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After discovering the Church’s website material previously published as “Mormon and Gay” (now “Same-Sex Attraction” – https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/topics/gay) I scoured it for help to address my confusion, anger, and distress — but there was nothing. The stories in its pages remain devoid of practical guidance because Church leaders recognise that healing is impossible within the framework it has helped to construct. The web pages are filled with false hope.

And it wasn’t too long before I noticed that some individuals whose glossy stories graced its content had their faith-affirming articles swiftly removed when they went off the rails. It was inevitable. White-knuckling through life (as it is referred to when one lives in denial) is no life at all.

A question that bothers me a lot and has previously been raised is that of how can revelation positively gush out of our leaders on every conceivable topic that is either self-evident or inconsequential in the grand scheme of things while, for something of such critical importance, the heavens remain closed. Something is wrong. Something smells rat-like. And no one can be held to account.

I searched the web pages for a personal history to which I could relate; someone like me who had followed the Lord’s counsel to marry and have children despite their being intrinsically unsuitable. I found nothing. So I emailed the content owner using the address provided and received an automated response to assure me that my query would be addressed in due course. I never heard back.

The same thing happened when I contacted Deseret Book on March 15, 2019 to request its removal from sale of The Miracle of Forgiveness in eBook form. I made the following assertion: “President Kimball was an inspired prophet of God, but his seminal work The Miracle of Forgiveness includes material that is offensive, divisive, and in stark contrast with the greater light and knowledge revealed to successive prophets.” No one responded, but the publication was withdrawn from sale soon afterwards.

On some days, I feel so much anger, resentment, and frustration. I simply desire to feel normal, and to love my wife like she is my entire world. But demons lurk in my shadows, and many have the silhouettes of senior priesthood leaders.

I wrote to the Office of the First Presidency with a lengthy accusation of Church-sponsored abuse in relation to its decades-long practice of portraying vulnerable individuals as perverts and worse. I published the material anonymously on a website and asked them to respond to me using the contact details on the site. It will come as no surprise that, seven months later, I have received no response. I wrote anonymously to prevent them from simply forwarding my letter to my stake president who is fully aware of my situation and that of others in my stake but has no idea how to accomplish anything positive within the stranglehold maintained by the Quorum of the 12.

I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but what is still being perpetrated in the name of Jesus Christ is abhorrent.

So I hang on — serving to the best of my ability in stake leadership — wondering how long it will be before I reach the end.

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nibbler wrote:

The only hell LGBTQIA+ people are going to is the one that the church itself creates for them. It’s not unlike a self-fulfilled prophecy, look how miserable they are because of how miserable we’ve made things for them. Then human prejudices and a feedback loop take over. They must be miserable because they’re doing something wrong, which justifies our mistreatment of them, which makes them more miserable.

Thank you for being charitable with me. When I have voiced my suspicions elsewhere that individuals who experience challenges with gender and identity probably have many commonalities with soldiers who return from battle with PTSD, I have been mocked and vilified. Yet I feel there is mileage in exploring the idea that such self-expression could be a logical stress response from insidious or accidental childhood trauma.

As someone who believes in evolution (within a orderly plan), I can find no sense in such aberrations from a biological standpoint. They are self-defeating. Also as someone of faith, I find they make no sense in the context of loving deity. That leads me to conclude that other forces must be at play — but no one wants to address such an outrageous idea that society may be creating its own monsters. Everyone wants to blame someone else, but perhaps we are all to blame.

It is my understanding that “experts” used to believe that homosexuality and the other stuff were mental illnesses until it was agreed that the individuals showed none of the classic hallmarks of illness. However, it is possible to experience the outcomes of trauma in the form of PTSD, for example, without being mentally ill.

I hope it won’t be offensive to suggest that it sounds to me like you may either be a disaffected/disenfranchised/ex- church member or an agnostic or atheist. If that is the case, it would be perfectly reasonable for you to blame the church and the wider faith community. In the context of my own assertions, I find myself somewhat in the same boat — but I am mindful that I wish to avoid throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

If church leaders could adequately address the mistakes made in the name of God for decades, it would be easier to trust them. At the moment, however, I feel that trust has been betrayed.

[Carburettor]

More from me.

Who among us genuinely believes that individuals in Biblical times were possessed by evil spirits and demons? It works in fairytales, but it is unreasonable in an age of greater education and science. Surely those poor folk were suffering from conditions that science has since shown to be unrelated to the devil: epilepsy, schizophrenia, personality disorders, etc. But everything inexplicable was treated with suspicion and associated with the father of lies. And that culture of fear is likely to have poisoned society from its origins. I am left-handed. Did you know that the word “sinister” comes from the Latin for “left”? Such indoctrination is founded on ignorance and persists in cultures today.

I suspect that what we now describe as issues relating to gender and identity are outcomes of the same inherited backwardness. What if the presentation of these challenges is simply a reaction to and symptoms of society’s limited understanding? Of fearing the implications of non-compliance and responding with mistrust or rejection of those in question — thus preventing them from accessing the validation they need to thrive in the dominant gender binary — driving them in the opposite direction. What if individuals are conditioned into believing they don’t fit because society relentlessly imprints that disconnect into them?

Consider the actor Jason Statham: https://www.looper.com/341342/the-untold-truth-of-jason-statham

Was he likely to have had his gender and identity questioned and ridiculed from childhood? Not on the basis of his appearance, no.

And what about this other actor, Harry Trevaldwyn https://www.vanityfair.com/london/2022/04/quick-fire-questions-harry-trevaldwyn

Wait, what? He’s gay? How could that be? Surely someone like him would never have been subject to cruelty, hatred, and general viciousness. Hmm.

There are plenty of effeminate men (and butch women) who don’t turn out gay, however, and I’d like to think that they were nurtured appropriately, whereas those whose compass spins the other way are likely to have been subject to unrelenting childhood and adolescent nastiness. That was my personal experience.

There is no actual gender binary. It is a scale with chromosome-disadvantaged intersex individuals in the middle. I have come to suspect that the closer one is to the biological centre (or the further one appears to be from the biological ideal), the increased likelihood there is that a rough life-path will lie ahead.

There are also macho guys and girly girls who end up same-sex attracted, of course, but there are no end of emotional conditions (as expressions of one’s biology) upon which society preys to undermine, confuse, and disenfranchise when such individuals display undesirable behaviours or impressions of failing to align with the desired binary.

My stake president father used to beat his children into strict observance. My older siblings seem to have emerged from that trauma intact, but the genesis of my identity confusion was manifest when I begged for a doll for my seventh birthday. In hindsight, I was unable to relate to the masculine role models in my life. They subjected me to constant punishment.

For convenience and understanding, I describe myself in confidential settings as same-sex attracted. However, under scrutiny that descriptor simply isn’t true. I am attracted to masculinity — not individuals. I crave its companionship because I have always found myself excluded from it.

And now movements such as Pride have risen up to demand acceptance of the things society hates and that may, ironically, be the outcomes of its own wrongdoing. If that is true, it is no wonder we are at an impasse. I am now of the opinion that the positions of both secular society and the Church are wrong in ways they simply cannot conceive.

That is my belief. It is why I now suspect that biology loads the gun — and society pulls the trigger.

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Here’s a little more of my thinking. Of all the hundreds of Church members with whom I have communicated and who identify as being somewhere on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum, I believe I’m pretty much the only one who doesn’t believe they were born like it (or worse, that they were perversely blessed by God to experience life differently). This goes against all my logic from a faith perspective. I struggle to accept that a loving God would confuse the core identity of any individual (which puts me firmly in agreement with DarkJedi’s earlier statements), thus setting them up to fail. That is not the God in which I have faith.

The standard argument adopted by most is that they can’t remember feeling any different, so they must have been born that way. My counter argument is that absolutely no one can say for sure how or what they felt like as a baby because no one can remember what took place in those critical months and years when each of us was learning our place in society. My earliest memories date back to just before my second birthday, and I only have a couple of them. I have no inkling of how I was interpreting cues from society in my formative years nor of what was taking place in my home and how that affected my development.

And then there’s the Church position within the wider religious context of the Abrahamic faiths. Moses got the ball rolling by documenting debauchery and associating it with personal choice. Senior Church leaders in the latter half of the 20th century subsequently ratcheted up the hatred by declaring in no uncertain terms that identity-challenged individuals were sick perverts by choice, but that they could equally choose a path to normality if they were more faithful. I believe we can all agree that senior priesthood leaders are no longer permitted to make such “inspired” statements.

In respect of how people end up experiencing life differently, I am drawn to an alternative explanation. It involves humanity trying to ensure its own survival by setting up a straw man argument. A child perceived as weak, too sensitive, or in some other way lacking desirable traits of the idealised sexual binary finds themselves constantly challenged over their shortcomings, which serves only to disconnect them from precisely the reaffirming influences necessary for normal adulthood.

I’m gonna cut this short. It’s my bed time.

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DarkJedi wrote:

You’re teasing with the rationale statements! I want to hear it.

Thank you for you generous tone. Unfeasible though it is, I’d love to sit down with someone like you to gently unravel the detail of this monstrous issue. I guess I’ll have to settle for pulling up a figurative chair and attempting to do so here.

In the years since all my frames of reference fell apart (from the day I learnt that the Church had ceased “officially” accusing benign individuals like me of choosing to follow Satan), I have been unable to find anyone with whom to impartially discuss my deeper concerns about the ongoing predicament. Everyone has an agenda, and convictions are invariably too ingrained on both sides of the argument to ease the stalemate.

As I have explained, I found myself dragged from one camp into another a few years ago. I had been imprinted for decades with bigotry, yet suddenly a bunch of North Star strangers were trying to convince me to identify as a homo (or MoHo as they termed it). I soon felt unable to trust what anyone was telling me because everyone was always defending a position.

I now suspect that the entire argument is a massive misunderstanding that has become so distorted that everyone is looking in the wrong places for solutions.

In respect of North Star, I eventually felt obliged to unsubscribe because my views were received with contempt. The victim culture is alive and well there. I tried to coax hundreds of them into bringing about wholesome change (such as efforts to dispel bigotry at ward and stake level, which I modelled in my own stake), but literally no one was interested. They are all simply hanging on for doctrinal change. I hope it never comes.

Your comments about North Star made me smile. In the course of contacting so many individuals, I encountered a former NS subscriber who said something along the lines of “North Star members are all depressed, needy, and hate themselves. Why would I want to be part of such a group?” I protested it was untrue, but I have since changed my mind.

In terms of what you shared about unfairness, I have heard the same ideas from North Star subscribers and others. And I have no difficulty understanding why people feel that way.

So, brace yourself; this is where I get all crazy. For simplicity, I will focus on the oldest-recorded and maybe simplest issue: homosexuality.

Faith position: As per Genesis and the writings of the Apostle Paul, two men (or women) engaging in sexual activity is an unnatural act and against God’s law. Well, as someone who has a testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and who believes in the evolution of species (a whole different ball game), I actually support that position. It’s what I defended for decades.

Secular position: People deserve inalienable rights of self-expression, of dignity, and of self-governance — meaning they must be allowed to love whomever they wish. Well, I also support the whole drive for human rights.

What I now suspect to be a critical misdirection, however, is not the actual choices we face but how we reached the point where we are faced with these incompatible choices.

Using an overly simplified soundbite, I increasingly suspect that all the challenges associated with gender and identity can be encompassed thus:

“Biology loads the gun. Society (family, faith-based, and secular) pulls the trigger.”

Please don’t be angry with me. I will be happy to expound further so you can offer valuable insight. My already stated position is that my entire life has been underpinned by sadness, and my faith in God informs me that something beyond my control is therefore wrong. I am simply searching for truth that may steer me towards ways to mitigate the distress.

[Carburettor]

Roy wrote:

As noted by Dark Jedi, if your intent is to discuss membership in the LDS church specifically then it might be better to title the new thread “Can individuals who identify as LGBTQ+ truly find peace as active members of the LDS Church?” I also support creating this new topic.

Wonderful. I will proceed on that basis.

Roy wrote:

DJ is correct. The rule against addressing others outside the forum prevents people from writing something like, “Hey Mr. President, are you listening? This message is for you!…”

Thank you. I am still a little apprehensive about what is acceptable to post, so I trust you will kindly help me with a course correction if I step out of line. I’m simply searching for answers.

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DarkJedi wrote:

I think the idea that one can’t find peace in the Gospel of Jesus Christ while being Gay (or LGBTQIA+) is erroneous. I think this error in thinking comes about because the church and church members so often conflate the church with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They are not the same thing.

Thank you, DarkJedi. I took aim in the wrong direction as you have pointed out. Indeed, I reached this conclusion myself in recent years — having regurgitated for decades clichés like “I know without a shadow of a doubt that the Church is true.” I now squirm when I hear fully grown adults repeat that same mantra each testimony meeting. As it happens, I was recently asked to share my testimony in a stake council meeting, and I made everyone uncomfortable by beginning with something like “I no longer believe the Church is true.” To their relief, I made the assertion that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is true — and I have a testimony of that — and the Church is simply a vehicle that attempts to drive us in that direction to the best of its ability (or that of its leaders).

[Carburettor]

Roy wrote:

Lastly, I would avoid the term “so-called” because it seems pejorative and is often used with a mocking tone.

Please accept my apology for this, Roy. It was fuelled by my simmering frustrations and disenfranchisement, which will become clearer in due course. I am happy to edit my post to remove the offending adjective. To complete the removal, we should then both delete all references to it to avoid confusion for any third party. If, however, you prefer the comment(s) to remain to indicate forum practice, I will take the hit and try to avoid re-offending.

Perhaps the title of a new thread could be “Can individuals who identify as LGBTQ+ truly find peace in the Gospel of Jesus Christ?”

Roy wrote:

You can refer to public figures as you already did with the 1995 article by Dallin H Oaks about “same gender attraction.”

OK, so I’m still unsure about this. What about referring to information in the public domain (if you dig deeply enough) that reflects badly on specific senior priesthood leaders (living or deceased) in a 21st-century context? It is easy to say, “hang on, you can’t evaluate decades-old teachings in the context of our current day,” but what if, in my case, the negative ramifications of those teachings have only recently become apparent to me? To consign them to history is to invalidate their aggregated effects on me (and others). I have searched the past to understand my present, and I have subsequently found myself reminded of many troublesome things. Basically, I have emerged from the figurative cave in which I felt obliged to hide for decades only to be confronted by a tsunami of pejorative comments that shaped who I have become. I was thinking I would need to obfuscate the identity of those individuals. I wish to avoid drifting into ad hominem territory.

Please assess the following illustration. Several sections of a certain GA’s talk delivered in a past General Conference have been redacted in the transcript found on churchofjesuschrist.org because they contain content that is now considered inaccurate and offensive. Most Church members would probably consider the comments to be unfortunate, but for me they represent a single strand of damaging emotional conditioning — so hiding them only adds to the injustice. For someone in my position, it feels like gaslighting. The video of the GA’s talk hasn’t been edited, however, so the content is readily verifiable.

The purpose of examining past comments isn’t to question the integrity of individuals who believed they were offering inspired counsel; that is for them to deal with on judgement day. Rather, it is to unravel the tangle of unresolved negative outcomes that such comments caused. We can easily say, “let’s forget the past and move on,” but that leaves unaddressed the damage that continues to drive people like me from the Church. I feel we must be honest and own it — and accept the repercussions to allow the healing process to begin. Until then, it smacks of an aggressor silencing its victims.

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AmyJ wrote:

The only pointers I can recommend are learn about “scrupulosity” and it’s ramifications. Learning about “Trauma and Sexuality” from actual experts may be useful as well.

Amy, I love your insight and level-headedness. I hope you (and others) won’t mind if I add another dimension to my complicated and most-likely boring personal story by sharing what has happened from 2016 to the present day, which leaves me pessimistic about what “experts” (both in and outside the Church) have to offer. Essentially, no one dares attempt to unravel sexuality these days on the basis that it may be considered conversion therapy. Plus, I don’t live in Utah but the UK where I would be laughed out of a therapist’s office for insisting that my faith is more important to me than my sexuality — even though the disconnect between the two has been strangling me for decades to the point where I have come close to ending everything (or simply contemplating it on fairly regular occasions as a means of escape), yet those recurring thoughts eventually percolate into anger that I should even find myself in such a position. It is surely messed up that a person’s religious devotion should make them want to kill themselves. Am I wrong to believe that something isn’t right for that to be the case?

In 21st-century western secular society, accepting oneself is what it’s all about. However, that doesn’t work for someone of faith in respect of complications relating to gender and identity. I fully accept that I may be barking up the wrong tree, hopelessly misguided, a wolf in sheep’s clothing, or some other bad actor, but it is my sincere belief that it is currently impossible for someone like me to find peace. I’d like to explain what has brought me to this conclusion in the past few years so that maybe you or someone else can apply logic to point out where I’m going wrong. All I want is to experience joy in living the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I already know what is involved in doing all the “right” things. I can’t now remember if I mentioned that I’ve been serving in stake priesthood leadership since 2019 after serving in ward and stake leadership since the 1980s (which is what you get for being a reliable member in the UK), so I would consider myself to be reasonably well informed in terms of being a faithful, committed, covenant-keeping member of the Church.

Before I share anything more, I wish to point out that I understand from the rules of this forum that I am forbidden from referring directly to individuals (alive or dead), which means I will need to be somewhat obscure about some material — but I can provide evidence offline if that helps. I simply wish to avoid being kicked off the forum. Unless I can talk through the obstacles to my continued activity in the Church, I feel doomed to become yet another tragic statistic.

Perhaps I should begin a new thread in the “Support” board. Something along the lines of “Can so-called LGBTQ+ individuals truly find peace in the Gospel of Jesus Christ?”

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DarkJedi wrote:

Seems to fit the definition of asexual at least to some extent.

Sorry, I’m definitely not asexual. I experience unwanted attraction and “longing” (if that’s an appropriate expression).

DarkJedi wrote:

I do believe you. And the porn thing is not at all a stretch. I think there are lots of people who don’t look at porn and there are certainly people who have no interest in porn or who find it less than appealing.

I was raised on a diet of mind over matter. I have never smoked a cigarette or anything similar. I have never intentionally drunk alcohol. I have always kept my language clean. I have never viewed porn. All these issues are part of my unhealthy “scrupulosity.” Perhaps I sit somewhere on the autistic spectrum, but I function at a superficial level much like everyone else — except I have a massive rift in my sense of self that has brought only sadness. Never the feelings of “man is that he might have joy.”

[Carburettor]

AmyJ wrote:

There is a lot out there about “purity culture” and “Scrupulosity” from a religious standpoint that may be useful to you – there are even posts about the second topic on this site. Trauma does a number on sexuality too (especially for men – that is a growing field of data and information on that) – that might be a useful topic to explore in general.

Thank you, Amy! I have returned from my vacation (which was lovely), and I confess that my photo could sit comfortably in the dictionary beside the word “scrupulosity.” I have never previously encountered this word, but it perfectly encompasses my childhood, adolescence, and a few more years after that. Thank you for enlightening me — and for also making me feel terrible about myself! 😆

AmyJ wrote:

I don’t know you, and I am female – so I might be off base. But at the end of the day, it seems that your soul is in conflict because what feels “normal” is also defined as “perverse” as defined by the church culture (and some teachings). I can relate to that conflict.

The word “normal” doesn’t fit well for me in any context, but I understand your reasoning. I always felt “abnormal,” and I somehow understood from the age of four that I must never put my feelings into words or even spend time dwelling on them. I was repeatedly taught in the home, classes, meetings, and conferences that such abnormality was of one’s own choosing, and I believed the message that I could extricate myself from its clutches by consciously rejecting it.

I searched all the materials we had at home back in the 1970s for advice on how to fix myself — but the messages with the greatest impact were found in The Miracle of Forgiveness and Mormon Doctrine — and I was left squirming in discomfort and bewilderment. In terms of the “perverts” to which it referred, all I could think was, “That’s not me! That can’t be me! That will not be me!”

I subsequently served my entire full-time mission feeling dirty for something I had never done — but was somehow inexplicably drawn to — while, at the same time, being driven to despise by my quest to rid myself of all things unholy.

The final piece of my misfitting jigsaw puzzle was the 1995 article by Dallin H Oaks about “same gender attraction.” It convinced me that normality was something within my grasp if I pursued it with singleness of mind. It was everything I longed for from a logical and gospel standpoint. I could be as straight as an arrow if I put my trust in God. So I reasoned that I should never question the matter further. Simply accept and become.

I believed that marriage could fix what was wrong with me — as directed by my patriarchal blessing — even if it required me to pretend to be someone else. So I did. And I ended up not knowing who I was. I even paid for two courses of hypnotherapy (first in my thirties and again in my forties) to banish the morbid thoughts that plagued me (while explaining to my wife that the treatment was to help me deal with work stress). And while my marriage continues to offer a veneer of acceptability and cosiness some 27 years later, I have always felt like an imposter. The way I love my wife is possibly similar to the way someone might display an overly touchy-feely love in a sibling relationship — perhaps even as a form of co-dependency (although I don’t really understand how to properly use that term). And I did everything as an act of faith.

And then, in November 2016, I received a Church email saying the “mormon and gay” website had been updated — and all my frames of reference went out of the window. Everything I had learnt to pretend wasn’t real was being written and talked about openly. How was that possible? Everything I had suppressed and denied for almost 50 years was there in black and white, couched in an entirely different we-don’t-really-know narrative. So I have spent decades destroying my emotional and mental wellbeing for what, exactly?

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DarkJedi wrote:

Seriously? You didn’t know about the M-word until you were 19? I believe you, I’m just flabbergasted and can’t say I’ve ever met anyone who has said that before. Were you a late bloomer?

It is true, as unbelievable as it sounds. I was like Kimmy Schmidt in some respects. I don’t wish to overstep the mark here by getting graphic, but I had no idea about human intercourse other than from still images in a biology class.

There’s more. I have never viewed pornography — other than in those scenarios when you’re presented with something and you choose to look away.

So all the while I’m making conscious decisions to be clean and “unspotted” (as I understood it), yet I’m also experiencing infatuation after infatuation at the same time that isn’t sexually motivated — set against a backdrop of church literature that spoke unequivocally about homosexuality being perversion. That simply could not be me, I reasoned to myself, because I didn’t even understand what I was supposed to have chosen. I had no real comprehension of the mechanics in the bedroom of a man and a woman let alone two men.

So I withdrew into my unhealthy denial, believing that God would someday straighten things out. Literally.

[Carburettor]

Roy wrote:

Finding out that the LDS church is not quite like you had once been taught and believed with all of your heart is like a death and those that go through this process are in a period of mourning.

So true!

Living in an area with a small church community may also magnify the complications. Where I live, it has become impossible to be a member without being in a responsible calling with all the associated requirements to lead, teach, and testify about an ever-decreasing selection of safe topics (e.g., love, charity, the Atonement).

There is no place to hide. In one of our units, the branch president is on loan from another ward. Another ward has no bishop (he moved away). There is no one to call in his place, so the stake presidency is waiting for their request to change it to a branch so they can call pretty much anyone as branch president (even one of the full-time missionaries).

In my area, people who feel they need time to recover find themselves actively having to separate themselves, else they become the next project for the bishop to call to repentance, or they are strong-armed into a calling that only makes matters worse.

It’s a tricky situation.

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DarkJedi wrote:

This is commonly referred to as putting the stuff on a shelf. The problem is that many times the shelf breaks. Yours did (and so did mine).

Great insight! For now, my fractured shelf is holding; but only just.

[Carburettor]

What follows may be too long and self-indulgent for anyone to bother with, but it’s cathartic to put it in writing.

I don’t want to get all weird, but I was aware of nothing sexual going on in my early years. The message I learnt was that anything sexual was evil and forbidden. And I never questioned what I was taught.

My father was a bishop when I was born, and he was called as stake president when I was four. In hindsight, I’d say he was so invested in saving the ward and stake that he overlooked the emotional impacts of his absence on his family. Certainly on me.

At the age of four, I experienced my first “crush” if you will, and it had nothing to do with sex because I had no concept of what that was (and wouldn’t have until my late teens). I can now see that I became fixated with replacement father figures who embodied everything I couldn’t access in my own father. That sounds horribly creepy, sorry.

Decades later, I can logically accept how a craving for affirmative masculine validation while being on the receiving end of a punishing physical relationship with an older brother likely fermented into something entirely unhealthy. The layering of sexual interest (in the context of associating pleasure with the subject of one’s strongest motivations) probably began to take shape only in my twenties as a logical development of unresolved emptiness.

No conscious choice was ever involved. I had no idea what the M-bomb was until my stake president asked me during my mission interview if I did it — and then had to explain it to me. Oh, the horror!

So that’s the start. I was committed to never exploring anything immoral (as instructed), so a naive and submissive devotion to my faith prevented me from ever addressing the unhealthy attitudes that were developing without my consent to fill my longing for acceptance and validation.

That’s the background to a life of emotional confusion, anxiety, feelings of fraudulence and of being an imposter, followed by several professional interventions that were believed to be work-stress related, during which I relied on meds to mitigate the hopelessness of feeling that ending it all was the only way out.

Note: a request for sympathy is neither expressed nor implied. Since 2016, I have been able to largely unravel my angst. And that unravelling is what has brought me so much uncertainty in respect of the self-loathing I learnt from Church teachings, which, for at least 50 years, were focused on individuals “choosing” a path of perversion. I simply wanted to be normal.

I’ll take a break at this point. I’m on vacation, and the day beckons.

[Author]

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