Nassau, Bahamas, 2006. I was curled up in the uncomfortable seats of a beach resort theater, clutching my favorite baby-doll close to my chest. It was a source of comfort for me, as I’ve always been anxious in crowds and dark indoor spaces.
I don’t remember much before the show started. I’m sure I was anxious (I’ve always been anxious), but I was excited. I have always been drawn to theater, performances, and live experiences. I was expecting some kind of musical or maybe a rip-off, off-Broadway production, specifically designed to entertain tourists.
But when the curtains opened, a beautiful woman emerged. They were tall and glamorous, with big, curly hair. Glitter makeup adorned their face and shiny gloss painted their lips. They had on the most glittery, rhinestone-encrusted, skimpy top I had ever seen. Looking back, they were (poorly) impersonating Cher. But at the time, all I knew was that I was in awe.
WIde-eyed, I whispered to my mother, “I like her top.”
My mother looked back up at the stage before whispering back to me, “Julianna, that’s a boy.”
Without missing a beat, I kept my eyes glued to the performer as they sang, danced, and skipped around the stage, “Oh, I like his top.”
Six year-old me didn’t know what any of that meant, but in that small, dark theater in the Bahamas, she fell in love at first sight — with drag.
I returned to drag culture in my junior year of high school after watching YouTube clips of RuPaul’s Drag Race for hours on end. For most of my high school career, I kept my interests a secret: I was a closeted bisexual living in one of the most conservative counties in Western Pennsylvania. My friends supported my interests, but never really understood them. Nobody in Beaver County was exactly jumping at the chance to see a drag show. I was too afraid to explore culture from beyond my iPhone screen.
After a long day of school, work, and sports, I found so much comfort watching old episodes of Drag Race. The queens on the show were so unapologetically themselves, from the way they spoke and performed, to the manner in which they dressed. It made me feel comfortable and safe in my sexuality. They were a part of a community of queerness that I had never experienced, but longed to explore. I just didn’t know how.
When you try so exponentially hard to be anything but yourself, you often find yourself forgetting everything that made you, well, you.
When I was 18, I booked a one-way flight to Los Angeles with two suitcases and a yearning to find myself. I applied to colleges as far away from my hometown as I could, thinking that it would lead me to find communities I belonged in. I was eager to leave every part of myself behind in order to have a clean slate in SoCal: I cut my hair, dyed it black, and threw all of my passions and hobbies into the fire – and that included my love for drag.
It wasn’t long before I hit rock bottom.
When you try so exponentially hard to be anything but yourself, you often find yourself forgetting everything that made you, well, you. I quickly realized that I had no hobbies, no passions, no friends, and was confiding in my bottles of Barefoot Sweet Red Wine to get me through the days. My urge to rid myself of the person I was before college put a strain on my relationship with my family, friends, boyfriend, and, most importantly, myself.
Without a community and a sense of self, I felt completely and utterly alone.I plastered on the best fake-smile I could for about a year, posting on social media that I was having the time of my life. But, the truth was that I was a shell of myself. I didn’t sleep much, I didn’t eat much, and spent most of my free time at house parties or alone in my room.
The one bright spot in my college career? My annual participation in the Rocky Horror Picture Show shadow cast. I loved dressing up in flamboyant outfits and dancing around to the Time Warp on Halloween weekend. Like Drag Race, I had found a community of queerness that embraced and empowered my sexuality (even though I was still in the closet). And while I was often on the outskirts, I met someone that would lead me to taking the first step to getting better.
Second semester of sophomore year, I moved out of a toxic living situation, shed a majority of my “friends” I had since freshman year, and found myself in a brand new apartment with two girls I had never met before. Although I was still lonely, I felt this sense of calmness that often comes with a fresh start. Once again, I could be anyone I wanted to be. I could find new hobbies, new friends, and finally finish college on a high note.
Rid of my wine habit, I spent most weekends alone in my room, reading, writing, cooking, or calling my parents to fill the time. It was lonely, but I found comfort in my own solitude. Then, on a random night in February, a friend of mine from Rocky texted me: “Get ready, we’re going to the campus drag show.”
Before I knew it, I was sitting front row at my school’s makeshift drag stage. Just like in 2006, I felt anxious: This was my first time around crowds in a while, and I had been so far removed from my drag obsession that this instance felt so entirely new to me. I didn’t know what to expect or how to feel. But my life was about to change again, for the better.
I felt myself become swallowed by a feeling of comfort I had only felt once before: alone in my room, watching these very same queens compete on television. And now, they were right in front of me.
My school’s show featured iconic queens like Roxxxy Andrews, Sonique, and Jade Jolie, who were somehow headlining at some small private school in Orange County, California. The crowd was full of queer and allied college students cheering, fluttering dollar bills in the air, as a student drag performer hit the stage to emcee.
I felt like I was in a movie. At that moment, as soon as the main lights lowered, the fog machines hissed, and the LED strip lights illuminated the student-built stage, I felt myself become swallowed by a feeling of comfort I had only felt once before: alone in my room, watching these very same queens compete on television. And now, they were right in front of me.
There should be a word that encapsulates the feeling of blacking out, but remembering everything all at once. I felt my guard lower, my shell shed, and the person I was emerging like some sort of college-aged butterfly. I stood up and danced with people I had never met, sang my heart out, and threw whatever bills I had in my pocket at student drag performers. For the first time in a long time, I felt like me.
I lost my mind when the Roxxxy Andrews hit the stage. I danced with my friend, sang along to every word of her “Read U, Wrote U” verse, and made an absolute fool of myself throughout the entire set. So much so that Roxxxy Andrews herself beelined right to me, grabbed my hand, and pulled me onstage to dance with her.
And boy, did I dance.
I don’t remember the crowd of students cheering me on or the song that was blaring from the speakers. All I remember was dancing onstage with the drag idol I had been watching since I was 16. I was transported back to being that awestruck six year-old in Nassau, Bahamas and that scared teenager in Western Pennsylvania simultaneously. Although I was onstage in front of so many people I didn’t know, I felt safe there.
As the song ended, she stooped down to my level and said to me, “Mama, you’re so beautiful.”
The next day, I received videos of me dancing at the event. Admittedly, I cannot shake my butt as well as Ms.Thick N Juicy herself. But in those videos, I looked so happy. I looked like myself again. And I wanted to look and feel that way forever.
To think that I was struggling with something more than just the blues, and not getting the help I needed, really put things into perspective.
The next day, I scheduled an appointment with my campus counselor and began using BetterHelp, a teletherapy app. I learned that I was going through a depressive episode–which is common in people who struggle with anxiety and depression (which, you guessed it, I was). To think that I was struggling with something more than just the blues, and not getting the help that I needed, really put things into perspective. What would’ve happened if I didn’t get help? What if that friend never asked me to come with her to the show? While Roxxxy Andrews wasn’t the entire reason I decided to seek help, the joy and comfort of drag pushed me in the right direction. Drag made me want to feel better.
If you’re diagnosed with anxiety and depression, I’m not going to tell you that you should just marathon Drag Race or go to a drag show as a cure-all for the way you feel. Talk to your friends, seek out a therapist that works for you, explore those comfort passions that you may have forgotten about. Drag may have been my push to get help, but at the end of the day, I wanted to feel better for myself — and that made all the difference.
We all deserve happiness, community, and all of the wonderful vibrancies those things offer. And while the healing journey isn’t a linear, straightforward process, I know that I will be dancing, slaying, and sashaying through it all.