The stories of people who, for various reasons, forced to hide their sexual identity, they remain, unfortunately, to this day many. Family, friends, work and general community acceptance and fear of rejection are the main reasons people hide their true identity for years.
THE Sarah Glassgrowing into a ultra-orthodox Hasidic community, she learned from a young age and used to follow strict rules for almost everything. He had to account for what he wears, who he loves and when he will marry.
“TI felt very strongly inside that I should be with a woman and not a mansays the woman speaking on the Anna Martin Podcast. “But I wanted – and tried – to do what God said was right.”
Thus, Sara married her first husband at the age of 19. After two marriages to men and her years of work as a psychologist, Sarah stopped hiding that she was gay. Today, she shares her experience from leaving the Hasidic community to accepting her true self.
The strict rules in her daily life
In the ultra-Orthodox community in which she grew up, Sarah ashe was forced to wear only skirts and dresses, never trousers. Skirts had to cover the collarbone, elbows and knees and she had to wear leggings for no skin showing at all. She also wore a long blonde wig.
14 years ago she slowly started making small changes, such as not wearing a wig and wearing slightly shorter skirts.
“I think what I wanted was when they look at me to have a doubt in their mind about my sexuality and my faith,” explains Sara, speaking on Anna Martin’s podcast at New York Times.
The marriage to her first husband at the age of 19
When she was 19 years old Sara married her first husband and he prayed that god and marriage would “fix her” as he was already beginning to understand that he was gay. In an account describing her first experience with a girl she fell in love with in high school, she concludes: “I woke up next to her and i promised myself and god that this was the last time». (But it wasn’t).
“When I married my first husband, inside I felt very strongly that I should be with a woman and not some man. But I wanted to do what God said was right and so I fought it, I prayed, I fasted I came to believe that ‘okay I’ll get over it, I just think about it every once in a while,'” he describes.
“For me, what was happening was something very bad, almost diabolical,” he says. “Was it similar to killing someone for you?” the journalist asks her and she answers bluntly “exactly».
“I was thinking ok, I can do it, I’ll be with a guy. But at least I’ll get a PhD in psychology. My body will belong to God. Everything I do every day will be for God. But that was the only thing I wanted for myself. It was my deal with God. “Let me do my PhD in psychology. I only want to do this one thing,” he confesses.
Sarah dreamed of becoming a psychologist since she was a child. She wanted to work with children and teenagers. But it was very rare for a woman in her community to get a college degree.
“We’ve been raised to believe that what we think has consequences, what we eat has consequences and what we think while pregnant has consequences for the fetuses we carry,” explains Sara.
Her husband did not agree with her studying at a higher school and she did an internship as a social worker.
Divorce, second marriage and studies in psychology
Eventually, Sara Glass divorced her first husband and remarried with another man, who supported her in getting it her PhD in psychology. She then had two small children, most evenings she studied until dawn, so her days were busy.
Still, even then, her lust sometimes surfaced. He wanted to be with a woman. But she was suppressing her desire, as she had learned to do over the years.
Eventually, Sarah graduated and was officially a psychologist. She opened her own office in Long Island, doing sessions mainly with children and teenagers from the ultra-Orthodox community.
The second divorce and the revelation of her sexuality
“I divorced my second husband because I now knew I was gay and couldn’t hide it anymore. So I got divorced, moved out, and started dating women. I didn’t want to hide it but I also didn’t advertise it because, as a psychologist, I wanted to create a safe haven for my clients – most of whom came from the ultra-Orthodox community – and I knew that this would perhaps disrupt their daily lives,” she says. Sara.
Then he describes how he was finally revealed to be gay. “I hardly ever talk about it. I was dating a girl at the time and I really liked her. I was debating whether to keep it a secret or admit that I am gay. So when she wanted to upload some pictures of us on social media, even though I knew it was a bit of a risk, I said okay, don’t tag me, but upload them,” he describes.
Unfortunately, these photos were leaked. Someone saw them and they ended up in the hands of the Hasidic community.
“Then the phone calls from my patients started. Some told me to take a break from our sessions but others told me “I wish you had told us the truth from the beginning”. And they weren’t wrong to feel somewhat cheated,” he admits.
The phone call to a teenage girl that made her cry
Sara talks about the phone call I received from a teenage client of hers who, after coming out as gay, told her “I only talked to you and now I can’t and I don’t know if I’ll ever trust anyone again”.
“I didn’t say anything to the child, she told her she was right, I apologized and that I would try to talk to her mum. but this the phone blew me away. I was crying so much” Sara exclaims.
“The woman I was dating then is my wife today. And acoma remembers how broken I felt then. He held me in his arms at night when I I would wake up and cry because I wanted these children and teenagers to have someone to talk to and I ended up hurting them,” she says emotionally.
When asked if he feels nostalgia for the ultra-Orthodox community who dropped out, Sara Glass says: “yeah, first of all I live very close and then there are times when I feel like I want to call someone and say ‘this great thing happened today.’ And I don’t have many people like that. Sometimes I also miss the food, the traditional Jewish food, which is not always the best, but I miss it” Sara concludes.
Source: News Beast
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