The Insidious Root of Shame

Sometimes shame masquerades as something on the surface, when really its insidious root goes much deeper. For instance, I have joked that I have the genetic makeup of a yak…I have far too much hair. At my Italian family member’s funeral, the comment was made: “I’ve never seen so many mustaches in my life…and that’s just on the women!”

I too have hair where I, as a woman, ought not to have hair. Oh the shame I felt over this unwanted hair! Yet my shame was not merely based in my increased volume of hair follicles – rather, it was rooted in my gender. Shame suggested, “Maybe I am not really meant to be a woman…” Though I hid my hair, I was trying to keep people from noticing and rejecting me because I was not, and could not be, what I was supposed to be.


Though I have focused on how having same-sex attractions causes shame, maybe the root of this shame goes deeper. In The Heart of Female Same-Sex Attraction, Janelle Hallman talks about the shame that is at the root of female same-sex attractions: shame of being different, shame of being alone, and the shame of feeling empty. Sometimes a woman experiences shame in her gender, feeling ridiculous as a woman. And sometimes a woman experiences shame in her very existence, as if she is not even worthy of being alive.


Although electrolysis was helpful in my hair-shame, the more core gender-shame had to be addressed to be truly free. In the same way, facing the shame over same-sex attractions can be beneficial, but it may be more important to address the deeper shame that keeps us powerless and isolated.

Book Review of The Heart of Female Same-Sex Attraction

Click here to view The Heart of Female Same-Sex Attraction on Amazon