Hi MusicNerd, Those are a lot of great responses and it sounds like you have a pretty good handle of what's going on. hey Carmen! thanks, i don't feel like i have a good handle on what's going on right now, but i appreciate your compliment. haha :P Based on your pattern of stressing out in the past...

wow, thanks so much for both of your replies, Carmen and Redskies! :) Ah that is a lot that you have going on in your hometown. Regarding this summer, what are some things that you think think could help you feel not so pessimistic about the possibility of staying there? Are there any things you lik...

Glad some of those suggestions sounds like things you want to try :) It sounds like you know what you want and what would be best for you which is awesome - and sometimes even the hardest part. So if striving towards some summer plan that is out of your hometown is possible then that sounds great. ...

Oh wow that is a lot of stuff you have going on. I can't imagine juggling all those different aspects of life at one - that totally makes sense why a routine is necessary to manage it all. Since it sounds like a lot of it is coming up fairly soon hopefully you will be able to more easily get out of...

hey Carmen, thanks for responding (and presumably moving my thread)! :) Hi MusicNerd, I am sorry you have gotten stuck in one of those loops - they can feel so hard to get out of and it does really suck how easily they can become self-fulfilling prophecies. Self-care is a big part of getting yoursel...

P.S. I just realized this is in the wrong section! I meant to put this in the "et cetera" section, my bad!

so, basically i'm stuck in a negative self-fulfilling prophecy loop that's happening in different aspects of my life. i'd rather not go into detail about what those things are, but i'm wondering: do y'all have any suggestions on how i can get out of this loop and instead move towards a positive self...

sorry to take so long to respond! things have been super hectic for me lately. yeah, I like the idea of only partially-agreeing with them on things. like, I won't buy into the whole "oh, we're such a perfect family" thing, but i'll definitely be trying to excuse myself as often as possible...

hey Heather! yes I'd really like going over both of those things: how to interact with parents around extended family without pretending everything's perfect + finding ways to excuse myself when necessary. my parents want to plan a dinner event somewhere for family members to gather (idk where) so t...

Hi Carmen! Yeah, I've definitely thought this through quite a bit. If you were to identify another feeling regarding your parents not coming besides guilty what do you think it would be? sadness. I know that's super-simplistic, but really though, I'm bummed out either way because it just reminds me ...

so, I'm graduating in less-than 2 months!! :D but my abusive parents want to come and they're wondering if I want them to come, because they also want to gather some extended family to celebrate with me afterwards. I like my extended family and would wanna see them on my graduation day, but I really...

Thanks MusicNerd! - I've downloaded some social apps to use for when I return home in May. I'm a little cautious about dating websites/apps, because there are so many horror stories out there, but I'm on Tindr - I know its mostly a hook up app but at least its a start. Are there any dating apps, he...

I sent in my first uk job application last night and it was so exciting! I may or may not have screwed up the name of the company in my cover letter from it being 2 AM, but hey-- I turned one in finally!! I used British spellings in my cover letters and cv and formatted my cv in the UK-style, I was ...

just wanted to chime in and say-- Redskies, you're on-point with your advice again! I needed to read this thread too :) also, to sociallystunted: just wanted to say that you're definitely not alone in feeling this way. I'm in my 20s and can relate to a lot of what you've expressed regarding inexperi...

how do i know so many awesome people?! anyway, one of my friends who I met while I studied in London, Travis Alabanza, is a fierce queer Black femme non-binary poet whose film "Too Wide" [/b] (filmed by Moyin Saka) was advertised by South Asian trans poetry duo Darkmatter!! :) it's only li...

hi monkey014! first off, I just wanna say I'm SO jealous of the fact that you're gonna be living in London for a year!! I'm really itching to go back sometime in the near future since I studied there for a semester and fell madly in love with the city. so, congrats on such an awesome opportunity! :D...

wow, almost like the universe wanted to chime in! here's a post about this topic that just appeared on my facebook timeline haha http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?s ... ry_index=0

oh man, idk where to even begin. basically, i'm trying to figure out what labels feel good for me and everything's just kinda "????" for me, and i'm trying to figure out how to be okay with that (there's a TL;DR at the bottom of this post if no one wants to read all my ramblings below). li...

aww, thanks Heather, you're so sweet! haha but yeah, i'll def let my friend know. yeah, I can only imagine that (in ways that police forces across the country are systemically problematic) a police presence Chicago would also instill fear in folks (especially trans women, and trans women of color).

She's a trans woman sex worker activist, and she was featured in Buzzfeed LGBT today! I'm super proud of her and felt the need to share her story here This Trans Sex Worker Wants To Use Her Ivy League Education To Build An Empire

so, since y'all always seem to have really cool and interesting things to say about gender-related things, I wanted to ask: what are folks' experiences with gender and conversation/discussion dynamics in different spaces (ex. jobs, classrooms, etc.)? how has gender affected the way your speech was r...

hey Redskies! nope, no worries! it's always nice hearing from you :) yeah, that's definitely another valid option! it probably wouldn't register much on my radar either if it wasn't something that people all over my university's campus made a big stink of-- but unfortunately they do. lol hence why I...

hi al, thanks so much! haha :) i also just remembered that i'm going with a friend to a tattoo convention this weekend as well, so that'll also be fun. i've basically got a jam-packed weekend ahead of me! still need to figure out what to do on V-Day, but i might take you up on your friend's idea and...

so, roughly a week from now is the infamous holiday about love and romance and whatnot-- but what to do when you're single on this day and everyone around you seems to be making a big fuss about it?? this year, I don't feel as bad about being single around this time even though Valentine's Day's rig...

UPDATE: so, today marks exactly one month since I went no-contact with my parents, and.... it feels really great. I only have "talked" with them once or twice and that was to reply to a text regarding a logistical issue related to my graduation. otherwise, there's been zero communication ...