Dear Diary

Have you ever walked into a room to know that everyone there is thinking something about you, but would never bring it up?

Have you ever wanted to pour your heart out, but the only people you felt comfortable with were the people you could never talk to about the issue?


The last several weeks have gone remarkably well, but I have hit a very hard wall. Since last night I have been having trouble breathing, blinding panic attacks, hopelessness where my body feel like lead and despairing anger at the world that is filled with so much self-righteous hate.

Yesterday I was at a childhood reunion that was pleasant, happy and remarkably uncomfortable. It was filled with people who think of me as betraying them and my roots by being gay, who pray that I change and who admirably try to be civil despite that. My mother last week wrote me a very painful note intended to be kind in response to watching "For the Bible Tells Me So" upon my request. To her it was a noble act to both watch the film and respond with her conditioned love. To me it was another passive stab at my heart and the foreboding that such a relationship is ultimately unsustainable. I am between therapists and feel lost without anyone to share these deep pains, just as I start a new job, apply for a 20k loan for school and try to keep financially, mentally and emotionally solvent without any assurance that it will be ok. I know that this level of openness is almost inappropriate for my very public blog, but in many ways I feel like this is my cry into the universe. I am so angry that these feeling persist, that my wounds from a quarter century of forced shame and irrational betrayal have not healed perfectly. This is only natural that such intensely negative experiences would remain. Emotional memory, especially from trauma is said to remain fresh forever. What we do with that is close up or open up. My identity is not tied to a brand, a group, an idea, an act or any other process addiction, at least to my understanding. This leaves me to reconcile these vestiges of blinding and immobilizing hopelessness without a crutch. I have neither family, self-medicating behavior nor understanding friend to support me. I have no security, no money, no love, no hope that I do not conjure up myself.

In general I am a kind, motivated, smart, attractive, understanding, creative and sincere person. But I am not impenetrable and there are days like this that all of the weight I shoulder day to day crushes me. This video from the Olympics sums up what days like today are.



After days, years, a lifetime of struggling to achieve everything possible, I am crushed. The things that are meant to vault me, my passion and motivation, come down and destroy me.

I feel compelled to put a positive spin on this post, to suddenly force the objective perspective I know is true. This is only 1 day versus the full month I spent at 22 in an early crisis of identity. These days grow shorter and farther apart every year. My means of coping with them grow healthier and stronger and what support I do have reinforces that despite passive rejection elsewhere or even everywhere, I will be continue to live most of my life experiencing peace and joy.