A snippet of transcript from a long conversation about disabilities and chronic illness from Joe and Cleo’s March 23rd, 2022 craft hermits stream:
Cleo: “-When you’re talking about, ah, specific people. Um. And say ‘they’re so great for what they do and they push through and I’ve got a lot of respect for that.’ It’s a case of, what if they, couldn’t? Push through?”
Joe: “Yeah, I spent three months on bed rest because I couldn’t push through.”
Joe: “I was in the best shape of my life. I could run an 18 minute 3 mile, do 20 pull-ups, in a minute, and do 100 sit-ups in 2 minutes. That’s like the minimum for being a marine core infantry officer.”
Joe: “I was in the best shape of my life. I had gotten to college and I weighed 125 pounds, and there’s a joke you gain the freshman 15 because of the food or whatever.”
Joe: “I gained 25 pounds of muscle. In one year. I was 150 pounds of muscle. And in the best shape of my life. Umm.”
Joe, reading chat: “Quarka says ‘thats a perfect 100 PFT.’ If you’re gonna be a marine core infantry officer you need to be able, to do a perfect 100 PFT. That is literally, that’s the baseline. You aren’t going to be a good leader in the marine core if you cannot do that. You’re not gonna make it through OCS. Um, if you cant do that. Okay.”
Joe: “And so, what I’m saying is uh. I was, I had every physical advantage in terms of, powering through, some sort of illness. Um. And like, when they were checking um- Cause they checked everything. This was like really like, this digestive issue manifested in a way that looked like it was respiratory.”
Joe: “And then when it wasn’t respiratory, and my body freaked out in response to the steroids they gave me for that, uh, because it turns out digestive issues respond very poorly to steroids. They checked a bunch of stuff. They did an ultrasound on my heart and the person was like ‘i don’t ever get to do ultrasounds on hearts this good. this is bizarre.’”
Joe: “-Cardiac wise I was fine! I was in incredible cardiovascular shape. I was in incredible muscular shape. But my digestive system just decided one day, that it had been too stressed out, and it wasn’t gonna happen. And-”
Joe: “And-and I was, I spent three months thinking on bed-rest, what if the rest of my life is on bed-rest? What if I’m struggling to get to the bathroom, dizzy, trying not to fall over, everyday for the rest of my life? I’m depending on other people to bring me food or to help me stagger to the dining hall on the days where I felt like I could maybe walk a hundred feet, just to see if I could.”
Joe: “Um, and like yeah. So its like, I’m glad that you know, some people are like ‘wow joe, its really inspiring that even though you dealt with that you’re doing this now’ but like.”
Joe: “What if I couldn’t?”
Joe: “What do I deserve in that case?”
Joe: “I think that it would be nice if uh, you know, I wasn’t just completely forgotten by society or ignored, because I might still be able to contribute something. Even if it wasn’t this.”
Joe: “I don’t know what that is, and I was terrified the whole time to think about how… horrible a process it would be to find out. But. you know.”
Cleo: “So yeah its a case of- When you’re saying ‘well this person managed to do this and this and this so i respect them for pushing through.’ And I’m like. But.-”
Cleo: “You need to be aware that some people just can’t. And when you’re saying you’re proud of this person you need to- You need to actually say- Okay, you can be proud of them and that’s great- But you cant. Like. Even pretend that that’s the norm.-”
