Community Rainbow Waves

Lesbian

i realized that i was gay when i first watched pitch perfect. brittany snow and anna kendrick just hit different. only when i found wayhaught though was i able to gain the courage to come out to my parents. i only came out to them this year, but i’ve known i was gay for about 6 years now; since i was 12. i’m forever grateful to dom and kat for portraying these roles and for coming out themselves. they have given me the greatest gift; they gave me courage and they gave me hope, and those two things inspire me to keep pushing forward and to keep fighting for what i love.

I identify as a lesbian

Okay so I know now that I have always been gay, but I just realized that with 16 (now 18) basically when I had my second surgery I had a huge crush on this night shift nurse hahaha and I have always pressed the nursing button so that she would come and talk to me. Then the first person I told that was my best friend and she was totally okay with it.
After 3 more weeks I spoke to my brother, me and him were sitting in the car and talked and I just wanted to tell him. I told him „ I have to tell you something but I also am very scared to tell you” he said that it’s all good and that he would never judge me for any actions that I did. But then I got scared again and said that I won’t tell him and well he said „ why what’s wrong do you have a boyfriend?” and I said no. He answer with do you like girls ? And I said yes and I got so ashamed… he looked up to me and said and ? That doesn’t change anything!
2 years later
Im fully out to everyone and I’m proud to tell my not soooo dramatic or shocking story but I just feel like that you can always count on your siblings ( at least I can I hope you too)
I feel like he reacted in the perfect and accepting way 🙂 and as a example my when my grandmother found out she wasn’t happy about it and treated me like I’m not worth it and today I don’t talk to her anymore, but that is okay if she doesn’t accept me that she can’t be in my life.
So I hope you are all Save and have a Great Morning/evening/Weekend/week
XO

No More Pretending

Funnily enough, when I was about 6 I told my sister that I was gonna grow up to be a lesbian. It was naturally laughed at by her and the rest of my family. Fast forward, looking back at high school, my friendships were all close with my female friends, particularly touchy, and I would occasionally be jealous of their relationships (even when in my own). I played it off though, just me being a needy friend. When I got to college, everything changed. I met out queer people, one of which was my roommate and one of my favorite people on this earth. She introduced me to media and the community (and funnily enough, Wynonna Earp nearly a year ago now). And it was like my entire world opened up, and I realized I was bi. And that was crazy to me, how I had been missing this huge part of myself. How everything finally clicked into place.

I was opened to the community and all of the beautiful people in it. And I finally put myself out there. I was out to everyone at school, and nearly all my friends at home as well. But it took me even longer to come out to my family. I told my brother first, his response (and my favorite by far) was “Well, I also love women so we have even more in common now.” Coming out to my mom and sister was harder. It was immediately met with “Are you sure?” “Don’t label yourself.” “I thought I liked women at one point too.” and many other cliche lines that I never thought I would actually be hearing. Eventually, my sister came around, and even my mom to an extent. They both support me and love me, and that is something I am very grateful for. However, my coming out was met with a “But play it straight around your father.”

And finally, after coming out to them, I started dating my first girlfriend, and I was absolutely in love with her. But it also led to probably one of the worst experiences in my life. While planning a trip home to see her, my mom decided that after months of telling me to “play it straight” that she would take it upon herself to tell my dad about my sexuality. Only 5 days after I had left for my third year of college. Which led to the absolute worst phone call of my life with a very angry father and some of the most hurtful words I had ever had spoken to me, with the phrase “You’re not gay.” Yelled over and over.

The sarcastic person in me so badly wanted to reply, “You’re right, I’m not gay. I’m bisexual.” But I don’t think I could’ve landed it with confidence over the way I was feeling in that moment.

Eventually, the relationship ended, and me and the girl went our separate ways. The response from my father being “Thank god that’s over”, while I was experiencing heartbreak for the first time. Luckily, by that point, my mom had learned a lot and was there to have my back and reaffirm that I am who I am, regardless of my relationship status.

And now, nearly a year and a half later, I am proudly out to anyone and everyone in my life. Whether they accept me or not, I have no care in the world. I love men and women and I decided that I wasn’t going to hide it for a second longer than I already had. I am proud to be bisexual and a part of this incredible queer community. I love you all. #OutIsTheNewIn

Queer!

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.

Noah, just a boy in a world who doesn’t see him as such

My whole life I’ve known I wasn’t like all the other girls I was friends with, everyday I felt as though there was something in the back of my mind telling me something was off. From a young age, I had always been more of a masculine person, and while yes, any gender can be masculine, I don’t think most little girls wanted to be a boy, be seen as a boy, as badly as I did. But the fact was that I had not been armed with the words that I could’ve used to express myself just yet, living in a religious and very conservative home does that sometimes.

So, when I was about 11 or 12, I met a friend of mine who identified as a lesbian, a word I wasn’t familar with and part of a world I had yet to discover. With her by my side, we figured that world out together, and from that point on, I identified as a lesbian, or as gay rather, because I hated that word for what I now realize was me hating the femininity that goes along with it, while gay was more gender neutral. But back then, I simply didn’t use that word for reasons I didn’t know.

Fast forward to my freshman year of high school, the year I was the most depressed and anxious I had ever been. I was so numb and tired all the time that I was even distancing myself from friends who had been supporting me my whole life. But then I figured out why. It was because I was unhappy with how I look, how I sound, how tall I am, all of that and it was eating away at me.

Before I knew it, I was watching a YouTuber named MilesMcKenna, a trans FtM youtuber who shared stories of his experiences as a trans man and his transition and… I had never felt more at home. I thought about what it would be like to transition into a guy both medically and socially and I smiled a real smile for the first time in a while. And that’s when I knew I wasn’t a girl, I was and have always been a boy who didn’t have the language to put to how I felt, but now I do.

I am Noah. I am trans FtM and I’m proud of who I am, even if only a handful of people in my life know right now. What matters is that I know, what matters is I’m truly, finally, happy.

My name is Gaby and I´m Queer

Hi guys my name is Gaby, I have 23 years old and I from Venezuela but I live in Argentina.

so here goes:
I started to feel strange when I was very young, when I have 10 I started to realize that I was attracted to one girl in my school something that not happened to me with boys, it was a stange felling it scared me a lot I studied in a religious school and my family were very traditional So what they had instilled in me since I was little was that those feelings I was having were VERY BAD because of that I made my feelings go aside I grew up trying to ignore what I felt, I knew that something was different in me and that kept scaring me a lot, I did not talk to anyone, many nights I cried and told myself that it could not be like this, God going to punish me and that My mom would suffer a lot, so I kept ignoring that feeling and hid it pretty well until I fell in love. I fell in love with a girl without realizing how it happened, but it was what I felt, I do not know what happened to me, but one day I woke up and told myself that I could not continue deceiving myself, that I could not let go of my happiness because of people think bad about me, so I dared to be myself, it was not easy to accept me but when I decided to talk to my friends they supported me 100%, gave me strength, I started to read and see lgbt characters on tv what made me inspire me more and more and make me feel great, YES I am different and what? being different is AWASOME.

Time passed and I decided to come out the closet with my mom, I can swear that it has been the most hard and sad moment for me, she cried a lot, got angry to the point of calling the who was my girlfriend at that time and demand her that she move away from me I was a minor (16 years to be exact), that night I felt extremely bad I came to feel very guilty for all the pain my mom was feeling, for my mom, being a lesbian was the same as being a drug addict, coming out with my mom it was not nice, but I must say that it is the best thing that I could do, After several visits to the psychiatrist, many conversations, and all the information my mother sought about homosexuality, today my mother has become my greatest support. hearing from my mother “You are my daughter, I love and accept you as and as you are “is the most gratifying and beautiful thing that has happened to me, she supports me, she loves me as well as she also loves my girlfriend (The love of my life), little by little I was telling my cousins and aunts my truth and I The only thing I have received is love and support, now and after several years (I am 23 years old) I can say that I am a free woman to love whoever I wantand with all the confidence to shout it out to the world, thank you To my mother who despite being from another era and being a traditionalist, put love for her daughter before everything, thanks to my friends for always supporting me, thanks to the fact that we now have good and incredible LGBTQ representation on TV, I must thank the universe for putting such amazing people in my life. I really hope that if you are reading this it will help you, that you understand you are not alone, that the world is a beautiful place, love always win because LOVE IS LOVE and love is what moves the world.
Be BRAVE, be STRONG, be HAPPY and FREE.

This was my story, thanks for letting me share it with you

I don’t think i know yet but i’d probably say for now queer

i think i’ve always known that i liked girls i just never thought anything of it. i always just didn’t even acknowledge it because i didn’t know what it meant. then probably around 10-11 i started really questioning my sexuality and gender identity. today, truth is i don’t know the answer to either of those questions. lately i’ve been thinking maybe i’m gender fluid because i feel like i’m both and i’m neither. this proves to be very confusing for someone who’s just trying to figure themselves out. i’ve thought out all scenarios and i’m not sure of any of them. i’ve questioned being a bisexual trans man and being non binary and just being attracted to feminine people but truth is i don’t think i’ll know for
awhile. I, as a 16 year old kid, don’t have to know exactly who i am right now. at this point i’m just trying to stay positive and patient and when i know who i am i’ll know.

Carol S

I realized that I was different since I was little, when I fell in love with my roommate at age 7. Of course, I didn’t understand what that meant, but I knew I had something different. I grew up and my look to my friends was different from the look to my friends. When I got to the age to understand what was happening I repressed all this feeling. I started kissing the boys, buying posters of beautiful actors, talking about boys, trying to make me believe that I was not a lesbian. Because for the society in my time (today I am 37 years old), I was much more prejudiced, and still had my family, especially my mother, religious and very attached to children. I was afraid of hurting her.
At 15 I had my first homosexual experience. I kissed a girl. It was so strange, confusing but, at the same time, great. At that moment I realized that what I felt was for real! However, I still didn’t have the courage to take on myself or others! It was then that I plunged into religion! I participated in celebrations, prayer groups, youth groups, retreats, etc., to try to hide, oppress what I felt. It was a very big internal conflict, I suffered a lot at that time. Then I started to date a boy. It was only 6 months, then a girl appeared with whom I fell madly in love. I couldn’t resist! I stopped fighting a war that was already lost but I didn’t want to lose. I ended my relationship and we got involved. It was 4 wonderful years. Not so much with my mother! One day I went out to find my girlfriend and my mother went after me. I got a huge scare. She asked me if I liked women, I didn’t have the courage to say yes and said no. Until one day she asked me again and my heart filled with courage and I said yes. She said that I had not chosen to be a lesbian, that I simply felt attracted to women. That I did not want and never wanted to make her suffer.
At first it was very difficult, but little by little she realized how happy I was, how happy I am. I earned her and everyone in my family’s respect with great honor, dignity, wisdom and character. I love who I am and I don’t give up being happy to the detriment of anyone else!

Just me

I always knew I was different from a young age but thought it was just retaliation to my upbringing. I never really addressed it and choose to just keep pushing it away until my early teens hit and I coped using alcohol as a defence, and continued to date boys/men (most of my partners were older than me).
When I was around in my early teens, I can’t quite remember the exact age, I told my mum at a party I was gay….the result was not great as now it was gossip and my father who I had just recently met came and told me I was not gay. For fear of acceptance, which is all I ever wanted, I recanted my declaration and continued to live my life as “normal”. Gossip was always abound and I wanted to protect my family from it.
Life went on with its usual trials and tribulations until I made the decision to move away, I was in my mid 30s. Being away from my small home town gave me a sense of freedom that I’d always wanted but I had suppressed so much of my life already that it was still difficult to admit my true feelings.
I am now a couple of months from turning 40 and in the last five years I have met so many people from all walks of life and I have realised that I can be who I want to be!
Even though the subject is still kind of brushed under the carpet back home I am proud to say that my family continue to be my rock and reason for doing all that I do now. I want to teach my nieces and nephew especially that you don’t have to fear anything in life no matter what it is, a fear of flying or whatever.
I have followed Dom for about a year now just purely because she is so pure and true and that really is an inspiration to know that everyone is different and can still conquer the world.
Thank you
I would like to end by saying that I am far from perfect but I am me and that is that.
I love my and friends unconditionally,
This is the first time my story is going beyond them.
Peace out peeps

Gay cis gender woman

So… growing up being gay was never a thing. Nobody ever talked about it, or at least not that I remember. In like 6th grade we briefly discussed different sexualities but 6th grade me didn’t think anything of it.
Flash forward a few years and all the girls in my class have crushes on boys and start dating. I was never interested so remembering the 6th grade discussion I just thought I was asexual. Problem solved.
And then I started watching Ellen and figured out she was gay. It took me a while to get the internalized homophobia (and hell I don’t even remember where that even came from in the 1st place.. probably that my dad hates everyone who’s not “normal”) out of my head. But once I realized that people are gay and that’s fine I realized that that’s an option for me to. And there was this big ohhhhhh… Moment where I finally realized.
I then ignored that for another few weeks or months and then wrote about it in my diary. Immediately after I sent it to my internet best friend. She was the only person I trusted enough to tell and I knew she wouldn’t be very judgmental. And I guess the whole internet friendship aspect helped too. It’s easier when you don’t get a response to a text for a few days than it is being ignored irl.
So I sat there anxiously waiting for her response… And she didn’t read it for a while. But when she did read it she responded in the best way imaginable. And that meant a lot. It still does.
Months go by and I wanna tell my friend group that’s around me in school as well. But that involves 3 people. If you tell one.. you gotta tell everyone.
And it was a bunch of times that I was almost at this place where I thought I’m gonna do it. But then one friend (we’ll call her Sally)made some slightly homophobic comment or whatever that most likely meant nothing to her and I was back at zero. I did that a few times.
Finally, summer 2018 after 10th grade I was on vacation with my family. It was the last day of pride month and the next day was my birthday. So that day I gathered all my courage and over WhatsApp told the friend out of the group that I knew the longest and trusted the most(we’ll call her Lina). Her response was positive too.
2 weeks of vacation go by (yes, tactic that in case she reacts badly there’s time ’til we next see each other) and I’m back home. During the following week we met at the pool with another person from the friend group (we’ll call her Anna, not the judgy bitch). I was joking about this one guys hair bc he was relatively small but he had dreads which made his head look huge in comparison. She then asked me if I was into him or something. Both me and Lina giggled. Anna then asked what’s going on as she was very confused. Lina pushed me to tell her but I just couldn’t.
After we got home that day I took to WhatsApp to explain. I know I’m a coward but I can’t handle that much rejection. I get enough from my dad. Lol.
So I explained and she was very cool and understanding about it. So then it was time to tell Sally. Also over WhatsApp. And although she seemed accepting and all… Looking back hell no.
A few days later I met up with her at the pool and we were just laying in the sun talking when all of a sudden she asks me if I could really imagine fucking a girl. I at the time was totally flustered bc baby gay but looking back.. that’s such and inappropriate and dumb question.
Starting 11th grade I was out to my closest friends and so I felt okay about maybe slowly but surely telling other people. Meaning basically everyone but my parents and anyone who’d tell them.
Classes changed and I met a bunch of new people. It didn’t take long and I had queer friends. And that was amazing. Because all this time I thought I was alone… Yet to realize that wasn’t true at all.
One of them (Nick, if you for some reason ever read this, Hi) moved away after 11th Grade but he’s still one of my best (queer) friend.
In 11th grade there was this incident where Sally was showing me a chat with her boyfriend where he basically said he wanted to punch Nick because he’s gay and wearing makeup. She found that funny. And for her it was weird that I didn’t. Then she explained the back story which was apparently supposed to make it funny. Spoiler: it didn’t. It only made it more disgusting and horrifying to me. She never understood why I was offended by her boyfriend being homophobic. And her too.
I’m still very uncomfortable around him. Even tho I barely ever see him. Luckily. And she’ll be the 1st person I’ll cut off when I’m done with school.