My 40 Year Journey to Queer

When I was 9, I experienced my first kiss with a girl from my class. She was my best friend, and we practiced kissing each other when I spent the night at her apartment. At the same time, I learned in church that a human’s default sexual setting was straight. Anything else was gay, which also meant evil. I didn’t understand that at the time, but I absorbed it.

14 Years

When I was 14, I was worried I might be gay. I’d had sexual dreams about women and crushes on a couple of girls in my class. I was fearful this meant I was an awful person who was headed straight to hell when I died.

I opened up about this to a church counselor. She assured me that my sexual thoughts didn’t belong to me. The ideas had been forced into my mind by the devil and the sexual abuse I’d experienced. It was my job to shield myself against the harmful thoughts through prayer and Bible reading. She asked me to share any more dreams or evil thoughts that invaded my temple. Then she doused me in holy oil.

She also stopped allowing me to come to her home because she had a daughter about my age.

“You are straight. Satan is trying to confuse you. I’ll pray for you. But you need to stay away from other girls until we get this sickness out of you.”

I felt dirty and contagious. I stopped sharing my thoughts with the counselor or anyone else. I began to squash them down as far as I could.

The whole “girl” thing was just a phase.

15 Years

Fro m 15–16, I didn’t allow myself to dwell on sexual thoughts (straight or otherwise) just to be safe. Satan’s tactics were no match for my sexual suppression!

17 Years

At 17, I lost my virginity to my first serious boyfriend. I felt guilty because I knew premarital sex was terrible, but I was happy that I was sexually attracted to men. The whole “girl” thing was just a phase.

At the same time, I was questioning why homosexuality was a sin. It made no sense to me. Premarital sex had the possible “pregnant without a father” consequence. I could understand the caution there. However, other forms of sex- if done safely, were healthy. I began parting from my Christan upbringing on that opinion.

19 Years

When I was 19, I watched a movie called Foxfire and fell in love with Angelina Jolie. I was captivated by her. The desire was so powerful that I didn’t have time to suppress it. I finally admitted to myself that I was, indeed, attracted to women.

Around the same time, a good friend of mine came out to me as gay. I wish I’d dared to come out to him as well, but I didn’t. However, knowing that someone I loved was gay reaffirmed to me that “gayness” wasn’t evil. I hugged1 him, and he cried. He grew up in church, too, and he shared many of my anxieties.

24 Years

When I was 24, I began to identify as bisexual. I started seeking sex with women. My husband was bisexual also. The marriage was short-lived, but I learned a lot about myself through the connections I had with women.

When I was 29, I had my first serious relationship with a woman. It was beautiful while it lasted. When it was over, we parted as friends.

34 Years

When I was 34, I discovered the term pansexual. At the time, I thought that *“bisexual” referred to an attraction to men/women only. Pansexual better described my sexual attraction as I was honestly physically attracted to every type of human the world offered. I began to identify as pan.

40 Years

Finally, when I was 40, I happened upon the term queer.

The meaning and power of the word punched me in the gut. Emotions I’d suppressed for 31 years, flooded me.

I felt the greasy burn of heated holy oil pouring down my throat to save me from unclean thoughts. I heard the language called “tongues” that was spit into my ear by a pastor who knocked me back, so I fell to the ground. I felt the sexual damage from my lady babysitter, both painful and exciting. I felt the sting of the counselor who blamed sexual assault for my attraction to women. I felt the fire and brimstone from every pulpit that told me I was evil.

I also felt the soft, searching tongue of my best friend when we decided to practice kissing each other. I felt the weight and warmth of a woman’s breasts in my hands. I tasted the sweetness of a woman’s nipples in my mouth. I felt the deep penetration that can only come from a woman whose fingers know how vaginal penetration feels.

When I was 40, I identified as queer.

It was about damn time.

Note from the Author

*Webster defines bisexual as an attraction to both males and females. However, I’ve heard those who identify as bisexual say they define it as “sexually attracted to the same sex and other” which makes it an definition.