“What’s she up to?”įinnegan Shephard, writer and entrepreneur “How’s Linds?” they’ll ask in our FaceTimes, craning their necks to get a peek at my sunny spouse, the one who never mopes no one’s paying her enough attention. Now, my family loves my wife more than me. This used to annoy me, but I’m an artist and thus always moping that no one is as interested in me as I think they should be. My sexuality felt like a mystery they weren’t particularly interested in solving: there were no follow-up questions. We were close but had never discussed sexuality beyond my mother suggesting to me as a tween that I wash my hands before I “touch myself” after getting a rash from chronic masturbation (to this day, I can still recall the way each of my internal organs liquified from sheer mortification). My family are jazz-loving liberals who recycle. “Can you tell Dad and William?” I’d mumbled into my iced chocolate, partly to avoid the awkwardness of discussing my sex life with my father and little brother, and partly because I was lazy. It wasn’t: I was deeply, wildly, in love. I think my mum assumed the fact I’d fallen in love with my best friend would be another attention-seeking phase. I’d become a raging student activist, dying my hair blue and getting regrettable facial piercings. I came out to my mother at 18, in the coffee shop of a fancy Sydney department store. We spoke with 20 adults from all across the LGBTQ+ spectrum about their coming-out stories, to unfurl the beautiful array of experiences the journey entails. Another 30% said their family was “not accepting” of LGBTQ+ people and 19 percent were scared or unsure about how their families would react. A recent Human Rights Campaign Foundation survey found that, of 10,000 teens ages 13–17, 31% feared they would be “treated differently or judged” if they came out. population identifies as LGBTQ+ according to the most recent Gallup data, but not everyone feels safe and accepted in their identities.
For many LGBTQ+ people, coming out as their true gender or sharing their sexuality comes fraught with fear over how family members will react, whether they'll lose friends once they bring their authentic selves into the light, or if their workplace, church or community will look at them differently.Īnd even as Pride flags ripple from many homes and storefronts and everyone from the Google doodle to your favorite snack food seem to have turned rainbow-hued for Pride month, we're still a long way from full equality. The road to self-acceptance can be a rocky one, especially when it's paved with others' reactions.