I wanted to be whole, pure, the person I was supposed to be. I wanted to be good enough that my sexuality wouldn’t matter.

Lilith after all has become a sign of every socially unacceptable aspect of women, including and especially our sexuality.

“I loved the Church, and I loved the gospel. I was the kind of Mormon who politely dismissed myself from classrooms when teachers showed R-rated movies. At my first and only high school rager, I texted my mother to pick me up because I felt out of place amidst the drinking and smoking. That was me, Straight-Edge Dera, except apparently I wasn’t so straight.”