Yoonmin Fluff is my kink.

brain: you have to tell people about your problems first.

brain: you have to tell people about your problems first.

I’ve been in and out on Tumblr for a while and I’ve alluded to my situation here and there but I’ve never actually…..sat down and explained it and right now everything is so hopeless that I just don’t know what to do anymore. So please….if this resonates with you in any way, please help me. I really have no other choice.

As a lot of you know, I suffer from debilitating chronic pain all over my entire body. It started when I was a child and has progressively gotten worse year after year. No one can tell me what it is. I’ve had constant tests, tried every treatment imaginable, and my condition has just gotten worse and worse. Doctors treat me like shit, they either refuse me treatment or to even see me half the time. I had painkillers for a while, but then about two years ago the doctor I was seeing abruptly took me off of them.

I come from a very abusive, toxic family who doesn’t understand or support my illness whatsoever. Their abuse got so bad I fled about five years ago to come live with a friend across the country. I have no ability to work and no income, so she has had to support me all on her own. At first I was able to contribute in small ways like cleaning or cooking her dinner, but after my painkillers were taken away I lost more and more of my ability to do things. I could barely stand. Moving my arms and legs was torture. I constantly felt–and still feel–like my body is attacking itself, that my muscles are being torn apart, and it’s pure agony. At my worst all I can do is lie on the floor, screaming and drooling and babbling incoherently from the pain. Doctors were useless. I’d go to the ER and they’d just sedate me and send me home. For two years I suffered this with no pain relief whatsoever. It was brutal, endless torture. I hated everyone and everything around me. I couldn’t think, could barely speak, couldn’t focus on anything but getting through the next second with the least amount of pain possible. I suffer from debilitating ADHD, OCD, depression, anxiety and PTSD which make everything fucking worse. I lashed out at people. I couldn’t clean or do anything by myself, and I walked (and still do walk) through life completely detached from reality because it’s the only way I ever learned to cope and I can’t break out of it. I drained everyone around me, and lost the people closest to me. My best friend since before high school, someone who promised to always be there and take care of me, completely broke off contact with me. And my fiancee, the love of my life, my partner of ten years, told me she couldn’t handle the responsibility of taking care of me and ended our relationship.

My roommate is also chronically ill, and she can’t support my anymore. Her parents flat out hate me. They think I’m this manipulative person trying to take advantage of their daughter and even though that couldn’t be farther from the truth I can’t fault them for thinking that. Even though I’m back on painkillers and can contribute more and be more independent, they still don’t want me around anymore. At first, they welcomed me in and treated me like family. Now, this fucking disease has poisoned them and everyone I know against me. I have no support, no help. I have to do things like drag my laundry around all by myself and I can barely manage it without ending up on the floor sobbing from the pain. I can’t even take care of my cat, the only being on this earth that really loves me, because I can’t handle litter or bending down to clean his litterbox or even to feed him. I still can’t work and I’ve been fighting to get on SSD for six years now. My disease isn’t something that can be seen on a scan, or tests, or anything. This thing that has destroyed my life for over 20 years is something some people don’t even believe exists.

My entire life I’ve been abused by people who are supposed to take care of me. My parents and sisters have systematically stripped me of every ounce of self-worth I’ve ever had, and they continue to be horrible. My mother is an alcoholic and I’ve had to do everything from scrape her drunk ass off the floor to practically raise her son because she was too busy drinking herself into a stupor. And she just made it incredibly clear, just recently over text that if I come back to live with them she and my father will not work to accommodate my disability in any way. She accused me of being selfish and said I was trying to bring more drama to the family just because I asked her if I could have my own bedroom and access to hot showers. I have no friends left. My partner left me. Now I have to move out in a few months, and I have nowhere to go.

My disability hearing is on June 12 and everything is riding on it. Everything. Even if I do get it, though, it’ll be some time before I get my money and even then I won’t have very much. My roommate has made it very explicit that she expects me to be out before the summer is through. I have nowhere to go. I can’t go back to my parents. All of the growth and healing I’ve done over the years in the wake of their abuse will be completely undone. Besides, they’re way back in Michigan. I’m stranded here in Washington state where I don’t know anyone and have absolutely no connections. My roommate is literally all I have and now I have to somehow break off and be independent when I’m so fucked up from pain and all my mental illnesses that I can barely function as a human being. In a few months I could very well become a statistic, another disabled mentally ill LGBT homeless person, except I know I won’t survive a day on the streets. With all my medical conditions I will certainly die. That’s not even an exaggeration. 

I’ve kept this inside for as long as I can manage. I’m a proud person. I’ve had to rely on people for everything for years now and I’m so tired of it. I’m tired of being a burden on people. And now I have to be a burden on you guys. I’m so sorry, but I have no choice but to reach out to the internet for help. I can’t survive on my own. I’m asking for donations now but if anyone knows of any housing available in the Spokane area, please let me know. I can’t work. I can barely contribute anything. I’ll drain your water tank with my showers and mess up your house because I’m in too much pain to clean. I’ll need help with a lot of things. I’ve come to learn that most people can’t handle that and that’s okay. I understand. But if someone could just open their heart and reach out and give me a place to stay, I swear that I’ll do everything in my power to contribute to you and be as little a nuisance as possible. I would, after all, owe you my life.

I know that’s a lot to ask, so I’m opening up a fundraiser just to get me in a place where I can either give my roommate some rent money or get myself a place of my own. Any little bit helps. Like I said, my hearing is in June so I have a few months to get some money together to at least cover rent and necessities until I receive my money from SSD (provided I win my case). I also have a ton of bills that are overdue. I just…desperately need help, so if you could contribute or at least get the word out I would appreciate it so much. And while the pain prevents me from drawing as much or as quickly as I’d like to, I can still take some commissions if you’d like something in return. It’s the least I can do. My art can be found here.

Here is a more detailed account of my story and how I ended up in this situation. Please give it a read if you can.

While you are worrying about whether beta readers will steal your ideas, there is a more genuine threat on the horizon.

When offered a publishing contract, please do all your research before you sign. There are a number of fakes and scammers out there, as well as good-intentioned amateurs that don’t know how to get your work to a wide audience. I won’t tell the heartbreaking stories here - there are too many.

Being published badly is worse than being never published.

It can destroy your career and your dreams.

The quick check is to google the publishing house name + scam or warning.

But, to be sure, check with these places first. They aren’t infallible (nothing is) but they can help you protect yourself. They are written and maintained by expereinced writers, editors, publishers and legal folks.

Absolute Write: Bewares and Background Checks

Preditors and editors

Writer Beware

and the WRITER BEWARE blog

Keep yourself and your work safe.

Equally important to know is that you can SELF-PUBLISH through a number of platforms these days. @ean-amhran and I used Amazon’s CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing to publish both of our books. No editors, no contracts, no finagling with publishers who want to change your materials. Just direct-to-market material.

(Granted, it means you’ve got to do a LOT more work yourself with editing and formatting and cover art, but it’s worth it to miss the headache of trying to bargain with publishing houses or avoid scams.)

It lays out how to neatly format an e-book in a wonderful step by step format, and you can get it free from Smashwords. Just leave off the couple of things that are (very obviously) Smashwords specific.

Writer Beware is a wonderful resource, and I highly recommend it. It’s both a good general guide to the scams people run/red flags to watch out for (such as giving up your copyright entirely as opposed to specific rights, or being charged to publish something or have it edited, when they’re trying to act like they’re a “normal” publisher), and a frequently-updated list of the latest specific known scammers, both in “fake agents” and fake/scammy publishers categories. (The company formerly known as Publish America is one of the most famous and egregious cases, but by far not the only one)

Also related to agents: Should you go this route and seek one, DO NOT PAY ONE DIME TO THEM upfront! A real agent only gets paid when he sells your book to a publisher! The average cut is about 10-15% of the first sale profits, if I remember right, with cuts of film and other rights maybe being more, when sold. At most, writers should only be responsible for the costs of phone calls and postage.

For more information see: How Literary Agents Get Paid. Standard Commission Practices and Payments for Literary Agents

Edited to Add: Some other great, highly respected resources for writing and getting published are:

Writer’s Digest

The Writer

• New armys (not all , only some) call hobi “jhorse” as they think it’s okay to because they see some PATHETIC old armys continue to do so even after him saying that he doesn’t like it !! You tell them how they’re wrongdoing him , they argue and say members still call him that , tries to fight , realises how shit the other person actually is and lets it go.

• Sees people saying that it would’ve been better if hobi had actually left bangtan(after watching burn the stage) because he doesn’t contribute to the band in any way , thinks it’s better not to correct or talk to such stupid people and lets it go.

• Sees ACTUAL BLOGS !! Dedicated to hobi needing medical “assistance” , fairness treatment , how he is so annoying, just in general hobi hate . Sees comments on youtube saying “why is jhope like this 😓😓 ” , “jhope tone it down a little bit 😖  ” AND STILL LETS IT GO !!! Why?? Because ofc in a fandom there are many screwheads and you cannot correct everyone .

• But this time I’m not letting it go , because it’s not the fandom doing it , GUYS BTS IS A SEVEN MEMBER BAND !!! Not a FOUR member band but a SEVEN member band !And through the time I’ve spent in this fandom , I’ve gathered that dicon(dispatch) are in a way the official photographers of BTS , like almost all photoshoots are done by them , so if a magazine is released (by them) saying that it is of the band bts , then it should have all the members in it ! And in their new photobook hobi is the only one who doesn’t have a solo page(solo/individual pictures) in BBMAs behind the scenes and DNA jacket shoot also in general his pics are WAY LESS than the other members.

• Now I see some people saying that they didn’t forget Jin this time so why are people still whining?……..I mean seriously ?? This is not some sort of compensation going on ! All the members should be in the photobook/magazine!