A Very Late 2017 High/Low – Coming Out Of The Spiritual Closet

I usually do a post at the end or beginning of the year, looking back at the high points, and mulling over the low ones to release them.  My blog has been so neglected the whole of last year, as my art has been too, and it’s taken me up till now to find the time and energy and mental ability to put this post together.

2017 was just a bad year ME-wise.  At the start of the year, I honestly felt like I was slowly dying (and not just in the sense that we all are).  Thankfully, last August, I began seeing a naturopath who gives me IV vitamin and mineral infusions and I’ve seen a big difference in how I feel getting them regularly.  I’m still crawling out of the ME-hole and have even less energy than any year before, but I feel like it’s getting slowly better instead of always worse, now that I’m getting these treatments.

Speaking of, an enormous THANK YOU to every single one of you who has contributed so generously to my GoFundMe campaign to help me continue the quite expensive IV treatments.  Thank you, thank you, thank you!  I am incredibly grateful and humbled and every gift has been so deeply appreciated.

Last November my neurologist put me on a new medication to try and help ease my migraines.  He warned me that it would make me feel “extremely nauseated” for the first week, but I’d just have to push through that, and then he thought it would help me.  I finally screwed up my courage and swallowed one of the dubious pills and did, indeed, have a terrible night full of nausea, hot and cold sweats, extreme temperature swings and a strange, but not unwelcomed, detachment.  I continued on like a good patient and after three weeks I finally stopped needing to take a sublingual Zofran the second I opened my eyes in the morning (morning nausea was always the worst, maybe because I take it at night?) and it began to settle into my body.  The good thing is that it did indeed help decrease the number of migraines I’m getting per month.  The bad thing is that ever since taking it, I’ve needed to sleep for a good 2-4 hours EVERY SINGLE AFTERNOON.  This is on top on the 10-12 hours I spend sleeping every night.  Do you realize how few hours are left in the day to do ANYTHING of value after all that damn sleeping, winding down and waking up is over with?  It’s really insane.  I will be bringing this up to my neurologist and seeing what can be done because I’m not sure this is a realistic way for me to live the rest of my life.  On the other hand, some months prior to this I was getting up to 19 migraines a month, which destroys your ability to do anything meaningful as well.

And, for some completely unknown reason, the medication also seems to be helping (in conjuncture with the IV infusions) with my temperature regulation issues, ie, my “hot flashes.”  I believe I’ve mentioned them here before, but in case I haven’t, these have been slowly increasing for the last three or four years.  Essentially, what seems to be happening, from my vantage point stuck inside this body, is that in the mornings, wild rabbits have run through my brain overnight, nibbling on wires, pulling things apart, gathering bits of gray matter together to make little warrens, disconnecting neurons and causing a bit of havoc.  My brain is wildly trying to repair itself, ideally quickly, and makes a lot of very broad guesses about what temperature my body should be at for the first several hours of the day.  What this translates to practically is that I can be sitting miserably directly in front of the heater, covered in layers of blankets, bathrobes and cats, sweating profusely, simultaneously far too hot, but getting many more signals that I’m far too cold and must stay PERFECTLY STILL for several hours until it passes on its own.  This is also very not conducive to getting anything done at all.

And  yes, I did see numerous doctors about this.  The first three shrugged at me and told me it sounded hormonal and that wasn’t their field, which is fair enough.  I finally saw an endocrinologist for this problem and he ran a bunch of blood but didn’t bother to look at a single hormone.  Apparently you have to request that an endocrinologist, a doctor who specializes in hormones, test your hormones when you’re seeing him for something which sounds, to laymen and other doctors, like a hormone problem.  I did not punch him, but probably only because I was too tired.  (I also asked my gynecologist about it since they deal with female hormone issues too, to a degree, and she had a “Oh, let’s not go looking for trouble,” attitude about it.  I AM ALREADY IN TROUBLE.)  So the underlying issue there is still unknown but hell, if the infusions and the weird pill help with it, I’m happy about that at least.

Basically I feel like 2017 was mostly spent crawling on my stomach through a disgusting swamp while people shot at me from hidden locations, periodically shouting that I wasn’t trying hard enough or that I was just over-reacting, while also making sure I brushed and flossed my teeth and fed my animals twice a day.  I’ll freely admit it was a pretty shitty year.

Here is the upside to all that time spent in deep solitude, my mind active as ever but my body unable to do much: I had a lot of time to meditate and connect with my spirit guides.  I think I met my first guide near the end of 2016, so I was primed for more contact when 2017 came around.  And boy did they.  I acquired five new main guides and spoke to numerous others.  I talked with and made friends with various interdimensional beings.  I am learning to channel, astral project and remote view, be  medium, a conduit and a spirit translator, although I’m getting fairly good at some of them, considering the short amount of time I’ve been at it.  For some reason historical figures I read about seem to connect best with me.  The spiritual growth in the last year has been an absolute explosion of love and light into a very dark year.  And though it was such an awful year, I look back on it and remember all the love and grace that was shown to me.  I have never felt more loved, protected and cared for.

So while I am disheartened with the amount of art I was able to put out last year, I AM very happy with what came in its place.  I’m thinking of it as I took a year off from art to go have mystical, spiritual experiences, and hopefully now I can marry the two together better.  I just need to find a new way to work in really short chunks instead of stretches of the afternoon so I can increase my art output.  Then things will be much more the way I’d like them to be.

If I had to have such a crappy year to gain so much spiritually, I’ll take it.  I don’t know if it was a direct trade or how it works, but I wouldn’t give up the new friends I have for anything.  And I’ve found some really, really wonderful online communities who love me, support me, have my back, help me work through confusing things, answer my questions and reassure me that I’m always ok.

For anyone concerned, I have shared many intimate details of my experiences with both the wonderful Geoff and my excellent therapist and neither of them is concerned about my mental wellbeing.  🙂  Only loving beings are allowed to talk to me, and as I said, I feel much greater peace, security, love and support than I ever have.

Now on to this image… this might look like it goes against what I just wrote, but it’s inspired by someone else’s experiences, not mine.  🙂  Over Christmas, I re-read Demons in the Age of Light by Whitney Robinson, which I’ve read many times now and is a favorite for its beautifully poetic prose.  Whitney’s memoir is about a psychotic break she suffered in college, where she felt like she was possessed by a demonic entity but everyone diagnosed her as schizophrenic.  Her journey back to wellness is haunted by the ever-present question of if she’s experiencing something mental or spiritual, and the answer is often allusive and not nearly as clear as you’d think.

“The sentience envelopes me while I sleep…  I awaken with a gasp in a strange bed.  No, it’s not the bed that’s strange – it’s the same one I’ve slept in since I was a child…

The strangeness is that I am not alone, here in my bed.  I will never be alone again.

I feel it slithering out of the darkness for the first time, the presence that’s been whispering its sinister enigmas.  A living, breathing thing – cold stars and glittering mathematics with the inhale, hot copper and rotten fruit with the exhale.  Foreign from anything I have ever known.  Other.”

I loved how the usually comforting, loving idea of never being alone has been turned in this passage into something deeply wrong and full of dread.  I wanted to try and capture that feeling just before she was overtaken by the being she calls the Other, of knowing the possession is imminent and you are helpless to stop it.  And of course I used my favorite little lamp to light the scene, exactly as it’s shown in the image.

I wasn’t planning on uploading this on Valentine’s Day, but I suppose it does make a dark, sinister anti-Valentine’s-Day image, haha!

Never Alone Again – ​​© Sarah Allegra

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Shades Of Sleep: Invisible Illness Day

Sometimes I get a little daunted when May 12th rolls around each year, wondering what new I can say about the subject.  If you didn’t know, May 12th is Invisible Illness Day; a day to bring attention and awareness to illnesses and diseases which don’t manifest obvious outward symptoms for the world to see.  If someone has the measles or is in a wheelchair, you can hopefully tell that just by looking at them.  Diseases like fibromyalgia*, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome*, Crohn’s Disease, multiple sclerosis, mental health problems, Complex Regional Pain Syndrome7, Celiac Disease, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, Lyme disease and the one I have, myalgic encephalomyelitis* (ME for short) are considered invisible illnesses.  This is by no means a comprehensive list, just a few examples.

According to Wikipedia and the 2002 US Census Bureau, 96% of chronic illnesses are invisible.  This adds in an enormous extra challenge in obtaining proper medical care and treatment as well as being misunderstood by the population in general.  If people don’t know that there are quiet, private, hellish wars being fought every day by millions of people all over the world, how can we ever expect our treatment to improve, let alone find cures?

That’s why May 12th is so important.  We, the sick, need people to understand, to care, to help us advocate when our treacherous bodies won’t allow us to.  Awareness is the critical first step in any change happening.

Why is it so important that we treat ME?  What makes our disease so special?

It can be fatal.  People die from this.  If not from the disease ravaging our bodies for years and decades, then it often comes by our own hands as we can no longer endure the daily torment.

No one should have to live like this.  As someone who has what’s considered only a “moderate” case of ME, I can tell you it’s a living hell.  Pain is nearly constant, sometimes to the point where I’m in tears and desperately wishing to die.  It takes away the plans you had for a normal, fulfilling life.  Careers, hobbies and passions are taken from you.  You either simply cannot expend the energy on anything non-essential, you lack the basic funds to sustain most pursuits because most of us can’t work, or your brain is compromised by what we call “brain fog” and you’re unable to focus on and accomplish anything.  (More on brain fog later.)

We deserve to live happy, fulfilling lives, just like everyone else.  When you’re constantly in pain, always exhausted and unable to think clearly, this doesn’t leave much room for whatever kind of life you wanted for yourself.  And when I say exhausted, I don’t mean that we’re tired because we didn’t sleep well the night before.  On a good day for me, it’s like how other people when they have the flu.  A constant, crushing weight that makes the slightest exertion a Herculean effort.  On bad days all I can do is lay in bed and drag myself to the bathroom periodically.  Sometimes even feeding myself is a challenge.  I might have to choose between feeding my animals or myself, because I don’t have the energy for both.  And of course the animals always win; they’re my responsibility.

I am mostly house-bound and I require help with the sort of tasks I used to take for granted.  Forgot something at the store?  No problem, just go back tomorrow!  Nope, not with ME.  Any time I take a trip outside my home, I have to plan at least one full day of recovering at home from it.  If it’s something late at night, very noisy and extra stimulating, plan on 2-3 days at least.  (But frankly, late night, noisy, stimulating activities happen EXTREMELY rarely because of the damage they cause later.)  When I do gather my strength to photograph models, that is my exertion for the entire week at least.

ME is extremely isolating.  You can’t just go hang out with friends.  You can rarely make it to family functions.  Last year, I had to miss a surprise party thrown for my own mother, something which still upsets me today.  I was just too exhausted to go, and I knew that if I REALLY pushed myself and forced myself to go, I would pay for it for a very long time.

ME is vengeful god.  If you violate any of its insane decrees, you WILL be punished.  Probably for a long time; sometimes forever.  There have been cases where someone with ME did just a little too much one day, they spent the next day in bed… and then they were never able to leave it.  At the same time though, if you try and do as little as possible, your energy supply will shrink and you’ll be worse off too.  Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.

Right now ME received approximately 5 million dollars a year in funding from the US government.  To put that in perspective, that’s about the same amount given to researching hayfever.  Male pattern baldness gets at least four times as much.  HIV/AIDS, which is comparable in both frequency in the population and severity of illness, gets about 600 times that amount.  I’m not saying that HIV/AIDS patients shouldn’t receive that much; I think they should!  What I’m saying is that ME needs to be recognized at all levels of society and government as the deadly, hellish disease that it is and get proper funding as well.

This year I decided to do something that was a big stretch for me physically.  I planned a set of self portraits (all shot at the same time) with a rather complicated makeup look for my Enchanted Sleep series on living with ME.  Doing that much makeup on myself normally would have been enough exertion for one day for me, but that plus shooting the images, even with Geoff’s generous help, put me in bed for days afterward with migraines pounding my head.  But I’m not sorry.  It was worth it.

Oh yes, brain fog.  (Which I’ve got a bit of as I’m writing this.)  It’s like when you have a fever and can’t concentrate or think clearly.  Sometimes it reaches new heights where people suddenly can’t spell, remember their names or understand their native language.  Most days it’s more like mentally wading through a bog, at least for me.  I decided I wanted to portray this visually in the images I created since it’s such an annoyance at best and terrifying at its worst.  I think it will be obvious how I incorporated that element into the images.

I have the video I took of me applying the makeup as well as the finished photos to show you, but I want to issue a challenge as well!  I want you: you, who are reading this right now, to #GoBlue4ME!  Why blue?  Because that’s our disease’s awareness ribbon color.  What does “going blue” mean?  There are any number of things you could do to go blue.  I created a couple images that you could use as your profile photos for May 12th, or even this whole week (or more!).  You are more than welcome to download them and use them however you’d like!  You could dress all in blue and post a photo of yourself with the #GoBlue4ME hashtag on any of your social media accounts.  You could get a bunch of blue balloons, take a photo of them and use the hashtag on them too; anything blue works!

For makeup artists, I’m issuing a special challenge.  As you’ll see in my video applying my makeup, I used ONLY blue shades for this entire look.  Foundation, concealer, eyeshadows, blush, mascara, EVERYTHING.  I challenge you all to do the same and post your looks using the #GoBlue4ME hashtag!  If you’re on YouTube and create makeup tutorial videos, this would be perfect for you.  There are so many fun makeup challenges going around YouTube, Instagram and other social media sites; let’s make this the next big trend!  You’ll not only be stretching yourself, you’ll be contributing to a wonderful cause and helping us raise awareness for the whole world!

I did allow myself to use shades of teal, green and purple in my look because they’re offshoots of blue and I really thought it would make for a better overall look, so feel free to do the same.  And you don’t have to make the blue tie into your foundation color as well, but bonus points to you if you do. 🙂  Let’s have some fun, create gorgeous looks and help a community in need of a lot of support by coming together!

Ready to see the video and my images?  Here you go!  I’ll be releasing the images individually over the course of the week leading up to May 12th, but you can always find them all here.

And please, pass these around!  Share the links, video and images with anyone and everyone!  We have to make a lot of noise to get the change we so desperately need.  You have my full permission to share far and wide!

And please, if you take up the #GoBlue4ME challenge, let me know!  Of course, I can search the hashtag and see what you guys have been up to, but I’m very excited to see what you come up with!

One last note, your going blue does NOT need to happen on or before May 12th.  Keep doing it as long as you’d like to!  The longer we can keep the word spreading, the better.

Thank you to absolutely everyone who has and will participate in this!  You are helping so many more people than you know.  I thank you from the deepest wells of my heart.

Download these images and make them your profile photos for a day!

Shades of Sleep, © Sarah Allegra.  A self portrait about brain fog and living with myalgic encephalomyelitis.

Shades of Dreams, © Sarah Allegra.  A self portrait about brain fog and living with myalgic encephalomyelitis.

Shades of Blur, © Sarah Allegra.  A self portrait about brain fog and living with myalgic encephalomyelitis.

*[There are various theories and arguments about weather ME, CFS and fibromyalgia are all the same disease or separate.  You’ll find as many different opinions as there are sufferers.  It is my personal belief that they’re probably all the same thing, or at least all very closely related.  Some people are extremely militant about using the “correct” name; I find it more important to help people understand by using the name they’re most familiar with.  I tend to use them all interchangeably depending on the situation and who I’m talking to, but if I had my druthers, I’d simply call it ME and be done with it.]

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Creating Rapeseed’s Harvest

This was one of those self portraits that I just HAD to shoot RIGHT THEN or I was going to explode.  It’s actually been a pretty rough couple of months; I’m fighting my way out of another bout of depression that came on for seemingly no reason.  This does happen periodically, so I tried to just give it time and let it pass, it always will eventually… but it’s been clinging like it hasn’t in a long, long time.

As depression progresses, it gets worse, not just additionally, but exponentially.  You can very quickly move from, “Ok, I don’t like this, but I’ll get through it soon,” to “Oh my god, this is going to be the rest of my life, I will never feel joy again ever; what’s even the point of living??” in shockingly short time.

For me, one of the best tools I have against depression and slowly losing my will to live is creating art, especially art that expresses how I’m feeling at the time.  It’s incredibly cathartic.  Working on this self portrait has been a huge help in keeping me sane lately, but the pessimistic side of me wonders if I’ll just be left right where I was before I started it, once I’m totally finished creating it.  I suppose that even if it does, I’ll at least still have a new image in my roster.  It hasn’t helped my depression to know that it’s been so long since I released any new images (there are far too many reasons to get into right now, but it’s been incredibly difficult to find and make time for art lately).

I was thinking about what I would say to accompany this image, which (probably obviously, belongs to both my DreamWorld and Eternal Storms series) and pondering how to explain what long-term clinical depression feels like to those who haven’t experienced it.  It’s not the same as just being sad or upset, it’s a stain on your soul which you can’t ever blot out.  Out, out, damn spot.  A stain which not only looks ugly, but spreads like a cancer and does you actual harm, emotionally, physically and mentally.

Depression, especially when it gets really bad, feels like your brain is beating and gang-raping your soul every day while the rest of the world goes about their business, either not noticing, or at best stopping to take cell phone videos of your torment, but offering no help.  And much like the unjustified stigma and shame victims of abuse feel, people who have trouble with depression and who don’t feel excited about being alive are often subject to the same kinds of judgements.  We must enjoy wallowing in our own emotional filth, or else we’d just get up, dust ourselves off and go be happy, right?  Or, ok, maybe it’s really a chemical imbalance thing; so just take an anti-depressant and let’s all get on with our lives, all right?  And she was wearing a short skirt, so she was asking for it.

I wish it worked like that; I wish it was that easy.  I can’t recall how many medications I’ve tried, not to mention the far, far greater number of alternative healing treatments, supplements, and anything else I could think of.  Some help more than others, but so far nothing has completely cured me.

For anyone wondering, no, I do not believe this bout of depression is really related to the ME.  The ME has been about the same as it has been since my injections kicked in, so there haven’t been any recent changes on that front.  It definitely doesn’t help anything, but I don’t believe it’s the cause.

Depression lays a gray film over your life.  Everything appears bleak and hopeless.  There’s no point to trying, no point to doing anything.  And there’s also the honest, nothing-to-do-with-depression frustration of having to be your own guinea pig as you try different treatments, often with horrible, horrible side effects, which may or may not stop after you discontinue the medication.  It’s been recommended that I add a psychiatrist to my team of doctors (I have a wonderful therapist, but she’s a psychologist, so she can’t prescribe medication) which I’m not looking forward to.  My depressive mind doesn’t want to go through the bother of more appointments, more co-pays, more explaining my symptoms and feeling judged, more trying new medications will probably make everything worse before it even might get better.  My rational mind says I should try it anyway, but I’m not looking forward to it.

So, back to talking about this image.  I chose the title even knowing it might ruffle some feathers, because I honestly don’t feel like there’s a better way to explain it to those who have been fortunate enough to never be so depressed that they feel they can’t go on another day.  It is your mind raping your soul, verbally abusing you, telling you you’re worthless, a horrible person, undeserving of love or bothering another person by asking them for help.  It’s a prison only you can see and feel; a prison you both hate and are afraid to leave, because it’s all you’ve known for so long.  (My first memories of what was clearly depression are from my early teens, but I wonder if the terrible anxiety and nightmares I endured since I was a very young child were a precursor to this.  The first time I gave serious thought to killing myself, I was 17.)  A strange Stockholm-like syndrome can develop where you long to escape, but are afraid to.  However, I hope it’s clear that I am in no way trying to take anything away from the trauma victims of the “regular” kind of rape suffer from.  Though our hells overlap in some ways, they are not identical.

I liked the idea of using “rapeseed” in the title, not only because it catches the ear, but because I feel it works on a metaphoric level.  Rapeseed is a plant which grows beautiful yellow flowers; it belongs to the mustard family from what I’ve read (and apparently the name has to do with the Latin word for root vegetables and nothing to with an act of violence).  Kirsty Mitchel shot part of her Wonderland series in front of a breathtaking field of rapeseed flowers.  It is also, apparently, what canola oil is made from (or at least used to be?  I’m finding mixed info), around which there is some controversy if it’s truly safe for human and animal consumption.  The word at once touches on horrible, horrible acts of violence and abuse, potential danger but still has immense beauty to offer the world.

In this image, I imagined a beautiful, unicorn-like creature, someone that would look completely pure and innocent, someone who looked like that would never have had a single bad day.  And I just poured my emotions into the shoot, letting them all out.  I’ve already said it was cathartic, but I can’t stress just how much it was.  I felt lighter that day than I did in a long time.  Even editing it was therapeutic.  Some images seem to fight you the whole way, kicking and screaming, into what you want them to be; this one felt like it was actively working with me to help me achieve my goal.  It’s one of the most gratifying feelings when art flows like that.

I have been studied makeup application a lot recently (mostly for upcoming images) and this was one of my first times being able to test just a little bit of my new knowledge out.  That was fun, although tiring.  But I’m pretty pleased with my first attempt at being a makeup artist!  I had to search high and low for some cosmetic-grade silver glitter of the right size and color to make the glitter-tears; you really wouldn’t think it would have been so difficult, but it was!  I eventually found some on either eBay or Etsy; I’ve bought some from both and now I don’t remember where this particular one came from.  I already had the silver wig, so I just grayed up my eyebrows to match it better.  I used Nyx’s Jumbo Pencil in Milk for the entire eye/cheekbone area along with a nice matte white eyeshadow from BH Cosmetics pallet, along with two shades of lavender and a darker purple in my crease and as blush.  I contoured with another Nyx product, an eyeshadow in Taupe which is perfect for my pale skin (even paler here, so I used a very light hand).  I highlighted cheekbones, lids and inner corners with Deviant Cosmetics Ghost Violet, which is just about my new favorite thing ever.  It has the most gorgeous flash of purple when the light hits it, and Deviant Cosmetics has four or five colors in their Ghost line; I recommend them all!  (If you’ve been eyeing the Kat Von D Alchemist Palette but don’t have the money, go see Deviant Cosmetics.  Their colors are brighter, more vivid, they carry one more color than comes in KVD’s pallet, and it’s WAY less expensive!  And since it’s mineral makeup, there are no weird or harmful ingredients to worry about.)

After I did my makeup and looked utterly insane in person, I set my camera up and a couple lights.  I actually really hate setting up lights, so I always try and make it as minimal as possible.  Luckily, this shot didn’t call for anything fancy, so I got away with only two.  I taped some white, mesh fabric to the inside of my front door, and it gave me a lovely, neutral whiteish backdrop that wouldn’t distract from the main subject.  I was nearly done shooting when I remembered I’d intended to wear my unicorn horn circlet from Firefly Path!  I quickly shot a few more images with it on, tipping my head at different angels and planning on adding it on to the final image in post, which I did.  (This is not the exact circlet that I have, my horn is silver and the crystals are lavender, but this seems to be the only one in her shop at the moment.)

Unicorns represent a lot of things to me, but innocence and purity are two big ones.  If a human is sad, well, that’s… sad, but normal.  If a unicorn is sad, it’s tragic.  That there could be anything their magic couldn’t overcome underscores the power of whatever is causing them pain.  To me at least, that emphasized the magnitude of the power depression can hold over you.  The working title for this image as I tinkered on it was Sad Unicorn, because that was all I could think of when I needed to save the file for the first time.  It still feels appropriate in a way.

I added the trees and birds on the background, as if perhaps the unicorn girl is longing for her forest home.  I specifically chose to add crows, both because they’re one of my favorite birds (did you know they actually make and use tools and are incredibly smart?) and because Native American legends say they escort one’s soul into the afterlife.  That felt very fitting giving the subject of the image.  She seems like she’s in an alien land, somewhere she doesn’t truly belong, which is how I’ve felt about my time on earth just about every single day since I was born.  I knew this was not my true home.  My true home is where my soul resided before it decided, for whatever insane reason, to incarnate into this life.  In a meditation, months ago now, I actually visited what I consider to be my true home and I sobbed and sobbed, because I was so glad to be back, even for a moment, and also because I knew I couldn’t stay.  That place, that timeless, unchanging Home, is where this ethereal creature belongs too.

Now that I’ve gone on for probably far too long, I’ll finally show you the image.  I felt it was very important to explain my reason for the title I gave it to give people a way in to understand it.  And for anyone concerned about me, thank you, but I’ll be ok.  I’ve been through worse.  And I didn’t even have photography back then.  I have an excellent support system, which I didn’t have nearly as much of before, including my really incredible therapist.  All that said, let’s get on to the first image I’m releasing this year!

Lastly, I don’t enjoy talking about my mental health (or lack thereof) to strangers on the internet, no matter what impression this post gave you.  I speak candidly and openly about it because we NEED to end the stigma around it.  And the only way for that to happen is for those of us who struggle with it to speak about our experiences.  A lot.  In detail.  Repeatedly.  I do think things will change eventually, but it will take a lot of voices speaking honestly, blatantly, about it.  My voice is only one drop in the ocean of voices, but to quote Cloud Atlas, what is the ocean but a multitude of drops?

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Christmas Is Coming

I Felt It Was Glory
Model: © Sarah Allegra, sarahallegra.com

Well, it’s been a little while, hasn’t it?  A big part of the reason I’ve been so silent recently has been due to that bastard ME doing its usual bastardy things, just more of them and more frequently.  Sigh.  I won’t recount each and every thing, since not only would that be boring for you, but it would also take far too many spoons for me to type up.  So let’s just leave it at I was being held hostage by ME.

Between Awake and Asleep
A self portrait, © Sarah Allegra, sarahallegra.com

Ok, I will actually tell you about one thing it’s been doing because it’s new and super annoying.  Keep in mind that I’ve lived through many winters by now, and this has never happened before.  Usually, summer in Los Angeles just about kills me each year, but the winter provides a much-needed break from the oppressive heat.  However, this winter I’ve been experiencing something very strange and it’s difficult to even put it into words.  It’s like my body is having a lot of trouble adjusting to temperature changes.  Say I go to sleep at night (as I usually do) and it gets kinda cold overnight.  I actually like things getting cold; it means it’s not hot!  But then when I wake up in the morning, the air is cold, the house is cold, so I bundle up and turn the heat on.  But then as I’m bundled up, I start to sweat, as if I’ve overdone it and now I’m too hot, only I still feel cold.  Then I’ll start sweating more, which does its job and starts cooling me off, so I feel even colder, so I pile on more clothes and heat, then I sweat more, and I get colder… and the cycle continues until I’m a tearful puddle of both ice and fire, shivering in front of the radiator, stripped down of as many clothes as I can bear, waiting painfully for my body to just figure it out.  Which might take an hour or two for it to do, and by then I’ve used up more than all my spoons for the day and it’s barely breakfast time.

Images from my 2017 calendar. Models: Teri Wyble and Dedeker Winston. © Sarah Allegra, sarahallegra.com

It seems to be more of an issue when I’m stressed (thank you, Geoff, for pointing this out!) so staying calm helps, but you all know how easy it is to simply stay completely peaceful every single second of the day.  If we don’t let it get SO cold at night, that also seems to help, and if I force myself to warm up and cool down more slowly, those things help too.  But it’s just one more obnoxious way the ME toys with me and makes life more difficult.  ME, you’re a sadistic bitch.

Some time soon I will also tell you about FINALLY having another round of nerve-blocking injections after months and months of fighting with my insurance company over them and the recent developments in Calantha’s growth removals, but I’m not ready to get into any of that right now.  So, on with the show!

They Lived To See The Dawn
A self portrait with Calantha, © Sarah Allegra, sarahallegra.com

This is the time of the year when I usually remind you guys of all the things I sell which would make excellent holiday gifts for whomever you have on your list, so I’ll keep to that tradition!

Of course, there are my fine art prints, available through my Etsy shop.  It’s not at all cost- or time-efficient to list every single image I have available in every size, so if there’s something you’d like and you don’t see it listed, just email me!

Two more images from my 2017 calendar. Model: Katie Johnson, © Sarah Allegra, sarahallegra.com

I also sell my images printed on all sorts of fun items through Red Bubble.  What kind of things?  Just about anything you could want!  Tshirts, mugs, scarves, leggins, clocks, phone and laptop skins/cases, stickers, blank greeting cards/postcards, tote bags, zippered bags… really, you name it, they probably have it!  I like Red Bubble because it gives a really wide range of prices starting just a buck or two for a sticker, so it’s workable for virtually any budget 🙂

2017 calendar, front and back. All images © Sarah Allegra, sarahallegra.com

Red Bubble is also my printer for my collectable yearly calendars!  You can get your 2017 calendar right here 🙂  These are some of my favorite things to produce, as well as some of my most popular items.  They’re practical and also give you an inexpensive way to have 12 beautiful images to display on your wall throughout the year; a great value!

I’d also like to mention that I’m really happy with the quality of what Red Bubble makes.  I’ve bought numerous items from them over the years, for myself and others, and I’m always very pleased with how they look and function!

Then there’s my self-discovery-through-photograhy-online-course Introspective: A Photographic Quest.  It’s still almost 50% off its normal price because I haven’t had time to figure out another hosting option for it yet (Udemy recently decided to cap all its classes at a maximum of $40 per class, regardless of the original cost).  Take advantage of that savings while you can!  This isn’t a class so much about camera functions, f-stops, shutter speeds, etc (although I provide links which explain those things to those who want to learn).  This is truly about exploring who you are as a person and portraying that through art.

The eight-week course gives you weekly prompts of things to photograph; it’s more like visual journaling than simply taking photos.  You can share the images if you want or keep them all to yourself, the choice is yours!  I built the class based on my experience with the incredible healing power of art and self portraits when I first picked up a camera; this class is completely unique and would make a wonderful gift for anyone who enjoys art and/or self reflection!

And something new this year; I’ve also selling high-quality skin serum through my other Etsy shop!  This is a skin serum I developed while searching for the perfect serum for my own face.  I couldn’t find what I wanted anywhere, so I took matters into my own hands and made my own blend of oils!  Once I saw the wonderful results it gave me, I started giving it to friends for them to test and they also reported excellent results.  After many glowing reviews from friends and friends-of-friends, I decided to start offering it to everyone!

My serum is blended with high-quality, natural ingredients (no fragrances or fillers).  It’s 100 % vegan and cruelty-free and it is safe for all types of skin.  Each bottle is hand-made in small batches and infused with eternally loving unicorn energies!

Right now I’m offering two different versions, one for your face and one for your hands and nails, but the base of both blends are the same.  They contain rosehip seed oil (high in fatty acids, vitamins A and C, it helps to regenerate skin and stimulates cellular membrane and tissue regeneration), argan oil (an extremely healing oil overflowing with vitamins A and E and anti-oxidants, along with omega-6 fatty acids and linolec acid which helps ease inflammation while deeply moisturizing the skin) and vegan squalene oil (one of the most effective and powerful moisturizing ingredients currently known!  Because it mimics the body’s own natural moisturizers, it can penetrate the skin well and is absorbed quickly.)   And you also have the option of adding vitamin C serum to your oil blend (reduces signs of aging and is especially wonderful for eliminating sun spots or other skin discolorations.  This vitamin C serum has an infusion of enriched organic aloe and jojoba oils to provide additional healing and hydration for your skin.  These unleash powerful antioxidants while preventing the formation of free radicals which contribute to signs of aging.)

Concrete Walls
Model: Katie Johnson© Sarah Allegra, sarahallegra.com

 

So, there you go!  Now go have fun shopping!  🙂  If you choose to purchase anything from the places listed in this post, thank you very much!

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Square Holes and Human-Shaped Pegs

Square Hole: a self portrait © Sarah Allegra

I’m sure everyone reading this has had times when they felt like the often cited square peg in a round hole.  It’s a pretty universal human experience.  And, of course, we shouldn’t all fit neatly into every hole society expects of us.  If we did, there would be no one to rock the boat, to bring about desperately-needed change, no inspirational leaders, no one going against the flow and showing us we can do the same.

We need those people who obviously, obtusely, refuse to contort themselves into whatever-shaped hole is expected of them.  We need our spiritual leaders, those who bring about social reform, who call out those in power and refuse to let injustice stand.  We need artists and creatives who show us with words and paint and dance and pixels how the world could be different.  And we need them all to help us make this possibility a reality.

It feels cliche to say this as an artist, but I have always felt different from most of the people around me.  I rarely felt like I fit in, except for with the occasional kindred spirit I would meet, shining like a beacon in the night.  Those other beautiful, misfit souls who also felt like they didn’t belong; when we were together, suddenly, we did belong.  And I am very lucky to have married such a man!  Having just a few people like that in your life, people who truly understand you and appreciate you for you you are right now in addition to what you might be can make all the difference in the world.  It can be the difference between life feeling like a desert wasteland or a lush garden, full of birds who eat from your hands and fawns who curl up on your lap like a Disney movie.

Humans need to feel understood, to find their tribe.  I am very grateful to have found so much of mine, both online and off!

This square hole is in my mother-in-law’s house and usually houses a very handsome metal owl sculpture.  She was kind enough to let me move the owl and Geoff was sweet enough to help me shoot with self portrait in it (along with a number of other self portraits which I’ll eventually get around to editing).  He was also in charge of making sure I didn’t plummet to my death; one side of the hole is about chest-high on me, on the second story of the house, but the other side opens into the main living room, probably 20 feet high.  I am quite scared of heights, but I will brave a lot that I wouldn’t normally endure for the sake of art… especially if Geoff is there to make sure I stay safe.  🙂

Don’t worry if you feel like you don’t fit in.  You will find your people.  And once you do, the whole journey will feel worth it.  Dance to your own drummer.  Break out of the mold people try to put you in.  Live your life authentically, because you’re the only one who can.

Square Hole: a self portrait © Sarah Allegra

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What Else Can I Say About ME?

Here we are at May 12th again.  Another Invisible Illness Day come to bring awareness to all the illnesses and diseases which are impolite enough to leave their sufferers still appearing to be well.  Of course, anyone more than casually acquainted with someone who has fibromyalgia, myalgic encephalomyelitis, chronic fatigue syndrome, complex regional pain disorder, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease, Lyme, lupus and many, many more illnesses can attest to how debilitating they can be.  The facade of health they leave intact feels like salt in the wound; a confusion for those untouched by their cruel hand, a silent undermining force with us at every doctor’s appointment, a declaration that we are lying or greatly exaggerating our illness.

What else can I say about ME?  About all the other forgotten, ignored diseases swept under the rug of modern medicine?  Illnesses which embarrass our doctors with their constant reminder that we remain unhealed.  Sicknesses with confusing, confounding symptoms which can morph and change like the whim of a butterfly’s flight.  Maddening maladies which suck away our vitality, our joys, our passions, our lives as completely as any vampire.

I’ve written about ME extensively as it’s been an enormous part of my life for the last eight years.  How I have not had a single day since late May of 2008 that was free of pain or its constant, overwhelming exhaustion.  How it has progressively gotten worse each year.  How the government would like to pretend we invisibly ill don’t exist.  How grotesquely underfunded our research is, giving us the same amount of money for research as hayfever gets and less than 1/4 of what male pattern baldness receives.  You have heard me spout the facts and statistics.  You’ve heard me talk about my personal story and fight with ME.  What else can I say?

I can say this: I am not beaten.  I have not given up.

I am determined to get better.  I am committing myself to be well, even if I have it about through sheer mental will.  I will not give in to ME’s gloomy, hopeless future forecast of progressively worsening every year.  I am not accepting a future of the living death that is ME.

I don’t know exactly how I will get better, but I am going to.  As a sign of my determination, I changed my blog’s tagline for the first time since I started this blog years ago.  “Art, photography, life and why I always feel like shit,” felt perfectly appropriate at the time.  “Art, photography, life and how those are really all the same thing,” is much more appropriate now.  My identity is not Sarah-who-has-ME.  I am just Sarah.

As I wrote about in my last entry, my life has been pleasantly consumed recently by my spirituality.  I have strongly felt how focusing on fighting ME has been feeding it.  So now, I will ignore it as much as possible.  I do not mean that I will forget my body’s current limits, or not honor them.  Listening to my body and what it’s able to do is vital for my current and future wellbeing.  But I’ve realized that I can live within the confines of my case of ME while still not letting it reign in every area of my life, and that feel incredibly freeing.  This is the path I will pursue.

This also does not mean that I will not advocate for ME sufferers.  I still feel very strongly that the only way we will bring about change is by demanding it.  And we can only demand it if we know that it exists in the first place.  But I can also advocate without allowing ME to rule every part of my soul.

As May 12th approached, I wanted to create a new image for my Enchanted Sleep series, which is all about living with ME.  I asked Katie Johnson, frequent model and collaborator as well as dear friend, if she would help me bring some concepts to life and she gladly agreed to help.  Through a variety of factors, I wasn’t able to shoot these images until very recently, which meant I had a very short window to edit one up and release it for Invisible Illness Day, but I got it done!  Ideally, I would be releasing the whole short series we shot, but I am content with having just one to show you and help illustrate life with ME.  With that, please let me present my latest image to you, Living With The Tombstones.

Living With The Tombstones – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Katie Johnson. An image to help raise awareness about ME/CFS and other “invisible illnesses.”

I probably don’t have to explain the symbolism behind shooting this image in a graveyard.  ME (and many other invisible illnesses) truly can be a living, nightmarish death.  Even if you’re not one of the unfortunate souls cursed with severe ME, where any touch, light or sound cannot be tolerated, you die every day to the dreams and hopes you had when you were healthy.  You might discover new passions to pursue within ME’s confines, but do you ever truly forget what’s been taken from you?  If you do, I am not there yet.

I took the name “invisible illness” and interpreted it quite literally, editing out any part of Katie’s body which showed outside her long, princess-like dress.  And the mirrored mask felt like the perfect touch.  When people look at us, they rarely see us; they see their projections of who we are.  Often what they see says far more about them than us.  Some will look at me and, because I can occasionally manage to put on clothes, have Geoff drive and go with him to the grocery store, refuse to believe there could be anything physically wrong with me.  They don’t see the toll that those short, simple trips take on me.  They don’t know that grocery shopping is my ENTIRE plan for that day, probably several days.  How the lights and noise and bustle inside the stores give me migraines, panic attacks and leave me in bed for the rest of the weekend.  They don’t see the weight of my illness on Geoff and my family.  How if I see friends, they always have to come to me.  I so often feel like a dead-weight wife, daughter and friend.  The times I’m overwhelmed by the ME and can’t decide between crying and being too tired to cry.  How many pills I take every day to try and make it to the next day and not be consumed by the constant pain I’m in.  They just see a fairly normal-looking girl.

I can’t blame other people for not knowing that I’m sick.  I don’t display the characteristic signals of someone who is unwell, so of course people assume I’m healthy.  But we need to get to a place where I could tell a stranger that I have ME and they might know what I’m talking about.  That if someone else said they have MS or Crohn’s or fibro, that stranger would have heard of those illnesses.  That the stranger would have at least a basic idea of our struggle and the dire need for change, for research, for treatments, cures and basic respect.

We can get there.  We will.  One May 12th at a time.

Want to do more?  I can help you with that!

• Rent or buy the new ME documentary, Forgotten Plague.  Consider hosting a screening of it for your friends and family!
• Write a one-click letter to Congress to increase ME’s funding.
• Join in the #MillionsMissing protests in Washington DC and other locations through the world on May 25.  You can participate even if you’re too unwell to join in person or if there isn’t a protest near you!
• Wear a blue ribbon in real life or add one to your social media avatar.  Thanks to MEAdvocacy.org for the instruction!
• Start a discussion, link to articles, blogs, videos and/or artwork that discusses ME or other invisible illnesses that will help spread awareness.  Add a #may12th hashtag to your posts!
• Donate to an ME-related group, such as the Microbe Discovery Project, or help support those with invisible illnesses by purchasing items from our online shops.  Get some cute awareness-raising jewelry from The Hopeful Spoon, crystals to meditate and heal with from Mineralism Crystals (or just enjoy looking at!), museum-quality fine art prints from yours truly, give yourself or someone you love the gift of self discover and art with my online photography course Introspective, or a wide variety of fun and practical items from my RedBubble shop!
• See this article from ProHealth.net for more ideas!
• Watch and share the video below which I made last year:

I’d like to thank everyone in my life, online and off, who has supported me during these trying past eight years.  Especially Geoff, who I’d only been dating for a month when I became ill.  Lesser men would have run from what he had to face, but he’s stuck with me, no matter how bad things get.  And I’d also like to thank everyone for the extremely warm and receptive response you all had to my previous blog post.  Your kind words and love and support are greatly appreciated, now and always! ❤

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Angels, Unicorns and Faeries… In DreamWorld And Not

I have new images for you as well as some updates about my personal life!  Since most of my personal life ends up coloring my images in some way or another, I suppose that makes everything relevant, right?  🙂

Mountain Dweller series teaser – © Sarah Allegra

I recently had a shoot with a model who was new to me, the lovely Teri Wyble!  Sadly for me, she does not live in Los Angeles, but she does travel here now and then and we’ve already made plans to do more shooting next time she’s in town.  She was such a joy to work with; she’s not in modeling just to look pretty or puff up her ego, she’s interested in telling compelling stories.  She has a natural grace and beauty which lend themselves perfectly to my kind of photography.  On top of that, Teri is also just a really wonderful soul, full of love and kindness, and we share many of the same interests.  It was a perfect collaboration!

I’m also going to be sharing a bit of my spiritual journey with you guys here.  For anyone who’s curious, I am a lightworker, but I don’t define my spirituality much beyond that.  Organized religion does not work for me, but I know many people who love their branch of it.  If it’s a good fit for you, stick with it!  If not, you’re still ok and you can still be a spiritual person.

Mountain Dweller 1 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

I believe in an unconditionally-loving higher power, which I like to refer to as Source.  “God” brings to mind all sorts of connotations which I personally find hindering.  I believe that everyone and everything is made up of energy, as physics teaches us, and since energy cannot be destroyed, it’s most logical to me that life continues beyond death.  I have no doubts about this.  I have spoken to and had contact with those who have passed over… which would have been enough on its own to convince me of our eternal life, but I do feel science supports this idea as well.

Toward the beginning of the year, I experienced an EXTREMELY powerful guided meditation with a lovely woman named Mojo.  If you’re interested in her services, you can find her page on Fiverr here!  She currently doesn’t advertise her guided meditations, which she does live over the phone with you, but if you contact her, she can arrange it for you.

Mountain Dweller 2 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

During this guided meditation, I actually got to meet and speak with my two main guardian angels.  Prior to this, I had believed in angels in a vague sort of way, but despite how much I would have liked it, I never felt that I could successfully connect with any of them.  I have also done other guided meditations which are supposed to introduce you to your angel without much success other than feeling more centered afterward, like with any meditation.  My point is, the meditation with Mojo was very different.  I could actually feel and sense my angels; I could hear and even see them in my mind.  I know now that they have always been with me every second of my life, and they will for the rest of my time on earth.  I am never alone and they are a great comfort to me.

This new connection with my angels led me to buy a handful of books about angels; I wanted to learn EVERYTHING that I POSSIBLY could about them!  As I’m sure you all know, my passions are all-consuming.  When a new one ignites, my life becomes focused on that and only that until I feel I have a grasp on it.  For anyone else interested in learning more about angels, I recommend Angels In My Hair by Lorna Byrne, and The Angel Therapy Handbook by Doreen Viture.  Both are fascinating, well-written and impart excellent knowledge.  Angels In My Hair is more of a memoir while the Angel Therapy Handbook is more of a textbook.  I feel they compliment each other well.

Mountain Dweller 3 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

I mentioned being a lightworker a little bit ago.  What I mean by that is that I am certified at level 2 in Reiki.  I do energy work, sending positive energy to people, animals, places, situations, objects, whatever you want.  It’s healing and can never be used to harm.  I also began meditating much more regularly this year.  In the past, when I’d try meditating, I would always enjoy the effects of it, but I had a lot of trouble making myself do it with any consistency.  I’m not sure what changed, but for some reason, this year I was able to push past that.  Once I got over that initial block, I discovered that I LOVE meditating!  It’s incredibly healing and healthy for your body, mind and soul.  I found it was a bit like starting to work out.  At first, you don’t really want to do it, but after a little while of making yourself stick with it, you like it and actually begin craving it.  I now have meditation (guided and not) as a regular part of my life and I’d highly recommend it to absolutely everyone!  One thing I discovered are the millions of meditation tracks on YouTube; literally something for absolutely everyone and every interest.  There are also long tracks of nature sounds and/or music, some with binaural beats in them, some lasting up to eight hours, so you could listen to them all night while you sleep.  I’ve been learning a great deal about crystals as well from my dear friend Jessi who owns the shop Mineralism Crystals.  I HIGHLY recommend her if you’re in the market for anything!  Even if you don’t see something in her online shop, chances are, she has it.  I’ve placed numerous orders with her and they always exceed my expectations!  Also, she is a fellow spoonie, so your money goes to help support her as she’s unable to work a “regular” job; win-win!

As all these new revelations were opening up to me, meditation, angels, being able to “hear” animals more clearly when I contacted them energetically (for example, I was able to help one very special cat overcome his abandonment fears when he was newly adopted, something I was honored to have been a part of), Teri came along and we had our shoot.  I knew that I wanted some of this deeper spirituality to be reflected in something we shot, but I wasn’t really sure how.  However, I did know that I wanted to photograph Teri in a beautiful lace dress I had… that combined with feeling inspired by some images Geoff shot recently with a back-lit model that made me decide I would shoot an “angelic” look with the gauzy white fabric and light behind her.  (Although really, just try and make her NOT look angelic; that would be a far more difficult job.)

Mountain Dweller 4 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

As I suspected, Teri made the perfect angel.  Sorting through the images later, I realized that I was creating a new race of DreamWorld beings.  The Aethereans, as I called them, are DreamWorld’s angels.  They live high in the mountains, away from the more populated areas so they can be focus on devoting themselves to spiritual studies.  They are very wise from their decades of pursuing the truth in every facet of life, as well as skilled and compassionate healers.  Many of the other DreamWorld inhabitants send their young to train with the Aethereans for several years, where they are taught empathy, love, plant and animal care, healing, sacred geometry and the mysteries of the universe.  I thought that the Aethereans needed some kind of uniform or mark that visually informed everyone of who they are and the spiritual life they have chosen for themselves, so I decided they would all have a flower of life symbol on their foreheads.  I wish I’d thought to actually apply this in real life to Teri, but this idea only came later.  Thankfully, Photoshop made it possible to add it to all the images!

Teri did such a spectacular job modeling, she made it so very difficult to choose which images to work up!  I ended up editing quite a few more photos than I typically would pick because I simply could not narrow my selections down any more.  It took a bit longer to finish these because of the volume I had to work through, but also because of a couple other wonderful new journeys I was taking…

Mountain Dweller 5 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

Through a very miraculous series of events, I discovered Calista Ascension.  Calista is one of those very rare spiritual teachers who actually embodies and lives everything she preaches; I have met very few more accepting, genuinely loving and wise people in my life.  She offers numerous classes which I was lusting after, but when I saw that she created her own Unicorn Healing System which I could take online from the comfort of my home, I was hooked.  I had to take it.  Immediately.

I’ll let Calista explain the course in her own words:

Unicorn Healing™ is a hands-on healing modality for empowerment and wellness, but also a development tool that can awaken your Souls’ gifts and purpose. It can be used as a stand-alone therapy or complemented with other energy practices.

Brought forward in 2009, direct from the Unicorn realm via Calista, it is a very sacred modality that can provide all that you are ready to receive.This is a course for those who are ready to step-up, break-through and arise in their POWER!

Just as you have a Guardian Angel that walks with you so to you have a Guardian Unicorn. Once regarded as the fabric of fairytales, Unicorns are very much real. They have walked with us since the times of Atlantis and are now returning to our awareness to help us awaken to love and the infinite potential we hold within.

As this is a distant learning course, you can set your own pace and progression. A commitment is required however as this course is deeply transformational – the more you put in, the more you will receive. The Unicorns are ever-present to those who wish to better themselves and assist Mother Earth to ascend with grace. 

Yes.  Unicorns.  REAL Unicorns.  As I mentioned earlier, I am well-versed with Reiki energy, which, I learned, is apparently an earth-based energy.  The Unicorns however hail from another planet (bear with me here) so their energy is cosmically-based.  (For those interested, Calista recorded an excellent podcast all about who and what the Unicorns are, where they come from, etc, with much more detail than I’m giving in this post, which you can listen to here.)  I hadn’t expected their energies to feel particularly different from each other; I just hadn’t thought about it.  You may believe that these Unicorns are simply a pretty fantasy I’m escaping to in my imagination (which I’ll freely admit is an escape I would likely pick!) but OH MY GOD – once you’ve felt their energy, there is NO mistaking them.  They are every bit as real as we are, and their energy is incredibly powerful… yet also full of the most unconditional love I’ve ever experienced.  It’s nearly impossible to describe how energy feels in words, but the ones that keep coming to mind when I think about my Unicorns are high, clear, clean, bright, powerful, silvery, shimmery, penetrating, deep, beautiful, wise, loving, celestial, ethereal, and immense.  I love Reiki, but the Unicorns really kicked things up a huge notch for me.

Mountain Dweller 6 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

As part of my studying, I went through an attunement with their energy, where I met my three guardian Unicorns, who all serve different roles, and who are all equally exquisitely beautiful.  I spent 30 consecutive days meditating and communing with them every day in different ways so we could really get to know each other.  And I also practiced doing healings with the Unicorn energy, both in person and across distance, much like you do with Reiki.  The Unicorn healings I’ve done so far have been the most powerful I’ve yet witnessed in my life.  Problems that have bothered people for very long times suddenly lose their sting, allowing the people to let go of them.  Hurts are overcome, trauma is healed.  They are truly miraculous.  And my guides assure me that I will become physically healthy myself in time.

My guides… yes, I should mention the other guides too.  Meeting the Unicorns as well as my angels has opened my mind up to the idea of there being more spiritual guides for us in the universe than I had previously realized.  Currently, in addition to my guardian angels and Unicorns, I also have a dragon guide, a pegasus guide and a mermaid guide, although I have not worked with them nearly as long or as deeply as the Unicorns.  I’ve also started to sense and sometimes communicate with the elementals all around me.  The trees in my yard, for example, will remind me if the bird feeder has gotten low or the plants need watering.  I’m becoming a MUCH better gardener with their help!  🙂

Mountain Dweller 7 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

Then, right on the heels on my finishing up my Unicorn Healing course, I began taking Doreen Virtue’s Fairyologist course!  This is more or less what it sounds like; you learn all about the various fairies that exist, what they’re about (the fairies are mostly concerned with environmental and animal issues, but certain groups emphasize different causes), how to communicate and work with them.  At the end, you take a quiz and, assuming you pass, you become a certified Fairyologist.  As I’m also in the process of having all my Unicorn work reviewed by Calista as we speak, I’m on the cusp of becoming both a certified Unicorn Healer and a certified Fairyologist… both are NOT things I expected that I’d be saying if you’d asked me at the beginning of this year!

I’m telling you guys about all this for several reasons.  One, working with my guides and walking my spiritual journey is becoming an ever-more-present, ever-larger part of my life.  I wanted to just lay it all out there in one go and not feel like I had to tiptoe around it on my own blog.  Two, everything in my personal life effects my art.  Case in point, the images I’m releasing today.  I probably wouldn’t have even shot them if I hadn’t met my guardian angels, and I certainly wouldn’t have added the Flower of Life symbol to the Aethereans (who would not exist) without having learned more about sacred geometry in my studies.  In my life, there is very little separation between the real world and my art.  It’s all one big pot of stew where each ingredient enhances all the others.

Mountain Dweller 8 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

And lastly, I’d like to invite all of you to explore your own spirituality.  When you find what works for you, there is very, very little in life that is as rewarding!  There are many charlatans both online and off, so you must be discerning in who you choose to listen to.  A strong connection to your intuition and sense of truth will help you navigate the waters.  Any of the people or authors I’ve mentioned in this post have gotten the thumb’s up from me if you’d like to start there!

Mountain Dweller 9 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

I am an energy worker.  I work with Unicorns and angels.  I talk to animals, fairies and elementals.  I am a creator.  I collect crystals.  I am an empath.  I am a photographer.  I am clairvoyant and clairsentient.  I am a fulltime student of truth.  I am a healer.  I am a woman.  I am an artist.  I am Sarah.  I am me.  I don’t apologize for any of that.  You go be you, and don’t apologize for any of it either.  🙂

Mountain Dweller 10 – © Sarah Allegra. Model: Teri Wyble.

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A Cry From The Darkness: A Self Portrait

A self portrait that belongs to my Eternal Storm series, which explores depression, anxiety and other mental illnesses. A Cry From The Darkness © Sarah Allegra – a self portrait – detail

Wow, it feels like FOREVER since I finished my last piece!  This year has not been conducive to creating art.  I’ve done my best despite the circumstances which kept popping up (moving, medications, long ME flares, devoting a ton of time to the gallery show, stress from my recent battle among other things) but it’s felt like a very dry year creatively.  All I can do is my best though, and even when the ME really cramps my style, I still manage to get pieces finished… just much more slowly than I would like.

It was in this depressed feeling of “I haven’t created anything in the longest time imaginable” that today’s image was born.  When my regular creative outlets are blocked to me (by, say, solid weeks of migraines as I adjust to each new medication dosage), I become despondent and depressed.  Life slowly loses its flavor and color and if I’m not careful, I’ll sink into a pit of despair just like Artax in The Neverending Story.  Luckily, I have Geoff and my friends and family around to cheer me on and make sure I never sink too low, but much of it is outside of anyone’s control.

As I mentally pictured how I felt, this was it.  A big, ugly cloud of despair, depression, worthlessness, swirling around my head.  But this time, unlike my last self portrait which explored a similar theme, I wanted to show a bit of hope at the same time.  The cloud is surrounded, penetrated and pierced by beautiful, golden rays of light.  They stream in through the darkness, weaving through its thick blackness.  The darkness cannot survive in the light.  It will be broken up and dissipate.  And while I know this will probably not be my last battle with depression, I also know that each round will eventually be over… and once again, the light will have won.  That is the hope I cling to when the clouds cover me.

I’d like to mention my friend and very talented photographer Robert Cornelius’s Dust to Dust series as it provided some inspiration in my planning out of the darkness cloud.  Thanks, Robert!  🙂  He’s an incredible photographer and all-around cool dude, so check out his work if you’re not familiar with it!

A Cry From The Darkness © Sarah Allegra – a self portrait

This image belongs to my Eternal Storms series on depression, anxiety and other mental health issues.  These topics are still seen as quite taboo to discuss, something I hope to help with by portraying what living with them is like openly and honestly.  Silence and shame never helped a single illness get cured.  We need to be able to speak openly about our experiences, without judgement or fear, if we’re ever going to healed from them.

A Cry From The Darkness © Sarah Allegra – a self portrait – detail

A Cry From The Darkness © Sarah Allegra – a self portrait – detail

 

Do you have depression?  Try being a little more honest next time a trusted friend asks how you are.  You don’t have to go into excruciating detail, but try to avoid the temptation to simply answer “fine,” unless you actually are.  And if you have friends or family who you suspect or know suffer from any kind of mental ailment?  Invite them to tell you about it, ask some questions, assuring them that talking to you is safe and you will not judge them or call them crazy.  It is crucial that you answer whatever they tell you with love.  It is incredibly hard for people to open up and talk to others about these problems, so take their trust very seriously and treat it with the gentlest and greatest respect.

A Cry From The Darkness © Sarah Allegra – a self portrait – detail

A Cry From The Darkness © Sarah Allegra – a self portrait – detail

As we approach Thanksgiving, let’s be thankful for the help and support we have.  For the people dedicated to helping us win our fight.  For the people who will listen to us with only love and understanding in their hearts.  The people who give us hope.  The inner strength we are able to find when we think we’ve exhausted it all.  Those extra beams of light when we need them the most.  We need more people like this in the world.  Let’s try and all be them to each other.  The simple fact that there are people in the world who try to reach this goal is something I am very thankful for!

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2016 Calendars, Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday!

Hey guys!  2016 calendars are HERE!!

First, let me quickly update those of you who are regular readers.  You may remember my Preparing For Battle post where I talked about… well, preparing for the big battle I was about to face.  I was sick with stress and worry about it; it was honestly one of THE hardest things I have ever had to do.

But guess what?  I WON!!!  I’m afraid I still can’t give many details about the nature of the fight, but this is a huge, wonderful victory for me and will help make my life a little bit easier.  So thank you VERY much to each and every one of you who said a prayer for me, lit a candle, sent Reiki or good thoughts… they all melded together and produced one hell of a win for me!

Now, with that’s said, let me tell you about my calendars!

Sarah Allegra 2016 Calendar

These guys are always a favorite; they’re probably my single best-selling item.  And with good reason!  Red Bubble packs a ton of quality into these babies with thick paper, almost like a heavy cardstock or watercolor paper.  The pages have a subtle sheen without being shiny.  The daily squares are big enough to make notes in.  I still have calendars (both my own and from other artists) from years ago which hold up beautifully, even after years of flipping through them to see the lovely pictures!

Sarah Allegra 2016 Calendar

This also brings something else up: getting this calendar is like buying 12 small prints of my work!  Each year’s images are different, making each year a unique and collectible item.  And if you want to keep the calendar after the year is over, like I do, to enjoy the images whenever you want to pull it out?  That’s fine!  Red Bubble does a great job at printing the images and making them look the way I want them too; this is a solid buy!  You’ll get images which span across my series, from my DreamWorld, Enchanted Sleep, Eternal Storms to self portraits, which feature Katie Johnson, Dedeker Winston, Travis Weinand, Noemi Regalado as well as the beloved author of The Last Unicorn, Peter S. Beagle!

Also, while I was uploading a diptych of Travis for one month of the calendar, I noticed that it made a really awesome pattern for Red Bubble’s leggings.  So get your Travis-printed leggings now!  😀

Travis Leggings

All of us independent artists and craftmakers REALLY appreciate your purchases, whether it’s for Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday, regular holiday shopping, something for yourself, or any other reason you might have!  Please keep shopping small in mind during this holiday season!

And remember if you want to support my art with your purchases, there are always museum-quality prints of my images that you can buy, my online self-discovery-through-photography class Introspective, the Peter S Beagle e-books that have my images on their covers (but buy his other books too!), along with Red Bubble which has a myriad of other items with my images on them.  Everything from stickers to leggings to mugs to laptop/iPhone covers.  There’s really something there for everyone 🙂

A smattering of offerings from my Red Bubble shop

And don’t forget to check out my friend Jessi’s Etsy shop, The Hopeful Spoon, full of beautiful, hand-made earrings (and other jewelry pieces coming soon!) full of lovely semi-precious stones at very reasonable prices.

One of Jessi’s many offerings!

She also has a section dedicated to raising awareness about different illnesses, which would be perfect for the spoonie in your life!

The Hopeful Spoon

Thanks to everyone for your patronage!  Artists like myself could not survive without help from people like you 🙂

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Eternal Storms

 This is a big piece for me, not just size-wise, but for what it represents as well.

Like A Storm © Sarah Allegra – detail

I shot this self portrait a week or two ago after enduring months of worse-than-usual depression.  Some was due to outside influences, bad news, being sick and other things that any normal, healthy person would feel depressed about.  But a lot of it was that irrational, heavy, demanding, life-draining depression that is clinical depression.  This is not feeling sad about things that you should feel sad about.  This is round-the-clock, punishing joylessness, sucking the beauty out of everything, leaving all around you colorless and meaningless.  This is clinical depression.

 

I’ve battled this beast since it first started manifesting in my early teens.  It took me some time before I learned that what I was feeling was an actual condition, a potentially solvable problem, not just a bad mood that hung around for years.  I’ve also tried more remedied to it that I can recount; anti-depressants, therapy, energy work, supplements, yoga, getting more exercise (before I had ME; over-doing exercise now could do me great harm), self-help books, seminars, journaling, art therapy… on and on and on.

 

And it still clings.

 

I decided to start a series specifically addressing mental illness; clinical depression and anxiety in particular, since those are the two I fight with most.  I manage them, sometimes it’s better, sometimes it’s worse.  Sometimes I want to just die.  I don’t know if it will ever go away completely, thus the series title Eternal Storms.

 

I identify with Eeyore from Winnie  the Pooh, with his constant dark cloud covering just him.  I’m sure that was subconsciously part of the inspiration for this piece.  When I’m going through a bout of depression, this is what it feels like to me.  A dark storm raging round my head, that only I see and feel.  It makes the idea of asking for help feel pointless; even if I break up this cloud, another will come.  And the social stigma of admitting you need help at all, let alone help with your mental health, makes it all the worse.  If I’m having a week where I have to talk myself into continuing to live each day, I can’t talk about it except for a few select, very trusted friends who have also been there, as well as my therapist.

 

I shot this self portrait as a way to work through the cloud I was under, yes, but more importantly, to directly address depression and its stigma.  Admitting you have or struggle with depression doesn’t make you weak or unworthy.  It doesn’t make you a bad person.  It doesn’t mean you’re not trying hard enough, eating right or getting enough exercise.  It just IS.  And society needs to learn to stop judging those who do manage to ask for help.

 

The alternative is that we suffer in silence with our tormentor.  And that can kill.

 

Joel Robison happened to put up an insightful blog about his own battle with depression recently, which was a happy coincidence.  I’m very glad for people like him who will stand with me and admit that yes, we have depression.  It may not make sense to you, you may not understand it, it might *gasp* make you uncomfortable, but that doesn’t mean it will go away.We are no less human that you.  We did not ask for this fight.  This is not an attention-seeking behavior.  This is real, this illness is out for blood.  This is just our fight.  This matters.  And it can be won.One storm at a time.

This series is dedicated to all the others who fight this battle with me every day.  You are all so strong and so brave.  Don’t let anyone ever tell you otherwise.

Like A Storm © Sarah Allegra – click on the image to see it full-sized on my site!

Like A Storm © Sarah Allegra – detail

 

Like A Storm © Sarah Allegra – details

Like A Storm © Sarah Allegra – detail

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