greetings from zebratta

[louisev]

I am recently working on getting a diagnosis of non-classical adrenal hyperplasia, 11-beta (potassium-wasting hypertensive) so that I can solve a long-standing problem with severe water retention. I live alone with little interest in further intimate relationships after a 12-year marriage to a male pseudo from a family of pseudos.

While I have my own theories about what these chromosomal mutations mean, I also do believe that for a certain number of us, we represent a pioneering step in evolution. I have written a lot of stories that are about intersex, pseudohermaphrodites living as males and those living uneasily with their bisexuality and queerness - that is all I write about. I have been recently active on CAHSisters and CAHRing For Adults, and have had no luck so far getting an endocrinologist to do anything more than suggest a gastric bypass - for water retention and potassium-wasting! Ah, doctors, they are so quick to judge us on our appearances and not on our actual lab results.

I am working on a new book right now about doing your own genetic research, because I have had to. Since I now know I can't metabolize sodium in any but micro-quantities, I have managed to solve my hypertension problem and my weight is now plunging at the rate of 1 to 2 pounds a day. For anyone who suspects they have a hyperplasia problem (testicular sac with no testes, micropenis with breasts, other such spectra, perhaps something I have discovered in my researches might be helpful to you,which is why I logged in here. I am working up ultra-low-sodium dietary advice for 11-betas specifically, but keep in mind that there are many many forms of CAH, and one of my close friends has the polar opposite issue - she is salt-wasting and would die on what I eat. Everyone is different, yet we are all humans - at least we are NOW) :)

I have a name in my work that I call the mutants who suffer from these differences (and we do suffer, sometimes unto death). We are the Watchers.

[spacegirl]

Welcome, Louise. You even have a web site.
I knew I couldn't be from the only extended family of 11 betas in the world.

I know, salt is a killer. Can't always avoid it, when it's hidden in so many prepared foods. I've decided oral hydocortisone helps, but dex would be better.

Maybe not everyone would like the "m" word though.

[louisev]

I know of two other 11-betas just on CAHSisters. And two male 11-betas who are still struggling with the idea that their broken bones are just getting smacked in the wrong place and that otherwise they are perfectly normal and don't have any complaints about the endowments that 11-beta gives to the male sex. :) My own view is that CAH can make a karyotypical female into a male with a female's body which may or may not be fertile; and a karyotypical male into an ultra-male, without any 46th chromosome features.

Interestingly enough, perhaps, the novel I have been working on the longest, (the first volume is done, the sequel got stalled while I wrestled with my own understanding of myself) is about two brothers... who aren't really brothers but a brother and sister.

[louisev]

I know of two other 11-betas just on CAHSisters. And two male 11-betas who are still struggling with the idea that their broken bones are just getting smacked in the wrong place and that otherwise they are perfectly normal and don't have any complaints about the endowments that 11-beta gives to the male sex. :) My own view is that CAH can make a karyotypical female into a male with a female's body which may or may not be fertile; and a karyotypical male into an ultra-male, without any 46th chromosome features.

Interestingly enough, perhaps, the novel I have been working on the longest, (the first volume is done, the sequel got stalled while I wrestled with my own understanding of myself) is about two brothers... who aren't really brothers but a brother and sister.

[spacegirl]

So I got around to noticing on your website that you appear to be into Crowley style occultism?

[louisev]

no, nothing to do with Crowley. It is called Rosicrucianism. Crowley was disvowed and kicked out of the Golden Dawn, an early Rosicrucian-style group. I am a member of a group called the Ancient and Mystical Order Rosae Crucis (AMORC) claiming traditional fraternal relationships to the Martinist Order, the Freemasons and the ancient Egyptian monotheists.

[spacegirl]

Ok. I guess I was fooled by you having poetry dedicated to the "Book of Lies" on your website. That's who web searches on "Book of Lies" turns up.

[louisev]

"The Book of Lies" has nothing to do with Aleister Crowley. It is an original work of allegorical poetry, and the book contains a sample allegoresis (exegesis of an allegory.) An allegory is a piece of literature that is not literally true, but is either symbolically or metaphorically true. One must use a key to interpret it.

I studied European literature in French and German, and wrote an allegoresis to the medieval mystery fable "The Romance of the Rose" while an allegory student at Harvard University in the early 1980's. "The Book of Lies" is allegorical poetry in the mystical medieval tradition.

[spacegirl]

Ok.
Yes, I know what an allegory is.

[louisev]

I refer to allegories as "lies" because they are not literally true.