The Ghosts of Junes Past
June of 2017. The first summer my ex-spouse and I began exploring polyamory, and one of the most emotionally traumatic months of my life. June of 2018. Processing a different trauma + in my first relationship with a woman (as a triad) + attended my first ever PRIDE event–a “masquerade prom” at the local gay bar–but not with either of my partners. June of 2019. In my first solo relationship with a woman, experiencing my marriage falling to pieces no matter how hard I tried to hold it together, and beginning to process the possibility that I could be gay instead of bisexual. June of 2020. In the depths of grief. My spouse (and I) now knew I was gay, we just didn’t know how to move forward yet. June of 2021. I moved out 5 months earlier. Drowning in a different stage of grief. Trying to grasp some semblance of joy in my new identity, while still trying to pick up the pieces of my shattered life: the loss of my partner of 9 years, the future we had planned together, and my understanding of self.
June of 2022.
PRIDE has always felt almost like a taunt. A celebration of a community to which I never fully felt like I belonged. Both a reminder of how hard we’ve had to fight for the right to exist–and how hard we’re still fighting–and a beautiful uprising of support and recognition. Everything I wanted to own and be a part of, and yet I felt silent and invisible. How could I celebrate the part of my identity (my bisexuality) that introduced so much trauma to my life (from polyam and relationship experiences and disconnection from self)? Then, how could I celebrate the part of my identity (my gayness) that quite literally broke me down to pieces, dismantled my life, and forced me to completely start over at 32 years old?
For a long time, I didn’t want to be gay. I had taken the smallest baby steps towards accepting my queerness just before my ex-spouse and I reconnected in early 2012 (we had gone to high school together), and I quickly backtracked and placed that queerness up on a shelf. A part of I never denied, but also one I never gave much breathing room to until we began to discuss the possibility of exploring polyamory.
When the first inklings of inner knowing began to surface throughout 2018 and 2019 I shut them down without even realizing it. It felt like the worst cognitive dissonance in the world. How could I possibly be gay when I’m married to a man that I love? Before I even accepted the truth, I was utterly crushed at just the possibility. I knew even then that it would shatter my entire life.
Each June throughout this journey, as the rainbows began to bloom around me, and everyone began to share their quotes and their photos and their love, my heart ached and my stomach turned. The closer I got to understanding my truth, the less safe I felt being open about it. Instead of feeling any semblance of “PRIDE” I felt an overwhelming amount of shame, guilt, and heartache.
The past year has been a monumental practice in healing and accepting. I checked all the boxes I could: trauma therapy, self-work, beginning a new career I’ve felt called to for a long time, but never believed enough in my own capacity to step into, working with a coach to lean into authenticity, taking steps towards a future that aligns with who I want to be, and finding ways to let go of the guilt, move out of the shame, and embrace the magic of who I am.
Healing requires absolute faith in an end result you cannot fully imagine while enduring copious amounts of discomfort and pain through the process. It asks you to surrender to an unpredictable ebb and flow of highs and lows. It forms you and transforms you to the point where not everyone around you will be willing to embrace who you are when you are no longer operating from a place of pain. When you stop allowing the guilt to control you and the shame to keep you small and the grief to keep you silent.
Throughout 2021 I clung to the idea of what 2022 might hold. I knew that everything I was working towards would create the foundation for the life I was just beginning to re-imagine on my own terms. I fought through every challenge to lay a foundation for this year to be the “prize” I won for surviving the darkness of the past several years. Spoiler alert: nothing this year has gone to plan. 2022 has brought its own new set of challenges and heartaches and pivots. At times it has been difficult to not just give up.
As we entered June last week, I couldn’t believe that I had reached another June and still didn’t feel celebratory or fully connected to my community. A part of me wondered if I would always be haunted by the Junes of my past. If PRIDE would ever feel real for me. I spent some time reflecting on this, and this is what I’ve realized.
The first PRIDE march happened on the one year anniversary of the Stonewall riots in New York City. The riots happened because of the persecution of LGBTQ+ individuals for simply existing as their true selves in what should have been a safe place for them at the time–the Stonewall Inn. Fifty-three years later and our right to exist is still at risk. Our community is still being persecuted and actively harmed. PRIDE may have become an explosion of rainbows as corporations recognize the opportunity for profit, and it may have evolved into a celebration that is often billed as family-friendly, and welcoming to all, but we are still fighting for our lives. We still have states who want to erase our existence by making it illegal to even speak the word “gay.”
I don’t have to feel celebratory. I don’t have to place an expectation on myself that I find a way to “redeem” the month of June. The trauma of June isn’t just mine. It isn’t just the past few years of my life. Perhaps the heartache I have felt throughout June has actually been the most connected I’ve ever been to my community. Perhaps the fear that I feel being fully, loudly, proudly, openly myself this month isn’t just my own.
I love the idea of celebrating being queer, especially when so many still wish we didn’t exist. I love that for a little while everyone that’s a part of the community gets to feel a little more seen and recognized and included in a way we’re often not. And yet, I know how many folks are struggling with their identity and this month is breaking them down. I know what it feels like to feel like you’re standing on the other side of the glass watching a party you should be a part of, and instead feeling darker and lonelier than you’ve ever felt.
If you’re LGBTQ+ this is my message to you this PRIDE month.
PRIDE can be whatever you want it to be. If it feels good to celebrate and you feel safe to be out and proud, that’s amazing. If it feels like yearning for something out of reach and confusing because you don’t yet know what that means, I see you. If the corporate rainbows feel flat and fake because we’re still not safe to be our whole selves in all places, I get it. If the explosion of rainbows helps you feel seen and recognized, I get that, too. If this month brings up all of the grief and heartache for a life that you lost, or for the past you didn’t get to have, or for a future that was never really real, but you still thought could be, my heart aches with you.
PRIDE is for you. Whatever you want it to be. Whatever you need it to be. Whatever you hope it could be for you in the future. No matter who you are, where you are on your journey, or how you identify, I see you. I love you. And I’m proud of you. I’m proud of us. 🖤🌈
June 2022.
If this post resonates with you and you’re seeking more support on your journey with your queerness, check out my e-book, WLWs That Bloom in the Dark. It’s a survival guide for coming out after 30 and I walk with you through all the difficult AF emotions and experiences that come along with this.
If you think you might want 1x1 support with anything related to your queer journey, please reach out via email or schedule a free call here.
