Hannah's Story
My friend Hannah shares her story of growing up in the Church, realizing she is bisexual, and coming to terms with her faith. An honest, brave, great read that I'm thankful she shared!
I was born a Mormon.
While I was a developing fetus, my mother kept a journal addressed to me. It was supposed to help her work through each week and have a nice little memory for each stage of her pregnancy—a weird ‘90s thing.
But in that journal, she wrote about how I would grow up, get baptized, go to BYU, get married in the temple, and have a family of my own.
I was a fetus.
There was no alternative path for me. There have always been expectations. Very specific expectations.
So when I say I was born a Mormon, I was literally born into the covenant. That’s what we believe, isn’t it? There would be no deciding whether or not I believed in God, whether or not the teachings of the church aligned with my worldview, whether or not I felt comfortable in a niche society of like-minded people.
Fortunately for me, I thrived as a young Mormon in Utah county.
At eight years old, I prayed every night. I memorized all the Articles of Faith. I even started to memorize all of the temples, back when there were fewer than 100, but my mom, thank God, gave up on that dream.
At 12 years old, I planned activities, gave spiritual thoughts, led meetings.
At 16, I was told by my bishop that other girls believed in God because they believed me.
At 18, I got into BYU. I got A’s and B’s. I went on dates with boys. I stayed true and chaste. I followed every rule.
At 20, I fell in love. I got married in the temple.
At 23, I graduated.
I was perfect.
I had reached all the goals that fetus-Hannah was supposed to reach. I had done it all. I could relax. Finally, I could relax.
But it’s never really that simple.
I was 11 when I realized I had a crush on a girl. I remember the exact moment. It’s one of those memories that has stayed with me, even as a teenager, even as an adult. It has made me laugh. Made me blush. Made me cry.
Our class was rehearsing for our Shakespeare play. It was a simplified version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, easy for 6th graders to memorize and easy for parents to sit through. We had two main props: groups of fake ficus trees and hundreds of tea lights. It was shabby, but it had a childlike charm, perfect for an elementary school production.
I was the narrator. She was Hermia.
I watched as she delivered her lines. I was sitting, leaning forward, my elbow on my knee, my chin cupped in my hand. A day-dreamy look.
I watched her.
And kept watching her.
I missed my cue.
I didn’t hear the silence. The gap.
“Hannah.”
The teacher’s voice.
A titter of giggles.
Everyone staring.
I remember delivering my lines, but I don’t remember moving my mouth. I don’t remember hearing the words. But I remember the embarrassment, the panic. It was obvious that I had been daydreaming. Obvious by the feelings that were written all over my face and bouncing around in my stomach. Obvious that I had a crush. But had anyone noticed that I was staring at her? At Hermia. Hermia, who loses her love because of a misplaced drop of love potion. Who no one loves—except the narrator.
After that, I kept a strict distance from girls. I didn’t touch them. When my friends locked arms with me, or when they grabbed my hand to run, or when they jumped on my back and I had to grab the insides of their knees before they fell, I panicked. I cringed away. I ended contact as quickly as possible. I couldn’t risk being caught daydreaming. Couldn’t enjoy their touch too much. I couldn’t give clues. I couldn’t be gay.
Because what I felt and kept feeling through middle school, high school, and college was not just a friendship type of love. My love was a little too deep, a little too attached, a little too protective. Girls broke my heart a little too much.
Girls were beautiful and complex and dizzying.
Boys were clumsy and strong and smelled like pine and lemons and ginger.
I loved them both.
I didn’t accept that I was bisexual until a year after I had left the Church. Even while leaving the Church—when I was facing questions of existence and God and eternity and family and death and decisions and consequences—I couldn’t face that I loved girls. It should have been easy: I was destroying everything I had built during my entire life, so why not let this be the cherry on the top of the volcanic anthill I drop-kicked?
Goodbye to child-Hannah, who thanked God for “this day” and sang “I am a Child of God” with her whole heart.
Goodbye to teenage-Hannah, who wrote notes in the margins of her Book of Mormon with the tiniest handwriting.
Goodbye to college-Hannah, who learned as much as she could to be a good mom someday.
Goodbye to a whole life.
We moved away from my family, my hometown, and my friends so my husband could go to dental school. He told me he didn’t want kids, didn’t want a family. Having a family was the last goal that fetus-Hannah had yet to achieve. I struggled to differentiate between what I wanted now and what I wanted before I left the Church. What did I want? Some days, I couldn’t get out of bed. I had panic attacks. I was alone. No God, no family, no job.
Here is what I recommend: when life can’t possibly get shittier, tell your husband that you’ve loved girls your entire life. Make him be the first one you come out to. His response reminds me why I loved him and why I still love him, even after everything.
He shrugged and got into bed with me. He took off his glasses (one of the many reasons why I fell in love with him) and settled his head onto his pillow. He looked at me, and I waited. It had taken everything in my entire body to say the words to the person I loved more than anyone.
“I know,” he said. “But thanks for telling me. I love you.”
He supported me. He was my ally. When I came home crying after I heard a conversion therapy ad on the radio, he held me together. He held me while I cried into his shirt and while I apologized over and over and over for not being straight, for liking women too much, for not knowing before we were married. For lying to myself and, especially, to him.
Luckily for you married gays out there, our marriage didn’t fall apart because of my sexuality. Being in a heterosexual marriage doesn’t exclude you (or your partner) from the LGBTQIA+ community. There are books and blogs and an entire community that can help you navigate your sexuality while happily married. And sometimes it works. If you start as equal partners, being as open as possible with one another, you’ve got a true and unbelievably lucky chance to figure it all out together.
Our marriage didn’t end because I was bisexual. It ended because there were countless things that, over five years, became impossible to resolve. Couples therapy can fix a lot, but it can’t fix everything. Even two people trying their hardest is sometimes not enough.
I called my mother and told her I was coming home. I packed my things and left with a suitcase, my dog, and my mandolin. I moved back into the house I grew up in. I was given the bottom bunk in my seven-year-old brother’s room.
I failed.
I failed at being a Latter-day Saint.
I failed at my marriage.
I failed at starting a family.
I failed at being straight.
I failed at everything my mother wrote about in my fetus book.
But it’s okay.
I’m okay.
Because I am writing again. I play guitar again. I sing in the car again. I eat carbs again. I drink beer. I cuddle my dog. I listen to Taylor Swift. I don’t worry about wasting time on things I love.
I’ve kissed a girl—a few girls. One with tattoos and one with blue eyes and one with long hair. One on a rooftop, one in the desert, one in the middle of a city street.
My heart is open and raw and broken and free and happy.
I still have days where I don’t want to get out of bed. I still have the occasional panic attack. I still go to therapy.
I still have to come out to my parents.
I live with questions: Could I fall in love again? Could I get married again? Could I have a family? And the biggest question: Could I fall in love and get married and have a family with a man? Or with a woman?
Which is the better option? Which would make me happier?
But there isn’t an answer.
Would my family accept a same-sex partner? Would my parents consider my future child (made with donated sperm and my partner’s egg) their grandchild? Would my parents love my child more if it comes out of my own uterus?
There aren’t answers to those questions either.
But I do know this: the response from people about my sexuality wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I came out as bi to my old friends, my coworkers, my sister. They were all so kind. They asked all the right questions. They still respect me and support me and even love me. And most of them are active, faithful Mormons. In fact, my belly button piercing sparked their ire and concern more than my bisexuality. (Understandably so.)
For now, I live moment to moment. My entire life has been planned, directed, scripted with goals and expectations. Life is wild and electrifying and passionate without direction, without milestones, without a husband, without religion. It’s scary. It’s wicked. It’s beautiful.
It’s a new culture. A new world.
But I’m ready.
I’m ready to write my future.
My own life.
While I was a developing fetus, my mother kept a journal addressed to me. It was supposed to help her work through each week and have a nice little memory for each stage of her pregnancy—a weird ‘90s thing.
But in that journal, she wrote about how I would grow up, get baptized, go to BYU, get married in the temple, and have a family of my own.
I was a fetus.
There was no alternative path for me. There have always been expectations. Very specific expectations.
So when I say I was born a Mormon, I was literally born into the covenant. That’s what we believe, isn’t it? There would be no deciding whether or not I believed in God, whether or not the teachings of the church aligned with my worldview, whether or not I felt comfortable in a niche society of like-minded people.
Fortunately for me, I thrived as a young Mormon in Utah county.
At eight years old, I prayed every night. I memorized all the Articles of Faith. I even started to memorize all of the temples, back when there were fewer than 100, but my mom, thank God, gave up on that dream.
At 12 years old, I planned activities, gave spiritual thoughts, led meetings.
At 16, I was told by my bishop that other girls believed in God because they believed me.
At 18, I got into BYU. I got A’s and B’s. I went on dates with boys. I stayed true and chaste. I followed every rule.
At 20, I fell in love. I got married in the temple.
At 23, I graduated.
I was perfect.
I had reached all the goals that fetus-Hannah was supposed to reach. I had done it all. I could relax. Finally, I could relax.
But it’s never really that simple.
I was 11 when I realized I had a crush on a girl. I remember the exact moment. It’s one of those memories that has stayed with me, even as a teenager, even as an adult. It has made me laugh. Made me blush. Made me cry.
Our class was rehearsing for our Shakespeare play. It was a simplified version of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, easy for 6th graders to memorize and easy for parents to sit through. We had two main props: groups of fake ficus trees and hundreds of tea lights. It was shabby, but it had a childlike charm, perfect for an elementary school production.
I was the narrator. She was Hermia.
I watched as she delivered her lines. I was sitting, leaning forward, my elbow on my knee, my chin cupped in my hand. A day-dreamy look.
I watched her.
And kept watching her.
I missed my cue.
I didn’t hear the silence. The gap.
“Hannah.”
The teacher’s voice.
A titter of giggles.
Everyone staring.
I remember delivering my lines, but I don’t remember moving my mouth. I don’t remember hearing the words. But I remember the embarrassment, the panic. It was obvious that I had been daydreaming. Obvious by the feelings that were written all over my face and bouncing around in my stomach. Obvious that I had a crush. But had anyone noticed that I was staring at her? At Hermia. Hermia, who loses her love because of a misplaced drop of love potion. Who no one loves—except the narrator.
After that, I kept a strict distance from girls. I didn’t touch them. When my friends locked arms with me, or when they grabbed my hand to run, or when they jumped on my back and I had to grab the insides of their knees before they fell, I panicked. I cringed away. I ended contact as quickly as possible. I couldn’t risk being caught daydreaming. Couldn’t enjoy their touch too much. I couldn’t give clues. I couldn’t be gay.
Because what I felt and kept feeling through middle school, high school, and college was not just a friendship type of love. My love was a little too deep, a little too attached, a little too protective. Girls broke my heart a little too much.
Girls were beautiful and complex and dizzying.
Boys were clumsy and strong and smelled like pine and lemons and ginger.
I loved them both.
I didn’t accept that I was bisexual until a year after I had left the Church. Even while leaving the Church—when I was facing questions of existence and God and eternity and family and death and decisions and consequences—I couldn’t face that I loved girls. It should have been easy: I was destroying everything I had built during my entire life, so why not let this be the cherry on the top of the volcanic anthill I drop-kicked?
Goodbye to child-Hannah, who thanked God for “this day” and sang “I am a Child of God” with her whole heart.
Goodbye to teenage-Hannah, who wrote notes in the margins of her Book of Mormon with the tiniest handwriting.
Goodbye to college-Hannah, who learned as much as she could to be a good mom someday.
Goodbye to a whole life.
We moved away from my family, my hometown, and my friends so my husband could go to dental school. He told me he didn’t want kids, didn’t want a family. Having a family was the last goal that fetus-Hannah had yet to achieve. I struggled to differentiate between what I wanted now and what I wanted before I left the Church. What did I want? Some days, I couldn’t get out of bed. I had panic attacks. I was alone. No God, no family, no job.
Here is what I recommend: when life can’t possibly get shittier, tell your husband that you’ve loved girls your entire life. Make him be the first one you come out to. His response reminds me why I loved him and why I still love him, even after everything.
He shrugged and got into bed with me. He took off his glasses (one of the many reasons why I fell in love with him) and settled his head onto his pillow. He looked at me, and I waited. It had taken everything in my entire body to say the words to the person I loved more than anyone.
“I know,” he said. “But thanks for telling me. I love you.”
He supported me. He was my ally. When I came home crying after I heard a conversion therapy ad on the radio, he held me together. He held me while I cried into his shirt and while I apologized over and over and over for not being straight, for liking women too much, for not knowing before we were married. For lying to myself and, especially, to him.
Luckily for you married gays out there, our marriage didn’t fall apart because of my sexuality. Being in a heterosexual marriage doesn’t exclude you (or your partner) from the LGBTQIA+ community. There are books and blogs and an entire community that can help you navigate your sexuality while happily married. And sometimes it works. If you start as equal partners, being as open as possible with one another, you’ve got a true and unbelievably lucky chance to figure it all out together.
Our marriage didn’t end because I was bisexual. It ended because there were countless things that, over five years, became impossible to resolve. Couples therapy can fix a lot, but it can’t fix everything. Even two people trying their hardest is sometimes not enough.
I called my mother and told her I was coming home. I packed my things and left with a suitcase, my dog, and my mandolin. I moved back into the house I grew up in. I was given the bottom bunk in my seven-year-old brother’s room.
I failed.
I failed at being a Latter-day Saint.
I failed at my marriage.
I failed at starting a family.
I failed at being straight.
I failed at everything my mother wrote about in my fetus book.
But it’s okay.
I’m okay.
Because I am writing again. I play guitar again. I sing in the car again. I eat carbs again. I drink beer. I cuddle my dog. I listen to Taylor Swift. I don’t worry about wasting time on things I love.
I’ve kissed a girl—a few girls. One with tattoos and one with blue eyes and one with long hair. One on a rooftop, one in the desert, one in the middle of a city street.
My heart is open and raw and broken and free and happy.
I still have days where I don’t want to get out of bed. I still have the occasional panic attack. I still go to therapy.
I still have to come out to my parents.
I live with questions: Could I fall in love again? Could I get married again? Could I have a family? And the biggest question: Could I fall in love and get married and have a family with a man? Or with a woman?
Which is the better option? Which would make me happier?
But there isn’t an answer.
Would my family accept a same-sex partner? Would my parents consider my future child (made with donated sperm and my partner’s egg) their grandchild? Would my parents love my child more if it comes out of my own uterus?
There aren’t answers to those questions either.
But I do know this: the response from people about my sexuality wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I came out as bi to my old friends, my coworkers, my sister. They were all so kind. They asked all the right questions. They still respect me and support me and even love me. And most of them are active, faithful Mormons. In fact, my belly button piercing sparked their ire and concern more than my bisexuality. (Understandably so.)
For now, I live moment to moment. My entire life has been planned, directed, scripted with goals and expectations. Life is wild and electrifying and passionate without direction, without milestones, without a husband, without religion. It’s scary. It’s wicked. It’s beautiful.
It’s a new culture. A new world.
But I’m ready.
I’m ready to write my future.
My own life.
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