“I think I might be gay,” I whispered to my cat. Her name was Whiskers but when I was little, I could only say Whiskey. She was a feisty cat and was more annoyed with the fact that I woke her than confessing to her my feelings.

I didn’t have anyone else I could talk to about them and feel safe. It was mid-90s. “Coming out” wasn’t really a thing and a lot of shame came from it. Kids in my school, myself included, were beaten for even acting gay. Besides, I knew what my parents would say. My father already talked badly about homosexuals. My mother had made fun of a gay character on one of her soap operas. The character was dying of aids because apparently that’s what all gay men got. And growing up in a gospel family, I learnt at a young age that being gay was a sin.

I had no one in my life to tell me otherwise.

I was forced to have this secret and I didn’t want to get beat up anymore. I didn’t want my dad to have anymore reason to hate me. I didn’t want to disappoint my mom. I didn’t want to get aids or go to hell.

I just wanted to be loved and I wanted to love, too.

I laid in bed staring up at the ceiling with burnings tears in my eyes. I had a mantra I started to repeat each night throughout my teen years. Some nights the mantra would turn to begging until my throat dried. Other nights it was angry and demanding until my voice fell to a raspy whisper. The fiery tears would streak down my face.

“Don’t make me gay. Don’t make me gay. Don’t make me gay.”

I just wanted to be normal and I didn’t feel normal. I saw what normal looked like. I was taught what normal looked like. A male and a female. I had no one to tell me otherwise.

I once made a friend around my neighbourhood when I was really young. She was a nice girl but she’d always give me the slimiest kisses. I didn’t like them but the adults around me thought it was so adorable. No one told her to stop even though I didn’t like it. They kept calling her my girlfriend. I kept telling them that she wasn’t.

Years later, I’d make another friend at my school. He was a kind boy and he’d give me the softest kisses on the cheek. I liked them but the adults around me grew angry and pulled us apart. We weren’t allowed to be friends anymore. He kept calling me his boyfriend. I didn’t get a chance to call him one back.

And even now, as an adult, I see the same conversations around me. Already parents and other adults are matchmaking the opposite genders to each other. I see boys wrinkle their nose and think its gross. But they only laugh and tell the boys they’ll like it one day.

I was told the same thing and I never started to like kissing a girl.

But I was a kid. How was I supposed to learn when the adults around me were so wrong? Have you ever tried to tell an adult that they’re wrong? I have. Many times. Detentions. Suspensions. Yelled at. Hit. Threatened. I had no conception as a child that adults could be wrong anyway. But no matter how hard they tried to make me submit, I learnt at an early age that…adults can be wrong.

Be patient with me right now as I try to sit with myself and be the adult I needed in my life and talk to my younger self and perhaps you, the reader, who might not have one yourself. I’m going to do the best that I can. I’m going to say everything from a place of love. I love you. I love who you are.

Just be you.

Wow. Those three words mean so much and I think as a teen I’d be like, well, what does that even me? I don’t know myself. You don’t know me. It’s not that simple.

My teen self wouldn’t be wrong. Humans are a complex creature. I mean, literally, we’re a bunch of animals. No shade. Maybe a little.

We all need a safe space to grow up. We need a safe space to learn and decide who it is we want to be. We don’t need limitations with our thoughts. We just need consequences for our actions. Here. Right now. You are safe. Your thoughts are your own and the choices you make belong to you. So whether you might be gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans, pans or amongst the variety of different genders, you are safe within these words.

“So, who are you?” is what I want to ask right now and I know what the teenager me would want to say, especially if I knew that I was safe.

“I think I’m gay,” I’d still say with a hint of fear because my family had done a good job at putting the fear of god in me.

Give me a moment to respond. To be able to say what I so desperately wanted to hear an adult say to me:

So, you think you might be gay? So what!

I was 12 when my parents decided to give me “The Talk” over a game of Monopoly. I’ve never been able to look at that game the same since. I learnt so much about the dog piece and what would happen at puberty and the changes. I was told that one days as I passed Go I’d collect a wife, which was the shoe. I was taught the difference between a dog and a shoe. If you ever play Monopoly with me and I have a weird look on my face, you’ll know why.

But what stuck with me was that there was no other options. I wanted to ask about the other pieces, the other options in the game, but my parents explained no other options.

Adults sometimes only teach about the selective truths that match their own ethics and morals. Actually, as humans, we all do that to some degree, but you can be selective about facts. Facts are just exactly what they are. Facts, unless proven otherwise, aye?

Did you know that humans are part of the animal kingdom? That’s right. I wasn’t wrong when I said we are a bunch of animals. Mammals. And did you also know in other animal species, same sex attracting or ‘coupling’ isn’t uncommon? From the Macaques to the Flour Beetle and the mighty Albatrosses, many animals don’t even think twice about the gender of their mate. There are even some animals who don’t have sex at all! The sea urchin is an example of such a creature that are just fine on their own. We won’t be seeing the Albatrosses sitting around together over Monopoly discussing about proper pairing!

It’s amazing to me that it even matters. If it doesn’t matter to the rest of the animal kingdom, then surely it shouldn’t matter to us, right? But the sad truth is, it does seen to matter. We question each other’s identity all the time, even shame it and if it doesn’t meet our standards we’ll even sometimes cancel it. Condemning sexual identity is unfortunately a huge problem so much so that it forces the LGBTQ+ community to “come out”.

Have you ever noticed that heterosexual (or straight) people don’t have to come out? No one ever asked my siblings if they were straight, but I was asked a lot whether I was gay. I never say anyone ask friends at college if they were straight. I’ve seen an LGBTQ+ member, though, stand on a table to declare themselves to the rest of us. I’m proud of them, don’t get me wrong. They’re so brave. Anyone that has to ‘come out’ to ‘just be’ is brave. But I see the unfairness in that and it shouldn’t be that hard and in most cases, it shouldn’t be just a taxing, emotionally draining experience. Especially for those, like me, who did not have a safe space to talk about it.

I once had a co-worker take me aside once to ask me if I was gay. They tried to quickly say that it didn’t matter, but I was feisty enough to say, “Then why ask?” I can’t count the amount of times I’ve been asked whether or not I way gay. They might as well be asking, “Are you in love with men? Do you kiss them? Do you have sex? Tell me about your love life.”

It’s an evasive question and it’s an evasive tradition we’ve created with this ‘coming out’. Whether or not you do it is up to you and I’d hug you and I’d praise you for doing it. I am not shaming those who ‘come out’. I’m shaming the history that has been created that has made it so we feel we have to.

And things sometimes change in the most unexpected ways when you do declare your sexuality. It did for me anyway. I noticed people at work would make off-handed comments about my sexuality. “Drama? Hey that sounds like something Michael would be into. You know, because he’s, you know…” And though, they’re right I love drama that has nothing to do with whom I love. It has to do with the fact that I love drama. “For an incursion, we could bring the fire brigade. Michael, we’ll excuse you from this because we don’t want to make you uncomfortable, especially if the fire fighters are hot.” And then I’d be excluded.

Sometimes people just want to be private about their personal lives. Sometimes I’m one of them. I shouldn’t have to talk about a part of myself that I don’t want to talk about.

It shouldn’t matter. It’s none of their business. If a person is sitting down and talking about their girlfriend or boyfriend or both or neither, no one should be batting an eye.

“Are you gay? Are you asexual? Are you queer?”

The only person who should be asking you that question is YOU. You define yourself. Sometimes it’s trial and error. Sometimes it’s preference. Sometimes you know. Sometimes you don’t. Sometimes you just don’t care.

And quite frankly, no one else should care either.

I never had a safe space growing up so I didn’t accept myself for who I am until later in life. A relationship with a woman ended. It was a relationship that I felt that I had to have. It wasn’t until I left that relationship and walked to a park that I was tired of waiting for a safe space. I was going to create it myself. So I did, at the park bench with a pigeon.

This time I didn’t say that I think that I was. I just came out and told the pigeon, “I’m gay.”

And you know what? Typical animal, it didn’t care and just flew away. Much like Whiskey oh so many years ago didn’t care either. She just loved me and cuddled me and expected Doritos.

I don’t know how anyone else will take these words. All I know is that my teenage self would ask a lot of questions. I wouldn’t answer them over Monopoly. I’d just say these words and let him listen. I’d share these words and hoped he felt safe. I’d ask him, “What Do You Want To Know?”

I don’t know about you, but I want to know a lot of things and that’s part of growing up isn’t it? Growing up is a lifetime of learning not only who you are but you were and who you’d like to be.

I want you to know though, that you are you. I want you to know that there are so many different parts of you that make a whole and this whole sexuality thing? It’s just one part. One part of a complex and confusing animal that we call human. I want you to know that it is okay to be happy being you and all its parts, despite the world making a bigger deal about these parts than they need to be. I want you to know that I’m proud of you. I’m proud of you for trying to figure yourself out.

As long as you exist in this world, I hope that you fill it with joy, love as you want to be loved and find peace in who you are. You do all that and the rest doesn’t matter, especially the bits where someone else is trying to define you and who you should be.

Just Be.