My coming out story and what i struggle with ten years later.

(For clarification this is not about an relationship this is about my personal story with coming out and it’s tolls it’s taken on me)

I was 13, it was the summer before 8th grade. I had figured out I was queer earlier that year, and I was keeping it a secret from most people in my life besides my friends and some internet friends. I had felt a lot of shame in this because of my family being extremely homophobic and conservative. I was very depressed. I hated myself. This was when I started self-harming, and my eating disorder began. I struggled a lot to come to terms with the hand I was dealt. I felt that the only way I had to let out my emotions was by harming myself. During this, I met this girl through a Dan and Phil fan account on Instagram. We hit it off and became friends quickly. We liked the same music, had similar hobbies, and liked a lot of the same stuff. I had dated my first girlfriend in secret around this time and had my first kiss with her. As all middle school relationships go, we dated for like a month, then broke up for whatever reason. A little while later, I was talking to my online friend, and I realized I had a huge crush on her. Like a real crush, not some "I think I like this person" middle school crush. I was staring at her picture and smiling, I couldn't wait to talk to her in the morning, I was always thinking about her, I blushed when we called each other, the butterflies and everything. One day, I asked her if she liked me and would want to be my girlfriend. She said she liked me and wanted to be my girlfriend! I think that time was one of the happiest times in my life. We truly adored each other, and I loved just talking to them more than anything. Everything was great until one day I was showing my mom something on my phone, and she had decided that was the perfect time to go through it. Let me tell you my stomach fell out of my ass in that moment. This was a couple of months after the Pulse nightclub shooting, and I had posted in support of the victims on my Instagram. She asked me, "Why are you posting about all this gay stuff? Are you a dyke or something?"

My throat felt sharp, my eyes were filling up wth tears, and then I told her, "mom im pansexual." She was confused, angry, and disgusted with me. I tried explaining over her yelling, I tried to help her understand. She just kept telling me how wrong it was, how it was just a phase, how I would grow out of it. Then she saw in my texts between a friend and me that I had told my friend I had hurt myself again. That set her off even more. I imagine she was scared and confused about why her daughter would do something like that. She didn't express that, though. She got angrier with me. She called my father into the living room and told him, "Your daughter is a dyke, and she's cutting herself." All he said to me was, "What the fuck is wrong with you" She saw everything about my online girlfriend. All my confessions to my friends. All I could do was cry. I was terrified. I was a child. My brother came home with some of his friends and saw me crying on the couch and asked my mom, "What's wrong?" They talked on the porch. He came back in and put his hand on my shoulder. No words but the most love I've ever felt. It was the only way he could show his support safely in that moment.

I was grounded, no phone for a month during summer break. I had to break up with my girlfriend and was not allowed to talk to her. My best friend was in Louisiana. I stole the house phone when everyone left for work. I called my best friend asking for help. I begged her to call her parents to let me stay at their house, but she wouldn't. She was a child, too, and couldn't comprehend what was truly happening. I felt completely alone. During that month, I had to go through emotional abuse, and I ended up going through physical abuse. I had been spanked when I was younger a couple of times, but my mother had started backhanding me whenever she felt threatened or disrespected by me. This is where my memory starts to get fuzzy on specifics. All I know is I moved through that house like it was made of glass then.

Eventually, we started to move past it. I got my phone back. I was able to hang out with my friends again. It was like that whole fiasco never happened. No one talked about it again. They all chose to forget. To push it away as if it never happened. I was "straight" again. I have stayed in touch with my ex internet girlfriend and we reminisce on our emo times occasionally. I tried a couple of times throughout the years to have romantic relationships with girls, but I never could let myself get close to them. I am terrified to come out. I probably never will. It has been ten years since that summer, and sometimes I still feel like that scared kid on the couch. I hold out hope that one day I can live my life free. That I'll be able to love who I want. I can be who I want.

I am so proud of every person out there fighting for the right to love, to live, and to be free. I have been trapped in the dark for so many years, and I see everyone standing in the light, no matter how bright it is or how much it hurts, and I commend their bravery. I hope to one day join them.

I know now I am not wrong, I am not broken, and I deserve sunshine.

You are not wrong, you are not broken, and you deserve sunshine.

We all deserve sunshine.