Anglican Mainstream

`Jackie Bruchi'    `Stand Firm'

 

It all began in pre-kindergarten, when shy and afraid I stepped out of my parents’ protective arms and into the wide world of judgment and rejection. A fearful, dependent, and emotionally fragile piece of clay, I cried every single time my mother left me at school. But this only effected a label, as my peers reputed me weak. Sensitive and yet incredibly perceptive, I linked the label they dealt me to the distance I already felt from them, producing a deep self-hatred at a young age, believing my weak identity separated me from the rest of the entire world. And so, between the ages of 4 and 5, I rebelled.

 

I began to reject everything I perceived to be weak, assuming this the answer to the establishment of acceptance, of friends, of love. Afraid of everything, I forced myself to do the extreme in overcoming my fears. I ripped the night-light out of my wall. I held my breath and stepped in line for the biggest rollercoaster with the most upside-down loops. I picked up spiders and squashed ants with my bare hands. I was on a mission, and I had a lot to prove. I began spending a lot of time with boys, believing they embodied the strength I longed to dip into. I began playing rough sports that left me bleeding and beat up. But calloused and hardened, I banned the personal display of tears, shutting up and cutting off my emotion from the entire world. And as the years went by, I continued in my pursuit of strength, climbing trees, jumping off high objects, playing sports and getting into fist fights. The only problem was that I was growing up with the wrong gender. The boys around me were in the developmental phase that entailed rejection of the feminine; and their ridicule of my gender only pushed me further from it as I continued in the hatred of myself and of my gender. So I tried everything to escape my gender. In fourth grade, I cut my hair and began to dress like a little boy. Between the black Nike sneakers, long shorts and baggy t-shirts, I fit right in with the group of boys I played with. But this act only led to further years of pain and confusion. The irony of it all was that I still knew I was a girl, and though I rejected that part of me, I secretly still longed for it.

Over the next 3 years I found myself lost and confused in my sexual identity; and my parents were there; they never stopped loving me, though they knew not how to deal with me, considering this only a brief childhood phase. Countless times I was asked to leave the ladies’ restroom as angry women rushed me out. I was even chased around the playground by other little girls that wanted to know my name. And in the midst of my struggle against femininity, I remember feeling a knife through my heart every single time an adult woman asked me to leave the women’s restroom, I felt a wave of nausea every time another girl batted her eyelids and asked me my name. I hated myself more. I was trapped between who God created me to be, who I thought he should have created me to be, but then lost between which one I really wanted to be. And even though it was my fault that I was consistently asked to leave the women’s restroom as I looked the part of a male, it only instilled a belief in me that I could never be a true woman. That part of who I was supposed to be had been cut off forever. And as puberty rolled around, the gravity of my lost sense of identity obliterated any sense of hope that I ever possessed, vomiting me up onto a road of incredible despair, followed by years of tears and utter loneliness… until nearly 8 years later, when God picked me up and carried me out.

I clearly remember the confusion I experienced when all my male, childhood playmates abandoned me in pursuit of the girls they had so adamantly bashed for years. I could not fathom the sudden switch as all I had invested in had been instantly stripped of its foundation. But soon after, I was hit with the brutal realization of just how lost and screwed up I really was. I felt abandoned by men as they looked toward the ‘true’ women, I felt rejected by women as I received awkward, funny looks when I asked to hang out with them. But alone, still desperate for love and acceptance, I then began to believe conformity to the social rules of my gender may allow just that. So at the age of 14, I grew out my hair, bought jewelry, make-up, and tighter fitting clothes, watching and observing how girls walked, talked, how they sat and ate. And awkwardly, I forced myself to do the same, daily putting on a mask to hide the wounded, confused child inside. And as the years went by, it did become easier to present myself a woman, but again, it was all a front, I still never felt like one.

It was also in puberty that I began to experience same-sex attractions. Estranged from my own sex for as long as I could remember, rejected by them, I longed to understand them and to be loved by them. And some were nice enough to befriend me, but quickly sought escape from the dependencies I developed, my thirst so great, no ocean could quench it. But the constant rejection sent me further into the abyss of hopelessness, lost and alone in the desert of despair. And raised in a Christian home, I recognized my attractions for what they where: a testament to the sick and twisted depravity of my pathetic existence… And I hated myself more. I cried out to God daily to remove this repulsive thorn in my side, but found no relief, only more heartache. And hearing my peers bash homosexuality, hearing it torn apart from the Sunday morning pulpit, I emotionally retreated from society, locking myself inside a huge fortress with iron gates, surrounded by a moat stocked full of alligators and great white sharks. I stuffed all emotion and sought only to exist, a mechanistic zombie, functioning one day at a time.

And hell got hotter as I entered high school. My father accepted a position as principal in my small private school, and when his fist of discipline came down on my classmates, all their anger and frustration was directed toward me. By my junior year, my entire class hated me and they made sure to influence as many others as possible to join the corporate rejection. Each day was spent in solitude as I entered the classroom and all fell silent, shooting evil, biting stares in my direction, as the homecoming queen announced her party of the year, passing out invitations to all but me, as the lunch table cleared when I sat down. My evenings and weekends were spent bathed in sweat and tears, laying in a fetal position on my bed, forsaken and alone. I wrote numerous farewell letters, spending hours working out elaborate plans to end it all. But God was not finished with me yet.

How I survived those years, I often wonder. But it all comes down to the power and love of God. I looked toward college, hoping for a new life, a new start. Still in pain and struggle, I had no idea all that God had in store. The cycle of emotional dependency continued into college, though no one knew about it. I kept my struggle hidden from all but God as I sought a closer relationship with Him. But as this part of me was left unhealed and raw, I was setting myself up for disaster. However, even with the intensity of my attractions, I never acted on them. A moral and God-fearing young adult, I fought them with every ounce of strength I possessed. The only problem was that I was fighting them in my own strength, and I was fighting them alone. Assuming my struggle with homosexuality to be a secret battle I would forever fight alone, assuming no person on the face of this planet could ever know or understand, assuming I would take this pain to my grave, God showed me otherwise.

My junior year of college, two women from an Exodus affiliated ministry visited my university campus. They were holding a discussion on the topic of homosexuality, which immediately captured and assured my attention. They explained the development of homosexuality as a series of events that affect or hinder emotional development in the area of same-gender relating. This causes a deprivation and desire for same-gender love that is so strong, it overshadows everything else, and becomes confused with the already developing sexual drive. One of the two women then gave her testimony and journey out of lesbianism, which confirmed all that had been previously explained. And I remember that day as clearly as I remember yesterday. I remember it because it was the first time ever that I began to experience hope.

Walking with this new knowledge I was able to break out of an emotional dependency I had currently been struggling with. And God began his work in me. For two straight years I found myself free from all dependencies, flying on a spiritual high and ready to change the world… until suddenly and abruptly, I was knocked off my high horse by another shocking dependency that caught me totally off guard. It actually happened at the conclusion of a relationship I had begun with a guy. The rejection I received from him confirmed all my feelings of inadequacy as a woman and everything I had fought against for so many years came flooding back into my life; and a new friend was available… the only difference this time was that this young woman was equally dependent on me. Rarely more than a foot apart from each other, we shared everything. We shared clothes, money, food, and eventually, our deepest secrets. She was the first one I ever told about my struggle with homosexuality, and probably, the wrong one. As we swapped secrets, it bonded us in an unhealthy way. Although nothing sexual ever took place between us, it came dangerously close, and I became very aware of the direction the relationship was going. I felt powerless to stop it because I felt a type of love from her that I had never known before, yet I was afraid because I also knew how wrong it was. And that was when God stepped in.

In the midst of this struggle, God chose to resend the two people from Exodus whom he had used in the beginning. The very same two incredible women of God (who had visited my college campus two years earlier) dynamically stepped back into my life. I still get goose bumps at the recollection. God, in His infinitely perfect timing, organized an otherwise improbable reunion. Heaven’s clock struck time as my path crossed first with one and then the other for no reason outside of providence; and all within 48 hours. Their faces a fixed memory, my heart nearly burst from my chest upon immediate recognition; and not only of them, but of God’s lovingly divine mercy, and of His transparently clear will for my life. It was in those two separate, but holy moments, that I made one decision: I chose to speak with each of them… I chose to shed the mask, to step into the light, to confront the truth about my chains… and what followed forever impacted the course of my life. A lifetime spent in church, I had sung all the songs, read all the scriptures and heard all the sermons about God’s love and forgiveness; yet it was not until those precious moments that I experienced and fully understood the weight of its profound depth. It was then that I saw the REAL heart of God. God put skin on through the tears those women shed, the compassion they displayed, through the love they gave; and I saw that in spite of my pain, in spite of my sin and in spite of my chains, I was loved, I was cherished, and in the eyes of Almighty God, I was even worth dying for. I saw that truly, ultimately, there is no pit too deep that God is not deeper still. And from that recognition, He took my broken, wounded spirit and began to make me whole. I got involved with Exodus, stepping onto the painful road of deep soul-searching, leaning more and more on the strength of God and giving up my own, exploring the pain of my past, understanding it, and letting it go.

It was in this time that the words of the old hymn ‘I surrender all’ made more sense than it ever had before. I recognized that all this time I had been fighting in my own strength; I had not completely given everything over to God. And God continued to pour His love into me through the people he brought to mentor me, through the books and videos he spoke to me. I then developed a craving for HIS love that surpassed everything else I thought I wanted or needed; and in the quietness of my room, again bathed in sweat and tears, I gave him everything. I gave him all of me, all of my gifts and talents, all of my knowledge, all that was left of my shattered heart, my pain, struggle and future, I surrendered it all. And shaking from the awe of His incredible presence, I asked him to hold me. And like the father who spotted his prodigal son limping toward him, God ran to me. He took me in his arms. And on the floor of my bedroom, I was experiencing a taste of Heaven, surrounded by an army of angels, lost in the arms of Jesus Christ.

From there, by the strength of God alone, I let go of the relationship I had with that young woman. I began meeting with people who have loved and mentored me consistently. I opened up to my inner circle of friends who have all embraced and loved me harder. I read books such as Out of Egypt, Restoring Sexual Identity, Shattered Dreams, and Captivating. God showed me the roots of my pain and ignited a flame of healing and of passion in the depths of my being. He has healed the fragmented pieces of my womanhood, causing me to embrace and to love who I am as a woman, unafraid to be one, unafraid to let go of the mask I hid behind, and to live and breathe the essence of who he created me to be: woman, and for the first time ever, fully alive. God has taken a wrecking ball to my walls, smashing through the fortress I had barricaded myself within, freeing the emotion I held captive from childhood. And I have cried. Like never before, I have cried for everything that happened to me, I have cried for everything God did for me, I have cried for everything God is doing IN me. I am a new creation. God has taken my ashes and turned them into beauty. I was once a captive, but now I know the truth, and the truth has set me free.

Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders, nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. AND THAT IS WHAT SOME OF YOU WERE. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. -1 Corinthians 6:9-11