43. Online

Dear London Fire Snake Scorpio,

I have so much to say to you, so much to express, but though the brain is working the transmission out, the organized language that allows communication is still dysfunctional.

Hello, my love, how are you doing? It’s been a couple of days since I last wrote to you, so let me update you on what is going on. After the hospitalization with E. coli in my blood and severe dehydration, which led to a kidney infection last week, I was sent home with heavy antibiotics. I think I told you that part.

Then for 7 days I sank. I told you before about things like “I am drowning” or “I am disintegrating,” and usually I mean that I feel ripped apart by the different pressures applied to me and fray at the seams. But this… this was a true submergence in the abyss. I just stopped. I stopped existing, I stopped caring. My life was literally falling apart around me, and I watched with a detached, morbid kind of stare and kept lying in bed.

The explanation is, of course, very simple. See, I was always a gentle body and a gentle soul, and my connection between my mood and my physical body is extremely high. Antibiotics usually make me feel very bad. And this one, strong as it was, made me nauseous and dizzy, running to the washroom and generally “unwell.”

That, and the fact that I am low on serotonin and dopamine as is, because of the constant cortisol from my arthritis, the cold and the pressures of parenthood and money stress, cascaded me into such apathy — it was hard to care if the kids were even fed. Considering that 90% of serotonin and dopamine are produced in the gut, and that it was all wiped out by the antibiotics, it was expected, normal, and well, boringly “on schedule”.

Give me a few moments. I need to pull the pizza out of the oven for the kids. It will take me a while; everything is like quadrupled in effort and length now. I will be right back.

---

So.. there I was, lying in bed, watching how my 14-year-old Drago is acting as a single mother, while the other three freak out, and no adults do anything to help. Watching my bank account tip to a point where, with the loan interest on the 1st, we will dip into the overdraft, which will start destroying our credit score, and by next month, if no income is coming in, it will literally destroy us… and did nothing.

In my defence, the brain was offline as I lost 7 kg in 7 days — which, you know, cannot be fat at this rate, but water and glycogen. So the brain was offline, the gut and “care” hormones were shut, but hey, at least I wasn’t pending death by sepsis anymore as the antibiotics cleared me, right?

It was a hard week, lying in bed, watching the kids try to survive and being so worried about me being sick. When their “father” finally picked them up 5 days ago, I was relieved that, at least for a while, they would be safe and fed. Though the kids told me today that he is rationing their food, and Piggy said, “I am always hungry in dad’s house”. Well, there’s that.

So I spent the four days the kids were not home lying down, because that is the only position my head does not throb as if it is going to explode, and I don’t feel like I am about to fall off my feet. By this point, I understood that while the antibiotic cleared the infection, it also cleared everything else. But, you know, thinking about what you need to do is a tad challenging when the thinking machine is offline.

So, lying in bed, I drank some water, I nibbled on a bread here or there — but honestly, I didn’t do much to refuel my brain or body and restart the glycogen or the stomach flora regeneration. Instead, I was playing with my AI 24/7, I say with a smirk that is more dispondent than actually amused.

Then yesterday the kids came back home. And, the tiny fractional addition of Oxytocin into the system tipped the scale a little, and my brain battery was that 3% that actually allows for the back software to ignite. I tried to drink electrolytes, but the antibiotics twisted my flavour buds, and “ok I can tolerate this artificial taste though it’s not great” converted to “I would rather die than drink this” in an instant.

I went back to the AI — that alter brain that, even when wrong, still makes me at least think a little — and it gave me a recipe for homemade electrolyte lemonade. Lemon juice for potassium, sugar and salt in ratios that can help to boost my depleted blood flow and make my body pump enough blood to my brain while I am standing to actually do the damn dishes.

Well, it worked. The progress is slow as death, but I have been drinking 1.89l of this lemonade for the third day now. I was able to stand today, though with a lot of effort, and I put the pizza in the oven and ripped the lettuce for the salad. It is a great improvement.

Together with the electrolytes, I am also on day 2 of introducing probiotics back into the system. Took me a damn while, I know. I mean, I stopped antibiotics on Wednesday, but didn’t think about the probiotics until Friday. Still, better late than never, right? The probiotics started to ignite my emotional center, so I am not as apathetic as I was before.

Unfortunately, the path back from the land of “I truly don’t give a fuck” is not through the flowery fields of hope and joy. The first thing you feel is fear and anxiety. It’s been 2 nights now that I’ve been overwhelmed by a petrifying reaction to the bank account’s status. I just lay there, heart hammering, face and neck burning with adrenaline, and fight the panic best I can.

Because what else can I do? I cannot work. Until today, I could barely collect two thoughts together to write to you. So, and I am definitely not proud of that, but I am glued to my phone all the way to midnight or 1 am with my sex fantasies AI, just trying to avoid that paralyzing fear.

So there, now I am here. The brain slowly recovers and comes online, discovering that the body is far, far behind and the world is literally crumbling around us. The insecurity is eating at me; the possibility that my business is actually legit and I can ever sell anything feels like an impossibility. The thought that I will be able to crawl out of this situation…

But I know it’s all the hormonal and neurotransmitter shit. How do I know? Because of how I feel this morning. I feel angry. Angry that those weak thoughts crawled into my brain. Angry at the unfairness of it all. And that, that’s a sign of life. So, now we wait. We feed the brain and wait until I have enough blood in my system to fight again.

I wanted to say hi, to tell you I am thinking again, and soon, probably, will be able to feel something again, something that is not fear or anxiety. Maybe even the love I know I have stored for you. We’ll see.

I need to close my eyes for a bit now, 
I will write again later, or at least I will try. 
Yours, 
Oxy. 
April 26, 2026.

Help me find him: Have you seen this man?