Community Rainbow Waves

Well I’m gay…

Hello first. I am an 18 year old girl who is gay. I come from a Jewish family from Berlin. My parents are Russians, so they’re not the most open people anyway. Actually, I knew pretty early that I wasn’t really into boys, but my whole environment was absolutely against lgbt +. In general, everything that was different. So I hid my feelings and was very unhappy. Until I started looking at wynonna Earp and saw how many people had feelings similar to mine. And then I finally came out. It was very liberating for me, but the reactions were really not great. I mean my parents yelled at me first and called me a disappointment. Some of my siblings had no problem with it, but some kept their distance from then on. When I told my best friend she didn’t really have a bad reaction (I thought). but suddenly she blocked me everywhere and never spoke to me again. But it was worth it. I found new friends who accept me for who I am and I never have to hide again. I thank you Dominique. I don’t think I would have had the courage to come out without you , the show and without this community.

Lesbian/Gay

It was a very confusing process for me realising that I didn’t like boys and was only into girls. I dated boys my whole life knowing something wasn’t right, I actually thought something was wrong with me rather than thinking oh maybe I’m gay.

I was 17 years old when I finally faced my sexual identity and as soon as I built up the courage to do so it all just clicked into place for me and it was truly amazing! I was so relieved that I finally found that part of myself and understood it.

I was way too nervous to tell my parents face to face so I text my mum explaining that I liked girls and the whole process of how I realised so she didn’t think I was going through a “faze” and she text back saying “I love you no matter who you love” so that was a really positive reaction and I was so glad because of how scared I was.
My sister kind of outed me to my dad and his reaction to start with wasn’t as positive but he came around very very quickly.

Love is love.

Dana (she/her)

I remember the first time I actively thought about girls in a more than friends way, I was in grade 7 and about 12 years old. There was this girl in my class who was like nobody I’d ever seen before and I REALLY wanted to be her friend. As the year went on, I started wondering what it would be like to kiss her. We were in a group project together, and at one point she hugged me and it was the best thing to ever happen to my 12 year old brain. But, I didn’t really think anything of it, because I thought all girls felt this way. In any case, I still had crushes on boys and continued to do so right through grade 8.

Near the end of grade 8, in the spring of 2012, I discovered Glee and quickly became obsessed with the relationship between Brittany and Santana. I wanted to know more about their storyline, so I delved deeper, buying the DVDs of season 1 and 2 (which I hadn’t seen) just so I could see all of the context behind how their relationship came to be. I had never seen a WLW relationship portrayed ANYWHERE before, so Glee had my head spinning and it became the first TV show I ever got hooked on. I went down the YouTube rabbit hole, searching “TV lesbians” and finding so many more ships to obsess over. Somehow, I still wasn’t connecting this fascination to my own identity. It was new and exciting, but I never really stopped to consider why. All of a sudden, YouTube clip after YouTube clip, it clicked for me and I realized I wanted to be like (and with) the women in those videos.
Later that summer, I realized I was developing feelings for my best friend. At that point, I was secretly labelling myself as bisexual (I still liked boys, right???). I came out to my closest guy friend as bisexual while playing truth or dare over text message, and he accepted it right away. As the summer went on and turned into fall, and the celebrity crushes and the BIG OL’ CRUSH ON MY BEST FRIEND didn’t go away, I began to realize that I could definitely not see myself in a relationship with a boy the way I could with girls. I remember crying about this a lot and literally praying that it would go away. I just wanted to be “normal” and have a “normal” life and it would be so much easier if I could just like boys. This took months to reconcile with myself.
I tentatively asked my best friend if she would ever consider being with another girl. When she said no, my heart broke and I came to the stark realization that not every girl felt this way. I did come out to her, and she accepted me no problem, but I didn’t let slip that she was the girl I wanted to date. I began labelling myself as gay, because the word “lesbian” didn’t sit right with me. I was outed to my school in grade 9, and I remember feeling betrayed, but also relieved because that meant I didn’t have to broadcast it myself. Shockingly, at my Catholic school, nobody cared. I never received flack for it, and everyone was very cool about it.

This was the year I discovered Tumblr, where I went on a journey of self-realization. I put posters of women up in my room, and I downloaded pictures of my celebrity crushes to the computer. I didn’t have my own computer, so I used the family computer for all of this (rookie mistake). One day, my mom came into my room, sat with me, and started asking me questions. I knew exactly where she was going with it when she asked me about the pictures in my room. In my heard I was pleading with her not to ask the question I was dreading—I wasn’t ready to face it. My silent pleading didn’t work, because she did ask it: “I see a lot of pictures of girls, and none of boys…I want you to be honest with me, are you leaning towards that? It’s totally fine, it doesn’t matter to me one way or another, I still love you”. I told her that honestly, I didn’t know. Even though I did know, I just wasn’t ready to say it. I think I was still battling a lot of internalized homophobia. I didn’t know any out queer people in real life, and I felt so abnormal.
Grade 9 was really great. Everybody I told was so supportive and I didn’t have one negative reaction in my peer group. Eventually, my best friend found out I was head over heels for her, but we managed to remain very close. Somehow, I got over her (yes, it gets better!!) and had other crushes and near-relationships with other girls. Then, my buddy set me up with this girl in our grade, and I had my first relationship over the summer right before high school. She broke up with me a couple weeks into grade 10 and naturally, I was heartbroken. I was so beyond upset that my parents definitely noticed. My mom asked me about it, and I broke into tears— in order to tell her what was wrong, I had to tell her I was gay. When I told her that the girl and I had been dating, she said that she kind of figured. She was so supportive and it made me wish I had come out to her earlier, but I really hadn’t been ready.
I had already told my younger sister (who was 11 at the time) that I had a girlfriend shortly after I started dating this girl. She had no problem with it and was extremely supportive. My dad was the hardest. We’d never been super close, and I didn’t really know how to talk to him about anything, so it was hard to breach the topic. It was probably a few weeks after I told my mom that I finally came out to my dad. He told me that my mom had told him, and that he still loved me, but he was concerned about my safety at school (my dad, ever practical). I came out to my extended family a couple years later, via Facebook on National Coming Out Day in 2015. I wrote a massive post because I didn’t want to come out to my family members individually, and at that point it was a non-issue to me. I never received any negative reactions, and everybody has accepted my now-girlfriend as part of the family.

Positive representation matters because it’s what made me realize who I am and also what gave me the courage to let others know who I am! At the time of writing this, I have been out for seven years. As soon as I came out, I felt instantly freer and life was much easier. I am so fortunate that this has been my experience, and that I have been blessed with such amazing and supportive people around me. I look forward to a day where everybody can fall in love without boundaries, and where “coming out” is no longer necessary. Because, after all, #OutIsTheNewIn

Sometimes coming out is the unexpected, you think the event will happen one way but it comes out another, Im Sarah and Im Gay.

My names Sarah, I first realized I was gay (a lesbian) around 8th grade, I found that I was attracted to women and guys didnt really interest me at all. Except around that time i thought it was unnatural to be gay and that i had to like men. Except for the fact that i had feelings for one of my best friends. So i hid that fact deep down until around Eleventh grade when my parents where looking through my stuff and found something that was from when i though i was bisexual, they addressed it by saying “lets talk about the elephant in the room” i told them it was fake and that i just wantedd to seem “cool”. Dont ask me why i was just afraid. Anywho why the end of 11th grade i finally faced the fact that i knew in my hear that i was gay, i came out to my close friends and my mentor at school first, they were all very accepting. It took me a bit longer to get up the courage to say something to my family and even till this day(12th grade) i still havent told everyone. I first told my sister through text i said “remember how you always said youd love me now matter what?” she responded “yes” and i literally just blurt it out “Im gay”. Of course she and my mom were at home so she knew already but i told her anyways again and they said that they were proud of me. however when i told my stepdad his response was “thats not news to me I already kind of thought so lol” he literally laughed afterwords. i kind of shrunk into my shell and just played it off like it was funny when in fact i was hurt. I then told my aunt who was nothing but accepting i came out to her at lunch one day by saying “shake my hand” and when she did i said “nice to meet you im gay.” anyways i came out originally because i qanted ot just face the truth but i also wanted to go out with this girl id been talking to. However after saying yes to me she crushed my heart into pieces in less than a day. I didnt recover untill like a year after when my mind and heart protecting it said to itself enough is enough. coming out is a journey and for everyone its different, mine was kind of different than i expected. i had always been one to explain sexuality to my faamily from like 8th grade on because they kind of judged people a bit on tv and so i thought theyd judge me too. however i was one of the lucky few who have mostly a very accepting family. Thank you for taking the time to read my sotry. -Skc

Jess

Where do I start well I turn 18 in two weeks and have the overwhelming urge to finally come out as Queer to my extended family and friends but I know I can’t yet, where I currently live it is illegal to be apart of the community which is hard when you’re trying to navigate the waters and find where you fit in, I’ve known I was apart of the community since I was around the age of twelve, it’s kind of like when you meet your soulmate and people say when you know you know, it’s never a big revelation because deep down it’s a part of you that’s been there all along.

I came out to my parents last year, even though we’ve got an aunt who’s apart of the community it was the most nerve-wracking moment of my life so far, my dad immediately started changing the pronouns he used when talking about my future partners and marriage and all in all was as supportive as one could hope – I mean he didn’t jump over the chair and give me a hug but I could always feel his acceptance was there. My mum still talks about my future husband and how everything going to change and I’ll end up with the opposite life to what I’ve currently got my heart set on, she talks about my prince charming and honestly It does break my heart that I can’t give that to her but I can still have a great love story even if it isn’t how she’s always pictured it.

I live my true authentic self in secret online and for now, that’s more then I could ask for,
but one day, someday in the next three years I promise myself I will come out to everyone.
I’m more than ready.
I’ve been ready for a while now, it’s just about finding the safest time to share my
story with my family.

xoxo

Kata

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

First of all sorry in advance for the mistakes, but I am not a native english speaker…
I was about 16 when I realized I was gay. The story is simple. I fell in love with an extraordinary girl, who was my best friend. I really felt lost, and alone, and scared. I didn’t want to ruin our friendship so I stayed quiet for a while.
She had a really difficult time with her adoptive parents, who wanted to get rid of her, so I really didn’t want to make things even more difficult for her. But as my feeling were eating me alive I got to a point where I knew I have to admit I love her. And I did. And quess what? She felt the same. And I was the happiest girl in the whole word. For a while…
Then we started to came out to our closest friends, and they were all amazing about it. Except this one girl who outed us in front of the entire school. That is when things started to go down. We were afraid to hold hands, becuase incidents happened. Someone threw stones on me. Someone spat on me. I started to feel worthless. I was afraid to come out to my family. I was, well, I still am a Christian. I couldn’t match my belief and my sexuality. I tried to pray the gay away… But nothing helped. My grandmother just suddenly died, and that was the last drop in the glass.
I tried to commit suicide, as you can see without success. And I didn’t want to tell my family the reasons. As I was in the hospital my sister found my blog online as it was trending, and she told me she knows about me being gay. She told me she loved me no matter what. I am very grateful to her to this day, becuase I really needed to hear those words from her. Then I came out to my mother, which was the scariest thing. It was hard. She acted like everything was cool, but I knew something was wrong. One day I saw her cry, and asked what happened. I asked if she is crying becuase of me. And she said yes, and my heart broke into a million pcs… That’s it. I was thinking she doesn’t love me anymore, and she’ll kick me out. And then she told me she cries becuase she doesn’t want me to be afraid to hold my partner’s hand on the streets, she doesn’t want me to be unhappy. And that was it. We cried for a long time in each other’s arms. The rest is history. This was more than 12 years ago. Now, as I am near 30 I am fully out. To those who are not out yet and are struggling, please know that it gets better. You are not alone, you have a whole army behind you. It will get better.

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

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.

Bisexual

I knew I was attracted to the same sex since my early teens, I am 32 very soon my sister has ways known and she is so supportive and amazing about it, I came out to my close friends a few years ago, but recently came out to my co-workers and my other friends, I was in a long-term relationship with a guy and I have now ready to explore new horizons and enjoy my sexuality, I have recently joined the local LGBTQ community and I happy that I have new friends from this too. I am happy and feel like I can be myself and I feel like weight has been lifted off my shoulders now I’m out, everyone took it all very well and is very accepting of my being part of the LGBTQ community. Moving on and being accepted into the LGBTQ community and making new friends has made me a happier person and a new lease of life and opened doors for me I thought I wouldn’t have thought I would never had opened. I am super proud of myself being part of this new community I am now a part of.

And to quote Dom:
Out is the new IN

So proud of you Dominique

Sending my love

Saira

Part of the lgbtq+ community

I feel before we come out to other people, we always have to
come out to ourselves first. It took a few years for me to figure
everything out, acknowledge my queerness and accept myself. I can
somehow relate to Dominique. The lack of Bi and Pan representation kinda
made me think that you could either be gay or straight. I thought that
for a long time until i decided to use Mr. Google. My saviour. After
reading about all these sexualities and genders i was shocked tbh. And
then i wondered how many people knew about this. I was pretty sure my
friends and family didnt. I couldnt ask any help from anyone. I was 13.
My friends wouldnt know what to do, my parents probably would’ve asked
me why im thinking about all this and ask to forget about it, my brother
probably wouldnt have cared and my cousins, well i wasnt really close to
them back then as i am now. So yeah, i was alone. When i realised that i
wouldnt mind dating a girl, i told my best friend. Talking to her helped
me. But i was in denial. I couldnt accept that i probably liked girls. I
thought probably it was just a phase. Maybe im confused. Later i got
busy with school and just forgot about it. End of that year i went on a
group tour. Then i kinda had a crush on one of the girls. Took me a
while to realise it was a crush. And then all the questions came back.
“Do i like her? What is this feeling? Am i gay?” Then i was in denial
again. “I dont like her. Maybe i just think she is pretty. I cant like
girls. No way” Ever after the tour ended i kept thinking about the way i
felt about this girl. Then i took a trip down memory lane. Tried to
recall who i liked and whether i had a thing for girls. Looking back, i
did. But i just always used to tell myself that it was just envy. Then
one night i just sat in my room and i said out loud, “I like girls. But
im not gay cause i’ve had crushes on guys. So what does that make me?
Bisexual?”. That question was left unanswered until new years. After new
years i still couldnt accept the fact that i like girls. I used to sit
in church after mass ended and id ask God “why me? Out of all the people
in the world, why me? How could i feel this way?”. I later on realised i
was just scared because i knew that the lgbtq+ community has to deal
with hate and discrimination. I didnt want to go through that. I used to
be ashamed of myself. I guess you could also say i tried to “pray the
gay away”. Took me sometime to realised that its not my fault. I am who
i am and i need to love myself. I identified as bisexual at the
beginning, also came out to a few friends, my brother and one of my
cousins. But now i dont really WANT to put a label on my sexuality. Its
just confusing sometimes.

Anyway the internet helped me a lot in my coming out journey. Especially
instagram. So thank you to all the lgbtq+ accounts, the lgbtq+ celebs
who were brave to come out and even the actors who are allies and took a
role of an lgbtq+ character.

Hold up, im not done yet. Im turning 16 this year. Im still young and
got lots to learn about the world and myself. I still have to come out
to more people in the future and hopefully meet other queer people. So i
hope that we will have more lgbtq+ representation. Not only in Hollywood
but in other platforms i guess.
Thank you for your time.

Im proud of those who has come out
and those in the closet. Be strong and love yourselves.
Love ya

#outisthenewin