I did a presentation for a group project in class, and it was about homophobia/bullying. And my job was to present resources to go to if you were being bullied or were experiencing homophobia. I personally have never been bullied for being homosexual, but I understood the fear that came with coming out. I was still in the closet during my high school years, and I was still so confused about my sexuality. After coming out to people in the past, I've had to deal with people treating you a bit differently simply because you're gay. So the topic was pretty personal to me. I have no idea what came over me in that moment. I shared my experience of coming out to my best friend for the first time to the entire class, struggling a bit to find the words to express the importance of why homophobia is an issue that needs to be addressed. And suddenly I felt a huge weight lifted off my shoulders. And yet at the same time, I can't help but feel a bit exposed, like I just revealed a very personal part of me. I feel almost uncomfortable. I mean, I'm definitely not one to show my feelings to just anybody, let alone a group of people. But I know what I did was right, and I'm glad I did it. So I hope in some way, me coming out of the closet yesterday made some difference. So today, I changed my out status from to this My aunts, uncles and all except for one cousin don't know about me yet, and I'd be lying if I said I don't still feel a bit nervous about all of this, but this is a part of who I am and I'm gonna embrace it :icon_bigg
That's so amazing!!! I did that too, and it was definitely weird at first, but you'll LOVE it after a few days. I'm so happy for you!
:eusa_clap I found myself doing it too, but with a bit of notice...in my class we were to do a personal identity paper including our gender and sexuality. EVERYBODY breezed past it, "oh and of course I am a woman and STRAIGHT, duh!" one girl said. I could see me up there NOT being able to do that and it made it so hard to decide how to put it. So I did it in the order posted on blackboard, so it was 2nd to last. family economic condition was last. I pointed to the gender one....and shrugged and signed in ASL "(I) Hate that (one)" and took maybe 3 sentences to say because I am a boy...inside, transgender, and then i tried to ignore the sexuality one by saying something like "complicated". At least my class had to read about those topics first, so I didn't have to explain it. Gee I know how you feel being exposed and not knowing what to do next.
That's marvelous! I admire your courage. I'm toying with the idea of doing the same thing, so I know how hard it can be. Good luck on coming out to your relatives!
Thank you for the responses, everyone. I still can't believe I went through with it :icon_bigg You're brave for coming out like that. It is so nerve racking and hard to do and I'm glad we can relate. What class was this for? Mine was a health science class. All I can say is to be patient. It took me some time to finally come out and it was pretty scary. But it was totally worth it, and I hope in time you'll be able to do the same I completely forgot about the Coming Out forum when I was posting this so I apologize to the mods for putting it up here :icon_redf I go to university so everybody's a bit more accepting where I'm at, but I could tell that a lot of them felt pretty awkward about the whole thing, like they didn't really know how to respond to it. My group were pretty impressed by the whole thing actually, and my professor actually applauded me for it so I feel pretty good
That is amazing. You are so brave! And just think of the impact you might have made on some of your classmates. It's harder to keep up your homophobic actions when hear a personal story like that. Kudos to you!
I couldn`t do that at all. most if not all of my mates were of the homophobic type would have been called names ranging from batty boy ''English urban slang '' to the dreaded Q word .your story does give hope to others sometimes it`s not all doom & gloom .:eusa_clap
