Tachycardia; or What This Site Is Actually For

some birch trees along a riverbank, sunlight overhead
Photo by Boston Public Library / Unsplash

Another day in the 90°s which, for my body that’s been damaged by Long Covid exacerbating a lot of my underlying connective tissue disorder issues, means a rapid heart rate even when lying down in bed, a lil Honeywell fan blowing full blast on me. This has been my entire summer: largely unable to walk more than a block before experiencing tachycardia and dysautonomic syncope. Much of this past year has been an Ordeal. So much fatigue, so much joint pain, so much brain fog, so much heat intolerance. I’ve been getting better the last couple months, whether that’s through time alone or through the physical therapies or the nutrition changes or my spiritual wellbeing that I have had to develop and rely on to survive these things. Getting better, however, has not been without its immense costs.

Beyond the brain fog, it has taken me months & months to work up the inner courage to start this site/blog/newsletter/magazine/Patreon-alternative/whatever this ends up being. This is a scary leap of faith for me! A trustfall off of a cliff. I’m not only betting on myself that I’ll be able to wrangle my executive functioning together enough to regularly make entertaining & informative content for y’all, I am also betting on there being enough of an audience for my work that can support me in this endeavor.

In the interest of, like, radical honesty or whatever, a big part of me is scared of moderate success. I am scared to have irrefutable support that me & my work are valued in the world; valued enough to enable my further existence in it. My mental health too is worse than I let on. I have way too much debt, especially since my divorce and since the crisis of hypermobility intersecting with Long Covid began last October. Some of that is bad spending habits. Some of that is compounding medical costs happening at the same time as having paid work opportunities cut from my schedule. Some of that is being too disabled to perform a lot of jobs out there (on top of the hiring discrimination I’ve experienced for years for being transgender and autistic). But a not-insignificant part of that has been my irrational fear that "taking money from others" is inherently bad. It's a brainworm for sure, and it has burnt me out trying to live with it. Its likely burnt others [who used to be] in my life on me as well.

Cammy’s Well, as a title, is me being my usual cheeky self. I like water metaphors. Read my book, Hall of Waters, to know why. Here’s a free pdf (https://www.theoperatingsystem.org/oa_library/hall-of-waters/ )! And I enjoy the idea of me being Truth, coming out of her well to review a mtn dew flavor or to talk about sneaker design. But also there’s the fact that I am not well financially or physically. I’m not ok. I’m not healthy. But I’m trying to live. And this endeavor will give me some truly necessary income that my circumstances have prevented me from obtaining elsewhere.

Ultimately this is about reciprocity. A gift for a gift. I can’t afford to burn myself out any longer by giving away my time and skills and energy for free. It has been literally killing me. It took me a little while but I have decided that I want to live. I need help doing so.

Thus: I hope to use Cammy’s Well to earn your patronage. Your monthly support of me will enable me to be of service to my communities both online and IRL. It will enable me to take care of my body in the new ways that it needs care. It will enable me to give you more of what you want from me: silly videos, entertaining articles and, if you’ll permit me some horn-tootin’, some really fucking good lyric prose.

Launching along with this note will be a few free examples of what you will get if you choose to financially support me on a monthly basis. There are other ways to financially support me that don’t involve a monthly subscription too! Cammy’s Well will also be a hub for my personal services as a manuscript editor, as a personal stylist, and as an intuition coach rooted in my creative writing pedagogy.

If you've read this far, thank you. If you sign up for the free content, thank you. If you sign up for a paid subscription, thank you. I am so grateful to have readers. I am grateful for the audience that I have developed over the past decade of publishing my work, reading across the country, and being goofy online. I am grateful. And with my heart racing as I type this I am grateful to myself for taking this creative risk and for accepting the love and support that is coming my way. Thank you.