The Slow Burn of Self-Acceptance by lesbian romance fiction author Ruby Scott

When people talk about “coming out”, they often describe it as a single, dramatic event: a door flung open, a declaration, a before and after. But for many of us, self-acceptance is not a moment. It is a slow burn.

It flickers at first, hesitant and unsure, before becoming something steady and bright. Like the best love stories, it takes time, patience, and the willingness to face what scares us most: the truth of who we are.

The Long Road to Owning Desire

Every woman I have ever written has wrestled with self-acceptance. Some hide behind control, others behind charm or denial. Yet at the centre of it all lies the same question: Can I allow myself to want this?

Many of us learned to edit ourselves from an early age. We toned down what felt “too much”: too intense, too emotional, too bold, too queer. We read the room before we spoke. We measured safety before showing desire.

As Suzette tells Victoria in Desire’s Truth, “To know the truth of your own desire and not walk away from it, but instead to embrace it, gives you a power beyond comprehension.”

That instinct does not vanish overnight. Even after coming out, the echoes remain. You might tell the world who you are, yet still hesitate to feel it freely. Self-acceptance becomes a journey of repeating the truth to yourself until it finally feels natural.

Why Slow Burns Matter in Fiction and in Life

I have always written slow burns because they reflect something essential about being human. The waiting, the hesitation, the quiet yearning are not only romantic tension. They are emotional truth.

Falling in love is rarely instant. Learning to love yourself is the same. Both require the same delicate rhythm: recognition, resistance, and surrender.

That is why readers often tell me my stories feel real. In every slow burn lesbian romance, whether it is Abby and Victoria in May I Call You Mistress? or Kristi and Fenna in Rescuing Hearts, there is an echo of our own self-discovery. Each glance, each almost-touch, mirrors that private moment when we start to believe we deserve what we desire.

The Fear Beneath the Flame

Desire is rarely just pleasure. It is courage. To admit what you want is to risk rejection and invite judgment. For lesbian and bisexual women, that risk has often carried real weight: ridicule, erasure, or worse.

So we learn to disguise want as friendship, admiration, or banter. We turn it sideways to make it safe. The slow burn becomes a kind of shelter. It lets us explore attraction in whispers before the world can interfere.

Yet longing becomes a teacher. It sharpens self-awareness. It reminds us that love is not about arrival, but about endurance. The ache itself is part of becoming.

That is why I write tension that aches rather than teases. Because the ache is the story.

When Self-Acceptance Feels Like Rebellion

There is something quietly revolutionary about a woman who no longer apologises for her desire.

For lesbian women especially, loving another woman is never only personal. It is political, whether we choose it or not. Every act of affection, every story told honestly, becomes a declaration of existence.

Self-acceptance is not a flag waved once a year. It is a quiet, daily choice to stop editing yourself.

As Suzette tells Victoria in Desire’s Truth, “You’ve built a space where she feels safe enough to voice her desires without shame. Do you have any idea how rare that is? Most people spend their entire lives hiding parts of themselves, afraid of rejection.”

Rebellion does not always roar. Sometimes it sighs. Sometimes it looks like two women holding hands at a bus stop, or one woman deciding she will not hide her books anymore.

That, to me, is the essence of it — quiet courage lived out loud.

Learning to Desire Without Guilt

For many women, desire is tangled up with guilt. We are taught that wanting is selfish, that leading is unfeminine, that craving another woman is wrong.

The truth is that desire is neutral. Meaning comes from how we hold it.

The slow burn of self-acceptance means learning that wanting does not make you dangerous. It makes you alive.

My dominant heroines—Victoria and Suzette are powerful not because they control others, but because they have stopped apologising for what they feel. That is the heart of lesbian empowerment: not imitation of masculinity, but full ownership of authenticity.

When you reach that point, when you can look at another woman and think yes, this is mine to feel, you have crossed from shame into freedom.

How to Nurture Your Own Slow Burn

Self-acceptance is not a single victory. It is maintenance. It is tenderness. It allows you to be both confident and uncertain, fierce and soft.

Here are a few gentle reminders:

Speak kindly to the version of you who was not ready.
She protected you when you needed it. Honour her for surviving.

Find mirrors that reflect you truthfully.
Read sapphic fiction. Watch stories where women like you are loved without condition. That is nourishment.

Let desire unfold at its own pace.
You do not have to rush to prove you are “out enough”. Authenticity has no timeline.

Redefine success.
Self-acceptance is not loud confidence. It is peace. It is the moment you stop performing for anyone’s approval, including your own.

Celebrate small victories.
Every honest conversation and every choice for truth over fear is the flame growing stronger.

The Freedom in the Waiting

Readers sometimes tell me they wish my stories reached the kiss sooner. But life rarely does.

The slow burn is the story. It is where transformation happens: the small awakenings, the tender cracking open of the heart.

Self-acceptance is no different. It is a love story we live every day, one where the heroine and the beloved are the same woman.

When you finally reach that place, when you no longer need to justify the way you love, it feels like that final slow-burn chapter: breathless, relieved, and completely true.

Every woman I write begins her story in uncertainty and ends by standing in her own truth. In that way, they are all fragments of us.

Because the greatest romance is not between two people, but between a woman and her own becoming. And if my stories have taught me anything, it is that the slow burn of self-acceptance is the hottest flame of all.

Love

Ruby

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