Hello, dear Steemians!
Must confess I have been thinking about writing on this topic for a while... And i think it's gonna be the first time I'll do it so openly. If you had read my last post, you could see i talked about panic and anxiety attacks and I said it would be a loooong story, and I'm gonna try to summarize it but... It's still gonna be long. So feel free to take a seat and get ready to read.
I lived my childhood like a normal girl. I think the only thing I was worried about was about my Disney Channel shows. I had never been a girl that was often aware of what boys did, to be honest. I had a few crushes but that was it, I literally just wanted to play and have a good time. When I was 12, I met another girl that became my best friend almost immediately. Months went by and our bond tightened more. When we turned 13 we would still be very close despite being usually having different classes at school. She was very protective of me, would go with me everywhere, wait for me if I came out of class later than her and she always greeted me with a forehead kiss. I fell in love with her, though I never questioned it cause, at my very young age, I was very comfortable with my feelings. She didn't feel the same for me though, but I understood cause we were still children and that wasn't going to get anywhere. We had a couple of issues between us and eventually stopped talking. This is the first time I ever got my heart broken haha
Two years went by and I have gotten over her, or at least most of it. I even had a boyfriend even tho I didn't feel much for him. I did think he was cute, but I still wasn't ready to fully let go of that girl yet. In this whole time I have been telling this story, my mom played her obvious mom-role. She noticed I got feelings for that girl but I denied it cause I was scared. We never talked about the topic ever again and acted like that conversation didn't happen. When I was close to turn 16, I got into another school and met a new girl. Ever since the first time I saw her, I liked her. We started talking and she said she had a boyfriend, but I felt that this feeling was mutual. Many things happened (I'll summarize this story cause it's the longest one so), till I finally asked her to be my girlfriend; Every day that went by, the harder it was for me to hide everything, cause when I fall in love I become waaaay too obvious. Anyway, my mom did notice again and I couldn't hide it anymore. I told her everything and she didn't really react bad, so it gave me a green light to tell my dad expecting obviously, the worst, even though a bit of me had hope. But it WAS the worst.
He yelled at me, threatened me and even wanted to make me drop school and spend a whole year inside my house without anything to do. What happened in the next couple of months after that wasn't as hard as that but it was equally chilling and horrible. They didn't transfer me to other school nor did they make me lose a whole school year but they did take my phone and my computer away, I couldn't go out anywhere and they started taking me to a priest and a therapist so they could "cure me". To my greatest luck, the priest and the brothers at the Church were wonderful people to me. They told me my parents were just afraid I backed up later, and if the love I had didn't pull me away from God then there wouldn't be any problems. They spoke very highly of their faith to me, and it gave me peace. The sessions with the therapist, on the other hand, were horrible. She didn't try to "cure" me, but when she was in private with my parents she gave them hope, meanwhile when we were in family therapy she only heard my dad say hurtful things about me and never said a thing. I started being another stranger in my house. My relationship with my parents was truly broken and I only talked to them when I had to. At school, everything was even worse. My relationship turned out to be toxic, she humiliated me in public and I was blind enough to never tell her off or stand up for myself; The whole school knew about our secret and they made fun of me everytime. I didn't care at first but the bullying grew up to the point that they even hurt me; They would stalk me to the girls' bathroom to see if I was checking girls out, they took pictures of me and my girlfriend, they made fun of me in my face, the TEACHERS made fun of me in my face and some of them even spat on me a couple of times. Here's where my anxiety and panic attacks started. I couldn't bear be surrounded by so much people, my pulse would reach a skyscraper, I felt like I was bathing in cold sweat and I had to lock myself up in the bathroom many times to calm myself down.
Time went by and things with my mom turned off a bit. I had my phone back and I could get out once again, my therapist sessions ended, my relationship with dad still was hanging off a cliff, and still is till this day. In my graduation I only talked to 3 people, the girl and I broke up and even though everything between us ended up in a tornado, I was happy i could close this cycle of my life. Everything went clearer and better.
Time went by and I met another girl, whom I consider to be the love of my life and existence, even though we are not together now, but that's a whole different story that deserves an entire post on it.
Things got better. My mom and I are fantastic even thought we don't speak on the topic. I'm aware she feels fear for this, not gonna lie, but she knows this girl is important to me, that she's a good person, that she loves me and makes me the happiest ever. Things with my dad are... ugly. We don't speak on the topic anymore and I know he still negatively of me, but we are kiiiiiinda working on that. No more anxiety or panic attacks, everything healed on that part.
Even tho all of this happened to me I never doubted who I was and who I am now, nor did I ever doubt my feelings or tried to deny them. I never judged myself. I love being who I am now. Right now, at my short 19 years of age, I am proud of being bisexual (I know I only mentioned one guy in the whole story but none of the others were actually THAT relevant lol). I'm proud of how I see the world today and I'm learning everyday something new and keep pushing forward. I wanted to tell my story for pride month this way. I swear I would go through all of it again no matter how acidic it was, cause it made me the person I am today.
Be proud of who you are, no matter who you love, the most important thing at the end of the day is the love you got for yourself.
HAPPY PRIDE MONTH!
Thank u Pao for translating this♥♥♥
Make everyday the best day of your life.
