The Body Image Episode: Millennial Women, Diet Culture & Gender Expression

2026-02-10

Wives Not Sisters

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1:02:44

What does body image look like when you’re queer, partnered, confident… and still unlearning everything you were taught?

In this episode, Alix & Kayla get deeply honest about body image, desire, and self-perception inside queer relationships. They talk about comparing yourself to your past body, feeling pressure to look “gay enough,” navigating femme and masc expectations, and how confidence, strength, and self-expression shape attraction far more than size or shape.

From almond moms and Gen Z style anxiety to masculinity, femininity, fitness, sex, and learning how to dress—and live—for yourself, this conversation explores what it really means to feel at home in your body when the rules you grew up with no longer apply.

This is a candid, funny, and thoughtful episode about queer identity, lesbian relationships, body neutrality, confidence, and the slow, imperfect work of decentering the gaze and choosing yourself.

00:00 – Intro: Married, Codependent, and Back in the Jungle
01:00 – Queer Camp Update + Life in Nicaragua
05:30 – Today’s Topic: Body Image in Queer Relationships
06:40 – “My Body Had to Be ___ to Deserve Affection”
09:00 – Comparing Your Body to Your Past Self
11:00 – Unlearning Food, Rest, and Exercise Guilt
13:35 – Body Image in the Queer World vs the Straight World
17:00 – Confidence, Self-Expression, and Attraction
19:00 – Dating Women: Feeling Bigger, Stronger, or More Visible
24:30 – When Body Image Wasn’t the Problem at All
26:00 – Weight Gain, Health, and Changing Body Shapes
28:00 – Masculinity, Femininity, and Wanting a Different Body
31:00 – Being Femme, Being “Hot,” and Decentering Men
34:00 – Getting Dressed for Yourself (Not the Gaze)
37:15 – Listener Hot Takes on Body Image
39:30 – Masc vs Femme Bodies & Internalized Misogyny
42:00 – Aesthetic Attraction vs Romantic Attraction
44:00 – Power, Confidence, and “The Hotter Partner”
46:20 – Are Queer People Expected to Be More Body-Evolved?
49:45 – Gender Identity vs Learned Body Shame
52:40 – Who’s the Problem: Men, Women, or the Patriarchy?
58:30 – The One Thing We All Fixate On
01:00:00 – Why We Do This to Ourselves