http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=222x46462Oh my.
Tab (1000+ posts) Mon Oct-20-08 10:42 PM
Original message
Pa. woman ordered out of chemical-free 'bubble'
ALLENTOWN, Pa. – Ten hours a day, every day, Elizabeth Feudale-Bowes confines herself to a galvanized-steel-and-porcelain shed outside her house. Inside are a toilet, a metal cabinet, a box spring with the metal coils exposed, and a pile of organic cotton blankets. Aluminum foil covers the window. The place is as austere as a prison cell — but it's also her sanctuary from an outside world that she says makes her violently ill. She and her husband call the structure "the bubble."
This bubble, though, may be about to burst: A judge has ordered it taken down by the end of the month.
blahblahblahblahblah; this was covered in general discussion here
crim son (1000+ posts) Mon Oct-20-08 10:45 PM
Response to Original message
1. The place doesn't look any worse than much of the housing in rural Maine. It IS missing the plastic furniture and piles of old car parts in the yard, though.
bluestateguy (1000+ posts) Mon Oct-20-08 10:49 PM
Response to Original message
3. Hypochondriac
The judge should have ordered her to see a shrink.
franksolich's thoughts exactly; all his life, franksolich has observed a strange corelation between married women (of non-Iberian derivation) with hyphenated last names and a propensity to have really weird "diseases."
It's not a cause-and-effect thing; it's just that many go to any psychotic extreme to prove their specialness, their uniqueness, and this is one of the ways they do it.
Really. Think about it.
k8conant (1000+ posts) Mon Oct-20-08 11:08 PM
Response to Reply #3
6. Get off it!
May you also suffer from a disease I don't have, so I can call YOU a hypochondriac!
Seriously, your kind of comment sucks.
womanofthehills (101 posts) Tue Oct-21-08 02:03 AM
Response to Reply #3
10. I've had environmental illness and it's life threatening
Do some research before labeling people. When my neighborhood was sprayed numerous times (by truck) by the city of Albuquerque with Malathion the whole neighborhood became ill and I developed EI. Half the kids on the street developed asthma and I developed reactive airway disease. Exposure to smoke, perfume, gas etc. all made my airway inflamed with bronkospasm - talk about scary. About once a week, the ambulance was on our block taking another child to the emergency room. I filed a law suit against the city of Albq. and that really began my activism.
When I joined a support group, 90% of the people in the group developed environment illness after a pesticide exposure. Many could not live indoors and slept in their cars. I really feel for this woman as she made a safe environment for herself and uneducated, selfish people care more about appearances than about someones life.
Now, isn't that a dictionary definition of.....primitives?
salvorhardin (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 07:29 AM
Response to Reply #3
11. Maybe, but...
Maybe she is a hypochondriac. I certainly don't think her illness is anything other than psychological. That doesn't make it any less real to her though, and it sounds like having this shed to go to everyday is her coping mechanism. It's her sanctuary. It'd be great if she got real treatment for her condition, but I don't think it helps anyone to be so dismissive.
Sure it helps. If enough people remind her that she's just a silly hypochondriac, sooner or later the message is going to sink into her head.
babydollhead (754 posts) Mon Oct-20-08 10:52 PM
Response to Original message
4. For the past 2 years I have had a reaction to sunshine.
I flush bright red and itch and get large welts or hives. I take 2 claritin a day and benadryl if I get an attack. My acupuncturist said i have a reaction to "the last thing", that my body is so toxic, one more assault; the sun, a chemical in the air, something going on at a gas station, chlorine, something coming through on a train... who knows. It happened in Pittsburgh, Chicago, Seattle, Georgia and Florida. I saw an allergist who told me it was a virus that had to work it's way out. If I have an attack of it, which goes away with 2 benadryls, I am on my ass and lose a day.
Uh, franksolich deals with something similar.
franksolich suspects those pharmaceuticals might have something to do with exacerbation of the condition.
If the Barbie doll primitive changed her life-style, probably the condition will ease.
But the Barbie doll primitive, being a primitive, self-centeredly thinks she can do whatever she wants to do, and pharmaceuticals will deal with the consequences.
FrenchCori (74 posts) Tue Oct-21-08 08:37 AM
Response to Reply #4
13. Virus Hives
I had 2 attacks a couple of years ago. (And the biopsy scar on my arm to prove it) The only thing that could touch that deep itch was a topical steroid cream. I would wake up and find myself scratching in my sleep.
As to the shed, that's how my sister's MIL lived for many years. She seems okay now, but still has some sensitivities.
Nambe (1000+ posts) Mon Oct-20-08 11:03 PM
Response to Original message
5. I know a marijuana barn when I see one.
EvolveOrConvolve (1000+ posts) Mon Oct-20-08 11:08 PM
Response to Original message
7. I see a toxic mixture of pseudoscience and gullibility. Nothing more...
franksolich sees one thing more; this deranged "need" to feel "special" by having an exotic "disease" or "condition."
Orrex (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 12:46 AM
Response to Original message
9. Okay, I've checked out the property
The shed in question doesn't actually stand out much at all. The houses in that neighborhood aren't that close together, and her "bubble" is no more obtrusive than the big-ass above-ground swimming pool in one neighbor's yard or the two-car garage, double-extended enclosed breezeway, and detached shed on another neighbor's property.
To be honest, I suspect that the judge doesn't think that Ms. Feudale-Bowes' illness is real, because if it were, then wouldn't she enjoy the protection of the Americans with Disabilities Act. I mean, if she were confined to a wheelchair, would her neighbors be suing her because of the ramp leading to the front door?
However, I confess that I'm not convinced that the disease is real, either. My belief is irrelevant, of course, but it would be disingenuous of me to argue in favor of Ms. Feudale-Bowes' shed without making that disclaimer.
cosmik debris (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 07:29 AM
Response to Original message
12. How could they believe that they could build without permits?
Are they really that far out of touch with reality?
It sounds to me like they have gone off the deep end and they are using illness as a ploy to get sympathy for being stupid.
These are not senile old farts or juvenile delinquents.
They should know the rules and they shouldn't whine when they are asked to follow the rules.
trotsky (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 08:54 AM
Response to Reply #12
14. Exactly.
Whether her health issue is real or not, has nothing to do with it.
It's people who broke the rules and are trying to get away with it. If they had just bothered to get permits beforehand, there wouldn't be an issue.
Orrex (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 09:17 AM
Response to Reply #12
15. Doh! Shame on me for not even thinking of that!
I was caught up in the immediate is-she-sick/is-it-an-eyesore conundrum, and I hadn't even thought about the issue of permits.
Still, where I currently live, if you build without a permit, then you're fined, but the construction doesn't necessarily have to come down. And as I mentioned above, the bio-shed isn't that big of an eyesore, given the context of the neighborhood.
Weird story in any case.
cosmik debris (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 09:39 AM
Response to Reply #15
16. There are lots of issues involved in permits, Zoning regs, utility easements, fire prevention ordinances, water/waste water and sanitation issues, certification of habitability, electrical safety ad infinitum.
I have to suspect that there is more to this story than is being reported.
It is a lot easier to report that the poor sick people are being abused by the government than to report that stupid people are using illness as an excuse for violating the law.
Orrex (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 11:53 AM
Response to Reply #16
17. Well, I'm sure she'll be all right after some chelation therapy
And with a little judicious application of Kinoki footpads.
cosmik debris (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 12:56 PM
Response to Reply #17
18. I'm doing remote Reiki now.
Sending a lot of energy her way.
I'm a Grand Imperial Double Diamond Reiki Master, you know.
Orrex (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 01:51 PM
Response to Reply #18
19. Does that trump spades?
Or is it improper to call Reiki enthusiasts "Rubbers?"
After which the outer-space debris primitive provides a link selling a product.
I'm surprised my fellow alum Skins lets the primitives get away with this, doing free advertising on his real-estate.
Orrex (1000+ posts) Tue Oct-21-08 02:09 PM
Response to Reply #20
21. Sweet! How does a young go-getter like myself get involved with the good people at Amway?
They're so hard to get a hold of, after all.
