GQ, October 2009 THOROUGHLY MODERN MIERS You knew her as the ambitious young assistant to Massachusetts' 8th district Congressman. She began as his nanny, worked her way up to girlfriend, and became his wife in June. Since then, she has worked with Senator John Boehner (R-OH) on Capitol Hill. Her newest occupation? Writer. She fell off the radar after a miscarriage in early September, something she still prefers not to talk about. Having taken almost a month off of life in Washington, instead living in her native England, Avery Miers returns to Washington ready to tackle anything in her path. And with her return and recovery comes a new job, namely the News + Politics section of GQ. A no brainer for a woman completely entrenched in the political side of Washington -- married to a Congressman with several degrees in the political area, Miers is the perfect voice for Washingtonian commentary. She's opinionated, and always has been, she says, but there was no place for her vocalizations in past vocations. She's not bitter, though, as she acknowledges that her opinions weren't what she had marketed. "I was being paid for something other than lending my voice to print," she says, referring to her position as nanny, a job she held for nearly four years and whose responsibilities she still has. "People interviewed me because I was this sort of controversial figure, a young single woman working for a widower, I was foreign, and I was a democrat working for republicans," she says this all matter-of-factly. "I think I unsettled people. And I'm still unsettling people. They didn't know what to make of me because I wasn't putting myself out there. I wasn't in a position to be someone you had to pay attention to," As the Congressman's nanny, this was very true. Aside from a handful of interviews about the glamorous D.C. lifestyle, Miers kept her political views to herself for the most part, and the fact that she votes Labour when in England was a backburner tidbit she wouldn't allow herself to elaborate on. But the role of women in Washington is changing, and Miers recognizes that. "The position of First Lady has never been a completely passive one, but there's an expectation that comes with the title. You're supposed to be the ultimate hostess. You're the social ambassador to the world. I think Washington still sees the First Lady position as very much a Jackie O sort of role, something that is more concerned with wallpaper and pillbox hats than foreign affairs. And Michelle Obama has begun to change that." While many first ladies in the past have been social champions, and Michelle has hesitated to deviate from that path, she's also begun to change what people expect from a first lady. She's smart, strong, and comfortable in her position beside the President. On the campaign trail, both the Obamas stated they were a 'team' when it came to their marriage and professional lives. "I think Michelle is allowing herself to have an opinion. She's involved. She's incredibly intelligent, and I would be surprised if her opinion was not one the President sought on a daily basis. She's not concerned about the dust ruffle in the Lincoln bedroom. She has more important things to do." Miers also cites Hillary Rodham Clinton as an inspiration. "She was the first former First Lady to run for public office, and she's been very successful in that area. She's back in the White House because of her own ambition, not her husband's. And I think that's admirable," For Miers, however, family still comes first, regardless of public image. She was absent from Washington for a month following the family's personal tragedy, and those who worked with her husband could see the physical strain in the Congressman. On news of Edward Kennedy's death, Gregory Miers became one of Massachusetts' senior representatives, and for the first time in four years, Avery was not there to help him. She becomes solemn when we mention this. "I don't deal well with grief," she admits slowly. "I have never dealt with loss healthily, and I was able to scrape by on that policy while I was alone. But I had a family, and responsibilities to them, and if I had stayed, it would have been disastrous. I had some things to work out on my own, so I took the time to repair. And now that I'm back, I'm able to devote myself to what I need to do. It was the lesser of two evils, that situation. It was going to hurt either way," Her hiatus has infinitely improved her spirits, though she would not call it a vacation. "It wasn't a relaxed period. I was recovering from a trauma. I know some people will think that it wasn't the right thing to do, but they weren't around to see what I was going through. It was absolutely not a happy time," While we certainly didn't think she was sipping mojitos for the past month, we were a little surprised when the meeting for a position at the magazine came up. "I thrive on responsibility. I thrive on work. It's been a coping mechanism in the past, but now that I'm home, I'm wife and mother. I didn't come to Washington to be a wife and mother. I came for the politics. And this is giving me an opportunity to pursue a goal while giving me time with my family," Aside from simply recovering and networking professionally in London, Miers says she's changed for the better. "I did some growing up while I was by myself. I'm young, twenty-seven is very young in a place like Washington, but I did some growing up. I'm better equipped to deal with our lives now. I have a voice. I've found an outlet," And, being a figured based in Washington, that outlet is unsurprisingly professional. Miers says she wrote while she was in college but never had the introspect before now. "I wrote for the purpose of catharsis. And I think what I came up with can not only be cathartic for me, but others. So I'm looking for a publisher," She also says she expects Washington to be used to her by now, as she's not planning on going anywhere. As the wife of a senior Republican Congressman, she feels pressure from the party, as does her husband. But as a consistently middle-of-the-road politician, Congressman Miers has already cut himself apart from the rest of the Republican party. So it would only make sense for a non-right-wing Republican to have a decidedly non-right-wing wife. Avery's leftist persona isn't far from the truth -- one would expect the party to push her in the same vein as Cindy McCain, but Miers is having none of it. She appears on our cover scandalously dressed, surely the only wife of a Republican Congressman to ever do such a thing, but she says it doesn't bother her and it doesn't bother her husband. "If we're talking about the so-called Christian morals, my husband doesn't try to pick men up in airport bathrooms. He doesn't **** interns. He doesn't hire prostitutes. We're raising our daughter in the Catholic church. We were married in the National Cathedral. Embracing my sexuality and femininity doesn't make me a bad person. And there are far more important things for my husband's party to focus on than my cleavage," We wouldn't argue with that. Look for Miers' upcoming contributions in print and online at GQ.com.