World of Warcraft Patch 10.2 Battle Pet Preview!

Hello everyone! World of Warcraft’s Patch 10.2 – “Guardians of the Dream” is launching TODAY on NA realms! Yesterday I posted my Battle Pet Preview video on YouTube, highlighting all the new collectible pet models coming to the game, a little about their sources – and may have included my fair-share of silliness in there as well!

Due to constraints in editing time, however, I needed to cut out over 20 minutes of additional (voiceover-edited!) content pertaining to collection mechanics. I just didn’t have enough time before the patch was dropping to get it all in and edited up to my standards, so I had to scrap it at the last minute. Very sad!

But then I remembered, Oh! I have this BLOG! So why not include my written original script here to give a complementary source of information for all my pet friends out there! So here you go, folks, here’s my unabridged original video script for the Patch 10.2 Battle Pets – The “Compendium” Edition!


Hello everyone, my name is Wezmerelda, you can call me Wez, and welcome to WonderWezGaming!

I hope you’ve all been having fun in WoW since the last time I uploaded one of these little pet preview videos! Have you been doing some sniffin’ with the Niffen? Fighting off the myriad murloc minions manifesting from the Azmerlothian multiverse? Or perhaps raising up the dragon whelps at Little Scales Daycare, ensuring they become upstanding and conscientious members of their Dragonflights?

Well, I hope in there somewhere you’ve managed to get a little R&R, because on November 7th, 2023, World of Warcraft is launching Patch 10.2, “Guardians of the Dream”.

 You might even say “sweet dreams are made of thiiiiis”, because not only does Patch 10.2 let us spend some quality time in the spiritual realm known as the “Emerald Dream” –  interrupting the Primalists’ dastardly plans to menace the new world tree, whilst meeting new furry and feathered friends, unlocking some cool new Druid forms, and finally get to take flight freely on our favorite flying mounts the good old-fashioned way… but we’re also getting 33 new battle pets for our collections!

In this video, I’ll walk you through all the new battle pets we’re expecting in the patch – so sit back, relax, and enjoy this preview of the new friendly pet companions you’ll get access to, in Patch 10.2.

WILD PETS

As soon as you step foot into the new Emerald Dream zone in Patch 10.2, there’ll be 9 new wild pets available for you to capture.

While most of them can be found through the typical method of finding their green pawprints on the mini map, and then using your favorite teams to engage in battle and cage the desired pet, there’s one wild pet that’s a bit more unique to find.

We’ll get to that one in just a moment, but first, here’s a quick montage of the wild battle pets you’ll find scattered around the Emerald Dream…

The final wild pet available for capture – the Pale Slumbertooth – a very cute, very sleepy baby dreamtalon – requires a little extra help from some “friends”.

In order to spot the Pale Slumbertooth on your minimap, or even to see it at all within the Emerald Dream, you’ll need to have the Friendsurge Defenders toy active, which displays an adorable trio of Emerald Dream critters above your character’s head for 30 minutes’ time.

While the buff is active, you’ll be able to see the otherwise hidden Pale Slumbertooths taking some Z’s under trees, or nestled into other bushy flora in various spots around the Emerald Dream.

If you don’t already have this toy, it comes from the Dreamsurge events added in patch 10.1.7. It can be purchased from Celestine of the Harvest, a worgen vendor who’ll be stationed at the quest hub in whichever zone that the current Dreamsurge event is located, and it costs 500 Dreamsurge Coalescence to purchase.

This currency doesn’t take too long to collect. Not only can you grind mobs around the zone, but empowered rares drop it at a much better rate; plus you can loot it from Dreaming Growth nodes, and they can even be collected by simply flying through the green orbs dotting the entire zone – so your farming can be as fast-paced, or as laid back as you feel.

QUEST PETS

Questing in the Emerald Dream will yield many rewards, and some of the new quests will reward battle pets, as well!

First up is Kal’andu, a beautiful blue juvenile faerie dragon, who is rewarded by completing a side quest called “Burning Out”. To start this quest, find Solarys Thorngale near the Central Encampment quest hub at 52.01, 63.63 – she’ll send you on a quest to find and assist her three siblings in defecting from the Druids of the Flame, and you’ll meet Kal’andu in the process.

DREAM INFUSION PETS

Once you reach Renown 5 with the Dream Wardens, you’ll receive the “In Touch with Nature” perk, an account-wide unlock that allows you to “infuse creatures with the Dream”. What does this mean? Well, for pet collectors, it essentially means getting access to 8 new battle pets!

Let’s talk about what’s involved:

As soon as you hit Renown 5 with the Dream Wardens, Melsysra – a little green dragon – will come find you, offering a breadcrumb quest to speak with Elianna, a dryad Dream Infuser, who’s located at the Central Encampment quest hub.

When you initially report to Elianna, she’ll inform you that she’s researching some curious dream magic that’s left behind by creatures within the Dream, and to help her out, she’d like you to collect some of that energy for her experiments. She’ll offer you two quests that serve as an introduction to the Dream Infusion system.

The way Dream Infusions work is you’ll collect Dream Energy by completing various sorts of activities within the Emerald Dream, and once you collect a certain amount of the energy, Elianna can harness it into a Dream Infusion that you can then use to purchase battle pets and mounts.

Now, this Dream Energy is actually a hidden currency, with a hard cap of 7000 energy, and as of this recording, there’s no native way to track it without going back to visit Elianna to check the status bar attached to her nameplate.

But you can use a simple in-game macro or even a WeakAura, to help you keep track of your current total energy. And you will wanna keep tabs on this energy because of the cap – since once it’s at that cap, you won’t be able to earn any additional energy before reporting back to Elianna, collecting the Dream Infusion, and trading it in for a pet or a mount.

If you’re interested, fellow battle pet enthusiast PattiFord, also known as Lazey, has created a pretty slick WeakAura to help you track the dream energy even when you’re away from Elianna, and I’ve got a link for it in the description below.

There is another important mechanic we should talk about in the Dream Infusion system. In order to obtain one of the dream-infused pets, you need to already have a pet in your collection with the same model. And it works the same way for mounts, as well. When we go over the list of available pets, I’ll walk you through the pre-requisite pets required for each trade.

So, let’s pick back up on walking you through these introductory quests.

Once you’ve ruthlessly murdered – uhhhh, I mean ‘taken care of‘ some problematic plants for the first quest, “Mean Green Infusion Machine” – turning it in will reward you the battle pet Rithro, a snaggle-toothed dragonkin whelpling who, turns out, really likes naps.

There will be an immediate follow-up quest called “Green Dream Team” that will provide you with a Lesser Dream Infusion to spend on the next new pet, Snorr – the dream-infused version of Rithro, who – surprise, surprise! – also happens to enjoy sleeping!

To complete this follow-up quest, learn and summon the Rithro pet you received from the previous quest, and use the provided Lesser Dream Infusion to purchase Snorr from Elianna.

An important word of warning:

I found this 2nd quest to be a bit unintuitive on the PTR, with it giving no mention of purchasing Snorr as a requirement. In fact, on my first test account, I made the mistake of turning in the “Green Dream Team” quest as soon as I saw the yellow question mark pop up, indicating it was completed.

However, what it actually did was remove the Lesser Dream Infusion from my bags – leaving me unable to purchase Snorr – since it seems the currency only exists while you’re on that quest.

So, if the quest sees no changes once the patch goes live, be sure to purchase the Snorr pet while you’re still on the quest, so you don’t run into the same issue I did.

Let’s have a look at the magical Dream-Infused pets you can collect in this system and go over their corresponding pre-requisite pets:

The Dreamborne Scarab can be unlocked for purchase once you have one of the Primal Beetles from the Zaralek Cavern content, including Paulie, Rango, or the wild pet, Endmite.

Dreamhoof requires one of the Dream Fawn pets available from the new patch content. The easiest and quickest pet to obtain is Leyhart, who’s available as a wild capturable pet in the zone. We’ll discuss how to collect the other qualifying pet models – Ivy, Juniper, Spruce, and Mitzy – a little later in this video.

Drowsey requires one of the many, many Rock Snail pets available in the Zaralek Cavern content. The list includes Bashful, Brulee, Tricky, and Roggy from the Snail Races; Scarlapod and Cobbleshell, who can be found in the cavern as wild pets; Diamondshell and Thimblerig, who come from various Niffen vendors; and Newsy, the achievement reward for hitting Renown 20 with the Loamm Niffen.

Memorie requires one of the new Fol’ya pet models, who look like druidic baby red pandas crossed with ring tail lemurs or something. I’m not exactly sure what a “Fol’ya” is, but I can tell you they sure are cute. The easiest to obtain is the Fol’ya Pup, which can be captured through the wild pet battles in the Emerald Dream. Having either Napps or Snoozles will also meet the requirement, and we’ll go over their collection methods later in the video.

Then there’s Reverie – whose purchase requires one of the other duckling pet models, including Pilot, Plucky Duckling, Wild Duckling, and Mallard Duckling from earlier Dragonflight content – or the new pet Sergeant Quackers, who I’ll talk more about later.

And finally, Somnolet – who has some excellent flavor text – requires one of the new pineshrew pets available in the Emerald Dream, including Sapnibbler, a wild pet that should be the quickest to acquire, and Dustite or Seedle who both have a couple of acquisition methods I’ll – you guessed it – describe more in-depth later in the video.

Between these battle pets, and the mounts as well, the Dream Infusion system should keep us all relatively busy in the Emerald Dream zone for awhile to come.

RENOWN VENDOR PETS

Once you hit Renown 15 with the Dream Wardens, you’ll not only get the Freshscales Fifteen achievement, but you’ll also unlock the opportunity to purchase two new pets from Moon Priestess Lasara, the Renown Vendor located in the Central Encampment at coordinates 50.28, 61.64.

Spruce and Juniper, two of the newer dream fawn models, can be purchased for the low, low price of 375 Dragon Isles Supplies each.

EMERALD BOUNTY PETS

As you explore the Emerald Dream, you’ll likely encounter an object called “Mysterious Seeds” in your loot – which starts a quest of the same name, directing you to an NPC named Sylvia Whisperbloom, a Night Elf botanist located at the Wildling Garden, a small island just northeast of the Eye of Ysera. 

Similar to how Elianna’s quests introduced you to the Dream Infusion system, Sylvia’s quests will introduce you to the basic mechanics of new mini-events called “Emerald Bounties”. These events involve planting Dreamseeds that you’ll organically acquire as you explore the zone.

Planting these seeds kicks off the 3-minute, repeatable event, where you can then nurture those growing seeds with Emerald Dewdrops. Dewdrops are another currency that you’ll acquire through events like Superblooms, Emerald Frenzies, or during these Emerald Bounty events.

At the conclusion of the event, you’ll be able to loot the completed Bloom that can include a variety of reagents, cosmetic armor, a chance at Drake Crests, and even mounts – but specific to our interests, there are also 6 new battle pets to collect!

So how do you take part? Well, these events are available virtually all the time, and it’s up to a player to begin the event. There are likely to be many available bounty locations at any given time – and the one closest one to you will be marked on your zone map with a green seed icon.

As you approach an Emerald Bounty site, you’ll either see a brown dirt pile on the ground, with a shiny, translucent green seed atop it, indicating that a bounty is ready to begin, or you may see a bloom growing within a shimmering shaft of colorful light, indicating that the bounty was started by another player, and is currently in-progress.

If you’ve found a fresh Bounty site, you can start the event yourself by planting your choice of Dreamseed. The quality of the seed planted will determine the type of reward given at the end of the event, and a few special rewards are also dependent upon the number of Emerald Dewdrops contributed.

Planting a “Small Dreamseed” gives a chance at cosmetic armor items. Planting a “Plump Dreamseed” – the important one for us pet collectors! – has a chance to reward 1 of 6 new battle pets. And planting a “Gigantic Dreamseed”, has a chance to reward a 1 of 6 new mounts.

If you’ve stumbled upon an Emerald Bounty already in-progress, don’t fret – you can still participate for the rewards by either depositing a Dreamseed of your very own, or contributing Dewdrops to help fill the bar to its maximum. Plus, all participants can earn additional Emerald Dewdrops by fighting nearby angry plants, pulling out weeds, and stomping on the tiny Destructive Weevils running around. Besides, it gives you something to do while waiting for the 3 minutes to be up!

Now let’s have a look at all the pets that can drop from the Emerald Bounties:

Dustite | Elmer | Napps | Seedle | Snoots | Snoozles

If you find yourself unlucky with the reward drops, or you want to target something specifically, the pets, mounts, and transmog can all be purchased individually once you hit Renown 11 with the Dream Wardens.

To purchase an item, you can visit either Sylvia Whisperbloom back at the Wildling Garden, or her relative, Talisa, who can be found more conveniently at the Central Encampment. Talisa also gives a worthwhile weekly quest for planting Dreamseeds, so you should definitely pick that one up.

The currency used to purchase these collection items is called “Seedbloom”, and as of this recording, it’s quite an elusive currency on the PTR, with no testers having seen it drop. So while I can’t yet share how prevalent the Seedbloom will be once the patch goes live, at least we know that there will be some alternative to the sometimes-punishing RNG.

ACHIEVEMENT PETS

There are three new pets coming in Patch 10.2 that are rewarded from Achievements.

The first of these pets is Blueloo, a blue-eyed baby umbraclaw rewarded for the achievement “Friends in Feathers”.

This achievement can only be earned while the world quest “Claws For Concern” is active, and you’ll find it in the Whorlwing Basin area, just east of its small bridged island. In this quest, you’ll be tasked with slaying twelve Umbraclaws or Podlings, and then rescuing 6 Moonkin Hatchlings along the way.

To complete the achievement though, you’ll have to rescue all 18 named Moonkin Hatchlings. They’re dotted around the quest area in sometimes hard-to-find places, like deep down in caves, concealed behind or up on the branches of trees, and in one case, even completely hidden in bushes!

Finding and rescuing all the moonkin babies before inadvertently slaying the 12 enemies can be tricky, and once you complete the world quest criteria, not only will the quest be completed, but the Moonkin Hatchlings will also despawn. With this, it could take several rounds of the world quest to come available to complete the achievement conventionally. But for inpatient collectors like me, there are options to speed this up.

The first option is to bring a few level-70 alts into the new zone to rescue more hatchlings while the world quest remains active. Having a stable of high-level alts on-hand is a vital time-saver for collectors, be it for attempts at time-limited holiday boss drops (*cough* ARFUS! *cough*), collecting Polished Pet Charms, and generally just speeding up a multitude of collecting activities.

A second – and maybe more sneaky – option is to use the game’s own quest mechanics to complete the achievement all in one go. If you didn’t already know, quests often cannot be completed while in a raid group, so if you find at least one other player to join a party with, and then convert that party to a raid group, you can freely explore the quest area, navigating to and rescuing all 18 of the Moonkin hatchlings, and get credit for the achievement without getting credit towards the quest criteria.

Completing this achievement will add Blueloo directly to your pet journal.

The remaining new achievement pets are earned within the new raid: Amirdrassil, The Dream’s Hope, which opens the week after the patch launch. The two raid achievements for these are only available in Normal Raid difficulty or higher, and are not obtainable while running LFR.

If you find yourself without access to a raid group for these achievements, and don’t want to wait a few years or expansions to solo them, I’d suggest keeping an eye on the LFG tool for groups listed for the achievements, or joining communities that help facilitate group formation.

With that said, let’s now take a look at the pets rewarded for these raid achievements:

First up is Ivy, a little doe who you’ll need to rescue from the fiery clutches of Larodar, the Keeper of the Flame, who you’ll battle in the Molten Incursion wing of the new raid zone. Ivy is rewarded for completing the achievement, “Don’t Let the Doe Hit You on The Way Out”, which requires extinguishing the flames from little Ivy (😱!?!) and keeping her alive while you defeat Larodar.

And the second pet is Sergeant Quackers, a brave little duckling rewarded for completing the achievement, “Ducks in a Row”. This achievement requires recruiting Sergeant Quackers to join the battle against the Council of Dreams, within the Viridian Weave wing.

I’m pretty sure this is the same Quackers we rescued back in The Waking Shore as part of the “Let’s Get Quacking” achievement, and I for one am delighted to see that little Quackers is paying it forward by helping us out in the raid!

Because the raid achievements weren’t available for testing on the PTR, we’ll need to wait a little bit to see exactly what is involved in completing these achievements, so make sure to keep your eyes pealed for guides here on YouTube or on sites like Wowhead for more detailed instructions.

OTHER UPCOMING PETS

There are just a few more battle pets left, and these will be coming to us Soon™(?) after Patch 10.2 launches.

Lil’ Frostwing, who looks like the frosty twin of Lil’ Deathwing from the Cataclysm Collector’s Edition, is a reward for logging in during World of Warcraft’s 19th Anniversary event. According to the in-game calendar, this event starts at 10am Pacific Time on Thursday, November 16th, and lasts for three weeks, ending at 10am Pacific Time on Thursday, December 7th.

And lastly we have three new pets that are expected to be available via the Trading Post at some point in the future…

First up is Mitzy, a Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer-inspired dream fawn who’s the daughter of Metzen the Reindeer. In case you don’t know, we encounter Metzen every year during the annual Winter Veil holiday event, as he’s the reindeer we’re tasked with freeing after defeating the Abominable Greench as part of the daily quest “You’re a Mean One…” out in the Hillsbrad Foothills.

Now, I’m not sure exactly who Metzen mated with to produce the leafy Mitzy, but if her shiny, strangely egg-shaped nose is any indication, she’s likely to grow up into the amazing sleigh-puller she wants to be.

I expect Mitzy to be available for purchase during this December’s Trading Post, and her expected cost is 600 Trader’s Tender.

Then we have the Time-Lost Salamanther. This model has been in the game files since the launch of Dragonflight, along with a number of other pets we’ve yet to see – but with the launch of Patch 10.2, it looks like we’ll be seeing this little time-traveling lizard sometime soon. Or maybe later. Time is weird like that. The salamanther should also sell for the price of 600 Trader’s Tender.

And finally, we have one of my personal favorite new battle pet models coming with the patch – Aura – a magical duckling pet colorfully-festooned in an orange flower hat and leaf-green scarf, and she’s wielding a tiny blue crystal staff. I’m hoping to see Aura come to the Trading Post very soon, and I have my 600 Trader’s Tender all saved up and ready to spend!

That’s all the battle pets we know to be coming in the “Guardians of the Dream” patch. Of course, there can always be secret additions left hidden from the prying eyes of the dataminers among us – and with this video being recorded before the patch goes live, there’s always the possibility for changes to pet availability or collection methods. I’ll try to share updates in the description if I notice anything changed.

So which of the new battle pets are you most looking forward to acquiring? And are you gonna go full-out and feverishly farm the pets as soon as possible? Or are you going to take your time and enjoy a slower pace of collecting? In either case, I hope you’re all as excited as I am to add these new companions to our pet journals.

I’d like to take this opportunity to give a big ‘thank you’ to my friends and fellow content creators, DragonsAfterDark and PattiFord, aka “Lazey”, who both dedicate so much of their time to helping provide useful information to the pet battle community at large. Go check out both of their YouTube channels and drop ‘em a sub!

<<miscellaneous calls to action 😆>>

Thank you so much for watching – enjoy your collecting, and until next time, take care.

DRAGONFLIGHT NEARS!

Hey everyone! How y’all doin’? Thought I’d dust off this blog since, well, Twitter is near imminent implosion, but more importantly, there’s LOTS of cool stuff happening in World of Warcraft coming up Very Soon™.

As Shadowlands nears its end, my guild is only raiding one night a week, and that’s to blow through 10 or so mythic bosses from the various Fated raids in order to collect some mythic upgrade tokens. This weird intermediate time where we have new talents and yet legendaries and covenant powers are still around has yielded some fun results for my particular spec, Arms Warrior. We’re in that bizarre position where – combined with our available talents – our Venthyr covenant ability Condemn has achieved HUGE VALUE in basically all content. But it’s going away once Dragonflight launches, so there’s no need for Blizz to try to balance it. We’re not as ridiculous as, say, warlocks were in Season 4, but we’re sort of a meme-worthy Condemn-spam class, and I’m seeing some funny big numbers. Not usual for little old me!

The pre-patch lands FOR REAL next Tuesday (Nov 15th), when not only will we start seeing the Primal Invasions happening around Azeroth, yielding some gear upgrades for alts, new transmog, and – of course – a new PET(and can I just break here and say, with that pet, I’ll achieve 1500 unique battle pets in the game?!? Aaaaaaah! So excited!!) – but we’ll also get access to the new race and class – Dracthyr Evokers! I have a name reserved already for my Evoker alt. I’m going to be terrible at playing “Count Dracthula”, but at least I’ll be able to get even further benefit from hitting big renown numbers for Venthyr 🙂

With the launch of this 2nd and final phase of the Dragonflight pre-patch, WoW is having a special Twitch Drops promotion where interested players can watch some hours of their favorite WoW streamers (provided they have Twitch Drops enabled!) to unlock some seriously cool in-game rewards.

First up, starting next week you’ll be able to unlock the Dragon Kite battle pet (originally from the TCG) by watching 4 hours of your favorite WoW streamer between Tuesday November 15th at 3:00pm PST through Friday November 18th at 11:59pm PST.

And then once the Dragonflight expansion officially launches on Monday, November 28th, you’ll be able to unlock the AMAZING Feldrake mount (also a rare TCG prize) for watching an eligible streamer between Monday November 28th at 3:00pm PST through Thursday December 1st at 11:59pm PST.

November 28th also launches the beginning of their “Support a Streamer” promotion on Twitch where, if you gift 2 subscriptions to an eligible WoW streamer during the time between Monday November 28th at 3:00pm PST and Monday December 12th by 11:59pm PST, you’ll unlock access to the brand new Ichabod battle pet shown below! For this promotion, “eligible streamer” means someone who’s either an Affiliate or Partner on Twitch (meaning they can accept subscriptions), and that they’re also streaming World of Warcraft while the Twitch Drops period is in effect.

The final Twitch Drop is a toy called the Perpetual Purple Firework – which was also a TCG item, I guess? This toy shoots a firework into the air that purportedly bursts into a thousand purple stars. I’m definitely going to be counting them! This reward is unlocked by watching at least two hours of an eligible WoW stream between Tuesday, December 13th at 3:00pm PST (also the beginning of Season 1 of Dragonflight!!) and Wednesday, December 28th by 11:59pm PST.

Of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that I have stepped my toes back into streaming on Twitch, and I will definitely be taking part in the Twitch Drops promotion (they kept my Affiliate status active even after nearly 3 years of crickets HAHAHAHA)! For next week’s festivities, here’s my schedule:

Be sure to follow me at twitch.tv/wonderwez and turn on notifications to be reminded when I’m live those dates! Times for the Feldrake should be similar (starting around 3:00pm PST on launch day, with 8:00am PST starts the following days), and I’ll be sure to post those final schedules on my Discord and Twitter!

IMPORTANT: To receive these in-game goodies, you must have your Battle.net linked with your Twitch account. You can do that by starting at https://account.battle.net/connections, and then following the instructions to sign-in and link your Twitch account to Battle.net.


Outside of all that excitement, I’ve been working on putting together a YouTube video previewing all the new (known) battle pets coming to Dragonflight. It’s been quite an endeavor, and I’ve already probably put in A LOT of hours researching online and in the Beta, going through WoW.tools build details, running collection theories by other pet enthusiasts, and gathering footage. I’m finalizing my script by the end of this week (hopefully) and hope to record the voiceover and assemble the video for upload just before Dragonflight launches.

For those of you who took the time to come to my blog and read all this, here’s a special preview of the script, so far!

Thanks so much for reading – what are YOU excited about right now? If you’re into WoW, what class are you going to be maining in Dragonflight, and what are some of your early-expansion goals? If you’re not into WoW, what games have you been playing? Take care, y’all!

Where Did Wez Go?

Some of you may be wondering where the heck I’ve been. The last time I streamed was in August of 2018, and I’ve been pretty much radio-silent on all social media. Well, there’s been a lot going on in my personal life, and I wanted to now share it with you friends I’ve made these last few years.

In the summer of 2018 I experienced a very long bipolar episode of depression preceded by a brief bout of hypomania. I live with bipolar type 2 disorder which for me flares in cycles every few years. During the hypomania I was awash in scattererbrained creativity – so many ideas for my Twitch and YouTube channels! The mania feels great for me, with heightened self-confidence and a sense of “I can do anything!” that rallies me in a way I don’t typically encounter.

Unfortunately this “rally” also leads me to spend more money than I should and make plans that aren’t necessarily achievable. And it is, 100% of the time, followed by a devastating depression that lingers for months or longer. By July of 2018 I was struggling with said depression. This time it was accompanied by severe anxiety which was new and terrifying for me.

I sought professional help via therapy and medication, which was unsuccessful. My depression and anxiety persisted as we tried a number of different medications over a year-and-a-half. I even ended up in a partial-hospitalization program for three weeks to try to turn the tide.

During this time I was also diagnosed with frozen shoulder (which caused me ongoing pain and stiffness for the better part of a year), PCOS, and pre-diabetes. Quite a wallop. But the worst of it was a tremor I first noticed on Christmas Day in 2018. That tremor became worse as time moved forward and moved up into my leg, and eventually my hands. It affected my ability to drive and type. My doctor referred me to a neurologist, and she preliminarily diagnosed me with possible Parkinson’s disease (either the classic or drug-induced variety). My walking was affected, as was my speech (which I had not noticed until brought to my attention). 

Also I did not feel like myself. More than just the depression, I felt fundamentally different. Nothing brought me joy. The days of gaming were far behind me but I could barely watch anything on tv or get pleasure from reading. Even checking social media was scary. I didn’t find anything funny or even remotely amusing. I spent the better part of a year on the couch watching HGTV because it was the only content that didn’t spike my anxiety.

My whole personality changed and I could barely respond to anyone with more than monosyllables. Even eating was difficult for me and I ended up losing over 100 lbs.

I was sent for what’s called a DAT scan at the University of Washington where they inject you with a radioactive substance and then stick you in a PET scan machine.  For me the results were incredibly relieving: I had drug-induced Parkinsonism (DIP). My dopamine (the chemical responsible for bringing enjoyment of things) was severely hampered. And it had a chance of being eliminated by merely ceasing the offending medication.

Fortunately (and unfortunately), the medications I had been on to treat my depression were not doing their job anyway (and the DIP made it impossible to tell otherwise) so I ceased them at the end of last year. My tremors slowly went away, and as of very recently I’ve noticed my dopamine response is more normal; I’m feeling more myself. 

I’m able to watch stuff on tv and actually laugh at stuff. I’m able to hold a conversation with Mr Wez and others (and even crack jokes). My voice is back to normal, less stilted and weak. My enjoyment of food is back (thanks for the extra 20 lbs!). And finally, I found myself able to play and get some fun out of games. And, folks, it’s been SO LONG since I’ve had any fun in games. Crazysauce.

There’s been some other family stuff that’s been going on that is still lingering that I won’t go into detail here that is quite heavy and is affecting me deeply, and of course with these self-isolation times upon us everyone is affected by a new and unpleasant state of affairs. I hope that you are persisting as well as you can through this and that you and your loved ones come through this without lasting negative effects.

You likely won’t find me streaming anytime soon (I still have a smidge of anxiety), but thankfully I’m still here. Finally.

My Grand Return is Booked!

CHARITY_ANNOUNCE_02

That’s right, I’m coming back!

After an unexpectedly long absence due to illness, I am planning to return to streaming with a new, updated streaming setup (woo!), and what’s even better – a charity streaming goal for the month of May. Help me kick off my fundraiser for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital PLAYLIVE as I kickoff Phase 2 of the WonderWez Twitch channel THIS SUNDAY, April 29th, 2018. I’m planning to stream from 10am-4pm Pacific Daylight Time, though we may go longer depending on how much fun we’re all having.

This will be my first charity stream of several throughout the month of May. I’ll be doing these on weekend days, so hopefully if you can’t make it this Sunday, you’ll be able to hit up one of the future days (stay tuned for the future dates listing!). I’m planning to stream World of Warcraft while leveling a new character that early comers can even help me create! I’m planning some fun little incentives for donors, and when we hit certain milestones, I’m planning some epic future streams including a synth music stream for hitting $250, and a live drumming stream for hitting our $500 goal. (Seriously that drumming stream would be AWESOME!)

I’m also excited because I’ve spent some time this month investing in some new gear for the stream, including a new camera, an extended soundboard, among others. Also I’ve spent some time implementing some new features including new alerts, and customized minigames for your chatroom pleasure.

I really hope you all enjoy the upcoming streams. I love livestreaming and have really missed it, so I’m so glad to be coming back! Until Sunday, take care!

 

January is rockin’ this year!

I remember last January…

Twice in the emergency room. Coughing, back outta whack, vertigo as the cherry on top. I was completely reliant on Mr Wez for everything. I spent most of my time on the couch with pillows propping my legs up, watching Parks and Recreation and The Office over and over just to stay sane (thank goodness for Netflix!).

It was… unpleasant, to say the least.

I’m so happy to report that this January is frickin’ amazing so far. Let me count the ways:

  1. I am totally rockin’ the #52HikeChallenge. 26070619_1079345728874818_3837704131112337408_nI’ve completed 4 of the 52 hikes I promised to complete this year and it’s not even the middle of the month! Four. I’ve hiked in rain, hiked when I was sore, hiked ’til I felt like throwing up (okay, that moment was not my best but I assure you I was totally safe and am just super deconditioned!), and have increased my distance each and every time. If you’re interested in following my hiking endeavors more closely, check out my “WanderWez” Twitter account for updates, photos. etc.
  2. I’m feeling strong. I haven’t been really sick this season with cold or flu, and even with all the hiking I’m not feeling super sore for very long. I’m a little tight and wobbly the evening after a hike, but by the next morning I’m rarin’ to go. I purchased some new hiking boots on New Year’s Eve and my feet are loving them. It’s so nice to be able to hike without my feet aching for days afterwards! As for not being sick, I’m planning to get a flu shot this week (I’m late, but the flu’s bad this year peeps – go contribute to that sweet herd immunity!) so hopefully I can dodge that bullet.
  3. I’m having fun with my streams! I’ve been focused on playing what I want instead of what I think will “score me more viewership”. I had a LOT of fun streaming classic The Oregon Trail, re-living my 5th grade cross-country adventures, not killing off all my in-game pioneer family, and using my hillbilly accent. I need more games where I can read aloud ‘cuz it’s, like, my favorite thing! I’ll admit, my streams have mostly been me playing PUBG – and I’m happy to report that I feel like I’m getting mildly better. I’m seeing small improvements to my engagements with other players, and have even run my first squads ever with Erin over at Let’s Make Friends (one of my favorite partnered streamers!), and some duos with Snoozzzalot (another fave streamer!).
  4. My mood is good! You may not know this, but I live with recurrent depression. It rears its ugly head pretty often in my life, sometimes just threading its way into my thoughts and other times completely capturing my whole being such that I can’t even get out of bed. I wouldn’t say I manage it very well, but for this holiday season I haven’t had any issues and I’m feeling really steady so far this year. My hope is that with all the hiking I can keep the good chemicals firing.

I hope all of you are also having an amazing January. I’ll report back on my resolutions progress (or, what I realize I should’ve called them: “Wezolutions”!) as the end of the month nears, but (spoiler alert!) the drumming hasn’t happened yet. Ruh roh, better get on that! 😬

Happy New Year! 2018 Edition

Wasn’t 2017 just awful? Like, I experienced a lot of nagging, near-constant terribleness throughout. A whopping case of bronchitis at the top of the year led swiftly (and directly) to throwing out my lower back, which kept me bed-ridden for like a month. I battled vertigo, I re-injured my back right before a big birthday trip (which was thusly cancelled), and then strangely I developed an acute case of debilitating tendinitis in my right hand that I suffered with for over a month (as soon as my back felt good again, naturally) , that only a ginormous shot helped relieve.

Not to mention we got the biggest lame-o president ever, here in the States, but that’s just, like, macro-level stuff that I can’t even fathom right now.

Suffice it to say: I’m so done with 2017.

[A little aside here that it wasn’t all bad – some really cool stuff happened in 2017, too: I completed my 2017 Goodreads Challenge by reading over 24 books (averaging 337 pages!), and I became an Affiliate on Twitch and made a bunch of new friends online who are totally stellar humans!]

goodreads

But as the year came to a close and I spent a couple of amazing weeks with Mr. Wez and Benny, I felt really buoyed and optimistic about this new year. Assuming my body doesn’t murder me this year, it can only get better, right? (Best not to check King Orange-One’s tweets right now…)

So as the December days crawled towards their end and January was nearly upon us, I began to imagine what I wanted to do with myself in 2018. How could I take the proverbial reins and find some absorbing challenges for myself that would give me a sense of ownership in this time of my life where everything feels like super cray-cray? A few things sprang to mind, and I’ll share them here!

In no particular order:

Stream more, but don’t take it as seriously. This first half of this would be almost impossible not to do since I had to take a bunch of time off in 2017 when my back and hand went out. I’m going a step further and extending my hours by two each streaming day (starting at 2pm pacific time instead of 4pm). As for the not taking it as seriously: I’ve been approaching streaming as a job. I track my income, keep receipts, constantly strive to improve quality, pay a lot of attention to followers gained and lost… Only one of those is really valuable right now, and I’ll let you guess which. I need to take a step back, breathe a bit, and take stock in why I got involved on Twitch in the first place: it’s a platform I totally dig, using technology I totally dig, whilst playing videogames (which I also, totally dig). I’m gonna work at taking the “work” out of streaming. And who knows, maybe more fun = more friends?

goodreads2

Continue reading. I set my 2018 Goodreads Reading Challenge goal to 18 books – splitting the difference between 2016 and 2017, because while I still wanna push my reading, I wanna spread out my bonus time to more endeavors. I still can’t believe I’ve completed these challenges two years in a row! Would you like to take the challenge with me? Feel free to find and friend me here on Goodreads!

Drum more. Many of you may not know that I was quite the accomplished little drummer girl in high school. I was in all the school bands (marching band, drumline, jazz band, wind ensemble – I even made the All-American High School Band!), and was also in my fair share of cringe-named rock bands who played even-more-cringe-named venues (“The Vampyr Lounge”, which was an early-90’s era local coffee shop **cringe**). I have an amazing Roland V-drum kit gathering dust in the guest room and I can’t believe I don’t play it more. It’s always so fun (and quite the workout!), so I’m promising myself to play at least once a week – even if for only one punishing Queens of the Stone Age song!

Get outside. I love hiking. Like, more than I should what with having clumsy, arthritic feet. 2014 was the year I got serious about hiking and exploring the Pacific Northwest – I never felt so empowered and adventurous! 52hikeI wanna get back to ascending those heights, walking through tree-filled forests, and generally getting the good kind of sore and sweaty. I have a lot of conditioning to do, but what better way to do it than attempt the #52HikeChallenge? I stumbled across this challenge on Instagram and while it seems daunting, it also totally seems doable. WanderWez is born! I’ll be sharing more of my hiking exploits here and on Twitter, so stay tuned.

I think that’s more-than-enough resolutions for me this year. I feel like this list is more the embracing-one’s-wants type of list than a rejecting-one’s-flaws type, and I feel pretty great about that. What resolutions have you made for yourself for 2018?  Share in the comments!