intimacy practice / more about lack of belonging / raising kids / exhausted, discouraged

[belenen]

Today was intimacy practice and it was really wonderful; hard topics, but deep sharing and very nourishing. We've been at max capacity (8 people) for the past two sessions and it takes significantly longer, right under 4 hours this time, but (for me at least) it's worth it. But I think it might be a bit much for some people, so I'm trying to

Comments

[classical_wolf]

Can you speak more about intimacy practice? I'm quite intrigued.

[belenen]

Here's where I explain: http://belenen.livejournal.com/532220.html and there's more in the tag: http://belenen.livejournal.com/tag/intimacy%20practice

[classical_wolf]

It all sounds quite wonderful, really ♥

And you're truly beautiful, so....to lead all of this....and to be able to do this with you must be awesome. I wanted to say gorgeous but I didn't want you to assume I was labeling or gendering you. I tried to be non-gender specific ♥

[blimeyzawn1]

I want long-term unity, and I definitely want intimacy in a large friend group. And I'd like to at least try to help you make it. I also know that I've been one of those people who has probably required a lot of work to maintain the connection, but I don't want to be, and I promise to do better.

[belenen]

<3 this filled me with love and joy, I am very glad that you want these things and are willing to try to help make it!

[belenen]

Well I want community that includes Suzu. And at the very least, Topaz and Abby and Zawn all love kids from what I can tell and I think they would be happy to have zir around. Kylei gets worried around kids at first but warms up when ze feels confident that ze doesn't need to be normative. I dunno how the others would feel but I feel sure they wouldn't be negative, just maybe neutral.

Distance, ugh. It is annoying. But Abby lives long-distance now (closer to you than me actually) and is still very much included in our world I would say. I don't think it's as much of a barrier as with most people.

[belenen]

cool! about the cartoon explaining genderfree, heh. We're all gentle about pronoun correction so no worries.

[raoin]

indeed, we think of ourselves as being incredibly lucky to have an extra set of hands around the house for child-rearing purposes. we joked, in the early months, that the ideal adult-to-child ratio is 3:1. but it's not really a joke, some days it feels like a necessity.

[belenen]

I feel you! It seems a necessity for me too, otherwise things fall into a binary so easily where one person does all the parenting and the other does financial support and house maintenance. With 3+ parents you can split it up better.

[twofootsmall]

Your writing is not super crap, nor is it ever from my brief experience of your journal.

But this post reminds me that I need to respond to it and to the 'belonging' one, too - you raise points that resonate with me, repeatedly! :)

[belenen]

aw, thanks. <3 glad to resonate though sad that it is on a topic of lack!