jay > Recent Status Updates

“I know I don't have to have a label, but I want one. Lesbian.
It feels like a good thing.”

started crying and had to set the book down goodness gracious

“The only thing that made me feel better about caring too much was that you did too.”

“Here's the thing. When you're little, you can be friends with anyone. And then when you’re older, everything changes. One day you turn around and your friends feel like aliens to you, and you feel like an alien to them.

Even worse, you're like an alien to yourself, too.”

“My favorite part is when NotEmilyD writes ‘sometimes I'm lonely and I don't know why.’ It's like she reached into my brain and pulled out thoughts I've had and never told anyone. I guess it's a sad sentence. But it doesn't feel that sad to me because it means she might understand things about me that no one else does.”

so freaking sweet 😭

“What if letting other people write your story is just a way to hide from yourself?”

reread for a local sapphic bookclub 🙂‍↕️

“I’ve been trying to ignore the fact that I’m avoiding Miwa like she’s a bill I can’t afford to pay…”

girl… i’m not even having fun anymore 😭

“‘How do you expect to create anything if you get all your experiences second hand?’”

“If Carol had to go home now, Therese thought, she would do something violent. Like jump off the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge. Or take the three benzedrine tablets Richard had given her last week.”

i understand her tbh

“Carol was like a secret spreading through her, spreading through this house, too, like a light invisible to everyone but her.”

“She carried so much clamor inside. And what to do with it? How to be? Why did life put so much inside a woman and then keep her confined to smallness?”

“It seemed, at times, that this was the only way the world would be remade as the heroes had dreamed: one woman holds another woman, and she in turn lifts the world.”

So many incredible quotes in this book but my goodness this one struck me

“It gets a bit tirin’, tryin’ to prove yourself to others. Some people are just never gonna see you the way you want to be seen, y’know? I reckon it’s best to please yourself first, and the ones who love you will get it.”

a student wants me to read this so bad that they loaned me their copy 🥹

and you did it at my birthday dinner…

already obsessed with this dynamic

“If you have to, you can. Beginnings and endings. Endings and beginnings. I can uncoil like a sweater and make a new shape. I can loosen and change. Stretch and expand. Begin and end. Then begin again.”

“If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound? Why is sound the pivotal factor? Unrooted, roots exposed, lying on the forest floor. I must have fallen in silence. I can't remember how it went. All I know is I awoke untethered.”

goodness me.

“I just need one person to know me all the way, to know every unsavory detail and love me anyway. Love me anyway.”

“To me it isn't the sex part that matters. It's the part where we laugh about how we're in a special club, one that the rest of the world could never understand, could never love, would never write about in their dumb books. But we know about us, and we can love us, and we will write about us, even if it's just in our journals or on the back of a sweatshirt.“

“You win by grieving what you didn't get and moving forward to find what you truly deserve. We can break this unconscious pattern by bringing it into our conscious minds and asking ourselves:
What draws me to this person? Do I like them because they remind me of what I know, or because I genuinely feel safe and enjoy how I feel around them?”

“We can use what’s happening in the present moment as a way to heal from the past. All we have is what’s here right now, and that’s enough.”

i fear this may be a bit too dark for me 😭🥀

was SOOO EXCITED when i saw the ig post saying this was out now… im about to devour it

this is draaaagginggggg

“The true act of rebellion is to live a life that is not a response to them but a life as an authentic person with wants, needs, aspirations, mistakes, strengths, vulnerabilities, hopes, and feelings that are completely yours.”

“Healing is an act of resistance, defiance, and rebellion. It requires a commitment to breaking out of long-standing cycles of self-blame and away from the existing narratives from the world at large. (...) It is about giving yourself permission to say ‘No,’ and not just to the narcissistic folks who already riddle your life, but to the ones you still haven’t met.”

“Seeing the narcissistic behavior doesn’t make you ‘bad’ but rather quite courageous. To clearly see and accept a pattern that is painful to acknowledge yet be willing to make realistic choices and protect yourself is the height of fearlessness and resilience.”

“Healing isn’t just about crying it out. It is about grieving and clearing out space, and in the new space, building a new life, finding your voice, and feeling empowered to articulate your needs, wants, and hopes, and finally feel safe. This is a process of evolving from surviving and coping to growing and thriving.”