http://www.livegirlreview.com

Well, it’s no secret that I <3 Audacia Ray - in fact, we’re working together on a couple of very cool projects and trust me, you’ll be the first to hear about them! I’m nearly bursting at the seams as I write this because I want to tell you all the neato things we have up our sleeve(s). Until then, I’ve got your Dacia fix! Live Girl Review Episode 3 is up and ready for you! ::Click the pic:: Here’s what you’ll find:

Reviews

* Books: Opening Up: A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Open Relationships by Tristan Taormino (the book has its own community site: Opening Up) vs Open: Love, Sex, and Life in an Open Marriage by Jenny Block
* Sex Toy: Fun Factory’s Delight - buy through this link and type in the code “livegirl” at checkout and you get a 10% discount
* Smut Review: Hospital! directed by Benny Profane and featuring Mandy Morbid, Zak Sabbath, and Caroline Pierce

(whose website URL I just have to point out because its hilarious: jennyonthepage.com. Ha!)

One Hot Minute
Because I reviewed two books about open relationships, Jamye Waxman decided to share a few tips about how to have a happy threesome.

Bad Press
Here’s why you should think twice about a vaginoplasty - put those muscles to work instead!

Fan Girl Moment
I get fan girly on Marisa DiMattia of tattoo couture blog Needled. She talks all about sex and tattoos and the study she’s been doing on the subject - you can read more about the study in her column Erotic Ink over on Suicide Girls.

Goodies!
This episode’s give aways will go to one lucky commenter who must come on over to the post on Live Girl Review to drop their words of wisdom - not top five or top ten, but anyone who comments before the next episode goes up. The winner will get: a copy of Hospital plus Ellen Forney’s Lust (comics inspired by personal ads).

Technorati Tags: Audacia Ray, Jayme Waxman, Jenny Block, Live Girl Review, Tristan Taormino

Icanhascheezburger.com

I had to buy a new bra today - a 34A.  Where the hell did my boobs go?  Breasts, okay, but for this post I’m sticking with boobs.

What you might not know is that in my 20’s I was a size H.  I had boobs, natural boobs, the size of Mz Berlin’s.  I had breast reduction surgery in the mid-90’s to reduce my gignormous, and in my opinion burdensome, boobies to a size C.  Now, at the time I was a much larger woman.  Here’s Bra 101 for you men:  The number is the size around your chest and the letter is your cup size small to large.  I went from a 46H to a 46C.

Even though I considered myself to be fat, I still felt like I had proportionate boobs for the first time and I loved them!  I showed them off to anybody who would look.   I ran around braless for the first time, showing off my perky nipples to the world!  I got my nipples pierced even, twice (why I took the first piercings out I don’t remember).  Oh, it’s safe to say that even at something like 230 lbs., I still felt sexy - curvy with great tits.

One of the things I did not anticipate in this giant weight loss adventure was losing my precious boobs (bewbs, breasts, tits, jugs, and boobies).  I dropped down to a 40B, then to a 36B, and then 34B.  Each time I noticed that I filled out my new bra less and less.  I’ve been talking for weeks about needing to buy a smaller bra, joking that I would have to give W my old bra as she grows and I shrink.

I’ve been dreading it and anticipating it in many ways.  At one time I dreamed of being flat chested, but I never actually imagined it or envisioned it.  I have noticed over the last few weeks in particular that there is noticeable space between my skin and the fabric of my 34B bra that I love so much.  I noted it to Mark, who is always sweet to point out that he’s really only interested in my nipples.

I gave in today and bought a 34A.  The last time I remember wearing a 34A it was a training bra (What exactly do training bras train?  Has anyone figured that out?) and I think I was 10.  This wasn’t part of the plan.  When I envisioned losing 150 lbs., I didn’t really factor in my boobs.  I was just thinking about being a size 4, my goal.

I’ve gone from being the girl with the second biggest boobs in high school (my sister is 3 years older and had bigger boobs) to being the Mom with the boobs smaller than a teenager.  What the fuck happened?  The other day some guy called me “flat-chested” as an insult.  Holy shit!

Women who are curvy and scrumptious, dare I say, fat, are curvy and scrumptious.  They do have the wonderful curves and the soft feminine tenderness that, in my opinion, fat provides.  Fat women that I find attractive are to me, in a way, so attractive because they do embody that motherly femininity that gives one comfort and warmth, the heft of weight in a breast held in your hand is sexy.  I miss that kind of feminine sexiness.

Coming to terms with my new body means I really do have to accept that my boobs are gone.  It’s not tragic, and I would never want anybody to compare this little pathetic observation of my body changing to the sudden loss of your boobs due to mastectomy - whole different game, not just ballpark.  They are gone, though, and the scars beneath them that are all that remain from the previous surgery leave me looking as though I’ve had them removed.

What I was just commenting to Marky is that I lost all this weight to feel sexier, and yet in many ways I feel less sexy.  Losing my boobs is for sure one of them.

Technorati Tags: ex-fat femme, real life, weight loss

Read PostSecret.com Every Sunday

I never considered going to my 20 year high school reunion back in Oregon until recently.  My friend, M, was faced with his reunion this year.  As a very successful man, he kind of wanted to go back just to prove himself in some way.  Yet, at the same time he was concerned that he was just going back to brag.  But really, why else do you go to your 20 year reunion?  To talk about what a utter and complete failure you’ve been in the last 20 years?  Clearly everyone there either thinks that they have been successful or they are lying about their failures.

Recently, after writing the post about my metamorphosis from fat to thin, I started thinking about going to my reunion for the first time.  Why?  Why now would I even consider it when my stance before was, “Fuck them.  I hated them in high school, why would I want to waste my time on them now?”  For the same reason everybody else goes to their 20 year reunion - to prove something to everybody else.  What is it that I’m trying to prove?  That’s what’s kind of interesting to me.

Why didn’t I think my life was worthy of bragging before?  Why would I go now and not then?  Nothing has really changed, except that our public relations firm has grown in leaps and bounds.  Still, most of my work is in the adult industry and I can’t imagine going back to small loggertown and bragging over my client list at my class reunion - not really classy.  I could have gone just as myself, put on the sticker with my whole first name and my maiden name and my married name in parenthesis like most of the women there will do.  I could have gone and bragged about my amazing children and my husband’s undying love and devotion.  I’ve gone through a helicopter crash, divorce, college, grad school, teaching at the University, boarding school, and high school and those are all worth discussing.   I could fine out whatever happened to…  pretty much everybody.  I haven’t kept up with anybody.

So what is the defining reason that I’m even considering this?  This decision is solely based upon my opinion that I look pretty fucking good for a 36 year old mother of two after losing 130 lbs.  Following logic, my payoff then would be that some of the people who were mean to me in high school would be surprised to see me now, and my secret hope would be that they would regret being so mean to me would be fulfilled.  It’s like a Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion movie with a weird and kinky twist.

I don’t think I’m alone in my sentiment.  I think everybody at some point in high school thought to the future and envisioned being the successful ________ that comes back to the reunion and everybody would be sorry they were so mean to you.

What I do think is odd is that my weight ultimately carries the most weight, no pun intended, in my recent reconsideration of attending my upcoming class reunion.  I don’t really know what it means, other than I think I probably my weight probably has an unhealthy effect on my self-esteem whether it’s high or low.  The fact is, I put too much value on my weight and not enough value in my person.

[Posted Originally on CatalinaSays.com]

Technorati Tags: helicopter crash, high school reunion, weight loss

Image from Postsecret.com

In a recent discussion amongst ourselves we came to the conclusion that we need more diversity in our group of contributors.  I believe it was stated something along the lines of us all being white, with advanced educations, and with the exception of one (me) identified as fat femmes.  I still fit though.  I'm an ex-fat femme.

Not long ago I came out, not as a queer femme, but as an ex-fat queer femme.  I started talking about this recently with friends, how life has changed for me, especially as a femme, being thin.  I've been informed that the rules have changed and I now have to learn how to navigate my way through society as a thin woman, which means (and my friend really did say this) I'm not supposed to use the word fat anymore.  Really?  Is that true?  Is it like the "N Word"?  Maybe it's the equivalent of calling myself queer, but not wanting someone else to call me a queer?  I don't know.

Let me give you some background.  In February of 2007 I went to the doctor.  I had a baby at home with a midwife in 2005.  I hadn't seen my weight since 2005.  I knew I was fat, but I didn't expect them to say, "270 lbs. today".  I immediately began to cry and cried through my entire initial consultation with a physician I had never met.  She must have thought I was nuts.  Well, kind of.  I was there for refills on my antidepressants.

I cried and cried and cried and came home and cried some more.  2 7 0.  Two hundred and seventy pounds.  I felt sexy.  I still felt like other people found me to be sexy.  My delicious husband never let on that he didn't enjoy my body or find me attractive.  Our former girlfriend was a yummy size 18 and never once did I find her anything but perfect in her skin.  Yet the numbers resonated in my head.  Of course I knew I was fat.  I could only buy clothes at Lane Bryant or go with the limited selection of "plus-sized woman" options in a mainstream department store that were sinfully ugly.  I remember feeling like it was a punishment for being fat - either pay exorbitant prices at Lane Bryant or wear the ugly fat lady clothes.

Something fundamental changed that day, and I can't tell you what it was.  It wasn't about being healthy.  I know, it should be.  It was something else that I hope to be able to pinpoint by writing about this topic.  I strictly couldn't process that I was 30 lbs. shy of 300 lbs. and I am only 5' 4".

Fast forward to today - it is August, 2007.  I weigh 140 lbs.  I'm a size six.  Life is very different and apparently the rules of engagement have changed.  I'm going to try to figure them out, and hopefully you'll help me by just giving me a place to write about it here.  I want to, for example, write about how uncomfortable it makes other people that I've lost weight and they haven't, or how people now worry I'm anorexic because I am so self-disciplined.

This post would go on forever and a day if I were to talk about each of those 130 lbs. that I've lost and all the work that went into each one of them - physical and emotional.  Everybody wants to know the secret.  There was a rumor where I used to work that I had gastric bypass surgery (how else could she have lost all that weight?).  I didn't.  I would have, but the process seemed so complex and complicated.

Here's what I did, in a nutshell:  I changed the way I thought about the world.  I changed the way I thought about myself.  I changed virtually every element of who I am except for the core values I hold and my red hair and freckles.  I journaled every day.  I found ways to enjoy exercise (a totally unique concept to me).  I did it the good, old-fashioned way and threw in a bunch of yoga, visualization techniques, meditation and neuro-linguistic programming.  I'm far from finished.  I don't just mean the last 20 lbs. I want to lose.  I mean in the way I see myself now and how that is different from how I thought it would be.

So what do you think?  Is fat a naughty word we ought not say unless we ourselves identify as fat?  Does it count that some days I feel fat?  Can I still support the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance or is it patronizing?  [On a side note:  I do think it's funny that in their own Cafe Press store their largest size is XL].  Does being thin make me more feminine than when I was fat?  I feel more femme than ever, to be honest.  Is my friend right?  Am I limited to using {BBW, volumptuous, curvy, overweight, larger, bigger, and plus-sized} when all I want to say is fat?

Technorati Tags: diets, ex-fat femme, fat, feminine, identities, labels, meditation, NAAFA, neurolinguistic programming, society, weight loss, yoga

The Iris by Lelo is the latest toy I’ve tried out.  If you’re not familiar with the company, Lelo is a very high end, European company with top drawer toys.  They make some of my favorite products  The Gigi and  Liv are two other examples of their upscale dildo vibes that I’m dying to review.  Some of their products are very discreet, in fact the Lily looks more like a spa hot massage stone than a vibe.  I just recommended it to a friend recently who wanted to put a surprise in his wife’s carry-on bag that wouldn’t get her arrested or embarrass her in airport security.

Just this week I received the only product made by Lelo that isn’t as much a sex toy as a sex product - the Luna Beads.  I’ll write my review here soon about them, but the bottom line is they are a combined pleasure and exercise system.  You can enjoy the sensation of them while flexing your pelvic floor muscles (so to speak).  The company states that “Her movement-induced subtle vibe makes for more efficient, fun and pleasurable “Kegel”-exercising. Indeed, performing daily “Kegels” helps restrain and prevent stress incontinence, but benefits moreover include increased neuromuscular control, enhanced ¬¬sensation and ultra-intense orgasms.”  I’m all for ultra-intense orgasms, so I figured I might give them a try.  I’ll let you know!

The Iris is the ultimate multi-tasker pleasure provider.  It came in a really nice box with a thorough instruction guide, a really nice silk storage pouch, and a charger.  It took me a while to figure it out, because there is one little square button to make so many things happen!  Maybe I didn’t read the booklet well-enough because I was so excited to put it to use, but it wasn’t as intuitive as the company claims.

It is very responsive and allows you to target the intensity or balance it equally between the tip and the shaft of the vibrator - in simple terms, there are a pair of “individually balanced vibrator engines, operating in harmony”.  The one touch does it all button was initially confusing, but once I figured it out, it’s really quite a benefit.  Side-to-side to increase intensity, up-and-down to change the location and pattern of intensity.

A fully-charged Iris is good to go for 7 hours and you don’t have to spend a fortune every week in batteries to use it.  It also has a one-year manufacturer’s warranty - they are a great product and the company is willing to back it up.  I’ve never had a Lelo product fail me, but for the investment, it’s nice to know that if it did, I’d have a new one in a week.  (It would be one rough week!)

I’ve used my Iris enough to know that it’s my good friend.  I have a nice selection of dildos and vibrators and other sex toys, so it’s worth noting that along with the G-twist, the Stubby G, The Cyberglass Felicity, and the Hitachi Magic Wand you’ll find my Iris.  It’s a toybox favorite of mine.

Now before you go toy shopping crazy, read this:  VibeReview.com is offering 10% off if you use this link.  Their Obama for President Coupon is good through election day and here’s what VibeReview.com has to say about it:

Hello Naughty Voters,

Is it politically correct for businesses to announce their support for a particular candidate? Probably not! We live in difficult times and there’s no reason to remain neutral to appease other people. So, VibeReview is officially announcing its support for Barack Obama. It’s time to take our country back, our sex lives back, and focus on change.

Note: We are not affiliated in any way with the Obama Campaign. We are using our First Amendment rights to support the candidate we believe has the country’s best interest in mind - meaning this is merely our collective opinion.

We believe in working today to build a better tomorrow, a new day that includes everyone, regardless of color, gender, and sexual orientation. Barack Obama represents equality during a time of turmoil and separation.

The Obama for President Coupon is good for a 10% discount on your next purchase. Feel free to pass the coupon on to your friends. The more the merrier!

For more reviews, take a look at the Reviews page on BestSexBloggers.com.  A lot of my friends and colleagues also review products, not exclusively VibeReview.com products, but it’s a good place to get an honest opinion before you make a very special purchase.  Take a look.