Our Stories

Notes from a Bride
by Anita Cadonau-Huseby

As her wedding day approaches every bride is filled with happiness and excitement and wants to share it with the world and I'm no different than anyone on the cusp of their wedding. I'm in love with Dana and I want to shout it to everyone who can hear and write it across the sky for those who can't! I love her and she loves me and God is doing an amazing thing in our lives!

I also want to tell our story for another reason far more important and that is to offer you hope if hope is what you're searching for, the hope that maybe one day you who are in the closet could step out into the light and live life fully and freely.

A little more than six years ago I was living with the secret that I was a lesbian and you would never have convinced me then that one day I would fall in love with a woman and be marrying her in a church surrounded by dozens and dozens of friends and even a few members of my family. I would have thought that dream was impossible and that you were crazy.

The journey between there and here hasn't always been an easy one. I've lost a few close friends who I loved. There have been times of great conflict and distance among myself and my family. Doors to ministry closed. I faced the overwhelming reality that there were suddenly people in the world, people who had never even met me, who hated me simply because I was a lesbian. There were times when the emotional pain seemed unbearable and when the fear and anxiety threatened to break me.

In Psalm 30 the Psalmist wrote "Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning" and after a long night in my own life joy came again and with a brilliancy I had never before known. I made new and meaningful friendships. Though the relationship was changed forever between my family and myself, love remains secure and certain. Ministry opportunities abound and I've discovered a whole world of people, both in the church and outside the church, who appreciate and affirm the diversity in God's creation and in humankind. And at the age of 43 I met Dana, fell in love and the rest is history...and the future.

So that's my story and I pray in its telling you find some hope and see some possibility for your own life if you still find yourself struggling in the night of your own life. As long as God remains God there is hope for you and that joy will come in the morning. Get ready for a glorious sunrise!

© 2002 by Anita Cadonau-Huseby