When I learned that my friend Alyssa Gonzalez was publishing a book through Thornapple Press, I was eager to read it and I knew I wanted to write a review of “Nonmonogamy and Neurodiversity.”
Tag: relationships
Why Leaving an Abusive Friendship is So Hard
Partner violence is often centered in conversations about emotional abuse, when truthfully, leaving an abusive friendship can be just as hard
Resistance to Conformity: Balancing Authenticity with Community
I’d like you to please welcome a new writer on the Yopp platform, Eleni Stephanides! She’s here to talk about the complexities of conformity: the damage it can do, and the benefits it can yield when used well. CN: discussion of the emotional impact of neurodivergence in a neurotypical society, brief mention of theoretical death by plane crash “We could say that Old Survivor was too weird or too difficult to proceed easily toward the …Read More
Poetry & Trauma: It Is Hard to Write with a Broken Heart
This week my debut poetry book, “Pet: the Journey from Abuse to Recovery” comes out. The poetry sequence takes you through my experiences in an abusive relationship, my attempts to heal, my retrospective reflections on the relationship, and the larger-scale insights that came with long-term healing. To introduce it, I wanted to share with you this piece about what it took to write that book in the first place. CN: extensive and detailed discussion of …Read More
I Was My Boyfriend’s Servant: The Nightmare of Financial Abuse
CN: extensive and detailed discussion of emotional & financial abuse; discussion of domestic violence; mention of suicide and sexual abuse; overall disturbing content. “When I say, “Good girl,” I want you to say, “Thank you, sir.” “Yes, sir.” “Good girl.” “Thank you, sir.” I handed him the yellow check. When the bank clerk originally asked me what color I wanted my checks in, I picked gold, but it turned out that gold just meant a …Read More
I Think My Friend is Being Abused. What Now?
This post was originally published as “What Do You Want out of a Relationship? An Alternate Method to Reaching Abuse Victims” on January 25th, 2020. CN: extensive discussion of the experience of being in an abusive relationship, discussion of physical abuse and the painful process of recovery after abuse, brief discussion of Dissociative Identity Disorder, mention of sexual abuse. Being able to recognize that you are being abused, while the abuse is still happening, is …Read More
A Gay Man’s Guide To Life: An Interview with Britt East
CN: discussion of racism, homophobia, transphobia, and explicit violence toward the LGBT community– especially transgender folks; mention of abuse, AIDS epidemic, and addiction. One of the things I love about having Denny Upkins as a guest writer is he has some connections with amazing people and he takes great joy in interviewing them for Yopp! I’ll let Denny introduce today’s interview. Upon Yopp’s return from hiatus, I knew there were a number of intriguing and …Read More
New Merch: You Could Never Be Ice Cream, You’re Too Hot
Back in our early days of social justice work when most of what we knew about was the forms of oppression specific to women, an important part of our journey to empowerment was establishing for ourselves the idea that we could enjoy and appreciate our appearance, and that of others, while still treating them as a human. This value was particularly strong in the social circles we frequented but no where was it stronger between …Read More
Hanging Out with Your Autistic Friend: A Guide to Social Inclusivity
CN: extensive description of the experience of autism including ableist treatment, triggers, and sensory overload. Mention of ableist term. Autism advocacy as a branch of activism is something I’ve learned a huge amount about just in the last few years, and one of the repeating problems the community faces has been how any “advice” on interacting with autistic people that’s published in large scale media sources, is exclusively written by neurotypical or allistic (the opposite …Read More