Month: February 2015

I’d like to buy a mattress

I recently went mattress shopping. Yes, I took advantage of the president’s day mattress sales at Sleepy’s.

I knew I wanted a FIRM mattress, and I knew this because I do some of my best sleeping on the floor. I’m letting my SPD take the complete blame for this one. The hardness of the floor pushing against my body feels super awesome.

Unfortunately, my family frequently has to poke me to make sure I’m not dead. I’m fairly certain it’s an unsettling experience for them.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, THE MATTRESS STORE. Once inside, I was greeted by an overly-friendly man in pink. He had intense eyebrows

The dilemma occured to me quickly. I had a near IMPOSSIBLE time finding the difference from one mattress to the next. ALL the mattresses felt EXACTLY THE SAME. Was this my sensory processing disorder? Could my body have an inability to distinguish different types of pressures? I don’t know.

I DO know that it made the whole experience very daunting.

I was instructed to lay on the mattresses for approximately 3-5 minutes. Eyebrow man said it was because it needed to conform to my body. What a load of crapsauce. There was no way I was gonna sit on each mattress for up to five minutes. I had stuff to do! Like, buy a mattress, for instance. It never seemed to end.

I was a lost soul, wandering hopelessly and without a destination through the outer reaches of the mattress solar system.

It became quickly overwhelming. I did what my body told me to do, which was to go to each and every mattress in the store and pick up the little flap at the bottom and read the information about the specific mattress. I did this for about 50 mattresses. Luckily for me, eyebrow man was distracted with other customers, so everything sorted itself out.

At one point, I tried a super expensive mattress that nearly sucked me into the underworld.

In the end, I went for a firm mattress with a pillow top. I also upgraded from a twin to a FULL SIZE bed. (GET ON MY LEVEL).

The tag on my mattress said this, roughly:

And so, I essentially purchased a very expensive boulder. I most likely could’ve chosen any mattress and it would have felt like the same damn mattress to me. What matters, however, was the experience. I’ve slept on my new rock-hard mattress for a few days now, and let me tell you, I don’t want to leave my bed. You should be impressed that I reached my computer to even make this post. Even now, I can hear my new mattress calling my name.

“kelly………..come lay with me……kelly…..”

I should get going. I have to lay in my bed and stare at my ceiling.

xo kelly

Be My SPD Valentine?

Love is in the air! (WOW IT SMELLS INTENSE, SOMEONE GET ME OUTTA HERE). Just kidding….eh, not really.

In honor of Valentines Day, I’ve teamed up with the lovely Rachel S. Schneider, author of the SPD blog, Coming To My Senses, to create four unique sensory valentines. Rachel created the funny valentines messages and I took care of the illustrations. Two of the valentines feature Rachel and her husband, while the other two feature yours truly. If it isn’t obvious, Rachel and I make a great team.

Check out these ~~badass~~ heartwarming Valentines:

Feel free to share them ❤

I hope for you that love may find you – sensory friendly love, that is.

xoxo kelly

Marcus and the Club

I’ve come to realize that one of my greatest obstacles in life has been (and probably will continue to be) getting people to understand my sensory processing disorder. This rings true in college, the epitome of social involvement. But as you know, social-ness is not part of my expertise, as my sensory needs consistently seem to trump successful leisure activities. I have a very specific moment engraved in my memory that highlights this struggle.

This is me sitting in class at my local community college about three years ago:

(Yes, in case you were wondering, I was the coolest person on campus…if you couldn’t tell from the illustration).

That day was unremarkable. I, along with several other students, were waiting for the arrival of our professor, who never showed up on time. During this time, most people were on their phones viewing pointless crapsauce, or chatting with their neighbor about pointless crapsauce. Meanwhile, I spent my time doing more important things:

Suddenly, and I mean like outta freakin’ nowhere, this guy smashes his body onto my tiny desk, interrupting my wizard battle drawing.

After I succeeded in NOT crapping myself, I realized he swiftly took the empty seat next to mine. His name was Marcus. He looked roughly similar to this:

Marcus never talked to me up until this point, I doubt he knew my name. He normally sat on the other side of the classroom and generally made life annoying for the professor with his shenanigans. Every now and then, he was incredibly insightful during class. This was not one of those moments.

I was all like:

I realized I had to, you know, respond. So I did.

Without missing a beat, he fired right back.

“YOU SHOULD COME CLUBBIN’ TONIGHT!”

Hold up. Did I miss something? Didn’t I already address this invitation? I didn’t feel like diving into the hundreds of reasons why I didn’t want to – and probably should never – go to a club in NYC with this random guy from school.

Luckily for me, Marcus was a real charmer.

“But, sugar, you should come tonight.”

I tried politely turning down his offer.

“No thank you,” I said again.

Marcus replied, “But why don’t you want to go clubbing? I mean, I’LL BE THERE.”

KILL ME NOW.

It became apparent to me that I needed to give Marcus an explanation for why I couldn’t go to the club with him. I tried the simple response; nice and straight-forward.

Marcus stared at me with silence and uncertainty.

With nothing left to lose, I began rambling on about what I’m sure was a complicated mess of crapsauce. On the bright side, it sounded great in my head.

*pause*

This ridiculous charade went on for several minutes. Marcus was a persistent bewb, and I was slowly losing my faith in mankind. I was beginning to worry that I would run out of ways to explain my SPD issues to him, because no matter what I said or how I said it, Marcus didn’t grasp the concept of me being physically unable to go clubbing…whatever the heck that means.

Just when I thought it was nearly over, a female classmate with very yellow hair and about ten thousand bracelets joined in the madness. Apparently, she was also going to the club, and now I had the pair of them giving me this look:

It was at this point that I attempted to smile, because I was out of options and kinda stressed. KILL THEM WITH KINDNESS….ERR SOMETHING.

Fortunately, since there is mercy in this cruel world, the professor FINALLY arrived. Marcus and bracelet girl stood up and returned to their seats on the other side of the classroom.

Of course, not before shouting, “YO SUGAR, I’LL PICK YOU UP TONIGHT. THEN WE’LL GO TO THE CLUB! AWWW YEAAA.”

unnamed-15

Moral of the story: If you get invited to “the club” or someplace similarly sensory dangerous, do a better job explaining yourself than I did. If that doesn’t work, smile intensely until you scare the person away. The latter method has rarely failed me.

xo kelly

Do you have a funny experience trying to explain your special needs? Share it in the comments!

I did a podcast!

Good afternoon, gorgeous people of the internet!

I want to share a quick post about a very exciting thing I did recently – I was beyond honored to be featured as a guest speaker, if you will, for an organization known as SPD Parent Zone. I was interviewed by the lovely Kelly Jurecko, president and co-founder. This organization is a superb resource for anyone who needs support and info about SPD.

In the podcast, I talk about my life, my blog, my artwork, and most importantly, sensory processing disorder!

Click the link below to listen to my voice – I’m more than just a quirky illustration! Believe it or not…

http://www.spdparentzone.org/episode-14-with-kelly-dillon/

Here’s the link for the home page of SPD Parent Zone http://www.spdparentzone.org/

ALSO! I’ve created Facebook (here) and Twitter (here) pages for this blog – now you can follow me through social media. That’s what people do, right?

xo kelly

My dog doesn’t love me

The following post strays from the theme of my usual posts, but I know you’ll read it anyway…especially if you love animals. If you don’t, well, what the heck is wrong with you?

This is my dog Sam:

He’s a bona fide oddity.

Sam is an 11 year-old shih-tzu/cavalier mix, and due to several unfortunate circumstances, he has lost several body parts over the years. Most notably, his left eye. (Yes, he is the perfect pirate doggy.)

Sam is also missing a toe, and a salivary gland. He’s covered in an alarming amount of moles and warts, but luckily he’s very furry. His one leg is crooked, and has been for a long time. According to the vet, nothing is wrong with it.

However, my dog’s bizarre list of physical flaws can not compare to his glowing personality.

I am not ashamed to say that my dog is a self-serving, stubborn, morally corrupt, annoying creature. From the start, Sam has never loved me. He simply uses me for his own personal gains.

Taking him for walks consists of being pulled around mercilessly. If I want to change direction, I have to take a battle stance and face off until he gives into my will. But usually, he drags me to wherever he desires, with no consideration for my life.

If he’s not on a leash, I have to watch him or else he’ll take advantage of the invisible boundaries which have been established over his 11 years of life. He clearly knows what they are, yet he doesn’t give a flying crap about them.

I am the person who gives Sam a bath. Sam smells similar to a frito – like the chip – but one that you would absolutely never eat. During the bath, he will slowly try to make his way just out of my reach, as if I don’t see him leaving. I spend the majority of my time pulling him back. He applies a variety of methods to get away from me.

After I scrub the frito out of him, I have to dry him. While he’ll willingly sit on a small bench, he does not like the hair dryer for long periods of time. He resorts to a desperate crotch escape:

Sam’s biggest peeve is food. Sam is perhaps the only dog you will ever meet who turns away from freshly cooked steak. Every meal for Sam is a chore for the rest of us, as he refuses to eat even the most extravagantly prepared dishes.

Eventually, after shoving a piece of food into his mouth, he realizes that he has to eat – to, you know, survive – and finally, he eats. Slowly.

While I am Sam’s least favorite member of the family, he’ll willingly grace me with his presence from time to time. Again, these moments are only meant to serve or satisfy him in some way, like when he’s trying to get a better view of the television.

One of his favorite things to do is to slap my door with his paw as if to knock before entering. I’ll open the door to let him in, but he quickly wants to go back out. And so on, and so on.

*2 seconds later*

*REPEAT FOR 3 HOURS OR UNTIL SANITY IS LOST*

Other times, he’ll hang out with me in my bedroom or in my art room while I paint. I get fooled into believing that he’s suddenly taken a liking to me. I should know better. As many dog owners know, when a dog comes and goes quickly from a room, it is for one reason.

The poisonous gases released from the bowels of my dog are so putrid, I feel as though I am drowning in liquid death. Is my dog trying to end my life? YOU DECIDE:

Sam also isn’t the brightest pup around, although he does put forth a valiant effort to guard his precious property. Regrettably, anything on his left side goes unseen – literally, due to lack of eye.

Here is an actual picture of Sam staring at walls, one of his more common activities:

Here is an actual picture of Sam selfishly eyeing our birthday cake. Yes, you heard that right, “our cake,” as in, we have the same freakin’ birthday:

Here’s an actual picture of Sam sitting smugly on a mattress, knowing that while the sheets are being washed, his stinkiness will penetrate the mattress fibers permanently.

Amazingly, on a rare occasion, Sam does reach out to me to express his gratitude and love. Considering the fact that I shower him with affection and care 24/7, it’s nice to receive it back. I mean, he is pretty adorable.

“hahahah just kidding!” -Sam

I hope, dear reader, that your animal friend loves you unconditionally. Unless, of course, you’ve got a dog like Sam.

oxox kelly

Eating Off Plastic

An illustrated blog about neurological misfortunes and some other things

Month: February 2015

I’d like to buy a mattress

Be My SPD Valentine?

Marcus and the Club

I did a podcast!

My dog doesn’t love me