Katie's Story
Freak Out to Peace Out
by Katie Makolondra
Life as a teenager in an ultra-conservative part of Wisconsin was the worst. To begin with, I had non-traditional parents. My mom had a physical disability and I viewed my dad as an elderly man because he was twenty years her senior. They were nonconformists and political philosophers. The one good thing was we attended the “hippie” church in town that housed a brilliant, liberal pastor who preached the values of being human. He did not spew any controlling, literal interpretations of the Bible. We had no fire and brimstone at Hope United Church of Christ, only good feelings and a strong, supportive community. Our church, however, was in the city of Sturgeon Bay, far from the boondocks of my school district’s boundaries.
All my classmates were religious. This is not hyperbole. The kids in my class were either strict Catholics or the kind of Lutheran where men sit on one side of the aisle and the women on the other, all in silent reverie of the pastor’s threats of eternal damnation. I did not fit in at all.
I recall my first experience at my best friend’s church one Sunday morning. She warned me it would be boring, but made consolation promises of Schwann’s ice cream sundaes afterward. The sermon dwelled on David and Goliath and burning in Hell. Every time the pastor mentioned, almost casually, burning in Hell, he looked right at me. I have seldom felt as hated as I did that morning. It penetrated my heart. At that moment I convinced myself he knew I was weird. And by weird, I mean queer.
The slow realization I was a lesbian sunk in like molasses in winter. In first grade whenever Nora came near I had my first collection of butterflies fluttering in my stomach. She and I would play married couple, complete with kisses and cuddles. It seemed innocent enough to the outside, I am sure, but for me I knew our “friendship” wasn’t normal.
At nine or ten years old, while watching a horror movie, I asked my mom if it were possible for me to have a crush on girls. I remember getting red in the face and a little sick to my stomach just asking such a shameful question. She laughed at me and assured me I liked boys and I definitely did not like girls that way. I begrudgingly accepted her opinion, but it didn’t sit right. My attraction to beautiful women was strong.
As I got older I had crushes on all my best friends with increasing intensity. I became obsessed with Tiffany; simply had to have sleepovers at Jamie’s house; and don’t get me started on Julie.
Yet I knew enough to establish public crushes on boys to avoid becoming the target of a witch hunt. I always had an overarching sense that being gay out loud would endanger me. I would get bullied relentlessly and possibly attacked. Actual gay bashing truly existed where I came from and the idea of getting caught, then ostracized and injured, terrified me.
Nevertheless, one can hide the truth for only so long. In seventh grade, I developed the strongest feelings I had ever known. Actual love. Jodie stood out as a funky, oppositional rule-breaker. She was not a girlie girl. She was crass, she smoked menthols, and she had a boy haircut. Jodie was perfect. After swimming at her cottage, I will never forget as we showered in our swimsuits to get the lake off our skin. I felt compelled to wash her hair. I desired intimacy and actually went for it without thinking.
As I started massaging shampoo into her hair, she looked at me – and ‘looked’ is not the right word. She knew me with her eyes. Her smile faded. She pushed me away and got out of the shower still full of shampoo.
Jodie had me call my mom to come pick me up. She stopped answering my phone calls and threw the notes I had passed to her in the trash. Worse yet, Jodie told people.
I had already served as a target for bullying because of my unusual, non-local family, and my individuality. I always prayed – literally prayed – nobody would figure me out. But now kids started teasing me, calling me dyke, laughing in my face… and this was the only interaction I received. Nobody wanted to have sleepovers. Nobody wanted to hang out. I was the loneliest I had ever been. My once-friend’s mom called me a “fat dykey hoe” to my other friends at an awards ceremony.
No tears could fall fast enough from the amount of pain I suffered. I began cutting myself and started smoking. Eventually I fell into a group of misfits who self-medicated their quirks away.
Thankfully, my own church, my sanctuary away from the emotional suffering as a queer teenager, became the first church in our region to openly accept gay members. I remember the day like yesterday. The gay and lesbian congregation members put rainbow stickers on their name tags and we hung rainbow flags around the inner worship area. I swallowed everything and memorized the faces and names of the queer members of my church. These people always existed. I had never known they were LGBT. If I could have known sooner, I would have had an outlet for all the confusion and frustration. Maybe I could have shown more bravery. Yet, this one gesture by Hope Church actually gave me hope. I realized maybe someday I could live as openly gay. Could someday hurry up?
In high school my friend Amy, who knew nothing of my sexual orientation, took me in during hard times. She went to my church. I felt certain I could tell her my secret without repercussion. After a night of liquid courage, I asked her if I could tell her something. I was sick to my stomach from nerves, but felt confident she would be throwing rainbow confetti and celebrating my coming out. Wrong.
I told her I was “bi,” not even true, but it felt safer than straight-up lesbian. Amy left the room. She would not let me sleep in her room anymore and preferred I find an entirely different living situation. My heart dropped to the floor. I couldn’t stand the rejection. I felt betrayed by my own self. How could I have let my guard down? Didn’t I know better than to trust anyone? Amy finally did come around, but our friendship had changed forever.
The accumulation of false starts and failures pushed me deep into the closet. I decided I would call my endless longing for female companionship a horrible fetish, if not a curse. I tried to ignore my nature. At college, I dated a few women, all disasters, and therefore sought a different type of relationship. I met my now ex-husband and hunkered down internally for a life of regret and sacrifice for the greater good of fitting into society.
We had three children, built a wonderful life together, and enjoyed a legitimate friendship. A friendship I could no longer keep as I got older.
I turned thirty and went to Minneapolis with my best friend for a night of dancing and cutting loose. We ended up at the Gay 90s, an awesome LGBT nightclub, where I locked eyes with a foxy, butch lesbian. We danced all night.
When I woke the next day I told my friend I was totally a lesbian. “What do I do? I have a husband. I have kids! Should I keep waiting it out until the baby is eighteen?” We strategized and planned.
I went home to a very honest and painful conversation with my husband. We began to detach emotionally from one another and started the process to end our marriage.
Without Messiah Lutheran I could never have legitimatized my identity as a lesbian. I joined the church to help ease my mind about the monotony and misery of marriage by focusing on the other joys of life and on God’s ultimate plan. I am a firm believer in God and find solace in His ways, but I particularly needed the moral compass delivered by Pastor Nancy’s sermons. Pastor Nancy accepted my struggles and guided me through the most difficult times. I thought my love for my husband served me well enough to carry me through life. He remained a dear, dear friend, but I felt no passion. The touch of a man made me feel violated. I was stuck and Pastor Nancy helped me come to accept the path laid out for me by God.
I was never an abomination, as my former community believed. I was a child of God. My place in His eyes did not change as a lesbian.
I am now happily married to my wife Kate. She is full of piss and vinegar, love and empathy, and she makes my children feel adored. I have never felt love like this in all my life.
The slow realization I was a lesbian sunk in like molasses in winter. In first grade whenever Nora came near I had my first collection of butterflies fluttering in my stomach. She and I would play married couple, complete with kisses and cuddles. It seemed innocent enough to the outside, I am sure, but for me I knew our “friendship” wasn’t normal.
At nine or ten years old, while watching a horror movie, I asked my mom if it were possible for me to have a crush on girls. I remember getting red in the face and a little sick to my stomach just asking such a shameful question. She laughed at me and assured me I liked boys and I definitely did not like girls that way. I begrudgingly accepted her opinion, but it didn’t sit right. My attraction to beautiful women was strong.
As I got older I had crushes on all my best friends with increasing intensity. I became obsessed with Tiffany; simply had to have sleepovers at Jamie’s house; and don’t get me started on Julie.
Yet I knew enough to establish public crushes on boys to avoid becoming the target of a witch hunt. I always had an overarching sense that being gay out loud would endanger me. I would get bullied relentlessly and possibly attacked. Actual gay bashing truly existed where I came from and the idea of getting caught, then ostracized and injured, terrified me.
Nevertheless, one can hide the truth for only so long. In seventh grade, I developed the strongest feelings I had ever known. Actual love. Jodie stood out as a funky, oppositional rule-breaker. She was not a girlie girl. She was crass, she smoked menthols, and she had a boy haircut. Jodie was perfect. After swimming at her cottage, I will never forget as we showered in our swimsuits to get the lake off our skin. I felt compelled to wash her hair. I desired intimacy and actually went for it without thinking.
As I started massaging shampoo into her hair, she looked at me – and ‘looked’ is not the right word. She knew me with her eyes. Her smile faded. She pushed me away and got out of the shower still full of shampoo.
Jodie had me call my mom to come pick me up. She stopped answering my phone calls and threw the notes I had passed to her in the trash. Worse yet, Jodie told people.
I had already served as a target for bullying because of my unusual, non-local family, and my individuality. I always prayed – literally prayed – nobody would figure me out. But now kids started teasing me, calling me dyke, laughing in my face… and this was the only interaction I received. Nobody wanted to have sleepovers. Nobody wanted to hang out. I was the loneliest I had ever been. My once-friend’s mom called me a “fat dykey hoe” to my other friends at an awards ceremony.
No tears could fall fast enough from the amount of pain I suffered. I began cutting myself and started smoking. Eventually I fell into a group of misfits who self-medicated their quirks away.
Thankfully, my own church, my sanctuary away from the emotional suffering as a queer teenager, became the first church in our region to openly accept gay members. I remember the day like yesterday. The gay and lesbian congregation members put rainbow stickers on their name tags and we hung rainbow flags around the inner worship area. I swallowed everything and memorized the faces and names of the queer members of my church. These people always existed. I had never known they were LGBT. If I could have known sooner, I would have had an outlet for all the confusion and frustration. Maybe I could have shown more bravery. Yet, this one gesture by Hope Church actually gave me hope. I realized maybe someday I could live as openly gay. Could someday hurry up?
In high school my friend Amy, who knew nothing of my sexual orientation, took me in during hard times. She went to my church. I felt certain I could tell her my secret without repercussion. After a night of liquid courage, I asked her if I could tell her something. I was sick to my stomach from nerves, but felt confident she would be throwing rainbow confetti and celebrating my coming out. Wrong.
I told her I was “bi,” not even true, but it felt safer than straight-up lesbian. Amy left the room. She would not let me sleep in her room anymore and preferred I find an entirely different living situation. My heart dropped to the floor. I couldn’t stand the rejection. I felt betrayed by my own self. How could I have let my guard down? Didn’t I know better than to trust anyone? Amy finally did come around, but our friendship had changed forever.
The accumulation of false starts and failures pushed me deep into the closet. I decided I would call my endless longing for female companionship a horrible fetish, if not a curse. I tried to ignore my nature. At college, I dated a few women, all disasters, and therefore sought a different type of relationship. I met my now ex-husband and hunkered down internally for a life of regret and sacrifice for the greater good of fitting into society.
We had three children, built a wonderful life together, and enjoyed a legitimate friendship. A friendship I could no longer keep as I got older.
I turned thirty and went to Minneapolis with my best friend for a night of dancing and cutting loose. We ended up at the Gay 90s, an awesome LGBT nightclub, where I locked eyes with a foxy, butch lesbian. We danced all night.
When I woke the next day I told my friend I was totally a lesbian. “What do I do? I have a husband. I have kids! Should I keep waiting it out until the baby is eighteen?” We strategized and planned.
I went home to a very honest and painful conversation with my husband. We began to detach emotionally from one another and started the process to end our marriage.
Without Messiah Lutheran I could never have legitimatized my identity as a lesbian. I joined the church to help ease my mind about the monotony and misery of marriage by focusing on the other joys of life and on God’s ultimate plan. I am a firm believer in God and find solace in His ways, but I particularly needed the moral compass delivered by Pastor Nancy’s sermons. Pastor Nancy accepted my struggles and guided me through the most difficult times. I thought my love for my husband served me well enough to carry me through life. He remained a dear, dear friend, but I felt no passion. The touch of a man made me feel violated. I was stuck and Pastor Nancy helped me come to accept the path laid out for me by God.
I was never an abomination, as my former community believed. I was a child of God. My place in His eyes did not change as a lesbian.
I am now happily married to my wife Kate. She is full of piss and vinegar, love and empathy, and she makes my children feel adored. I have never felt love like this in all my life.
I am out and stay fairly vocal about it. I work in a middle school and want any other questioning students not to suffer as I did. I want to serve as an advocate and a mentor. Though the past remains dark and sad for me, the present and future look perfect. I am so grateful to have faith and to receive support in my faith here in the north woods. No more suffering in the heartland.
Katie Makolondra and her partner were happily married in December 2016 at Messiah Lutheran Church, Washburn, Wisconsin. Currently working at Bayfield Public School, Katie is in the process of getting her bachelor’s degree in Special Education.