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240 pages, Paperback
First published June 3, 2021
"There's an authenticity that sits right at the heart of queer culture that makes it inherently appealing. The things that society teaches you to hate about yourself – the way you cross your legs on a chair, the way t-shirts hang on your body, the stuff that holds your attention – queer culture more readily embraces. Within the culture of lesbians especially, the male gaze – the idea that you should dress and act a certain way to appease men – is taken out almost entirely; it's simply not there. And what you have left, is space. Endless, free space to be yourself."
"In later years, therapists would try to mine me for trauma surrounding my coming out. They didn't understand that trauma doesn't always have its root in queerness. You can be healthy in your queerness and fucked up everywhere else. Or, more accurately, the initial coming out itself isn't the only and original source of anguish."
"It's been over a decade since I first walked into the Joiners but still I remember the feeling of being surrounded by queer people and still I crave that feeling today. I breathe a sigh of relief when I'm in an LGBTQ space even now. It's subtle, my body relaxing in minute and indeterminable ways, like how your muscles stop tensing one by one when you climb into a hot bath."
"Mental health problems can exist through a lens of shame and isolation. Anger gets magnified. The queer experience never got you into this mess, but the queer experience was there to pull you out of it."