Every queer person I know has a coming out story and a day they remember as their coming out. Me? I don't. People seemed to already know about my being queer. It was this unspoken thing that slowly turned into a spoken thing. My mother knew before I ever told her. Everyone seemed to know before I did. I never really had that monumental moment of "coming out of the closet," I was always in the closet with the door open. This is my moment. In the wake of the Orlando shooting, the incident at L.A. Pride, the one year anniversary of same-sex marriage being legalized in the U.S, and my involvement with OKC Pride this weekend, I thought what would be a better time than now?
So here it is: I'm Gay (Pansexual to be exact).
Because this is me 100% coming out, there's more to this story. I'm genderqueer, or more specifically, Genderfluid. This is the part of my identity that took the longest for me to accept, and even now, I can't say I've come to terms with it completely. I grew up with society shoving the gender binary in my face. Pink is for girls. Blue is for boys. If you have a vagina you are a girl. If you have a penis you are a boy. "You can't play with that, those are boy toys." "Boys can't wear makeup, skirts, dresses, etc." That's it; nothing more, nothing less. When I started to feel uncomfortable with myself and my body, I thought I was just insecure and anxious. As I got more involved in the LGBTQA+ community, I learned the gender binary is a lie. I figured out that dysphoria was masking itself as insecurities and discomfort. I learned that I am most comfortable when people refer to me with gender neutral pronouns but am comfortable using she/her, they/them and he/him.
I've been blessed with great parents who are completely accepting of everyone in the LGBTQA+ community, even if they don't fully understand it. They are both always willing to learn. I told my mom in passing conversation about my gender, and while she was very confused at first, she was willing to learn about who I am and my community. She sent me to San Francisco for spring break to stay with my aunt, where I learned even more about the queer community. She made sure I felt alright after Orlando, even though the whole day I felt like I was going to throw up. My mom has been my support for 18 years and I couldn't have asked for anyone better. She even made the fantastic choice to marry the man I call my stepfather who has been just as supportive since the day he came into our lives.
So here I am at my first pride festival, getting a pride tattoo, on the 26th of June, coming out to the whole internet.
