Saturday
Apr072012
I'm Speaking My Truth and Spreading the Word, Because It Does Get Better
Saturday, April 7, 2012
I hesitated to publish this, because there may be family members reading this weblog now who are not aware of my sexual and gender identity. When I read it out loud to the Palinode, though, I broke down in tears when I got to the part about feeling so proud of these kids speaking their truth at Brigham Young University, and my pride for them coupled with Didactic Pirate's coming out story earlier this last week won't let me keep this to myself. No one should have to hide.
Thanks, Heather, for making me aware of the video at the end of this entry.
----------------------------
I grew up a very lonely child, because I grew up instinctively knowing I was different and that that difference was not necessarily welcomed by those around me.
I fell in love with girls. I crushed on boys. I felt I was born into the wrong body, but I didn't necessarily want a boy's body. I was a combination of things I had never heard of before. Kids at recess made jokes by giving creepy, overly intimate handshakes and then saying "Lez be friends", because apparently lesbianism was hilarious, but nobody shook my hand like that and said "Lez be friends but also look at boys and maybe dress up like we're intersexed with a male-leaning gender experience."
That last one might not have caught on because kids in grade five in 1982 lacked the vocabulary. Also, it was a little long to be catchy. I'm pretty sure that was it.
So, I kept quiet about it. Secretly, I wrote coming out letters to my parents and rehearsed magnificent speeches under my blankets at night about who I was and why I should still be loved. In my fantasies, I was the Martin Luther King of my kind, leading my protest of one, but I never let my truth be said out loud. I didn't know how to start without a vocabulary that could convince them. If I had no words for what I was, I certainly had none that would help them to understand what I was.
I grew up in a world artificially devoid of anything that deviated from heterosexuality. Throughout elementary school, when people did mention homosexuality, it was done with a sneer at the sexual acts engaged in by faceless men. They were Other. We didn't know them. There was no mention of love. The concept of being gay was reduced to its pornography. It was disgusting, it was animal, it was a degradation of humanity's higher nature.
I eventually came to believe this about my own desires, about who I was becoming as human being, only I was certain that it was much, much worse in my case, because I wasn't just gay. I was GAY. My desire for girls was gay because I had the body of a girl, and my desire for boys was gay, because I was in the wrong kind of body. I concluded that the mere existence of my desire as it stemmed from my experience was an abomination. By the time I was fifteen, I was terrified that I was some kind of sexual monster whose sure end was in pedophilia and beastiality, because isn't this what my kind of spiritual debasement led to?
I tried, as they say, to pray the gay away. I thought surely that a loving God would remove this horrible affliction from my heart. I was a Mennonite kid, but I slunk around the parking lots and grounds of Catholic churches, attempting to screw up the courage to enter a confession box. I had sins I could speak to no one, and I felt bereft of God's presence. I needed an intermediary. I wanted redemption. I needed to know that I was not condemned.
When my deviance didn't disappear, I weighed the possibility of suicide, sure that it was the only option for someone so soul-deep sick. I felt as though God had denied me as his child, and I wrote the note that would explain my death as a kind of gift to those whom I was sure my deviance was hurting.
People knew that I was sad then, but no one knew the depth of it or why it was there, because I had no voice to share with them who I was. When I look back on that time now, I feel so very lucky that I stuck it out and that I can be here living this beautiful life I get to have on the other side of that silence.
I didn't really start talking about the real truth of who I am until I was in my thirties, and, even now, I don't mention it very often. Coming out, though, writing it down and being open about my identity and experiences, has been nothing short of liberating. I have shifted from someone who felt unworthy and invisible to someone who feels and is worthy and seen.
I am beautiful, and I am loved, and I am here fully in this life in a way that I only dreamed of when I hid what I once thought of as my great sickness but I now know is the gorgeous fact of my personhood and humanity.
When I watch younger people in their teens and twenties speak out about their identities as queer and transgendered people, especially out of an environment that can make them feel less than loved like the students at Brigham Young University have in the video below, I feel so much pride in them, and I am nothing short of down-deep-in-my-soul grateful that we have come to a place in our culture where we now have the vocabulary and the means to speak out, share our stories, and find our tribes.
If you are gay or trans or some other variant of the vast spectrum that makes up humanity who has felt silenced, I want you to watch the following video and know that you are, really and truly, by thousands if not millions of people, believed and honoured and loved.
Speak your truth and spread the word, because it does get better.
Thanks, Heather, for making me aware of the video at the end of this entry.
----------------------------
I grew up a very lonely child, because I grew up instinctively knowing I was different and that that difference was not necessarily welcomed by those around me.
I fell in love with girls. I crushed on boys. I felt I was born into the wrong body, but I didn't necessarily want a boy's body. I was a combination of things I had never heard of before. Kids at recess made jokes by giving creepy, overly intimate handshakes and then saying "Lez be friends", because apparently lesbianism was hilarious, but nobody shook my hand like that and said "Lez be friends but also look at boys and maybe dress up like we're intersexed with a male-leaning gender experience."
That last one might not have caught on because kids in grade five in 1982 lacked the vocabulary. Also, it was a little long to be catchy. I'm pretty sure that was it.
So, I kept quiet about it. Secretly, I wrote coming out letters to my parents and rehearsed magnificent speeches under my blankets at night about who I was and why I should still be loved. In my fantasies, I was the Martin Luther King of my kind, leading my protest of one, but I never let my truth be said out loud. I didn't know how to start without a vocabulary that could convince them. If I had no words for what I was, I certainly had none that would help them to understand what I was.
I grew up in a world artificially devoid of anything that deviated from heterosexuality. Throughout elementary school, when people did mention homosexuality, it was done with a sneer at the sexual acts engaged in by faceless men. They were Other. We didn't know them. There was no mention of love. The concept of being gay was reduced to its pornography. It was disgusting, it was animal, it was a degradation of humanity's higher nature.
I eventually came to believe this about my own desires, about who I was becoming as human being, only I was certain that it was much, much worse in my case, because I wasn't just gay. I was GAY. My desire for girls was gay because I had the body of a girl, and my desire for boys was gay, because I was in the wrong kind of body. I concluded that the mere existence of my desire as it stemmed from my experience was an abomination. By the time I was fifteen, I was terrified that I was some kind of sexual monster whose sure end was in pedophilia and beastiality, because isn't this what my kind of spiritual debasement led to?
I tried, as they say, to pray the gay away. I thought surely that a loving God would remove this horrible affliction from my heart. I was a Mennonite kid, but I slunk around the parking lots and grounds of Catholic churches, attempting to screw up the courage to enter a confession box. I had sins I could speak to no one, and I felt bereft of God's presence. I needed an intermediary. I wanted redemption. I needed to know that I was not condemned.
When my deviance didn't disappear, I weighed the possibility of suicide, sure that it was the only option for someone so soul-deep sick. I felt as though God had denied me as his child, and I wrote the note that would explain my death as a kind of gift to those whom I was sure my deviance was hurting.
People knew that I was sad then, but no one knew the depth of it or why it was there, because I had no voice to share with them who I was. When I look back on that time now, I feel so very lucky that I stuck it out and that I can be here living this beautiful life I get to have on the other side of that silence.
I didn't really start talking about the real truth of who I am until I was in my thirties, and, even now, I don't mention it very often. Coming out, though, writing it down and being open about my identity and experiences, has been nothing short of liberating. I have shifted from someone who felt unworthy and invisible to someone who feels and is worthy and seen.
I am beautiful, and I am loved, and I am here fully in this life in a way that I only dreamed of when I hid what I once thought of as my great sickness but I now know is the gorgeous fact of my personhood and humanity.
When I watch younger people in their teens and twenties speak out about their identities as queer and transgendered people, especially out of an environment that can make them feel less than loved like the students at Brigham Young University have in the video below, I feel so much pride in them, and I am nothing short of down-deep-in-my-soul grateful that we have come to a place in our culture where we now have the vocabulary and the means to speak out, share our stories, and find our tribes.
If you are gay or trans or some other variant of the vast spectrum that makes up humanity who has felt silenced, I want you to watch the following video and know that you are, really and truly, by thousands if not millions of people, believed and honoured and loved.
Speak your truth and spread the word, because it does get better.
categorized in personal history, politics & religion and tagged in BYU, Brigham Young University, LGBT, gay, homosexuality, it gets better, lesbian, transgender, video, videos
personal history, politics & religion and tagged in BYU, Brigham Young University, LGBT, gay, homosexuality, it gets better, lesbian, transgender, video, videos 
Reader Comments (67)
You're awesome, Schmutzie. That's your identity.
your truth is beautiful, Schmutzie. Word.
This is stunning. Thank you.
Stephanie
You are fantastic. Thank you for writing this down and allowing us to read it.
I see you. And am so glad I can.
No one should have to hide who they truly are. No one should have to live a lie. I'm proud of you for speaking out.
I so needed something like this today. I am so sick of being scared. Thank you for sharing.
Whew. This was so much and so liturgical and I want to hug your face off always, always.
"The concept of being gay was reduced to its pornography." is particularly striking, because you absolutely nailed it, the homophobe's philosophy, in one sentence.
I love you, my sweet friend, and I am glad that you are who you are today even though you had to endure struggles to become this person. You enrich my life and the lives of SO MANY. So many!
Loving you.
Damn. You are such an inspiration. I wish I had a half of your courage.
Thank you.
The video made me cry.
I wish that everyone who needed to read this could. Love this, love you for writing it.
I want to cry for that little girl who couldn't speak her feelings. I want to hold her hand and tell her it's all going to be ok. Instead, I'll tell the amazing adult that came from there just how amazing and strong and wonderful she is and how glad I am to be a tiny part in her world.
No one should ever feel like a deviant or an outcast for being who they are supposed to be. No one. I hate that you felt that way once. And that you had to hide.
I am glad you don't have to hide now. I wish you peace.
You say it perfectly: anything other than heterosexuality is reduced know to just physicalness. All possibility of love ignored, and removed.
That is it, right on the head.
Thank you for bringing this to a basicness that I can use when I talk to my children and to others: thank you so much.
You ARE loved. And beautiful.
I really love that video and I hope it makes a positive influence in the lives of those who think they are not worthy and not loved and that they should end their lives for that reason.
I'm glad you're still here.
we are ALL so glad that you stuck it out. my love for you, your words, all of you is fierce -- no, not pornographic at all -- and i have no doubt that i am not alone in feeling it.
That one part in the video where the young man talks about being denounced by his father and the light just goes out of his eyes...that hurt my heart. I'm so proud of you for being who you are. That is what I want for us all - to be the best, biggest, most real versions of ourself, where we let the light shine from our eyes.
There's only one way for any of us to be truly IN our own lives. This is the way - this owning and declaring the truth. You're a bad ass.
Thank you.
Good for you. I think it is easier after you get the courage to come out.
I have had the privilege of meeting you on several occasions at blog conferences. And I have not tell you that at no time did I ever think 'Geez, there's something wrong with this girl.' Never! All I thought was how cool you were to share your photography, your love of words, your support for other women struggling to find a way to bring more beauty and love and awesome to the world.
I'm so terribly sad to know you hurt and wondered if maybe something wasn't quite right. Please don't wonder. You are perfect just the way you are. If people walk away because they can't deal with who you are then they're creating a you that doesn't exist. Focus on the people you are - a woman, a friend, a daughter, a cousin, a writer, a photographer, a wearer of cool glasses, a blogger, a Canadian, a survivor (and so much more).
I feel like I'm in a Sci-Fi movie if I say I'm part of the alliance but we're out there. And we support you!
Keep being awesome! Keep being perfect!
I love the way you write, and I love that you share your heart. You're brave and beautiful, just exactly the way you are.
I'm always awed at the eloquence with which you write about difficult topics. I want to cheer for this post, especially its potential to spread your truth to family members who might not know it. That's brave and it is the best way I can imagine to say, "It gets better."
Found your blog today and wow, what a great day to find it! This was the first post I read and I am so moved. Thank you for writing this! Your experiences resonate with my own in many ways! Btw, I'm a year older than you, but don't remember those toys you mentioned with baking soda. :) I guess I missed out!
I'm going to watch the video as soon as I push return, but wanted to say first that your words brought tears to my eyes repeatedly as I read your post -- I'm so glad you didn't suicide - so glad you're here to share your beauty and help open other's eyes to theirs!
That was absolutely beautiful and as another queer grrl in the world, I thank you so much for sharing this. I grew up in the same era, and I am continuously amazed at what this next generation has to offer. I grew up in the midwest where the word "Lesbian" held so much hatred on the school yard. I am either very optimistic or very naive that we will get to a point where people let go of all of the hatred and just accept everyone no matter what. :) I hope for the former.
God, Schmutzie, this is beautiful.
You know, I am grateful for these words and this truth not just for you but for all the kids I will meet and point back here to you. And I will say, "This is my friend and I love her and she is VERY loved. And you will know this love but you will learn bravery from her."
Your words are important. Thank you for sharing them and entrusting them to us. Here.
This video is just so beautiful in so many ways. It's heartening to me to see these accepting folks who are part of LDS. I'm in California, where the Mormons absolutely crushed our fight for same-sex marriage, and I think I had a very limited idea of what it was all about. But on the other hand, I should have realized this because I attend and sing at a Catholic church in Hollywood, which has a thriving Gay/Lesbian Ministry. People always ask my gay Catholic friends how they can be a gay Catholic, when the church has been so anti-gay in the past, and they always say that you can't look at the giant corporate entity of "The Church" but at the ground level - the priests and lay people who truly are accepting and loving to everyone. A couple of months ago, my choir sang at a mass hosted by my church which celebrated the 25th anniversary of the Gay/Lesbian Ministry in Los Angeles - thousands of people attended, both gay and straight and it was officiated by about 20 priests, some gay/some straight. It was a giant love fest. They covered the altar with rainbow vestments! Really heartening.
I love you even more for speaking your truth, and for making hope seem possible.
I watched that video in my office on Friday and cried and cried for those kids -- for their remembrances of pain, for their hope and their relief at speaking out, for their obvious love for the place where they go to school and for the amazing step they're helping it to take in terms of acceptance and equality. They are trailblazers in their spot more than most.
Mostly, though, I'm so happy you're writing through this as you always write through the important things. The life you're continuing to build is a wondrous reflection of the remarkable person you are, and thank God you came through the hard times to the way things are now. I feel grateful to walk even a little bit of the path with you, and selfishly know how much better my life is with you in it. You do that for so many, and you live true. The world is so much better with you in it.
I love you.
Other commenters said It all but I like this last line especially: The world is so much better with you in it.
Thank you so much for sharing this. I needed to read this and see this today.
xx
A standing ovation from me Schmutzie! You're incredible!
Huge, huge, huge, hugs to you, Schmutzie. How wonderful life is, when people like you who speak their truth so eloquently are in the world.
Beautiful like you!
Wow. You are amazing. Beautiful. Wonderful. Brave. And brilliantly talented.
Thank you for being you.
BRAVO Stephanie. YOU are amazingly beautiful because you are YOU!
Ten pounds of awesome in a five pound bag
I confess that my love for you is a little bit pornographic.
Sigh. Also, yup. Also, we really need an hour and some coffee. Love to you, woman.
Thanks for sharing. I watched it twice.
I am so glad I know you. You've just made my world a better place. Thank you for sharing your truth and making the world a bit more beautiful for it. Love you my friend.
Am I supposed to feel ANY differently about you? My love is just as epic as it ever was.
Perfectly perfect... the post and you... thank you!
"Lez be friends but also look at boys and maybe dress up like we're intersexed with a male-leaning gender experience." -- Okay, it might not be catchy. But you're so brilliant with words, I'm sure you could manage to pull it off! :)
Terrible that any child should feel ashamed and terrified of their own beautiful, natural, nature. I want so much more for my children and brave, honest people like you are carving the way forward.
I see you. I support you.
5th grade Schmutzie and 5th grade Mandy would have been best friends and flipped all of those little a-holes on the playground off.
Thank you so much for writing this. You are brave and beautiful.
You and Seth are so awesome and brave. This is the epitome of blogging with integrity, because it's rooted in being honest with yourself about who you are, and fully accepting it. You are such a wonderful person that it physically pains me to know you've ever in your life thought you were an abomination. It's as incongruous with how I (and so many others) see you as it would be if you said you had a tiny baby arm growing out of your face.
I hear you and I stand with you. Thank you for being you.
You rock!! Good for you!!!!!