This story is sad, but in a way, it is also powerful and victorious. By the end of the novel, the author isn't comfortable saying that she is perfectly at peace in every regard, but her decision to contact her birthmom does represent her unrelenting commitment to understanding her shame. When she talks to her real mom, she will be forced to understand in a bodily way what it means that she was adopted. By talking to her mother, she will be able to accept that her childhood was shaped by a hateful and abusive couple.
Of course, there is the highly symbolic issue of homosexuality to discuss. In this case, it's symbolic because at this point, the story is nearly archetypal; a young, tough, well-meaning child is in conflict with hyper-religious parents who shame them, and then the kid discovers that they are actually gay, and they have to work that out with hyper-religious, abusive parents. In other words, the fact that Winterson went through this journey represents her martyrdom in that home; she was forced to witness human hatred, up close and personal, in one of the most painful, humiliating ways that it can happen.
But that is just an origin story. For Winterson, the journey truly begins when she forgives herself for her shame and trauma, and when she decides to love whoever she wants to. Her girlfriend helps her to work through these things one day at a time, and the girlfriend's love is a direct contradiction of whatever Winterson's parents wanted her to believe about herself, so we can be hopeful and thankful for this author's journey, because through family and self-acceptance, she can thrive in a family that actually accepts her.
