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In the beginning…

Growing up gay, I wish I’d known some of these things…

Homosexual behaviour and gender non-conformity have been recorded and celebrated since the beginning of written history.

Opposition to these things only began rather recently in the scheme of civilisation.

Homosexual behaviour and transsexualism occur in every animal group across every geographic region.

The existence of LGBT+ identities is evidently fundamental to our species and planet.

The fabulousness of the LGBT community extends far beyond humanity

But I’ve got to be honest.

I’d be lying if I said it always felt this way for me.

I’d never have guessed that the hardest person to come out to wouldn’t be any member of my family or school. It was, in fact, the one person who remained a sceptic at the end of it all: myself. Man, that guy gets on my nerves.

And I have a feeling that many of you reading will get exactly what I’m talking about.

This article is aimed at young LGBT people, but I’m sure that any straight people reading will learn a lot reading on!

What’s The Problem Here?

Well, wishing to be something you’re not is pretty common. I always clung to this idea that perhaps I was bisexual, perhaps I still liked girls— when in reality I was gay, and couldn’t face it. Yet Hannah, who is in fact bi, has actually wished she could just be gay: “it’s easier to just fit in a box sometimes.”

Yeah, life’s funny like that.

What's happening here is that the mind has absorbed the uneducated attitudes of our society, and it’s using it all as information for building the way we see ourselves.

This internalised homophobia can be a tough beast, unique to growing up gay (and queer in general).

But perhaps the most important thing I needed to understand was that it’s okay to feel this way about yourself. Even though I grew up with accepting family and friends, I still grew up in a society filled with messages that there’s something bad or at least unusual about me. And like most queer folk, I crushed on a few people throughout adolescence with whom my chances were, well, doomed from the start… which sure didn’t help with building self-esteem.

'Do not expect to receive the love from someone else that you do not give yourself' - Bell Hooks

And that’s only the baggage pretty much every LGBT person has to deal with. Many individuals reading will know all too well the effects of homophobic abuse they faced growing up gay. Abuse can take many forms and according to Stonewall, 2 in 3 young LGBT people in the UK have faced homophobic abuse.

Since it’s what they’re used to, ruminating on the abuse they’ve faced and their consequent feelings of inferiority is the closest some people can get to feeling themselves, to feeling authentic. And you know what?

That’s all okay, too.

You’ve gotta embrace your demons at this present moment if you want to address them.

So… what does addressing this problem look like?

The Solution to Internalised Homophobia

Here’s a thought…

You are not your emotions.

The next time you find yourself overcome with feelings of self-doubt, step back and reflect on yourself.

You will notice it’s not that there’s something wrong with who you are, but rather that there are ‘voices’ in your head who try to convince you of such a nasty idea.

And these voices in your head that say there’s something wrong with who you are— they are simply that. Voices.

You don’t owe them something.

Your sexuality and your conflicted feelings around it do not define you. Growing up gay, I think it was easy for me to make all that a much bigger part of myself than it needed to be, in an attempt to compensate for feelings of shame; when Hannah and I first came out, we felt as if we were suddenly supposed to embody a certain gay persona.

In reality, the solution to such deeply personal issues has to come from within. And no amount of flannel or tight shorts is going to achieve that. This is a quest that will be different for everyone, but Hannah and Ellie have some suggestions:

“The biggest thing was having certain people removed from my life,” Ellie told me. Sadly, this wasn’t a choice for her. Like so many before her, Ellie is a gay person who lost a lot of her friends upon coming out. But in many ways, this was a gift in disguise. That’s the great

thing about being queer: once you’ve come out, you earn this sort of filter. A filter that guarantees the people closest to you will be open-minded people.

“It’s nice to contemplate that there are queer people who play sport professionally, queer people who run highly successful businesses, queer scientists, queer prime ministers and presidents…”

Of course, this is not so simple for some. The reality is that many young individuals reading this article live with people to whom they simply could not come out.

But thankfully, many people growing up gay manage to transcend this painful paradox by forming a ‘chosen family’ of fellow LGBT individuals in the form of a strong friendship group. Hannah benefitted amazingly from “meeting others like me with my exact experiences” as this “really validated” the way she felt. It’s often thought that queer individuals in unaccepting households must relinquish their families and start a whole new life. But these inspiring people show that a fine balance is achievable.

Now I don’t know about you, but my first glimpses of the LGBT community were scarcely-clothed men… some expressing Zeus-like hypermasculinity, whilst others give the word ‘camp’ a whole new meaning. I saw girls dressed like boys dressed like girls dressed like boys. And I saw a whole lot of white folk, which no doubt is alienating to people of colour growing up gay.

But what you must know is that this is merely the fabulous face of the LGBT community. I’m stating the obvious here, but it’s nice to contemplate that there are…

And that’s merely a tiny sample of your incredible community. There will be queer people who are nothing like you and queer people who are just like you.

Ellie says that “there are loads of things people say that you don’t believe until you experience it yourself.” I know it can all feel so lonely sometimes, but by chatting more and more with other LGBT individuals, you will be shocked by the similarities between some of your experiences!

Hannah says she “didn’t realise how intolerant people at high school were” until she went to university. Ellie adds that “teachers preached tolerance but made a lot of jokes in reality.” Only at uni did Hannah understand that her sexuality didn’t have to be “such a big part” of her identity. As Ellie says, “it is what it is… it’s not a choice, so there’s nothing you could be ashamed of.”

And those idiotic voices in your head, they’re not you. They are separate.

And in the face of self-doubt— or actual homophobes for that matter— you always have the option to rise above it all and say

No.

That’s not a No, you don’t exist. It’s an Oh, I see you alright. But no, I

don’t have time for any rubbish.

I have nothing to defend against.

…Because these voices in your head— and the toxic people from whom they originate, whether or not you can put your finger on who in particular they are— these echoes are not the raging laughs of people high on superiority. They are in fact the pitiful groans of people so dissatisfied with themselves that the only way they can temporarily claim some semblance of happiness is through stepping on others.

And I mean that word, pitiful, quite literally: homophobes are folk for whom we ought to feel great sorrow. Because trying to hurt someone, in the end, only hurts yourself.

…But I’m no fool. I imagine that even right now as you read my words, an insistent force might continue to downplay your worth. That’s okay. Continue to say no. Nope. Not this time. Again and again. Tear down every layer of the internalised homophobia you developed growing up gay, embracing each of its vindictive cries as you whittle it down until it’s but a dying whimper.

NO.

Refuse to be controlled by society's prejudices

What goes down… must come up.

There’s a bittersweet truth that can set us free.

You see, the mind is pretty much programmed to focus on negativity. We’ll generally notice the bad parts of a situation more than the good parts, or at least more quickly. And so, left to it its own devices, doesn’t it make sense that our minds are so quick to criticise us!

But framed correctly, this can be a blessing growing up gay, not a curse. Think of it like this…

Our minds are already so busy searching for the bad in everything, critiquing our every move…

…So our job as human beings is to put our energy into looking for and appreciating the awesome parts of everything!

In the context of internalised homophobia, as with any self-hatred, this means making the effort to be kind to ourselves. Growing up gay we must focus on our positive qualities, no matter how hard that is sometimes. This isn’t blind optimism. It is balancing out our natural pessimism to see ourselves realistically for what we truly are: just people, trying their best in a tough world.

For as long as we look for flaws in ourselves, we’ll find them. The answer isn’t always to fix our ‘flaws’; it’s to stop seeing them as flaws. Partly that’s learning to appreciate our sexual orientation, rather than hate it, but as well it means becoming comfortable with our capacity for self-sabotage. The inner critic is a formidable adversary, but not quite an evil foe, and the greatest self-compassion is making amends with this sub-personality.

“Homophobes, when all is said and done, are folk for whom

we ought to feel great sorrow. Because trying to hurt

someone, in the end, just hurts yourself.”

After all, the ultimate goal here is balance: addressing your pain whilst not letting it rule you.

Self-care exercises won’t always defeat misery, but they are always worthwhile, even when they feel futile. Meanwhile, however… part of getting better is choosing to live the life we ‘would’, were it not for everything we think is stalling it.

Here’s the permission you were waiting for.

Because there’s no time that’s any better than now for doing something to feel good, like listening to music, going for a walk or making plans with friends to look forward to.

Choosing to enjoy life in the midst of turmoil isn’t burying our heads in the sand, so long as it’s supplemented by time spent regularly working on our struggles.

When we aren’t tending directly to our wounds and instead working on proactive ways to relieve our pain, the most powerful thing we can do is definitely to channel it into kindness. Maybe that’s for

a family member or friend, maybe that’s for ourselves. Or maybe it’s working on a career to share our much-needed gifts with the world.

Explore other Fledglink content for motivation towards bettering yourself. Seek others going through this. And most of all, keep your head up high. It gets a whole lot better.

Hannah’s and Ellie’s parting messages: ~ “No matter where you are in the world, your feelings are normal.” ~“Having the right company... makes a massive difference to your wellbeing and your ability for self-acceptance.”

Photo credits of images 2 and 4 go to Lloyd Rhodes-Brandon