My story
I never thought coming out would be a problem for me. I grew up thinking I was straight because of the amount of hetero-normativity in my environment. I first really learned about the LGBT community when I was in 8th grade. I had known gay people existed obviously, but I never really put much thought into a whole community of people being shamed for their sexuality. I was always supportive of it because that’s just their own feelings. As the years went on, I started to think on a deeper level about my own sexuality, but was in partial-denial of what I really was. I finally came to terms with it and accepted who I was when I was in 11th grade. I declared myself as pansexual to a small group of my friends in a hotel room that night and I’ve been confident in it ever since. Because I identified as pansexual and not something like gay I thought it wouldn’t really matter to come out to my parents. I had always said, “I don’t think it really matters since I don’t care about gender/sex. If I was gay then I would come out to them.” I had confidence in my parents since they’ve loved me for so long and I was so sure that I would have their support in whatever I would choose. It went on like this for a year and finally it’s the summer of 2019. I’m about to head off to college in less than a month and I still haven’t told my parents. I had been working with my dad for the summer as a cleaner at a school along with 3 other white straight men. I’m the only woman. I’m the only POC. I’m the only democrat. I’m the only LGBT person. My dad is a Christian and he keeps talking about stuff like religion and politics with the other guys we work with and it irritates me, but I stay silent because I don’t want things to become awkward. As frustrating as it is for me to stay quiet about all of their comments, I couldn’t stay quiet today. We were on break today and I could hear my dad and one of my coworkers talking through my headphones. They were talking about gay marriage and people they know being gay and such. They kept on speaking about them as if they were sinners.
They said things like:
-My oldest daughter had a friend who was gay, but I really liked him
-I had a friend who was lesbian. I think she’s a lesbian because she didn’t have a man’s influence in her life since she didn’t have a dad.
-I can accept people who are gay, but I draw the line at marriage
-If there were a gene that makes people gay, then I would look at this situation very differently
-This transgender thing is just a mess. If you’re a man then you’re a man.
All of these things just made me feel horrible about myself. Hearing these things from my own dad who raised me and loved me for the past 18 years. I really felt betrayed, like I was suddenly going to be hated by him because of who I feel attracted to. I never thought I would have to come out to my parents, but now I knew I was just being optimistic and naive. I guess I didn’t know my dad the way I thought I did. When we got home he tried talking to me like normal, but I just glared and walked past him to go to my room. He asked, “Are you mad at me?” and I said, “Yes.” He asked, “Why?” and I said, “Reasons.” This wasn’t the first time I had acted like this after work since he’s made comments about Islam and Trump and other things. I closed my door and then he said angrily:
“Are you mad because I don’t share the same beliefs as you? Maybe you’re the close-minded one.”
This just really enraged me. I was already debating on whether or not to come out today, but this just pushed me over the edge.
I opened my door and said, “Guess what dad, I like girls. Yeah, I’m coming out to you right now.”
I thought I was going to be okay, but after saying those words I started to cry. My voice was shaking and I couldn’t think clearly. I don’t know why I started crying. I never thought my sexuality was such a big deal and I thought coming out would be easy for me, but it really wasn’t.
He looked at me in the eyes and my mind felt blank. I tried to finish up by saying, “Your comments really affected me. The way you talk about these marginalized groups really affects me because I have friends who are like this.” I shut my door and went to cry on my bed. I didn’t want to cry. I wanted to feel proud of myself, but I felt like someone I’ve known all my life became a stranger to me just now. He hasn’t said anything else, he hasn’t come up to talk to me. He just hasn’t done anything. I don’t know what I’m waiting for at this point, but all I know is I just don’t want to go outside of my room today. I cried about 3 times just writing this because I needed somewhere to vent.
If you made it this far, I’m thankful that you decided to listen to my story. If you are in a situation where you haven’t come out to your parents yet, just know that you aren’t doing anything wrong by being attracted to any gender.