samanthachristinewrites

[samanthachristinewrites]

national coming out day 2017 - 10/11/17

october 11th, 2017: i can’t believe that it’s 2017 and i’m making this post. i can’t believe that i’m getting to make this post at all.

if you’ve ever wondered why i like gay memes on facebook or why i yelled so much about lefou from beauty and the beast being openly gay, or why i’m constantly ranting about anti-lgbt+ politicians, then you know now. i never, ever thought that i’d be writing this. i feel like i say that every time i come out to someone important to me, but i think that people that have never gone through anything like this can’t possibly imagine how difficult it is and how much of a journey it is to get to a point like this. some people say it’s a choice or a phase or that people have made a quick decision, and i can honestly say it’s none of those things. it is in no way a choice, a phase, an “easy way,” or anything anybody could “decide”. nobody can help who they fall in love with or how they feel and it took me a long time to realize that and that God doesn’t make mistakes, despite what i grew up thinking. if you already knew, then thank you for being there for me when i’ve needed it the most. i’m incredibly blessed. God has put wonderful people in my life to make this easier and i just want to quickly say that my friends have helped me undeniably throughout everything and i am so incredibly grateful for their guidance, support, help, and understanding these past four and a half years. and i also want to say that i’m incredibly thankful for my mom, despite not growing up in my generation that she could still find the room to learn and understand and accept me for the person that i am. she is my hero and it means the absolute world to me that i don’t have to hide anymore.  if you didn’t know, then now you do. if you have something negative to say i ask that you please keep it to yourself. i’ve worked so hard to surround myself with loving and supportive people, so if you have nothing nice to say then say nothing at all.

[samanthachristinewrites]

pride 2017 - 6/24/17

Today I had the wonderful privilege of getting to experience something that I've only dreamed about experiencing for such a long time. Something that to some people may not seem like a big deal, but to others it is. To me it is. I got the opportunity to go to my city's pride festivities today and it honestly made me feel so many emotions. Happiness. Joy. Sorrow. Amazement and Pride. I felt happy and proud to be in a place with so many people like me. I can't tell you how many times I almost cried seeing all the flags on my way in, the joyful thoughts on my mind as I looked at all the warmth and love and acceptance even in my own city. So many people. All kinds of people, coming together for the same reason. I can't tell you exactly how many times today I heard "be unapologetically you" "God still loves you" and "be yourself." Walking in today the first thing I heard was Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" and it sent chills down my spine. I have waited so long to be able to do this and today I finally got my opportunity and you'd better bet that I had one hell of a time. From getting a temporary tattoo to smiling at everyone and anyone around me to smiling at every vendor and thanking them two or even three times for the things I bought or helpful pamphlets I received - even if I won't use them. To seeing every pride flag and dying a little inside at all the recognition and acceptance and everything else. To watching loads and loads of people march down the street, one after the other, holding their flags and signs up proudly for everybody to see. This has been such a long journey full of so many painful things personally and today I finally got to do the one thing I've been dying to do for a few years now. I can't begin to explain to anyone how warm I've felt all day and how full my life feels when I get to experience these kinds of things. I am so grateful, so so grateful that I get to live in a country and in a state that can celebrate that people are different, that not all people are the same and that there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. I'm so thankful and grateful and amazed that I get to live my truth and that I can be in a place now, in 2017, where I can be open and honest and experience these wonderful and incredible things that before now I never, ever thought that I could. I spent so long locked away and hiding from my own feelings and my own life and I never, ever, want to be back there. This is the happiest that I have ever been. Today meant so, so much to me. I'm never going to forget this feeling.

[samanthachristinewrites]

my first equality bracelet - 6/4/17

I completely forgot to post this earlier because I'm trash but a year ago today I asked my friend to go to Spencer's with me and had my heart set on getting my first LGBT/equality bracelet. I had no idea how anyone would respond, because I'd never worn anything like that before and I can't explain the feeling I felt putting it on for the first time and the next four months that it lasted me until it broke (devastating me). The littlest things can mean so much. I'm so blessed to be able to happily wear both of my bracelets now and not having to worry about any judgment that will come my way. Happy pride month, friends. There's more to come. ❤️💛💚💙💜

[samanthachristinewrites]

pride in public - 7/2/17

A week ago today I went to my first pride and a week later I took the very first step of wearing something like this in public. I went to a couple stores and the library wearing this hat proudly and openly and it’s the craziest feeling. 🤷🏻‍♀️ It’s July 1st, but every day is a day to celebrate being yourself, regardless of how people look or what they say. I know I say this a lot, but I’m so happy where I am right now in my life. 🙏🏻🌈

[samanthachristinewrites]

sappy sap - 6/9/17

i will honestly never be able to explain or put into words what it feels like to go from repressing everything and hiding everything and feeling like you’ll be trapped forever to going to a place where you can joke around with your mom about anything. i heard my mom say so many positive things over the past few days. “did you find anything for gay day?” “did you find anything gay enough yet?” “do you like that one?” “well joke’s on them!” nothing is better than explaining how i used to be made fun of as a little kid for wearing purple and being friends with other kids and being called gay or being threatened for literally no reason. and my mom just said “well joke’s on them, thanks for figuring it out before me is what you could say now!” and i just stopped and smiled and laughed like i always do. except the laugh isn’t nervous anymore. the laugh is happy. i can laugh happily about my sexuality and that’s amazing. i can say things like “nope not gay enough” “that’s super gay, i love it” “it’s gay, sign me up” in front of my mom. things i couldn’t even say OUT LOUD a year and a half ago. i can say that to the person i never ever thought i could and the person i thought would hate me for the way i am and she doesn’t. that is absolutely insane. i’ll probably end up deleting this later on, but coming out was easily the single best decision i have ever made in my life. i have no regrets about coming out to my parents and this entire year has felt like a dream. i’m able to be un-apologetically me in my personal life and my home life and that is the best blessing that God could ever give me.

[samanthachristinewrites]

1 year - 4/8/17

april 8th, 2017.

so a year ago today in a mexican restaurant during a heated conversation with my mom i came out as asexual. it made me nervous, i hardly ate the food i’d just ordered, and i tried with every fiber of my being not to cry as i explained to my mom that i’m ace. she seemed disappointed and upset and i felt very upset and it took a long time of asking me if i could change before finally getting to where we are now.

a year ago today i finally felt like i could be free for the first time since coming out to myself and this would be the second out of three times that i would try to come out to my mom. it’s a year later and everything’s fine. despite my worries and anxiety and everything else, eventually it turned out fine. if you know me at all and as embarrassing as this all probably sounds i know someone i know will probably see this on their dash, but this is for me. because a year, two, and even three from now i’m going to want to look back on this and show myself how much better it gets. because it does. and i never ever believed that it could get better for everyone until i saw how my life changed and how much better it got for me. so happy one anniversary it’s crazy to think that in july i came out to myself two years ago. but for now it’s this and that’s incredible and so crazy to me.

[samanthachristinewrites]

political thoughts - 1/21/17

politics tw

i have been alive for almost 21 years and in that time i have never felt like this about someone before. i have never been terrified of the “potus” or vp. i know that a lot of people have been saying it but i have not said it up front. i have opposed it, i have yelled, i have complained on social media and ranted to my friends. i am genuinely, i feel like i have to watch things happen and i can’t do anything about it. and each time something else happens all i can do is cry or yell about it, which feels so useless at this point. and trust me, i’ll never quit yelling. i will yell for the next four years and another four after that if that’s the way it is. i will never compromise. i will never agree. i will never be okay with the things that are happening in this country. i will never be okay with the things that america has let him off the hook with. i will not ever be okay with this.

i do not have respect for people that voted for him and support him. and some of those people are my own family members. and it makes me very, very sad. i would never tell them that and i know that they don’t understand but it feels like personal betrayal and that’s something that has destroyed me during the election, before and even now. i don’t know if i can forgive certain people for wanting a man like that in power. or a vp like that in power because yes, i do know people that support him. and wanted him in office. and it sickens me. i am a good person. i would like to think that i am. i try to help people. i try to send good vibes and prayers when something is bad, i share go fund me’s of strangers and missing person’s ads and if anyone has a problem i try to listen or help as best as i can. and you know what, personally i think those are things that /everybody/ should do. but the people in my life and the people that i’ve seen, they don’t do that. i try not to hurt anyone and if i do i feel bad about it and always apologize. i am not a bad person. the way i feel is not bad, the way i think is not bad, the way i am is not bad. i am not an evil person, i am not a bad person, i am not any different from anybody else. that is why it’s so hard for me to wrap around my head around their actions and their statements and beliefs because they could impact not only my friends and their lives, which i’ve stated before several times on facebook but they also could impact my own life. and that’s something a lot of people in my physical personal life don’t know. and i think that makes this the hardest because every time something comes out whether it be the website or the agenda or whatever it feels like someone is ripping out my soul and smashing it or picking little pieces of it out or some stupid cliche thing like that. and there is nothing i can do about it. there is nothing i can say to my friends, nothing i can say to stop myself from being sad. i watch everything with obama leaving and it brings tears to my eyes. i have cried today, a few times. i’m devastated honestly. it’s so devastating and so scary and i hate that it’s like this. it’s just so sad for so many people and so alarming for people and i can’t imagine how kids feel. you know teens, or kids, or anyone that’s different. whether you’re a woman, lgbt+, or a different race or anything else he’s spoken out against. nobody should lose their rights. no one should be scared of being told what to do, whether it’s your right to get married or planned parenthood services or anything. free will exists and planned parenthood provides a lot more than abortions. i think it’s sickening. it is all sickening to me. he doesn’t know what he’s doing, he doesn’t have the people’s interest at heart. everybody just covers for the stuff that he does. no one cares when he does bad things and it just makes me so sad.

i can’t tell you how hopeless i felt on election night. i can’t tell you the devastation i felt. i sat in my bed watching and counting electoral votes as they came in. i had friends messaging me having panic attacks and while i tried to calm them down as best as i could, once i knew he would win for sure something in me snapped and i couldn’t deal with the reality. and sure, you can call me pathetic, a “special snowflake”, a sore loser, a big baby, i’ve been called them all before and it certainly won’t be the last time that i’m called any of those things. but this is more than being a “sore loser”. when people’s lives are at stake, then it’s more than being a sore loser. never have i claimed to be hillary’s biggest fan. but i certainly never, in a million years wanted him in office. some of the hopelessness i felt that night revisited me today. and i do feel really upset, but i’m not going to shut up. i will never shut up about this and if you’re reading this then i urge you not to shut up either. the people of america did not choose this. yet, here we are. we did not want this. but hopefully, in four years it will be different. i know for a fact what side i’ll be voting for next time and i really hope people will see it the same way.

[samanthachristinewrites]

national coming out day 2016 - 10/11/16

alrighty this is a post i should’ve made yesterday but i was dumb and totally forgot that tumblr existed for a little bit so i of course didn’t think that i could post this here. to the majority of my friends, i’m already out and even though it’s not exactly a brand new thing, i think it’s important for me to feel comfortable enough to say this somewhere public, like tumblr. this is probably going to sound very similar to my one year anniversary of coming out post that i made back in july, but ultimately i am ace and it took me a very long to come to terms with the fact that i’m not straight. i’m not going to lie, this post is mostly for me and not as much for other people. i wished i could’ve posted this to facebook but i’m not entirely out and it’s something that i’m not very comfortable doing, at least for now or to quite a few people in my life.

i’ve seen so many wonderful videos and posts today and i’m so happy that so many people can feel proud and happy to be the person that they’re meant to be. and i know i don’t know many of them but i’m so proud of these people for coming out (even if they’re already out) and showing other people that it’s okay to be the person that you were born to be and the person that you are. i believe that we’re all created a certain way and i know personally, that God doesn’t make any mistakes. i feel so blessed to be surrounded by so many good and supportive and loving friends that have made everything so much easier for me and have lifted me up during the worst times and have helped me learn so much about myself and have helped me to understand that it’s okay and it’s valid to feel a certain way, especially when it isn’t something you’ve ever been taught about or something that you’ve learned isn’t ordinary growing up. i’m just so freaking thankful to have been put where i am, and to have met all my friends, and to have found all the resources i’ve found. i don’t really know how to end this, but for the past year or so i’ve been super open on tumblr about everything and it’s a tool i’ve used to help express myself and the feelings i feel so if you’re following, thank you for listening and if you aren’t and you’re just reading this then thank you for reading this. happy national coming out day.

[samanthachristinewrites]

i don’t own any of these photos.

isn't it funny how a photo can somehow encompass a swarm of feelings or memories? 

how is it that one picture can bring you back to a certain day and time? 

how can i still feel the warmth of the air that night and the cool of the ocean breeze? 

how is that i can still feel the aching in my chest, wishing that you could've been next to me? 

how can i feel the phone vibrating in my hand, 

how can i still feel the way i wished my phone would've been your hand? 

how can i still feel the waves and hear them crash against the shore? they seemed so strong, so stable, like they would never die; because waves never die, they just keep going on and on and that's what i thought we'd do too.

 the sand in between my toes on that august night, the night that i realized i loved you. the first night i ever lied about you; the same night i felt my heart skip a beat and felt the breath get knocked out of me when i thought about you. the lights lit up the buildings around me, yet you were the only light on in a sea of darkness. 

smiles, giggles, anxiety, excitement, love. 

God i would've spent forever, i could've spent forever fantasizing about what your hand would feel like in mine, 

how the moon would be big and bright over the atlantic. 

counting shooting stars and feeling like them, 

two souls blasting off in a whirlwind of change and emotion. a dark light and a burnt out lantern, trying to survive the best they could.

[samanthachristinewrites]

intro, being gay & other stuff like that - 12/20/17

hi. this feels like a better first post than anything else. my name's samantha and this is my blog for personal writing. this is going to be my first post. tw: very brief self harm mention, very brief suicidal mention, mention of body issues/negative self esteem, and anxiety. 

sometime this january, i made the decision to come out. and that's something that has been a very, very big thing for me. my anxiety hit an all time high and i couldn't function with my day to day life anymore without difficulty. things were really bad and i had to do something about it, so i did. i poured all my thoughts and feelings into an eight page letter and read it to my best friend and my mom. and on february 13th, 2017 i could finally share the biggest thing in my life, although i had felt ashamed before that. and that day, a new part of my life started. i have spent most of this year getting to know the person that i am now and finally trying to navigate my life as a mostly out person. which is wild, because if you know me, you know how hard this has all been for me. i got to tell my mom about feelings i've had for years, that i could never share with her. the homophobia in my own home stopped entirely. i have been blessed with the pleasure of having my mom tell me that she's proud of me for the person that i am today. i am still loved, despite my orientation. and that is not something i could guarantee at the beginning of this year. my mother did not kick me out, she did not turn me away, and she did not try to send me to a therapist or a camp like i thought that she would. i grew up thinking that people chose who they loved or who they were interested in. i didn't understand the difference and i didn't understand that sometimes girls do not like boys, or boys do not like girls and that it is okay. i grew up thinking that wouldn't be okay. i grew up thinking that it's gross to be anything but heterosexual. i grew up thinking that feeling things for the same sex is a direct betrayal to God.

i have always been spiritual. i spent two years in catholic school, have made all of my sacraments, and have considered myself a pretty devout believer in God for my whole life. i've had weak points, but we all do. i don't go to church much, but i'm very, very sure about my beliefs and prayers. that's the main reason why it took me so long to come to terms with everything that i've learned about myself.

when i was fifteen years old, i met a friend online. we met through our mutual favorite band at the time, we the kings. my friend also identified as queer, something that i didn't really think a lot about. despite how i was raised, i would never be mean to anyone about their sexuality. i've always been pretty good about that. but being friends with her and much later on, friends with many incredible lgbt+ people, it occurred to me that people that don't conform to society's standards and aren't the same, aren't weird. they're themselves. and what would happen to me next would show me more than anything in this world, that loving someone is absolutely not a choice. and looking back, i can count all the instances where i experienced something and brushed it off, or didn't know because of my own internalized homophobia; something that i dealt with even after i came out to my parents. learning is hard and at times it takes a long time to do. i've done a lot of learning, not only about other people, but about myself. and i've been taking this year to learn about the real me, because i fooled myself and everyone else for a long time.

i've always had a lot of friends, in a lot of places. the internet has been a safe place for me for a really long time. whether i wrote with friends online or talked because of bands or music or tv shows, different fandoms. i've made a ton of wonderful friends over the years based on common interests. when i was sixteen, i met a girl online that lived in california. we became very close friends and i considered her a best friend. she brought sunshine into my life, even on the darkest days and she lifted my spirits and made my life feel worth living. she sounds like a really good friend, right? well it's not quite like that. i developed very strong feelings for this person, so strong that they scared the crap out of me. i had never really experienced those feelings, but especially not for a girl. she gave me butterflies, she made me feel so amazing, and i wanted to spend all of my time with her. no one in my life had ever made me feel the way she did. finally, the stuff that people speak about in movies, books, and tv shows made sense to me. it felt, so scary and i felt so abnormal, but it felt so natural at the same time. it felt so wrong, but so right.

but naturally, due to the way i grew up and what deep in my heart i knew about these feelings, i knew that i couldn't do it. i couldn't experience this. i believed that lgbt+ individuals should love who they are meant to love, marry who they want to marry, and should be able to do every thing that any straight person could do. i believed that when this happened and i still believe that. so about a month after i started feeling things for my friend, i sat my very best friend down at warped tour (of all places, right?) and i told her i had something important to tell her. i couldn't even look her in the eye. i was so scared. i didn't know how to tell her, but i did. and she told me that she already figured it out. she is the very first person that ever knew. her initial reaction, as always, was "does your family know? have you told your mom? what would your grandma say?" and at the time i didn't have the answer to even one of those questions. i smiled a nervous smile, shrugged and said "i have no idea, haha. no, i can't tell anyone about this. no one can ever know." and we left it at that. i told her i couldn't date the person i had feelings for and i didn't understand any of it.

as that summer continued, things with us got more emotional. i went on a family vacation and made the decision last minute to go. but not before i put almost forty dollars worth of minutes on my phone so i wouldn't have to be apart from her on my trip. i kept that phone glued to my hand all twelve hours to my family's destination. in the mountains, when i had no service, i spent my time writing her letters and spraying them with my perfume. i joked that they always sounded like love letters, because they were. but i didn't want to admit that. i wanted her to read them and to think about me and how my perfume smelled like. i wanted to put a little piece of my heart in the envelope and mail it to california so she could always have a little piece of me. and yeah, that's sappy. but this made me feel sappy. because it mattered.

i was a very insecure person back then and i often struggled with body issues, at times self harm tendencies, and pretty bad emotional problems. i would often times have breakdowns, especially surrounding certain family issues going on at home or personal issues i had and she would, without a doubt, always be a text or message away in calming me down during anxiety attacks or bringing me back down to earth during a self destructive episode. i tried to take care of her in the best way i could when she needed that from me and she relentlessly did the same for me. she's the first person i'd message when i woke up or before i went to bed. they always gave me so many butterflies, but i was too scared to admit that a girl gave me butterflies, so i would call them something completely silly to try to take away from the seriousness of the situation. i called them "rubber chickens" because when i googled the definition of how she made me feel inside, google told me they were butterflies. and i knew i couldn't feel butterflies for a girl, when i'm a girl, so they suggested "warm fuzzies" and that felt too "gay" for me, so they became "rubber chickens".

we never spoke about it, which in hindsight seems crazy. i wouldn't talk about it and i think at that time, we both knew not to bring it up. in one breath i'd talk about an ex boyfriend or say "oh i'm straight" and in the next i'd be talking about how much i loved having her in my life or how she gave me "rubber chickens". there's this quote, i think it's, "i'm sorry to all the people i hurt while i was hurting" and i've never heard a truer quote in my life. when she would talk about her ex girlfriend or something, i would get undeniably jealous. i would get at times, aggressive, emotional, or upset. i couldn't tell her i wanted to be with her, but i didn't want her to be with anyone else either.

as time went on, i became extremely dependent on her. she became my rock and my main support system, my cheerleader, my best friend, and my girlfriend all in one. we were not together and we never discussed those things, that much. but i really, really loved her. she cared for me through my crazy problems, my most insecure days, and my anxiety attacks when i thought she'd walk out. she would always assure me she'd never leave my side, even if i pushed her away and i begged her not to let it happen.

during this period of time, i had a lot of guilt and anxiety about betraying God or making Him mad by my feelings. i knew that i hadn't chosen to feel things for this person and i knew that it came as a huge shock to me. it happened naturally and i never expected it to. but i also knew that while i didn't believe it for other people, that when it came to me, i had to be different. i worried that God would punish me or that i would go to hell for liking my friend. i barely understood my feelings, so how would God? i had many nights of trying to deal with or figure out how i could like this person, if i had never liked someone like this before and how i could like them if they were my same sex. i struggled with that greatly and it gave me severe anxiety, almost constantly.

near the end of the summer, i realized that i did not want to let this person go. our little fantasies about meeting up and doing things together, turned into things i wished could be a reality. the vacation changed a lot for me. i remember at one point my cousin took me on a walk across the beach around midnight. i loved the freedom and of course, took my phone with me because i couldn't be away from her. the text said something like "i wish i could be there with you. i wish we were there together. i would throw water at you" with some silly emoticon attached to it. and i swear, my heart flipped over in my chest. i looked down at my phone and smiled and my cousin turned to me and asked me "so what's his name?" and i said, it's no one. she kept asking and insisted i had to be talking to a boy because i wouldn't stop smiling. so, i rest my case.  but the thing is, i did wish that. to be specific, i wished that i could hold her hand and walk with her at midnight. i wished that i could do everything with her. and in that moment, i really, really realized that. i couldn't and didn't want to live without this person in my life.

so i made the conscious decision to continue. i didn't know what that meant but i did believe in one thing for certain. God's always had my back and i wholeheartedly believe that if someone is put in your life and you have such a deep connection with them, that it would be a waste not to pursue that. people are placed in our lives for reasons we can't always understand and in this case i trusted that He put her in my life to help me or for me to help her. i didn't know how it would work or if it even would, but i decided i wouldn't push her away or out. and that i'd stay there as long as she wanted to stay there. we were young, but we wouldn't always be young. i didn't know what the future would hold, but i knew i wanted her there by my side.

i don't know how much of this part i want to tell, but around that time my ex boyfriend came back into my life. he had been missing after walking out entirely and disappearing about two years prior. it threw me for a loop and in my heteronormative mind, thought that it had to be a divine sign that i needed to be with a boy. that in some way, God tried to tell me that i shouldn't be doing this and that i needed to be with him. i don't want to get too into this because it upsets me a lot and i feel a little uncomfortable talking about it on the internet, but i basically hurt her. i hurt her, really really badly. i pushed her away and she tried her best to stay, even when i pushed her out. my feelings for her did not stop when i started dating my ex. they didn't go away and the relationship with my ex boyfriend didn't last. the entire situation taught me that it never would've worked because i didn't feel the way for my ex boyfriend that i should've.

i managed to push everything away and pretend like none of it ever happened. it was incredibly painful and i still to this day can't imagine what it felt like for the person that i had this with either. my mom would ask questions because she knew we were very close, my friend would ask questions because she knew and each time i would lie. i would lie completely. i acted like it never, ever happened. i internalized everything and a few months later, it started to eat me alive. not only did i miss her, but it hurt. little things would hurt. certain songs, certain movies, certain places. i can't begin to tell you how much it hurt, but i dealt with it. i would check up on her social medias, but i would rarely say anything. and when she started to date someone new, i reached out and she seemed happy to be talking to me. but i congratulated her on her new relationship and carried on. i acted like it never happened.

the next year, i developed feelings for another one of my friends and didn't realize it. i would do all kinds of unusual things. i would call her pretty all the time, sometimes save her instagram posts to my phone, and talk to her about really emotional things. i remember at one point telling my friend, "isn't she the prettiest girl you've ever seen?" i was eighteen and i had never really found a girl, super aesthetically pleasing before, but she changed that. of course, i would always say things like "oh i'm straight, i've never liked girls. i like boys" and things like that. but one day, i found out that she had a girlfriend, a new girlfriend and (okay i know she's reading this, hello this is awkward but you already know this story) it crushed me. pretty badly. and when i say pretty badly, i mean, crying in bed to sam smith for about three months, pretty badly. that fall became a repeated playlist of mary lambert's cover of jessie's girl and sam smith's stay with me, i'm not the only one, and leave your lover - over and over and over and over again. i think i drove my mom completely crazy singing along to that entire album. my friend found out, again and i told her how i felt about my friend that i liked entering a new relationship and she gave me this look and kind of just said ..okay that's weird, samantha. and it made me feel kinda bad, but i knew she didn't mean it in a negative way. but it got me thinking. why do i feel like this? she's my friend, shouldn't i be happy for her? i couldn't possibly want a girlfriend? why do i feel weird complimenting her appearance now? nothing seemed to click for me and i continued on with life and thinking that i just got really close to my friends.

some time went by and i started to make new friends and reconnect with old friends and i kind of came to the conclusion that i'm on the spectrum of asexuality. so everything kind of clicked in that sense. oh so that's why i don't like this or that, so that's why this or that grosses me out or i just have a general lack of interest in it. i have a great friend that is so knowledgeable and she's always been there to help me with these kind of things. she gave me some websites, one of them had an email to ask for help, and long story short two weeks after typing the email out i sent it. but by the time i'd gotten a response back, i figured out that i didn't need it. because i'd done my own research and knew for certain that it matched me.

i identified as heteroromantic asexual for a few months. but as time went on, i realized more and more that i found myself attracted to women physically and most certainly emotionally. i would connect with my queer female friends like i hadn't connected with anyone ever before. i've always had really good relationships with my friends, but basically after a few weird crushes here and there i realized, hey okay so girls, this could be a thing, right? and i thought. i started to deal with the feelings i felt when i liked a girl for the very first time. the way it affected me, the way that i felt after it happened, and what i missed during it. i finally accepted that it had happened and more than once. it had happened a handful of times. i had spent a long time liking girls and didn't realize it. sometime around this point, i went back to the person i had the initial feelings for and tried to explain and apologize. i apologized over the course of about close to going on two and a half years. i still don't know whether they believe me or not, but the point is that i very much regret what i did.

allowing myself to deal with those emotions, opened up a lot of things for me. a lot of pain, mostly. things got more difficult in 2016, with the election. i found myself dealing with severely homophobic comments from family who wanted a republican president to take away rights from lgbt+ people. near the end of 2016, i reached a point where i wanted to seriously hurt myself, i didn't want to be here anymore if i had to hide for the rest of my life and it became evident that i would need to come out to my mom at the very least, because keeping it inside slowly killed me emotionally. i had severe anxiety and some chronic pain and that brings us back to where we started.

coming out is the best decision i ever could've made. being able to talk to my mom about my feelings, is the best blessing. i don't have to hide anymore. i came out to my dad in may of this year. he already figured it out. he agreed to take me to my first pride.

going to pride is something that i've wanted to do since i've been comfortable enough to be as out as i am and it made me so happy. i had such a good time and such a great experience. the best feeling in the world. it feels like you aren't alone, you're right where you belong, and that every difficult thing you've endured is worth it. i cried every time i saw a pride flag and still can't believe i had such an amazing day. it really changed my life.

i am proud of the person that i am today. the other day, my mom read something in an adult coloring workbook or something like that. she said "this page says: tell us something new you're grateful for this year, that you didn't have before" or something like that. and she said "i don't know what to write, oh wait, yes i do. i learned that i have a beautiful gay daughter, that is perfect just the way she is" or something like that, and i swear i could've cried in that moment. at this time last year, i was up crying every night wondering what would happen if i told, or even worse, what would happen to my mental health if i didn't tell. my life has flipped entirely. and if you're not out or you're out to some people, i want you to know that even when things seem horrible. like you can not go on, like they couldn't get any better, it gets better. and i know that's kind of repetitive at this point and cliche but it's so true and i didn't believe it, until it happened for me.

this will get better. it does get better and it's going to keep getting better. thank you for reading. hope you enjoy what's to come.