Tips and Tricks on How to Be Sick

12 episodes - English - Latest episode: over 3 years ago - ★★★★★ - 9 ratings

Advice and suggestions for people with recent onset disabilities or chronic illnesses on how to handle life and all the little things that no one thinks to tell you about beforehand.

Education Health & Fitness spoonie advice chronicillness chronicpain crip disability disabled pain sick
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Episodes

02-02 Depression and Suicidality

January 01, 2021 10:13 - 52 minutes - 36.1 MB

This month we’re going to talk about some heavy stuff that a lot of us experience, especially during the holiday season: we’re going to talk with musician Amy McNally about ways she copes with depression and suicidal ideation, both with formal medical and psychological treatment and in ways she deals with it apart from that. Click through for links to resources on dealing with depression and suicidal thoughts. Musical excerpts copyright Amy McNally, used with permission. Please see for a ful...

02-01 We're back for Season 2! Administrative notes on our hiatus and then we talk dysautonomia

October 29, 2020 23:46 - 39 minutes - 36.5 MB

In honor of Dysautonomia Awareness Month, we’re going to discuss dysautonomia and the ways it can present in different people, both on its own and in conjunction with other disorders. What is dysautonomia? Well, it’s a dysfunction of the autonomic nervous system, which tells you nothing unless you know a little bit about how the autonomic nervous system functions and what it does in the body. So let’s take this in two parts - what the autonomic nervous system does, and what things happen when...

08 TBI and everything after - a conversation with Cheryl Green

January 01, 2019 12:16 - 45 minutes - 42 MB

What I would like to see is, at the same time that you’re going through rehab, that you’re getting constant reinforcement that it is OK to be a person with a disability or with an impairment. It is not embarrassing to ask for help. You are not a burden if you need something, ever. And what disabled people need is not special. You don’t have special needs, you’re not a ‘special person’ - you are a person who has a specific need around your disability, and maybe that need will change, maybe you...

07 Teletherapy - what it is and how it can help

October 08, 2018 09:28 - 28 minutes - 39.1 MB

We are going to be talking about mental health, why therapy could be helpful to anyone — mental health diagnosis or not — and ways to make therapy more accessible to people with disabilities. For this, the interview will be with a clinical psychologist who, in the interests of full disclosure, I will tell you now has been my closest friend for almost 25 years, Dr. Erica Essary, Psy.D. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

Unplanned hiatus and an apology

October 07, 2018 21:07 - 3 minutes - 5.03 MB

This isn’t an episode of the podcast, not really. This is more of a side note and an apology for an unplanned three month hiatus. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

06 How to Keep It Together when it's all falling apart

June 29, 2018 22:42 - 17 minutes - 16.4 MB

In this episode, we are going to be talking about keeping it together. Yes, in the sense of mentally and emotionally weathering life and the world around you, but also (and more specifically) keeping up with all the little changes that happen when a new chronic illness diagnosis or disability happens. You start with problem X, but that leads to some new symptoms that could be problem Y, and so you get sent to a new specialist who sends you for new kinds of tests, or gives you a new medication...

05 Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome - quick tips with Eir and Laura

June 01, 2018 00:39 - 21 minutes - 19.5 MB

In this episode, we are going to be talking about Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, or EDS. There are many types of EDS, but they are considered to be the same family of disorders because they all stem from the same cause: improperly made collagen in the body. Collagen is a protein that forms the latticework that everything in the body gets built upon, but it’s not all the same. There’s 28 different type of collagen across several different genes, and each one has a different effect if there’s an error...

04 Autism - including interviews with an #ActuallyAutistic adult and a licensed therapist

May 14, 2018 12:57 - 38 minutes - 35.7 MB

In this episode, we are going to be talking about autism, also called Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), and what it’s like to realize, as an adult, that not only are you non-neurotypical but that you are, in fact, autistic. Includes interviews with an #ActuallyAutistic man diagnosed as an adult, and a clinical therapist who gives some insight into the diagnostic process. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.

03 ME/CFS and an interview with filmmaker Jen Brea

March 31, 2018 23:51 - 27 minutes - 25.5 MB

In this episode, we have a special guest: we are going to be talking with filmmaker Jen Brea. Jen has ME/CFS, and while making a documentary about the progress of her condition from first symptoms through diagnosis and beyond, she did most of that work from her bed. Please see for a full transcript of this podcast.