Good morning and Happy Wednesday! Thanks for reading today.

I am currently felled by allergies (which I didn’t even have until a year or so ago — aging is great), so I spent the day watching a couple of documentaries I’ve had on my watch list forever.

The one that really affected me was Life Overtakes Me (Netflix), a 2019 Oscar-nominated short documentary about refugee children in Sweden who just …opted out of life after severe trauma. They suffer from what’s known as “Resignation Syndrome,” in which children slowly stop speaking, interacting, eating, and, eventually, being conscious. Instead, the children exist in what we would call a “persistent vegetative state,” not living, not dead, but somewhere in between. As Swedish doctor Elizabeth Hultcrantz told The New Yorker, “I think it is a form of protection, this coma they are in. They are like Snow White. They just fall away from the world.”

These children aren’t sick with anything medically diagnosable. They are simply sick of the world.

The trauma the children in the film have faced is unfathomable. One young girl was raped by four men while her mother was away fetching water. Another girl, only five years old, watched her mother being beaten and tortured by a group of men while her father was out. And while some have cast doubt on the legitimacy of Resignation Syndrome, it’s hard to imagine the children in the film are acting, especially as they are all being fed via feeding tubes. In one scene, we watch a mother learn to make sure her child has swallowed the melted ice cream she spoons into his mouth with the help of Hultcrantz.

All the children in the film are refugees, and all exist in a strange limbo while they wait to find out if their families will be allowed to stay in Sweden or will be sent back to their home countries, where, presumably, retribution awaits. One child in the film, Dasha, returned to school after her family’s unsuccessful asylum hearing and promptly told her kindergarten class that she was returning to Russia, where she and her family would be killed.

While initially, Resignation Syndrome was only documented in Sweden, and only among children in refugee families, it has since been reported among refugee children in other parts of the world, most notably in an offshore Australian refugee detention facility in Nauru, Micronesia. Does it exist elsewhere in the world? Why does Resignation Syndrome only affect the children of refugees, and not more children who experience trauma? As far as my research can tell, we don’t have an answer to that; in the same way, we don’t have an answer as to why some abused children develop Dissociative Identity Disorder (formerly known as Multiple Personality Disorder) and others don’t.

For now, Resignation Syndrome is believed to be a culture-bound phenomenon exclusive to immigrant children in Sweden. Miraculously, once the family has hope of survival, the children often awaken. By the end of Life Overtakes Me, Dasha is awake, alert, and riding her bike, repeatedly asking her mother if she was sleeping. Her recovery began after her family’s asylum in Sweden was granted. While many doctors are dubious of the Syndrome as a medically diagnosable condition, it’s clear that this is a trauma response that only the child can explain.

This is a long way of saying that I was thinking about the children being held in ICE detention camps all over the US, and imagining how much easier their lives would be if they could simply fall asleep until all of this is over. According to The Marshall Project, 6,200 children have been detained in Trump’s second term, more than 10 times more than were held at the end of President Biden’s term.

The American Academy of Pediatrics has maintained that any amount of time spent in detention can cause long-lasting trauma to children. Currently, the Flores settlement is the only thing standing between detained children and even worse conditions. So of course, the Trump administration is fighting it.

Children in ICE facilities is one of those things that we all should be yelling about, constantly, but there are so many things to yell about. As with everything else, their plight tends to get lost in the daily churn of the news cycle. It makes me feel ashamed. What kind of human being am I if I can’t find ten minutes in my day to advocate for the most vulnerable amongst us?

British psychologist Mikael Billig says in Life Overtakes Me that a long period of uncertainty after trauma is devastating for a child, adding that safety and security are the “basis of rehabilitation.” I found a few groups in the US that are working to provide that security for immigrant and refugee children — The Young Center and KIND. Both provide a myriad of ways we all can help. Let’s all help.

In other news: Road Rules Secretary of Transportation (and formerly NASA) Sean Duffy has been filming a reality show for seven months; Epstein’s pal was at the unveiling of the golden calf; Kash Patel agrees to take an alcohol test during congressional testimony (what?); and The High Note.

Here we go.

Not only is former Real World contestant Sean Duffy the current Secretary of Transportation, but he was also the administrator of NASA from July to December of 2025. That’s interesting because, since October of 2025, Duffy has been filming a reality show with his family, which includes the insufferable Rachel Duffy (if you know, you know. Team Pedro 4ever).

You can take the Road Rules out of the boy, etc. Not only was Duffy doing all this while ostensibly holding down two jobs for the American taxpayers — to be fair, he’s not very good at either job — but the entire thing was bankrolled by companies he’s supposed to be regulating.

There is literally nothing these assholes won’t set up a shell corporation for. Is this more or less out of touch than George Bush’s motorboating after telling us all to save gas? I’m going with more. Anyway, I suffered through Rachel Duffy on my screen once already; you couldn’t pay me enough to do it again.

This is your weekly reminder that not a single man who went to Epstein Island to hang out with trafficked underage girls has been sent to prison.

But wait, it gets worse.

Not only did Pierce attend the unveiling of the Golden Calf, he cut the ribbon. I went to look up Pierce, because his name doesn’t ring any bells, and “child actor” is a pretty generous term for a guy who showed up in two Mighty Ducks films and First Kid with Sinbad. Either way, he sucks.

I defended many DUIs as a public defender, and one thing I always told my clients was to refuse the breathalyzers and field tests. They are designed so that you fail, even if you’re stone cold sober. There are tricks to pass the field tests, and breathalyzers are infrequently calibrated, and you can actually test higher after you’ve sobered up than when you were drunk, especially if you’ve eaten.

It appears that no one passed that info on to Kash Patel, and thank God.

I researched the “audit test”, and it’s exactly what I thought it was — a self-reported assessment of alcohol usage, which is easy enough to lie about. CHRIS. Next time, have the breathalyzer sitting next to you and ask him to take it in front of the whole committee. Hell, you could probably sell pay-per-view tickets. I’d buy one.

Anyway, I’m not a huge fan of Patty Murray’s, but I appreciated how bad she made Kash look.

SNL really nailed the casting with Aziz Ansari. It’s like Patel is cosplaying as Tom Haverford.

Each Day, I do my best to leave you with a smile on your face, a song in your heart, and the will to fight another day.

I need RFK to spend less time thinking about the sperm count of teen boys.

Hey, survive and advance out there today, kids. Don’t let the bastards get you down.

Follow Julie on Bluesky and Instagram so she can get another book contract.