Happy Pride, y’all!
I hate talking about myself, but here we go…
I’m nonbinary. My body is the least interesting thing about me. I dress to protect it because the sun hates me, not because I care what people think. I work out and eat as well as I can because it’s good for my brain, and because sheer spite may not be enough to outlive my enemies.
I’m not a girl/girlie/woman/chick/chica/ma’am.
I’m not a boy/man/guy/dude/bro/sir.
I prefer they/them, but she/her works, the same way it works for a pirate ship or a fast car.
I’m demisexual, but I am more likely to vow to die for someone than to be physically attracted to them. I’m panromantic, but my past relationships have made me anti-romantic. If I didn’t already have a partner, I probably wouldn’t. That doesn’t mean I love him any less or make our relationship any less valid. It’s also none of your business.
In high school, I threw myself into bad relationships just to be IN a relationship. “Look at me, I’m being normal!” My partner and I met because our friends were “not” setting us up. (They were totally setting us up.) I got lucky. He’s my best friend. We bonded over Star Wars, video games, and Surge cola. He’s the reason I believe in fated mates and life bonds. He’s my forever person.
On the outside, we have a heteronormative relationship. To some, that means I don’t belong at Pride.
I don’t need to be accepted into the community to know who I am. I don’t need y’all to validate my queerness. I am queer. Always have been.
I came out later in life. I blame the Church, my fam, and my people-pleasing abuse response. It took over 40 years and a fight with Bette Midler (she never acknowledged my Twitter comment, but it changed my whole outlook on life). I know who I am now. I’m not broken. I’m me.
As part of the Q+, I feel pressure to prove my queerness. People who once welcomed me as an ally now look at me with suspicion, or claim I’m mentally ill. They knew when they were young, but it took me so long to figure it out …
I knew when I was young. I tried to come out. I was shoved back in the closet by people who love me but didn’t understand.
“All girls wish they were boys.”
“All girls hate their bodies.”
“You’ll grow out of it.”
“You only develop attraction after you’ve been dating a while? That’s normal!”
I tried to be a good girl, the best girl, even with short hair for most of my childhood (it was a curly mess. I get it). I got my ears pierced at 8, but that wasn’t enough. I wore makeup (badly). It wasn’t enough. I was a cheerleader. It was never enough.
For the record, I was a boy before I hit puberty. Then I fell for the “tomboy” lie. FYI: I did not grow out of it. However, perimenopause is bad enough. No way in hell I’m going through puberty again, and I have enough facial hair as it is. I’m content with this vessel. It’s gotten me this far. It will never be “feminine enough,” and while I am often mistaken for a boy, I’ll never be a man. I’m nonbinary, and that’s fine by me.
I could have stayed in the closet, writing my LGBTQ+ romance books as an outsider and an ally, but I don’t want another kid to go through the confusion and questioning I did. It took meeting other nonbinary and demisexual people to see how wrong I had been to fall for the lies society feeds us. People like us have always existed, and we always will. The more visible we are, the harder we are to ignore.
Why we still need pride month:
Right now, the US is in the early stages of a trans genocide. Trans people are dying. Anti-trans legislation is killing us. Anti-trans hatred is murdering us with zero legal consequence. LGBTQ+ panic is still a viable defense in 30 states. My state, Iowa, has rolled back protections for trans people so they can pass more anti-trans bills with impunity.
Why we still need pride month:
Asexuals still experience corrective r@pe: “You haven’t met the right person yet,” “I can fix you,” or, “Don’t you love me?” followed by s3xual assault. For one study, 43.5% of asexual people had been the victim of s3xual violence because they were ace.
I didn’t know I was ace at the time, but I am a survivor.
This is a symptom of the prevalent r@pe culture in our society. Until we acknowledge we have a problem, we can’t fix it.
Instead of passing protections for LGBTQ+ people, our politicians are hell-bent on stripping them from us.
No laws will stop LGBTQ+ children from being born to cis-het parents every day. No amount of conversion therapy will change who we are. We have always been here. They might send us into hiding, but they will never eliminate us completely.
I’m done believing the lies society told me about myself. I’m done hiding. I will never stop fighting for equality for all humans and protections for all living beings.
None are free until we all are free.
If you made it this far, give me a follow, and maybe check out my queer books?
I write snark, spice, and HEAs:
MM romance as Edie Montreux
Mpreg romance as Edie Monte
Sapphic romance as Edith Montreux
and Taboo MM romance as Mercury Gemini