1) Send a video to them explaining your sexual orientation. Better yet, send them a whole playlist of videos of other people coming out. Then put yours at the very end.
2) Or you could send them a montage of cat videos and at the very end quickly state your sexual orientation.
3) “I’m the gayest straight person I know. You know why? BECAUSE I’M NOT STRAIGHT.”
4) Give them a call or tell them through Skype
5) Send them a thoroughly thought out text message
6) Write a diary/blog/journal entry for every time they say something homo/transphobic. Explain to them what it really means to you, and how to change their view, if they wish to do so.
7) Make them a playlist of the most gay songs ever, then end it with “Everyone is Gay” by Great Big World
8) Send them the music video, “Coming Out” by Ally Hills
9) Ask them to join you in a pride parade
10) Alternatively, tell them to turn on the TV when the parade is on the news. Make sure you’re right in the news anchor’s way for this one
11) Blast “Born This Way” by Lady Gaga at your next family dinner
12) Introduce your same sex significant other to them
13) Tell the Starbucks barista that your name is “insert Sexual Orientation here” and come when they call you up
14) Admit to your extremely long list of same sex celebrity crushes
15) Take them to a gay bar
16) Or post a picture of yourself at a gay bar to a form of social media you both share
17) Give them Ellen Degenere’s autobiography for Christmas
18) Request that your next birthday party be rainbow colored everything
19) Put a gay pride flag bumper sticker on your car
20) Fly a gay pride flag outside of your home
21) Send them this list
Just as a quick reminder to myself and all of the other people of the LGBTQA+ community, I urge you to accept yourself before you come out to others. Start with the people you know will accept you, and create a support group for yourself. Always know that you have millions upon millions of people who support you and are looking out for you, myself included. We love you and accept you for who you are. Never change for anyone.
Love,
Hannah ❤
gay
My Irrational Fear of Teeth
Ever since I’ve realized I’m bisexual, I’ve developed an irrational fear of wisdom teeth.
Wait, what?
I’m terrified of getting my wisdom teeth for fear that I will accidentally out myself while under anesthetic. I don’t know if that’s ever happened to anyone else, but it’s bound to happen to me. As some of you know, I live in a conservative Christian household and any form of homosexuality is looked down upon. (If you’d like to read an entire post of what that is like, click here) My only guardian that would take me to the dentist for the procedure is my mom. Again, she doesn’t know about my sexuality. Thankfully, I don’t have to have the removed immediately, but I will have to eventually. Hopefully by then I have a friend who can be my chauffeur for the day.
Overcoming (and Avoiding) Obstacles
For the past few months I’ve been on a slippery slope of depression. My mom has become extremely outspoken about her opposition to the LGBT community, and it is making me sick to the core. Every night I can’t help but wonder if she would still love me, and would want to continue communication with me. I can almost feel the negative response through my bones as I shake underneath my pile of blankets. During the first few weeks all I could do was cry, or feel like sobbing my eyes out. Now it’s just a dull feeling pain, and only stings when she herself provokes it.
I’ve already accepted myself for who I am, why can’t she? I know why she can’t: because she was raised to despise any other sexuality except heterosexual. She was brought up in such a strict household of going to church every single Sunday, that she thinks she is better than those who love the same-sex.
I can’t keep on recovering from her blows with Macklemore songs and coming out videos. I don’t have the privilege of being able to call the Trevor hotline because I don’t have the privacy to do so. My friends can only help me so much when they themselves don’t fully understand what I’m going through.
I’m in my current residence with my mom and stepdad for the next 9 months. Before anyone gets scared about suicidal tendencies in me, I have hope for the future. I do not want to kill myself. All I know is, I need help to get through this. I just don’t know how to get it. Anything that any of you may have to give me advice about, it’s more appreciated than you’ll ever know.
Thank you,
Hannah
Indirectly & Involunarily Coming Out to Someone Close to You
A few months ago something happened that was not under my own control: I came out as bisexual to my dad.
My dad has always been supportive (to my knowledge) of the LGBT+ community. (Also sorry about not including the rest of the acronym, but I swear it just keeps getting longer every time I see it mentioned in a post) His philosophy was “if it doesn’t hurt anyone or involve me directly in any way, I don’t care about it”. Keep in mind that I live in the South, and things can get pretty homophobic down here. So when I heard his opinions on it, I wasn’t all that worried about telling him.
I worked up the nerve over the process of about a year of visits to speak my opinions about the LGBT community. From time to time I would bring it up, according to news reports and the like.By doing this I actually grew closer to my dad and Julia, his fiancee.
When victory at the Supreme Court came around, I had already come out to Julia. It was on that day exactly that she told my father that I’m “gay”. In her own retelling of the event, she and my dad were sitting in the living room watching the news report on it. My dad remarked “I don’t see what the big deal is. I mean, they’re just getting married. *Insert comment reflecting his own views about marriage thanks to his failed ones*” This is when my stepmom replies, “Well, it wouldn’t hurt for you to be more supportive.” My dad proceeds to go have a smoke break, then comes back in and asks her “Is Hannah gay?” And she replies, “Yes”.
I can’t express to you how much that bothers me because of how untrue it is. I’m bisexual. If I was gay, I would have come out to the 15+ people in my life as that. However, I am not.
She told me all of what happened around 2 weeks after it occurred because that was the next time I was to come over. She was so excited, and didn’t want me to freak out about it. But I was anything except ecstatic. I wasn’t ready to come out to my dad, and I gave her specific instructions not to tell him because I wanted to tell him myself. She even went outside with me to see how it all would play out. Looking back, I know I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, but I should have told her that I just wanted it to be him and me. She already had the stolen honor of telling him the first time, why should she be there again?
When I finally go outside and meet my dad, all the while choking on my tongue and having an anxiety attack inside, I give him the longest hug I probably ever have given to him, and I correct her crucial mistake. I tell him that I am, in fact, bisexual and like girls and boys. “That’s fine,” he says. He goes on to say how he always sort of knew. I don’t recall what else he said because I blacked out like I’ve done in the past in coming out to people close to me.
I think the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard my dad comment about my sexuality was uttered that day: “Besides, aren’t those Converse high tops lesbian shoes?”
Skipping forward to last Friday, mid-Bible class:
My Bible teacher gave us the simple assignment of thanking someone who has raised us. I sent messages to my mom, grandma, Julia, my other grandparents, and my dad. My message to my dad and Julia is as follows:
“Thank y’all so much for loving me and accepting all of me. It means the world to me that y’all support me, and it keeps me going when things are tough. Everything is fine, but I just wanted to let y’all know that. I love y’all so much. Have an awesome day 🙂 <3”
My dad’s response left me in a puddle of tears in my school’s bathroom:
“Thank you, baby. That made my day. I’m so proud of you and always will be, and nothing will ever change that. I LOVE YOU.”
With the lack of confidence I have in my mom accepting my coming out, It’s incredible to hear that my dad does. My advice to people coming out is this: create a support group of people who love you regardless, then work your way up to the challenging ones. I can’t tell you anything about facing the hard ones, though, because I still have my own lions to tame.
I still can’t say I’m completely convinced that my dad believes in my bisexuality as much as he does my false homosexuality. All I’m saying is, if I come home with a guy for him to meet, it’ll be his own fault if he’s shocked half to death.
A First for Everything
Yesterday (Friday) I made the 2 hour drive from my home to my dad and his fiance’s house. Being the second night here without a blog post was driving me crazy so I had to steal away the laptop and post a few things. Friday afternoon I all of a sudden decided to come out to my dad’s girlfriend, Julia. I think I blacked out once I croaked it out into the atmosphere. She took it incredibly well, and we talked it through for a few hours. I explained to her what I’ll eventually explain to you all. I feel infinitely blessed to have her in my life for these past couple of years. She has now become the first ‘family member’ I have come out to as bisexual.
The rest of the night was unusually uneventful. My dad loves to have all of the control of the remote, so we watched MMA fighting for a couple hours. I will openly admit that until last night I had never watched MMA fighting. Coming from my point of view, though, it seemed pretty gay (for a show targeting mainly straight men). Just think about it: two shirtless men fighting each other for a beautifully gawky belt. Not only that, but another guy rubs vaseline on them beforehand. Come on, they can’t all be straight, right?
We also watched “We’re the Millers” because I’d never seen it before. It was actually pretty funny, unlike the Rodney Carrington comedic stylings which we watched shortly after. I like watching and listening to many diverse comedians, but I don’t quite enjoy the country ones so much.
Skipping forward to Saturday, I fell asleep around 4am again, watching one of my favorite John Mulaney comedy skits. Yet again I didn’t wake up until after 12. Actually, none of us woke up until almost 1. Immediately after we all awoke, my dad changed the channel to HGTV. I swear he lives off of home improvement and history channels. Anyways we watched a 4 hour (or at least it felt that way) marathon of “Flea Market Flip”. Much to my surprise I liked it, and got really inspired. I’m planning on redoing a dresser that was gifted to me a few years ago. It’s quite old, but it’s in better shape than many 30+ year old dressers. I’m a Marvel comics fan, and since the franchise is so popular, I decided to decorate it as so. I’m going to decoupage comic book clippings onto the top of the dresser and on the front of three of the six drawers (catty-corner. Is that an actual word? I can never be sure.). I’m going to paint the rest of the dresser white including the other drawers. Instead of decoupaging the front of the other three drawers, I’m going to make a collage onto the sides of of the drawer (that is, when the drawers are opened). Being that my grandpa was a carpenter, I have a knack for it in my blood. I’ll keep you guys updated on the dresser and try to post pictures of it as I go through the process.
When HGTV became monotonous, I began drawing my first set of realistic hands into my sketchbook. I’ll post a picture of them if it’s requested. I’ll be posting my reading progress/process of “Great Expectations” tomorrow. I’m beginning to thoroughly enjoy reading it. I can’t wait to talk to you all again.
A Brief Backstory
First of all, let me give a HUGE thank you to the people who have liked or commented on my last post. You have no idea how good it makes me feel to have someone reading these. The amount of support that you all have shown me in only the past 24 hours has given me hope and brightened my week. In honor of the first five blog posts I’ve done, I’m going to be completely real and honest here. No censorship or lies on this blog. I’ll be telling you guys the whole truth, and hopefully you’ll stick along for the ride and learn some things about me.
In the theme of getting to know one another, I’m going to re-introduce myself. As in, give you my backstory, interests… just consider this an About Me page (is that a page I can already write in on wordpress? I’m trying to get the hang of this). I grew up (well, am growing up) in a strict conservative household that went to church every Sunday morning, and shamed anything out of social norms. Eventually my mom stopped going to church for reasons unknown to me, so I started going with my grandmother. These two women brought me up in my childhood home until I was 14. We weren’t poor, but we certainly weren’t well to do. We always had what was needed. I love my grandmother more than anyone on this earth. She’s like a mother to me, and even took that job while my own mother was working. My mom and dad split up right before my 5th birthday, and never were married. The real kicker is that my dad’s parents were (are) Holiness Pentecostal churchgoers, and just about shunned him once they found out I was being born. To be honest, my dad and I are like the black sheep of the family reunions because of it (and because neither of us go to church anywhere). My dad and I haven’t always had the best relationship throughout the years, but we’ve grown much closer over the past 3 years. I’ve been spending more time with him, and I don’t feel like a burden to him anymore.
During middle school my mom started dating my now stepdad. I can’t say I ever liked him after the first few visits. I wanted my mom to be happy, though, so I kept quiet. I can easily say the past 5 years have been hell for me. I won’t get too much into their relationship because it gets my blood boiling, but I’m sure I’ll have many stories about him that I’ll vent about in this blog.
I’m skipping around a bit, but stay with me here. A week after my 5th birthday, on a mother’s day, my grandfather died (my mom’s dad). A bad back surgery and a lot of esophigial problems killed him. I still miss him to this day, but he’s influenced me more than anyone else I’ve ever known. Eventually I want to get a tattoo of one of his guitar picks over my heart. He was a welder, a carpenter, a musician, and an all-around completely loved man. He’s my hero to this day, and I’ll always cherish the short time I had with him.
Now onto the present and who I am today… I’m a senior in high school, and want to become a pastry chef with every fiber of my being. I’m bisexual and have been coming out to my friends since October of last year. My family doesn’t know about my sexuality as of yet. I’m an atheist and have had atheistic beliefs for around 3 years now. I’m sure that I’ll share my ‘realization of my sexuality’ story eventually. I love reading, and the classics are my favorites along with YA fiction scattered around within it. I enjoy listening to classic rock, and one of my best-loved bands is CCR. I’m not that good at art, but I try my best. Maybe I’ll even give you guys a look into my portfolio class drawings.
Thank you for listening to me ramble on about myself and my interest. I’d love to get to know all of you, and would love if you could comment on this post telling me your own story. To all of you, let this be but an excerpt of what is to come.
REREADING THIS TWO YEARS AFTER POSTING: Hannah I know you think it’s the cool thing to not believe in God and all, but girl you never stopped believing. Stop lying to yourself.
REREADING THIS 6 YEARS AFTER POSTING:
Past Hannah, both of you, calm the hell down. Your views on religion have changed constantly. Here in the year 2021, you identify most with Agnosticism. I know you both wanna be high and mighty because of immaturity or just ignorance, but it’s okay to change your mind. Love you both. 💜
What’s Cooking? My Sexuality
I baked cinnamon rolls, and a lemon pound cake for my actual dad for father’s day today. They turned out well. Now to the actual blog post: my sexuality and how I’m having to deal with ignorance every single day of my closeted life. As I was baking the said pound cake, I was wondering how my dad will react when I come out to him, because I will come out to him. I hope he’ll take it well whenever I tell him. In a way, I think Julia may already kind of know. Considering that she has told me in the past that they’ll support me no matter what. I’ve explained my opinions of the LGBTQA community to them in the past, just because it was something to talk about (as in, something to criticize my mom and stepdad about). They seem to have the same basic opinions as I do. I don’t want to come out to them yet though because I’m not out of the house yet. I mean, if I could drive, I would tell them (just in case I’d need to leave, although it’s pretty unlikely).
As for my mom and stepdad’s opinions on the LGBTQA community, homophobia seems to run strong in their veins. While we were watching one of those baking championships on TV, one of the men revealed that he was gay. This was relevant because he was talking about how he was making a cheesecake in honor of his partner (that was the first thing he’d ever made him). Not only that, but he’s also from Oxford, MS. That means that he’s probably been through more prejudice and hypocrisy than I’ve ever imagined. Maybe I’m just underexaggerating, though. Immediately after he stated he was gay, my mom and stepdad acted as if he didn’t even deserve to be there. It’s as if any respect for him even as just a person disappeared. I guess you could say that bigotry is magic in that sense.
It’s not so much as my mom who I’m afraid of. I know that she wouldn’t yell at me, or I hope she wouldn’t. She’d possibly cry and claim she did a terrible job of raising me or something, and try to ship me off to some kind of conversion therapy camp. A big concern I have with all of my family is that they won’t believe bisexuality is actually a thing. It’s actually real, regardless of opinion. I hate when people say that bisexual people have a choice, too. I’m sorry, but I didn’t choose to be attracted to this person or that person. Whoever I fall in love with isn’t my choice. I didn’t choose to fall for Abby, but that certainly doesn’t make me a lesbian. I just don’t understand the way people think. It’s not my place to know, I guess.
My main worry is how my stepdad will react because I know that he will indefinitely kick me out of the house. It’s “his” house, and he’s already kicked out Sharon’s daughter in the past for being a lesbian. Why would I be any different? I won’t get too much into what I’m about to say, but I’ve been trying to convince my mom to let me create a Facebook so that I could sell the things I bake or furniture I redo. Needless to say, I heard them talking last night (because he doesn’t know how to keep his voice down), and he claimed that he didn’t “want that trash in his house”. Well, he certainly won’t want me here. I wonder how he’d feel if he knew I watched porn in his house?
On a semi-lighter note, he got all riled up about gluten-free stuff again. For some reason, he doesn’t think people in need of a gluten free diet exist. I just have no words. I assure you that this guy actually exists, trust me, I forcibly live with him everyday. If there’s one thing my dad and I bond over, it’s how much we both hate my stepdad. It’s a good thing I’m getting away from this madness for the weekend. Just one and a half more days, then I’ll be with people who accept me as I am (or at least I hope they will).
somethingstoremember 