Community Rainbow Waves

Victhoria – Brazil

My name is Victhoria and I currently live in Brazil!

I came out has lesbian when I was 17 years old.
I’ve always knew I’d liked girls from a very young age, but growing up in a religious family, I tried to hide and suppressed those feelings.

I tried to date boys but I didn’t feel right, I just couldn’t carry a relationship with boys, so when I was 15 I had my first gay experience and then I understood what was that I felt and start to find myself.

When I came out to my family it was the most scary and brave thing that I’ve ever done.
It was hard at first, but now, thankfully, my family loves and support me and my relationship.

Be true to yourself, it’s a scary path but it’s worth it !

I went through enxiety and panic attacks but when you are true to yourself it’s liberating and free .

To all the people who are afraid to come out, don’t be , there will be people that will love you, support you and accept you for who you are !

Love to all

A butterfly who loves flowers

When I was 5 yrs old I had a huge crush on my female teacher. I knew it was different because I felt butterflies in my stomach. It was way different from my admiration to boys. After that I had another crush on a 6th grader when I was in my 3rd grade. She didn’t like the attention and the fact that I had a deep admiration to her so she ended our friendship. I was so heartbroken and confused. What did I do wrong? Why can’t I just like her? Then on my 5th grade I had a 6th grader gf whom I invited to go to my house. My mom was open about it and made a joke of how weird and abnormal I am. I think my family knew I am into girls since I am more boyish than girlish. I love playing ball games, wearing shorts and big shirts. They even call me “Cathy Boy” for standing up to boys (who bullied me and some girls) and for just being me. I haven’t had any struggle coming out with my family probably because I have a colorful family (gay aunt, sister, and cousins).

Though I am fortunate of having a family like them, I had difficulty coming out to the entire world. Coming from a Catholic and patriarcal country like the Philippines, it is still a big deal if you’re part of LGBTQIA++ community. I could remember back in my college days that some of my friends lectured me from acting on being gay. They told me that it is a sin to engage into sexual lesbian acts but being one is not. Some told me it is just a phase in my life. So back then I had few experiments. I tried dating and kissing men for a week or two but it didn’t work out. I knew there was something wrong. Something lacking. SPARK! It is different when I kiss a woman. There is magic. There are butterflies in my stomach. There is fire. There is passion. There is care. There is love. There is happiness.

It’s been more than a decade since I decided to just be me regardless of what people say. All I know now is that I am proud of being me and for being in the LGBTQIA++ COMMUNITY.

I am Charlie, a queer trans male.

I have been misgendered from a very young age.

Whether it was a stranger seeing a boy but being told that I was a girl or by my parents who only ever knew me as a female. Then came my next identity crisis. In primary school, I also had my first crush on a girl which created a new bunch of questions that I didn’t know whom to ask. I hadn’t been taught about the vast spectrum of genders and to the extent that I had a sense of sexuality it was faint at best.

I have always been lucky to be surrounded by people who support me and have loved me for whoever I want to be. However even at the tender age of 11, I was well aware that the world around me was not always going to have my back. This fear of whether or not I would be accepted for who I am kept me from yelling from the rooftops how I felt and how I wanted to look.

I went to a girl’s school in Melbourne, Australia. While this only further awaked my sexuality, it did nothing to help with my doubts over who I was. As a 14-year-old I never felt more different to everyone else around me than when I was at school play acting at being a girl surrounded by other teenagers who were definitely female. Yet due to the limited education that I had received about the gender spectrum I only felt alienated and different, without the comfort of having an identity that I could cling to. Believing that there are only two genders in the world, boy and girl, and that you are what you are born as, sent me to a terrifying and dark place.

Even so, I had the comfort that my friends were supportive of me when I came out as queer. I was so shocked when they shrugged and moved on like it was a completely normal thing, I had to ask them if they had heard what I said. Every LGBT story I had ever read led me to believe that I would receive a negative reaction. However, I believe I have been lucky for my parents were the same, reacting with joy and support.

Later, I discovered the gender spectrum and I have never been more relieved. I found a place that I could home and an identity that I could feel comfortable in.

You would think that after coming out once, a second time would be like a piece of cake. Unfortunately, it was even harder. Before I had known my parents friend who were queer. They had been over for dinner and they had tucked me into my bed. Although I wasn’t certain, I wasn’t too worried. Now I was about to tell them that the daughter they had known for years could no longer be their daughter. Perhaps blurting it out at the dinner table ten minutes before our favourite tv show started wasn’t the best idea but they couldn’t have been more supportive.

Although, with my parents I am now in a place where I can talk to them comfortably about me being their son, I have not reached that level of comfortableness outside, in the real world. It is the sad truth that we do not live in a world where every single person is guaranteed to support you. But from my experience so far, there are many people out there who have my back. As someone who is still afraid to go to public toilets, stutters out that they are girl when questioned in the female bathroom but is too scared that they might be thought of as a fraud in the male bathrooms, I applaud those who stand strong and say I don’t care what the world thinks, this is me and I am proud. As a person who does not correct my grandmother when she calls me Sophie, even though my name has been Charlie for three years, I read Dom’s message and I smile, for a person who I have looked up to for so long has stood up and paved the way for many people to truly be themselves.

With the courage from Dom’s coming out, I stand here and I yell from the rooftops that I am a Queer Trans Male and I could not be more proud of who I am.

#OutIsTheNewIn

Free proud lesbian woman

I realized I was gay at a very young age I have my brother to thank for that because he was the first to realize who I truly was. I had my first girl crush when I was 12 my brother helped me build up the courage to tell her even though she didn’t feel the same we continued our friendship til this day I thank my brother because without his help I probably would not have came out I can honestly say my family supported me from day one and loved me for who I am…

Alycia N.

I knew for quite a while that I had weird feelings for girls that I felt like I shouldn’t be having. In middle school, I was having the hardest time feeling normal. I wasn’t having the same feelings towards boys that all my friends were having, during lunch my friends would talk about all the boys they liked, and I was making stuff up because I didn’t want to seem weird. This made me very depressed because I was unsure what was wrong with me. I would come home and watch ‘Friends’ and I always had a crush on Rachel, but I would just tell myself that every girl thinks other girls are pretty, it’s just being nice right?! Every gay character I seen on television growing up was a background character who rarely came on. High school came around and I became more depressed keeping all of my feelings in, I did not like the person I seen in the mirror. I wanted to cut my hair and wear clothes that I felt more comfortable in. During my junior year of high school, I came out to my close friend who was a boy. After I came out to him, he was very supportive. I started going over to his house a lot, because of this my mother thought I had a crush on him. She would always bring it up that we should date. My mother had gay friends and was a very supportive parent all around but it’s still very overwhelming coming out to your parents. I was lucky to have supportive parents who loved me no matter what because I know a lot of queer kids do not have that. I was still very nervous of coming out, we ended up going to an amusement park and she kept talking to me about my close friend. While we ate lunch at the park, I told her I had to tell her something important, I then proceeded to cry a lot that I couldn’t speak. She guessed “what is it, are you a lesbian?” I shook my head yes, and she then told me that she loved and will always love me no matter who I love. It was nice to have that kind of love and support from someone. After that, she made sure I was comfortable with myself, she let me cut my hair, she bought me a pride flag, I shopped in the boy’s section for clothes. I felt more confident in myself just by having that love and support and I was happy to be in the LGBTQ community. With having that lack of LGBTQ representation growing up, I am so inspired by shows like ‘Wynonna Earp’ and can’t wait to grow my career in the film industry and add more queer representation that I didn’t have growing up. It is such a positive message to see people on a big screen coming out and being authentically themselves because it shows that everyone is valid, and everyone is beautiful. I think start the wave shows so many positive messages to be kind, and be the best you, you can possibly be.

You can call me B, I go by she/her and I’m a lesbian. 🙂

It’s probably not a surprise but it’s taken me quite a while to get to this point, where I’m comfortable enough in calling myself a lesbian and being able to share that to the world. But here I am. And I couldn’t be happier.
Around gr. 10, I had a tough time with friends. The year before I moved to a new city and being the shy quiet kid I am I was extremely nervous about making new friends. But I did become close friends with two people so it wasn’t that bad. Then came gr. 10, and I didn’t have any classes with either of them which sucked. By that time, everyone else seemed to have made friends and well… I wasn’t a part of that, I wasn’t really friends with them. So I just stayed quiet.
Then one day, I ended up checking out this club that I knew a few of my friends would go to every Wednesday. It was GSA. Around that time I had heard of gay people and how they weren’t very well accepted, I never understood why they faced so many hardships because it was just love wasn’t it? So then why was the Catholic community I had grown up in so unaccepting of it when all I had learned from them was how to be kind to others?
Anyways, that sparked my curiosity about the LGBTQ+ community, and along with my friends in that club and my favorite art teacher running the club, I kept going there. Soon enough it became my safe haven that year. A place that I was happy to go to every week while the rest of my school life seemed to suck.
I learned a lot from the wonderful people there. I saw what a supportive and caring community was like. Safe to say I never stopped going to GSA even after started making more friends and high school no longer felt like it was terrible.
Subconsciously, at some point, I’m not sure when I started to have this question that would randomly pop up in my head. “What if I was gay?” My continuous and automatic response to that was no, I wasn’t. That when on for at least a year, and I wouldn’t give it much thought. I would ignore it. Then near the end of gr. 12, in the last month of school, I came out to one of my closest friends. I never planned to, nor expected it. We were on a phone call and she brought up boys, and most importantly how I was talking to this boy she hadn’t met in the hallway. (Note he was asking me something about one of the other clubs I was in/running). And when she brought it up, I just felt this gut feeling that this idea seemed… wrong, I had that feeling is several other occasions when my friends would talk about boys. So I took a deep breath and said, “I think I like girls.”
At the time I wasn’t sure because I never liked a girl before, but I had a lot of female celebrity crushes the same way that girls my age had crushes on Zac Efron for example. Looking back now, I remember I tried liking a few celebrity guys, like Brad from the Vamps. But it never came with as much ease as it did with liking Selena Gomez or Olivia Holt. I felt like I was in a way forcing myself to like him.
Sure there were a few actual guys I said I had crushes on, but I think they were just what I thought as a crush at that time, something I now call an admiration crush. One where I looked up to that guy and would want to hang out with him a lot, but never really thought about relationship stuff. Because honestly the idea of girls liking girls never really occurred to me, until I discovered this ship on my favorite show Supergirl. Kara and Lena. Easily I developed crushes on both actresses and loved the idea of their characters getting together. I finally had representation.
That grew more when I started watching Wynonna Earp and One Day at A Time. And yes, I did solely watch those shows because I discovered Wayhaught and that Elena was a gay character. I started to feel more okay with the idea of liking girls.
That summer, I also told one of my other closest friends that I liked girls. The two of them were the best about it. Which was great because they were the friends I was going to university with. The place I decided I would let myself explore this and see if I really did like girls.
Surprise, surprise, I do. I developed a crush on this girl. I finally experienced an actual crush, with the whole feelings thing. Yes, that whole “your heart races around them and you can’t seem to form words” thing I discovered is real.
Then I started to come out to a handful of people, the friends that I wanted to know, that I felt safe telling. Then even two of my cousins. I’ve gotten lucky because I have yet to experience losing a friend because of my sexuality. It may happen later on when I am fully out, but I now have a group of people who do accept me for who I am and will be there for me no matter what.
Then, one day with some advice. I gave myself before winter break to try and ask her out. (I know, a lesbian girl who’s an introvert asking someone out. That must be new lol.) On the third day, the chance came up and I did. I took the risk. She got back to me after winter break, and well, I got rejected.
Even though things didn’t turn out the way I’d hoped with her, thanks to her I got the courage to come out to a lot of important people in my life and I’ve never been more sure about liking girls.
Heck, I got a pair of Doc Martens and a friend gave me rainbow suspenders. (And added to my already large collection of flannels). Never in my life had a simple thing such as clothes made me so happy and confident in myself. It was refreshing and absolutely amazing.
So now here I am. Happy and more confident. No longer as shy as that girl in gr. 10. I went from someone not knowing why we stated our pronouns during GSA meetings to being proud of being part of the community. I’ve grown a lot in the past few years, and especially this year.
Right now, the only part that scares me, is telling my family. Especially my parents. They are both aware of the community, know I went to GSA, and have seen gay people on shows and movies. But it’s different when it’s your kid. I’m sure a lot of you who are part of the community understand that. I know that they won’t kick me out or anything, but I’m still scared. I know I will finally tell them one day when I’m ready. But for now, I’ll just be in my room watching my gay movies.
Anyways, I hope my story helped you with whatever part you are in your journey or made you feel less alone in all of this. I just wanted to share my story with all of you whoever you are, however you identify, and whoever you love. Remember there will be people who have your back that you can lean on even if that won’t be everyone. It takes time to figure this out, so take your time, there’s no rush. And you don’t have to come out to people until you feel safe to do so and when you feel it’s the right time. Even to your parents. Your journey is your own.
Be authentically you, because when you are “you are all the colours in one, at full brightness,” (-all the bright places).
Sending you my rainbow love, B.

I am enough

I grew up afraid of being myself. Scared to be different, anymore so than I already was. I didn’t have a normal childhood by any means and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. At the ripe age of 5 I remember telling my mother my father was cheating on her and a week later we were moving from Ohio to Florida to live with my grandmother. Fast forward 3 years and two days before my 8th birthday my mother dropped by sister and I off at my grandmother’s house for what was supposed to be the weekend, which lasted for about 9 years.
I remember feeling abandoned, unwanted and unloved by the 2 people in the world who are supposed to be the ones who do that unconditionally and without labels and expectations. Being told at 8 years old that your mother doesn’t want you and isn’t coming back for you, that your father never wanted you and more or less feeling like a burden led to a lifetime of anxiety and insecurities.
The last thing I wanted to be was different in any other way but the universe had other plans.
Being queer wasn’t something I was sure anyone in my family would accept and more or less confirmed after my uncle came out. The first thing that I recall my grandmother and mother saying afterwards to each other was that they didn’t care that he was gay as long as they didn’t have to see it. I was maybe 12 or 13 at the time and knew my saying I love everyone regardless of gender or that I love love would be met with the same mindset by them so I hid who I was. I continued to be the simple self sufficient kid that they didn’t have to pay much attention to since I was the normal smart child who didn’t have any problems or issues she couldn’t solve on her own and I became really good at hiding who I was as well as the anxiety and fear so they wouldn’t treat me any differently.
Growing up my older sister and I were always close and we joke that I was her first child since she was always making sure I had what I needed and was my safe place. She has always known that I always saw love as love and didn’t judge or label people and treated me with the same courtesy. She has always known me better than I know myself even without me telling her I was queer she knew and accepted it when I did tell her finally. I took cutting out toxic relationships, mediation and finally being me for me to come out to her but she told me she knew already and just wants her hippie , peace loving, hates confrontation but will fight for who and what she loves, wants to change the world , wants to make every stray a pet, kind, smart-ass, sarcastic, too smart for her own good, protective, love is love baby sister to be happy ( and yes that is who she describes me to someone when asked). So I may not have come out to my entire family but the most important person in my world knows and accepts me for who I am without labels and with just love

Loving all humans

I come from an very conservative military family so when I found out in middle school that I liked boys and girls equally I felt like my whole world was collapsing. I couldn’t talk to My family or seek their advice about this feelings and I didn’t have that many real friends so I started to feel like I didn’t know who I was. For years I put on a mask and only showed people what I wanted them to see. In 2018 my whole word changed. At the age of 22 I meet this girl what am so lucky to call my girlfriend. But that wasn’t easy. I finally told my family about her and me. They decided to send me a letter that said that they didn’t want to have anything to do with me and I was confused because “ as long as you love boys you are straight and just rebelling and trying to hurt us”.

I didn’t talk to them for 1 1/2 year. Now they say that they don’t respect it but have accepted.

My girlfriend and this community makes me strong and wanting to walk to the end of the world with my head held high and with a heart full of love and color.

Jen, A Moslem closeted queer

Hi, my friend often call me Jen, I’m an Indonesian girl so, pardon my English .
Well.. how do I start?
Mm.. I was recognized my self being attracted to a girl when i was on a 8th grade, prior to it when i was on my 7th grade there was a girl who always want to walk home together and says that she attracted to me but I never considered it and I have to moved town and school.
At my 8th grade or when i was 14, I started to feel this strange attraction to a girl on my class, I love to watched her studiying, playing and anything from a far.
I felt it so intentsly until i feel that I can’t hold it anymore. I was so confuse. I didn’t know what to do.
Surounded by a moslem family, neighbourhood and being in the Country with the largest Moslem population didn’t help my confusion at all, me being truthfull for who I am will only sent me into another deeper problem.
Until one day I did a wager, I decided to tell the truth to my bestfriend. Her name is Tina. I said to my self that day, If she will accept me for who I am, I promise I’ll always be there for her.
And.. I told her, after school, and I cried, feeling guilty like i was comitted to a sin.
But.. her reaction is priceless, she smile and say thank you for trusting her and promise she wont tell anybody else, and be there for me when I need her..
And I cried harder.. hahah! I dont believe such a wisdom could came out from a 14 years old friend.
And yes. She’s keep her promise until now, we’ve been friends for 20 years now since then! And still awesome!
We were went to highschool together and that was when I need her the most.
I have a crush to a girl on my class on my first week in highschool. Her name is Vani
Unfortunately, she’s a daughter of a strongbeliever, rich, respectful Moslem family. Hahah..
But.. somehow it doesn’t affected us. We were friend, I tried make a move as a friend.. share something in common, i try to find what’s her hobby, what she likes, tried to matched her schedule study. And… at the end of the year, we were finally close.
We were almost unseparable on our second year. We had fun, go somewhere together and so on, until one day some of student around us start to whisper about our closeness. Say that i was a bad Influence for vani, that it was wrong for two girl holding hands, or too close. Well i was always considered as a bad girl at school, while Vani is the sweet, beautiful, kind, a true moslem, and sincere.
I realised that there were “something” between us. We just don’t want to admit it.
My bestfriend Tina try to confirm about the school gossip to me and I said, yes.. I think Im in love with Vani and I guess it wont be one sided love. And Vani is my first love I guess. I was 17 that time.
My friend Tina asked me: “are you happy..?” I said “Absolutely”
And then she asked again
“Will she (Vani) happy if you confess to her?”. I said “I have no idea..”
She then just said, “you know I supported you all the way, but please don’t make descision when you’re on cloud nine. Think about her too, think about the problem she will face, about her confussion after you confess. What if she doesnt have friend who support her ?”
Tina is right, I cant think only about my self.
So.. we spent the rest of our high school with being “best friend”. Until one day we go on our separate way to the University. We cried at each other arms when we went apart.

2 years went by after that. We met again on our high school reunion. Even we still keep in touch through SMS. But we never saw each other.
I never realise how much i missed her when i saw her again.
Andddd.. something i least expected happened. Vani Kissed me, yesss kissed me on the mouth! I was so surprise and she said “I missed you” . Damn.. i cant even say it back. My brain was numb.
We spent the night catching up, talking about ourself the past year, talked about her Engineering study, my Accounting study and else until its time to go on separate way again. We lived in different city and its quite far. About 5 hours driving.

We never talked about it again, and we just continued our life like usual, we texting each other on daily basis but never met until our graduation.
We met again after she and I graduate, she was back to our hometown but I still live in another town but at least its only 1,5 hours driving.
I often came to see her, to her house met her parents, befriend her sister and she sometimes came visit me..
We were getting close, so close until i can savely said that we were together. But we cant said it to anyone else. Except I tell it to my bestfriend Tina and her reaction only “im glad..but when somethings goes wrong, u know I always right behind you..”.

Me and Vani get together for about a year and a half becauuseee… she has to be married.. . Her family expect her to be married. Her family engaged her with a very decent man, the date has set in stone and we broke up 5 minutes before her wedding.. and I was her maid of honor.. hahah!

Vani and I still a good friend until now, she lived with her husband and 3 kids now and its been 10 years since her wedding. And we were both 33 years old now.
We live in different city but sometimes we visited each other. Her kids adore me! Haha. But I know my boundaries.
Vani often said to me, “move on please find your happiness, its what i always wanted.”

We knew too well that our surrounding wont accept us, that’ s why we gave up
But I knew we hold up each other preciously at our heart.

And.. Tina keep her promise to be always there for me, she’s now have 2 adorable kids. I always gratefull to have her. She’s there for me on my lowest and vice versa. One friend who accept me for who i trully am is more than enough for me to keep my sanity.
Because I never came out to anyone except her.

-Fin-

Wish anyone is luckier than me!

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.