Disabled Fat and Fabulous

My body is constantly fighting itself in many ways. Like when my body is hurting but my brain is bored, like when I exercise to stop my legs hurting, but exercising triggers a migraine, like when all of me is tired, but my brain won't let me sleep. When my anxiety was uncontrolled, insomnia was a nightly occurrence for me - I'd get 2 - 3 hours of broken sleep a night. Now it affects me a lot less often; maybe 1 - 2 times a month. I feel all the usual sensations leading to 'sleep', so I get ready for bed. It normally takes me around half an hour to fall asleep once I'm in bed. With insomnia, I normally realise after an hour that my brain is still talking. She's chatting, and playing and singing (normally Under the Sea from the Little Mermaid). Yes I call her she. It can be really isolating and lonely when everyone is asleep and you feel like it's just you. It doesn't help that a lot of people (doctors included) think that having insomnia is your fault. It

Part of being chronically ill is going to appointments and spending time in hospital. Saying that, I didn't expect to be there this week. Wednesday at 10pm, I felt very unwell, was having shaking fits, stomach cramps, incontinence and a fever. With the amount of conditions I have it's like a guessing game as to the cause. We have to go through a list of possibilities. Diabetic hypo, fibromyalgia flare, IBS, anxiety attack, asthma attack, complications of my liver cirrhosis, gastritis or dehydration and low potassium like what happened to me in February? Or is it something new? It carried on through the night, until I was concerned because the shaking fits weren't allowing me to breathe properly. We called an ambulance, and when they got there after 90 minutes, I had improved quite a lot. They suspected an infection, but weren't too worried. They left and I managed to sleep. When I woke up at 8am on Thursday, my wife had gone to work (she didn't want to leave me, but

 I'm proud of my mobility aids. People find it weird when I say that, but I am. Mobility aids are just tools to get a job done. Whether the job is walking, showering, cooking, gardening, working at a desk, listening to a podcast - there's a mobility aid for that. When I say 'people', I mainly mean non disabled people, but not exclusively. Anyone can be ableist. People who 'don't use' mobility aids, don't tend to understand that they do use them every day. Do you have a phone, a car, or wear glasses? That's a mobility aid. Just a tool to get a job done. I wish the world would see that mobility aids are everyday things we all use to make our lives easier. Some mobility aids are an extension of my body, like my wheelchair. So naturally part of learning to love my body, meant learning to love my mobility aids too.  My first mobility aid was a crutch, given to me by a physiotherapist to help with my balance. I called him Cooper (yes I named him). When I&#

Who am i? It's a fair question. So here it is. My name's Kelly, I'm 29, I'm chronically ill, disabled and plus size. I live with my wife, 2 dogs and 2 cats. I love crystals and crafts, so I combined them and make gemstone jewellery. I am passionate about disability advocacy, accessibility and equality. I also love clothes, not that I'm very good with fashion. What's wrong with me? What an incredibly ableist question; so let's rephrase it. What are my conditions? I have a lot of diagnosed conditions. Some i was born with, some were caused by other conditions, some were caused by medication and some we don't know the cause. Currently my conditions are anxiety, depression, fibromyalgia, arthralgia, costochondritis, chronic migraines, vertigo, PCOS, asthma, hayfever, high blood pressure, diabetes, non alcoholic fatty liver disease, liver cirrhosis, gastritis, duodenitis, IBS, low vitamin d, low potassium. I'm also under investigation for a few things. I