Is Your Boyfriend a TV Lady Hater?
October 4, 2014 § Leave a comment
When it comes to television, it’s a brave new world. All you have to do is grab the remote after Sunday football to realize that the ladies have arrived. Veteran shows like The Good Wife and newcomers like Madam Secretary and How to Get Away With Murder teach us that television doesn’t have to have a bro-dominated cast to draw in male and female viewers alike.
The days of neurotic female subordinates or flighty love interests might be waning, but has your boyfriend’s brain caught up to the 21st century? TV lady haters unfurl their banners proudly on the Internet, but most have to be smoked out of their misogynist cave dwellings. If you’re not sure whether your guy is a lady hater or a lady worshipper, here are 4 questions you can ask him.
How did you feel about Skyler White? Recently a friend taught me that this is the ultimate litmus test. Hate for this badass Breaking Bad lady was so vitriolic that Anna Gunn personally wrote a letter to the New York Times defending her character. The “I hate Skyler White” Facebook page has 30,000 likes, and her fanpage has about 300. Just to find this picture I had to wade through uncountable hate memes on Google image. If your boyfriend felt that Skyler White was wrong not to support her husband’s reign of terror, then you might want to take a closer look at this one.
What do you think about the women on Game of Thrones? If a prospective male can’t even tell you his favorite female on Game of Thrones, then you should probably be worried. Chances are you’ll get an answer like Arya Stark and Brienne of Tarth, but a true lover of women also knows that real strength comes in many forms, not just the kind that will stab you in the gut. If your guy says shit about Sansa Stark or other ladies on the show, then you might want to be careful. Why hate on a woman who’s just doing what she can do survive?
Do you watch The Big Bang Theory? Look, I am well aware that 20 million people watch this show. Big Bang Theory reruns are about as avoidable as Internet comments. But aren’t we past the days of shelving women in science geek or dumb, hot girl tropes? This show is an advertisement that men are the true nerds, and at best, a woman can serve as a love interest. So if you’re interested in being more in life than someone’s girlfriend, I suggest you ask this question to a potential guy.
Who’s your favorite female lead? If it takes your dude more than fifteen seconds to answer this question (because he can’t think of any, not because there are so many he can’t choose), then it’s worth a deeper conversation. It’s great for couples to have their own TV interests, but if your boyfriend won’t even consider watching a show with a female lead, then you need to know his thinking.
Talking about powerful women in television isn’t about picking a fight with a guy you’re dating. It’s about getting a peak into the brain and seeing how he might process and label his interactions with women in day-to-day life. A man who respects ladies, sees their weaknesses as only human, and understands their stories arc as larger than that of a wife or girlfriend, is likely to be the best kind of guy. So go find the remote, and see what he has to say.
Vote for the BAMFiest one-liner!
October 3, 2014 § Leave a comment
Tougher than Fiction: Why Habits Are Hard to Break
October 1, 2014 § Leave a comment
Today I asked some of you on twitter to tell me what some of your worst fangirl habits were. Here are some of the responses:
- Watching TV instead of doing my work.
- Daydreaming about my OTP when out with friends. Also excusing myself early to be back online.
- Compulsively reloading tumblr and tracked tags I know damn well have no new content.
- Letting post TV hangovers affect my work life the next day.
If this sounds like you, you’re n
ot alone! The fangirl brain, or any brain, loves to conserve energy. So if we do anything over and over again, that action will eventually shift to autopilot. Our behaviors tag along behind where we choose to place our attention, so it’s no wonder that we get stuck. What hope is there for us to ever any of our personal goals or change our daily habits?
As fangirls, we see transformation happen over and over again in our favorite TV shows, books, and movies. A villain is confronted with the error of his ways, and he starts leading a better life. An addict hits rock bottom and has nowhere to go but up. Half of an OTP realizes she’s been shutting people out her entire life and finally reaches for love. Change is romantic, sudden, and powerful, isn’t it?
Wrong! In real life, change is slow, small, and often a struggle. So if you think staring at a BAMF screencap, reading an inspirational quote, or guilting yourself into a different behavior is enough to do the heavy lifting, think again.
Learning new behaviors takes practice. Just like writing really good smutfic takes time, patience, and poor vocabulary choices. So if you want to start living a different kind of life, here are a few tips for you. Luckily the fangirl already has most of these skills at her disposal!
Step 1. Reroute those neurons. Think about the change you want to make. Write it down in a journal. Write it on a piece of paper and stick it in your sock drawer. Write it on a screencap of Lana Parrilla and save it on your desktop. Tell yourself what’s going to happen. For example, “When I feel like not going to bed on time, I’m going to turn off my computer.” Say it again. Say it in the mirror. Text it to a friend. Write a letter to your grandma for godsakes, who doesn’t love mail?
Step 2. Headc
anon that shit. Imagine how you’re going to do this. Think about all the crap that’s going to stand in your way and how you’re going to fly over those hurdles like a motherfucking BAMF and how wonderful it’s going to feel. Visualizing yourself bobbing and weaving around the temptations of life is powerful.
Step 3. Simulate creys. Put yourself in situations (safe ones!) where you need to enact the behavior. Go through the motions, and pay attention to how it makes you feel. Keep practicing, and keep repeating steps 1 and 2.
To try this out, I suggest you pick a small change, like not checking your tumblr activity compulsively or making your bed every day. Remember, character transformation may be more romantic in fiction, but it’s way BAMFier in the real world. So have at it, lady.
BAMF One-Liner Competition!
September 29, 2014 § Leave a comment
All right ladies. It’s time to bust out those quoting skills and try your emotions on another Fangirl Therapy competition.
We all have quotes that float off the lips of our favorite ladyBAMFs and lodge into our brains. Perhaps we constantly reblog them in gif sets on tumblr, or we jot them down to motivate us when we’re sinking in self-doubt. It’s time to share that BAMF wisdom in a friendly little competition.
How to participate: Email your favorite BAMF one-liner to me at fangirltherapist@gmail.com, tweet @fangirltherapy, or drop the quote in my tumblr ask. Anyone can be quoted, as long as it’s a fictional character. One entry per human.
Deadline: Friday, October 3, noon EST. I’ll pick my ten favorites, and let everyone vote.
The prize: 
Kidding. I mean who wouldn’t want a Diane Lockhart coucharm mug? For the prize I’ll put your winning quote on a mug and mail it straight to you! So you can drink your coffee and your BAMF wisdom every morning.
So there you go! Start pulling quotes and keep on BAMFing.
fangirl dilemma: there and back again
September 29, 2014 § Leave a comment
Aredhel writes,
Just another 17-year-old daydreamer who spends her time in made up reality rather than with her friends. My fangirling has been really unbearable these days, and I really don’t know why. It all started in July. I decided to read The Hobbit book again and completely fell for it. Then for the movies and characters and whoooosh, here I am. Crying all day, knowing how the book ends, scared by the fact my beloved dwarves are gonna die.
And that is my problem. I want to be normal again and take it as a normal movie without emotions. But it seems impossible. I need someone with the same problem I can talk to. Or someone without this problem to help me. I think the third movie will tear my heart apart.
Whoooosh. What a perfect word to describe what it feels like to get swept up in a fangirl tornado of emotions. I’ll have to remember that and add it to the dictionary.
Aredhel, do you have your own tribe of friends like Tolkien’s 13 dwarves? Friends who are as beloved as the fictional characters steering your thoughts and emotions? If you don’t have fangirl friends, don’t be afraid to reach out to the great wide Internet and scoop some up (always being careful and checking they’re not axe murderers of course, with you being a young one). But even if they don’t share your interests, real life friends can be just as valuable. What is your dream for your life, and what is the dragon in it? And most important, who can accompany you along the journey and help you feel brave?
I can assure you that you’ll survive the third movie, my friend, but what you do with the story is up to you. And as the great J. R. R. Tolkien wrote, “There is nothing like looking if you want to find something.”
Friendship, The Best Ship
September 28, 2014 § Leave a comment
Jealousy always has been my cross, the weakness and woundedness in me that has most often caused me to feel ugly and unlovable, like the Bad Seed. I’ve had many years of recovery and therapy, years filled with intimate and devoted friendships, yet I still struggle. I know that when someone gets a big slice of pie, it doesn’t mean there’s less for me. In fact, I know that there isn’t even a pie, that there’s plenty to go around, enough food and love and air. But I don’t believe it for a second. I secretly believe there’s a pie. I will go to my grave brandishing my fork. – Anne Lamott
Spend two seconds in any fandom and you will see jealousy flare its ugly head. Fangirls act like they own a character, or they dismiss anyone who disagrees with them. They secretly hate those with more of a following or those who’ve met a certain celebrity. Anywhere there are humans on this planet there will be competition, so flailing over an OTP or debate over characterization is no exception. But did you know that that your emotions are the most tasty when you hand over the pie and let someone else have a slice?
Last weekend I went on a fangirl road trip to visit some of my tumblr friends (then twitter friends now real life friends). Two of us left after a long day of work at 9pm for a 6 hour road trip to meet our friends. And I can tell you without a doubt that arriving at a person’s house you’ve never met, in a strange city, at 3:30 in the morning, is the reason I am fangirl. It’s like getting to be a kid again, but with wine. When you meet women with whom you have shared the spectrum of emotions over the stories and characters you love, it’s like coming home. There is no need to impress, no need to size up, no need to compete in the manner that plagues so many of our adult relationships.
If you spend a lot of time complaining about interacting in a fandom, then it’s probably because you’re not doing it right. If you feel anxious because someone posted a picture of a celebrity before you do, or stole your fic idea, then you’ve failed to set your sights on the best part of fandom. The ship that sails faster and farther than the most life-ruining of OTPs. Friendship.
Unless you make them up yourself, you can never own a character, or a pairing, or a story. Sure, maybe you write better Vampire Diaries fanfic than anyone else ever has. Even better than Diane Lockhart’s housekeeper. But when we fangirl, we are borrowing characters. We’re taking them off the shelf, dusting them off, and taking them for a spin. But the shelf isn’t yours. The house isn’t even yours. You’re a guest, and you can spend that time bossing around the other visitors, or you can start paying attention to some of the absolutely fabulous people who just so happen to have stopped by.
The best fandom friends are the ones who root for your story as much as they do for your favorites in fiction. So don’t be afraid to introduce yourself to someone, or to shake someone off who’s bringing you down. Life is too short to get stuck in what’s temporary. Your interests may be transitory, but your confidantes don’t have to be.
Put Down the Fanfic
September 23, 2014 § Leave a comment
Books. Every fangirl likes them in theory, but sometimes we get sidetracked by our OTP and spend months submerged in the depths of fanfic, both good and bad. If you’re wanting to move out of a fic reading stage and pick up an actual book, here are a few tips to get you started.
1. Read what you like. You don’t have to be reading Dostoevsky for your brain to get all wrinkly. If it takes some chick lit for you to prep yourself to sink back into denser fiction, then that’s fine.
2. Consider the benefits. Did you know that people who read fiction are more likely to demonstrate greater empathy towards others as well as greater interpersonal skills? But you have to be willing to put yourself in different people’s shoes, not just your favorite character’s over and over again.
3. Use your fangirl imagination. If you have to plaster another character’s face on the protagonist in your mind to get excited about a book, then cast away. There was a blonde protagonist in the Wool series named Juliet, so of course I cast her as Elizabeth Mitchell.
4. Ask your fangirl friends. What book reminds them of a TV show or a movie you like? To get you started with this, here are few of my recommendation.
If you like Downton Abbey, then you might like
If you like The Walking Dead, then try
Rather than reading Harry Potter for the 9th time, how about
Did you love how much LOST scared you? Then I recommend
Caught in a Hunger Games slump? How about
Love BAMFy middle-aged ladies? You must read
I’m not into The Big Bang Theory, but I did love
Who doesn’t love Orphan Black? You have to read
Interested in prison life from Orange is the New Black? I loved
Finally, for all you Battlestar Galactica fans who love middle-aged idiots in cabins, then you must read,
fangirl dilemma: livin life
September 23, 2014 § Leave a comment
Monet asks,
Im doing a science fair project on what causes people to ‘fangirl,’ and I’m looking for answers on how to stop since I for one am a die-hard One Direction fan. Help?
First of all, GOOD FOR YOU for generating awareness about the science of fangirling. I’m curious to see what your findings were.
I get a lot of messages from people about how to stop fangirling. My first response is usually, “Why would anybody want to stop?” But then I remember how it feels to experience anxiety over something that isn’t really worth it. We’ve all been there.
To me, though, the question isn’t how to stop fangirling. It’s how do you start living your life? Maybe that’s too Oprah of a question for some people, but it’s the one we have to ask ourselves.
We admire people in fiction and celebrities usually because they are out there LIVIN LIFE. But dump in a couple of ounces of creys, shake and stir, and that concept gets twisted around in our brains. We associate our emotions with the person and not with the story that tugs at our insides.
So if you want to stop fangirling, then start living my friend. Going cold turkey will leave nothing but a gaping void, so rather than dumping your One Direction merch on the side of the road, I suggest you start adding healthy habits to your day. Make mistakes. Be bold. Get rejected. Discover what passions give you the same fuzzy feelings that they do. The more you start living your own life, the less you’ll need someone else’s to get you through the day.
How to Speak Fangirl
September 22, 2014 § Leave a comment
My latest from Thought Catalog.
Being bilingual is an essential life skill in this day and age. Unfortunately, linguists have failed to recognize that Fangirl is a growing dialect that infiltrates the Internet, pop culture, and beyond.
The fangirl is the thirteen-year-old crying in the school bathroom when a One Direction member won’t reply to her tweet. She’s the college student at Comic-Con parading in full Battlestar Galactica gear. She’s also your forty-five-year-old boss who got fired for writing erotic Harry Potter fanfiction on her work laptop.
Fangirls have suffered among those peoples whose accused deficit in social functioning has historically justified their persecution, such as English Majors or gingers. So if you’d like to play a role in rectifying history, you might benefit from learning a phrase or two from their language. Read the rest here.
Mythbusters Fangirl Edition
September 17, 2014 § 1 Comment
Part of my mission here at Fangirl Therapy is to do my part erasing some of the stigma that has plagued the ladies of fandom for centuries. Okay decades. But it’s still a big fucking deal. We are not all fourteen year olds crying at a Bieber concert. We have jobs and healthy relationships and some of us even make our beds every day. You wouldn’t even be able to pick us out of a lineup on the days that all our Threadless t-shirts are in the dirty laundry.
The truth is, the time is ripe for fangirling. We are rising up out of the ashes and claiming that our imaginations make us hot commodities. We are on the rise and on the move. Like if you had a magic wand and personified a Kelly Clarkson song. Okay maybe too far.
So let’s bust some myths, shall we?
Myth #1: Fangirls are all teenagers. The first fangirl friend I ever met in real life was a wonderfully intelligent and successful woman in her 40s. Sure there are herds of thirteen year olds lurking about the web and whining about not having enough allowance money for concert tickets, but most of us are college age and beyond. Is it more socially acceptable for a teenager to cry about Sirius Black than your grandmother? Yes. But that doesn’t mean the middle-aged ladies of the world aren’t secretly pining over Claire Underwood’s wardrobe in their free time.
Myth#2: Fangirls are trying to escape their boring lives. False. My life is pretty damn exciting. The stories I could tell about my clients if confidentiality weren’t an issue would fill a thousand TV seasons. I have hobbies that don’t involve making gifs. Fangirls can have rich and adventurous lives just like other people. We just have six thousand imaginary friends along for the ride and don’t require Bejeweled to keep us occupied.
Myth #3: Fangirls aren’t capable of healthy relationships. Seriously? What is it about the Internet that makes people think all of our fangirl friends are serial killers or proselytizing lesbians preying on straight girls? All of a sudden we’re all Orange is the New Black characters. Are there fangirls who meet online and become involved romantically? Of course. This tends to happen sometimes when humans interact with other humans. I met my boyfriend through an online dating site. It’s a brave new world folks. Engaging in fandom and participating in healthy family, friend and romantic relationships aren’t mutually exclusive. Anything can become unhealthy if you focus on it too intensely, real world relationships and online relationships alike.
And finally, Myth #4. Fangirls spend all day on the Internet. Hmm. Fine, this is 100% true. I’m on the Internet right now, scrolling past cat gifs. Haters gonna hate. Fangirls have been known, from time to time, to hang up our clicky fingers and breathe some fresh air and go hiking and shit. How else do you think we come up with vacation headcanon for our OTP?
Fangirl Therapy 