Community Rainbow Waves

Kaleen’s Journey

Your personal journey to finding yourself¬–whether you’re queer or not¬–is a universal thing we all experience. As unique and individual those journeys may be, the feelings and emotions are something we all share, and I find that to be so beautiful!

Love is love, hurt is hurt, heavy is heavy, hard is hard, joy is joy. Remember we all experience these things together and no one should judge anyone’s story and compete over struggles, but rather find connections and how much we all share as people. Let’s all continue to grow, love and support each other and continue this wave of self-love and discovery!

So that said, I would love to share my experience publicly for the first time, in the hopes it helps someone else find their truth. <3

I’m Kaleen and I identify as lesbian, queer and gay. I am 28 years old and I’m an art director and actress in San Francisco. For me, and I’m sure many of you, finding myself and accepting myself are two very different things and came at very different times in my life. Next week, I proudly celebrate my 4 year wedding anniversary with my amazing wife (we’ve been together for over 8 years) so my story has a very happy ending! But it definitely didn’t start that way.

For most of my life, I did not realize I was gay. I didn’t even consider it as an option. I grew up in a religious household with a mother who I believe after years of therapy to have Borderline personality disorder (BPD). It was not a healthy or emotionally safe environment for me. I truly believed that I was just an amazing Christian who was waiting till marriage (for you know)… but waiting was super easy for me because I had ZERO desire to be intimate with a man. Even when I had boyfriends and would kiss them, I would find myself counting down the seconds till it was over. I truly thought everyone felt this way and it was something I would learn to like and we all just have to get over that hurdle of disgust. I would see my friends falling head over heels for their boyfriends and wonder how they got over that hurdle, and think I’ll get there soon too… that day didn’t come for me.

Knowing myself now and looking back, there were so many “clues” that I was gay, but it still did not cross my mind. I remember watching the show House and there was an episode when Olivia Wilde’s character, Thirteen, came out as bisexual. The scene where she kissed another woman, I remember rewinding and watching it a few times. This was one of the first times I’d seen this on T.V. and it was the start of my eyes opening into what is possible. This is why representation is SO important!

Fast forward to college. This is when my life flipped on its head! I found myself in a relationship with a man and we got engaged (for his privacy, I will call him John). He was a wonderful human, and I truly thought I was “in” love. I did love him, but just not the way he deserved to be loved, and not the way I deserved to experience it. At this time, I also built a wonderful friendship with a girl and we became best friends. When I got engaged to John, something in me snapped because my mind knew that eventually I will have to have sex with this person. This tossed me into a deep depression and in doing so, also opened my eyes to a past I had bolted shut. I realized all in one moment, that I was gay, in love with my best friend, and I also had PTSD with memories of being sexually abused by a family member for half my childhood flooding my mind, all while going to school full time and holding a job to pay rent. It was a lot to discover all at one time and I felt completely overwhelmed and alone. The only person I felt comfortable sharing all these pieces of myself with was my best friend Kay. Little by little I had to confront and try to accept all these things happening in my life.

At this time, I asked John to give me space. He understood that I was having trouble with my PTSD and needed to distance myself from him. We were fully separated for over 3 months with no communication as I worked to find myself again and heal from my past.

Kay was patient and helped me heal, and through all this we became unbelievably close. At this time, she was not out as gay either. Funny enough, we did not even realize that our relationship was different than other girl/girl relationships because it felt so natural to the point we didn’t stop and ask ourselves if this was “normal”. Needless to say, we figured it out together. At this point, I still wasn’t sure if I was going to allow myself to live an authentic life because I knew in doing this, I would lose family. Before I said yes or no, I gave myself one day to openly (in the privacy of my home) love Kay and acknowledge how we felt for one another. We spent the day just holding each other, laughing, and enjoying how we felt. As the clock drew near to midnight, our hearts began to sink as we knew we only had this moment. To this day, I can’t watch All Dogs Go To Heaven because that was on in the background. We shared one last amazing kiss and then walked into separate rooms. Oh, did I not mention we were also roommates! Yeah… that made things even harder!

Days turned into weeks of me pretending like I could live without her, till I just couldn’t take it anymore. I decided I would let myself be gay if, and only if, my sister could be ok with it. Lucky for me, she was open to trying to understand. It was at this point I officially ended my engagement with John. I returned the ring and we had a wonderful moment of thanking each other for all the good times and wished nothing but happiness and healing to one another. A few months after this, I began my first true relationship with Kay.

I came out to my family and my father and stepmom were amazingly supportive and even helped pay for my therapy during all this, but my mother would not accept my truth. She said to me “I would rather you be unhappy in this lifetime, but forever happy in the kingdom of god” and asked me to deny myself love and live alone. I gave myself the best gift I could and will ever give and decided to fully embrace my love for Kay regardless of what this person thought. It was hard, it’s still hard to think about, but it’s what was best for me. Years later when we became engaged, my mom officially removed herself from my life and we haven’t seen or spoken since.

Like I said in the beginning of the story, Kay and I have now been together for over 8 years and we are about to celebrate our 4 year wedding anniversary on April 2nd. She is my absolute best friend and I don’t have words for how much I love her. She is the first time I have experienced unconditional love, and I value her with everything I am. Deciding to accept myself and live an openly gay life is the best decision I’ve made for myself and it’s a privilege I will never take for granted.

I wish everyone who reads this love and acceptance within themselves. You are love, you are here and you stay. Xoxo

Lesbian

Hi my name is Belen and I struggled with finding my sexuality and who i was all throughout middle school and the beginning of high school. I am 16 years old and i came out to my mom at 15 on November 11th 2019 and then came out to my dad in February of 2020. It took me a while to come to terms with me liking girls and hated myself for a while because of it. It was a big struggle that i had to overcome and i am very proud of myself for finally being able to be my true self and be proud of who i am and how far i have come.

Lesbian

CONTENT WARNING: THIS COMING OUT STORY CONTAINS DESCRIPTION AND/OR DISCUSSION ABOUT SEXUAL ASSAULT.

I came out when I was 14 years of age, 13 years ago, most of my family were accepting, though a few were not. Some still not to this day, but have been a little more accepting through the years. Shockingly for me the older generation in the family were more supportive than the younger, excluding my dad. My dad was not accepting at first, it come to the point where I didnt have any contact with my dad for over two years.. due to the fact that when I was in my late teens he actually tried to pay me to be with a boy! As you could tell that was a big no. Thankfully my dad is 100% supportive of me now and we have a great relationship. Many people ask me how I could forgive him? My reply.. whats the point in holding on to something bad, when hes sorry and I’ve had many more happy memories shared with him. I have had many struggles in life many battles I have fought, the most hardest was being told I was confused because I was sexually assaulted from the age of 12 to 14, “your not gay, your just traumatised”, i always new from a young age, the first time I kissed a girl, 9 years of age (practising) like kids did. My happest memory of coming out was actually only 2 years ago, to my great grandfather, I was always told not to say anything as he was old and wouldn’t understand, i was very close with my grampa so, when he was 93 I came out to him, he did not judge me what so ever he just told me about the time he met my great grandmother, and told me it doesn’t matter who you love, it doesn’t matter how much you fight, if you love you them don’t ever let them go . That conversation was one of the last conversations I had with him. Its a conversation that I hold dear to me and one people should listen to.

Nonbinary/ queer

I think some part of me always new that I wasn’t a girl. I dressed in boys clothes and I hated wearing anything that made me look feminine. When I was diagnosed with autism (aged 12) I assumed that that was the reason I felt different. About a year later I started questioning my sexuality. It took about 2 years before I accepted myself as gay. I came out to a few friends who were really accepting and I finally felt happy with myself, but I didn’t feel whole. Like I’d just told people something so they’d understand, but it wasn’t me. For about 2 years I kept having lapses in thoughts about my gender. It got to the point where I gave up and decided to just present myself in a way that made me comfortable. So I cut my hair short and changed my name. A couple of months later I had a sudden realisation moment where I realised that I’m nonbinary. Two days later I came out to my friend who I had previously come out to as gay. It took a couple of months to come out to my family. It took some time for me to fully accept the dysphoria I have about my chest and I got a binder. I recently started causually slipping into conversations that I’m nonbinary to anyone who doesn’t know yet. I feel like this isn’t my definitive coming out story though. As someone who is queer I am constantly coming out to people whether it’s my gender or sexuality, but this is how I found out who i am as a person.

Nicole (not Haught)

I am on my mid-30s, have been married to a man for 10 years, have 2 young kids and have just recently begun to come out. It’s in some ways a sad journey because it marks the end of my marriage to a truly amazing man who gave me the security and space to find myself, but it is not the end of my family. I feel an incredible sense of relief at finally being able to love and accept myself and live an honest life. My children will be better for having a happy mother, and they still have 2 loving parents who love them very much.
Announcing your divorce and your queerness all at once is quite a lot, but I have been so lucky to receive nothing but support from my friends and family.
I think part of what scared me for so long was being defined by my sexuality, but we are all so much more than that aren’t we? I am a mother, a friend, a damn successful businesswoman, a sister, a daughter…and I happen to also be a lesbian.

I’m a trans-masculine nonbinary lesbian.

I realized that I liked women when I was thirteen. I recognized it and came out as bisexual when I was fourteen years old. I came out for the first time on 3/29/20. I kept searching for labels that fit better after realizing that bisexuality didn’t fit me. I began experimenting with they/them pronouns and my attraction to men decreased very quickly. I chose a new name for myself and began using they/them pronouns. I began identifying as a lesbian, and came out as a lesbian in June 2020. In July, I came out as nonbinary. I started dressing masculine and I felt a lot more comfortable. I was not accepted by my family after coming out, and I struggled with undiagnosed depression and anxiety and possibly ADHD. Even though I was out of the closet, I still struggled with internalized homophobia and compulsory heterosexuality. My family continues to deadname and misgender me, despite all my efforts to correct them and get them to use my correct name and pronouns. I began to self harm to cope with gender dysphoria and my family’s rejection of my identity. I still live with my family and I am not currently able to get away from them or move out. Seeing the state of the country that I live in, and how it treated people like me worsened my feeling of hopelessness. My story does not have a happy ending yet, but I want to live to make it better. I am human. I’ve got goals, and dreams, and hopes. I am not just my past, and I am not just my trauma. I want to become an actor. I want to have a family one day. I want to adopt kids when I get older. I can’t wait to make some of my dreams come true.

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!

I came out after being dumped by my first girfriend

I always knew I was gay, even before I knew what being gay was. I was always just interested in girls. But I never told anyone. When I was 18 I got my first girlfriend, and I was sooo in love. She dumped me 6 months later, and I was heartbroken. So I finally decided to come out to my best friend. And it turned out I was worrried about nothing. I was sooo nervous before saying the words, but I was just met with love and understanding.

I had quite the easy journey of coming out, I was lucky. Thankfully I live in a country where it’s easy to be open. For the past 12 years I have lived with my girlfriend, and we have 2 beautiful kids together. Live your own truth, and be with the one you love

I identify myself as female

I think around the age of 8 or 9 when the girls of my classroom started liking the boys and talk about them I had the thought that the boys were so childish and stupid and still girls liked them. After that when I knew that existed gay and queer people I already accepted them even though I never had think about it. Some years later I was talking to my best friend and I said that I really liked girls and apparently some guys but I didn’t know exactly what I was and she accepted me and open up about herself too. I still don’t have a defined sexuality and that’s ok since I know what I like.

JENNIFER, 19, CISGENDER LESBIAN, SHE/HER

I first thought I might be gay when I was 11 (2011). It occurred to me that every ‘crush’ I’d had on boys had only ever been for show. Boys weren’t something I ever thought of that way unless prompted by peers or parents. I remember thinking over in my head ‘no, Jeni, you can’t be gay. This kind of thing doesn’t happen to me’ and then I pushed it far back in my mind for years.
By high school (2013), I started to notice I was different. I happened to be in an all girls class so it was easy to notice. I was spending every day with 30 other 13yo girls and all of them obsessing over boys and I started to feel like something was wrong with me. Funnily enough, 13yo me didn’t even consider that I might be gay, I was just pleased to not be distracted from my school work and went on faking crushes on boys, barely realising that was what I was doing.
It took one of my close friends coming out as bisexual, in grade 9 (2014),to make me start thinking about that again, and I didn’t fully admit it to myself, that I liked girls, until I couldn’t deny my feelings for that friend.
I wanted to tell my best friend first but she was away sick from school the day I planned to do it. It made me sad all day and in English I ended up coming out my bi friend/crush as bisexual. I saw being bisexual as more ‘normal’; I was too scared to admit to anyone or even myself that I didn’t like boys. She took it well of course. I texted my other friend that afternoon and told her and she was supportive too.
The next person I told was my older sibling and they were great about it but warned me that our parents didn’t ‘believe’ in bisexuality.
Those first ‘coming outs’ went down in August 2014 right around my 14th birthday. By that September I told a classmate of mine (later became my best friend, now still a good friend) after she’d gushed to me about the boy she liked and then asked who I liked. And, after some nervous hesitation, I told her. She didn’t even question it she just said it was cute and wanted to hear more about the crush not my sexuality which was a huge relief.
The rest of my family (mum, dad, other two siblings) I came out to that October, when I started dating my bisexual friend, simply by telling them who I was dating. They weren’t not supportive. I didn’t expect them to have any ‘issues’ with it. But I can’t say I was happy about their reactions. All that sticks out to me is my dad joking ‘at least you won’t get pregnant’ (which hurt because I’ve always really really wanted to be a mum) and one of my siblings chiming in with another joke. And I can’t ever complain about that because they support me which is ‘lucky’.
My other friends and peers just found out by seeing me with my girlfriend, from what I remember. We didn’t hide it much at school, but there was still hate. I remember holding hands once on the way to class and some guy called us f*gs.
It took me a couple more years to let myself be just gay. I’m almost 20 now and still struggle to talk directly about how I’m attracted to women, unless I’m saying it in a joke. I still feel a bit ashamed at times when watching intimate moments between 2 women in shows/movies and even when no one else is in the room and it’s just kissing. I still have to worry about how anyone new I meet could be moderately to extremely homophobic. I still feel the need to come out to new people I meet. I still have to hide it from my homophobic grandparents. Some of it just really sucks.
But some of it is beautiful too and I try every day to focus on those parts more. My new goal, inspired by Dominique P-C, is to remind myself daily that my queerness is beautiful.