Community Rainbow Waves

Toni

Hi, my name is Toni I am 13 and I’m Bisexual. I have two very conservative parents who may never support who I am. But, that’s fine with me because I’ve realized over the years that their opinion on my love life doesn’t matter. As long as I’m happy and the person treats me right why should how they identity matter? Being with a woman is a better experience than being with a man. When you’re with a woman, they understand you better, they can relate to all the struggles that come with being a woman. Especially if your a colored queer woman in America. My family has no idea how I feel they won’t accept it but I’ve decided that once I’m 18, I’ll come out to them. That way, they can’t kick me out, by then they can disown me if that’s what they choose, at least I’ll be happy.

As a survivor of 3 years of sexual assault, it’s more common for me to gravitate towards women. It’s ok for me not to be comfortable with a man. Those 3 years of my life were the longest and hardest. It started when I was 7 turning 8 and it ended when I was 11. During the duration of those years, I was very depressed life was so miserable. Then, I meet a girl who changed my point of view of things, she had experienced the same tragedy as me. We were both survivors, we are always there for each other, we make each other smile it’s great. The sad part about the whole thing is the person who ruined my childhood is someone that I will continue to see. My family knows of what happened, but they act like it’s never happened.

Once I came out to the people who genuinely know me, I’ve been living my best life, things have been so amazing, of course, life isn’t all sunshine and rainbows but for the most part, it’s alright. I’ve found out that I’m most happy when talking, thinking, or texting a girl. “Wynonna Earp”, Wayhaught’s relationship is so adorable, even though it’s just a show, Dom and Kat’s relationship is just so beautiful and It makes me think “Wow now that’s the kind of love I want, I want someone to look at me the way they look at each other.”

In all, I hope that what you can take from my little story, is don’t be afraid to be you screw anyone else’s opinion but your own. If they don’t like who you are then it’s their loss, live for yourself and who you want to be, don’t let others live through you.

Fer

My first attraction to a woman was when I was 11 years old (2015) I didn’t really understand what was going on since I had heard something about that in my life since what my family believes and the way I was raised is that it is always a man and a woman so I thought that I had some flaw inside that made me feel very strong emotions towards someone that was not right. When I entered high school (2016) I had already heard and researched more things about the subject, on the one hand my family told me that the behavior of these people was unnatural and on the other hand the social networks began to ask for acceptance with the phrase ¨love is Love¨ which confused me more and more but one day on the program ¨supergirl’ Alex Danvers came out of the closet and I wished I was in his place, At that time I identified myself as a young bisexual woman, I began to watch programs like Wynonna Earp which is also one of the programs that has most marked my life from the way Waverly begins to accept her sexuality to her commitment to Nicole.
The first person I proposed to was my best friend and his reaction was better than I expected since he only told me that he supported me and then proceeded to ask me about her as if she was the most normal thing in the world and I loved that.
At my school I liked to talk to my classmates about it because sometimes my perspective and theirs helped us empathize with each other’s situations.
I hope that in a future there is no more the phrase ¨come from closet¨ and that all this is taken as something completely natural.

Bisexual

I knew I was different when I was about 11. Didn’t realize it until I was in my twenties.
I was reading fan-fiction one day and started talking to the author of the story and she told me that she was gay and how she came out and was proud of it. I told her what I had been feeling and came out to her as bisexual.
Then I had to buck the courage to tell My best friend of 20 years at that point. But she had pointed it out to me one day after my conversation with the author friend.
She told me she always knew because I looked at girls differently than I do guys. She wasn’t put off because she has a gay family member.
I told my husband and he smiled and said I still love you.
The hardest one to tell was my other friend. She wasn’t too keen on gay people as In she just didn’t get it. However now we play “couple” together when we do go out to the bar for a girls night. She’s fine with me now. Just blindsided her.
In a manner of speaking I haven’t totally come out. I’m terrified of telling my family. My dad I’m sure knows I’ve hinted at it and he goes with it. But it’s my mother. She’s called bisexual people greedy. And it’s stuck with me. She’s called me a butch since I cut my hair differently. Or how I wear my clothes. She says you dress like a dyke. I get annoyed and ignore her as best as I can.
It hurts. It will always hurt. But Dominique you inspire me. So here is my truth. I am a bisexual married woman. I love the heart not the parts type.

Bisexual

I didn’t grow up with much role models or people who understood what it meant to be part of the LGBTQIA community. Coming from both a religious and hispanic background it’s not something that’s easily seen or accepted. I was 14 when I had my first boyfriend, I really liked him and I was sure that my journey would continue to go straight as planned or how my family expected, but, not every relationship is meant to last. When I turned 15 I was a sophomore in high-school and I had developed feelings for my then best friend. It took three attempts for her to finally want to go out with me, talk about a challenge! It’s high-school and we were young but, it was my first true experience with love or the concept of falling in love. I knew I was bisexual from the moment I realized that I was attracted to both men and women.

Fast Forward to my 2nd year in college 2016, I came out to my super religiously Catholic mom. It was hard probably one of the hardest experiences of my life because I knew she wouldn’t accept it. But I needed to accept it, it needed to feel real and I needed to live my truth. Presently, it’s been four years and my mom still struggles with who I am and who I choose to love. I know some people find it difficult yet, I love my family, it’s hard to change the mindset of people who were raised and exposed to things a certain way, I don’t blame her for not accepting me. But I am very hopeful she will come around, our relationship isn’t the greatest but then again my mother is 65 years old and I’m going to be 24 this year, we’re different souls from different times and that’s ok.

I’m truly at peace with who I am and I know patience is key, accepting myself is and was the first step to my ongoing journey. Going back to what I said earlier, I didn’t grow up with representation or role models, in fact I might be the first openly bisexual member of my family, and I have quite a big family, I’m the youngest of five. Wynonna Earp wasn’t just a show that let me feel represented as a member of the LGBTQIA, but, it’s also a show where there’s a badass female lead and badass female casts, and it represents freedom. The writing is freeing and provides relief the actresses and actors are so refreshing and I’m proud to say that this is the first time I feel apart of something even if physically I’m not, if that makes sense. I’m free. I just hope that someone managed to read all this and feels apart of something great, because you are great, you are loved, and you are beautiful. Live freely, life’s to short not to.

When a trauma becomes a blessing, the struggle of the invisibility of bi people.

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

I realize when I was four that I liked boys and girls the same way, but when felt so confused when adults would call my boy crush my boyfriend and my girl crush my best friend. Then about 5 years later my sisters came out as gay and that’s when I realize that it was not the norm, she was met with so much hurt, mean comment, and hitting that it shut me up and all the shame arrive. But I didn’t feel like my sister, because I also loved boys and for so long I truly believed that everybody did also love everyone, but were too ashamed to admit it. And then started middle school. My younger self was thrown in a catholic school in the south of France and there I met this girl. Beautiful and funny soul and I fell in love with her, but I didn’t really understand it, dah just 12 years old, and apparently was quite obvious about it. And Gosh this is hard to write, but let me reassure you I’m all good now so no worries. After a few months of hanging out with that girl, I was one day attack in the school bathroom by two 14 years old boys, clearly, there were not weel and past their frustration on me, and they just raped me in the bathroom with the excuse that they were going to cure me, that I was not “straight enough” and their penis was the solution, which clearly it wasn’t. It took me 12 years to be able to overcome that event and openly talk about it. After suffering from PTSD, amnesia, had to re-learn how to read and write after I forgot it because of the trauma. After battling with internalize biphobia, self-harm, depression, and anxiety, Finally, it got better. I moved to Switzerland when I was 16 and was met with so much acceptance and love for the community swiss people and little by little started healing. And then in the summer of 2019 discovered the tv show Legends and Wynonna Earp and was so touched by how the actresses talk about there role and how Emily talked about the importance of positive representation and that were it all truly got better. It was the first time I heard the bisexual word use in a positive way and not as an insult or a sexual joke, which was such a revelation. To have that positive community of Earpers really helped. And I came out last November, at 24, to my family and they all really had progressed in there ideas and were all so supportive and then came out to everyone and being in Switzerland every one was so supportive, which was a really amazing feeling. I feel lucky now to be part of a support group of bi/pan people and participated in a lot of queer events organized in Switzerland. I’m sorry to anyone who felt triggered reading that but this story is actually a beautiful one, because I have now forgiven all of those people and hurt me out of ignorance and feel privilege now to be able to help educate and support the LGBT+ community here in Geneva, gay marriage here is still not allowed so still a lot of work to do. Anyway, all of those traumas were hard and at the same time a blessing in many ways. I am now a sweet vegan, queer, loving woman who does her best to make the world a better, more accepting place for everyone. So bless you all it can always get better and sorry for the writing, not my first language. love you all, melody.

Leanne M.

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.

Gay

I was never really attracted to anyone growing up, I never understood the whole thing. I just didn’t feel the ‘oh my God I like him so much’ thing that all my friends seemed to be experiencing. Until one day I saw a scene from the show ‘faking it’ where two girls kissed and I was immediately thinking, that looks right. I watched more episodes and I found myself drawn to the main couple and their trials and tribulations, I was never this invested in a relationship before. After I ran out of episodes I started looking online and turns out there was more than one show with a girl and girl relationship. I started to know the show by the scenes I saw on YouTube. I started realizing people in my life who I had always thought I just really wanted to be friends with them and realizing that that feeling was what a crush is. I had attractions to people for years I just never knew that those attractions being girls was an option so I suppressed those emotions and changed them subconsciously. My world changed around me. About a year later and I was up to date an all the wlw couples on TV and I decided to finally tell someone, my best friend. After school one day I sent her the link to a YouTube video of a coming out song. Her response ” hooray you’re gay!”. I was fully accepted by her and that was incredible. A feeling of freedom and openness. I started college and my new friends just kinda thought I wasn’t really into relationships and just let me off with that. Which would be great if that was the case. One day we all decided to make tinder accounts for each other for fun and when my flatmate gave me my phone back she had it set to see guys. She asked what I thought (meaning her choice of pictures) and I just said ‘ it’s great but I will change one thing’ and I switched it to see girls. None of them even reacted, my flatmate said okay fair enough and that was that. I still haven’t come out to any more friends from home, they seem like a bigger deal and it never seems to come up so it’s difficult. My parents are a different kettle of fish all together but we’ll get there soon enough.

I had been holding my breath for so long, and I needed to exhale at one point or another, or I would explode from holding it in.

I’ve had crushes on girls for as long as I can remember. Never made much of it, figured it was “normal”. Thought maybe it was just because I admired them and wanted to be them, or that it was a typical part of growing up.

In high school, I had crushes on boys and girls. I didn’t know much about anything back then, so I figured it was just a phase and one side would fade and disappear over time. That I was just figuring myself out and, one day, one side would win.
Since all I knew that existed was either gay or straight, it had to be one or the other, right?

I always hoped I would end up being only into boys, so that I could be “normal”. I wanted to be normal more than anything in this world.
My whole life, I had never fit in at all. With anyone, or anywhere. So I needed to at least be “normal” for one freaking thing, you know what I mean?

But then in college… I mean, classic story I guess, I fell for my straight female best friend. It didn’t go anywhere, but because at the time the only representation of bisexuality was the toxic version I had seen in the media, as well as the horrible things people would say about bisexuals, I decided to bury my attraction to guys.
I could NOT be bi… I’d rather be gay than bi. The examples I had seen were evil and toxic, and I just couldn’t be like them. There was no way. Absolutely no way. Never. Nope.

So I did everything I could to bury that side of me.
I would be so mean to myself.
…Fear and shame can make you think terrible words and do terrible things.

After a while, still in college, I ended up coming out as a lesbian. I hoped that by saying it, it would make it real. That it would erase the other part I didn’t want to think about.
I came out online to my classmates, after testing the waters for a while, trying to see if they would be accepting or not.

It was mostly fine. The more religious ones would often remind me that I would be going to hell for it, but apart from that it was great and the guys invited me to hang out with them. That was fun 🙂

Some time later, I came out to my parents through a letter I left in a place I knew they’d see it.

I was absolutely terrified they would kick me out.

The thing is… I come from a really judgmental family. My mum is very religious, but I’ve also heard a lot of racist and homophobic things growing up. And that’s just a tiny part of the range of judging comments I’ve heard all my life.

I’ve never been close to my family.
Discussions have never been a thing.
Disagreements mean either silence or terrible fights. Or both.

So I had no idea how that would turn out, but I felt like I needed to do it, if only to stop hearing “when are you gonna get a boyfriend?” that always tore me up inside.

I couldn’t breathe. I had been holding my breath for so long, and I needed to exhale at one point or another, or I would explode from holding it in.

Fortunately, in the end it was okay. I mean, at least they didn’t kick me out.

The “conversation” lasted for about 2 minutes, max, and then we never spoke about it again. (Except for the “maybe it’s just a phase” that I got a few times over the early years.)

That was around… 2004 I think?

Then once, in a birthday message a few years ago, my mum mentioned that she hoped I would find a woman I could be happy with. But that’s pretty much it. (And even today, I still hear homophobic things sometimes when I visit, if there’s something on TV about our beautiful community.)

Some time after I came out to my parents, I came out by email to most of my extended family. Again, I’ve never been close to anyone, and it’s always been easier for me to write than speak, so that’s how I chose to do it.
As far as I know, they’re all accepting. The ones I’ve told, anyway. But for other reasons, I stopped seeing them around that time, so who knows, really.

But to this day, except my godmother who I told recently when the topic came up, they all still think I’m gay.
Since emotionally I’ve only fallen for women, I didn’t want my parents to start hoping I would end up with a man when I don’t see it ever happening.

I mean, I’m pansexual, so I could end up with anyone I connect with no matter their gender, but… I’ve fallen for 3 women so far. No one else.

When I find “the one”, I want to finally feel safe using my chosen label. But until then, I feel safer just not talking about it around my parents.

But speaking of pansexuality… At some point I decided that no matter what society thought about bisexuality, I was only hurting myself by trying to fight who I was.
And then I heard about pansexuality, and it was the first label that I really connected with. The definition made so much sense to me, and it just felt right.

The puzzle pieces finally clicked into place. Falling for someone’s soul, regardless of their gender, regardless of their genitalia, made all the sense in the world to me.
And by learning about the different labels, by finding great people who identified as them, I started to really accept myself and eventually started to love this part of me.

I mean… I’m just me, you know? 🙂

I’m also out in my workplace now. Took me years and for an openly gay man to be hired for me to feel safe enough to do it, but it’s done. Haven’t had any problems so far.

And I want to believe that I would also be open if I ever got a different job.

I can’t go back to hiding. I need to breathe.
Now that I know how great and freeing it feels to have air moving through my lungs, I don’t want to hide this huge part of who I am.

And today, well… I’m just fighting for better representation. And for bisexuality and pansexuality to be seen in a better light (and to be seen, period), so that the next generations don’t have to feel all the shame I’ve felt back when I was still figuring it out.

Labels or no labels, people should have access to amazing examples of every shade of our beautiful and colourful rainbow, so they can find a place to fit in somewhere along the way.

I’m convinced that love is stronger than everything else, so… I do believe that one day love will truly win.

And what a world this will be. x

I’m a woman who’s proud to love other women

My coming-out story is a loooong journey. I first faced my homosexuality when I was 18. I’d left my family-nest to pursue my studies, and it really was the first time I was left alone with myself. It became a journey, during which I discovered myself entirely.
And I met that one girl. She was gay, and I completely fell for her. That moment was the starting point of a really long thinking about my sexuality and myself in general. Each step was full of sadness and pain … but also full of joy. It took me 6 months to tell my closest friends about being in love with a woman. More than a year to completely accept and embrace my homosexuality.
But the hardest part was telling my family. I’m really close to them, we share everything and love each other so fucking much. Taking the risk to lose all of this by telling them my truth, it was unimaginable for me. So I kept it inside of me for 4 (very long) years. The thing is, I was exhausted. Exhausted of lying to the ones I love, of hiding my feelings and a huge part of my life.
That is why, on January 1st 2019, I confessed to my family about my homosexuality. And, damn it, all the feedbacks I received were full of love and acceptance. I was scared of crying because they would reject me. Instead, I cried only tears of joy because they accepted me. Whole of me.
Nowadays, I’m a very happy 24 years-old gay AF woman.
M.
From France.

The darkness and pain never ends

Am a bisexual who haven’t come out to my family, but told my close friends
I know my family will never approve and I don’t want to lose them. They the only thing I’ve got.