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It's never too late to be yourself

To clarify, I’m not a wlw. I’m a mlm. But this story is wlw related, and I hope it can make people feel better about themselves, especially those who took a while to come to terms with themselves.

I came out as gay when I was 16. The reception was varied. My mom’s side generally accepted me in a lukewarm way where you can tell deep down they’re kinda not ok with it, but are trying to be nice. My dad’s side of the family rejected me pretty harshly. So, as you can imagine, I felt pretty alone.

I live in the US while my maternal grandma lives in Canada. We go to visit her shortly after I came out, and she eventually became aware of my sexuality from the hushed whispers. There’s a stereotype that older folk aren’t too accepting of the LGBT community, so I was nervous given she was 71… but I was wrong. She accepted me. Not only that, but she seemed to genuinely accept me. I didn’t get the vibe of lingering discomfort (and I’m very intuitive with that sort of thing). It was a relief.

She ended up getting an email address, and we’d keep touch via email. We’d talk about the typical stuff: school, work, friends. But she also asked me about my love life, seeming genuinely interested. It didn’t seem unnatural to her that I’d be pursuing boys instead of girls. She was the first to hear about my first boyfriend, and by far the most supportive of it.

Fast forward 2 years. I’m 18. I was about to go into college (somewhere more liberal, for my own sake). I had been in a relationship for almost a year now. Things were going pretty well. I was still in touch with my grandma. Then one day, she asked if she can vent about something. I said of course.

Her email was long. She talks about how she was never really attracted to my grandfather (he died when they were 65 of a heart attack). She considered him her best friend, and she missed him dearly as a friend, but nothing more. She admitted that she considered it a relief when the two grew older and the once flaming hot passion cooled down to a mere sizzle.

She told me how she was into women her entire life, though she denied it for a while. She reminisced about repressed crushes on ex best friends, finding female celebrities attractive and denying it, basically a lot of stuff that seems pretty typical of the stories of lesbians in denial. 

She told me that it felt too late to be a lesbian. She was 73, had been married to a man, never was into women, and “past her prime.” I could only imagine how painful it was to have denied such a major part of herself for so long. When I came out at 16, I couldn’t imagine waiting another day, let alone so many decades.

I can’t pretend like my response was perfect and insightful. I was still a dumb 18 year old. But I did my best to assure her otherwise, and that she may as well live the rest of her life the way she wants to. I forget exactly what I said, but she thanked me and we moved on, talking about my upcoming college or something. The details escape me.

Fast forward another 5 years, to the present. If anything, her love life is going better than mine. She found a partner (also on a similar boat - in her 70’s, once married to a now dead man, denied her true sexuality), and she’s been with her for 2 years. I finally got the chance to meet her a year ago and they're so cute together and it’s the happiest I’ve ever seen my grandma.

It’s never too late to be yourself :)

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discovering butch femme culture felt like coming home

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This is Money Snake. She only appears every 312 years. 

If you reblog her picture within the next twenty-five seconds you will have good luck and fortune for the rest of your life. 

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Doechii photographed by Elizaveta Porodina for British Vogue (2025)

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there’s this extremely kind soul of a woman on instagram that makes accessible recipes that don’t require standing, chopping, or a stove and she might just have a permanent place in my heart

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Happy Pride Month! Here’s a fat LGBTQ+ reading list I’ve compiled! 🏳️‍🌈💜🏳️‍⚧️

Books

Fat and Queer: An Anthology of Queer and Trans Bodies and Lives edited by Bruce Owens Grimm, Miguel M. Morales, and Tiff Joshua TJ Ferentini

What We Don’t Talk about When We Talk about Fat by Aubrey Gordon

Fat Gay Men: Girth, Mirth, and the Politics of Stigma by Jason Whitesel

The Other F Word: A Celebration of the Fat & Fierce by Angie Manfredi

Nothing Is Okay Poems by Rachel Wiley

Catrachos by Roy G. Guzmán

Wow, No Thank You. Essays by Samantha Irby

Shapes of Native Nonfiction: Collected Essays by Contemporary Writers edited by Elissa Washuta and Theresa Warburton

Speaking Wiri Wiri by Dan Vera

Fiction

I’ll Be The One by Lyla Lee

Putting Makeup On The Fat Boy by Bil Wright

Soft On Soft by Em Ali

Faith: Taking Flight by Julie Murphy

If It Makes You Happy by Claire Kann

Here The Whole Time by Vitor Martins

Undead Girl Gang by Lily Anderson

Untouchable by Talia Hibbert

A Harvest Of Ripe Figs by Shira Glassman

Private Eye (The Spies Who Loved Her) by Katrina Jackson

Three romance/erotica novellas by Xan West:

Nine Of Swords, Reversed, Eight Kinky Nights: An F/f Chanukah Romance, Their Troublesome Crush

Xan’s work centers kinky, trans and non-binary, fat, disabled, queer trauma survivors. It leans more towards centering Jewish characters, ace and aro spec characters, autistic characters, and polyamorous networks.

Featured list from LGBTQ reads: Sapphic Plus-Size Protagonists!

The Summer of Jordi Perez by Amy Spalding

Leah on the Offbeat by Becky Albertalli

Bearly a Lady by Cassandra Khaw

The Seafarer’s Kiss by Julia Ember

Knit One, Girl Two by Shira Glassman

Final Draft by Riley Redgate

Articles

Being Queer When You're Fat, Femme and Gaysian by Mark Mariano

Black, Fat Queer Bodies: Receiving Pleasure And Demanding Respect by Darian

Cool People I Know: Fat Folks in Kink on Fashion, Femme, and Community by Shaan Lashun

CLAIMING MY NON-BINARY IDENTITY by Madeleine

How I Navigate Masculinity as a Fat Queer Woman by Hannah Schneider

Proudly Black, Fat, Queer and Making a Home for Myself in Cosplay by Briana Lawrence

Interview: Out Of The Closet With ‘Plus Size Trans Guy’, Shane Stinson by DapperQ

What it’s like being Fat, Queer, and Asexual by Michael Paramo

How Being Plus Size Affects Presenting As Non-Binary by Gina Tonic

I Am The Plus-size Transfemme You Stared At For Too Long. by Rori Porter

Mixed-Race, Non-Binary, Queer Fat Femme: How I Fail and Succeed in Finding Liberation by Cicely Blain

I’m Fat and Gay. Here’s What I’ve Learned. by Sean Bennett

What It’s Like to Be A Fat Black Queer Femme— With Cancer by Taylor Crumpt

A Brief History Of The Gay Bears And Big Boys Scene by Gay Star News

The Fat, Black, Femme, Queer Chronicles by Tina Colleen

Dissertations

"Fat is a Queer Issue, Too": Complicating Queerness and Body Size in Women's Sexual Orientation and Identity by Hannah R. Long

More Fats, More Femmes, And No Whites: A Critical Examination Of Fatphobia, Femmephobia And Racism On Grindr by Matthew Conte

Fat Activism: A Queer Autoethnography by Charlotte Cooper

Spatial Awarishness: Queer Women And The Politics Of Fat Embodiment by Adrienne C. Hill

Fat Mutha: Hip Hop’s Queer Corpulent Poetics by Mecca Jamilah Sullivan

Other

A Queer and Trans Fat Activist Timeline by Charlotte Cooper

Transcript: Fat & Queer Intersections Webinar by NAAFA

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A hibiscus flower under ultraviolet light, shining for the polinators.

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Every time a kpop artist wears a durag or smthn durag adjacent and wears grills and bamboo gold earrings etc etc they should be forced to give $1000 to a random black American.

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honestly it’s actually the small, mundane, boring things that someone does for you out of love which mean so much rather than grand gestures and proclamations

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2025 EDITION TUMBLR WHITENESS CENSUS

Answers amended from this prior poll based on other mixed people whining about reverse racism and a significant amount of very confused Turkish people 🙏🏽

If you’re mixed choose what feels right to you I’m not here to do phrenology or paper bag test you but don’t make it my problem either.

Reblog and share for wider sample size! More polls related in reblogs!

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Welp.

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Yeah

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I'm keeping an eye out for heat stroke in my area and I can't figure out what a full body flush would look like on dark skin since all the pictures are just fake training pictures. Anyone have video/pics of a heat stroke flush on black skin?

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the whole "lipstick on a pig" thing makes no sense because the second we gave a pig access to makeup she became god's cuntiest soldier

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shoutout to offputting autistic people