Hello dear ones,
Before we move into today’s newsletter, I wanted to share a special announcement: I’M PUBLISHING MY FIRST CHAPBOOK: POOR KID TRAUMA!! “What’s a chapbook???” you might be asking. Basically it’s a small printed booklet, shorter than a book but longer than a zine. For folks who’ve been around for a while, you might be familiar with my Poor Kid Trauma zine series, which has been sold out for some time now. Instead of reprinting them separately, I’ve decided to compile them into this chapbook.
What’s Poor Kid Trauma all about? Poor kid trauma is a term that I started using to describe the ways in which living in poverty is deeply traumatic. In this writing, I share my experience growing up in poverty and the work I’ve been doing to rebuild my sense of safety in the midst of poverty’s ongoingness. Inside the chapbook, you’ll find 8 essays, as well as a new foreword and epilogue. Section 1 is entitled “Building Safety in the Midst of Poverty”; Section 2, “Surviving Housing Crises,” focuses on my relationship to home, and Section 3, “What Happens When the Poor Die,” details my experience trying to plan a funeral for my father while being poor and deep in grief. The epilogue is the essay that you’ll find below.
In order to afford printing these babies, I have opened up pre-sales. I’ll need to sell 50 copies of the chapbook to front the cost for printing As a special thank you, the first 50 orders will receive a free coloring sticker pack!! If you’ve ever wanted to take a deeper dive into my writing, or love the idea of holding my writing in book form, it would mean the world to me if you took advantage of the pre-sale.
When I was sixteen I got pregnant. I’d stopped taking birth control out of sheer laziness and decided that the pull out method was safe enough for a human who hated on condoms felt. Eventually, five weeks pregnant, I’d go to the sexual health clinic in my mall and see the test immediately turn positive. Because of how far along I was, I would need a two-day out-patient procedure. And I’d have to go to Toronto.
The clinic wasn’t open on Sundays, so I’d need to take at least one day off school. I couldn’t tell my father, so I went to my high school vice principal, a man with a salt and pepper beard who always smiled at me. I told him that I’d need to be signed out of class on Friday, and that no one could call home to report my absence to my father. No one. I must have told him what my father would do if he found out. How the isolation in my own home would destroy me. He said yes, this man who saw something more in me than many of my teachers: pink hair, facial piercings, always high, but a straight A student.
With his permission granted, I had to ask another adult for help. Jan lived on Redbird Crescent, the street next to mine. She was married but lived largely alone: an abusive husband who was thankfully traveling on business for much of the year. Jan had started to befriend me after my mom died. I’d go over to her house for sleepovers and she’d feed me lime yogurt in the mornings and prepare roasted red peppers for our dinners.
Jan was the one who took me dress shopping for my grade 8 graduation. We went to my favorite store, Le Château, and I picked out a light pink dress with spaghetti straps. She gave me a silver necklace with pink and pearlescent beads. I keep it still in my jewelry box. Sometimes, when I’d pop by to see her as a surprise, the husband would answer the door and tell me that Jan wasn’t feeling well, couldn’t receive visitors. I knew that she was sick, but in ways I didn’t understand, and I could also tell that he was lying to me. At twelve years old, there was nothing I could do. On the day of my abortion, Jan drives me and my boyfriend, Kevin, into Toronto from the suburbs.
I lived in Canada, where I could access an abortion for free, but there was one problem: my health card was missing. Between our friends, a group of misfits who were also poor kids, and Jan, we raised the $500 that was needed. There was no way I could go to my dad and say We need to get a replacement NOW without raising alarm.
We stay with my best friend, Victoria, who’s Kevin’s age, three years older than my sixteen. On the way back to Victoria’s after the abortion, I have to run off of the subway so I can throw up in a trashcan. The next day, we return back to Kevin’s place, where I’ll spend the night. I know so many people report a deep sadness after an abortion. For me, the feeling was relief. Unlike the other teenagers who got pregnant at my high school, of which there were many, I didn’t have parents to love and support me and a child. And I knew that I’d never escape the suburbs with a child in tow.
Looking back on this event now, I realize that what I experienced was the magic of community care and mutual aid. Though I didn’t have these words for it back then. Now, twenty-two years later, I’ve been lucky enough to have been on the receiving end of community care multiple times. I am simultaneously moved and ashamed. Though I have done a lot of work to process my poor kid trauma, it is still very much alive and well.
I felt it rise back up to the surface these past few weeks, as I realized that I had only brought in a quarter of my monthly income with just two weeks to go before the end of the month. I knew why this was happening. It was one part chronic pain flare, the worst I’ve had since 2018 when my fibromyalgia began, which made it so hard for me to promote, promote, promote, hustle and grind. And I was also dealing with some pretty serious shadow banning on Instagram, the platform I use to promote, because, like so many other creators, I’ve been openly Pro-Palestinian.
And so I pushed through all of the poor shame and asked my community for support: “If you’ve ever been waiting to buy stuff from my website, now’s the time. And if you’ve ever felt moved by my work, if my memes have brought a smile to your face, you can send me a tip. Links in my bio.” I shared this call alongside a series of memes featuring cats and the popular prompt: “Imagine not liking me and I’m...”
In the caption, I wrote:
“The truth is I imagine people not liking me ALL THE TIME. My greatest fear is that I’m secretly a horrible person and one day everyone will find out and abandon me. And so when people actually don’t like me, it’s like my greatest fear as come true.
Coupled with this fear is another: I’m afraid that I’m annoying people or coming off as too needy. This comes up for me extra whenever I share that I’m struggling and ask others for support. And only gets louder every time I have to do that. What’s so funny about these fears is that I would never feel this way about another person asking for support. I see it as brave and vulnerable. And when it comes to people not liking me, the truth is that I don’t like every single person out there. It’s okay!!
But these stories are rooted in childhood trauma. Of being abandoned by my friends and bullied. Of being told that my needs were too much by my father and later on my boyfriends and partners.
So how do I move through these fears? I do the scary thing and see that there is a different result. I am rewiring those neural pathways! And, even if what I feared was true, I can remind my inner little ones that I am here and I won’t abandon them.
This is truly some of the hardest work I’ve ever had to do in my life. And honestly, being here with y’all has made it easier. Because you have shown me that it’s okay to ask for support and care. There aren’t enough words to thank you for this gift.”
Over the span of four days, I brought in the rest of the income I needed to make it through June. What a profound gift to be able to share that you need support, and then receive it. After a lifetime of having my needs ignored and pathologized, I’m still not used to. But I’m learning. Learning how to open myself to receiving care. Learning how to believe that I am worthy. No questions asked.
I know that not everyone is so lucky to have community there to support them. This is something that I grieve regularly. So often I find myself wondering: What might have happened -- or not happened -- to me if I had always received the care that I needed?
There really is no way I can possibly answer this question. And yet, it still haunts me.
We live in a world where so, so many are bereft of the care that they need. As we watch Israel continue to block aid into Palestine, my heart breaks. I ask myself: How could someone do this? How could someone deny another of their rights to safety and care? I could offer some answers here: the desire for power and money coupled with the ability to dissociate from one’s humanity. Perhaps there is some unresolved trauma there too. Not that trauma is ever an excuse -- especially for crimes so egregious. Rather, it is an arrow that points us towards the roots of harm and suffering, and helps us move towards healing. So I hope. So I need to believe.
I say “towards healing,” because I’ve not yet arrived at the destination. Nor have we done so collectively. I’m reminded of one of my favorite queer theorists: the late José Esteban Muñoz. His book Cruising Utopia is one that I return to often. For Muñoz, queerness is not yet here; it is on the horizon. Of course, we are here and we are queer. That’s not what Muñoz is saying. What he’s arguing is that we have not yet created the world that we dream of, one in which queerness is no longer under threat, no longer seen as other, no longer something to worry about.
“We must dream and enact new and better pleasure, other ways of being in the world, and ultimately new worlds,” Muñoz writes. “Queerness is a longing that propels us onward, beyond romances of the negative and toiling in the present. Queerness is that thing that lets us feel that this world is not enough, that indeed something is missing.” Community care and mutual aid are one way that we do this. Together, we are moving towards a better world.
Culture Diary
My partner and I have started Heartbreak High and the number of times we almost cried while watching the first couple of episodes was A LOT. It’s so meaningful to see autistic representation and supportive, access-centered friendships in the media. We are obsessed with Chloé Hayden.
Last week I shared that I was SO stoked to start Miranda July’s newest book All Fours and this week I can report that I DEVOURED IT and loved every second. July’s characters are messy and weird and sexy and a little repulsive and they do things that make you wanna scream don’t do it!!! But like from a place where, you know, you get it.
Like so many queers, I’m so happy for Billie Eilish’s queer awakening and I’ve been describing the vibe of her newest album as “I just realized I’m gay and wow I’m so happy and life is amazing!” The video for her song about eating out, “LUNCH,” is 100% that vibe. Loved seeing her channel some 90s Backstreet Boys meets Boys II Men looks but really don’t know how I feel about her wearing grills except that I kinda don’t love it.
My partner and I continue to wait with baited breath for each new episode of Under the Bridge to come out. If you love true crime and/or shows depicting the difficulties of being a teen, you might wanna check it out. One thing that I appreciate about the show, which is based off of the book of the same name, is it’s ability to sit in the ambivalent space of acknowledging the heinousness of Reena Virk’s death while also not wanting to completely villainize the teens involved.
Speaking of things I devoured this past week, can we talk about the newest season of Bridgerton???? For folks who haven’t taken the dive into this period show, the best way I can describe it is if Gossip Girl had a baby with a Jane Austen novel. I love how sexy and silly and serious it is all at the same time. And Nicola Coughlan has been very outspoken about her support for Palestine, which makes watching this show all the sweeter.
My partner and I just picked up our copies of Disability Intimacy: Essays on Love, Care, and Desire — a book I’ve been waiting for since it was first announced. Filled with essays by some of my favorite disability justice writers, including Mia Mingus, Ellen Samuels, and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, as well as so many new voices I can’t wait to check out. Plus the book just has a really great feel to it!
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Image Descriptions
A collage made by Margeaux. In the center is a house that is covered in diagonal lines, as though someone as woven threads across it. To the right of the house is an illustration of a femme figure with long brown hair, leaning against the top of the house with a sad expression on their face. There are washi tape flowers growing out of the house and red floral origami paper to the left.
A meme from the softcore_trauma instagram. A small white kitten with long-hair wears a pink bow above one ear. There are butterfly wings that have been superimposed on the photo. Text reads: imagine not liking me and i’m just counting 5 things i can see, 4 things i can touch, 3 things i can hear, two things i can smell, and one thing i can taste.
A picture collage with three images on the top and three on the bottom. The top lefthand corner is a promotional image from the show Heartbreak High featuring a group of teenagers. Top middle: the cover of Miranda July’s book All Fours. Top right: a still from Billie Eilish’s music video LUNCH where she’s eating a cherry. Bottom right: the book cover of Disability Intimacy: Essays on Love, Care, and Desire. Bottom middle: a still from the tv show Bridgerton. Bottom left: promotional image from the Hulu show Under the Bridge.
Thank you as always for sharing. My 23 year old boyfriend gave me (barely 18) the money and I went with my two best friends. I recall it being ~$400 in 2000.
One of my friends (who is now a conservative Christian republican stay at home mom fitness addict, married to an inter-generational wealth finance bro haha and no we are not friends anymore) was so hung over that she crawled to the second floor of the Planned Parenthood building where the offices were that were closed on Saturdays) to take a nap while were downstairs in the medical facility area of the building. My other friend (who is a Nurse practitioner and all around bad ass who ironically got pregnant two years later but remained pregnant and had a son), had to go looking for her, not understanding where she was, she even checked the car at some point. It became a big joke between us.
I actually don't remember where I stayed right after the abortion, must have been with friends or perhaps the boyfriend, to not be at home. I felt nothing but relief as well, and again in 2004 when my Nuva Ring fell out unknown to me, during sex, and stayed that way for over 24 hours in the sheets of the bed. Relief.
I'm 42 now, never had children and thankful for that. I am only now reaching some level of financial security that feels...kinda safe? As safe as one can be in a society that will bankrupt for your medical bills (in the USA). I'm so thankful for my child-free journey. I mourn the potential futures of the youth today who do not have the same access that I did.