“I last talked at God on the beach at Los Palmas. It was nine years ago. Randy was drowning in front of me.”
Playa Los Palmas, Mexico | Spring of 1998 | CINDY FEY

“My head pounds. I think I connected with the chipped refrigerator door twice. I’m not sure. I’m dizzy.”
Lowell, Massachusetts | 1980 | By JANE TROLLEY

“The first place I woke up next to a woman was in a hotel bed.”
San Jose and Santa Cruz, California | Early 1990s | By KATE EVANS

“The contents of that envelope were powerful enough to destroy my dad, and our relationship, forever: I was in love, and he wasn’t white.”
2000 | Las Vegas, Nevada | By AMBER WESTON

“For the first time in a long time, I felt needed. Truly needed…. And it felt disgustingly good.”
January 2003 | Virginia Beach, Virginia | By R.V. DELUMPA

“The night after his father’s burial, both grieving and finally free, Stevie went cruising for men. It was his first time.”
1972 to 1992 | Columbus, Ohio | By LAUREN MORGAN

“My mother stuffed whatever was handy on the counter into her wide mouth any time he made that comment.”
1997 | Norwell, Massachusetts | By GABRIELLE JOYCE

“I actually thought that if I were the perfect, glamorous housewife, then maybe I would get that feeling of something being wrong with me to go away.”
January 2000 | Pasadena, California | By MARY ROSE GALE

“In my dreams, it’s you who devours me, who shows up on my doorstep. But we take what we can get.”
2006 | Palo Alto, California | By THE FORMER SCARLETT J.

“More than two-thirds (or if you ask him, more than .666666) of his life is over, and he can’t make himself happy.”
2002 to 2007 | Colorado | By STEF WILLEN