I left a place where I was not welcome, or cared for, or seen, and went to college. But it wasn't until I got to New York and found my people that I actually was like, oh, I can actually be this person. It's okay.
I'd stopped trying to find Matilda, because I realized she'd been inside me the whole time. She was the girl I'd been dreaming about since I was three. I didn't become her. I just finally let her out.
I think that being an adult is sort of like reconciling who you are with who you want to be. And it's great to have dreams, and sometimes dreams don't come true, but that doesn't mean you can't have another. That doesn't mean—life goes on, right?
The most damaging thing about conversion therapy was it said everything that is natural that felt natural to me... was sinful and that my desire to express myself as a person who wants to be in relationship with another human being — that because it was directed to someone of the same sex that I had to completely reorient and change everything about me to be acceptable to God.
