PRIDE – In the name of love, does being raped make me gay???

When I turned 21, I asked my mom to take me to Charlotte’s Web, a popular lesbian bar in Norfolk, VA. I decided to “come out.” After years of praying to God to take away any gay feelings, I decided that I no longer could pray about it, I just wanted to be me.

I felt a new freedom. My first night at Charlotte’s Web landed me my first girlfriend who was 36 years old. I cut my hair short, wore rainbow necklaces, pierced my nipples, had a tattoo and finally felt like I belonged somewhere with no judgments. I went on to have a few other girlfriends before I met the one that I would fall in love with. We met in college and both loved the Lilith Fair, CK One, Ellen, Melissa Etheridge, Indigo Girls, lesbian movies and Taco Bell. It was magical to have a best friend and lover and fall in love. 8 months later she broke up with me and left me for another chick that worked at Busch Gardens. I was totally devastated! I cried every day for 2 years. It was the worst pain and felt like when my mom had abandoned me at 13 years old to go live with her abusive boyfriend and left me with my dad alone.

I decided around that time to become a truck driver. I earned my Class A CDL license and drove for a major trucking company across the country. I tried to have other girlfriends, however I really just wanted to be alone. I didn’t know where to find women, and I lacked confidence that the ones I was interested in would like me because I was fat.

During my 2 years of trucking (1999 – 2001), I would occasionally visit my father in prison. He had served 4 years from 1991 – 1995 then moved to New Mexico. Apparently while in New Mexico, someone challenged his parole, and he was sent back to prison to serve about another four years in Virginia. Our relationship had been estranged since I was 14 and he first went to prison. He had continually denied ever molesting or raping me. I did not speak to him from 1991 – 1995. I would receive letters from him in prison that had to be first screened and opened by a social worker. I did not always receive all of his letters. While he was in New Mexico, my mother and I went for a visit. I believe I was about 19. I had not spoken to him in all those years. It was definitely awkward. Then later when I was about 21 or 22, I would visit him in the Virginia prison. It wasn’t until 2000 when he finally admitted and apologized for what he did. He said he had a sickness and compared it to being selfish and feeding his own pig. He continued to practice Buddhism in prison, and he aimed to balance out his karma and stay out of trouble. He taught prisoners to read, and most other prisoners respected him and called him Buddha. He always tried to pass along to me the history of our Native American ancestors, and tried to share with me all his knowledge from readings of Buddhism, afterlife, psychic phenomenon and other worldly subjects.

Incest is so complicated. The fact that I am a lot like my father and share a lot of intellectual and artistic passions with him, makes it hard to also have to hate him. I have made peace now. However during that time, the loss of a father and a yearning to be close matched with disgust and repulsion was challenging.

It was after my father apologized and made amends that I began to be attracted to men. This blog post may upset some folks on either side of the issue. I can only speak from my experience. When I met my future husband in 2001, I told him I was gay. He still was interested in dating me. We dated for 5 years, and married in 2006. I loved my husband and made a clear decision to be in a long term relationship with a man. I was okay with having one partner for life that happened to be a man. I have had feelings and crushes on women since then. Yet I do not feel a need to define myself. Trying to find a box to fit into became exhausting. I don’t feel gay, bi, straight or anything. I recognize that all my parts are me. As I have grown into womanhood, I have found my own femininity. I used to wear men’s clothes and baggy hoodies to hide. I believe that was more of a self-conscious body image issue of feeling fat, and not being confident about myself. I wanted to protect myself. As I started to love myself more, I explored wearing dresses and finding places to shop that carried my size.

Being raped and molested is hard to explain at times. Plus one of my abusers was a woman. Figuring out sexuality from a standpoint of not knowing what it means to be a virgin is crazy. Plus the thin line of receiving attention and love and sex is blurry. At times I could not tell if I just wanted a friendship, to be close, to be loved, to be seen, or whatever. I just figured having sex with someone would get me closer to being alive. To be clear, I do not believe being raped makes you gay. I want to recognize that the effects on sexuality overall is a winding road of emotions and healing.