Placing myself in my work- What does "Sexual liberation" mean to me?

Lately, I have been telling people that I study black female sexual autonomy. To be completely honest, I am not completely sure what this means. I understadn the individual meaning of each of these words, but I think in order to fully grasp what this means as a whole in regards to my work, I need to place myself in the context of my studies.

So. It is not easy for me to talk about my concept of my own sexual autonomy, because in many ways, I feel like I have yet to gain it. When I was nine, I was raped by an older cousin. This is something I am still coming to terms with, mostly because I cannot fully remember it. My lapse in memory has been frustrating, and I believed that the sexual assault was a fabricated memory until my last year of high school because there were pieces of the memory missing. However, this act has completely affected the way that I understand myself as a sexual being.

My cousin was not the only person to take advantage of me sexually in my life, but he was the first, which means that for a very long time I assumed that sex was something that was supposed to be taken from me. I also believed that pleasure and sex were not linked.

In high school and most of college, I was afraid of being intimate with anyone. I didn't want to get close to anyone because I was afraid of being hurt. I successfully created a non-sexual character for myself. In high school, this character even had a name- Mama Damo. But at the end of the day, I was still a sexual being. So I tried to spark romances with people that I was attracted to. However, the people that I tried to pursue didn't see me "like that." Instead, they interpreted our intimacy as a mother-child type of relationship. And being the nurturing type of person that I am, I would accept these relationships, so long as I could stay close to these people.

I also realize that my hesitancy in starting relationships, especially in high school, have to do with me coming to terms with my sexuality. I came out as bisexual my freshman year of high school. But as much as my family loves me, I did not officially come out to them. My mother and aunt came across my internet blog, in which I stated that I was bisexual. They were upset, and I tried to avoid any more confrontation about it by not dating, or keeping quiet about my sexual interests. In that way, I was able to be "in the closet" while still being "out." My family asked no questions about dating or boyfriends, and I offered no answers.

I started feeling, and still do feel, stifled. My division three is an expression of my frustration with my current sexual state. It is me reclaiming my ability to be sexual, and expressing the want to be sexual. It is also a way for me to acknowledge my sexuality, and accepting that the "mammy" character can be "queered."

Whew. That was hard. :/