queer Archives - The Unwritten

It’s Time to Make All Queer Spaces Accessible

“Another reason I struggled to identify as gay was the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. The Mardi Gras was the first introduction to my people,” explained Hannah Gadsby in her 2020 Netflix special Douglas, “I used to sit there and watch it and go where do the quiet gays go?”

In her comedy special, Gadsby revealed that she was diagnosed with autism in her thirties, the delay partially because she did not match the prototype of autism, and the prototypical LGBTQ+ individual she saw on her TV screen.

Incorporating accessibility into queer community safe spaces is about acknowledging the diversity within our own community and welcoming people of all ability levels into spaces we create for expression, acceptance, and identity.

Gut Feelings: Being Gay with Familial Adenomatous Polyposis

Love has never come easy to me. Living with chronic illness and the aftermath of three surgeries, I struggle to let people in – to be intimate during sex.

It all started when I was 11. Sitting in a hard-backed, plastic chair, the doctor told me I had familial adenomatous polyposis (or FAP for short). They explained to me that tiny wart-like lumps called polyps (or adenomas) were growing inside my bowel and rectum and if untreated, they would turn cancerous. Fast forward seven years – and the removal of my bowel and the lining of my rectum – I came out to friends and family as gay.

It took me years to figure out what it meant to be gay and to understand how I fit into the world. Burdened by family and medical trauma, I found it difficult to process it.