Why I Am the Way I Am (Partly)

When I was a teenager, my mother told me two things about sex:

1. Don't do it until you're married.
2. Once you're married, you have to do it.

Hand to God. Her words.

But this blog isn't about what you might think.

When I was 15, she handed me a hardbacked book (I forget the title) and told me to read it for more information about, you know, the dreaded thing called sex.

It was a book about eugenics, meaning Nazi-type breeding for "good genes", only dressed up in "science." It was from the 1930s.

Even at a very inexperienced 15 (we can get into my misconceptions about sex and the male body at another time), I knew this was bullshit.

And her gynecologist gave it to her.

And his last name was GERMAN.

And she was IN LOVE (well, in lust, if my mother ever felt lust) with this guy.

How do I know? She told me. She giggled about him like a schoolgirl, as the saying goes.

Holy shit.

It was only recently I put all these pieces together.

My mother gave me USA-proto-Nazi bullshit to read as a teenager to educate me about sex. Even I could see through it.

She thought it was great stuff. Hawt, even.

I was as appalled as an ignorant rural Sixties teen could be.

I still can't fully wrap my mind around it.

This incident, plus serious emotional abuse at the hands of both my parents, warped my world.

And that's all I'm going to say about my life before the age of 18.

(Seen on the internet in a Thirties eugenics book)

Seen in NY Times: Source, Yale University, Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library