Melissa Petro

Mark prayed to Saint Francis, a patron saint of drunks and (according to Mark) lost causes. Mark wasn’t religious, but he wore a St. Francis amulet around his neck, a gift from his father. Nights when he didn’t come home, I prayed to St. Francis, too.

It's pretty well understood in 12 step programs that "who you see here and what you say here, stays here."

“If you believe in the decriminalisation of sex work,” Ian Dunt rightfully points out, “you will instantly come under a sustained and highly emotive attack on your morality and your identity.” In this vein, when a man comes out in favor of sex worker’s rights, he becomes “a betrayer of women, a gender Judas encouraging violence against them.”

Especially if you’re a woman, people assume you’re hungry for a man.

Use insect repellent, sleep under a mosquito net, and just don’t get pregnant — is this the best we can do for Latin American women?

If you watch TV and movies hoping to be emotionally moved or intellectually challenged, you know that means you’ll some

We’ve all been in a situation where we've thought NO ONE CAN EVER KNOW THAT THIS HAPPENED TO ME.

"We built a luxury dream home but can only afford to have two children."

The other day on Facebook, one of my friends remarked that I was a “later-in-life” bride.

No exaggeration, when I close my eyes— even for a second— I see white dresses.