Matt Joseph Diaz

Being asked about my weight-loss “secrets” make me uncomfortable. It feels very different from people wanting to know about my story. It feels like being asked to provide a shortcut.

I am so very afraid.

Think of #MondaysWithMatt as the ultimate #MondayMotivation. Today's topic is how to handle mental health in a partner.

Instead of being allowed to exist as fully complex and sexual human beings, they’re relegated to being a tag in pornography. They’re seen as a guilty pleasure among those with “abnormal” sexual appetites, something to be viewed sexually in spite of their comparison to what we consider "the norm."

We met Matt a year ago when he showed us his post weight-loss body.

As much as you want to believe people are all the same, we don’t have the luxury of being seen as the “default” in the same way white, straight, cis people often are. We don’t have the luxury of dismissing our painful history and systemic issues for the sake of everyone getting along, because we’re still in the middle of them.

For some of us, our first real taste of adulthood comes from sitting alone in a clinic, waiting to get our ding-dongs tested.

In the spring of 2013, I met a woman on OKCupid. She was petite, with a kind smile and a voice so soft that it could melt all your troubles away. Her shock of red curls went down to her shoulders — and because of this, and the fact that we no longer speak, let's call her Ann.

Ann was a few years older than I, wise and mature. She also, it turned out, spent her professional life beating up strangers for their sexual satisfaction.

You are not where you're from, and you are not your environment.

Representation is one of those persistent issues that will always be argued about. However for people of color, queer people, and those who live outside the gender binary, it’s an issue that ties into our identities as a whole.