Questions from the A+ Inbox were taking up such an enormous portion of the A+ Insider that we’ve decided to dedicate an entire post to answering them every month instead! We think this will be a lot of fun for everybody in the whole family. We have included as many as we can. We love you, your hair looks fantastic today!

---

WHERE’S MY QUESTION????

If your question isn’t here, that’s because:

1. It’s going to be answered or was answered on the A+ podcast
2. It’s a question that has already been asked and answered in previous editions of this column
3. It’s a question we don’t know the answer to / don’t know how to answer
4. It’s an advice question that we’ll be publishing / have published in an advice-focused post for A+ readers
5. It’s a question better answered via direct e-mail, which means we have emailed you about it, or will.
6. We messed up

---

Please note we have a big A+ advice post coming out tomorrow so if your advice question isn’t answered here, it’s probably answered there!

---

A-CAMP, MERCH, BUSINESS AND TECHNICAL CONCERNS

Is this comment box anonymous? Just curious!
Yvonne: It’s not. I can see who submits the comment.
Riese: Yvonne can see your handle and e-mail when she is copy-pasting the questions from the form into this post. The rest of us technically have access to that information but I can’t think of a time when we’ve ever seen a question here and then looked up who asked it? By the time we’re in the post answering questions, I’d be surprised if even Yvonne remembers who asked.

had fomo from not buying an a-camp 6.5 sweatshirt so i took the plunge and it arrived today and can i just say: THE BUILT IN THUMBHOLES!!! i knew i loved y’all. xo
Laneia: The built-in thumbholes is like getting a free milkshake that you didn’t ask for.

Oh when you change your name on here it changes your user name. I’m not sure if I want this one or to go back to my username username. This is more a proper name.
Laneia: OR you could do something totally different! You could change your name to Estelle. Thank about it.

Omg! the thumbs up are now reversible! thank you! too many times i’ve accidentally liked something I didn’t actually like, just out of habit. lifesavers! you are lifesavers!
Heather: Yes, same. Sometimes I even accidentally liked posts of people who were yelling at me and so then I had to get on my phone and give my own post an extra like to even out my mistake.

Merch requests: bring back the teal scissoring t-shirt and “lazy femme” shirts? They’re my fav and are starting to get old. I would like to replace them or re-buy them at camp again!!
Heather: Okay, but guess what? The news shirts are EVEN SOFTER than those ones. The teal scissoring shirt was my favorite too but the Lavender Menace one feels like being wrapped in a cloud!

So this is ironic but I lost the search button
Laneia: Tbh it doesn’t really work anyway.

Hello Auto-pals. Could there possibly be a like or kudos style button at the bottom of articles as an alternate option to a comment? Recently there have been lots of articles that I really wanted to show support/appreciation for but didn’t have time/emotional wherewithal/didn’t feel it was appropriate/didn’t have anything to add/etc to leave a comment and felt like needed to do something and being able to give kudos or whatever would have been a great solution.
Laneia: We tried that for a while and then abandoned it for a reason that I’m sure was very good and accurate at the time. Does anyone remember why we abandoned it?
Riese: Because people stopped commenting and also it made writers feel bad who published articles in less popular but still crucially important topics.

Hey, I upgraded to Gold membership in October last year and paid for my first full year’s membership at gold level at the beginning of March and haven’t heard anything about receiving my perk (tote bag or T-Shirt). Is this still something you do?
Riese: Yes it is still something you do! Specifically, it’s something I do. Yup, me, I’m the one who addresses your envelopes and mails your shirts & stickers (although I often have help from various unlucky souls who have come over to my house thinking we’re going to do something fun). When you check out it says to expect your items to arrive in 2-4 weeks, and that’s ’cause I do the mailings once a month — twice a month if we’ve had a huge membership push or boost in there somewhere. So if it’s been a while it’s likely you signed up like THE DAY AFTER the most recent mailing. Your stuff should definitely be on the way!

Okay, so this is a stupid question you’ve probably answered but is the calendar coming back? I miss it.
Riese: We miss it too! We’d really love to figure out a way to do them again, but the problem is that the cost of making the calendar was always way more than the revenue earned selling the calendar — back at the start when everybody was slaving away for free, our photographer and stylists and assorted photography-adjacent humans were down to do a ton of work for free, but that’s not something we or they were able to do for the long term. The cost of renting a space, doing the shoot, getting the models (who are unpaid!), wardrobe, makeup, etc., is several thousand dollars, and printing is another several thousand, and we’ve never really managed to sell more than 250 calendars. Because people don’t use calendars anymore! But I miss it. I miss having regular sexy original photo shoots, in general. I’m going to think more about this.

oh wow oh wow!! I’m seeing pics of the new A Camp sweater on instagram and I’m just going to be regularly checking the store until they are posted because I NEED ONE! SO cute!!!! Best design yet!! So perfectly camp!! Wish I was there!
Riese: I WISH YOU WERE THERE TOO because then you could have one of these wonderful sweatshirts! Unfortunately they won’t be in the store — they’re in storage, because they’re super heavy to ship back and we rarely are able to sell A-Camp merch through the store. But they’ll be on sale at next year’s A-Camp!

Lol the banner ad on Autostraddle for me right now is a National Weather Service alert for Vermont I think?? It just made me laugh because first of all, I didn’t know that the NWS paid for ads? Also I live in Tennessee and we’re having pretty much ideal weather here today but anyway I hope everyone in Vermont is doing okay?!
Riese: They probably are because there are so many trees and also Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream! But the ads are determined usually by cookies, like the little robots that follow you around on the internet. Like I went to Wildfang yesterday so now I’m gonna see Wildfang ads everywhere for the rest of my life, maybe even on the inside of my eyeballs.

take me back to camp pleaseeeeee
Riese: HARD SAME

Merch suggestion: car bumper magnets. Would love to rep AS driving around my city.
Riese: PEOPLE PUT MAGNETS ON THEIR CAR BUMPERS? I’d love to do a survey of everybody driving behind you to see what they think “Autostraddle” means in the context of a magnet on an actual automobile.

OMG! Those new pins <3 <3 <3 <3
Yvonne: Aren’t they super cute? Ugh, so good!

You’re doing great work. I am having an autoimmune flare and Autostraddle has been a beacon of light I can spend time with while in bed. Thank you.

ALL-CONSUMING NEEDS TO SHARE

hello! I was just on tinder (as part of my new project to go on 100 first dates) and one girl was in a galpal tee clearly taking a queer in the kitchen photo! It made me so happy to know of the existence of other straddlers in the real world!
Laneia: ?

2017 is my year of finally taking care of my mental health issues and facing up to responsibilities that I’ve avoided for so long! I decided that if society is going to hell than I’m going to fight really hard to sort my personal life out, in defiance and resistance. I got anti-depressants, an awesome therapist, and finally a sense of pride for the healthy lifestyle choices I’m making. Self-care to smash the patriarchy! Also, the “Feelings Rookie” column has helped so much to make me realize I’m not alone. Thanks Molly! Thank you AS!
Molly: Any sort of joy you can take in yourself at this point is resistance. The work you’re putting into yourself is amazing, and it’s an investment you can control and you know will pay off. To me, this touches on the idea of spheres of influence and our capacity to instigate change: If you can start with yourself, you have a better shot at affecting the concentric circles further away from you. The more solid you are as you, and the more confidence and happiness you can find there, the less you seek it from wells outside of yourself. It’s an incredibly difficult choice to make, so congratulations and I wish you continued success on your work. Thank you for taking care of yourself, because it only betters the community as a whole.

HI APPARENTLY I WAS BIRTHED OF FIRE THIS MORNING AND I AM PRETTY MUCH IN THE ‘WHERE ARE MY DRAGONS’ STAGE OF MY FEMINIST JOURNEY I HOPE YOU ALL HAVE THESE DAYS <3
Rachel: I have truly no idea what this means but I couldn’t be more thrilled for you
Riese: IS THIS A GAME OF THRONES REFERENCE REGARDLESS I AM PLEASED TO HEAR YOU HAVE BIRTHED FROM FIRE, ARE IN SEARCH OF YOUR DRAGONS

okay okay okay this girl and I both went through shitty breakups in the same week and then we started talking and bonding over it and got really close and then oops I have a crush on her and oops she has a crush on me but we’re not ready to date yet and neither of us is about to go date someone else and this has been going on for two months but we’re basically dating minus the part where you say that you’re dating and ITS VERY CONFUSING
Riese: It sounds like you’re doing okay except for feeling pretty confused all the time! I think just be careful and sure that you aren’t falling into codepenency on another person before you’ve had time to fully regain your own sense of self. Prior to my most recent breakup, I hadn’t been single in about a decade, ’cause I just kept hopping from one thing to the next, and I think I never gave myself the chance to recover and get to know myself and get a solid grip on who I am and what I want from another person before going into a thing with that other person. So I think if you can keep it low-key and be sure you’re still taking time for yourself you’ll be okay. There’s a little hole inside you and you have to let it heal instead of just throwing a bandage over it, if that makes sense.

I just asked my gf if she thought a celeb I find hot was hot and she said ‘yeah she looks like you’… :) got the feeling this only happens w queer ppl lol.
Riese: Was the celeb Leonardo DiCaprio

my friend agreed that i could go on a date with her ex-gf (she’s moved on and is happy with her new gf of 2ish yrs). we went on the date, it was great. i spent the night at hers. a few days later my friend decides actually it is too weird. now she’s not talking to me and i’m like… banned from seeing/talking to her ex. fucking. hell. i wish there were more bloody lesbians in the world so that i never had to get into ridiculous situations like this. i miss my friend deeply and im rly fucking sad about the loss of what seemed like it could have been a great thing with her ex. boo :( i feel like my friend is being kinda unreasonable but also like… i get that emotions are weird and hard. im just rly bitter abt the whole thing tbh.
Riese: Ummmmm I’m gonna give your friend a hard NOPE on this issue. She’s being selfish and unreasonable. She’s in a new relationship with a new person and apparently has been for 2+ years. The lesbian community is an itty bitty thing, and dating each other’s exes is an unfortunate fact of lesbian life. If they’d just broken up, or her ex was an evil asshole who ruined her life, this would make slightly more sense. But I’d like your friend to make a reasoned, logical argument against this situation that involves facts rather than vague feelings. She cannot “ban” you from talking to her ex. You can talk to whoever the fuck you want to! Go have sex with her ex, would be my advice. If I were your friend’s girlfriend I would have zero patience for this as well, I’d be like “what’s your damage??!!!”

Hi Autostraddle. My girlfriend of about four months broke up with me last night. I am still unsure of why, although I have guesses (she’s about to graduate college, she doesn’t know what she wants, she isn’t out to most of her family yet, etc.). Anyway, I wouldn’t have had the courage to start dating women in the first place two years ago if it weren’t for this website and all of your helpful articles and advice about how to be queer and dating and sex and stuff. And now I’m looking at all your articles about break ups and bookmarking them for later when I have more feelings or whatever. Right now I just feel kind of numb and shocked about it? Maybe it’s because I haven’t had coffee yet. So thank you for doing what you do! <333
Heather: I’m so sorry you’re going through a breakup but it sounds like you’ve got some good perspective on it and also that you know we’ll be here with you through that and also here with you when you fall in love all over again! I hope your coffee was extra delicious.

I went to my alma mater’s geek con this weekend up in western MA and it was amazing. So many people doing amazing things. So many panels and vendors doing amazing queer things. So many awesome young people on the con staff learning event planning early on who will graduate and become even more amazing. I was on my way back home, and I was like, “Wow. This is a tiny slice of queer geek heaven with the best conversations.” I was lugging all of the comics I bought from Modern Myths and a few from other vendors and I was super excited. I made the mistake of checking my work email on my ride back home and learned that the FotF bus was in the town I live in today, a stone’s throw away from the campus where I work. And now I’m angry again. I’m having a lot of not-very-positive feelings. Why can’t we have nice things? Why did I check my work email on vacation? Oh, and BTW, y’all were mentioned in at least a few panels, especially Mey’s comic writeups.
Heather: Yes, I totally understand that feeling. I felt like that when I came home from camp. Actually, I feel like that even if I check out on the news for like an entire weekend day. It’s so overwhelming to come back into the real world. I’m glad you had fun at the geekcon, though. I hope you got some super cool queer and feminist prints!

I JUST FOUND OUT MY CHILDHOOD BEST FRIEND IS ALSO GAY!!! My college friends started coming out after we graduated but I had no idea the “queer women find each other even before we know” thing went all the way back to childhood THIS IS THE BEST DAY AND MY BEST LIFE.
Rachel: EVERYONE IS GAY I’m so happy for you and your best friend!

I wish people wouldn’t assume that what they learned decades ago at school in humanities classes was the same sort of objective truths as simple mathematics. Humanities are just that – human and based on human opinions and hopefully making the world a better place for humans. They should just pick up modern books and keep up to date with modern ways of seeing the world which are slightly less biased than in the past (I say slightly) and form their own opinions. Sorry this is probably not the right place to vent but I want someone to read it and that wouldn’t happen if I kept it in my diary.
Heather: Yep, I wish that too. I wish that every day of my whole entire life.

I can’t find any poptarts and I really want to eat a poptart but I don’t want to go to the store, so.
Rachel: Can you let us know how this worked out? Did someone get you a poptart???

Yvonne: I have been in similar situations and usually I end up going to the fucking store. Sometimes you just need ice cream or Lucky Charms, you know. I hope you got your poptart too!

Hey! You should really get your photos printed. You know, the ones on instagram, or your phone, or your Facebook, or whatever. One day the Internet might implode, and you won’t have any physical evidence that your dog existed, ya know? And don’t get it done at Walmart. Their print quality is terrible & you deserve better
Rachel: Hm, fair point!
Riese: BUT I ALREADY HAVE SO MANY PAPER RECORDS OF THINGS I’M BURIED IN THEM

So my lesbian friends on my derby team are having a baby, and for their baby shower next month, they have asked that instead of regular gifts, we all bring a BOOK! And I’m so excited that I sent this article of yours to everyone on my derby team, encouraging them to buy a book off this list. Thanks for the great recommendations! I love books, especially children’s books, and especially socially-concious queer children’s books! I’m honestly so excited for this kid!
Rachel: This kid is really starting things off on the right foot, you’re right. Honestly a little jealous?

Everyone has the right to their own reproductive choices of course but there’s this cis guy on the TV who wants to be sterile cos he’s aspie and he doesn’t think he could cope with a kid who was aspie. Seriously is this the propaganda being put out that we’re so bad/unmanageable that nobody could cope with us as a child? Ugh mixed feelings about this. I wish he’d just said ‘I don’t think I’d make a good dad’ then I could be on his side about it. He also seems to think women make a habit out of poking holes in condoms. Just so sad. #mixedfeelings
Riese: I have to tell you something about the media — the media LOVES a contrarian who’s willing to degrade a group he is a member of. A Black person who thinks reverse racism is real? Media loves it! A gay person who doesn’t think gay people should be allowed to raise children? MEDIA LOVES IT! A trans person who regrets getting gender affirmation surgery? CALL THE MEDIA! So, this guy on TV is not representative of anything besides the media salivating over people willing to throw themselves under the bus.

I think I’m going through a friend break up. Its been difficult between us for a couple of months and I’ve asked to meet up to talk about it, but it seems like she has no interest in doing that. Man, it hurts.
Yvonne: Listen, I’ve been through some hard friend breakups. They can be confusing and complicated and they cut deep. I don’t know who broke up with who or maybe it was a mutual thing, but sometimes not speaking to each other is for the best in the meantime even though I know how much it can fucking hurt! One thing I regret the most is not telling my ex friend how she hurt me and why I wasn’t engaging with her anymore. We ghosted each other and that was the end of it. That’s probably not helpful at all but just know I feel you!

I’m vaguely bi so I’m not biased but I wish there could be at least one movie where all the gay stuff was text and all the straight stuff was just subtext.
Riese: I wish there could be a movie where the gay stuff was text and the straight stuff was no-text.

why does spring mean finding a hot girl to kiss me and hurt me and then dump me because she likes me but her life is too complicated why does spring always hurt like this
Riese: I think because it always feels like everybody else is outside frolicking in the sunshine and flowers like they’re in The Sound of Music and it always feels like the hot girl is out there in a tent holding a dewy beer and kissing someone else even though she probably isn’t and there are other people inside feeling sad too. But sometimes spring hurts like this because then when you finally have a good spring, damn the whole sky opens right up! Last year I had the worst spring and maybe some other year I’ll have a good spring. You will too.

Just had a physical and having a lot of conflicting feelings because was triumphant to discover I am Very Healthy (since I am also fat) but then remembered that the healthy bodies = valid bodies thing is bullshit and I don’t need my doctor to validate that my body has the right to exist and get taken care of and be happy in its space, but I still feel very happy to be healthy and oh well. LIFE, man.
Yvonne: I’m happy for you!

Dramamine is just benadryl with an added stimulant that’s similar to caffeine and zzzquil is just straight up benadryl and both are probably more expensive than store brand benadryl tablets; I’m Mad About It
Rachel: Wait but we can all just buy benadryl, right? Laneia’s wife Megan tells me to just buy benadryl and I believe her

Yvonne: I was in the Bay area recently on vacation and my partner and I went to Muir Woods, a beautiful national park full of redwood trees. If you aren’t familiar with Muir Woods, you go up a windy road to get to it. I had visited with my family when I was 14 and I remember getting motion sickness and throwing up on the way down. This time around, I was going to be prepared and take some Dramamine! But then I wasn’t totally sure if Dramamine made you drowsy and I was going to be driving so I looked it up to make sure and one of the side effects is indeed drowsiness. So I had to go back to the grocery store to get non-drowsy Dramamine and it worked! Yay!

New definition of music that’s a ‘guilty pleasure’. Music that’s produced by bad people. Toby Keith = guilty pleasure.
Rachel: Ohhhhhh like how I feel about Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream?”

you know you might be ace spectrum when: you read the excerpt from lesbian sex the zine thinking about how the writers seem really in touch with their emotional needs – and only end up squeeing when you see their adorable dog on Instagram
Heather: Share that adorable dog Instagram with us!

y’all I saw Fun Home for the first time tonight and it was SO GOOD and there were SO MANY beautiful queer ladies (and men) there and hearing 500+ LGBTQ people sniffling and wiping their tears at the same time during the show was a transcendent moment for me.
Heather: Yes! Even though I’ve read Fun Home multiple times and even though I listened to the soundtrack repeatedly before I saw the musical, I cried the whole entire time too! I’m glad the other people in your theater got it and it warms my heart right up to hear it was such a powerful moment for you!

So I met a hot woman a few days ago and she was flirting with me and I made a fool out of myself and I can’t stop thinking of it even though it’s not like I’ll ever see her again…
Yvonne: Sometimes I also dwell on when I Made A Fool Out Of Myself and I cringe and cringe and then laugh so much and then I shake it off because thank god it happened already and we can all just forget about it! I predict there will be many more hot woman who will flirt with you and you can learn from this experience and not repeat it again.

I’ve recently cemented a new life goal which is to try and get to A-Camp next year! It’ll be a trek cause I live in Ireland but I’ll have to try and make it happen somehow. <3
Riese: I CAN’T WAIT TO SEE YOU THERE! IT’LL BE FUN MY FRIEND MARY GOES TO A-CAMP FROM IRELAND AND SHE HAS FUN

Why can’t I accept being bisexual? I would rather be a lesbian. Just because I am so very slightly attracted at times to men. I can’t trust them and certainly never want to be in a relationship with one. Being with a woman is SO much better. It feels right, not like with men. But I know that I can’t lie and just choose women only. I spent my entire life not realizing that I was attracted to women. Now all my friends and family say that it’s better to be with a guy. But I don’t want that. Not anymore. I wish my brain would just switch permanently to women only. Anyhow, just needed to write it down, not stuck in my head all the time. Thanks for listening. 
Riese: If you don’t want to be in a relationship with a man, then it’s not a lie to say you identify as a lesbian? Especially if it will make your friends and family stop pressuring you to “find a man.” I mean, probably Rachel our Head Bisexual in Charge should answer this too because maybe there’s internalized biphobia going on that I’m not seeing, but I often say that I identify as “bisexual by birth, lesbian by choice” and just saying, you could do that too if you wanted to. How you identify is about your innate attractions but it can be about other things too, like your political and emotional attractions. I have no emotional attraction to men, you know?

Rachel: I think there are possibly a few things going on here, one of which may be internalized biphobia! I’d love to talk with you more about this because it seems complicated but I guess I want to tell you that a) we aren’t what or who we’re attracted to, and even more so b) we aren’t who our family and friends want us to be with! Any level of attraction you have to men (or any other gender) doesn’t say anything about you as a person. It’s just what it is, an attraction, and one you can choose to act on or not. It sounds like you don’t want to act on it at all, and that’s okay! You don’t have to! There’s a lot of messaging around the idea that people who are attracted to more than one gender are lying or misrepresenting themselves if they date anyone of one gender in specific, and that is just not the case. You’re doing just fine, bb, email me if you want to talk more, ok?

I JUST NEED TO YELL because RECENTLY, RECENTLY, PMS went from “normal lame stuff” to “for a few days, your whole body will just give up on digesting food, and it will be really fucking painful, and then you will throw up everything you idiotically tried to eat, probably in the bathtub because you’re too much of a trainwreck to deal by that point” and I’m just so deeply irritated by this development
Yvonne: Oh no! That sounds terrible! I hope you feel better now.

just wanted to tell you that you are awesomeness. All of you. The only website where I grow my brain, heart, funny bone and celeb gossip all in the same place.

HAVE YOU WRITTEN ABOUT THIS / I NEED INFORMATION / ARTICLE IDEAS

south florida opened a new lesbian bar! specifically: g spot in wilton manors. everyone should come visit me/this bar, asap. But for real, it would be cool if you guys could do an article on emerging queer women community (whether bars, community centers, yoga, tumblr, whatevs) to get away from the depression of the articles about disappearing lesbian bars/neighborhoods/websites. or maybe interview people about what queer community looks like in their city?
Heather: That’s a cool idea! Thank you!

Dear A+ team, Y’all have pets and I want to know about them. Pics or it didn’t happen <3, Ace
Yvonne: Yes, this is correct. I have a big pit/lab mix named Tungi. He’s four years old and is a puppy princess. Here he is being super handsome. You should check out Heather Hogan’s Instagram for lots of adorable cat pictures! @heatherannehogan

article or roundtable or A+ exclusive idea! some of the writers and editors talking about their educational backgrounds/what they did before they got to AS. I’m in that stage of my life where I feel like I need a ~career path~ whatever the fuck that means and it’s terrifying and I consider y’all “adults” and I want your life/career advice
Riese: I like this idea! What does everybody else think??

Rachel: I like it too! Honestly my knee-jerk reaction was that I was worried it wouldn’t be helpful because we’re all weirdos but then I remembered most people are weirdos, probably, so maybe our various examples are more helpful than I think

More (any) femme top/dom/switch articles would be awesome
Heather: Yes, okay! We will look into that! Thank you for your suggestion!

Omg wedding outfits for queers who are a few shades masculine of center but would feel weird going full on suit please
Riese: I feel like… we have done this? We could do it again, though! In the meantime, you should look at the wedding fashion tag and the lesbian wedding tag and the lesbian wedding inspiration tag.

• You Need Help: Wedding Fashion For Queers Just A Few Centimeters Femme of Center
• Queer Your Wedding Wardrobe: Last-Minute Grooms, Center of Center, Boi-Girls & Classy Cocktail Dresses

Do you guys still update the city guides? A friend and I were thinking we could write one for Madrid (Spain) especially seeing as World Pride will be there this summer. Not that we want an excuse to check out all the places again in the name of research or anything…
Riese: You should! Because we are!

Is there an autostraddle article on “how to flag”? B/c I need that! Thanks! It seems like a thing that would be on this website but I haven’t found it yet.
Heather: I do not believe we have that. I believe there was something about it one time in an A-Camp program. I will add it to my list of things to look into!

Riese: To be fair, we have been pitched about 56 articles on flagging

Food column idea: somebody tries to make some of these computer-generated recipe titles and posts the results. 
Heather: What in the heck was that dog robot when I clicked on that link?! I’ve been playing Horizon Zeo Dawn; I almost shot a flaming arrow at my laptop screen!

i got into grad school in sweden and omg i will have to learn how to be gay in a whole new place (im from england). if y’all could find someone who wants to write some AS content about queer stuff to do in Skåne, Sweden that would be amaaazing! i know tons of swedish queers read AS cos English is rly widely spoken there, so i’m sure i wouldn’t be the only one who would appreciate Swedish content! also aren’t white americans obsessed with being like ‘im part swedish actually!’ so like… a win all round??
Heather: I don’t think anyone’s ever pitched us anything about Sweden! We’ll be on the lookout!

Would you guys be interested (at all) in doing (or maybe you’ve already done??) a “things I’ve googled about my cat’s huge variety of health/body/personality issues” article? Ironic or serious or both? :) PS: I am about to spend a lot of time looking up specific food and vitamin products for older cats that have digestive issues!
Rachel: It seems SO hard to believe that we haven’t done this. Have we??? I think we worry a lot also about doing those kinds of articles because there’s always a minority of readers of them who construe them as very serious veterinary advice that we aren’t qualified to give. I think “things we’ve googled about our cats” content in general is a really rich topic to mine, though

As a newly single person, I would like to kindly request a serious 2017 review of queer dating apps. In lieu of that, I also enjoy “Can you get through this article without spending $X dollars” articles, articles with pictures of dogs/bunnies, and all things tech and science related. Also Zelda.
Rachel: Well Cecelia wrote this for you in 2016, which is sort of about dating apps but also sort of about Life, and Stef has extensively reviewed Dattch which I believe is now Her. Are there a lot of new ones in 2017? Is it obvious I’m out of touch about this? What’s up, fellow teens? I think all those other categories I feel pretty confident about us hitting organically, honestly.

Hey, I know this is probably a big ask but do you think at some point, when an opportunity presents, you could maybe (maybe?) do a short series on binding? There are so many different issues and topics in that area that aren’t covered (or are lightly) elsewhere. I know you all do so much and give so much – thank you!!!
Riese: I’d really love this a lot if somebody did this! We have done some things already for you to look at:

• Binding 101: Brands, Care Tips and Health
• You Need Help: Binding Breasts and Stretching Marks
• This Binder is Magic: A Gushing Review Of The GC2b

Idea for a beauty article: A how-to on wrapping the tips when painting nails if you have short nails. I just learned this is a thing and have no idea how to do it with my short-as-can-be nails. Is getting polish all over my hands inevitable? Thanks!
Rachel: I really hope getting polish all over your hands is inevitable because it’s definitely what I do! Maybe our fashion editor Nora knows about this. Nora, are you out there, can you hear meeeeee

column idea: interviews where couples talk about their astrology signs/ charts & how they interact
Rachel: I’m simultaneously very stressed out by this idea and very interested in it, which is probably a good sign. See what I did there? SIGN

I’d love an international list of queer friendly & esp queer focused lit magazines. My own writing is mostly poetry but I wonder if we have a variety of different writers on the site. Seems a more artsy place than most. Could you do that as one of your lit articles please
Rachel: This is an idea! I’ll put the word out! Or Carolyn will!

2 ideas/requests: garden witch aesthetic (maybe for Witch Hunt?) and queer in the garden gallery. gardening is gay, spread the word!!
Yvonne: I would be so jealous of everyone in this gallery because I wish I had a backyard or any sort of yard!

It would be great to do a “queer in the….” photo column about body parts, like your favorite or even least favorite body part. It’s nice and reaffirming to see what other people find beautiful and ugly about themselves. I did a smut-writing workshop with Virgie Tovar (amazing fat activist and sex educator) once and she had us include in our story one body part that we disliked most, and it was a really cool experience (I chose the floppy part under my upper arms).
Riese: OOOO this would also be fun for an A+ roundtable!

Ali should do an article on which music app is the best if you want to support an artist. For example, I want to cut the ITunes cord because I am super tired of their DRM restrictions and I vaguely heard that artists get more money if you buy their music on Bandcamp. Is this true? I’d love to know.
Heather: Good idea! We’ll pass this along to her!

May we please have more posts by Dorothy Snarker? Thank you for your time and attention to this matter
Riese: Her rates are far above what we can typically afford but we’re doing our best to feature her whenever we can! Because she is great!

There is this fabulous Kansas-City-born currently-France-residing jazz/blues/crossover singer Krystle Warren who has a partner she refers to as “her” and I would LOVE to read an interview with her from the Autostraddle perspective. Her music is woke and relevant and beautiful. This is her website. 
Heather: Wow, she’s super talented! We’re between music editors right now. Mey is covering for us in the interim, but she also has a lot of other duties a regular columnist and trans editor, but I’ll keep this information in my pocket for the future!

Hello, Box. Me and my Important Person have been having Conversations About Sex and Bodies and Things. It’s really interesting. We’ve just got to Part 2B, which was about names for body parts. We came up with a list of repulsive words, and a list of anatomical words, but got stuck in the middle. Did you write an article about this? Please send me in it’s direction, if so!
Rachel: I’m not sure we’ve ever done this but I’m interested in the concept! What were parts 1 and 2A? How many parts are there?? I would love to help but also I’m just intrigued!

Will you make a cycling in the desert playlist for me?
Yvonne: But like are you enjoying cycling in the desert or like are you sweating profusely and the sun is beating down on you and you don’t like cycling in the desert kind of way?

I just got home from Camp and I am experiencing a lot of feelings but one of them is that I love all of you!!! Thank you so much for all the work you do to make this amazing community possible!

I NEED ADVICE

Hey, friends. I need help. My dysphoria has been really bad lately and I was texting a partner about it last night. I was trying to talk about my relationship with my body as a nonbinary person and a sexual assault survivor. I said that a lot of the time when I have sex I disconnect from my body and enjoy sex in non-physical ways. She got really freaked out and said that if I’m disconnecting from my body it means that I can’t consent and our sex is not consensual. I tried to explain that I do like having sex, I just don’t enjoy it in the same ways that she does, but she said she couldn’t handle the conversation and would call me when she’s ready. Now I feel even less in control of my body and my sexual agency and my consent. I feel like she made her own meaning from what I said and then shut me out at a time when I am very vulnerable. I also feel bad for triggering her. She wanted me to try to open up more about dysphoria to her, and I tried to, but now I don’t feel like I can. I feel hurt and angry and shocked and guilty and confused all at once and I’m not sure where to go from here. Is she right?
Riese: NOPE NOPE NOPE. You are welcome to consent in the way that feels comfortable TO YOU. This is the problem! with! the! overzealous! and! puritan! unilateral! policing! of! consent! in! the! queer! community! If feeling disconnected from your body is a thing that does not stop you from wanting to have sex with your partner, then she needs to trust that. It’s not exactly liberating — or consensual! — for her to require you to consent in a specific manner or for her to tell you what you are or are not ready for. Her choice to police your emotional expressions has, of course, led you to feel uneasy about continuing to confide in her. I imagine you asked this question a while ago and things have evolved from here, but if this was a more recent question and is still relevant — I think you need to tell her very openly how you feel. If y’all are being triggering to each other, then that’s probably something you’ll both need to work through on your own before you can have a successful relationship with each other. And maybe that’s not in the cards! But more communication is always a good idea.

ohhhh how do you all deal with street harassment? Not just sexual harassment, but other types of harassment (for sexuality/gender expression/religious expression/race/etc)? I just had an awful encounter with a rando woman who I believe was very mentally ill who attacked my mom and I in a store and called us “lying jews” and “ugly motherfuckers” and just like all this weird stuff that had literally nothing to do with any interaction we had with her! I told her god bless you and jesus loves you and walked away until she started yelling things at my mom. at that point, I turned around and told her to not fucking talk to my mom like that, and some other things along that line and then walked away. I just feel like a) what the hell? b) i’m so frazzled, how do i release all this energy and emotion in a healthy way c) what can i do next time? I know walking away is the best thing to do, but when is it right to fight back? When is it not okay to fight back? If i’m in a crowded place does that make it more or less safe to confront someone about their actions and words?
Heather: My general rule is to always walk away. It’s not fair to have to deal with any kind of aggressive behavior from anyone ever, but you never know if a person is mentally stable or if they’re armed and so while I admire people who are able to fight back, for me, I always feel safest when I leave the situation. It’s not easy, but I always think about all the people in my life who love and rely on me and getting stabbed in the gut by some unhinged homophobe because I decided to yell back would not be very good for those people.

So often I get asked to go out and do things like trivia nights or other situations where I would be expected to be social and talk to people, but I don’t know how to say “no thanks, I don’t want to” without seeming rude, so I either make up some excuse or just ignore the message. I realize this isn’t a healthy way to interact with my friends so how I say that in a way that doesn’t make me seem rude or distant?
Yvonne: If you’re responding to friends you know well, I think it’s fine to be honest. They will understand and there shouldn’t be any hard feelings about it. Some other suggestions on what to say: “Thanks for the invite! But I’m not feeling up to it today.” “That sounds fun, but I don’t feel like going out tonight.” If you feel bad about not hanging out with your friends, you can follow up with them and invite them to something you would want attend or to hang out with you at a different time.

haaaaaaaalp me!! I finally convinced myself to go to the local queer bar alone to try to meet people in this city, and a lovely gal came over and we chatted for a while, but I think after a while she thought that I was out on my own because I was looking for strange, not because I just literally don’t know anyone. So, once she started making moves I told her I had to go and I think some other girls came up to her like “why did she leave?” and I’m so embarrassed but that’s really not why I went out and I get so weird when people assume they have sexual access to me… Can I ever go back to that bar again? I just want to meet some people in this city who are like me, but it seems that going to a bar alone is not actually a great way to put out platonic signals. Don’t get me wrong, I want to meet people to date eventually, but I think it would be a mistake to not know anyone else in the community before I start doing that….? I am the cringe emoji.
Heather: It’s totally okay to go back to that bar! You can always leave any situation that’s making you feel uncomfortable, and one uncomfortable situation at a place doesn’t mean it’s a place where only uncomfortable things happen. Even if you’d been there with friends, it sounds like you probably would have left because you started feeling a little weird about what was going on, right? So yes, it’s okay to go back and meet new people!

I need help… Last year, I had a brief but extremely intense fling with someone who lived across the country. Six months after whatever we were fell apart in a bursting pile of flames resulting in depression, I ended up moving to the same city they live in, not for them, but because it was the right move for me. I was planning to reach out to them eventually when I felt settled, but they ended up contacting me first and asking if I was interested in meeting up. I’m not sure if seeing them again would be more healing or hurtful, and as much as I’m longing to process through all of my “breakup” feelings with them, I don’t think I trust them enough to open up like that. Long story short, here’s where I need help: how do I try to create a healthy friendship with an ex who I have mixed feelings about before I accidentally end up running into them at some cool queer thing around town? Gratefully Yours, A Queer With a LOT of Feelings
Heather: I know this is not what you want to hear, but I think it’s hard to create a healthy friendship with an ex if you still have feelings for them because you don’t both want or expect the same things from the relationship so no interaction is ever really going to play out in an emotionally un-charged way. It actually might be easier to run into them at cool queer things around town. Yeah, it’ll probably be a little weird. And yeah, it might do things to your heart and to your guts. But the more you see a person from your past out and around, the easier it gets to see them out and around. And once the sting is gone and you realize you’re okay moving on, that’s when you can have a healthy friendship!

Anyone have wisdom or advice for romantic/life partnerships with a 20-year age difference? Bonus points if there’s any wisdom re. the older partner not being out as bisexual/queer, largely because of the time/place in which they grew up.
Heather: It sounds like there are two different questions here. One, the actual age gap. And two, the not being out thing. I think probably it’s better to deal with that second thing first. You have to ask yourself if you feel okay being with someone who’s not out. How will that affect your level of out-ness? How will that affect your friend and family relationships? How will it affect how you act in public with each other? If you feel okay with those answers, then you can start digging into the more general age gap stuff.

I feel crap cos almost every comment except mine has a like next to it on the Friday open thread and my social anxiety is making me think I must have said something wrong to make that happen. Tips on how not to judge myself based off of how many likes I get online?
Heather: I’m sure you didn’t say anything wrong! Us human beans are very narcissistic; we tend to like things that make us like ourselves. And also we like photos of dogs and cats. Try replying to other people’s comments as well as posting your own next time. Once you’ve struck up conversations, you’ll find friends, and once you find friends they’ll like almost every single thing you post.

AUTOSTRADDLE I NEED ADVICE. So say you’ve been kind of seeing a girl that you like that you THINK likes you back, but nothing has been said or done and you’re afraid you’ve passed the window of opportunity to Make A Move but you’ll be kicking yourself if you let it settle without finding out (but also you have v little emotional energy to have That Talk). What do you do?? What do you say so that you don’t make it weird if you read the situation wrong the whole time and really she just wants to be pals??
Riese: EVERYBODY HAS NOT ANSWERED THIS QUESTION, DON’T THINK I HAVEN’T NOTICED Y’ALL. Okay um, my friend! How do you find something out without asking… I think if you really don’t wanna bring it up, you have to either find other ways to ask or notice, like if she’s talking about dating other people, or if you’re like, talking about what you want out of life or in a partner and she chimes in and what she’s talking about might be talking about you? Or you hug her goodbye and see if she lingers for a moment right when you pull away like maybe if you both look at each other in the eyeballs like maybe you could kiss!??! then you might be able to tell. I feel like all of my suggestions sound weird because I know so little about this hypothetical! Go out dancing and see what happens? Invite her to sleep over afterwards and see if she assumes that means your bed or the couch? Sit next to her and see if she moves farther away if you move a little closer? I think you’ll be fine. I hope you’re married or not married already with a goldfish!

I’m nearly 30 and have been aware of my gayness almost all my life, and here I am suddenly attracted to a cisdude. Wtf. I’ve always kind of told myself that I’d be open to trying it, but this has my head spinning. What now?
Rachel: Oh angel, I know it’s not what you want to hear but I don’t know what now! No one does, because there’s no rule book for this. There are some things I could ask you, or that you could ask yourself — are you interested in pursuing anything with him in a real way? Is he? What would that mean? What are you worried about losing, and what might you stand to gain? What possibilities are there for joy and grief and self-knowledge in looking more closely at your identity? These are just some starting points though! There aren’t easy answers here. Maybe this specific attraction will be something; maybe it won’t. Maybe this larger realization will turn out to be a big shift; maybe it won’t. All you can do is be patient and kind with yourself and try to listen to what you want and need. Good luck bb, I’m thinking of you

I need advice. Or words of wisdom, or something. Over a year ago, I was new in a big city and started dating this woman, who was such a big part of me feeling whole again as a person after my last longterm relationship. We started dating in november, and it was like blissful, super romantic and all that. Like we went to outside concerts and held hands and drank cacao, and we walked home in the middle of the night and just bought pizza and drank wine and then fell asleep cuddling etc. And then christmas came, and I went away for vacation, and she went home to her family, and we didnt talk much, and when christmas was over, and i knew we were both in the city again, i texted her and tried getting a date. and she ghosted me. I was heartbroken, because i was really falling hard for her. Two months later i run into her, and she act like nothing happened between us, and that we are just friends. And I’m still heartbroken af about it. But then like half a year passed, and i met someone new, i was in a relationship. It ended. AND then yesterday, she came to this party my friend was hosting, knowing i was there, and stayed till the very end and followed me home, and we talked, and it was like back to how it was. Convo flowing, walking rly close and just laughing so much. When we said goodbye, she hugged me for a really long time, and i was like “holy shit, i want to kiss her. Wait no. dude she mean, remember how she hurt u!!”. And i didnt, and we walked away from eachother, and like 3 minutes later, she sends me a text and starts flirting with me. And i joined the flirting for a while, but then i was like “fuck no” so i just kindof ended the convo saying that it was really nice seeing her. And she said it back. And now i just feel a little stupid and hopeless, because goddamn, when we are together everything is like supernice, but deep down im like unsure if i can truly trust her. I have a feeling she is gonna show up in my life again soon, and I dont know if i should accept it or not. WHAT DO I DO!?!?!?
Riese: I think you have to find out what happened when she ghosted you, I don’t think you can figure out what to do next or we can help you in that process until you have a really long conversation with her about why she checked out like that, because that sounds super weird and like there had to be some other factor involved, something that happened with her when she went home for break. And then you can assess whether or not you’re afraid of that happening again. ‘Cause what she did isn’t cool and it’s a good way to drive a person crazy, and I think you have to be certain that she understands that, and also understands that she hurt you, before you can let her back in again. 

Hi Autostraddle editors! First, thank you for this website and the community you all created and work so hard to maintain. I turn to the site for all kinds of reassurance and advice on everything from home repair to swimsuits to fisting. Second, I need help. I know some of you work with your girlfriends or spouses. Do you have words of caution or encouragement for a person who will probably soon work in the same library as her girlfriend? A bit of backstory: I’m a librarian in middle management at a public library. My girlfriend is a library assistant here; there’s only one public library in our town. She used to work at the Main branch downtown with me but shortly after we started dating she transferred to a branch up the hill. Now there’s a full-time position in Circulation at Main and she wants the job. On the one hand I want to see her more often but on the other hand, I have some concerns. We’ve been dating for 4 months and everything is new and fun and seems perfect, and all I want to do is stare into her eyes and sit next to her on our bed and read. We don’t live together but I spend almost every night at her apartment because I live down the block. What if I bore her because we work in the same place, go to the same church, know most of the same people…what if we don’t have enough of our own pursuits and we start to repeat conversations on a loop and she gets bored with me? Or what if other staff members perceive favoritism? I direct library assistants in Technical Services and I get some say in staffing. What if my girlfriend eventually works in my department and other Tech Services staff think that I treat her differently because I love her? What if it’s just too much togetherness? I guess I’m not sure what advice I need. i cannot suggest that she decline the full-time job because it pays well and has a pension plan and great time off. I don’t want to get a new job. I enjoy my job and my coworkers. So if she comes to work at the Main branch and I see her every morning at work and every night at home, how can I keep our relationship from becoming monotonous? How can I keep potential work disputes from becoming fights we take home? I love this girl fiercely and our relationship works so well now. I’m worried about change.
Rachel: There’s a lot to talk about here and definitely I think there’s a lot of pros and cons to working with your person. Based on what you’ve said here, though, the best advice I think I can give is that you can say all of the things you just said here to your girlfriend. It’s totally possible and maybe even likely that she’s worried about the same things!

Riese: I think the biggest drawback is what you were talking about with having your lives too integrated to the point where you run out of new and exciting things to share with each other. But some people do this and are fine with it, it really depends on your personality and the nature of your connection. I think if you’re serious about your job, it won’t be too hard for you to maintain professional standards with her at work, I think that’s less important. But you’ll have to figure out other ways to carve out time separately from each other if you start working together, and to be sure that you’re both comfortable being honest at all times about the impact of this change on your relationship and not taking it catastrophically if an issue relating to that arises.

Is it in poor taste to go to pride in your scissoring t-shirt if you are marching with your religious group? (Quaker if it makes any difference)
Riese: My Dad was Quaker and my Mom was Jewish and I would wear a scissoring shirt to march all over the damn town!

is it weird to bring my own pillowcase when i sleep over at her house? last time she didn’t have any pillowcases (just moved) and in general i’m really ridic about pillowcase cleanliness and i just wanna know, i guess, if you would be scared off by that move
Riese: I dated a guy who did this because he had like a very serious acne-avoidance routine that required an always-clean pillowcase. For his birthday I got him custom pillowcases with his name on them and a cartoon of him playing basketball ’cause he played basketball which I thought was super cute! Anyhow, I wouldn’t think it was weird. I do that if I’m staying with someone who has cats, because if I sleep on a cat pillowcase then I might scratch my eyeballs out of my skull.

Can we talk about internalized homophobia for a hot minute? Because goddammit I experience this so much. Feeling ashamed for going to that one gay bar everytime I go out, because there simply isn’t any other place. Feeling ashamed for watching that tv show with that one gay character, because I relate so much to that character. Acting like im ok with guys sexualising me as a lesbian when I come out to them, because it makes me feel at least accepted. I’m so angry at myself, for being like this, but it’s so goddamn hard!! Like yes, i´ve accepted my sexuality, and yes I LOVE being gay, but jesus christ I deal with a lot of interalized homophobia. Been out for over 6 years now, had 3 longterm girlfriends, but still here I am: avoiding mentioning how much sad gay news bother me. Keeping my fangirling to myself because why would straight people care. Thinking about just dating a guy because sometimes that would just be a lot easier in most aspects of life. IT ANNOYS ME, WHY AM I LIKE THIS!??! I hate when people make a big deal out of gay stuff, but I also hate when they try to shush it. And when I take a step back and look at the situastion, I know deep down, that me not wanting to make a big deal out of it = internalized homophobia. Like wtf, how do I get over this. Talked to a bunch of my gay friends, and they say they feel the same, so it has to be like an actual issue in the gay community.
Riese: We get so many questions about internalized homophobia I can’t wait ’til we actually get a PITCH about it! Anyhow!

You are like this because you have been raised in a heteronormative society where gay people are degraded at worst, erased at best. You are like this because you have been raised in a misogynist sexist society where we are told that women are not enough WOMEN ARE NEVER ENOUGH and so two women, together, is two women making themselves irrelevant. That’s why you’re like this. You’ve been raised to believe that women only matter insofar as they are appealing to men, and so you respond to this sexualized affirmation from men when you tell them you’re a lesbian, because you’ve been trained to do so.

You are also probably like this because being different is always hard, whatever that difference is. And the dominant culture determines what is defined as “different.”

First of all you need gay friends. You need gay community. Because you know what? I’d never talk to a group of my straight friends about a lesbian couple I’m fangirling over either, because I don’t feel like listening to them pretend to care, even though I cared about Jim and Pam and I cared about Joey and Pacey and I cared about Lois and fucking Clark! But I don’t spend as much time worrying about my inability to talk to them about Poussey & Soso as you do because I have queer friends to talk to about my queer ‘ships.

Gay bars are haunted by spirits from long ago when gay bars were basically defined by their physical relationship to shame. They were where we could hide and drink away our anxiety and meet other inverts and deviants like ourselves, back when most gay people believed what they said about us was true. Those sprits are noisy so we have to dance and sing along and dress up really loud to drown them out, and we also have to adjust our own perceptions, to re-frame these spots as locations of defiance and resilience and strength and celebration, because that’s what they are.

So a lot of this is just practical — I think everybody, even the out-and-proud folks, feel frustrated talking to most straight people about gay stuff. It can easily feel shameful to go to a place your friends refuse to enter, like a gay bar. I think a lot of women’s spaces can feel “less than” for the same reason. And the way to fight back against that is through confidence, and I don’t know you well enough to tell you where to find your confidence but it’s there somewhere, I swear it is.

But yes, sure, some of this is internal. I know what you mean. I feel it too, sometimes, when I tell men I’m a lesbian and for some reason DESPITE BEING WHO I AM AND DOING WHAT I DO, I feel like I’m admitting to them that I’m a loser. As recently as a few years ago I’ve watched myself identify as more bisexual than I really am when I talk to men just because I feel like they’ll stop listening to me otherwise. I DID THIS. I did it! Okay, so we’re all vulnerable to it. At some point our need for confidence and pride has to overrule our self-hatred.

The funny thing is though that now everybody wants to come to our bars and our parties because everybody is realizing that we’ve been cooler than them all along! We are the ones moving culture forward, It’s queer people who started Black Lives Matter, the most important civil rights movement of our time, we are making the best TV and the best outfits.

I wanted to say thank you all, this place is a bright light in the dark and gloom of our world these days. AS is a force for good.

MISC

Where did the Bee go? Did it go extinct like the other bees?
Riese: Yes, it’s so sad that our bees were the first to go extinct. The reason is that y’all weren’t reading them and it was a ton of work for Chelsey after Grace left. Which I think is the same reason the other bees went extinct too.

I just realized Effingdykes is back! I feel like there should be a PSA. Also the article, What Lies Beneath (Her Fingernails), still haunts me all these years later. 
Riese: Okay this is getting confusing for me because i feel like every installment of this column contains somebody reporting on the backness or lack-of-backness of Effingdykes. I don’t know what to believe anymore.

Have any of you guys read this article on gay loneliness? It’s specifically about gay men so there are lots of things that aren’t applicable to the lesbian/bi or non cis community but I wish someone did the same sort of research and piece into the gay girl (by that I mean all of the above) community because I think there would be a lot of cross over. I read it a few days ago and I can’t stop thinking about it. I want to give every queer in the world a hug, but also I’m not good with physical affection so maybe just a high five.
Riese: I have and it was very interesting and touching and I also wished for the same thing that you are wishing for! I think I said so in TIRTL.

I just woke up, and as per usual began reading various newspapers on my phone before getting out of bed. The first article I read was about Katy Perry in the Toronto Star… and Riese was quoted!!! This made my day.. no other articles are going to measure up, except maybe for those on Autostraddle. Love from Toronto. Have awesome days, folx.
Riese: Oh WOW I just looked that up and there I am! The thing is that I felt very good about my point until I found out that Katy Perry actually read it and now I feel bad? Is that weird. But also I think I was pretty even-handed.

Hi! I love the “Queer in the __” series! I know tons of people have told you this already, but it’s such a good balance of the sating-curiosity/peeping people’s lives aspects of social media, but super lovely and feel good and safe-feeling! I would love to see…well, pretty much anything/everything as future themes, but I was specifically thinking: pets (e.g. Queers with their Pets), and bookshelf or bedside table. Also maybe like, Queer in your favorite shirt/outfit. Is that too niche? Idk.
Heather: This is a very good idea!

Hey Riese, how did whole30 worked out for you? Did it help reduce the inflammation?
Riese: It was really great, I felt really good most of the time and had more energy and less pain than usual. However I’m not confident it’s a realistic diet for anybody to maintain over the long term, unless you LOVE cooking. We spent SO MUCH MONEY on groceries that month, and so many hours preparing food. Also though, I’m not into meat very much, and I think if I was, it would’ve been cheaper and easier to eat. Like Kristin just eats deli-sliced turkey out of a plastic bag and tuna fish and I cannot do either of those things.

I saw a documentary tonight called Kedi all about cats in Istanbul and the first thing I thought was Heather Hogan would love this!
Heather: To no one’s surprise I can confirm that I cried literally the whole way through this documentary. I absolutely loved it.

riese what happened with you and abby? sorry if you don’t want to talk/write about it yet! hope you’re okay either way
Riese: I’m doing pretty okay now, most of the time! For a while I was very not okay, probably the least okay I’ve ever been in my life, I felt very sad and angry and my heart hurt. I used to tell her that I felt like she lived inside my ribs and she’d always be there, for better or for worse, so it was like a behind-the-ribs amputation? It’s jarring to have someone be your everything and then a few months later to not even talk to them anymore (which was my choice). I can’t really talk about what happened because I don’t think I really know, and also it’s not a neutral story. Right now the struggle is that we decided in 2015 to move to my hometown and buy a house together, which was a very specific context that enabled me to settle in to a place that is historically quite haunted for me, and also very far away from my friends, and now that context is gone but getting out of here is complicated. Fixing up the house and selling it is a huge arduous process I’ve had to handle alone — although Erin was super helpful when she lived with me for five months because Erin is my hero! Erin is so great you guys. Once I get out of here I think I’ll feel a lot better and the ghosts will stop screaming. Also I feel like I should mention that I am dating somebody else now (long-distance), and she’s really super great and she makes me laugh til my face falls off and she’s doing a very good job convincing me that love is not a lie! If this relationship doesn’t work out then I am becoming a Jewish nun, my heart is being held together with washi tape at this point

Oh my gosh this video is brilliant and will make your day. Also gal-dem is a really great uk online magazine for woc with lots of queer content. There’s a beautiful piece on the author’s coming out to her 85 Jamaican grandma X
Yvonne: Ooooo, this is an interesting publication! I like it. I’m following it immediately. Also there’s so many attractive people in this video.

I wanted to stop by to thank Heather for the “We’ll Have Sex Again, I Promise” piece (in a slightly less public venue than the comments section). It resonated with me in a big way as someone who has also been struggling with not feeling up to sex (thanks, depression). I shared this article with my girlfriend, who is wonderful and understanding, and we have reaffirmed our commitment to doing non-sexual things that bring us closer together. This piece made me feel less alone in this big scary world and I sincerely thank you for that!!
Heather: I’m very glad to hear that! Holding you in my heart as you and your partner work through your depression.

I just finished On a Sunbeam and it is SO GOOD SOOO GOOOD
Heather: Right? A boarding school! In space!

Some people have unnatural thoughts and feelings towards other people and it can be hard to explain this to kids. This is how you start. (don’t judge me ’til you’ve read the link ;) I just wanted you to have same experience I did reading it)
Heather: I did enjoy that experience and I thank you for it.

I just want to say that ever since you started doing the A+ podcast, when I read some of the pieces by the senior editors I hear them in your individual voices. I don’t mean that to be creepy, I really enjoy it. Thank you for sharing so much of yourselves with all of us.
Rachel: I think that’s cute! I mean I do it too obviously, and I think it’s great

Heather Hogan, writer of most beautiful heartbreaking things like what you posted today – firstly, thank you for putting this story into words. Secondly, I am thinking that given what you have been experiencing, if you don’t already know about Lissa Rankin and the work she’s doing, you may want to look into it. Martha Beck-adjacent with a medical background and a spiritual bent and maybe something to offer that you might need at the moment. With love.
Heather: Thank you, dear friend.

Has anyone else fallen in love with the person modeling the Soft Butch tee in the sidebar ad? I’m smitten. They’re also excellent at selling shirts because guess who just bought one…
Riese: I have! I’ve fallen in love with the person modeling the Soft Butch tee in the sidebar ad. I’m one hundred percent serious and not being hyperbolic.

(whispers) where did Carmen go?
Riese: She is working at Ms Magazine and hosting a podcast called THE BOSSY SHOW and running a website called Argot! She was here for like five wonderful years and grew and changed as a human and was ready to move on to the next thing. I’m super proud of her and happy for her and I cannot wait to see what she does next in this life.

Since comments are closed: THANK YOU for this post on prenups! It was written before I was out. I read it years ago, like 2014ish. My partner and I just finished doing our prenup, and then I realized this post was part of why I knew we should consider doing one to be kind to our future selves, and that prenups aren’t just for people like Rafael and Petra in Jane the Virgin. Major bonus is that we got to do it with two qwoc lawyers who were the best and everyone there for the signing was a queer woman, and we talked about Jane the Virgin. It was awesome.
Heather: That does sound awesome! Way to go, adulting!

Reading the comment section to Carolyn’s kink=/=queer article reminds me of this: 
Heather: Oh man, it’s never the wrong time for that video. What a great find by Samantha Bee!

A black gay man invented high fives. I didn’t know that. He was a baseball player in America.
Rachel: I think I heard this first from Mey! I hope that in the year 3027 we’re all still keeping this fact alive through the oral tradition, and also high-fiving

Dear Heather, I’m watching Carol again, and I keep expecting the Oboe to have its own subtitles, although I don’t know exactly what they’d say
Heather: It’s whisper like that part in The L Word that’s like “Shane, Shane, Shane” only it’d say “Gay, Gay, Gay.”

Sudden thought — old-fashioned snail mail / e-mail pen pals??
Riese: We did this once and it ruined Laura Wooley’s life

I just need to recommend that everybody read Becky Albertini’s THE UPSIDE OF UNREQUITED! The protagonist has two moms and a queer sister and it also deals really well with body positivity and mental health. Breaking my heart in the best way so far.
Heather: Yep! Lucy Hallowell recommended this book to me and I absolutely agree re: best way to have your heart broken.

Is it ok to be bigender and have two names and them not be ones which are male and female equivalents of each other? I’ve had my male name since I picked it out as a kid and had my other name since I was born and I don’t mind either of them but I prefer my female name to be shortened. But they’re not equivalents and I read on a website that that’s wrong.
Riese: Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm was the website “tumblr” by any chance i think you should do what you want!

I have been saving this article ever since it was published 3 YRS AGO to help me through when the time finally came to write my dissertation. and that time is here! and i was like…it is time….and went to my special bookmarks folder and retrieved said article and am so pleased at its existence. thanks past AS <3
Yvonne: Yay! I’m so glad you saved it, remembered it and used it. At the speed at which the internet and news cycle is going we collectively have an attention span of <24 hours, I feel. So it’s such an honor that you came back to an article!

This twitter thread is clearly intended to be funny but it made me sad
Heather: I’m sorry it made you sad. Your sexuality is valid. <3

So who has read the Hamilton biography and agrees with me that it’s a classic case of bisexual erasure? This guy was clearly in love with his best friend AND his wife.
Heather: Oh, Hamilton was for sure bi. I read that same biography and it was gayer than all six seasons of The L Word.

I just listened to the second episode of the podcast Nancy and and I’m crying… they are an LGBT podcast, and they have the most beautiful happy hopeful story ever in the second half. I won’t spoil to you gals, but have tissues ready. (Heads up, the first half is NSFW)
Heather: Yes! I love this podcast. I linked to them down below so everyone else can find them and love them too.

Someone should make a live action lion king where Timon and Pumba are canon. As long as it’s only bestiality if humans are involved… (they were different species)
Riese: Okay wow I did not even think about beastiality because i mean, look at every cartoon ever, animals are always falling in love! Anyhow I’m totally into this, I think we all know they are a classic case of falling for your best friend and then turning out to be a perfect couple all along.

I just went and saw The Lure last night. It’s a Polish movie about man eating mermaids and its also a musical. EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW
Rachel: The musical element was a real plot twist for me! Thank you, I wanna see this

How to stop yourself from getting into internet discussions with homophobes? SERIOUSLY I AM DONE, I’m so tired of all this “yeah I’m really tolerant, it’s just my personal opinion that gay people are sick” IT’S 2017 WHY PEOPLE ARE STILL LIKE THAT. It’s not good for my mental health and I know it will lead to nothing but I just can’t stand it and I have to react.
Heather: I don’t go to places where homophobes will be, is how I stopped myself from doing it. I unfriended them all, even my family, and I don’t read any comments on any websites where homophobes hang out.

Will Luisa ever come back to Jane the Virgin? I really miss her! :(
Yvonne: Spoiler alert: I have a feeling she’ll be in the next season A LOT more based on what happened on the last episode of the season. I missed her too! I need more Luisa action!

This video feels like an autostraddle party & the music gives me Friday warm-and-fuzzies. Also queer interracial love + bubbles.
Heather: Thank you for sharing that! It gave me warm-and-fuzzies too!

Naya Rivera and David Spade the weirdest couple since Julia Roberts and Lyle Lovett?
Rachel: Wait what??
Riese: fake news

Nsfw Is it weird to be ‘into’ pictures/video of sexy ppl (technically all genders but feminine sorts of guys and nb) but repulsed by all genitals/visual depictions of sex acts? is there a name for that?
Riese: I’m sure there is a name for that because apparently there is a name for every tiny little particularity a person could possibly have about how they experience sex and attraction. But sometimes I think those names are just a way for us to put our feelings into a box, slap a label on it, stick it on a shelf with all the other similarly-labeled boxes and then stop investigating or reckoning with where those feelings come from and what they mean. SO I refuse to name you and instead I think any way that you feel is valid, and there are so many reasons you could feel that way. We all have particularities about what we’re “into” — I’ve also never been into pictures of any types of genitals, and I don’t really know why that is, but it is. And here we are, all of us humans, liking what we like and not liking what we don’t like! What type of sexual imagery we enjoy often has zero correlation to what type of sex we enjoy (or if we enjoy sex at all), that is a fact.

Has AS ever sent a writer to the Allied Media Conference? A lot of people and projects I’ve seen at AMC have been published or covered on the site–Gabby Rivera, Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, Octavia’s Brood, e.g.–but I don’t know if I’ve ever seen direct coverage. A peek at the conference website will probably be more convincing of its relevance to our interests than any pitch I give, but it’s fucking rad and you should send someone! Their concept of media is very broad, more grassroots and more explicitly activist-focused than AS, but inclusive of the kind of work this site does as well. It’s very much led by PoC, focuses on things like disability justice and prison abolition that get a lot of coverage here, and frankly it’s gayer than most pride parades. I think it’d be both worthy of coverage and a great place to recruit some more diverse contributors. Plus it’s extremely affordable as far as media conferences go and fun. as. hell. June 15-18 in Detroit!
Rachel: I get their mailings and they do seem very cool! I don’t think there’s a specific reason we’ve never been, other than that the summer is usually the absolute most hectic time for all the AS senior editorial staff and I think we probably find it daunting to try to fit something else in, but this is a good tip and we’ll consider it!

I wish they just replaced Haley’s actress on corrie with a trans woman instead of killing her off cos I totally get why Julie quit & (narrative wise/character wise) why they couldn’t have her split from Roy & David wanted to carry on. But now there aren’t any trans women on Corrie anymore and there used to be one. Or they should just get a new trans character.
Heather: I also wish that. Gosh, I haven’t watched Corrie in a long time. Sophie and Sian 5EVER.

This really cool-seeming 3 A.M. comic would work way better if the episodes were weekly or otherwise closer to one another. All the emotional connection to the characters is lost because of the long time in this type of style where there are a lot of questions for the reader. (Which I love! But the episodes would have to be more independent (think Annas Saturday comic) for it to work in this format.) Looking forward to more cool comics on Autostraddle!
Riese: I agree! This is my dream too, I want us to run all of them in one week. I’m not sure if this dream of mine is one of the dreams people are trying to make reality for me or if it’s just a dream I expressed and everybody listened but nobody took action.

What happened to Carmen? I haven’t seen any pieces from her in awhile and I want to make sure she is doing okay.
Rachel: I think she’s doing well! She stepped back from a lot of stuff at AS to focus on a different role elsewhere that’s also a great fit for her and also she has a podcast, The Bossy Show!

Will you be chatting up Harlots at all? It queered!
Riese: I WILL.I LOVED IT AND I WILL! But I also wanna talk about sex work and I don’t know how to do that on the mainsite, but also I can’t put a TV review behind a paywall?

Dinner for breakfast is my favorite thing
Riese: Breakfast for every meal is my favorite thing

Why do we hurt the people we love?
Heather: Because humans are hardwired for narcissism and born with absolutely no impulse control. But! We can learn from our mistakes and get better and better at love every day. (And we can also learn to really forgive, which also makes us better at love.)

Hi, just thought you guys might want to check out this wlw animation clip about “a high school romance between between the clumsy, flower-adoring Yamada and the exuberant Kase-san, the school’s track and field star.” It’s based on a yuri manga and the first two volumes of which have been translated into English and released in NA earlier this year.  The official twitter tweets in English sometimes and they seem to want to know what overseas fans think. So if anyone feel inclined, they can drop them a tweet and maybe we can get a full anime series out of this! 
Heather: Thank you for sharing that! I’ll send them a tweet this very day!

Why is it ok to say ‘grow a pair’? That seems cissexist & sexist & ableist to me.
Riese: I think usually the people who say that are not the same people who even know what “cissexist” means. I personally feel like most of those types of phrases are symbolic rather than literal, buttt it’s also not really for me to decide b/c i am cis. Also honestly it’s rare that a reference to genitalia is ever the best way to craft an insult anyhow. There are much better ones out there!

YOU GUYS Be Steadwell dropped a new video and I’m very excited about it because it’s super witchy and Be is an awesome human BUUUUT relevant to the interests of several of you she drops a Harry Potter patronus reference in there ;)
Yvonne: Be Steadwell is dreamy af and such an awesome person! Here’s our coverage of her new video. 

Do any of you love the WNYC podcast Nancy as much as I do? Especially the episode with the “ring of keys” moment — that story really got me!
Heather: I do! Let’s link them so everyone else can find them and love them.

hi i miss camp and i miss you all and i’m sad
Rachel: Same, bb

how do you deal with depression ?
Heather: For me, personally: therapy, exercise, water, and plenty of sleep. Most especially therapy and exercise. We’ve written a lot about mental health. Maybe you can find some helpful personal essays and tips in our archive! Just know you’re not alone and there are so many ways to get the mental health help you need. I know it feels dark and overwhelming, but we love you and we’re glad you’re here.

Riese: Here look — The Autostraddle Guide To Queer Mental Health

I noticed in the large selection of “labels” in our profiles, “asexual” isn’t an option. Any chance of getting ace/demi representation in our profiles?
Riese: Yah sorry I made that a long time ago before I knew that asexual people could also be homoromantic / biromantic / panromantic / etc and therefore did not know that there would be ace people reading this website!

I just finished re-watching skins seasons 3 and 4 and I just want to thank Heather for her amazing recaps. I was sad I had to read them on AE. But they just cut so deep and true, I had to read them again too. I wish you could analyze my life that way… It would make so much more sense then!
Heather: You know, I own those recaps. I wrote them before I signed a contract saying Viacom could trademark anything that came from inside my imagination. I ought to make them accessible somewhere else like a PDF file. Maybe I’ll do that. Anyway, you’re welcome! My Skins recaps are my all-time favorite things I’ve ever written.

Can we get dr. liz rubin to tell us what can be done to prevent a-camp plague? Like, should I force my cabin mates to use purell every time they come back to the cabin?
Rachel: Hm this is a good question, I’ll text her

UPDATE: I texted her and she responded “lol,” which I think means that there’s really only so much we can do with Purell and Emergen-C. Good luck my friend, go with God

what is queermo?
Rachel: I think it’s a queer person! Somehow saying “a queer” doesn’t have the same sound to it, English is so weird

Hi Mey! I have listened to “Most Girls” approximately 1000 times since I first heard it in your “Queer and Queer-ish Singles for the Summer” post. Despite being 19, I am a grandma at heart and don’t listen to whatever hip music the kids these days are playing, so I would not have been introduced to this song (which has truly changed my life/summer) without your post. Thank you!! All girls think you’re great <3
Mey: Most Girls is such a great song and Haillee Steinfeld is my favorite young pop singer ESPECIALLY now that she’s clearly catering to her queer/feminist fans! I’m glad you love it too!

I’m wondering what y’all think about the new Philly pride flag! I’m now consumed with ideas about how we represent intersectionality symbolically (or aren’t) and how to start talking about what’s missing from pride garb, etc. as another form of white supremacy. Help!
Riese: It’s an interesting choice because the other colors stand for some pretty nonsense situations, like the green stands for “Nature” which… what does that have to do with LGBTQ+ pride? I have no idea. Like it seems like it’d be a neater fit thematically if the other stripes represented other identities, like trans or women or whathaveyou? BUT despite my obsessiveness over thematic continuity, I really like that it prioritizes POC in a space where white people are not given their own stripe — like that it shows that anti-racism and racial diversity is important not just because everybody should be represented and included, but because dismantling white supremacy and promoting anti-racism should be a pilar of our culture and our politics and at the very center of all the community work that we do. It’s a very clear and visible representation of a very important concept and maybe forcing white people in a very clear way to consider those concepts every time we wave our flag is actually a really radical method of engendering change. But yeah there’s the risk of it being just performative allyship, and also of having to listen to white people complain about it.

No one names their child Judas. There must be one of the least popular names
Riese: A long long time ago I was in a relationship with somebody who had chosen to stop taking her psychiatric medication and then had a severe psychotic break and every time I called a doctor or her parents or a friend who’d known her longer than I had or called the police to get her back into the hospital so she could get better, she called me Judas. She called me Judas ALL THE TIME. Now whenever I hear that name I hear her yelling JUDASSSS at me. She’s healthy now and we’re still friends and she would never call me Judas now.

so erin is amazing and i kept thinking she reminded me of someone and i figured out who it is it’s este haim thanks for your attention to this important matter keep up the good work
Erin: At camp Taylor’s fiance Evie told me she equated me with the 4th Haim sister, so this checks out it seems! I don’t know this band but two call outs seem like it’s a real thing.

Please make sure the Orphan Black recap headline blurbs don’t contain spoilers! Thank youuuu
Heather: Okay!

I just needed to tell you guys, I haven’t watched the new season of OITNB, so I haven’t been reading your recaps, but I fully intend to do so eventually. I just didn’t want you to think they weren’t getting hits, because I want you to know I really appreciate that you’re still reviewing the show, and I’m grateful that when I eventually do get around to watching the new season, I’m going to have somewhere to vent. It’s been the same with PLL this season. I’m still watching, just not quite at the same frenetic, addicted, I NEED TO SEE THIS YESTERDAY pace as I’ve watched previous seasons of these shows, which makes it hard to keep up with your recaps. But I AM still reading them, if not the day they come out. So thank you for still writing them.
Heather: Hey, you’re welcome! By the time you read this there will only be one episode of PLL left. Can you believe it? My feelings are all over the place about it.

Can we please talk about the upcoming Miseducation of Cameron Post and also Roberta Colindrez both in Jill Soloway’s new show but also just as a beautiful and talented human because damn.
Heather: Yes, please, I can talk about both of these things forever.

---

Really Nice Things You Told Us

Rachel give really good advice, you guys. Seriously, Rachel is a national treasure. You go, Rachel.
Rachel: Well this is very nice! You give really good compliments, anonymous person. Do you think we can get Nicholas Cage to take a role in the biopic??

My girlfriend said to me recently, “If I die, I want you to use my money to take yourself on a nice vacation and then donate the rest to autostraddle”
Riese: I love your girlfriend!

Hi! I just watched GIBWK with Mey on bisexuality and I want to register my support for making this a 4-part series because it was both delightful and validating as hell. Also I was surprised at how emotional and flustered I got when they answered my anon question. I didn’t expect to feel so much like they were talking directly to me. It was a good feeling (Also I want to submit a general big screaming THANK YOU to all of you amazing folx working your tails off for this site and community. I’m hoping to be able to up my subscription soon but in the meantime I hope internet hugs are sufficient placeholders)
Mey: Hey thank you!! I’m here in LA, so I can pass this along to Kristin and see if she’ll have me back on! I had a really great time talking about being Bi even though I said I was a lesbian at the beginning.

I just wanted to let you know that I’m scheming ways to support Autostraddle. Like, financially. You deserve ALL THE SUPPORT. Also that my wife was asked what fictional character she would be, and she answered “Rose Granger Weasley.” Heather Hogan, the two of you have so much to talk about.
Heather: Tell your wife to email me! I want to know more!

You guys I just wanna say how much I love you all and how I’m so grateful for the existence of AS! I arrived here like 1.5 years ago when I was on my way to a date with a girl which I was pretty sure was gonna be “the” date (I was right) and that I had no idea what I was doing so I panicked and googled and lo and behold came across a bunch of AS sex help/guide/advice articles and read all the things (it turned out to be a fabulous date in case you were wondering) and y’all have helped me in countless ways since then so THANK YOU you wonderful superstars. I now have basically an AS addiction, I share posts all the time with my friends… but okay I wish I could give you all my money but I have nooooone so what else can I do to help and support y’all?! (I dont know if Amazon affiliate links work outside the US?) Anyway love and hugs and rainbows and all that jazz xx
Heather: Hey, you’re a wonderful superstar too and don’t you forget it!

So I sent my Dad (straight 60-yr-old dude) an Autostraddle article at some point a couple of years ago because it was relevant to his interests, and he’s mentioned a couple of times that he reads the site occasionally since then because he values the perspective that he doesn’t get in his regular day-to-day media (and also he thinks y’all do better reporting!). So I’m aware of this, but it’s not like he and I *talk* about Autostraddle or anything, because, I don’t know, we are usually talking about baseball or feminist history or whatever. Anyways, two weeks ago we were staying in a hotel together because we went to Spring Training in AZ (lifelong dream), and we’re brushing our teeth and he says (with a mouthful of toothpaste): “Have you been reading the Supergirl recaps on Autostraddle? I haven’t watched the show, but the new writer they’ve got covering that show is great. I can’t wait for the recap to come out every week!” So yeah, though y’all might want to know. New goal for the year is to get my dad to be an A+ member (assuming you accept straight dude money) =)
Valerie Anne: My heart just grew at least three sizes! My dad is my TV buddy and at least 75% of the reason I love TV so much/ended up in the recapping biz, so I love the fact there there’s another dad/kid combo out there talking about a shared interest in Autostraddle; being a part of that makes me unreasonably happy. Thank you for sharing.

“if you’re like me and you like to wear white to weddings” Oh my god. I love you, Mey.
Mey: Thank you. If you invite me to your wedding I’ll come and wear white.

Thanks for fixing the bi tagging problem. And even if you don’t reopen the bi-women-dating-men thread, I’m really glad it happened; I come back to it a lot to feel less invisible. I’m sorry people said things about you guys “hating lesbians” or being a site for straight women because obviously that’s just…. whatever. I appreciate y’all. I’m so glad you exist. I’m so thankful for your work.
Rachel: Thankful for you! Please keep telling us what you want to see!

Random reminder of my endless love for y’all and gratitude for your superb work xoxo
Heather: Thank you! And hey, we are grateful for you every day too!

Hey there, just wanted to say that I’m really enjoying all the historical content you’ve been posting lately. I’m learning so much! Thank you for everything you do – you are amazing and inspiring and wonderful humans!
Riese: That’s great! I’m just super-obsessed with history and hope I get the time to do more of those pieces soon and also that we get more from other people! It’s so so so important, because this cultural amnesia will DESTROY US.

I love Laura Mandanas.
Rachel: I know right? Me too

Riese: ME TOO!!!

Thanks to Kristen for the GIBWK video about breakups. It’s one of the few things that is helping these days.
Heather: GIBWK is consistently one of the best parts of every week, I agree. I’m sorry to hear you’re going through a painful breakup. I wish you healing and all the ice cream in the world.

Thank you for Neesha’s piece on gentrification. This is exactly the type of stuff I want to read on AS. More pieces like this please! More Neesha please! More coverage on QTPOC and gentrification please!
Riese: We loved it too and we told her the same thing that this is exactly the type of stuff we want to publish on AS! I hope we hear more from her. Laneia tell her we want to hear more from her.

Yvonne: Neesha is an amazing writer and activist and is my friend and I can’t wait till they visit me in Dallas! I also want to see more writing from Neesha and from other QTPOC writers!

Y’all are killing it. Thank you: that is all.

SaveSave

SaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSaveSave

SaveSaveSaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave

SaveSave