From them.us's "It's Never 'Too Late' to Become a #Lesbian":
"Ultimately, many of us who have to start over in our late 20s or 30s and beyond are never quite okay...I like learning as much as I can about myself, but it’s not easy to reconcile those discoveries with the lives I’ve already lived and the lives I would have hoped to have lived by now."
Full article at https://www.them.us/story/late-blooming-lesbian-personal-essay-am-i-ok
I had a weird personal revelation this evening that part of why I didn't #ComeOut sooner was because I was traumatized by the Tea Party and then by the Trump administration.
It wasn't a conscious decision--it wasn't like Trump got elected, I thought things would be bad for #queer people, so I decided not to come out as #bisexual. It was more like, I was so terrified of #fascism that I dedicated myself to #leftist #activism for years (and was exploited by some shitty orgs and shitty people) and didn't really have the time or space or support to think about myself or my needs or my identity.
I post a lot on here about the on-going #trauma of #covid-19, but the #fascist movements in the US are also traumatic. A lot of us were weathering so much trauma even before the #pandemic
Anyway, just sharing this I guess because maybe it's a small step in forgiving myself for not coming out sooner. Maybe it will help put things in perspective for someone else.
Something no one seems to talk about when #ComingOutAsAnAdult is that even the tiny steps you try to take to affirm your #queer identity hurt.
They hurt because they remind you of everything you missed when you were younger, so you have to #mourn those losses and process and reprocess the #grief. They hurt because they often put you in contact with #LGBTQ gatekeepers or even people who mean well but can't begin to understand what you're going through.
Maybe it's different for people who are pretending #covid19 is over. Maybe they get to be happy about all the ways they can make up for lost time. Maybe they can see some sort of future where they get to live authentically and revel in all that queer pride and joy that we're all supposed to feel.
For me, though, recognizing that #CovidIsNotOver and #ComingOut just before the #pandemic started has been nothing but pain. I'm not supposed to say this, but I wish I were still in the closet—at least it hurt less
This is a rant that I wish I would have thought of on #NationalComingOutDay earlier this month, but better late than never, I guess.
I've been trying to think of why chirpy replies of "You're valid! 😊" and similar sentiments make me so angry when I post about struggling with my own #queerness and #bisexuality and #ComingOutAsAnAdult, and I think I've hit on it. Not only is this sentiment a parody of itself at this point, but it's entirely individualistic and doesn't situate the #LGBTQ experience within larger systems of oppression.
Allow me to explain...
That being said, I think #TippingTheVelvet pretty much still holds up today. Maybe there's a bit more opportunity there to explore the possibility that Nan is nonbinary now than there would have been back in the early 2000s. The camera work does this unnerving thing where the audience is sometimes put in the perspective of a character in the show in a way that to me is unnerving and 4th wall breaking, I think unintentionally. Sometimes tonally the Vaudeville kind of aestheic they're going for doesn't always work. But it mostly holds up.
I found myself comparing it to #GentlemanJack, and overall, I think Tipping the Velvet does a better job of examining class, which I really wish Gentleman Jack would have been more critical of or encouraged the audience to be more critical of. I'm sorry, but I struggled to root for Anne when she was a landlord.
5/?
#QueerRepresentation #LGBTQ #Queer #Lesbian #Sapphic #ComingOutAsAnAdult #QueerMedia
Watching it again, today, brought me back to my college days and just how paltry #queer representation was at the time. People didn't really even talk much about queerness then, honestly. In the mainstream, both in media and activism the focus was on white, cis, gay, middle class men and the big political demand was for #SameSexMarriage. Stories about anyone else were few and far between, and stories about even those white, cis, gay, middle class men were few and far between.
There was also a heavy focus on #monosexism, so in retrospect, maybe it makes sense #TippingTheVelvet didn't lead to a queer awakening for me. After all, I knew at that time I was attracted to men, and the main character in that show says she feels nothing for men. So maybe that's why I didn't relate?
4/?
#LGBTQ #QueerRepresentation #Lesbian #Sapphic #ComingOutAsAnAdult
Also, the actor who played Nan Astley looks a lot like my college crush (who I didn't realize was a crush until a decade later). So rewatching #TippingTheVelvet has kind of left me wishing that it would have spurred some sort of #queer awakening in me. But I guess it didn't. Maybe that's too much to ask of just one show in the early 2000s. As I said before, it was the first piece of media I'd ever seen at the time that focused specifically on queer women.
3/?
#LGBTQ #QueerRepresentation #Sapphic #Lesbian #ComingOutAsAnAdult
After opining in this piece that I want someone to tell me that my feelings for these past crushes were real and that they mattered, a couple paragraphs later, I wrote:
"If #FallOutBoy gets to write a song--well, their entire oeuvre--about wanting girls who don't want them, I should fucking get to write about two girls I had crushes on and have that seen as significant and important by other people and worth caring about!"
So I'll end this thread on that note. Straight guys write about #UnrequitedLove and it's art. #Queer people write about it and it's dismissed or seen as us somehow dragging down the #LGBTQ rights movement, rather than a reflection of society's continued #queerphobia. And if you're #bisexual, it's taken as an excuse for why you're "not really queer."
In this writing I'm revisiting, after chronicling two very close friendships, one with a woman from college and another I met through leftist activism, I come to the conclusion that I was infatuated with these women. But our society doesn't make space for narratives about "what might have been," and in an on-going #pandemic that makes #dating and #sex impossible, "what might have been" is still all that I have. It's maybe all I ever will have. I feel like I'll never get the chance to explore my #bisexuality in any meaningful way. And I'm still processing that #DisenfranchisedGrief. One point in the piece that stands out is:
"I want someone to tell me that it was real and that it mattered."
I still want someone to tell me that my feelings were real and that they mattered, even if they're all I have.
#queer #sapphic #bisexual #bisexuality #writing #RandomThoughts #SelfReflection #UnrequitedLove #Shame #ComingOutAsAnAdult #grief
I'm rereading a very long, rambling document of word vomit that I wrote about a year ago in which I was (and still am) struggling to come to terms with the #shame and #DisenfranchisedGrief that I feel around #ComingOutAsAnAdult.
A year ago when I wrote it, I felt ashamed that I even had to write it. But looking back at it now, as much as I wish I could go back and redo my whole life so I'd never have to write it, I feel a lot of compassion for that past version of myself. She didn't deserve to be so alone and deal with so many of those horrible, overwhelming feelings by herself. Maybe there's a small act of meaning and bravery in that writing.
Is this #SelfCompassion? Am I doing it right?
#LGBTQ #Bisexuality #Bisexual #queer #writing #RandomThoughts
Rat Can't Read (she/her)