Posts

POTS Is Not “Just a Fast Heart Rate”

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POTS Is Not “Just a Fast Heart Rate” My heart rate was 88 bpm. I stood up. It went to 134 bpm within four minutes. That’s a rise of 46 beats per minute just from changing position. For adults, one of the diagnostic features of Postural Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS) is a sustained increase in heart rate of 30 bpm or more within 10 minutes of standing, alongside symptoms of orthostatic intolerance and without the significant blood pressure drop that would point more towards orthostatic hypotension. So while one smartwatch reading alone does not diagnose POTS, a jump like 88 → 134 bpm shows exactly why simply standing can be difficult. Thankfully, I have been diagnosed and have managed my POTS for years now. And this is something people often misunderstand. Someone with POTS can sometimes manage sitting, moving around or even walking better than standing still. That doesn’t mean the condition is mild. It means the body is having to work differently to keep blood circulating properly while u...
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We Are the Dark Carnival — So Start Acting Like Fam

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  We Are the Dark Carnival — So Start Acting Like Fam When people talk about celebrities, artists or anyone with a bit of notoriety, there’s often so much negativity attached to it. That isn’t what I want K•Doll to be remembered for. I want people to remember me as the hype girl. The weird creative clown with creativity running through her blood, but also someone who made people feel good about themselves. I want people to be able to say: “I remember when K•Doll told me my hair looked amazing.” “I remember when K•Doll told me to stay strong when I was struggling.” “I remember when K•Doll shared my music.” “I remember feeling like she was actually in my corner.” That’s the legacy I want. I already have some notoriety, and I actually downplay a hell of a lot of what I’ve achieved. I’ve been internationally published as an alternative model and built platforms across creative, professional and community spaces. But I don’t walk into a room screaming my CV at people. Most people who m...
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When an Autistic Brain Can’t Just “Move On”

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When an Autistic Brain Can’t Just “Move On” Just because an autistic or otherwise neurodivergent person is still talking about something that hurt them does not automatically mean they are attention-seeking, dramatic, “obsessed,” or refusing to move on. Sometimes the brain genuinely has not finished processing what happened. Rumination is when the mind keeps circling back to the same event, conversation, question or feeling, often trying to understand it, make sense of it, work out what should have happened differently, or resolve something that still feels unfinished. For autistic people, this can be especially intense because several autistic traits can make painful or confusing situations much harder to mentally put down. Perseveration can make it difficult to disengage from a thought once it has become emotionally significant. Monotropic attention can cause the brain to focus very deeply on a small number of things at once. If one of those things is an unresolved conflict, injustic...
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DARVO, AuDHD and Why Community Groups Can Become So Difficult

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DARVO, AuDHD and Why Community Groups Can Become So Difficult Community groups are supposed to help people feel connected, informed and safe... But they can quickly become difficult when personal loyalties, gossip, misunderstandings and group politics take over. For autistic and ADHD people, those environments can be especially difficult because communication differences are often judged as attitude. AuDHD people may communicate directly, take words literally, struggle with unspoken social rules, become overwhelmed by conflict or feel a strong need to correct something that is unfair or inaccurate. That can create a familiar problem: The original behaviour gets ignored, while the neurodivergent person's reaction becomes the main issue. That is exactly what happened to me recently, and the person involved used a very recognisable DARVO pattern. What is DARVO? DARVO stands for: Deny — deny, minimise or reframe the behaviour being challenged. Attack — turn attention onto the person ...
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This Life Chose Me: Filmmaking, Acting and the Reality Behind the Glamour

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This Life Chose Me: Filmmaking, Acting and the Reality Behind the Glamour Something happened recently within one of my filmmaking circles that made me want to speak on something a little bigger than one bit of drama. Scare actors are not movie actors. That doesn’t mean scare acting isn’t valid, because it absolutely is. It takes confidence, timing, physicality, presence, improvisation and the ability to create an immediate reaction. But screen acting is a different discipline. Playing an actual character with history, flaws, emotions, relationships, motivations and a completely different personality is not as easy as good actors make it look. And good actors really do make it look easy. It isn’t. You can be filming one emotional scene in the morning, something completely different later, then return to that first emotional state from another angle and have to match the same performance all over again. Some scare actors can absolutely cross over and be brilliant screen actors too, but n...
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The Assisted Dying Bill:

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On the #AssistedDyingBill: I live with disabilities that cause suffering I cannot simply “recover” from. But I also love being alive. Those two things are not mutually exclusive. I am strongly pro-choice. I believe adults should have autonomy over their own bodies and, in the right circumstances, I can understand wanting the legal right to decide when enough is enough. But autonomy means the decision has to be genuinely YOURS. No coercion. No manipulation. No subtle suggestion that your care costs too much, that your family would be better off without you, that you're a burden, or that death is somehow more appropriate than giving you the support you need to live. That is where my fear comes from. As a disabled woman, I have personally experienced ignorance, cruelty and treatment from people and systems that were supposed to protect me — experiences that contributed to my PTSD. Disabled people are still abused, dehumanised, threatened and treated as though our lives have less value...
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Chronic Pain Days:

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Chronic pain days. 🖤 I’m on day twenty-something now. At this point I’ve honestly lost count. This is the side of chronic pain that people don’t always see. I might still post, create, laugh, message people, advocate, work on music or share little pieces of my life — but none of that means I’m not hurting. Some days are manageable. Some are brutal. Some blur into the next until you realise you’ve been in a flare for weeks. I don’t show you every bad pain day, because if I did, chronic pain would become my entire online identity — and I am so much more than the pain I live with. But those days still exist. Today is another sofa, comfort object, pain-management, take-it-as-it-comes kind of day. Still here. Still creating when I can. Still finding little bits of myself between the difficult moments. 💗✨ Not seeing someone’s pain doesn’t mean they aren’t living through it. Sarah Wingfield Actor • Author • Advocate KawaiiDollDecora.uk #ChronicPain #ChronicIllness #DisabledAndProud #Invisib...
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