The world is full of pain. We all know that. This is the story about my battle but I didn't write it as a way to complain and feel sorry for myself. I don't want you to get that impression. I wrote it because growing up I didn't know anyone else who experienced the things I did. I didn't have the words to describe what was happening to me or how conflicted I was feeling. It took decades to gather a vocabulary that could make some kind of sense out of it and I was only able to do that by finding other people and stories and ...
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The world is full of pain. We all know that. This is the story about my battle but I didn't write it as a way to complain and feel sorry for myself. I don't want you to get that impression. I wrote it because growing up I didn't know anyone else who experienced the things I did. I didn't have the words to describe what was happening to me or how conflicted I was feeling. It took decades to gather a vocabulary that could make some kind of sense out of it and I was only able to do that by finding other people and stories and experiences that I could relate to and borrow from. This book is in third person because it was too hard to write in first person, but it was written with the hope that it might help someone else find the words that they might not yet have to describe their experience. Maybe you don't have schizophrenia. Maybe you aren't gay or struggling with religion or identity, but I think we all struggle at some time with figuring out who we are and what are place in the world is. My struggle happened to be an unusual one because it needed to be so that I could face it. Yours might not be so completely unsettling and that's good, but maybe you do have that part that also wonders about what is right and wrong? And real and unreal? Maybe sometimes you look at your daily life and wonder if there is any meaning to it? Or maybe you don't. I did. For a long time I fought myself to try to be what I never was. I drew courage from stories of people who also had battles to fight. So, if this helps someone else to confront that inner element of fear-- the fear of not being who you want to be or who you thought you were, then it's worth it.
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