Before writing about this topic, I had no idea how much it still hurts me.
I decided to come out of the closet –or just open one of its doors– when I was about 18 years old. Late for a lot of people, too early for me.
Early, because I wasn’t sure enough to play what I felt. And when you’re not firm, you believe or cling to any argument that puts you back in the box.
I decided to tell someone, sorry, I don’t feel comfortable saying who it is, but the fact is that what I heard was: “let me help you? I’m sure it’s a phase.”
Worse than hearing that was hearing myself say, “yes”.
That was all it took for me to go through countless sessions with a psychologist, who insisted that I wasn’t gay and what I felt should be ignored.
I remember an exercise – that’s what he called it – where I had to close my eyes, imagine a scene in which I was kissing a man and then run my hand over my head and erase the situation, as if I were leafing through a book. . For anyone, it can be pathetic. But for those who think they are abnormal for who they are, this is abusive.
This book never made it to the last page, but with each page passed, the feeling of depression, anguish and frustration only increased.
Why… who can erase their sexual orientation? I could not.
O Jean Ícaro , now a psychologist, also failed. But, unlike many people who hide, with shame, situations like these, he decided to expose his own experience with conversion therapies, or the so-called gay cure. He is the author of the book “Gay Cure – There is no cure for what is not a disease” recently released.
This therapist, I came to her with facts that I was depressed. And then we understood that many issues that happened to me had to do with a difficulty for me to accept my sexual orientation. She – the psychologist – initially thought that the best way to alleviate the suffering of my problems was to try to change my sexual orientation.
Jean Ícaro, psychologist
Pointing out that someone’s sexual orientation can be a reason for depression is precisely the way to go. Searching for what makes this person uncomfortable, yes. And the reason is often prejudice and discrimination.
She (psychologist) took a theory that is outdated, without scientific validity from psychology in which it is found that a man can be gay if he has a lot of contact with a mother who is more controlling and dominating, and a distance from a father who is more passive, more absent. She suggested that I try to hook up with a woman, or even have sex with a call girl as a way to amplify heterosexual desire.
Jean Ícaro, psychologist
Jean Ícaro also had to watch pornographic films with sex scenes between heterosexual people. And went through amasturbatory reconditioning training” which, honestly, I won’t even waste your time trying to understand and explain. Because the result is only one: frustration.
Who also needed therapies to overcome the “therapies” was the American Mathew Shurka now thirty-four years old.
At the age of 16, he underwent four therapists, a conversion camp and, among other treatments, he was forced to take Viagra to have sex with women.
The therapist said that I was gay because I was very close to my older sisters and my mother, and that this caused my homosexuality. And in that reasoning, that if I was able to change my relationships, they believed I could change my sexual orientation. And for me, one very difficult thing was that I wasn’t allowed to talk to my mother and my two sisters for three years – and I was only 16.
Mathew Shurka, founder of the NGO Born Perfect
Sixteen years only. I think everyone here can imagine the size of the trauma he carries. That’s because someone once said that it was wrong to be attracted to someone of the same sex. And he, like thousands of people, genuinely believed it was possible.
So I started thinking that the therapy wasn’t working because I wasn’t trying hard enough, or I wasn’t good enough, or I couldn’t cure my problem. That’s when I started having anxiety, depression. I thought about committing suicide for about two years, but I think the worst part was the amount of insecurity it created in my life, and how I came to doubt myself about everything. When I was 16, I knew exactly who I was, what I wanted, who I was interested in, and the fact that so much time was wasted or spent in my life treating a disease that didn’t exist – and then having to rebuild my life at 30
Mathew Shurka, founder of the NGO Born Perfect
Mathew, who had every reason to try to forget what happened, took the opposite path and fortunately today he leads an NGO that puts this discussion on the agenda. And the born perfect , which helps draft laws and guidelines, support conversion therapy victims who file lawsuits, and assist prosecutors in different US states in cases involving conversion therapy. In what they call strategic support, Born Perfect has one goal: the end of conversion therapy.
This is also a fight of another North American, Garrard Conley . Her story became known worldwide after Hollywood printed it in theaters in 2019. After suffering a rape, she heard from her father that she should choose between being gay or his son.
The film, “Boy Erased” was inspired by the book with the same title, which became a best seller and one of the best of the year by the newspaper “The New York Times”. The film adaptation of “Boy Erased” stars Joel Edgerton, Nicole Kidman, Lucas Hedges (in the role inspired by Garrard), Russell Crowe, Javier Dolan and singer Troye Sivan.
After this presentation, the exclusive interview he gave for the column is an honor CNN no Plural+ .
One Sunday at school, I was at a church in my town, and a man came to our classroom asking us to sign a petition against the LGBTQIA+ Pride Parade. I was horrified, wondering if I should sign the petition. People would judge me as a different person, a weirdo, so I signed. This was probably the first time I realized how difficult things were going to be for all of us.
Garrard Conley, writer and author of the best seller Boy Erased: A Memoir
“Things” would get much more difficult. For those who don’t know the story, I’ll say it here in a very summarized way:
Garrard was born in Arkansas, one of the most conserved states in the United States. As his father was a pastor, he was raised within the church. As a teenager, he was sexually abused and, for years, believed the crime was “punishment” for being gay. That’s when he stopped at LIA – Love in Action – a conversion therapy center.
From now on, it was a sequence of other violence: I couldn’t even wear colorful clothes or read any book that wasn’t Christian.
I think the worst thing conversion therapy did was turn me against my parents and interfere with my relationship with God. It took a long time for all of us to heal from the painful messages of conversion therapy. It’s incredibly ironic that for all those who talk about love and compassion at Love In Action (the therapy unit I attended), they incited hatred above all else: hatred of our parents, and essentially hatred of God.
Garrard Conley, writer and author of the best seller Boy Erased: A Memoir
A hatred that marks and becomes difficult to get rid of. So let’s keep an eye out.
Today, in Brazil, the Federal Council of Psychology prohibits any professional from trying to apply conversion maneuvers to LGBTQIA+ people. The resolution, published in 1999, was the world’s first in this regard. The Federal Supreme Court (STF), in 2019, reaffirmed the council’s understanding, setting a precedent for conversion therapy cases that end up in Brazilian justice.
According to a survey generated by the NGO Equality Caucus , 22 countries have some type of regulation or law that prohibits or limits conversion therapy whether national (a law), regional (a state/municipal law) or else some determination of class entities (such as the Federal Council of Psychology) or the Supreme Court.
And it is always worth remembering: since 1990 the United Nations (UN) removed homosexuality from the international list of diseases (the ICD). Transsexuality was also withdrawn in 2019.
“I’m just asking that we don’t harm children with this practice that every major psychology association knows is causing harm. Regardless of your beliefs, ending conversion therapy should happen, because it is ineffective and in fact harmful.”, tells us Garrard Conley.
Sorry, Garrard, but to me it’s more than harmful – it’s a crime.
And when it messes with our faith, no matter what or who we believe in, it has an even greater weight, at least for me.
Because there are times when you only rely on faith to keep going.
- Production: Letícia Brito and Carol Raciunas
Source: CNN Brasil
