Heya Everyone, new Mega time and for it, I’m gonna advertise a TTRPG system called Thirsty Sword Lesbians.
A sword duel can end in kissing, a witch can gain her power by helping others find love, and an entire campaign can be built around wandering matchmakers flying from system to system.
Thirsty Sword Lesbians is a roleplaying game for telling queer stories with friends. If you love angsty disaster lesbians with swords, you have come to the right place.
In this book, you’ll find:
Flirting, sword-fighting, and zingers in a system designed for both narrative drama and player safety.
An innovative take on the Powered by the Apocalypse family of games.
Nine character types, each focusing on a particular emotional conflict: Beast, Chosen, Devoted, Infamous, Nature Witch, Scoundrel, Seeker, Spooky Witch, and Trickster.
Guidance and support for running the game, including how to make appealing adversaries, set the tone, pace the game, and structure play.
Tools to create your own settings and stories, alongside a dozen pre-written options including the cyberpunk Neon City 2099, steamfunk poets battling oppression as Les Violettes Dangereuses, laser swords and intrigue in the Starcross Galaxy, and more.
World building worksheet for custom scenarios and starting scenario seeds to play with: Best Day of Their Lives, The Constellation Festival, Gal Paladins, and Sword Lesbians of the Three Houses Variant rules to highlight different identities, emotional connections, and setting elements.
Strategies to adapt any setting where swords cross and hearts race for Thirsty Sword Lesbians.
Here’s a link to their website, I did copy everything over directly from it because I put off writing the Mega this week. I was drawing a blank on what I wanted to talk about. 
https://evilhat.com/product/thirsty-sword-lesbians/
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I finally did some reading on grapefruit medication interactions as it pertains to estrogen! the primary mechanism of interaction is at the “gut wall” (I was surprised to see scientific papers use this term), where the grapefruit can inhibit an enzyme that works to break down and metabolize many oral medications including estrogen. So with oral estrogen grapefruit will definitely screw with your levels and cause them to spike.
My main curiosity was injectable estrogen though. Many drugs taken by injection are unaffected by grapefruit, so I thought estrogen might be fine! As ever with biology though, apparently it’s not that simple. Even with purely endogenous (body-produced) estrogen, grapefruit consumption increases levels (though more modestly than the extreme/dangerous effects seen with oral medications, the study I saw cited a peak 26% increase in cis women 8hrs after consuming grapefruit). I didn’t see a ton of specific research on the mechanism of action here, but I expect it’s related to the fact that the exact same enzyme responsible for breaking down medications in the gut is also present in the liver and helps break down and eliminate various substances from the bloodstream there. The study noted that average levels remained the same with whole grapefruit consumption, it was just a temporary fluctuations.
So my conclusion for my own personal consumption (please don’t take this as gospel/medical advice, I’m pretty dumb) is that grapefruit intake doesn’t appear to be much more dangerous than it is for cis women if you’re doing injections (the reason for the study was elevated cancer risk associated with high estrogen levels so there may be some long term risks there).
It does affect levels, which is good to be aware of, and is a valid reason to be cautious, and there may be nuances I’m missing here (please tell me if you see any), but much like how preferred HRT dosage and levels vary widely by person, and even in cis women, vary drastically throughout hormonal cycles, the variance caused by grapefruit interaction is probably not harmful in any immediate way.
I guess if I was using a shorter lived ester with sharper peaks in levels and I was really worried about levels, I might be more concerned about not having grapefruit around those peak times? still probably not acutely dangerous though, IMO
Usually people on HRT are on other meds too, an anti androgen (spiro or whatever) and being trans is a risk factor for mental health problems to probably no one’s surprise. It’s not just the E that has interactions with grapefruit and the CYP 3A4 liver enzyme.
But if someone was on monotherapy and injectable, that’s really good research! Very fascinating!
Yeah honestly the mental health angle is my biggest concern. If these fluctuations are going to destabilize your mental health or otherwise interfere with your day that’s bad and not a worthwhile risk to take just for grapefruit, but I don’t thiiiink most people are that dialed into their levels hour-by-hour. I’m seemingly not, anyhow, but its worth considering
This inspired me to do some more digging on spiro! (might do other AAs later but got work to do unfortunately). What I’m finding is that spiro itself is not metabolized by CYP3A4, but one of its active metabolites is, at least in part. However, everything I can find seems to suggest if this interaction is significant at all, it isn’t dangerous. Spiro is actually listed here as a safe alternative to eplerenone, which is chemically similar but does have dangerous interactions with grapefruit/other cyp3a4 inhibiting substances.
I also found out during this that the active ingredient in one kind of dandruff shampoo is also a potent cyp3a4 blocker (but thankfully its not absorbed into the bloodstream really when used topically). Its actually crazy how many different things are affected by this metabolism pathway and/or inhibit or enhance its effect. hundreds of drugs easily
Also I have eaten two entire grapefruits since finding all this out and its very exciting for me