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i was standing in line at an Amanda Palmer concert, and a female presenting person in front of me made me go: oh. girl-types are pretty too. i havent looked back except to realize how much this reveals about my adolescent interactions with certain girls that i didn’t recognize because they were different than my crushes on boys.
At 10, I discovered that there was something different, I realized that I was attracted to a girl who studied with me for a few years. But I was always afraid to expose myself by the judgment of the people around me, most of the time the family says that they accept you, but when we assume who we really are, there is a certain judgment, which is a very sad thing, because they they are always represented by harsh words that I will never forget. At 16, I met a woman who fell in love from the moment I saw her, at 18 I told my parents as a lesbian, and it was terrible. I married this incredible person, who helped me, as well as his family, to be someone better and not be afraid of anything. Today we are no longer together, I still have some fears, because my parents still think it was just a phase, just a long phase of 8 years ne! I continue to work with them and show that it was not a phase, and I am proud to show and raise the flag, and I know that nobody and nothing will silence me anymore. thanks for the opportunity to tell my story.
I had felt “different” from others since I was very very young, I didn’t necessarily understand that I liked girls but I knew I didn’t feel for boys the same way my friends felt for them.
Growing up, being gay didn’t even cross my mind until I was maybe in high school and all my friends had crushes and boyfriends and I felt pressured to have a crush. It never occurred to me that I had crushes because they were not boys. I felt like I needed to like boys so I “tricked” myself into thinking I did.
The fact that I had never seen or known any gay people or specifically any lesbians and the fact that I started listening to some homophobic things from my friends and family made it difficult for me to get in touch with this part of my identity. Deep down I always felt I wasn’t allowed to be myself and I didn’t want to tolerate that.
So fast forward, I graduated high school I moved from my home country of Colombia to Argentina, went to university there and started meeting so many different people from all walks of life, straight, gay, bi. People who accepted and loved me and made me feel safe and seen. The 4 years I lived in Argentina where some of the hardest years I’ve had yet. I was diagnosed with depression and was really struggling to find my voice. After many years of therapy and working on understanding myself I finally realized and accepted that the reason why I hadn’t had any romantic relationships with men wasn’t that I was unlovable or ugly or not girlfriend material but because I wasn’t attracted to men. I was 22.
I felt like the weight of the world had lifted off of my shoulders and I wanted everyone to know that I thought girls were beautiful. I came out right away, I felt like 22 years was enough time to hide this and feel ashamed, and I didn’t wanna do it anymore. I was lucky enough to have friends and family who opened their arms to this part of me and still loved me for all that I am.
My name is Luisa and I am a Lesbian. 🙂
Hello,
Sorry for my bad english, I’m french.
I always felt different.
On many aspects, same for love and even more in my sexuality.
I started to have my first confused feelings for a woman when I was in middle school.
I was only 12 and it was a period that represent for me so much pain.
During a certain time, I was sexually abused from a male of my family, I was even more disoriented and lost.
I talked about it to my family many years later and about the fact that I was attracted by women.
There was a teacher I was intrigued about. She had something that made me feel like a moth in love with light and who can’t help but be around her.
I even remember going to a refresher course (well I needed it haha) in volunteer because she was teaching.
It’s fun to remember the path I have taken with acceptance.
Simply, I was a young teenager unaware and hurted. I didn’t realised the impact that it would represent in my life.
Deciding that I had already enough to manage (hiding that I have been raped to my family to protect them from suffer, my studies, all the hazards we find when we enter teenage years) I decided to put aside my attraction.
What a mistake because I soon realised that a part of me was missing. And while I was struggling to face my destroyed feelings with a big decline of self-esteem, I met this girl.
I met her in a video game, I arrived at a stage where my reality was hurting so much that the virtual was becoming my everyday.
When I could finally met her for the first time, I felt a big waves of emotions and a voice inside me was telling me that she was going to change my life.
And it was true. I loved her deeply, in secret, I was 16 nearly 17.
We were not ready to have a relationship, both of us because of our past… So it was a disaster.
However, she helped me to open myself up.
I was so happy that I started to talk about it to my friends, 2 or 3 members of my family…. They quickly accepted it.
When we broke up, I was so devastated that my mom found out that something was wrong so I told her everything.
I was so stressed because my family is religious and I will always remember my mom’s words : ” Every act done out of love is loving is the eyes of God”.
Now that I’m 22, I’m thankful. Because she (the girl I loved) broke me when she left but she helped me to accept myself.
In this grief we are forced to face the reality.
By destroying me on a short term she gave me the opportunity to rebuild myself, I searched for all the strengh I had left for it.
When we start to open up, it’s a path to acceptance. Now I’m considering myself as being Me.
I’m not in a box, a label, I don’t share this point of view to absolutely want to be dertimined.
For me, even in our similarities, we are no less different.
I will be in love of who my heart will choose, no matter the gender.
I’m into love.
I love being different.
I love my inner self and the one I aspire to become.
When I was only eight I realized that I liked girls, I didn’t understand the world like I do now and I didn’t know homophobia in it self. So I told my friends when I was something like 9. At the young age of eleven I decided to tell my mother of what I forced myself to be bisexuality, thinking that if she did not accept my homosexuality she wouldn’t be so mad. I am extremely lucky to be in a very understanding and open minded family. My mom said she was very proud of me to have the courage to speak my truth and to know who I was and accept it at only 11. At about twelve a girl in my class literally screamed that I was gay. I thought I was ready and whenever I would come out to one of my friends, it would this time be as lesbian. For two years I was bullied. I started having panic attacks everyday and I didn’t want to go to school anymore. When it became to overwhelming I thought about hurting myself (and I sometimes still do)… I did once or twice but nothing”extra”. At that point my dad knew I was gay and he helped like my sister who is, herself, an asexual biromantic. I had my friends and family to relate on and went to see a therapist. I’m now better and help a lot of my queer friends come out and know that it ok to be who we are and that we shouldn’t be ashamed. For a while I thought I was genderfluid and soon I realized that I felt like using they/them pronouns all the time. It felt right. Although it wasn’t easy understanding the gender confusion I was going threw, people were there and they had my back. I felt safe. I now use the term non binary/genderqueer and the pronouns they/them & she/her. All of that said I am only going to turn 15 in a few months and I still have a lot to learn and emotions to go threw. I am extremely lucky to be surrounded by open minded people. I know some don’t have that particular luxury. And I want to do everything in power to help them.
I hope my story will make a difference somehow. Love and know that you are not alone.
Nerea.
So i was like, 15ish when i found out i was bisexual. I kinda knew something was different when i was a kid but i never really looked into it until i started an all girls secondary school basically run by nuns. Very exciting. I was around 13 when i seen this one girl who was like 3-4 years older than me. She was one of the most beautiful people i had ever seen and at the time i felt it was odd that i was feeling like that towards her. I introduced myself and we got talking and i basically became her little side kick aka i got completely friend zoned at the ripe age of 13 and i didn’t know it yet because i still believed that one day she’d magically feel the same way. I would then spend the next several years of school feeling like crap because i was told it was wrong to like the same sex because “the bible says it’s wrong and you’re basically in a nunnery so if we catch you doing that stuff we’ll shame you”. My teenage years were a bit rough to say the least with other family related problems going on so i never felt i had the time to actually find out whether i fully liked girls like the way i liked boys or if it was just a phase /girlcrush. That was until i met my ex girlfriend at 17. I had kissed other girls before that but this time was different considering i was of age (as was she) and stuff was bound to happen as we really liked eachother. I realized after my time with her that i do indeed like having a female companion just as much as I like being with a male one. I am in my 20’s now and have been with enough woman in the passed few years to realise i am comfortable with who i am. As much as i dont know fully who i am but then again who 100% knows themselves. Well probably Freddie mercury but he was Freddie mercury so. Anyway, yeah so lesson is don’t let anybody tell you it’s wrong for feeling the feelings you feel and as i always say you’ll never know you like it until you try it.
I would never have believed that my childhood dream of becoming an actress, would lead me to reconsider my sexual orientation …
While I was looking for inspiration to play a crazy girl with a gun and a lesbian for audition scenes to try to get into a drama program, here Google offered me “Wynonna Earp”. After listening to a few excerpts, I was too intrigued to stop there … Something strange happened in me when I saw Wayhaught for the first time … My heart was racing and i wanted more. This new feeling had something euphoric and strange at the same time …
At the beginning, I rented the season one only for my auditions, always looking for inspiration to embody a romantic feeling that I have never felt. Then, from episode 2 to episode 9, while I realized more and more that I was not indifferent to Wayhaught, the famous scene of the first kiss made me realize that what was possible for Waverly was possible for me too … no matter what my family thought I was by the way I be or act …
It happened in January this year and I didn’t always go out, because I don’t think I should since we don’t have to define ourselves publicly by our sexual orientation … Maybe it is motivated by the fear of revealing myself … I am already disabled so what kind of strange person and actress I would be in the eyes of people if in addition to being a “Tomboy” physically disabled, I was queer …
If the path to full acceptance of myself is still under construction, I tell myself that publishing this rainbow wave is a good start!
Now that I have said everything to you, I return to look at Wynonna and Wayhaught … only as inspiration for my auditions.
Looking forward to being on your screen as a proud disabled actress and queer.
I knew it since I was born. That I was different. But I didn´t expected I could be different in this way. I hated dresses and skirts when I was a kid. I hated when my hair were loose. I said to my parents I won´t get married because I hate dancing in pair( I was in kindergarden). When I played with my friends I always wanted to be a boy. In one game I even married my best friend. I had never any romantic feelings for her, it was just a game. I probably wanted to play boy characters because in a game everything was possible. And I wanted to be a completely different person. I wanted to escape from reality, that was the reason.
When I was eleven years old I wrote in my diary that I felt like a boy. I had no idea that something like “transgender” even exists and that was good because if I knew it I would definitely label myself as trans. And it would make me really confused. Because I´m not a boy.
When I was twelve I started choosing more girl characters in our games. Maybe it was because I was ashamed of running through our garden with my friends, using male pronouns. That was the time when I started thinking romantically about every boy who was nice to me and I was ridiculous, honestly. I had no idea what love is, I was too young. In those times I didn´t know anything about LGBT. I thought the term gay and queer were just rude words for boys. I knew homosexuality exists and I didn´t pay attention to it. I thought it´s weird. Sooner I was called a lesbian at my classmate´s birthday party. I said a name of a girl who was my friend when the other girls were talking about ,,Who do you think is best in our class?” They were talking about boys they liked. And I didn´t like any of them so I just said the name of my friend because in the question were not exactly mentioned boys. Those girls laughed at me and I was embarressed.
I was thirteen when I wrote on a small paper that I think one girl is the most beautiful in our class, boys included. It was some kind of game where we wrote who do we think is the most intelligent or the most annoying of our class, etc. And I thought… Why should I write there a boy´s name? I can think a girl is more pretty, right? So I wrote it. Not a big deal.
I turned fourteen and I started surfing the net. I watched one girl youtuber who was bisexual. I was amazed because I had no idea such a thing has existed. I searched for more information about LGBT. I started following a lesbian youtuber. I thought her videos are really funny. I like your videos, I wrote her to a comment section, though I don´t think I´m a lesbian. And then… I fell in love for the first time. I noticed I´m paying pretty much attention to one of my classmates. And then I realized I like her. I was terrified. What should I do now? It´s disgusting. I´m disgusting. I don´t want to like her. She doesn´t like me back. Why do I have to feel like this? I really didn´t want to be a lesbian. I hated that word. I was thinking that I could be maybe bisexual. I hoped I was just confused. But it really didn´t feel like some confuison. First, I didn´t want to tell anybody. Never. No. Absolutely not. But after few months it was unbearable. I felt the need of telling one of my friends. I started to making small hints before my friends and brother. I thought they will be prepared for the truth when I´ll tell them.
I naively believed the feeling about the firl will just desapear with time. But it didn´t. I finally took courage and told my best friend. I thought she knew it already because of those many hints I was making long months ago. But she was surprised. She had no idea. And then she ignored the fact I told her my big secret because she thought I don´t want to talk about it. I was angry at her but didn´t said anything.
I didn´t want to be in love with that girl anymore but I still was and I felt desparate about it. I noticed I´m starting to thinking about other girls, too. I thought some boys were kind of good looking but it was nothing to compare with the way I was feeling about some girls. I watched some series and read wattpad books just because couples of two girls in it.
The biggest twist was when my brother came out to me as gay. I cried and felt even more desparate than before. Before his coming out, I wanted to tell him- someday. But when he came out also to mum, I lost every piece of courage I´ve ever had. Mum was kind of supportive but she was expecting me to be straight, obviously. I didn´t know if I even can have feelings for boys but I knew I have feelings for girls. I started thinking, what if I was just confused because I watched so much youtube LGBT content?
When I thought I´m after two years finally over that girl, I texted her that I liked her before. I just wanted her to know. I knew she hasn´t ever liked me and I was okay with it. She was probably straight or ace. Her reaction was great but it was always little bit awkward between the two of us since that moment. Anyways, I don´t regret it.
I still didn´t identify as anything, I was too scared of the lesbian label.
I was sixteen years old when I fell for another straight girl. But this time it wasn´t so clear she was straight. It was like she was giving me some hints, she danced with me the whole evening, she convinced me to go for a competition with her, to dress up with her in one toilet cabin, she slept on me in a car. I was so confused and then it turned out she is just that kind of “ally” who likes gays but doesn´t care about other members of the community. I cried and felt desparate again. I told few more friends that I´m maybe into girls. The situation between me and my best friend became clear and we talked about it openly for the first time.
I was really thinking about the labels(What if I´m just confused straight girl? No, I don´t think so. What if I´m a lesbian? Oh, geez how I hate that word. I won´t say this about myself EVER. Am I a bisexual or a pansexual? Do I really like boys at all? I haven´t fell for any boys yet but does that mean that I don´t like boys? What if I´ll start liking them when I´ll grow up? How do I know now? What about transgender people? I know just one trans boy and he´s just my friend. Could I be ace? Well, I´m kind of scared of sex. But I haven´t ever been in a relationship before. How can I know?) and I stayed with my own: I like this girl and that girl and I don´t know who else, yet, whatever.
Then boys started liking me. That was the moment I was hoping for when I was thirteen and fourteen. But now I was seventeen and I felt bad for them. I wanted them to just find another object of interest so it would be easier for both of us. One boy was really unrelenting. He really fell in love with me. I felt horrible because I knew that feeling when you like someone who doesn´t like you back. But I was never so obtrusive to those girls as he was now to me. Yeah, he was funny, trustworthy, responsible, loyal, honest but I couldn´t imagine kissing him. So I said that I´m sorry but I´m not interested. Now he was the one who was desparate.
,,There´s someone else,” I explained. ,,Someone who I like.”
,,What did he do so you like him and not me?” he asked. I didn´t know what to say.
,,Well… he was nice and good looking – and then he asked me to dance and-”
,,Oh, I get it,” he said bitterly. ,,He was handsome. I´m just not attractive enough.”
,,No, that´s not it,” I groaned. ,,That´s not something I could change.” He didn´t seem like he understands. So I decided to tell him the truth.
,,Look. The person that I like… it´s not a boy. Alright? I don´t like you because… maybe I just can´t. That´s it.” And I thought he understands now. Well, he didn´t.
,,But… no. There must be a way to change this,” he said. I couldn´t believe my own ears. That was absurd! He continued. ,,Everything is possible if you want to. It´s all in your head. How could you know if you haven´t even kiss anyone yet? Maybe you didn´t like the girl, you just wanted look like her!” It was like he has read some psychological book about sexuality.
,,Anyways,” I sighed finally. ,,Even if I liked boys, I would stay just friends with you.” He wished me good luck in life then. We´re not really friends or whatever but sometimes we just send to each other memes.
Now I´m almost eighteen. I see a change between present me and the past me. I don´t mind dresses, skirts or dancing in pairs. And I like having hair loose. When I was eleven years old I thought for a while I´m feeling like a boy. But now I don´t. I´m a girl and it is one of few things in my life I am sure about.
I didn´t came out to my parents or to my brother and I don´t plan it. What should I say? Hey, family! You thought I´m straight, right? Well guess what, I´m not! No idea what my sexuality is but I fell in love with two girls so far and that´s it. SURPRISE! Haha, no. Never. I told it to nine people in real life (not counting the internet), the obtrusive boy included. I´m still not sure about the labels. Having to choose one of them is making me feel uncomfortable. I just kind of like fluid labels like gay or queer. I will come out only if there is a reason for it. For example when I´ll start to date and it will be serious. I will come out if it is a boy or a girl. I have to tell my family anyways. Even if I dated a boy, it wouldn´t be easy for me to tell them because I´m a very shy person. Coming out in every case, haha.
So that was my story. My main point is – labels sucks. I don´t want to put myself to any concrete label because I don´t want to be judged. If you don´t know what label suits you, you don´t have to use any of them. If you need to label yourself, feel free to do it. Life is too short to trying beeing someone else. Just be yourself. Good luck!
I’ve known since a young age that I was attracted to girls. I kissed my babysitters niece when we were 8 or 9, a few years later I found my dad’s playboy magazines – and I wasn’t trying to read the articles, I was lucky enough to have a computer in my room when I was in 6-8th grade and I found wlw fanfics online and I remember the one time I took a 1 megapixel video recording of two (2) girls kissing from a TV show on my flip phone when I was in the 9th grade (of which a friend saw and I’ve never panicked more than I have then, but someone got them to drop it and move on). The point is I’ve always known, I just always felt like that part of me had to stay hidden, even though I later became a very outspoken ally of the LGBTQ2IA+ community. I even sat with several friends as we cried together while they came out to me and I loved and supported all of them, but yet I felt that I couldn’t do the same. Maybe it was just my body insecurities, or whatever but I felt, and I guess still do to an extent, that I didn’t belong. That I didn’t physically look or dress and certain way so I couldn’t be anything but straight.
Even though I supported and had friends in the community I felt that I still needed to hide that part of myself, like it was ok for everyone else but it was wrong that I felt that way. I kept that part of me isolated to my apartment, my second tumblr account, etc. I let others make their own assumptions and just ran with it. That felt a lot easier to me than actually saying those words out loud.
I also struggled as the years went on with my age (I’m 28) I started thinking that I was “too old to come out” and what if I come out as this but later figured out that I’m that or none of those. Would people take me seriously? Would that perpetuate the bisexual stereotype of just being confused? Thinking about coming out is stressful enough but add those questions on top of that with no one to ask or have provide some kind of reassurance that everything I was feeling and thinking was normal and valid and all I had to focus on was me was torture.
And then one day I was scrolling through Tumblr and saw gifs of WayHaught and I read the comments and found out about Wynonna Earp (Funny side story: I didn’t watch the series immediately so I was just going off comments and tags and I thought Nicole was Wynonna for the longest time and was a bit confused when I first started watching the show lol) Watching Waverly grow to understand and accept herself and how brave and sure she was of her feelings for Nicole really hit me. I knew it was just a TV show but her journey was so authentic that if helped me be a bit more comfortable with what I was feeling. As soon as I started the show I also sent out my #EarperGreet tweet and was floored by how friendly and accepting the fandom was. Everything combined made me feel like I had a safe place to be myself. I started getting bolder on what I posted or liked on my main twitter and eventually got the chance to hang out with other Earpers from my city. Being able to hang out with other queer people naturally made me feel more comfortable and confident to be myself. It would be another 7 months after meeting my fellow Earpers in person, of subtle hints and whatnot online before I finally came out on twitter, on national coming out day no less. I came out as Bi and I couldn’t be happier. I’m still a bit shy in person talking about it, but I think that’s just my normal introverted, awkward self. It sounds silly, or maybe it doesn’t, but Wynonna Earp, WayHaught and Earpers as a whole really helped in making it possible for me to be me. If I hadn’t found wearp I honestly think I would have continued to be a closeted ally. So thank you.
Disclamer: I am not a writer by any means and have major scatter brain when I try to write so this probably reads as a word vomit salad so I hope it makes sense.
I knew I was “different” in the early years of high school, 14 years old, and I denied it… hard. I had seen and heard how people in my family, in my community and in my friends group reacted to any sway on the sexuality spectrum, and so I hid it. For so many years, from every single person, to the point where I had hidden it from myself again, any thoughts or feelings for someone of the opposite sex and I would chalk it up to envy or just admiration and leave it at that, even though I knew I was actively lying to myself. When I was 18 a close friend of mine came out while we were still in high school And she faced some relentless bullying because of it, despite having friends and others who supported her, And that made me decide that I would wait until I graduated, which turned into I’ll wait until I’m not living with my parents which turned into I’ll wait until I move out of this very closed minded town.
I came out to that very same friend 2 years later because I was having some incredible inner turmoil over all of it, of what it would mean to be myself. To allow myself to breathe and live my life without lying or hiding.
And from then on I found it harder to hide my true self, and even harder to want to hide. I had been hiding for so long that once I started to accept that part of myself, there was no holding back.
I moved to the other side of the country, I had many reasons for that decision, but ultimately it was for my mental health, I had been through a lot of traumatic experiences and after four years of treatment for my depression and anxiety I felt the only way I could make progress and be able to live was to leave the town and people who had contributed to my state.
And when I moved I came out officially and publicly at 22 years old. I know there are people from my home town who no longer acknowledge my existence, that didn’t welcome me home as the same girl they loved when I left, but that is not mine to carry, I am being honest, and living my life which has seen me heal and grow into the best version of me.
By acknowledging who I am, I was able to acknowledge the pretty crappy things I had put up with because I had been convinced, by my own mind and by others that I didn’t deserve to be happy because I loved differently,
Since coming out, I have been in the healthiest relationship that I’ve ever been in, she helps me heal, and grow and strive for better everyday, and being in a healthy relationship is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, being open and vulnerable and trusting after years of closing myself off from pain or fear or my past is the scariest thing but it has been the most rewarding.
