issue. Right now I am drowning in scholarly essays about
substance abuse in queer populations. I can’t swim in academia,
but I have done this before. I have looked for evidence of my
trauma, of my oppression. I've documented my sexuality in

art, design, and writing to prove it exists. I've sought data so

I could feel real. I've witnessed that evidence become erased,

for my realness to be gas-lit, for the truth to dissolve, to have
never existed. So please, behold my attempt to reify myself.

In 2012, a paper by Kelly E. Green and Brian A. Feinstein
called “Substance Use in Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Populations:
An Update on Empirical Research and Implications for
Treatment” reviewed 12 studies on the correlation between
queerness and substance abuse. Green and Feinstein theorized
that heterosexual people are less likely to use substances in
excess, In particular, gay and bisexual women are more likely
to experience alcoholism than other populations. This paper
is not unique in its findings (sorry, Green and Feinstein).

Last year, right around the time I was celebrating one month
sobe!, a paper was published by the Substance Abuse and Mental
Health Services Administration entitled “Sexual Orientation and
Estimates of Adult Substance Use and Mental Health: Results
from the 2015 National Survey on Drug Use and Health.” This
paper found that “[gay, lesbian, or bisexual adults] were...more
likely than [heterosexuals] to have substance use disorders...

[and] were more likely than their sexual majority counterparts
to need substance use treatment.” In an article entitled “A Brief
History of Queer Experience with Addiction and Recovery”
published in Scholar & Feminist Online, Tom Hill refers to
“The Other Closet,’ comparing coming out as an alcoholic to
coming out as gay. I couldn't agree more with the notion.

This whole problem—both personally and politically—
revolves arounds shame. Shame in our actions, shame in our
addiction, shame in our bodies and our desires. Shame is
not our fault. It's written into the social code and woven into
our upbringing. The way I was shamed by my mother and
kicked out is not unique. Every day, queer people are shamed
by not having access to basic rights and freedoms, by being
erased from historical and contemporary narratives, by being
oppressed by active politicians. Shame is forced upon us.

What is up to us is how we process that shame. Harm
reduction is about reducing the suffering, the pain, the worst
things, and replacing them with better, less terrible things.
Sometimes that means replacing shame with liquor. Sometimes
that means replacing liquor with binge-watching Gilmore Girls.
Sometimes that means replacing Netflix with finally admitting
that part of being bisexual means wanting to have a lot of gay sex.

I re-closeted myself with liquor. For now, that’s done. Tom Hill
praises “recovery-friendly spaces that acknowledge and honour the
recovery of many of our [queer] community members.” I found this
at STAR and I attribute this to harm reduction as an empowering
recovery model. Harm reduction based treatment sets a patient-
driven precedent that makes room for oppressed people. The harm
reduction model—in contrast to abstinence based models—allowed
me to think through my trauma and oppression as sources of
my self-medication, instead of labelling addiction as a genetic
disorder, Part of healing was thanking myself for drinking
instead of hurting myself, drinking because I knew no
other way to access pleasure, to explore my sexuality, or
to reduce my anxiety. The harm reduction model allowed
me the self-compassion to think, “Thank you for learning
to survive in a world that wanted you to stop existing.”

And now I've grown, and I can stop. As for shame, it’s
still there—but now I see it for what it is, and I throw a gin
and tonic on it, light a match, and then fan the flames.