Rich Queer Aunties

We're back for Part 2 — and this time, we're getting into the practice. What does reciprocity in friendship actually look like when you're not just talking about it, but living it?

Lola tells the story of sensing "a disturbance in the force" and reaching out to Christabel — a micro-rupture that could've gone sideways five years ago but instead became a masterclass in showing up for your people. Kachi shares why she's not afraid to look someone in the eye and say, "Would you like to be friends with me? Could you show up for me in this way?" — and why that directness makes people deeply uncomfortable. We talk about building care infrastructure (yes, including setting up your own meal train before surgery), why "let me know what you need" is not enough, and how to be the friend who shows up even when you don't know how.

Then we go there: GoFundMe ethics, mutual aid, and what community responsibility actually looks like when people take without reciprocating.

Christabel grounds the conversation in ancestral practice — from West African village structures to susu collective savings — and reminds us that none of us are well under capitalism, white supremacy, or colonialism, so maybe we should stop treating friendship like a test and start treating it like infrastructure.

We close with friendship evolution: how to navigate the grief of becoming different people, whether you need to have "the closing conversation" or just close the tab, and why Lola is learning to X out of relationships without guilt. Plus, a rapid-fire round on the friendship practices we're cultivating, letting go of, and what friendship liberation looks like.

If you enjoyed this episode, rate and review us because it really helps. Leave a comment and forward it to one friend today.

Stay connected:

Instagram: @richqueeraunties | @christabelmintahgalloway | @Qingkachi

Catch you in the next one.

XO, 

Christabel & Kachi.

 

 

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Keywords: adult friendship, friendship as a practice, friendship and consent, rupture and repair in friendship, proximity vs. intimacy, queer friendship, Black friendship, friendship boundaries, community vs. friendship, parasocial relationships, acquaintance vs. friend, Rich Queer Aunties, friendship skills, making friends after leaving religion, friendship and migration

Is friendship something that just happens to you, or is it a practice you have to actually learn? This week on Rich Queer Aunties, we sit down with Lola to talk about what it takes to build friendships sturdy enough to survive late-stage capitalism, migration, queerness, and becoming your full self.

We get into it: growing up in high-control religious households and how that shaped our relationship to trust, the difference between proximity and intimacy, and why friendship requires consent and agency — not just vibes. Lola breaks down why she stopped handing out the friendship card to anyone who asked, and why "letting things take the time they deserve" has become her guiding mantra. We debate whether rupture has to happen for a friendship to deepen (big R vs. little r), Christabel shares the hard lesson from a 27-year friendship that never saw conflict until it ended, and we all get honest about the parasocial intimacy culture that passes for friendship in places like Oakland.

Plus: why you can't collect friends like Infinity Stones, why acquaintanceship is a valid and underrated category, and why Christabel believes you're either her friend, her community member, or her enemy — and you'll know which one you are.

If you've ever wondered whether you're doing friendship wrong, or whether the people around you are actually your friends — this one's for you.

If you enjoyed this episode, rate and review us because it really helps. Leave a comment and forward it to one friend today.

Stay connected:

Instagram: @richqueeraunties | @christabelmintahgalloway | @Qingkachi

Catch you in the next one.

XO, 

Christabel & Kachi.

 

 

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Keywords: adult friendship, friendship as a practice, friendship and consent, rupture and repair in friendship, proximity vs. intimacy, queer friendship, Black friendship, friendship boundaries, community vs. friendship, parasocial relationships, acquaintance vs. friend, Rich Queer Aunties, friendship skills, making friends after leaving religion, friendship and migration

In this episode of Rich Queer Aunties, Christabel and Kachi go down the rabbit hole: how far back does Western influence actually go in Igbo land, and what does that mean for the way we talk about “African culture” today?

Christabel went down a research rabbit hole after someone on Instagram told her that Africans must have been beating their children long before colonialism, otherwise why is it so widespread today? She went looking. What she found should make every person of African descent pause.

In this episode, Christabel and Kachi trace the actual timeline: 500 years of colonial contact, a British model of child-rearing that was explicitly theological, and an Igbo cosmology in which children were revered as reincarnated ancestors sacred beings you could lose if you struck them too hard. This is not ancient African tradition. It is colonial management practice, repackaged as culture and handed down as inheritance.

They also get into what it costs us today: hiding tattoos from parents who are themselves 500 years removed from knowing any better, calling queerness un-African, policing each other's bodies, performing respectability for a version of culture that was installed by the people who beat the original one out of us.

And the question that sits underneath all of it: if not our generation, who is actually doing the work of re-indigenization?

This is the first of many conversations on what it looks like to come home.

If you enjoyed this episode, rate and review us because it really helps. Leave a comment and forward it to one friend today.

Stay connected:

Instagram: @richqueeraunties | @christabelmintahgalloway | @Qingkachi

Catch you in the next one.

XO, 

Christabel & Kachi.

We tried to record this episode three times. Between technological difficulties and actual conflict while making a podcast about repair, the irony was not lost on us. We're here now. And we have a lot to say.

This is Part 2 of our conversation on rupture and repair in intimate relationships,  the ones you grew up in, the ones you chose, and the ones you're still trying to figure out how to stay in. This episode gets into the gritty of it: what aftercare actually looks like when nobody modeled it for you, what happens in your nervous system in the middle of a fight, and why the repair skills you're practicing with the wrong person are still worth developing.

We talk about:

the 1% rule,  the courage to name your part even when you're convinced it's not your fault.

what it means to move toward someone when every anxious and avoidant instinct in your body is pulling you somewhere else.

apologies that mean nothing because there was no reflection behind them, and acts of kindness that hold a relationship together without having to address the fight directly.

We also get into something we don't hear discussed enough: why people will stay in disappointing romantic relationships for years and throw away a friendship over something minor. And what Audre Lorde has to do with all of it.

This is not dating advice. This is relational advice. And it applies to every relationship you are trying to build a life inside of.

Resources mentioned: Relational Skills for Liberation Workbook and The Repair Manual — get your copy here.

If you enjoyed this episode, leave us a comment, review, question and share with one friend today. 

xo, C&K

Episode: Money Loves Circles - Working with Friends ft. Lola

In this groundbreaking first guest episode, Christabel sits down with Oakland-based stylist Lola to challenge one of capitalism's biggest lies: "Don't mix business with friendship."

In This Episode:

Why wealthy people always do business with family and friends

The capitalistic conditioning that keeps marginalized communities poor

How to navigate conflict in business relationships with friends

Building self-trust and follow-through

The role of vulnerability and relational skills in business partnerships

Reclaiming abundance as descendants of opulence

About Lola: Lola is an Oakland-based stylist, creative, and dear friend to Christabel and Kachi. She styles WNBA players and helps people unlearn the conditioning that ruins personal style, creating closets that future generations will fight over.

Find Lola:

Instagram: @lola.styling

Substack: Hypnotic Style

Timestamps:

2:22 - The lie about mixing business and friendship

5:20 - Self-trust and follow-through

9:35 - Breaking shame spirals

22:30 - Learning conflict resolution skills

42:25 - Reclaiming ancestral abundance

46:06 - Why you can work with friends

Key Quotes: "Money loves circles" - on how wealth circulates among the wealthy "I don't believe in being lonely at the top" "If you can work with your microaggressive boss, you can work with your friend"

If you enjoyed this episode, can you do two things for us please:

Share it with one friend

Leave us a rating and review

See you in the next one.

Ps. the video version is on YouTube if you're a visual person.