My Sexuality . . . My Canoe Trip: Seeking Truth, Overcome Confusion, Peace, and Recovery from Religious Abuses

By Steven M. Natale

This is a story of one mans struggle with living a double life, learning through experiences and realizing what is importanta relationship with the Lord, family, and friends. It is the story of an uphill struggle filled with tribulations, disillusionments, elations, and bravado. It is written honestly with wit and intelligence. Steves intent is to break down the Christian Divides because of human doctrines. This book is a classic example as to why not everybody in ministry should be eager to become teachers (preachers). Steve struggles with the fact divorced people are welcome at church. Homosexually oriented people arent, so welcome, repentant or not, thus this book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 19, 2010
• ISBN: 9781453535516

Steven M. Natale

This is Steven M. Natale’s first book. He writes occasionally for the Medina, Journal-Register, in Medina, New York. When not writing he refurbishes old houses, while living in them, turning them into homes. He lives in Western New York with his American Bulldog Blu.

Book preview

Part I

• Spiritual arrival onto the earth

• Family insight

• Favorite memories from youth

• Not so favorite memories

• Bad dreams? Maybe/maybe not

• The biggest issue of all

• Grade school

CHAPTER I

Life’s beginnings were premature, according to the calendar. Mom had given birth early. I was barely 4 lbs. and mom was around 20 years old.

My father was 100% Italian. Mom is German and Irish. Dad was eight years older than mom. This gene combination makes me one creation, yet to be figured out.

Children’s Hospital in Buffalo, New York was far from Medina. There were periods of separation, with visits of course by my parents. They did not have a car yet and eventually I went home.

During the time at Children’s Hospital I was alone in a machine. There wasn’t much holding or human contact. Could spirits already be working on my mind?

Long story short, I have no memories of those 6 weeks. My earliest memories go back to diapers and plastic pant covers. That’s pretty far back.

One thing is for certain, mom said I was the work of three children. My brother Michael came 1 year 2 ½ months after my birth. Karen came 1 year 3 months after Michael. I call that rapid succession.

Dr. Leoni recommended letting Uncle Tony and Aunt Rose adopt Karen, out of fear it would be too much on mom. We stayed a family of five. It was tough.

These memories I’m about to share aren’t in time frame chronology. Rather, the pleasant and full of questions memories first. The ones that trigger joy and wonder, such as Where am I? How is this place and stuff possible? It’s all still vivid.

Maple trees drop their seedlings. I’d watch them float to the ground. Pick them up, toss them up, and watch them float to the ground, like helicopter blades go around. This was big to me—more fun than toys.

Sky and cloud changes amazed me. My vision is monocular because of amblyopia, a condition caused by over oxygenation of premature babies in incubators. So everything looks flat, close and touchable.

Our earth’s sun looked like a hole in the sky. I wanted to grab a hold of the inside edges of that hole. I wanted to pull myself through that hole, like crawling through a tire.

There were no doubts in my little mind that once through the hole I would find another place to investigate. For sure if I could get up to it, somehow, I would go through to the other side. No depth perception makes reality look flat, like a painting or watching television.

Mom gave me great answers about where we came from. We talked by the old round top GE refrigerator. It looked like a monster to me. It was full of cold air with a section that had ice sometimes.

I love my mother. God made everything including me. There was a Bugs Bunny cartoon that showed a stork bird dropping babies off to families. I liked that cartoon. My dramatic arrival to earth hadn’t been revealed to me yet. I liked that God had storks drop the babies off. The old cartoons were cool.

During the midst of all the wonders and questions were also issues and crazy dreams. I had to have a night light. Later in life it would dawn on me some of those dreams were manifestations. Of what you might ask?

Nightmares were a regular occurrence. The monster of light had no real form. It was like cigarette smoke. Going into sleep it would come. I’d see it in the glass of the hall window. It appeared to come at me.

Another monster formed in the bedroom door, once again in that place between awake and sleep. My head would feel a little funny, not dizzy but different. Then away we go. It’s like I knew what was about to happen.

The bottom part of the door would become a huge mouth. It seemed like a car on its side, and the mouth would attempt to pull me out of bed. Of course there were screams and mom would come running. I never felt safe.

There was this issue I called dink trouble. Restlessness in my lower body drove me nuts. Sitting still was impossible. It was tormenting. This lasted lots of years. It also goes back to before words and speech. It did not stop.

This dink trouble bugged me all the time; still in diapers with plastic panties crawling around; I remember undoing my diaper and urinating through the old fashion air grate in the floor, onto a baby in the crib downstairs in another apartment. Later in life I was in marching band with that very nice girl.

Here is where it starts to get weird. Those diaper/plastic pants made me mental, sometimes. I wanted them off. One day behind a chair, and why did I have to hide to do this; I got those things pretty much undone.