Made me want to / and I did tap / that ass / many times / made it mine.

There is a different level of intimacy and affirmation that I have found when having sex with other fat people. Thin people approach the fat body like a series of insecurities. They see the swell of a stomach or rolls of fat on the back and assume that you hate those parts of your body. When another fat person touches me, it is to be made whole.

Because of the positive affirmation I received during sex, I began to believe it was all I was good for. When people wanted me, I assumed it was my job to provide joy for other people. I gave myself to a lot of people in that way. I had to remember that I had a right to pleasure as well.

First I became a cloud-woman. Min had always liked watching them as a child, one of her only good memories from that period. I lifted up my skirts, let her lap up my water. Her mouth was covered in dew when I kissed her.

Many Black women are raised to give our apparent struggles the stiff upper lip. We’re taught to be loud, and proud, and bigger than the world sees us. And at the end of all of that effort, in my most private and intimate moments, I wish to lay my burdens down. Ain’t I a bottom?

It seems contradictory to say I learned how to view my body as my own by sharing it with strangers and friends, but it is a truth that I revel in. What I love and learn about these encounters are the parameters of my body, its strengths, and boundaries, what pleases it.

Even one-night-stands have a spirit to them, but I wasn’t willing to confront that until I stopped drinking. When I did, I was finally able to place my mind right within my body, to touch and be touched without fear. Having sober sex was a way for me to unravel the contempt I felt around my body and my sexuality.

“For me, as a Black Trans Woman, to find her body not only as something worthy and magnificent (as it is), but to find someone to share that magick with, may very well be one of the only moments she has to enjoy a trying and very taxing life — one that’s always trying to kill her.”

“I view polyamory as a structure that’s helpful in me decolonizing my love life and the way I view relationships. Having complete ownership of everything within the borders of my skin, and doing what I desire with it and with whom, is an incredible “fuck you” to the systems of oppression I seek to dismantle (and a fun one!).”

This is not a how-to guide; there’s no right way to navigate these situations. Let’s share instances of microaggressions and some ways to deal in the hopes we’ll all be able to make it out alive, looking sexy and loving our hardest.

“Yup, we were just lesbians in a library. You know, just hanging out.”

Our QTPOC besties are vital to our existence so we wanted to create a list filled with our stories to celebrate just how magical they are.