hall" is strange, but maybe it made sense in old Ireland, or maybe it was originally a different phrase altogether.
Here's another version that makes better grammatical sense:
Oh, the old turf fire, and the hearth swept clean
There’s no one quite so happy as meself and Mary Keene
With the baby in the cradle, you can hear her mother say
“Won’t you go to sleep, Alana, while I wet your Daddy’s tay”
Now, I’ve got a little house and land, as neat as it can be
You’ll never see the like of it, this side of Moneylea
No piano in the corner, and no pictures on the wall
But I’m happy and contented in my little cottage hall.
(etc., etc. - the rest is much the same).
In this version, Paddy Keene sings the whole song (referring to "meself and Mary Keene"). The town he names is Moneylea rather than Knocknacran, so obviously it's worded differently to rhyme and scan. Neither name makes a goddamn bit of sense to me.
And there isn't even a "little marble hall" in this one. It's a mere cottage, which is pretty disappointing. I wanted Paddy and Mary to live in some stonemason's nightmare, with huge slabs of marble hewn from quarries in Kilkenny (or wherever) drug off to Moneylea by shaggy dray horses. Or perhaps made of great collapsing chunks of stone that Michaelangelo had rejected. And "cottage hall" is even more nonsensical than the other one.
And there isn't even a "little marble hall" in this one. It's a mere cottage, which is pretty disappointing. I wanted Paddy and Mary to live in some stonemason's nightmare, with huge slabs of marble hewn from quarries in Kilkenny (or wherever) drug off to Moneylea by shaggy dray horses. Or perhaps made of great collapsing chunks of stone that Michaelangelo had rejected. And "cottage hall" is even more nonsensical than the other one.
Then there are these strange couple of verses I found on various sites that have nothing to do with Mary and Paddy Keene:
Round the old turf fire
Sit the old folk, bent with years
As they watch us trippin' lightly
They're smilin' thro' their tears
So sadly they are dreaming
Of their youthful heart's desire -
In those dear old days so long ago
Around the old turf fire
The only reference to the couple is "as they watch us trippin' lightly", which is pretty strange. It seems like a paste-up job, something added later. A lot of folk songs have that cobbled-together feel, mainly because they've been passed down and passed down, never heard quite accurately, like that game you play where you whisper a phrase down a line of people and see how much it changes.
And then there are mondegreens, which I have written about before:
http://margaretgunnng.blogspot.ca/2013/01/have-you-ever-seen-mondegreen.html
This is a not-half-bad post, unlike some of the old ones which make me shudder. Mondegreens are just words misheard in song lyrics, then repeated and repeated as if they're correct. If you quote the lyric properly, someone will say the wrong one at you. The example that comes to me is "s'cuse me while I kiss this guy".
So I've put a tiny piece back in the mosaic of my listening past. Or something. That "little marble hall" has come back again and again over the years, and a question mark has formed over my head like in those old Felix the Cat cartoons, but then I'd forget about it. I may even have tried to find it on the internet once or twice before. But the internet is an amoeba which doubles in size every few seconds, so if you can't find the information you want, check back in a minute or so and you'll be inundated.
Sit the old folk, bent with years
As they watch us trippin' lightly
They're smilin' thro' their tears
So sadly they are dreaming
Of their youthful heart's desire -
In those dear old days so long ago
Around the old turf fire
The only reference to the couple is "as they watch us trippin' lightly", which is pretty strange. It seems like a paste-up job, something added later. A lot of folk songs have that cobbled-together feel, mainly because they've been passed down and passed down, never heard quite accurately, like that game you play where you whisper a phrase down a line of people and see how much it changes.
And then there are mondegreens, which I have written about before:
http://margaretgunnng.blogspot.ca/2013/01/have-you-ever-seen-mondegreen.html
This is a not-half-bad post, unlike some of the old ones which make me shudder. Mondegreens are just words misheard in song lyrics, then repeated and repeated as if they're correct. If you quote the lyric properly, someone will say the wrong one at you. The example that comes to me is "s'cuse me while I kiss this guy".
So I've put a tiny piece back in the mosaic of my listening past. Or something. That "little marble hall" has come back again and again over the years, and a question mark has formed over my head like in those old Felix the Cat cartoons, but then I'd forget about it. I may even have tried to find it on the internet once or twice before. But the internet is an amoeba which doubles in size every few seconds, so if you can't find the information you want, check back in a minute or so and you'll be inundated.
Pave Paradise: the destruction of Eden
Yesterday I was horrified to find they have ripped up our beloved duck part, our name for the little lake in Coquitlam which we used to walk around several times a week. It is ruined. They had steam shovels tearing up the earth, ungodly loud machinery and thudding noises, mud everywhere, enormous holes in the ground, miles of orange plastic fencing. I was stunned to learn that they’re putting up an “amphitheatre”, the design of which reminds me of Hitler’s Germany, designed with ugly concentric circles of cold cement. It will be enormous and dominate the lake. The “view” will be this towering sterile structure you can't look away from.
Our amateur birding, one of the few free pleasures left in our retirement, is probably over. Yesterday, incredibly, there were loons in the lake, but I was too upset to even appreciate it. The construction noise which never let up for a moment was sickening. No one else seemed concerned, but I suppose most of them live around there (which we don't) and already knew about it. I just can’t even begin to write about how this devastates me. Bill doesn’t even understand and accepts it all blandly, passively, as inevitable.
Our amateur birding, one of the few free pleasures left in our retirement, is probably over. Yesterday, incredibly, there were loons in the lake, but I was too upset to even appreciate it. The construction noise which never let up for a moment was sickening. No one else seemed concerned, but I suppose most of them live around there (which we don't) and already knew about it. I just can’t even begin to write about how this devastates me. Bill doesn’t even understand and accepts it all blandly, passively, as inevitable.
This is an example of “acceptance”, a so-called virtue, NOT protesting something horrible that destroys beauty. (I saw, for once, a good Facebook meme that said "I will no longer accept the things I cannot change. I will change the things I cannot accept." Just try saying this at an AA meeting, and everyone will converge on you afterwards.) This really has wrecked the entire thing for everyone, yet it wasn’t stopped. The amphitheatre will be booming and thrumming all the time with “performances” which likely WILL get rid of all the wildlife. I think I'd go with them.
I can’t even let myself think about this. Not the duck park, not the duck park, not that. Not after everything else that has been taken away from me, like the lovely New West quay with its funky boutiques and real, non-mall-quality food fair, its creaking boardwalk by the water, now all ripped up, ripped apart and converted into sterile, boring office space - I guess, so the executives will have a nice, picturesque setting to work in. And all the peaceful quiet green places to walk – all destroyed in the name of “progress”. All the humanness, all the haven. Taken away by ROARRRRR, thud thud thud thud, clank clank – and a hideous concrete structure with sterile, uniform concentric circles, design courtesy of Albert Speer.
I can see one person at a town council meeting a year from now standing up and saying, “But all the wildlife has deserted the place. There isn’t a single bird left. All the herons, all the turtles, all the ducks and geese and cormorants and loons. . . “ “Oh well, that’s a small price to pay for an exciting new venue! The wildlife can go someplace else.” Or, "Maybe we can put out a few cracker crumbs and lure them back."
I keep thinking Leni Riefenstahl might like to document the beauty of all this. The design couldn’t be more incongruous, oblivious to the lush ecosystem there, which has always teemed with abundant life. EVERYTHING was drawn there, almost magically, a haven right in the middle of urban Coquitlam - and now nothing will be. They will leave, not favoring cement as a good place to rear their young.
The prevailing sentiment seems to be, look at this nice patch of land, and no one is using it for anything! Never mind that it is smack up against precious green space. And where else are we going to build this thing, now that it has been deemed economically feasible and a much-needed source of revenue?
And the horror of it is: it's true! Every other square centimetre of land has been swallowed up by the new style of condo, "salt box homes" that are tall and skinny and squashed-together. They are hideous, and the three or four stacked-up floors have tiny, boxy rooms joined by stairs. No older/disabled people allowed, and three or four baby gates to keep children safely penned so they can't (shudder!) explore their environment. But hey, isn't one small room enough? Why would a kid want to run around, anyway?
And the horror of it is: it's true! Every other square centimetre of land has been swallowed up by the new style of condo, "salt box homes" that are tall and skinny and squashed-together. They are hideous, and the three or four stacked-up floors have tiny, boxy rooms joined by stairs. No older/disabled people allowed, and three or four baby gates to keep children safely penned so they can't (shudder!) explore their environment. But hey, isn't one small room enough? Why would a kid want to run around, anyway?
I try not to be sick, but I am sickened and feel a horrible foreboding about all that we’re doing. I don’t think it’s “cute” if wildlife shows up in your back yard. I don’t post “adorable” YouTube videos about it, because these animals have nowhere to go. They fasten on to humans or show up in the yard because they have nowhere to live and nothing left to eat - because THEY HAVE NO HABITAT! We are driving them into a corner, then complaining they’re getting in our way. Shooting them, of course, because "we hate to, but we have no choice”. There is no awareness that one thing is connected to another. These animals should just behave themselves and make do with less. This affects me every day of my life and is a major stress, along with all the horrors of climate change which WE have caused, and the utter escalating insanity in the States.
I'm coping once again with the spectre of possible health problems - I lost 35 pounds in four months, when I wasn't dieting and simply lost most of my appetite. Now my shrink, the only doctor I have ever respected in my entire life, tells me my kidney function is seriously out of whack. I need to go in and talk to him about it, and will try not to obsess until then.
And I will try once more to keep my mind off what is coming next. Which will be much, much sooner than we realize, and worse than we can imagine. Oh well - maybe it's not as bad as we think! There's always somebody telling us it's not as bad as we think. Maybe all the human beings will come back, if we just put out a few cracker crumbs.
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