Epiphany 1

I was gay. That’s for sure.

Her name was Rose. She smelled like one too. With a hint of vanilla and a little bit of calming lavender. Her smile made my stomach hurt. In a good way of course. At least for me it was good. But some people didn’t like the fact that I liked Rose that much. She was the popular girl among the boys. But I was no boy… At least I didn’t know it yet but that is another epiphany I had later in life. For that moment I was just a high school girl who had a crush on their desk mate.

I didn’t understand why the way she smelled or the way she laughed made me feel a certain way for a while. It wasn’t until later when I heard a person talk about their crush that I understood I liked Rose. I had a crush on her. But a girl having a crush on another girl? I knew that was possible, I knew it wasn’t wrong. But a part of me felt guilty. The environment of homophobes I was surrounded with didn’t help with the guilt and anxiety I felt either.

If I came out at school, which I didn’t -except for my closest friends (or the people who I thought we were closest to)- I would definitely get bullied to death. If I didn’t, I would be living a lie. If I came out to my parents, I had no idea how they would react. That scared me. So basically, my options were either be bullied and get rejected from your family (the worst possible reaction I could think of about my family) OR keep it a secret and keep hating yourself for the rest of your life.

You must understand, I was a teen, and being a teen as we all know, means that everything could be the end of the world. And this was not a simple bad grade or a breakup, this was who I was growing up to be. It was scary as hell. I already had depression and anxiety I couldn’t also be gay!

I was laying on the bed in my childhood bedroom. Staring at the ceiling as one does… I had talked to a gay guy about my feelings. He said: “You are overthinking it. Just go with the flow.” But I couldn’t go with the flow in the high school we were in, and he knew it. His crush on his best friend was the biggest secret I was keeping at that moment. He had said I should stop thinking about it. But how could I not think about it. This was going to be defining moment for me. The way I handled not being a cishet, was going to change my world.

I took a deep breath and texted my best friend at the time. I knew she wasn’t homophobic, but I was still scared as fuck. I told her I had a crush, and it was on a girl. She was like “Okay, sure. She is pretty”. I smiled, she really was pretty.

Unfortunately, the word got out in school. It was tough. I got beaten up and verbally abused and no one was there to stop it. I hadn’t told my parents and my friends were just as scared of being pushed out of the closet, so I never really felt like they were doing the wrong thing. Fortunately, I was supposed to be with them for the next two years and then I was going to university and that meant a fresh new start.

Uni wasn’t what I expected either but that will be on Epiphany 2.  

What I want to say to young gays is: It’s gonna be tough but you are tougher. You are braver than anybody I know for living as who you are. Go be the best girlboss you can be. But don’t gaslight or gatekeep!