Wednesday 27 June 2012

Attack of the Spoon Pixies



The term "spoonie" is a familiar one to many people working in disability and chronic illness circles. Put simply it describes anyone who experiences debilitating fatigue and has had to learn to continually plan and pace their daily activities. The name comes from the essay "The Spoon Theory", and is an excellent way of explaining fatigue to relatives or friends who just "don't get it"!

In essence energy is represented by a number of spoons. While people who are not ill have unlimited amounts of spoons, for some unknown reason "spoonies" only have a set amount each day. Every activity, be it getting dressed, eating, or going out uses up a certain amount of them. The harder the activity, the more spoons are used up. Once there are no spoons left, you're stuck for the rest of the day! Hence why a "spoonie" has to be so careful and plan their days in advance.

Some spoonies are even more unlucky and their number of spoons varies considerably. Some days they have a lot of spoons and can do a reasonably amount. Other days they have hardly any spoons at all.
Why is this?

We have given this much thought and finally have the answer everyone has been waiting for.

SPOON PIXIES!

Spoon Pixies belong to the same species of creatures as the Tooth Fairy and are a cousin to the Common Garden Gnome.

Like the Tooth Fairy they visit at night when you are asleep.

While the Tooth Fairy takes away a tooth and leaves some money behind, the Spoon Pixie is a much nastier piece of work. It steals spoons but leaves no trace of its visit.

This is why it has (until today) left both patients and doctors completely baffled.


While we cannot prevent visits from the Spoon Pixie a number of suggestions have been made.
  1. The first of course is to make sure spoons are carefully locked away before going to bed. 
  2. Secondly, it may be possible to stop the Spoon Pixie. Leaving sticky tape beside the bed may prevent it from reaching its goal. 
  3. Finally, a much more daring course of action being researched is to actively bribe the Spoon Pixie. In this way it may even be possible for the Spoon Pixie to return some stolen spoons! Leaving coins and shiny objects under the pillow or by the bedside *may* entice the Spoon Pixie into a "spoon exchange". Research in this area is also ongoing. 

We are open to more suggestions.

2 comments:

  1. Another silly way if you ve used all your spoons and desperate to do something ie take medication you have to wash your last used spoon.....that's a really hard one?
    I just feel lucky when I can wash last spoon......some days I can t eeeeek????
    Really like your blogs:))))))

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  2. You can sometimes confuse the Spoon Pixie.
    One good way is to have some good news. That doesn't always mean that the evil pixie doesn't take your spoons, but you can smack its paws for a short while.
    Another way is to keep changing prescribed medications - this can be a dangerous practise, but less dangerous than buying amphetamines off a teenager. The spoon pixie can be confused by change, sometimes change means the spoon pixie can steal more, sometimes steal less.
    Its a gamble - I have no idea how the spoon pixie deals with gambling per se though...

    The best way to flummox the spoon pixie is to have a totally supportive environment, meds that work forever and beautiful food and sleep.
    Obviously this is impossible, which is why the spoon pixie gets fat under succesive governments whose actions destroy all of those things.

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