a guy’s car, except to say that I felt in every sense a passenger. Next to men, I have always felt as if I should be expected to concede…to their agendas, to their ideas, and to their physical desires. They were never in tune with me emotionally; instead, they had a predetermined sense of how I should fit myself into their lives. Even when certain guys worshipped me for my intelligence and qualities I appreciate being noticed for, it still felt as if I was this “thing” to them, an accessory they could show off and from which they could derive satisfaction.
My realizing-I-was-gay story is funny, in that it was literally a realization I came to overnight. I was dating Matt at this point, a fairly decent looking boy I had met in acting class. Sometimes on school nights Matt would pick me up in his van to go to the local diner for “hot chocolate.” What this really meant is that I’d watch him stuff his face with a disgusting cheeseburger, and then he’d ask me for a blowjob in the parking lot.
Eventually came the day our acting class took a field trip to see Wicked on Broadway, and Matt introduced me to his friend Cat. Within seconds of meeting Cat, I felt as if I had known her for years. There was something familiar and endearing about her—perhaps I was sensing echoes of my future self, already aware she would shape my life in a way that would forever shift me. But never before had I felt so instantly compatible with another person. Cat was bubbly and affectionate; she laughed at the things I said and made me feel comfortable in my skin.
One night shortly after we met, Cat and I were chatting on AOL instant messenger when the possibility occurred to me that I might be attracted to women. Matt was constantly flirting with other girls. The status of having a boyfriend was the only part of being with Matt that actually appealed to me. Other than that, he didn’t make my heart beat any faster. Something just wasn’t right. Struck with the sudden urge to confide in someone, I told Cat how I’d been feeling. To my surprise, Cat replied, “I’ve been wondering the same thing about myself.” And with that, we agreed to “test” ourselves out on one another, despite both having boyfriends. The very next night, Cat came over, and after a few shots of vodka borrowed from my parents’ liquor cabinet, she leaned in to me and said, “I told you I wouldn’t be afraid.” Then we kissed, and electricity ran through every part of my body. Overcome with a combination of lust and shame, I felt desire for the first time. I wanted more.
For a moment, I sought refuge in my new discovery. I asked myself, Is this why I’ve felt different all my life? Because I’m a lesbian? Is this why I’ve never felt like other girls? Suddenly, everything made sense. I could read the writing on the wall.
Now that I’d resolved this tremendous part of my identity, I finally felt motivated to take the risks required to get to know myself more intimately. This is when I began to tell more substantial lies to my parents, like the time I said I was staying at a friend’s house for the day so I could take an Amtrak to Philadelphia to visit Alex, a girl I had met online, and experiment with her sexually; or the several times I snuck out my bedroom window, or smuggled a girl in through it. It was all pretty harmless, honestly. But it was harmful in the way that each time I told a lie, I reinforced something terrible in my own mind: that I had to keep secrets in order to get what I wanted.
My Sister’s Encounter with Self-Harm
Unbeknownst to me, around the time I discovered I liked girls, my sister had discovered the same thing about herself. In fact, she’d been discreetly fooling around with a girl for a couple of months (I’ll call the girl “Hanna”) and was in the midst of having her heart broken for the very first time. As I found out from my sister later, Hanna was moody, mentally unstable, and perhaps sexually confused. She took Kristy on a lust-filled roller coaster ride only to eventually go back to her boyfriend, leaving Kristy in the dust. The fling ended dramatically and abruptly with Hanna being hospitalized for cutting herself.
The day I found out what Kristy had gone through was the day my mom noticed scabbed streaks of red emerging from Kristy’s long-sleeved shirt and demanded that she roll back her sleeves to expose her forearms. Kristy refused as adamantly as I’d ever heard her refuse anything, but my mom persisted until she finally forced Kristy to reveal her arms. The gasp that came from my mom next was the gasp that changed everything. My sister had cut herself deeply with a box cutter—so deeply, in fact, that she has scars to this day.
Recently, I asked my sister’s permission to include this part of the story in this book and also asked her if she could tell me more. She sent me the following in a text:
“I did it because I was in pain and it didn’t seem like anyone really knew. I was a depressed, closeted homo in love with a very disturbed yet very alluring girl. I did it because I felt trapped. Seeking support around this would have meant ‘coming out’ and I just wasn’t ready for all that yet. I wasn’t even sure yet myself what I was. At the time I was aware that in a sick way I wanted Hanna to find out what I’d done to myself. I wanted her to know how much I cared about her and how hurt I was about her hurting herself. I wanted her to see her own reflection in me. I wanted her to see that perhaps we were more alike than she knew. In a weird way, cutting myself brought me to terms with the level of pain and numbness I was experiencing. The fact that I could harm myself to such an extent and barely feel it was evidence of my suffering, and so was the blood. It was proof of my existence, and so are the scars.”
After my sister’s encounter with self-harm, there was a significant shift in my family’s dynamics. My mother and father, concerned as any parents would be, took every measure they could to prevent Kristy from hurting herself again, from an initial trip to the emergency room to getting Kristy enrolled into psychotherapy. Patronizing doctors and concerned family members asked my sister, “Why would you do this to your precious skin?” Eventually, my mom sought treatment of her own and began seeing a therapist for a time, who I think pushed her to let Kristy and I have more trust and independence. This ultimately led to my mom pulling back and giving Kristy and I more room to grow as individuals.
My sister and I came out as gay a couple of years later, and my parents actually took the news lovingly and well. But still we had this in common: our first notions of romantic love were that it involved things we had to conceal. Euphoria and joy were feelings to be ashamed of, feelings we had to steal.
Chapter 2 MY QUARTER-LIFE CRISIS
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In this section, I’ll tell you about the events that immediately preceded what I refer to as “my big fat discreet breakdown,” which occurred less than six months into my first year away at college. It was some combination of feeling for the first time like I was free, combined with the pressures of new expectations—social expectations, adult responsibilities, etc.—which I did not yet know how to navigate. All the while I was experiencing this sense of overwhelm, I was also yearning, reaching, searching for something I could not quite put my finger on. And so I challenged everything—my sexuality, my metaphysical body, and my desires—essentially, my entire identity.
Overwhelmed by the Limitless World
The year I turned eighteen, I sought many things—freedom from my social anxiety, control over my feelings and desires, and relief from the pressure to become someone in a world that made little sense to me. In what felt like a very short span of time, I was expected to choose a four-year college, commit to a career path, assume a personality, and assert myself in ways I just wasn’t prepared for. For years, I had mastered the art of being invisible—and now I was expected to be someone? It was too much to ask, it was too much, too soon, and I wanted nothing more than to retreat into a private corner and hide.
The way I see
