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I came out as a lesbian to my mom when I was 13, she took it well at the beginning but she didn’t want me to tell other people and she wasn’t friendly to the idea of having a lesbian child, She didn’t want me to wear rainbows or other stuff that could let people think I was lgbt I disagreed and still told my friends and family (except my grandparents) and was finally accepting myself for who I am.
I knew I like boys and girls since I was at a very young age (5-6) I didn’t really think much about it until I was in year 7 and everyone started dating, up until high school I only had a couple of crushes on boys. When I got in to year 9 I was getting really close with one of my friends and we started “talking”. And that’s the same year in school we looked at different sexuality’s and feelings, I finally realised the way I felt about people had a name. I’m out and a proud bisexual.
The first time I probably really started to consider my sexuality was maybe around 3-4 years ago when I discovered the characters Beca and Chloe and then the ship {Bechloe} but what really helped me was Choni from Riverdale – Cheryl Blossom and Toni Topaz – a couple years ago i talked with my cousin through snapchat and then i told my Dad and Mom that i was bi in our back room before one of my brothers basketball games; i told people online who i trusted, that i was bi as well. Then early on in 2020 or late 2019 I discovered that i was just into females so earlier on i wrote a rough draft to some of my online friends and even went on a walk and called one of then and then came June of 2020; i went on a walk (yes, that seems to be a reoccurring thing i did haha)with my two best friends to my elementary school and i made a group chat with my Dad, Mom, and two older brothers and sent them what i wrote firstly to my ibf’s (internet’best’ friends) and they were all supportive. So although i may be out, i am still not 100% comfortable for some reason shouting who i am from the rooftops, everyone’s story and process is different, i know i’ll get there eventually, but all we can do is try our best to be our most authentic comfortable selves. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter, your mind can change and you can love whoever the heck you want to love.
I first realized something about me was different when I was about 14. All the boys in my religious private school, which was gender segregated, started noticing girls. I noticed girls, and boys, but more importantly I wanted to be the girls. This was during a time when it was very much not acceptable to be trans. And in the religious community where I lived, even more so. I was told, “a person can either be queer, or they can be Jewish. They can’t be both.” And the Jewish community was my world, my life. It was everything I knew.
Over the next few years, I struggled with myself and my identity, up-and-down and up-and-down. I tried to pray the gay away. I tried being hyper masculine, to offset what I knew was the real person inside me. Nothing worked, nothing made the pain of living a lie go away. And I would spiral up-and-down and up-and-down. And then I couldn’t take it anymore.
I sat my spouse down, and I explained to her how I have been feeling and how I was not the person that she thought she married. I had my bags packed, and I fully expected her to throw me out. And to my utter surprise, and as I started sobbing common she didn’t. She hugged me and said “OK. Let’s deal with this together.”
Since then, I have come out, I’m living my truth, and I could never be happier. I’ve met family members who I never knew before, and found the family of my heart. And I could not possibly be happier. My wife accepts me for who I am, my children accept me for who I am. And that’s all that’s really important.
I started thinking I was into girls when I entered 6th grade and this girl just made me feel different. I questioned my sexuality for while not really knowing if I just wanted to be her friend or if I liked her. And then after I finally knew I definitely like aI realised that I was different when I was 14 years old. I grew up in a pretty strict christian family, so I was scared. I believe in god myself and that’s why I prayed every day for two years for my “problem” to go away, to ”turn” straight. But at one point something was telling me that nothing was wrong with me. That I was born this way and that I should be proud of myself for what I am and what I’ve been through.
I started to tell some friends that I’m into girls and for most of them it wasn’t even a big surprise. After that I told my family. First my mother, after that my brother. The last one was my father. He was homophobic in the past so I was really afraid of telling him. But he told me that he loved me anyway und our father-daughter-relationship has never been better. He is really proud of me and of who I am today. Together, we even talk about how “complicated” women are, haha.
One day, not long after telling him that I was gay, I called him on the phone. He was driving home from work and it was the first time I told him about a girl. He said to me “I wish you could see me right now. I have tears in my eyes. I’m so happy for you and so proud.”People can change. Sometimes it takes a while. Sometimes people won’t understand. But, YOU are precious and worthy, remember that! Be good to yourself. You’re not alone. We’re all in this together. It will get better!
Shows like Wynonna Earp that have LGBTQ+ characters in it really helped me getting through the rough times.
So thank you for that!
Now I’m 22 years old and still waiting for the love of my life. But I’m optimistic that I’ll find her one day.
So yeah I’m pretty lucky and to be truthful the only real problems I’ve had are with my own insecurities. I just don’t really talk that much about my sexuality because it feels like I’m taking to much place so I have to sit through my straight brother explaining homophobia to me (and my family, he definitely an ally I just don’t always feel like I’ve experienced enough to actually debate about it with him )
I am so happy that there are safe spaces like this for the community and I just want to say that if the people around aren’t accepting of your sexuality they’re the problem and you are beautiful and strong and loved.
My journey of finding my true self started at the age of 14, I knew that the way I felt about one of my friends at school was slightly different and couldn’t quite grasp why I seem to connect so well with other girls. As this was the mid 1980’s there was no way I could even explore this as an option so I decided not do anything about it. I drifted through my teens and early 20s not even entertaining a relationship with anyone much less a woman. It was around the age of 28 when I was under pressure from people around me that I should really get married and settle down to have a family. In my heart I knew what I wanted but my head over ruled it so I met my husband and had a beautiful baby boy and was living the life others wanted for me. For six years I lived my life day to day doing all I could for my husband and son working hard and just getting on with life. I had always been close to my dad and out of the blue he rang to say let’s meet for lunch we need to talk which was very out of character as it’s not what we did. At lunch he asked me out of the blue………Sue why don’t you do something that will make you truly happy in your heart and make you the happy girl you grew up as. It will be scary but so worth it. I kept going over in my head what my dad had said…………….10 days after our lunch meeting my dad died in an accident at work but what he had said had woken something in me that I thought I had buried so deep I’d never find it again. Within in 3 months of his death I had sat my husband down and told him that I could not
be with him as I was lying to myself. I explained how I’d felt and been feeling most of my life and as much as it hurt he did understand. I wanted to be honest with him and my son as I didn’t want to go behind their back and live a double life. I didn’t rush into relationships but I knew now what I wanted. This was the first time in my life that the weight of the world had been lifted, I could breath and for that reason I bloomed…………..I was out shopping with my son and the most beautiful woman I had ever seen walked past me and I thought to myself I’m going to spend the rest of my life with her. I’m happy to say that 10 years later I live with this lady, my soul mate, my best friend and the love of my life. It wasn’t all plain sailing as I had to wait for her for 5 years as she was married……………but it was worth the wait. I have a beautiful 16 year old son who is caring and incredibly grounded, I had always been honest and open with him and he knows that whatever path he takes in life I will back him 100% as he did me from a very young age. I guess I didn’t really come out I just told my family this is who I love and I am very proud of loving this beautiful woman.
Be true to yourself and the rest will take care of itself x
I grew up in a very conservative environment, where women are taught to aspire to have good grades and a good job just to impress people and lure the right man in to have a big jolly family… And that’s alright and fair… If it is what you really want, which is never true for most. These sort of expectations have one BIG thing missing… Where is the part about knowing thyself? Well that was basically me for the first half of my life.
All I knew was that I should be on the look out for this boy who would sweep me off my feet, lift me up from the ground and took me on his horse to a shinny happy ever after. And for that to happen I needed to be pretty, and girly, and not play ball with the other boys or act silly after a certain age, or speak out when I saw or heard something that I disagreed with… Basically be a slave to stereotypical standards… And I was great at it! Straight A student, shy and proper, church on Sundays’ great! (with the exception of Barbies… I still have no idea what’s the point of them)
Since I didn’t know anything else, I was OK with this reality. It was not until my bubble got burst, that I realized I was missing out.
In my early 20’s I had the chance to travel, and soon enough that shy, insecure girl started blooming. I was fortunate that life aligned the right people on my path, understanding, brave and genuine, that helped me grasp that all that I had conceived as “wrong” it wasn’t… It was just unknown.
It was incredible how fear was replaced with curiosity once those walls started to come down… I make it sound quite romantic but really my process was: go party, get drunk, have existential and trivial conversations at stupid hours of the night… But the important bit… It was all with the right people, with people different from me. That’s when I understood that everyone has a different path, essence and meaning, for themselves and for you.
One of these people was a girl… Chan Chan Chaaaaan.
At this point I had have relationships with boys, serious and… Not so serious (let’s leave it like that haha), but I was always looking for reasons not to stay with them, even if they were amazing; but with this girl I was instantly hooked, and it was not because of what she could give me (marriage, kids, economical solvence… whatever that means) it was because of her beautiful smile, stupid but histerical humour, her support, I even found adorable when she was being a brat… Yep… I was done…and somehow… she felt something for me too… And the rest is history…
Not the right kind of history because we didn’t end up together haha Buuuut that was when I realized that I didn’t care what the wrapping was, I loved the content, I love discovering what is inside of people, what drives them and motivates them and more importantly, finding that satisfaction for discovery in myself, the more I learn from people, the more I know myself and the more is to learn. We are in constant change, evolution and flow.
Today, I am not in a good spot, I have fallen again into trivialities and vanities that don’t make me happy. But writing about this, makes me smile, and I am motivated to continue this journey that brightened my soul.
I am a Queer woman. I fall for passionate and calm, for intriguing and simple, for silly and mature, for anything that knows how to love.
CONTENT WARNING: THIS COMING OUT STORY CONTAINS DESCRIPTION AND/OR DISCUSSION ABOUT SELF-HARMING BEHAVIOUR AND SUICIDE.
I usually do not write on any type of website like this but found myself encouraged to do so here.
I knew I was different since I was 6 years old. I did not have a name for it, and I grew up in a strict Catholic environment so forget asking any type of questions. It was not, until high school that I was exposed to the concept of gayness through homophobic remarks toward someone who had graduated. As I realized I might be gay the local college library became my haven for information or should I say misinformation. There were no role models or mentors. All information stated being gay was a mental illness. I did not see myself anywhere in the world, my home was not supportive, and I felt alone in the world. The result left me depressed, isolated, and feeling ashamed of who I was.
This left my young adult years coming out as a lesbian fraught with self-doubt and battles inherent in the cultural norms of the 70’s. I suffered the wounds of alcohol/drug misuse, suicide attempts, rejection from family, dysfunctional romantic entanglements as well as harassment and discrimination from the world around me. One of the worse being the murder of a friend for being LGBTQ.
And yet these experiences built a resilience in me that offered a guide to my own awakening. To remember who I really was and discover my voice. After Charlie was killed the dam broke and I came out all over the place. It was then I became an activist and educator around LGBT+ and diversity issues in higher education. I did not want anyone to experience what I had as a young adult. Thank god for gay bars and dances, as I found sanctuary in the only places to be out and safe.
As the 80’s and 90’s went by it was during my work on college campuses that another layer of my closeted life peeled away. Supporting young adults would in turn give me permission to acknowledge I am a non-binary queer woman. All along, I had thought since I was clear about my sex as assigned by birth, I could not be trans. This was my mistake and the personal work I had done prior assisted me in stepping into the acceptance of a deeper awareness of who I was. Gender queer.
So here I am a 64-year-old lesbian gender queer woman continuing to stand in a place of opening to the soul of who I am. All those years impacted by trials of the world’s norms and judgments contributed to a lack of confidence in my ability to know love and I longed desperately to experience it. During the last twenty years I became a Druid Priest of nature and dived into the guidance of my dreams as a path to healing and wholeness. To find and heal the darkness which clouded my access to feeling love. The land is so forgiving and calls to all of us to remember the heart of who we are as one planet, one being, and we need each other to survive and thrive. In listening to spirit I have now been guided to creating Dreaming Back to Earth. This is the gift of opening my heart.
Unexpectedly along the way of remembering I have become a relationship anarchist believing there is no hierarchy, state of control, or norms that drive loving and being loved with others and in community. It is a beautiful reflection of how to live within this earthly planet. And my dreams have offered the guidance to remember this within my soul and body. The key is to be willing and open to challenge my beliefs, face my traumas and open my heart to love in all its forms. This is some of my story.
Every day, I learn and shift. I am not perfect in the process and have made mistakes. I am not done, never will be. What a life. Thank you.
Where do I start ? My childhood. I was a quiet, shy and lonely girl, raised in the middle of two siblings so nobody cared about me. I was not old enough to be heard and not young enough to be understood. So I just did what I had to do : nice girl, be graduated, find a job and live with a man. Typical hetero-normal life until I met this woman at 28 years old. She was so beautiful, so gay, so engaged and so not interested by me. But it was too late I was hooked.
I spent so many sleepless nights asking myself why… not why this gorgeous unsensitive woman… no, why NOW ??? Why not 15 years earlier ? Why not with my Best friend ? Why at the worst moment of my life ? So many why-s for one obvious Because : because life is a constant challenge, it sucks, it is hard and complicated all the time. Life is such a journey, you don’t understand everything in the moment. Life is also full of joy and beautiful people if you know where to look.
And because of course you felt for other girls and women before but you didn’t know what it was…
A couple of years before I started to question about my sexuality, my cousin died. We grew up together, he was my other half, we were different and similar at the same time. I played sport, he played music. I teached him sport he teached me music. He was gay, I was straight. He killed himself. He could not stand to be different.
I spent all my energy to be angry, to feel guilty and sad, i was a wreck. With a useless boyfriend who thought I could grieve for one month and get back to normal. But normal never came back, I miss him every freakin’ minute, and I am about to meet a woman who will make a mess with my life.
I am still grieving and now I am gay ?? What’s next win the lottery and lose the ticket ?
“You must give up the life you planned in order to have the life that is waiting for you” (Joseph Campbell) the sentence that changed my life. So I gave up my sooo booooring straight life to focus on me and only me. Life gave me the opportunity to meet bunch of people who really looked like the Earpers community. A safe, non-judging and very gay-friendly group with whom I travelled the world. I didn’t want to in the first place but I felt home with them and it was so gooooood !!!!! So good to finally speak to someone who listens.
I came out at 30 to my Best friend and she is still the best. I didn’t came out to my parents, my girlfriend did. She thought she was the one so obviously she made decisions for me. I kept my family but not her, she was so wrong !
My family agreed with only one sentence : “if it is your choice it is okay.” That was it, we never talk about the “room-mate” sensitive subject. It is taboo even if they truly think it is not.
I know it takes time to deal with it.
When I was 5 I started realising I didn’t really fit in with the girls who I was forced into groups with. I was more interested in playing football than dancing and I had a significant amount more friends who were boys than friends who were girls. The boys saw me as one of them and if someone said that I couldn’t do anything because I’m “a girl” they would defend me and say that I’m different. They were right, I am different.
I’m different but my differences make me unique. My gender dysphoria went unnoticed to me until I was 10, around the same time I started puberty. I started hating the body I was in and wished I could be more like the boys who I played football with. My gender dysphoria was manageable until I was 15.
As soon as I turned 15 I had reached my breaking point. I began researching what this awful feeling of hatred I had towards my body was and almost every article I read and every video I watched told me it was the same thing: gender dysphoria. After that I did more research and discovered what it means to be transgender. I came to the conclusion that I’m trans and that I should probably create a list of names for myself to try out.
By January 2017 I decided to tell my friends about my identity and my new name. At that point, I was identifying as non-binary. One friend knew about what it means to be non-binary so was incredibly supportive and the rest of my friends just wanted what was best for me. They used my new name and my preferred pronouns and it was going really well until a few months later when I realised that I’m actually FtM (female to male) transgender.
After I told people I was changing my preferred name again and was using new pronouns some people stopped talking to me which made me feel even more hatred towards myself. I soon discovered that coming out as trans in a Catholic school was a terrible idea (well for me at least). Someone who had stopped talking to me because of my new identity told one of my bullies about my identity and it caused his bullying to escalate. I soon began regretting coming out.
One day during our biology lesson we were talking about reproduction and my bully asked how same sex couples reproduce. I answered him in a clear and concise way that same sex couples can use IVF or surrogacy in order to reproduce. At this point he turned around and said “oh, is that how you trans freaks do it to?” before pushing a desk towards me causing me to be trapped between two desks. My teacher ran over to help and asked him to leave the classroom immediately. I was ushered off with some of my friends to go sit in an empty art classroom whilst we were waiting for the school nurse to come and check me over. Luckily I was only bruised and nothing worse had happened. He was suspended for two weeks for bullying and inappropriate conduct (apparently it would have been much longer if I’d have actually admitted to being trans but at that point I was too scared to come out to teachers).
Flash forward to now (September 2020) and I’m about to start my second year of university. I still haven’t come out to my parents but I’m getting there. My online friends help a lot with reassuring me that I’ve always got a chosen family and that I look masculine enough. I’m now at ease with my labels of transgender and pansexual (an identity discovery I made only a few months ago).
