Ep 7 - Polycules, Religious Deconstruction, and California Fries with Sylvie Savage
Timestamps:
Beach Volleyball, Sand in Places, and Meeting Sylvie — 0:00
Happy Pride and Wendy is Canonically 81 — 6:11
Canoodling in the Polycule — Wendy Considers Polyamory — 7:49
Relationship Anarchy, Defined — 10:31
Bible College, Becky, and Leaving the Church — 14:00
Wishing You'd Wake Up as a Woman — 25:26
Sylveon, Three Kids, and Being Called Mom — 57:05
Queer Intentionality and the Hookup Culture Question — 45:00
Trans Rights, Trans Wrongs, and People Are Just People — 52:44
Masc Women, Bi Women, and Lesbian Culture Discourse — 53:18
What Would Confound Your Younger Self — 1:06:19
California Fries and the Last Question — 1:12:30
Polycules, Religious Deconstruction, and California Fries with Sylvie Savage
Some guests walk in and immediately make the room feel like it expanded. Sylvie Savage is one of those guests.
Sylvie is a trans woman, TikTok creator, relationship anarchist, and someone whose story does not move in a straight line — which, honestly, feels very on brand. It moves through Bible college, religious deconstruction, a marriage, three kids, a miscarriage, a bipolar diagnosis, leaving the church, realizing she was trans, and somehow landing in one of the most intentional, loving, and beautifully complicated lives you'll hear described on this podcast.
She tells all of it with the kind of humor and clarity that makes you want to take notes and laugh at the same time.
Canoodling in the Polycule
The episode opens with something that has been quietly building since the beginning of the season — Wendy is seriously considering polyamory. After two marriages where she never felt consistently loved, wanted, and desired, she now has a plethora of women doing exactly that. And she is, as she puts it, pondering it.
Sylvie introduces the concept of relationship anarchy — the idea that every relationship, whether romantic, platonic, or somewhere in between, exists on its own terms and doesn't have to fit any social construct. It's one of the clearest, most grounded explanations of non-monogamy the show has featured, and it lands differently coming from someone who has actually been living it for years alongside her wife Becky.
Also covered: Google Calendar as a poly necessity, monogamy in this economy, and Wendy needing a housewife to help with laundry.
Bible College and the Slow Burn Out
Sylvie's deconstruction didn't happen overnight. It started in high school reconciling faith with evolution, continued through Bible college where she couldn't make peace with the concept of hell, and culminated in a moment where the church failed her and Becky so completely during one of the hardest seasons of their lives that there was simply nothing left to hold onto.
What's remarkable about how Sylvie tells this story is that it doesn't sound bitter. It sounds like someone who did the work, followed the logic wherever it led, and came out the other side with something more honest than what she started with.
Wishing You'd Wake Up as a Woman
One of the quietest and most moving moments of the episode comes when Sylvie talks about what it was like to know she was trans long before she had the language for it. Since she was four years old, she had this recurring wish — that she could wake up as a woman and everything would just be fine. She never connected it to transness because nobody talked about transness. It was just a wish that lived in the background of her life for decades.
Looking back at those memories now, she says, is like watching them change color. The pink, white, and blue flags were everywhere. She just didn't know what they meant yet.
Raising Kids, Being Called Mom, and Jackie Is Amazing
Sylvie has three kids. Her oldest is almost twelve. Her middle one is autistic and matter-of-factly told her she needed to work on her voice because she's a girl. Her youngest calls her Sylveon after the Pokémon and that's just his name for her now.
The conversation about parenting inside a poly pan trans household is one of the most honest and practical the show has had. How do you introduce a partner to your kids? When do they stop being a friend? What does it feel like when one of your partners is better at certain parts of parenting than you are? Sylvie, Siren, and Wendy all sit with these questions without pretending to have perfect answers.
The Rest of It
Because it is still Tongue First: hookup culture across queer communities, whether queer people are more intentional in relationships, the AI masc lesbian ChatGPT trend, trans rights and trans wrongs, a passionate discourse about Gia, Wendy being canonically 81 years old, and California fries as a complete life philosophy.
Find Sylvie Savage on TikTok at @sylvie.enchantress.
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Tongue First is a sapphic and queer podcast hosted by Aubrey "Siren" Jones and Wendy Reeves. New episodes every Monday. Find us at tonguefirstpodcast.com and support the show on Patreon at Tongue First: After Hours.
Follow the chaos on TikTok: @Sirenegade_440 @Wendy6181981
Until next time — stay curious, stay queer, and don't forget to lick responsibly.
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