I was a single mom of almost two years when I decided that I needed to do something other than sit at home in a small apartment with two very busy toddlers. I also knew that once these two got to an age when I would need to go back to work, I'd have to upgrade my skills. Since I had left my employment of twenty years, computers had become an integral part of the work world. I knew very little about computers. I decided to go to College and would take a general Business Administration Course and major in computer programming.

All this in place, half a semester later and a completely new direction in my chosen field of study, all was well with the world until once day I walked through the cafeteria on my way to a class. Sitting at one of the tables was a woman. A woman who made every hormonal nerve in my body quiver. This, needless to say, sent my world into orbit. Why was looking at this woman doing these crazy things to me?

Above all else, I am a thinker. So I began thinking about how I had so often been attracted to women as a pre-teen and throughout my teen years. My thoughts also went back to some pretty heavy petting and sexual experimentation with girlfriends during early pubescence. My thoughts also traveled over the number of crushes I'd experienced involving camp counselors, gym teachers, swimming instructors and teacher all of whom were women. What was this all about?

I also remembered two occasions when the adolescent petting was more than that with older women by two to three years. I was eleven and twelve; they were thirteen and fifteen. I enjoyed every illicit moment of those times. I was, however, given a very strong message that this was bad, wrong, and terrible when my mother caught us in the act on the second occasion.

I have been married twice. Neither marriage survived for a number of reasons. Neither marriage had fulfilled me emotionally or sexually. I can remember so often thinking, is this all there is? Why is everyone so fired up about sex? Why do I never feel that I belong?

With my hormones pumping I realized it was time to re-think the way I was living my life. I knew that I wanted to be with a woman more than anything else in the world and if I never was sexually intimate with a man again, it would be too soon.

I had other things to consider. I was the mother of two toddlers. Did I proceed with this new knowledge, which really wasn't new at all? I had awakened to knowledge, which had been part of me for years. If I followed this path, would my children suffer? Being children from a "broken home" held its own oppressiveness, but to add to this, children coming from a "broken home" and being raised by a lesbian ... what then?

I read everything I could get my hands on. I wanted to make an informed decision. Remember, I am a thinker. The issue amounted to 1) be true to me or 2) put me on the back burner until these toddlers were adults. I decided that the one thing I didn't want was to possibly lose the love of my children by coming out to them when they were teenagers or adults, living a secret until they were old enough to fend for themselves. So the decision was clear. I had to come out, begin being true to myself. It was never a decision or choice about whether or not I was a lesbian even though I had not been involved sexually with another woman. It was the decision that I couldn't keep pretending to be someone I wasn't and never had been. I had done all the things society and my parents had expected of me and it just plain hadn't worked. It wasn't for me.

I was thirty-nine years old. I needed more information. I visited a psychiatrist. I told him that I believed I was a lesbian, but knew no others. . His only concern was whether I thought less of myself since I'd come to this realization. My response was a resounding "No!" He suggested I contact the local lesbian and gay organization at the University

I called the local lesbian/gay organization and learned that there would be a lesbian/gay dance in two weeks. My children would be with their father for the weekend, so I decided I was going...alone!

I dressed for the occasion in a suit jacket, shirt and dress pants and off I went. I cannot describe the feelings I experienced as I walked into that hall, paid my admission and walked into the room where the music was playing and men were dancing with men and the women were dancing with women. I had never ever felt this way before. For the first time in my life I felt like I belonged somewhere ... and that somewhere was with people whose significant others were of their own gender.

Within a few tunes, I found myself being escorted to the dance floor. I was the new kid on the block. The woman with whom I was dancing was holding me too close and I began to feel a little uncomfortable because I didn't even know her. Another woman who both saw my distress and knew the woman I was dancing with rescued me. We spent the rest of the evening dancing, talking, and laughing and I didn't want the evening to end. What resulted was a very short relationship with my rescuer. I finally got to be sexually intimate with a full-grown woman ... Wow! Now I knew what everyone was so excited about! Being sexually intimate with someone was something worth getting all fired up about. She welcomed me into this new way of live, introduced me to many of her friends and then returned to a severed relationship when her former partner came back. This woman is still a friend and this all happened May 23, 1984. I have never looked back. I made the right decisions for me ... to be the me I was meant to be.

I raised my children knowing that their Mom was not into having significant relationships with men like the moms of their friends. They also knew that they might be ostracized by the parents of their friends because of my sexuality. It was their choice to tell their friends when they were ready. Both kept this secret for many years, telling no one until they were both well into their teen years. The one tremendous blessing I had was that their father accepted my sexuality, didn't understand it, but was supportive. He has always maintained a wonderful relationship with our two children and me. They both accepted/rejected and loved/disliked the women who passed though our lives. Having to adjust to a new adult in their lives was difficult for both of them and following a disastrous time when a partner was wonderful to them when I was home and nasty to them when I wasn't, I made the decision that I would not share our home with a partner until these two were able to leave home as adults. That decision was made ten years ago.

Now that my two are 20 and 22 years of age and have left home and are putting themselves through University and College. I know that the decisions I made along the way worked well for all of us. They are wonderful and loving young adults filled with hopes, dreams and ambition and they continue to have a warm, loving relationship with both their parents. So much for the theory that all children raised in single parent homes grow up with significant problems! So much for the theory that being a lesbian precludes good parenting!

About a year ago my mother admitted to me that she thought I was absolutely crazy to leave my wonderful husband...and then to come out two years later as a lesbian. She was certain that I, a single mom and a lesbian, would not be able to raise the children as I have ... and she admitted to me that she was wrong!