fighting reality
making room for all the things
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Brain Juice | 9/13/2025 | (c) Marivic Pinedo -
I’m hesitant to post this work that I’ve been working on. But I think it’s a manifestation of an anxiety dream I had recently. I won’t go into details, but the themes in it were fear, scarcity, survival, and people’s actions not matching their words.
America Unraveling | Digital Illustration | 9/11/2025 | (c) Marivic Pinedo -
Fit check for Wobbly Life Era.
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Flew down to the LA area last May for a wedding. Obviously, rehearsals are not terribly interesting to a kid, so we explored the church grounds and kiddo found a tree to rest on. I’m really enjoying Procreate and I’m still trying to get the hang of layers, and finding textures I want to use for certain things. If anything, I’m excited to feel excited about art again. Below is work on top of the photo, and what happens when I remove the photo from underneath. I like both. I just need to keep working on it and remember that playing is totally fine.
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The summer was on the slower side when it came to activities. Not much adventuring, and probably too much time spent at home. But during that time I did take to coloring, sketching, and playing with the illustration program Procreate. I enjoyed using layers to trace photos I’ve taken and just play around with them.
So the first is a photo of myself that I traced and tried to color. I’m rubbish at coloring, but I gave it a go. The second image is a line drawing I did that was just black and white, and I just filled it in with random colors. The third is interesting. They make these “coloring” books where they take away the black outline, but the color and shapes are all there. So all you have to do is add the black. I liked this a lot. It was easy and there was a level of just letting your hand go loose and find the shapes. The fourth one is a tracing of a photo I took of my coffee mug that had spilled when I accidentally bumped my desk. I liked how it splashed. I thought I’d try stylizing it. I have a white version, too. The last one is a drawing I’ve shown before that is originally just black and white, and again I just added color.
If anything, it’s been fun dabbling in something I’m not typically drawn to. I like blacks, whites, grays. It’s the film photographer in me. The whole Zone System locked in my brain (though, I wouldn’t be able to teach you about it because I’m not very good at that either). But it was a fun and relaxing way to get through some rough spots during the summer break.
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I am not a great artist, but I do like to pick things up and just try things. This summer, I’m home with the kiddo, and finding ways to fill the time. Another great excuse for all this is that I’ve been sick at home, so I am crafting-in-quarantine. So far…
Playing with play dough. Working with play dough is good for fine motor skill and graded force exercises. Our store-bought Play-Doh is pretty dried out, so I looked up a recipe to use. I’ve tried a couple of other recipes, but I think this one might by my favorite.
I started with a ball and it turned into this. I was pretty excited about it. But again, just dinking around with the medium.
Poking around with felt. We play a video game at home called Wobbly Life. You play a character that looks like this. And throughout the game’s different areas of play you can access a wardrobe of clothes if you want to change the Wobbly’s outfit. Our Wobbly’s name is Toby, and my kid wanted to make a wardrobe for them. So here are a couple of styles I put together. I’m not a seamstress (If I were I’d have pants that were the right length), but I can at least use a needle and thread to make felt couture.
Stay tuned for more crafting adventure!
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Day 2,357.
Today was supposed to be the day. The child would be well enough for school. Fever free for more than 24 hrs. Symptoms better. But the 4am coughing fit followed by gagging… yah. No go.
I woke up late for an appointment I had downtown in an hour. My head was pounding. I’d had night sweats, the 4am wakeup, irritability and rage cleaning before bedtime, and being short with my partner. Apologies were made.
I threw on clothes, took my meds. Made coffee. 45 min to get there. 3 miles in, Maps was yelling at me to take alternate routes. I ignored all of it. Then I hit the backup. At this point nausea set in. I turned around. I pulled over. Thumbs fumbling in my phone, struggling to remember if my doctor is saved under their name or the clinic, I made the attempt to cancel. I couldn’t do it.
Breathe.I closed my eyes until I felt more centered, started the engine, and careful drove home.
This is not the sun. This is me getting a moment to myself to be okay with feeling frustrated, tired, and hoping to release all of the guilt I feel about all the things. I am human. I am doing my best. I am a good mom. I am a good partner. I’m just having a hard day. That is okay. It’s okay to feel these things.
It’s okay to feel these things.
It’s okay to feel this way.
It’s okay. -
A quick merge of images by myself and Shelly Smith aka Studio Cornix
Shelly is an illustrator who collects water and soil samples from all over the world, and draws elaborate versions of the microorganisms that she finds in them. She also extracts pigments from what she algae and other fun plants that she uses in her work. And has even made cocktails with them. -
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Ever since I had a menstrual cycle I remember thinking it would be hard for me to have a child. I knew being pregnant wasn’t something that would accidentally happen to me. And it never did. Not accidentally. I had imagined what a child of mine would look like with partners. They were always beautiful and full of joy. Then, after years of “seeing what happens,” my spouse and I consulted doctors to see what might be keeping us from having a baby “the old fashioned” way.
It turned out we both needed some help. So we embarked on a journey to fine-tune our systems and got assistance from a fertility clinic. We talked about what we could do, plan, invest in. The doctor said “All you need is ONE good embryo. That’s it.” We didn’t realize what that entailed. What did that look like? Well, for us, it was three inseminations. One failed IVF that turned into an insemination. An IVF where the embryos had genetic abnormalities. And finally, thankfully, one IVF cycle that gave us ONE healthy embryo.
Since then, my body has gone through a lot. After the shock and awe of having and raising a child, my system decided to have a rager of a party that I just showed up to clean. Acne, cramping, irregular bleeding, rage, and an alarming number of fibroids that took up so much space in my uterus that they wondered why my uterus wasn’t larger. So, after some deep thought, I made the decision to have a hysterectomy. No more uterus, cervix, or fallopian tubes. My ovaries will still inhabit my lower abdomen to do their hormonal thing to produce estrogen which helps my dopamine issues that are related to my ADHD. It would mean no more bleeding or cramping or fibroids causing me pain every month at random times. I could have a better quality of life, at least physically. And with the hopes that it would help me emotionally; not feeling like my body was pooping out on me.
It wasn’t lost on me that I could no longer have children. There were feelings of sadness, for sure. But the fact of the matter is the chances of having another kid would mean going through IVF again, which insurance does not cover, and costs tens of thousands of dollars, endless clinic visits and blood draws. And there would be NO guarantee that IVF would even work. Then there is the fact that our current political climate is dangerous and could even interfere with going through IVF. Can you imagine going through IVF and the government all of a sudden shutting down an IVF clinic? Yah. No thanks.
So I scheduled a surgery date. An OBGYN used a robot called a Davinci robot to poke holes into me and remove my uterus, cervix, and fallopian tubes. I look like I’ve been stabbed six times. My recovery took longer than expected in hospital, but I think I’ve been recovering remarkably well at home. The pain was intense the day after, but each subsequent day has been fine, with little to no pain meds required. And I think my intestines are trying to spread out and get in on the new space that’s been vacated.
My uterus is in a better place. For the decades that it was a part of me, it was able to do me a solid and did the one job we really wanted it to. And boy did it give us the best of what we could have ever hoped for. If I could have talked to my uterus before it was removed, I’d have said:
Thank you for your service.
fighting reality 