(For those interested in submitting their own story of falling in love with a Pokémon or being a Poképhile or experiencing Poképhilia. Please note that the questions presented below are only a small section of the interview questions that we may present you with. And that not all answers to any answered interview question may not be published because of political bias, the explicitness of the answer or length of answers given)

Interview Question: Do you consider yourself a Poképhile?

Clara: No, not really, I'm just someone who fell in love with a Pokémon. Besides Milly* I have never been attracted to or even thought about being in a relationship with another Pokémon.

IQ: Do you believe Poképhilia is good or bad?

C: I view it as neutral I guess, before I realised I was in love with Milly I thought it was a sort of silly thing to think, that you could fall in love with a Pokémon. But after realising that I was in love with Milly, feeling the connection that can come about between a person and a Pokémon, I view it a lot more neutally than I did before. But I still don't consider myself one. However, those that intentionally try to have sex with the largest amount of Pokémon or sexually abuse Pokémon in their care, I consider little more than rapists.

IQ: If you could give one piece of advice to someone in love with a Pokémon, or who is experiencing Poképhilic attraction what would that be?

C: I guess I'd say that despite what the authorities and general public would have you believe, being in love with a Pokémon isn't wrong. That romantic or sexual relationships between humans and Pokémon can be happy, healthy and consensual relationships. But only if you put in the time and effort to know that Pokémon, and respect their boundaries if they do not want to pursue a relationship with you.

That you must treat them as you would any human, and that includes the only pursuing Pokémon who are mentally and physically old enough to understand and want sexual and romantic relationships. I firmly stand against those that would try and establish a sexual or romantic relationship with a baby or young Pokémon, or who try to groom Pokémon so as to have sex or establish a romantic relationship after they become mentally and physically mature.

IQ: What would you say is the hardest thing about being in a romantic relationship with a Pokémon?

C: Oh definitely communication. The inability for Milly to telepathically talk to me sometimes really hampers our relationship. I mean we always get there in the end, but even after the last fifthteen years with my Milly. Knowing the difference between her wanting to go out for dinner versus staying inside (for example) has caused a number of arguments. Also it's not always sunshine and roses, we have the same sorts of problems as any other sort of couple can have. From miscommunication, to fluctuations in mood or even misunderstandings.

And having to hide our relationship really doesn't help any of that.

IQ: So tell us, what is your story about falling in love with a Pokémon?

C: I think it all happened because I grew up on a farm. A very special farm, a Miltank farm. Though we were not farmers to start off with.

To be honest, I don't know what my parents did before the farm. I think I remember that my father was someone who worked inside most of the time, which was in part why he one day came home and announced that had invested all of his money into Miltanks.

I remember Mum being furious that he would do something so impulsive, and that I think was the first time I ever saw them properly fight, though I guess my father somehow eventually won her over on the idea. As a short time later I remember us moving deep into the countryside.

Though at the time I didn't really understand all that, I only understood that I could only call my friends instead of seeing them and that we now didn't live in the city any more. But being so young, these things didn't really phase me, and the Miltank's were funny to look at and play with despite them not doing much. But neither my family nor our new Miltank's could fill the hole left in my tiny heart by the loss of my friends, and I remember crying almost all day the first time I understood that we were never moving back to the city and that this was my life now.

That was, of course, till my seventh Birthday. My special birthday as I've come to call it, when I was given a Miltank of my very own to take care of, make happy and of course become best friends with. I named her Milly, after my favourite flower, the lily. Because she was just so pretty and sweet that she reminded me of them in those first moments with her, as she sniffed and licked my hand, as I offered her treat after treat.

I remember that she was the same size as me then, most likely as young as me, or perhaps younger, so she couldn't produce milk yet. But, I was told by my dad that, with a lot of affection and love, she'd grow up to be a big help to the rest of the farm and the rest of the Miltanks! Producing milk and making friends, maybe even having baby Miltanks all of her own one day.

The years passed and I grew up. With Milly by my side as a constant companion, my best friend in the whole wide world and I, hers. There wasn't anywhere I wouldn't go with Milly, no place she wouldn't follow me into. I think we even developed our own sort of secret language.

She was there with me through the holidays, celebrations and birthdays. As well as there during the tough times, such as the death of my grandparents, my multiple friendship failures and the hundred other trivial (yet at the time all consuming) tragedies of childhood. Nothing could separate us.

Even in the years when those massive storms threatened to tear up the very land where our farm stood and fire ravaged our home and all the surrounding vegetation, Milly was there, by my side. Comforting me as I comforted her in the way only children can, with gentle and greatly needed affection. We hugged so often, even before the storms and fire, I knew my parents sometimes referred to Milly as my magnet. With her attached to me as if she was compelled.

I will admit, I was never really that interested in Pokémon battles, too much violence and competition for me. Plus I always felt it was just wrong to make pokémon fight, even if it was for fun.

Also there was the farm, which always took so much of my time after school. With me either helping out my dad or my mum look after the other Miltank, and of course, Milly. Which meant that I didn't really have time for thoughts unconnected from the farm, my family or Milly.

So I did what anyone else would do when they don't have the dream of Pokémon training clouding their vision, and continued my education by going away to university. I thought I could help dad, my family, Milly. By going out there and learning everything I could know about Miltank and farming, about Pokémon in general. Not in the ways Pokémon trainers know pokémon, but in the ways other people do, as friends, as companions. As beings unconnected to violence or sport.

Plus, despite my dad's enthusiasm for Miltank farming, the rashness in which he'd spent the money and bought a farm hadn't exactly made him well versed in the agricultural sciences. And it meant that the farm was always just a hair's breadth from being repurposed by the bank. So me going off to university made sense in almost every way, except that which I didn't want to face.

It was hard, I'll admit. Hard leaving my family, harder still leaving Milly, my Milly.

We hugged and cried almost every day for two weeks before I left. Like what we… what I was doing was going to break us apart, like this wasn't something I was doing for the both of us. I think that's how I finally found the courage to go and not just stay with her on that farm, the knowledge that I was going out there to improve her life, improve the farm, improve all our lives.

But she waved to me, you know, when I was leaving. Waved from the moment I got on the bus to when I lost sight of her as I disappeared over the horizon. Tears falling from her eyes all the while. It almost broke my heart in two, what I did to her.

But anyway…anyway, throughout my education I always heard from my Dad that... Milly never gave milk, even though she was old enough to do so, even though the Milly I knew was most likely the world's happiest Miltank despite my…abandonment of her. That surely me not being there shouldn't have affected her so severely as to stop her giving milk. Afterall the other Miltank were there, along with mum and dad to look after her.

And yet every year, as I declined to go back to the farm for the fear I wouldn't have the resolve to leave again, he'd tell me how she didn't spend any time with the other Miltanks, or the Tauors that came to visit the Miltanks for breeding.

He'd say she just stood mournfully out in the field, under the apple tree where we had spent most of my youth playing as only two best friends can — for hours on hours of made up games and endless talking.

But I will admit, university was fun, it felt new and exciting to be back in a city after so many years away, I made new friends, I enjoyed my study, I even dated a little. And it was all enjoyable, truely, but there was also this tiny part of hurt in my chest, this pain that seemed to follow me from class to class, semester to semester, party to party.

It was Milly, me missing Milly. Because as much fun as my new friends were, as enjoyable as my classes were, and as exciting as my boyfriends were… they weren't my best friend. They weren't the sweetest, most kind hearted Miltank in the whole world, who always knew what was wrong with me, who always knew when I needed a cuddle, who always knew how to cheer me up.

They weren't her, and the fact that they never would be, just made the pain in my chest…in my heart, even worse because. I knew that I had left my best friend behind, despite everything we had gone through together, everything we had meant to each other. I had abandoned her, and I wouldn't see her for almost five years.

But eventually my university studies ended and I returned home, degree in hand. My brain filled with all the information I had gathered during my five years studying Miltank's, but my heart yearning to be back in the place where my best friend was.

I still remember the day I got back, Milly wasn't there to greet me. It stung, after being gone for five years and she wasn't there to greet me back into her friendship, but I thought at the time that I deserved that, for abandoning her, for deserting her for so many years. For failing her. I never even considered that she didn't know when I was coming back, that my family had failed to inform her because she was just another Miltank to them, just another one of the herd, despite how I'd essentially treated her as part of the family for most of my life.

My family, though, were ecstatic to see me. Their little girl returning after five years, a woman of the wider world. I'm sure they were glad to see that I didn't bring anyone home to them or that I hadn't arrived with shocking news of a pregnancy. It was just the expected news of a five year degree, and that I was back, to stay.

But there were more important things than my family to worry about as I quickly made my way out of the improture get together and ran out to the farm. It was frantic, the search I gave to find Milly, running every which way over the farm, calling out to her till my voice almost abandoned me, but eventually I found her, all alone under that apple tree at the top of the hill.

And I literally just rushed to her, yelling at the top of my lungs and when she heard and turned towards me, she stampeded down the hill.

And we collided into each other like two trains destined to crash, hugging and holding onto each other like we were the last two things on earth, as we fell and rolled and held each other tight.

I was so happy I couldn't hold back the tears as they flowed down my face, with Milly doing the same, as we were finally reunited. And I promised over and over again that I would never leave, that I would be with her forever, that I would never again abandon my best friend.

Every day after we spent together, as if we wished to make up for all the days that we had missed together. And we were very happy, being together once again. But there was still a problem…

A happy miltank can give milk, will always give milk... so was Milly not happy? Even though I had come back and even though we were spending each and every day together Milly still wasn't giving any milk. Even though she smiled brightly every time she saw me, even though we easily fell back into the trends of our childhood. With us spending virtually every moment playing and talking just as we had before I had left, Milly either hanging on to me or following me around just like she used to.

Though she still didn't give milk, with no indication that she would ever give milk. I even considered the idea that perhaps she needed to have a child before she'd begin producing milk, but that was totally at odds with everything I had learned. And the idea of forcing Milly to breed sent cold shivers of betrayal down my spine.

So eventually I ended up running several tests on her that I learned during my studies, mostly those that were easy to perform and which didn't hurt her but still there was... nothing. And it almost felt like it proved I was a failure, that it showed how it was wrong for me to have gone to university and caused me and Milly so much grief.

That was until one calm afternoon, when we were relaxing on the same hill we used to play on, under the exact same apple tree that had been growing on the farm for who knows how long. The house, almost a speck on the horizon. I remember that the grass was tall then, the heat wasn't too strong and Milly was napping next to me, content as a Magmar in a volcano.

I had a sun hat on, tilted up so I could both admire the view and read the book in my lap but I wasn't doing either, but instead lost in thought about the issue with Milly. I just couldn't understand why Milly wasn't producing any milk.

I thought maybe there was something wrong with her? But the tests had all come back normal, So I thought maybe there was something different about her that prevented her from producing milk, but as far as I knew she was very much the same as any other Miltank. My thoughts on the problem were endless, and so I closed the book in my lap.

But I guess I must have been too loud when closing the book because Milly woke up. She saw the concerned look on my face, and being her, she knew something was troubling me. So she stood up and then plopped down right in front of me, offering her affection to me as she often did to cure my troubles. I remember hugging her close and knowing that she knew I was concerned.

She kept ushering me to speak with little nuzzles and bumps and tugs until I finally broke and explained everything to her. My worries, my stress, the thought that I couldn't figure this out because I was some sort of failure, all of it. And I guess... since I was being so honest, she decided to share her honest feelings on the problem, or looking back, I think she might just have wanted to cheer me up in a different way.

I remember she pushed her little hooves into my shoulders and pressed her cute nose to mine, bringing our lips together in a cacophony of skin meeting skin. I sat there, after the first kiss... shocked. I mean, as I said — I had dated boys during my university stay and, sure — hanging out with them and doing stuff had been exciting... but I had never felt anything more than excitement or curiosity.

I had never felt this spine tingling shock descending from my lips to the tips of my toes. But I felt it impossibly strong right then, as Milly's lips pressed against mine again… and as my body pushed to have my lips pressed back against hers. As our bodies seemed to lose themselves to wants which had seemed unknown until that moment.

Each of us lost in these entirely new sensations and desires that now bled out of each touch and caress we gave each other. Before we separated at the sound of my father calling us for dinner, red faced and flushed. Both of us obviously wanting more, but prevented.

So that night I led her to a little secret spot we both knew about, a spot that I had used, that we had used, since we were young. A place we had used to get away from our troubles in the past. A warm secret place where we would be safe from the prying eyes and ears of my parents and the other Miltank. A place in which she explored me and I explored her… where we explored each other, in warmth and safety. As we both made each other feel things neither of us had experienced, but which we both knew, we would crave forever more.

And then after, we found ourselves cuddled up. Catching our breaths and just enjoying these newly found knowledges and experiences. Her, coated over my tongue and fingers, and I similarly coated over her tongue. Tired but content in ways we hadn't been before. Both of us at the end of a long and exhausting day, knowing that we would never abandon each other ever again.

For we had unlocked something so precious and valuable on that hill, under that apple tree. Something neither of us was looking for, but which we found all the same, love. A love different from anything that had come before, but which was more wonderful for us than anything.

We fell asleep that morning, her little hoof in my hand, and her tail wrapped around my body.

P.S I'd like to report that to this day my little Milly produces the most wonderful milk! And that we both wake, well rested and loved within our apartment. Wives in every sense of the word except legally. Loved, till the end of time 3

(some names in this interview have been changed to retain anonymity of the person & pokémon who may have been mentioned in this interview)