Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out Quotes

“My sexuality—however "late" it had come to me, however it had shifted (and might shift again)—was real, and worthy. It was okay that I didn't have a word for it, or a story that made sense to other people. I gave myself permission to meet my heart where it was.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“Suddenly it all looked so ... heterosexual.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“These were decisions I had made all alone. It had taken time for them to feel right, but finally they did. In making them I had proven to myself that I could be trusted with my own future. I knew more than I gave myself credit for. As far as I could tell, I was alone in the universe. But there were worse places to look for answers than within myself.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I’d been made to “play it by ear,” which in my experience means that several things will go wrong and I won’t be allowed to get mad about it.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“As someone who lives in any other part of the country, you see New York depicted so often and so prettily that it’s hard not to get there, take one look around you, and think ‘This is it?”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I may know myself better now than I ever have before, but ask me again in a year or two.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“Because I have always wanted to believe. In God, in ghosts, in karma, in UFOs.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I waited until I couldn't stand to wait anymore, and then, finally, I tried something different.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I had spent so much time feeling certain I knew myself better than other people did, because I was single and always had been, but now that I wasn't, I realized how little I knew about being myself with someone else.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“All that time I was single I went around thinking I was a normal, together, calm and cool person, but then I started spending all my time with someone else and realized I'm actually a nightmare.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I don't know much of anything, but I know more than I did ten years ago, when I thought I knew everything. And while I had a lot of fun believing I knew everything, I would have better off if I'd given it up sooner.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“My story didn't have to fit inside anyone's expectations, because it wasn't, first and foremost, a story. It was my life.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I am beginning to think that thoughtfulness can be overdone, and that after a certain amount of time spent thinking and thinking and thinking things over it might be better to just finally say the thing you've been wondering if you should say, and see what happens next.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I hoped I'd eventually lose interest in my own queerness in favor of something else, like, I don't know, artisanal bread baking.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“Then I realized: I'll never be caught up. [...] I was suddenly under qualified for everything.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“It was that I worried their presence might require an explanation and I did not have one.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“With no one to talk to and nothing much I could bring myself to do, thinking was all that was left.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“In the best of times I am prone to overanalysis, but when I am lonely there is no limit to how far inward I can go.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“I love mean people. It feels so good when a mean person likes you.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out

“Suffice it to say, I did what I always do before a big event or holiday: set myself up for disappointment.”
― Katie Heaney, Would You Rather? A Memoir of Growing Up and Coming Out