Life, Love and Understanding
By: Jeff Abney
“That is so Gay!”, “Fag!”, “Queer”, “Homo”. These are phrases that have been said in anger, indifference and hostility. Some have heard them as a bystander and others have heard them as the recipient. It seems so hard to believe that these mere words, among others that some people believe to be so harmless have caused so many of our precious young ones take their own lives.
Speaking as someone that was raised in a good old Christian household, Christian community and an area of the country that is even known as the Bible-Belt, I heard these phrases from people whom were suppose to be my support system on a daily basis. People that I looked too for protection, at time were bullies themselves.
At around the age of 12 or 13 I had actually stopped praying to change and began praying to die. You see from the time my friends and cousins started having their crushes on little girls, I was having my crushed on other boys. I prayed everyday to be different, to be normal. I did not have anyone that I could talk to, because like the community around me, my family taught that God did not want anyone to be that way and it could actually cause your soul to burn in hell. I could not believe it. The God and the family that I loved so dearly thought I should burn for feeling the way I did.
Then one day when I was about 14, I took a knife and started to cut into my wrist. I made a deep cut vertically instead of horizontally and I made it deep. There was minimal blood; I had just missed the major vessels. I explained it as an accident to my family and had it stitched up. To me this was just another way that I was meant to suffer. I could not control how I felt and now I could not control leaving this world. I was still in misery and it showed.
I spent many years trying to fit in and continuing to pray that God fix me. This led to an extremely low self esteem, experimentation with drugs, and other self destructive behaviors. I played pretend for years dating a few wonderful women. I was even engaged to be married to one of the most wonderful women I have ever met. I felt the sexual pressure that society places on all of us but because of our religious beliefs, I had my way of avoiding something that seemed so alien to me. Even something as simple as a kiss seemed so alien and uncomfortable to me. But as the date began closing in on me a life altering realization came over me. I knew that I was going to be miserable, but I could not bring myself to drag someone else through my hell. The engagement ended.
These feelings were still there but the conditioning that I was going to burn in hell still burned bright. Then the day came when I was talking to a friend of mine, who had been through a very similar life and I explained to him how hard I used to pray just to be normal. He looked at me and he asked me a question. “Do you believe that God answers prayers?” Well being raised my a mom that was the daughter of a Baptist preacher and a dad that was the son of a Methodist minister I was able to come up with a “Why Yes! God answers prayers.” Well, he said, so it is just your prayers that he does not answer. No, I replied, God answer my prayers also. Well then, have you ever thought that maybe that was a prayer that he did not need to answer he said. He then continues with “Maybe you praying to be normal did not need to be answered because you already were.” This was a statement that blew my mind, but also touched me with my first glimpse of hope in a life that up to this point was filled with despair.
Now I am not here to argue theology, because this subject is argued enough. It come down, people are going to believe what they believe until they started looking for something new. The point of this article is to show that you never know how your words maybe affecting others. There are people out there on the edge and it does not take much to push them over, when during their whole life they are continuously pushed.
No matter what anyone says, it is your personal beliefs that you are going to have to fall back on. Study for yourself and don’t let words full of hate, destroy a potentially beautiful life. Seek out a true support group. Remember there are always going to be people that try to force their archaic beliefs on you, but remember if their beliefs say they can judge you or if they are so arrogant that they believe they can possible know everything, just walk away. Love them, but don’t let anyone push you to the point that you feel your only way out is to end such a precious gift that is life.
Love is for everyone. So share it.
Sincerely your friend,
Jeff.
