Hi, I want to share my story of my boy and how homophobia took him away from me.
Hi, for the sake of privacy call me Nolan. I am a 17 year old trans man (he/him), I suppose it is also relevant that I am gay.
For the best thirteen months of my life I have been dating the most incredible boy a person like me can find. This person is my trans masculine (he/they/other pronouns) boyfriend who is 16 years old. For the sake of privacy, I will refer to him as Ryan.
101 days ago, the worst day of my life happened.
Me and my boyfriend had been dating for a very long time at this point. I already knew what life for him at home was like with strict parents who are incredibly homophobic and transphobic. We had to jump through lots of loop holes, and create so many lies, and spent lots of time missing each other because of the already limited contact and limited opportunities we had, for his parents did not like me beforehand for clearly noticing my queer appearance.
Regardless of the struggle it was amazing anyways, I was happy because no one is more worth it than he is. There is no one I am prouder in or believe in more. He is the genuine joy that not even the sun can bring on this planet. He’s kind, gentle, thoughtful, charismatic, compassionate, caring, funny, intelligent, talented, bright, strong, and genuine. There are so many incredible things about this boy, he’s the selfless one in the room who will give away something he needs just because he sees someone else struggling and needing it. One of the things I love most is how his heart is always open to those he cares for. This boy had picked me up when I needed someone most and showed me how genuinely beautiful life could be. Every second with him showed me the childlike wonder of color I once thought I had lost forever from this world. And everything about him from his curly hair to his intelligent mind to his heart of gold make me melt.
Despite the challenge we would still find ways to go on dates, we celebrated every anniversary, we had adjusted our whole school schedules to see each other as much as possible and involved ourselves in the same activities. We took pictures and videos together at every given opportunity to document what we shared. We had so many amazing things we built together. We also had so much planned. We were supposed to go to junior prom together. I was supposed to finally be able to join him on his birthday. We were supposed to go on a roller date together. People for so long had known us as the team.
Instead I sat home the night of prom, that date never happened,
And his valentines day gift is still sitting in my locker.
101 days ago, a friend had slipped that me and my boyfriend are dating and that we both are trans, this got to his incredibly controlling and homophobic parents.
We knew this day would happen and I know what I was supposed to do but it didn’t help anything.
Nothing. I knew I was supposed to do nothing.
He vanished in the middle of a conversation on text on a Sunday night. I waited, I waited to 11PM, then I waited to 12AM, then I waited to 1 AM, then 2 AM, and the whole night. Nothing. He never left without goodnight and the feeling of sudden dread and anxiety had overcome me like I had suddenly frozen in the middle of the Arctic Tundra and I knew it wasn’t my fear I was feeling.
The next day, he didn’t arrive at school, when I begged his friends to text him to check, no response, when I in desperation sent a message in our code, I got nothing either, then when I checked his instagram and it was gone. I knew.
I had at this point already spending a whole day in panic, worried if something else had happened or if his parents just found out.
It was the second option, and his parents didn’t take it well.
I broke that day. I couldn’t breathe or stop crying for hours. The person who I had built so much with was alone and being hurt in who knows what kind of ways.
The next day I arrived at school late, I was immediately called to speak with the vice principal. His parents had found out.
They nearly pulled him out of the school but with promises and bargaining the school convinced them to let him stay.
Staff would be informed to keep us apart or serious consequences would occur, we were to not share any classes anymore like we used to. The rules were laid out to the both of us independently: “stay apart, no contact at all, no notes, no texts, no letters, no speaking, no hugs, no hand holding, no signs or we’ll put you both in serious trouble again by telling his parents” which would.. put him in more danger than last time.
His parents are genuinely inhumane people. His friends have informed me of the horrible punishments and things yelled at him which he had to go through at home and still sometimes does.
Every time I think on it I can only be grateful he hadn’t gone through worse. For facing the harsh reality of how cruel this all is, is worse.
I had built a entire life with someone. A person who would make me happy to wake up in the morning. Someone who could make me smile by just being there. Someone who made me feel loved and let me love them a hundred times more back.
A entire thing we had built gone in seconds. Our entire high school romance which was already limited, ripped from our arms.
I ask myself what we did wrong, what on earth did we do wrong? That I held his hand? Every time we’d take a photo together I’d give him a peck on his cheek? Sit and talk with him on his hard nights and him do the same for me? That on our dates I’d stupidly flirt with him like a stupid teenage boy because my boyfriend is so cute? That anytime I heard or sung a love song it was always about him? That my wall proudly strings up every single drawing he’s ever given me?
I can’t find a single real reason why this is wrong.
As a young queer person, I do live in the united states but I have lived in a liberal state all my life, and while I do have a homophobic catholic family they have been kind enough to tolerate it. I had before this point lived a genuinely privileged live for a queer person, it was never easy. I have and still do experienced hate speech, and slurs, and rejection from my family, but I was still one of the “lucky ones”. I had never expected that I would become that queer person with the tragic gay story.
I wish I could say that this is a joke. I wish I could say that it’s a story I made to show how cruel stories like this can come true but it’s actually my reality but not only that this is his reality too.
It hurts, it really does. I sit everyday in my room scrolling through pictures of him and us, asking myself what could I have done better to show him that I love him more. What else could I have done to show the world that this isn’t wrong. If there was something I even could have done to somehow make his parents see that even though our love is queer it’s real and it’s who we are.
I’m 17, he’s 16, we’re still teenagers. You can believe and say what you want about “how we’re young” and “don’t know what we really want”. And frankly I don’t care to hear any of that kind of rhetoric. Regardless of our age he is still my boyfriend and he was still taken away and we are not being given the same and fair respect as cisgender and straight couples our age would be and that is the problem.
We were torn apart because of his parents’ strict attitude, bias and preconceived notions of queer people. And that’s not okay.
This is a hard to swallow story but the truth is hard.
I won’t deny it. Sometimes I don’t believe it myself, but these are things that happen to queer people. And we need to stop acting like this is all in the past. Last year a trans person younger than me, Nex Benedict experienced hate violence and died because they were beaten for being transgender. This is what happens when we actively spread misinformation about innocent groups of people who just want to exist.
I never asked to be profiled as queer or to even be queer, and the some goes with my boyfriend who fought his queerness for years. We simply found that denying ourselves and our hearts, hurts more than prejudice does. We don’t ask to be seen as odd. We just want to live and love ourselves and one another.
That’s our story. Ryan and Nolan. The team torn apart because two adult children couldn’t accept their child was queer and was dating someone queer.
My point of this story isn’t to bring folks down. Take this with an open mind. I have hopes things will get better with time. My story with him is not over yet. We still have so many chapters to make when the rules relax or when we graduate and he turns 18. There’s hope. Things aren’t over yet and I won’t let two adults with the maturity of 10 year olds take down my self esteem and pride in being queer.
Being queer is such a genuine beautiful thing. I find so much joy in being a trans and gay man. And I find so much joy in dating my beautiful boyfriend. Who I have created something so beautiful with.
So for this pride and likely the rest of the summer. I intend on writing a story each day of a beautiful moment or thing I shared with Ryan. For I don’t find pain in our love story but instead joy, gentleness, kindness, love, emotion, and something real. And as I stated. Nothings over yet.
So feel free to join me in my favorite moments with my pride and joy, my boyfriend ❤️
If you won’t stick along, just remember this story. Remember that these things are real and happening to real people. And staying silent is allowing more queer kids to go through things like this. Simply by spreading positive information about trans people and queer people can make such a difference in someone’s life.
For a chapter in our story might’ve been taken, but Ryan and I still have so much more to create.