Shared Thoughts

I read this over at TJ's blog (who got it from here) and thought "how appropriate" to end Pride Month with a collection of thoughts from our gay brothers and sisters. I've read the entries several times and have found more than a handful that apply or have applied to me. I know it's long, but take the time to read through them, especially if you are NOT gay!

Imagine you have a deep dark secret. It can be anything, it doesn't matter. Now imagine that if you told people this secret you would be ridiculed, hated, looked at like you are a freak. Imagine how badly you want to tell someone your secret. Imagine your fear of a persons reaction if you tell them your secret. Imagine you tell someone the secret, but it leaks out and soon everyone knows. Imagine people whispering and pointing at you as you walk down the hall. Imagine people staring at you as if your a freak, as if there is something wrong with you. Imagine people throwing their lunches at you or spitting on you as you walk across the courtyard at lunch. Imagine people taunting you with names that hurt you like a bullet.

Now open your eyes. Gays go through this every day. We don’t have to imagine. For us, its reality.

I’m a bi who wishes she was straight because i’m sick of hiding, sick of the heartache and i’m tired of not knowing what will happen what friends i’ll lose next what words i’ll let slip and what questions i have to avoid answering.

I am the boy who never finished high school, because I got called a fag everyday.

I am the girl kicked out of her home because I confided in my mother that I am a lesbian.

I am the prostitute working the streets because nobody will hire a transsexual woman.

I am the sister who holds her gay brother tight through the painful, tear-filled nights.

We are the parents who buried our daughter long before her time.

I am the man who died alone in the hospital because they would not let my partner of twenty-seven years into the room.

I am the gay teenager who cant tell his school who he really is, because he is afraid of what they will do to him.

I am the gay athlete who wants to use the locker room, but hears the ridicule of homosexuality just outside the door.

I am the gay friend that only has a few people who actually care, but hardly get to see.

I am the gay boy that wants to cry when he hears fag, gay, or homo in a way that makes me feel less human.

I am the foster child who wakes up with nightmares of being taken away from the two fathers who are the only loving family I have ever had… I wish they could adopt me.

I am not one of the lucky ones. I killed myself just weeks before graduating high school. It was simply too much to bear.

I’m the girl who was scoffed at by her teacher when she confided in her she might have a crush on a girl.

We are the couple who had the realtor hang up on us when she found out we wanted to rent a one-bedroom for two men.

I am the person who never knows which bathroom I should use if I want to avoid getting the management called on me.

I am the mother who is not allowed to even visit the children I bore, nursed, and raised. The court says I am an unfit mother because I now live with another woman.

I am the girl who hides under lies just to feel that she belongs.

I am the girl that lost her two best friends because they were gay as well.

I am the girl that spent heart breaking nights holding her gay cousin until he cried himself to sleep.

I am the girl who lost her best friend because she found out she had a crush on her.

I am the kid whose own parents told her that she was going to hell.

I am the girl who gets in trouble with her parents for wearing a rainbow colored belt and hanging a poster of Freddie Mercury on her wall.

I am the domestic-violence survivor who found the support system grow suddenly cold and distant when they found out my abusive partner is also a woman.

I am the domestic-violence survivor who has no support system to turn to because I am male.

I am the father who has never hugged his son because I grew up afraid to show affection to other men.

I am the person who feels guilty because I think I could be a much better person if I didn’t have to always deal with society hating me.

I am the home-economics teacher who always wanted to teach gym until someone told me that only lesbians do that.

I am the woman who died when the EMT’s stopped treating me as soon as they realized I was transsexual.

I am the person who feels guilty because I think I could be a much better person if I didn’t have to always deal with society hating me.

I am the man who stopped attending church, not because I don’t believe, but because they closed their doors to my kind.

I am the person who has to hide what this world needs most… LOVE!

I am the person ashamed to tell my own friends that I am a lesbian, because they constantly make fun of them.

I am the boy tied to a fence, beaten to a bloody pulp and left to die because two straight men wanted to “teach me a lesson”.

Over and "Out" from Toano, VA.