Sometimes, you can be doing nothing, or very little, and realizations plague you incessantly. Other times, you can feel the bile building in your throat as you slowly ease towards something that was a long time coming, and completely unavoidable and entirely necessary. Last night I had a realization of the latter kind. No, that's the wrong word. I accepted it, and realized I needed to accept it. I finally made my first baby step at moving past it.
I should've known, and maybe I did. It's obvious, when you go to great lengths to hide a major part of yourself, even change that part, that you hate it. You hate you. I hated me. All parts of me, not just the gay bits, and it wasn't because I'm gay- I hated me because I couldn't live up to all the expectations I had put in front of myself. I can't be skinny, or beautiful or wise. I can't say all the right things at precisely the right time, and I can't be calm and cool and confident. I can't be straight. I knew that, but I still told myself that maybe if I tried a little harder, I could get a little bit closer and maybe people would like me. Well, that's bullshit. I know it is. I always did, but now I've finally accepted that I just can't be what I used to say I could be.
Maybe I haven't completely made amends. I still can't love my self, and I can't be confident or proud, but hey, I hate me a lot less. I used to hate myself for not being good enough, and I hated myself for trying to be good enough, for hiding, for not being strong, but once I cut that out, maybe I've got a chance at it.
Being a lesbian isn't my defining characteristic, but it is unavoidably important, to me and to everyone else. I'm still figuring out what that importance means. It means I have to be careful in what I do, because I don't want to be pegged as only being an LGBT writer. It means I spend a lot of time explaining that rainbows are pretty and I like them for the color, not just because I'm gay. But, it also means I can kiss my girlfriend and not be ashamed or slightly icked out like I was with the boys. I can relax into a skin that I'm still growing. I can figure out what I want from life and get used to proving that I'm a girl who's gay, not just a gay girl.
Of course I will do it in the quiet barely noticeable way I do anything that matters to me, but hey, at least I'm beginning to try.
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