Published by the Washington Post, The Lily is a newspaper written by women for women. The articles are perfect for the curious minded and those who want to be heard.

The Lily

The Lesbian Switchboard was a critical emotional bolster for women in the throes of questioning or crises.

Chloe Lula for The Lily, covers the rise and fall of the Lesbian Switchboard, a Brooklyn based hotline operation that gave queer women support and advice, operating for more than two decades, between 1972 and 1997.

Sarah Naughton

This historic hotline offered lesbians support and advice for decades — this is the story of its rise and fall

Recently, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Evan Rachel Wood have been speaking out.

After a year of lockdown and heightened political contention, many of us have experienced overlapping traumatic events. But how do we know whether intense experiences have resulted in post-traumatic stress disorder? For The Lily, Sunny Fitzgerald provides ways to recognise and, if needed, heal from trauma.

“The trauma response is intended to protect us, but it can become harmful if it stays activated even after the threat is gone. 'If our trauma is untreated, we remain in that hypervigilant state,' Robinson says. 'If we stay in that activated state for a prolonged period of time, the body cannot sustain that. It will have to work hard to maintain that level, and eventually we will burn out'.”

We’ve been hearing a lot about PTSD — here’s how to recognize and heal from trauma

Model and author Chrissy Teigen and singer John Legend recently shared the loss of their third child.

"Fans responded quickly, offering sympathy. The candor of a celebrity who shared her pain so openly deeply struck women. Many commented on her posts across social media that they too had suffered a similar loss and thanked her for helping destigmatize pregnancy loss." Soo Youn of The Lily ponders how the couple's experience of pregnancy loss reflects reality for many expectant parents.

Ashley Klanac

Chrissy Teigen was deeply honest about her pregnancy loss. Her rawness struck a chord.

A personal reflection on our collective 'need for closure', and how to best deal with it.

After discovering an ex-boyfriend had passed away years ago, Akanksha Singh was left with a desperate search for closure. In this piece for The Lily, she talks to experts, who offer methods to help ease the pain associated with the unexpected end of a relationship.

Monita Rajpal

I looked up an ex during lockdown. He’d died years ago — and it sent me on a desperate search for closure

For one expert, the decision had all to do with 'strategy'.

Sexual assault and harassment have been central issues for the Democrats in the last two elections. But in August's Democratic convention, which saw Joe Biden confirm his presidential nomination, #MeToo wasn't mentioned, not even once. Caroline Kitchener explores the potential reasons in The Lily.

Why wasn’t #MeToo ever mentioned during the Democratic convention?

For one scholar, the debate has become a game of 'political strategy'.

"There's a lot riding on this debate. While antiabortion groups also lay claim to other suffragists, they tend to focus most on Anthony. This makes sense, said Tracy Thomas, a professor at the University of Akron School of Law, who has studied the suffragists' views on abortion: Of all the women in the suffrage movement, Anthony is 'the name everyone knows.' If you were taught about any one women's rights leader in school, it was probably her." Caroline Kitchener analyses this for The Lily.

Was Susan B. Anthony antiabortion? Two sides are dueling over the answer — and the definition of feminism

When a phone call doesn't go well in this line of work, it could be a matter of life or death.

A coronavirus contact tracer is "part disease detective, part social work, part therapist," and more often than not the majority of them, who constantly navigate thorny issues of trust and health, are also women. Rachael Allen explores for The Lily.

Betsy Foldes Meiman

A day in the life of a contact tracer

A night with a Georgetown student protester outside the White House.

"Friedland made her way to the front as soon as she arrived in Lafayette Square for the first night of protests on Friday. It's terrifying to be a few feet from a long line of police officers, Friedland says, who for years have scared her so much that she holds her breath when she drives by their cars. Before last week, Friedland had never been to a protest with violence. Neither had anyone else in her Georgetown group." Caroline Kitchener, writing in The Lily, reports.

Pepper bullet wounds, stinging eyes: a night with a Georgetown student protester outside the White House

What's the world like on the road for those on the front line?

These travelling key workers still have to gamble with their own safety and showing up for duty. Jessica Militare, writing in The Lily, offers this diary of a female truck driver who did 3,481 miles on the road during the coronavirus pandemic.

3,481 miles on the road with a female truck driver during coronavirus

"This is a major trauma to the country right now."

"With America now several weeks or months (is there even a difference?) into this new normal, our mental health needs have changed. Many people are reporting their anxiety is manifesting differently from even one or two months ago. That's especially been the case for women." Soo Youn reports for The Lily.

Kelsey Navarro

Is your anxiety ramping up? You aren’t alone. Here’s what mental health professionals say

The story of three women who got tired of a failed system, and decided to take action.

"In the year after Trump's election, some 26,000 women contacted the liberal political action committee Emily's List about running for office. Few of those were names you would have heard of; most were inquiring about local positions." Award-winning writer, Amanda Loudin, reports for The Lily.

First they got mad. Then they ran for office. Now they want others to do the same

For new mothers, isolation means after giving birth no recovery support or visits from family and friends.

"Postpartum depression is the No. 1 complication of childbirth, affecting 15 percent of new mothers, according to the American Psychological Association. Symptoms can include feelings of sadness and hopelessness, appetite and sleep changes and, in rare instances, thoughts of self-harm. Researchers say it can be caused by plummeting postpartum hormones, sleep deprivation and emotional stress." Juli Fraga investigates in The Lily, the effect coronavirus is having on mothers after giving birth.

The pandemic may be intensifying postpartum depression. But there are resources to help

From one decade to the next: seven stories of solitude during the coronavirus.

The Lily asked to hear from women who are self-quarantined alone and received almost 1,300 responses. In this interesting piece, Caroline Kitchener gathers seven of those responses and chronicles what is life is like for women living alone during the coronavirus outbreak.

A woman living alone

Stuck at home: clothes need to be comfortable, but not ‘straight comfy’ either.

"Assembling a 'WFH outfit' might seem simple: Go to the closet, select a pair of leggings and a sweatshirt, repeat. But Decker, a 32-year-old product manager living in Denver, had more specific requirements. She needed something comfortable that was not "straight comfy clothes," falling somewhere between the holey pyjama bottoms she wore to sleep and binge Netflix and the dark jeans she wore to the office." Caroline Kitchener, writing in The Lily, analyses.

The perfect WFH outfit? It’s more complicated than yoga pants

Rather than just "needing to relax", the issue could lay in serious, underlying medical conditions.

"Women are not typically told that their orgasm matters, that their pleasure matters." Due to not well-known conditions like vaginismus and vulvodynia, three out of four women are likely to experience painful sex. But why aren't treatments more common? Caroline Kitchener, writing in The Lily, investigates.

3 in 4 women will experience painful sex. What’s with the impulse to just ‘grin and bear it’?

A walk through Washington D.C. while the world stands still.

In this reflective piece, multiplatform editor of The Lily, Lena Felton, shares her struggles living alone and dealing with the consequences of the coronavirus outbreak. In walking through Washington D.C. while the world stands still, she has come to appreciate her surroundings under a completely different light.

A love letter to long walks while the world stands still

“I want to make my decision based on, who do I really trust?”

As caucuses begin in 2020, it seems Senator Warren is having serious troubles keeping hold of her younger followers. Caroline Kitchener from The Lily, reports on the reasons why.