(This is long. So read it when you have time to read it all the way through)

        Before I tell my story there are a few things you should about me first. I'm a southern born and raised. I say that it takes people in the south longer to accept something than it does in the rest of the country. Mom's side of the family is from Texas and Florida. My Dad's side is from Alabama. That right, the deep south. I'm also African American. There is a reason I told you my race, but we'll get back to that later. For context, it's also important that you know this. Polling data shows that the majority of Americans weren't ok with gay marriage until 2012. 

         Now that we got that out of the way,  let's begin. It was October 22, 2005. George Bush was president and the U.S was currently engaged in the Iraq War. I was eight years old and Dad was in the hospital. Dad was a U.S. soldier stationed in Iraq just a week earlier. He wasn't just a soldier, but a tanker. While operating a tank, somehow a bomb had gotten underneath and blew up the tank. Somehow Dad had survived the explosion. He managed to get up and run back and forth through the fire to save his fellow soldiers. He saved six lives that day, but it came with a cost. He got very badly burned. The U.S. Military managed to transport him to a hospital in San Antonio, Texas.  On October 22, 2005, he was in a hospital bed fighting for his life. Atlas, he was burned too badly with too many internal injuries. He lost that fight and became the 2,000th soldier to die as a result of the Iraq War. (Don't believe me. Google Staff. Sgt. George T. Alexander Jr.)  Mom ran into the waiting room barely holding back tears to deliver me the news and I cried my heart out. In the hospital room was a television and after all these years I remember what was on it. The television was on a news channel and a British citizen had recently been murdered for being gay. (I looked him up. His name was Jody Dobrowski. He was 24.) I remember some people in the room making comments about how he had "deserved to die for going against God's command". (Afterall, it's Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. Right???) That is the moment I learned that gay people existed and I didn't know what to think or believe.

    A year later, we had moved to Dallas, Tx. (Because there were too many reminders at home and living in a state of constant sadness isn't good for any one.)  It was the fall of 2006 and I was in 3rd grade. Mom had brought a new car and I was the new kid at school. (F.Y.I  My school went from Pre-K to 12th grade) I had huge thick glasses, a high pitched voice and was..... well a nerd.  (I loved books and loved to read!) So naturally, I got picked on. The kids called me all sort of names. At the time, I still hadn't completely accepted Dad's death. One day at school, I thought I saw him. I was filled with a sudden burst of joy. So I ran to where I thought I saw him and he wasn't there. I had given myself false hope. Somehow, I still naively believed that secretly he wasn't dead and was gonna come back home. When I didn't see him, it was reality crushing that false hope. I did what any nine-year-old whose dreams had been crushed by the cold darkness of reality would have done. I broke into tears. I caused quite a scene that day. I remember being dragged down the hall literally kicking and screaming while all the kids watched. The next day was incredibly awkward. You thought kids called me names before! I was considered the "oversensitive boy", a weakling, a sniveling coward, the cry baby, etc. (Cowardice was for the feminine boys! Real men don't cry!) This is when I first started to get called......you guessed it, a faggot. 

       Let's fast forward to the spring of 2010. I'm in seventh grade. I'm still being called a faggot and still being bullied.(though I'm wearing glasses with smaller frames and voice is deeper.... slightly) It was March of this year that I finally figured out I wasn't straight. (No, I was gay.) I had this huge crush on a boy. He was new to the school. He had the perfect smile and these beautiful green eyes. I thought I was in love! There was just one problem. Everyone already called me a faggot. This would just prove their point. This would justify all the names they called me. Plus, chances were that he wasn't into guys and all I would've done is gross him out and embarrass myself. No, I've got to hide my feelings. He could never know how I truly feel and he never did. 

        Now, remember how I said that there was a reason I told you I was African American. (If you do, then good job.) Mom is religious. I remembered how years ago she gave a standing ovation as a Pastor gave an "It's Adam and Eve. Not Adam and Steve" Speech. (Imagine being gay and sitting through that) Mom, to be fair, had no idea that her son was gay. I remember some of the church members saying "The only homosexuals are those nasty white boys." (That statement is racist and homophobic.) This is how I learned that certain segments of the black community believed that all the stereotypes about gay people were true. (This while they complained about people believing black stereotypes.)    

      Now let's talk about High School. The year is 2012 and for the first time ever the majority of Americans are cool with gay marriage. (Yay!) So was now finally the time to come out? (Many people already expected it.) The short answer was no. I was still being bullied and being called a faggot at school. Mom is religious and I wasn't ready to deal with being possibility shun and disowned by my own mother. Plus, I was struck listening to pastors who preached that I was "willingly bathing in sin and should be outcasted by society " every other Sunday while simultaneously being surrounded by people who thought homosexuality was a "white people thing".  So I waited another two years before I told Mom. It took some time, but she has come around. Goes to a different church and everything. My advice is that you don't come out until you're ready. It took me years just to work up the courage. Some people are not meant to stay in your life. Live life happily. Hope this story helps someone.  

It was fine at first. I know he tried to understand, but maybe it was a bit much to comprehend. He's not homophobic per say, but it had never directly affected him before, and now his daughter liked girls.

He never called me a faggot or dyke, he didn't kick me to the curb. So I guess I was lucky in that sense. But instead I'm stuck in a household that doesn't quite 'get it.' I'm in a household where I have been told my sexuality makes others uncomfortable, where 'in my day, we didn't talk about such things.'

I was proud of my sexuality before I told him. It was one of the few parts of me I could love, but it slowly got twisted to just another feature to hate.

So I still live under my parents roof, and I don't get called names. But I was taught to hate myself.

It's a contagion, that's what it is.

"Faggot." The word spread like wildfire,

and it's suffocating like it, too,

it could be a rope around my neck instead,

or pills down my throat.

Words are bullets

that plunge into my mind,

bleeding me, savagely,

it's there, it's all right there.

Even my parents are saying it,

one behind my back, the other to my face,

"Faggot." A pestilence, a molestation

A murderer.

Their words linger

Stagnant, in the air

Suffocating

Love, trust; gone

In an instant

Leaving a crumbling statue

Of a family; now in ruins

They proclaim

It's Satan's work

Fixable, curable

A poison I refuse.

They say

I am too young,

Naive,

Still figuring things out,

I'll come around,

I'm just confused.

They swear this is true.

But I know better,

I know me.

I know my heart.

I know love.

And it ain't changin'.

They refuse me.

Say it's my choice

And I'm choosin' wrong.

That I ain't no child of theirs.

They raised a good boy

And a faggot ain't no good boy.

Lost for words I stutter

Looking for a rewind button

That doesn't exist

Or glue that can fix this

But I can't deny who I am

No matter how hard I try.

So I watch

It all fall apart

Before I walk away.

Your perception of me

Is a travesty

A conception of which

You will never understand

Embedded so deeply

In your lack of humanity

Because you refuse to be

Humane

And I’m the one who becomes insane

In trusting friends

Who never were

Or loved ones

And family

Who don’t want to admit

They share the same blood as me

Who can’t see

Intrinsically

I am not the sum of my sexuality

That there’s more to me

A duality

A sum of parts

That made me real to you

At one time

Now you treat me as if

I’ve committed a crime

In being me

Who else can I be?

Should I pretend

To be something I’m not

To feel something I don’t

To mend the fences you erected

Because you can’t admit you disrespected

Me

-Your son

-Your best friend

-Your brother

Why I get this shit from my own mother

I will fail to ever understand

This isn’t something I chose or planned

I die each day I have to suppress

Myself

And each time I

Have to defend and address

Who I am and why I am this way

Something I fundamentally

Strive to understand

Myself

I’d drink to my health

But my mental

Is inconsequential

When it comes to delineating

How I should live

Though you prefer me to exist

-survive

Fuck that

I rather thrive

And if revealing who I am

-What you define as a faggot

Is enough to drive you away

Then you best make it a habit

And stay the fuck

Out of my life…

I’ve struggled too long

Picking up the gun and knife

Wondering if I should end it

Before some predatory, homophobic pussy

Does it for me

So I’m sorry if my big reveal

Makes you feel a little quirky

It’s not my mental that’s been murky

It’s the illusion

You had of me

-Desired me to be

But I’ll tell you right now

-I’m something!

People come out in different ways.

I am bipolar

I've taken lithium for 37 years

so I have tremors

I try to hide both conditions

working hard to control my moods

keep the trembling from showing while fighting back anxiety

staying out of the public eye so no one will notice.

Coming out

with any invisible attribute

those things no one can see 

but are difficult to deal with

meaning discrimination 

subtle or not

but mostly knowing once you tell

no one is eve going to treat you the same     

                                                              again.

Letting out whatever secret is clawing at your soul 

removes the pain of hiding

from your scared up inside

for the world to deal with

know longer your's but someone else's problem.

You've overcome the greatest hurdle.

I step out the door

Only to be shoved back in

Left crying on the floor

As if what I feel is nothing but sin

What is wrong with me?

I'm human just like you

What makes me  unable to be?

You act like I'm an abomination under your shoe

But truly we're two of the same

I do nothing for you but give

We both have a life and name 

But you act is if i shouldn't live

What did i ever do to deserve this?

What little detail did I miss? 

They get somethings.

They get when you love

him or her, and some of them,

they get when you love both,

but when you love "all,"

as the prefix reminds you,

they do not get.

They do not get,

when I say there is more

than he or she, 

and they do not get,

that what is or is not

found between your legs

has no weight in the ease

at which I can love you.

And if they do get that,

they do not get that sometimes,

I cannot be with you

unless I am in love with you.

They do not get 

the absence of lust 

or my lack of it, unless,

you have poured into my heart.

They do not get that I

am not straight, 

or gay

or ace

or bi,

but that I am

demi

that I am

pans,

that sexuality is full of wars

of terminology and outcasts,

because to them,

I do not exist.

They do not get 

to get me,

not with their eyes,

not with their words,

not with their bodies,

because if they did,

they would see

that all I had to give,

before they did not get me,

is love.

  “I’m gay.” Those were the two words that I had spent years thinking about and hiding away from the rest of the world. Those were the two words I had struggled so hard to say out loud. And those were the two words that had lead me to where I am now. I knew how liberating saying those words could be and I knew how much of a difference it could make.

When I finally plucked up the courage to tell my family and my friends, all I got in return was rejection and disgust. I will never forget the sting of my mother’s palm, the emptiness of losing my best friends, the pang of pain from when my father kicked me out of the house. How could two words simultaneously do so much damage? Why couldn’t I be accepted for who I am?

Even I disgust myself. I’m a shame to my family for being gay. What’s more, I destroyed my whole life in a millisecond by admitting it. How did I screw up everything so badly? Why couldn’t I just be normal?

I’m at the top of the world. Literally. Staring down the rooftop edge, contemplating whether or not I should jump. What’s the point of living if I can’t be accepted, if even I can’t accept who I am? Questions are running through my head, everything else except the ground storeys beneath me is just background. My heart is pounding; tears are streaming down my face.

Goodbye world. I slowly lift a foot, when I feel arms wrap hurriedly around my legs. “Don’t! Please don’t, I need you.” I look down and see the owner of the voice – the girl in my Biology class I’ve had a crush on. With her help, I shakily walk away from the edge. I hear “I’m bi. I know what you’re going through and I’m here for you.”