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thomas jackson

@jtommyj

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@ncstate alum in landscape design
Lost my left leg, and? | ΑΦΩ | Cat Dad
Frequent poet, reading for @wildscapelit live on @tiktok

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LIFE UPDATE: I am now an amputee, below the knee on my left leg. At the end of October I had a medical emergency and since then I have been in the hospital, from the emergency department to my time in the ICU, waking up from a coma to @noahkahanmusic playing to my time in the step-down unit, two surgeries, being on dialysis in kidney failure, feeling my kidneys come back online and entering renal recovery, and the countless nurses and staff who saved my life and made my time bearable and as comfortable as can be. I am so grateful my loving family, Team Tom, who pulled off Thanksgiving in the hospital, with matching t shirts, and I am done with my time at an Acute Rehab center and am home with all my lovely animals. I am overwhelmed by the support and healing love sent my way as I adjust to this new reality. I have learned so much about the innate desire for life within us all, and I am blessed to be alive today, recovering in a healthy body, less part of my left leg. I look forward to working toward a prosthetic. Never give up on your importance to this world and never forget how loved you are. Thank you for taking the time to read my story. Love to everyone. by @jtommyj

to not want to be alive is one of those experiences that forever changes your worldview. i’m so glad to not be in that space where you grieve yourself, you grieve the person you wanted to be, the character you wanted to portray. three years ago I performed a poem centered on this. how self-harm transcends into eating restriction, how it established dissociation as coping. i learned how it isolates you, makes you drink yourself green, turns you toward silence and isolation, feeding the stigma. to feel that way at 16, and have those cycles keep churning as a constant while your identity evolved as you started college is always a source of hopelessness. though I’ve been one of those people who somehow comes to know so many people in the community, I’ve spent too much of my life feeling like I have to be funny to be included, to be invited. it’s been easier to consider leaving than confront feeling like I’ve never been given the chance to enter. two months after losing one of the earliest supporters of my poetry, a few weeks before the world changed forever, three years ago I spoke on the stage at @tedxncstate . After, I let grind culture run my life for me, let accomplishments feed mania, and let every trauma cycle under the sun close me off from what I’ve wanted in life. it’s been hard to feel like the villain, to question every decision of my own as a show of bad nature. I’ve felt bound to the moments before I’ve lost people like my life ended then too. i’ve fed the devotion to the catch 22 where I miss the people I push away the most. The ending of this piece on my closest suicidal episode, which is also my youngest, still rings true. What’s done is done, you made it through, and all I can say is, I am so proud of you.” I will give you space to be who you’ve always had to minimize, interrogate, brutalize, and sublimate to feign having a place. I’m letting you gain weight from that med, letting you lean into sobriety, letting you put the blades down that you hold out at the world, which inevitably turn toward yourself. and thank you to Simba, the life-saving cat. we are losing too many people to suicide. I hope this poem endures and helps save even a few. by @jtommyj

Father Goon and Scaretwink take Halloween ‘26. This priest pose NASTY!!! #fiyero #exorcise by @jtommyj

October 30th, 2024. This would have been the last photo ever taken of me had I not survived all I put my body through two years ago. So much contributed to it, much of which I have explored through a wealth of writing which will be given its time to shine whenever the time is right. Through EMDR therapy and more fine tuned medication I’ve been able to confront and resolve all the behavior and mood cycles I felt trapped in and bound to. The abuse of alcohol, the toxic insecurity, the inability to escape the trappings of trauma, repeating poor treatment of people as patterns of my own. I can’t say I have it all figured out, but in a time of immense loss I found resolve, resilience, and determination to put better energy out into the world. Bipolar Disorder undercut every attempt at progress I made, I sought solace in cheap comfort, sleepwalked my way through life with no purpose. In a life where you feel you’ve made every wrong choice, you’ve pushed away everyone who was on your side, you’ve allied yourself with the darkness you carry and married your damage in lieu of a partner, the worst choice you can ever make will be ending your life. You have so much good to do and offer the world if you just believe you deserve to heal, that you aren’t a lost cause. The only true religion is love. #mentalhealth #bipolar #bipolardisorder #lithium by @jtommyj

As an amputee, my heart is deeply disturbed by the commonality of child and adult amputees in Gaza undergoing procedures without proper medical care. by @jtommyj

a poem. 🇵🇸 i feel it in my stomach, my throat, my heart. Part of my attempt to take my life was not wanting to live in a world so complicit and engaged in this level of monstrous cruelty. If the United States government treated us how the government treats Palestinians there would be mutinies and revolts. And we already have, to natives and immigrants alike. Having read as much on the history since being assigned the topic in Model United Nations in 6th grade I’ve always questioned the narrative of the establishment. If this poem offends you, I sincerely welcome you to either leave my page, or look within and hear the testimony of the “others” to understand why there is such passionate resistance. And no, I do not celebrate the loss of Jewish lives on October 7th. This scale of destruction is not defense. It is brutal vengeance. It is disgusting, and a stain on the history of man. If you condone it, I rebuke the darkness in your spirit and heart. by @jtommyj

thought about posting this for 6 years because SA and survivorship is an ongoing conversation, wanted to post NC-17 first in the process so I did. what happened at Cornell is really angering. it feels like there’s not much to say because you say all you can and then the same thing happens. it’s both shocking and not surprising. every time. and you wonder if hope means you live in delusion or something will actually change if you just keep doing it. and then you think about the stories we don’t hear, the stories which don’t trend, the everyday, the next door, same towns or school. child to elderly. you wonder how much rage a body can withstand without being the first ever to spontaneously combust. anyway. lock them up for life. #cornell #cornell7 #poem #sa by @jtommyj

#lanadelrey #whitedress by @jtommyj

celebrating Dad’s birthday to cap off a week which began with a 5-day migraine leading to the worst IV I’ve ever had placed. turned every which way but loose by insurance denying an important prevention med. hell was unleashed by lovely pharmacist ❤️ #thelifeofashowgirl by @jtommyj

oh summer, i’ll miss you by @jtommyj

we quite literally got adopted by our new cat Bubbles. for the past few weeks she would show up at our door, eat 4 bowls of food, drink some water, nap, then go off somewhere outside to nurse kittens after filling with milk. she didn’t show up for a few days, then decided to become a full-time indoor cat and addition to our family, filling the hole left by losing our kitty Gus to intestinal cancer last year. due to how friendly and well-adapted she is, we assume she was just dumped by a family who previously had her, which happens a disturbing amount of times on our street in rural Virginia. we are happy to be a source of the love she’s needed and deserved. she will be fixed soon 🤍🖤 tuxedo babies forever #universalcatdistributionsystem by @jtommyj

flicking the bean #lobsterroll #espressomartinis by @jtommyj