Happy #worldsmentalhealthday everyone. I have lived with severe, chronic Major Depressive Disorder and anxiety for 25+ years. More recently, I have experienced PTSD symptoms from trauma.
Sometimes my mental health symptoms are absolutely debilitating, other times they are manageable, and sometimes I even feel amazing. Most days it’s some combination.
Doctors call me “high functioning” because I manage to get a lot of stuff done, but it also masks my suffering to those outside my inner circle & gives people the impression that I have my shit together & am “happy” most of the time.
Work is a coping mechanism for me which, like anything else, can be done to excess. I treat my mental illness with multiple medications, regular visits to a psychiatrist, Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) Dialectical Behavior Therapy (truth: DBT has saved my life more than once),
rigorous self care, meditation & asking for help. It has taken me years & years to be out & open about my mental health; I’ve suffered tremendous shame & isolation over it. Everyday, I need to remind myself: my brain is wired differently, I am not broken. Neither are you.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
Inequities persist in wages, visibility, power & opportunities. Companies continue to produce content w/racial fetishization, stereotypes & offensive language & marketing. We talk about how to address the inequality & oppression performers of color face...
...how marginalized folks are creating their own content & how average consumers can support sex workers of color. We also dive into the history, issues, & debate about the “ethnic” and “interracial” categories in porn.
New @SexOutLoudRadio!Professors @JenniferSHirsch & @shamuskhan are the authors of Sexual Citizens: A Landmark Study of Sex, Power, and Assault on Campus (from @wwnorton) based on brilliant research by them and a huge team about sexual assault on college campus. #sexualcitizens
Current #sexualassault discourses focus on toxic masculinity, consent, bystander intervention, adjudication—all important. @JenniferSHirsch & @shamuskhan take a new approach w/the concepts of sexual projects, sexual citizenship, & sexual geographies...#sexualcitizens
They share compelling stories of students navigating sexuality in a new environment; they don’t just focus on individual players but the systems that fail many of us. We talk about sex education (or lack thereof), power dynamics, inequalities, social status & peer pressure.
On the new @SexOutLoudRadio, I welcome veteran anti-racist activist Jordan Flaherty to discuss his book No More Heroes: Grassroots Responses to the Savior Mentality (published by @haymarketbooks@AKPressDistro).
No More Heroes traces savior mentality in pop culture, political movements, non-profits incl. Batman, Teach for America, the flood of young white activists to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, Occupy Wall Street, #BlackLivesMatter, and the growth of anti sex trafficking orgs.
We talk about how white saviors often begin w/good intentions & where it goes wrong; how different grassroots responses can both help people on the ground & challenge the oppressive systems that undergird racism, poverty, and inequity.
On the new @SexOutLoudRadio, @albtweetin, host of Bodies podcast, talks about the women whose stories she shares & their medical mysteries. It’s a fascinating show where the interviews are deeply personal, yet what we learn has far-reaching consequences beyond 1 person’s life.
We discussed discrimination in health care, the detrimental effects of shame, how women’s symptoms are trivialized, how to be an advocate for your own health care. We delve into her own medical mystery—which involved painful penetration and sex—and the journey to solve it.
Are you a @SexOutLoudRadio listener? Do you love the show, our diverse guests & scintillating topics? First, thanks for listening; we appreciate each and everyone of you. As you know, @raymondj & I recently began independently producing the show & distributing it through @libsyn.
Creating this show takes a lot of hard work, but it’s so rewarding. Since we left VoiceAmerica, we’ve lost a few folks who only listened on the VA app & didn’t move with us. We’d like to ask you to help us grow our now independent podcast listenership!
If you don’t already, please SUBSCRIBE on your favorite podcast app. You can leave a REVIEW which helps prospective listeners know more about us. We’d love it if you would TELL YOUR FRIENDS about the show!
As I’ve been going through old files, I stumbled upon these gems. When I was a baby dyke at Wesleyan in 1992, I was working on my undergraduate senior thesis about butch/femme lesbian identity (my advisor was @TenuredRadical!).
Write a letter to one of my idols, @PatrickCalifia, on the off chance I might get a response. Low & behold, Califia sent a handwritten letter & some unpublished poetry. I practically lost my mind. I’d read everything he had written incl. the unmatched, groundbreaking Macho Sluts.
His writing had such a tremendous effect on my thinking about sex, gender, BDSM, power, and identity. The fact that he took the time to write to me just blew me away. I continued to be a fan, reading every book and piece of writing he’s written.