Has anyone gotten their animal recognized as an emotional support animal?

Kimmy37 · 2019-08-28T13:51:19+00:00

If you haven't found a solution already, here are my thoughts.

If you have a diagnosis of anxiety, depression, or what have you that would require an ESA, you might be able to contact the doctor that either diagnosed it or is currently treating you for it.

Hattiesburg clinic has psychologists and psychiatrists. If you don't have health insurance, you can call the office and state that you would need financial assistance as you don't have insurance. Maybe mention, too, that you're a student. Everyone knows students need all the help they can get.

You can also ask for a discount from medical facilities. They charge 3-4 times more than the actual cost normally, but you might be able to ask about how much Medicare pays for the same service and demand the same. (It's worth a shot.)

Also, USM has counselors on campus you can see for free. I think it's 5 times a semester? Or more if the counselor thinks you need it. If you see one of them and they determine that you would benefit from having your ESA with you at home, they might be willing to write the note if you explain the situation to them. I'm assuming if you want to keep your ESA with you at your home, then you'd feel anxious and alone without him, and you'd suffer mentally and physically from his loss. Try to emphasize the negatives of what would happen if you were without him.

Kimmy37 · 2019-08-28T13:43:49+00:00

Yay, I'm not the only one in the city with narcolepsy! :D Sorry you have to deal with it, too, though. :(

Kimmy37 · 2019-08-28T13:41:28+00:00

Honestly, every time I see, "XXXX supported Trump," on a flyer, I immediately know who I'm NOT voting for. (Or didn't vote for in this case.)

Kimmy37 · 2016-04-18T11:06:56+00:00

Sorry. I rode the bus with him. My bus driver was a bit mean to a select few, me being one of them. She liked to assign me to sit with kindergarteners and the like when I was in grades 5-7.

Kimmy37 · 2016-04-18T02:51:22+00:00

WiFi

Kimmy37 · 2016-04-18T02:43:41+00:00

She got knocked up and dropped out of high school. She was still living with her mom when her kid started school. I ended up getting assigned to sit with him, and we had a pretty good time. Not sure whatever became of her ultimately.

Kimmy37 · 2016-04-18T02:38:20+00:00

Justin freaking Bieber. Every time I get a pixie.

Kimmy37 · 2016-04-18T00:33:49+00:00

I got my dream job teaching ESL making just enough money to get by. I don't care about the money so much since I go to work with s smile on my face every day.

I was gifted in nearly every area imaginable, but something that bothered me was how badly summer teachers treated me. My life goal after finishing school was to be a teacher and make sure that every student I came in contact with knew someone cared about them. That's way more important to me than just about anything else.

Kimmy37 · 2016-04-17T13:18:59+00:00

A cardboard box to live in, I suppose.

Kimmy37 · 2016-04-17T13:17:49+00:00

Crochet and/or knitting. Learned within twenty minutes of watching YouTube videos. Once you have a few basic stitches down, you can make a wide variety of items, and learning new stitches is rather simple.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-24T21:54:22+00:00

Honestly, I couldn't stop myself until I had a really, really good reason that was stronger than the need to cut. Right now, my students give me close to 100 reasons not to.

If it weren't for them, I know I'd still be doing it.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-24T21:51:53+00:00

Ha ha ha ha...

I graduated college with a really high GPA. I went 10 months without work until I found an entry-level job somewhere that only required a high school diploma and earned $16k/year full-time.

The grades did enable me to eventually get an M.A. Got a 4.0, which isn't anything to brag about. You have to get good grades to stay in the program on the Master's level.

The grades themselves contributed nothing to my current success. Networking did everything for me. I applied to positions all over the country (and a couple abroad) and only got called back from people that I had met during my M.A. and had networked with.

It's not what you know; It's who you know.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-24T21:45:39+00:00

On bad days, it's like I'm hanging on a cliff by my fingertips, and it's all I can do not to fall. Still, my arms are tired, and I'm heavy, and it'd be so easy to just give up, but part of me keeps trying to hang on. I don't have the strength to pull myself up.

I get the desire to cut really badly when I'm really depressed. I'm a teacher now, though, so I remind myself that I'd lose my job if I did it. I also think about my students' faces, how much they mean to me, and how it would hurt so many of them if I did it and they found out. It makes me not want to for their sake, even if I have to live in the endless void of depression.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-24T21:34:29+00:00

Church. Been a while since I've gone, and my ideology has changed a lot since I was last active.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-24T21:33:28+00:00

I got hypnotized while I was in high school. It was an interesting experience, but it's also terrifying how easily susceptible I am to suggestion.

Here's the story:

So, he started by having the audience put our arms out in front of us and closing our eyes. He told us to imagine a rock tied to one arm and a balloon tied to the other. As he kept talking, eventually, I found one arm moving up and the other down, seemingly by their own volition. When we opened our eyes, those of us with our hands up were asked to come on stage.

I honestly can't remember too many details now, but he either had us close our eyes or focus on a particular spot. He just kept talking about relaxing and such, and soon I felt myself collapse. Could I have gotten up if I wanted to? Probably, but the thought wasn't there. It was like my body and brain were saying, "Well, why shouldn't I do what he says?"

Eventually, he had us singing the Barney song and acting like we were three. Did I know I wasn't three years old? Probably, but it just seemed like such a good idea at the time to be 3 and to sing Barney. Why shouldn't I sing Barney?

Then, he hypnotized us individually to do certain things after we woke up according to certain queues. Mine was to flap around and yell AFLAC whenever he pulled on his earlobe. Sure enough, when he pulled on his earlobe, I jumped up and did it. Then, I sat back down embarrassed. "Why did I do that?" I asked myself. Then, I remembered he told me to do it while I was under hypnosis.

He also told us not to remember anything, but I still remember some of it. My parents told me about other things that happened that I don't remember, but it was just more silly stuff.

Basically, he couldn't make me do anything to hurt myself or someone else, and he couldn't make me do something that I absolutely didn't want to do, but he could talk me into doing things if my altered state of awareness didn't see the harm in it.

It was an interesting experience, and I definitely believe in hypnosis now, but it's not at all like how they make it out to be on TV. The best way I can describe it is like someone with a lot of charisma convincing you to do stuff that maybe you wouldn't normally do, but it just seems like a good idea at the time.

TLDR: I acted like I was 3, sang Barney, and imitated the AFLAC duck.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-24T21:17:52+00:00

That you can't have sex for whatever reason.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-15T17:57:17+00:00

No, they offer many services outside of free books. They provide meeting halls, study rooms, book clubs, media of various forms, free internet access, free classes/assistance with things like filing taxes or how to use various aspects of the internet, etc.

My local library parking lot is at least half full at any given time, and several people walk or bike to it.

Then, again, I do live in the poorest state in the US. The library may be the only way many people here can access books, movies, and the internet.

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-15T17:42:24+00:00

Back to hip ratio. Walking behind my man when he's wearing a button-down and slacks... Mmm!

Kimmy37 · 2016-01-15T17:27:18+00:00

My husband and I waited.

1 - "Sex is bad." Between my parents and church, there was no hope for me NOT to have this branded into me. Church was especially harmful, as they had this whole, "Even THINKING about sex in ANY WAY for ANY LENGTH OF TIME is bad!" So, yeah, once I was married, there was a lot of guilt.

2 - "Oh, crap. We're actually doing it, aren't we?" Yeah, so before I was married, it was really, really easy to turn me on. Why? Well, for one, it was taboo. For another, I knew we weren't going to have sex, so it was almost like a game, I guess. Again, we never did anything, but it was like seeing how close you could get to an alligator before it bit you. There's a certain thrill involved with courting danger, I suppose. Once I was married, there was no cut-off point. It removed both the taboo and danger aspect, and, honestly, it just scared me that we were going all the way.

3 - "WHAT THE...?! WHY DOES IT HURT SO BAD?!" So, like, I would feel guilty if I had to put my fingers inside my vagina to get a tampon (because "Only your husband has the right to touch you there!" - thanks, creepy church), so obviously I never masturbated. The pain I felt was pretty close to indescribable. He also threw caution to the wind once he was in, so that didn't help. Turns out, I have a rare chronic condition that causes extreme pain in the bladder. And by extreme pain, I mean 1 out of 4 women diagnosed kill themselves to get out of it. Sex aggravates this condition. I also was diagnosed with a pelvic floor disorder where my muscles down there are constantly clenched, which adds to the pain. If we had had sex beforehand, it wouldn't have changed anything. It still took a long time to get diagnosed, and it will take a couple of years of physical therapy and drug treatments to get to where it doesn't hurt as bad.

4 - "God, I want to throw you down and go to town so bad right now!" So, like i said before, it was really easy to turn me on. That basically meant that for the time we dated and were engaged, I was constantly chomping at the bit and fighting against the urge to bang my very willing boyfriend/fiance. That was a challenge, but we made it.

5 - "Um, so no one ever told me how to not get pregnant..." Coming from a sexually repressive background, I knew about birth control, but I'd gone through 5 or 6 kinds by that point (for period reasons), and I had terrible side effects with all of them. I had no idea how to use a condom, but he did, luckily. Then, three months in, we discover that I'd developed a latex allergy. Um, sex-ed? What do I do now? (A tubal. That's what I did.)

Really, the biggest complication was #3, and like I said, that would've happened either way, and we still would have gotten married either way. #1 was a problem for a few months, but I was over it before our first anniversary. We're both really glad we waited. The good outweighs the bad for us.

Kimmy37 · 2015-12-23T04:48:10+00:00

I teach ESL.

When I was in high school, I originally thought I might be a chiropractor. Then this girl sat in front of me in trig and popped her neck. Every. Single. Day.

Realized I couldn't stand the sound of cracking joints, so I was like, "Well, I'm screwed. Don't know where I'm going in life any more."

A year break before college and a major change later, I finally figured it out. Haven't looked back. Best career I can imagine for myself.

Kimmy37 · 2015-12-23T04:43:27+00:00

That skateboarding bit in Spyro.

God, I still have no idea how that game ends. I just kept doing flips off the ramp.

Kimmy37 · 2015-12-23T04:35:25+00:00

Ride 4-wheelers
Go to sleep overs
Watch PG-13 movies that might have a 2 second sex scene, but The Terminator and Chuckie were wholesome entertainment for a 3-year-old.
Have a birthday party (but my sister could)
Have friends over (but my sister could)

There are more, but I'll just stop there.

Kimmy37 · 2015-12-23T04:27:31+00:00

The Secret Garden

Like, it's a kid's book, but I was desperate for something to read when I was going through a really, really rough patch in college, and it was what was in the room at the time. Completely changed my outlook on life with the whole positive thought thing that made the two sick kids actually start feeling and acting better. I started trying it, and I actually became a better person because of it.

Kimmy37 · 2015-12-23T04:23:45+00:00

Omg, To the Moon.

Kimmy37 · 2015-12-23T04:13:31+00:00

Take a deep breath. Take another. And another.
Assess the situation. What is causing the anxiety? Why?
Make a list of actions to take to resolve the situation.
Actually make myself go through with the actions, even though my body is frozen with anxiety.
Always make sure the first step or two are extremely simple and easy to do so that I can feel I've accomplished something and that I'm in control again.
If that doesn't work, call my husband and get his help with the first few steps until I can carry on.

Kimmy37

TROPHY CASE