The Hidden Cost of Coming Out | Middle Ground

hi I'm gen and explore social and controversial issues through both sides today I'll be moderating this Middle Ground episode of closeted versus openly queer for anonymity the closeted queer side prefers to have their faces blurred and the rest of the cast and crew have agreed to respect their privacy the first prompt is coming out has a price can the agreer please step forward I grew up in a Mormon family and being queer is not a thing like they say there are no gay Mormons just people with sam

e-sex attraction they won't even call it gay it actually didn't even occur to me till I was in my 30s and I had left the church that I could be queer and it was really really hard there's a huge price to pay I was married to a man and I had three kids with him I had to break up my family I had to break somebody's heart that I loved that I cared for and change my kids lives forever and my whole family huge price uh but the only decision that I could ever make I think it's really Brave of you to t

ake such a huge step a huge leap to be able to be to yourself of course um it's something that I aspire to do one day inshallah I'm Muslim so in in the Islamic community being gay is very much um of a sin and and it becomes really hard for me to try to have open conversations with my parents because they don't know that I'm clear at all they don't even know I'm here so likeo also me being first generation it becomes a huge pressure because both of my parents they basically travel like thousands

of miles out of her comfort zone just to give me a better life and I think it's hard for me because I feel like in order for me to come out I do need to be financially stable financially pant because I constantly do feel like that I am Ed Adept to my parents also um religious background um Christian parents my parents don't know I'm I'm here then I drove out here yesterday um but yeah it it is definitely a cost cuz like all growing up all my friends were through the church I was a youth leader t

hrough the church and there's always like this worry in my mind that like if I come out the people that I like LED through the church the parents might think differently like did he something with our kids was he like a I don't know it's just that's always in my back of my mind or all these like how will it change if they when they see that like cuz but it's always it's scary to see if you lose your friends and I'm so sorry yeah I mean it's fine I think also you also brought up the fact you want

to wait until you're financially stable and independent of your parents that come out and I finally have like paid my parents back they they L me a ton of money helping me like buy my car so like I'm coming to that point where I'm like it's scary but I'm getting close to when I can actually tell them and come out personally coming out as transgender it's had a lot of hardships I've had to cut off family it's made my working environments kind of unsafe or uncomfortable but I don't regret coming

out just because I feel like it can be more authentic but really that's your journey that's your timeline so you know whenever you feel ready or if you're not ready that's it's all good yeah like I definitely like I'm I'm glad that I can finally be somewhere where like I resonate with all your guys' story like it's crazy cuz where I live like I'm the only one and so it's hard for me to like express myself because nobody I know feels the same way and especially my parents as well they're very lik

e hey a man is supposed to do this a woman is supposed to do this it's very like you know if you don't follow these like your guidelines like we don't want it type thing if I were to come out they'll probably like kick me out the house where I and so it's tough doing that for sure what's been interesting to hear is that there's been a lot of mention around safety not just like Financial safety but mental and psychological as well as relationships as well I would love to hear from you two if you

guys have any advice um well I would say the fact that we even we get to see your lovely faces but the audience does it should show obviously that there's a price I mean if there wasn't you'd be able to say this openly so I just commend you for coming out here with or without your parents permission and and just it just felt so nice to hear all of you speaking and I really resonated with you cuz I grew up Muslim my dad is very religious and I came out in my late 20s when I was independent and fe

lt like if my parents disown me then at least I'm like 28 and I have my own life and I have friends and whatever and so I called my dad and I was like I don't even remember what I was trying to say I was talking circles and he was like oh you're coming out and I was like sir who taught you that word what is going on here and then he was like yeah and I was like yeah and we were both kind of like I don't know it was very strange cuz he was just like well you're still Kadija and I started you know

I was like No And I just like I didn't realize how much I needed to hear that until I heard it and I wish more parents realized how important their opinion of their children is and so when they don't approve of you when they disown you it's like okay if they can't love me who else in this world could I love that story about your parents so much and my own experience of coming out so I also uh grew up in a religious community Christian and I'm still part of that community and so for me part of t

he coming out journey was figuring out like what does it look like to continue to be in those spaces and so I kind of came out in sort of a blaze of glory like I simultaneously said okay I think I'm going to be celibate which was like one more thing for everybody to have an opinion about and I instead of just coming out I I wrote a book on the subject and literally came out by taking the pre-order link to my book posting it to Facebook and writing dear friends I'm delighted to announce that I ha

ve a book coming out also here are a few other things you should know about me um iconic [Music] behavior and and you know and the world went a little crazy and there were like radio shows dedicated to proving what an evil person I was and it was it was kind of a wild time but one of the things that was so important to me before I did that I sat down with my parents and I was like I think I'm gonna publish this book how do we feel and I distinctly remember he's sitting in the backseat of the car

and he's like if people have a problem with that screw them and I was like you go down and it was one of those moments where I just realized no matter how many people hate you after you come out like as long as the people who matter are there for you that's what counts most and sometimes in the process of coming out you figure out who the people are who matter most and yeah when people start to love the real you that's often a lot more important it's hard to feel loved by someone who doesn't kn

ow that you're queer um just a little background about me I'm actually Mormon and I'm going to school currently at a church school so I do feel like I don't know what to call it I don't I wouldn't say like fully love but I do feel like people like to be my friend and hang out with me but if they knew this information about me would they really love me would they really be there for me it's just hard to have that always in the back of your head do you have someone at the University that knows abo

ut this yeah so I have about my three friends in my posy one of them is my sister and one is my cousin um so just having them there has been a huge help um they weren't always there so um just reflecting on that time is is hard it was very uh suicidal time for me and it was down to that um idea of like suicide come out so when you were feeling that way did you is that when you told someone yeah I had like a meltdown it was kind of crazy um but I finally came out to my sister and she just gave me

a hug and it was like probably the best hug I've ever had in my life a yeah that's beautiful curious if you have had any similar experiences yeah I mean I'm a coming out coach so I help people come out you know you say that it's hard to feel fully loved and I totally relate to that because you aren't your authentic self but what I've realize is that when people don't approve it's not actually about you at all it's about them because you are just being more of yourself it's not like a shameful p

art of you it's it's a beautiful part of you and so people who know you and love you will continue to know you and love you unless there's some part of them that's making them shut that down if they they have you know they're raised in the same heteronormative society as you so when you do come out if anyone isn't accepting it's not about you at all yeah and your relationship with your parents my parents don't yeah they don't know I'm here either so yeah I think we have a lot of things children

are bad I'm kidding do do you ever find yourself trying to predict like how people would respond if you came out to them I feel like before I came out it was like everybody had like a little percentile hovering above their head where I would be like you're like an 87% chance it'll go okay you're like a 30% chance like this is bound to tank and I feel like that act of trying to predict like how's this going to go was part of the stress even for me of being like I don't know how much you love me b

ecause that percentile keeps changing yeah no it it's for me it's kind of like that also kind of like a dating simulator where you have like the three different options like what you could say it's not like that like oh I'm predicting these things I have like actual like evidence-based Reacher kind of thing because I have family friends who are openly CER one of my family friends he's very much more flamboyantly cleer but my mom would always be like you see that the nail polish that makeup why h

e's going to hell and I'm like yeah if I may ask what percentage would you assign to your parents that's hard because my mom is like openly homophobic my dad is like silently homophobic um right it do be like that it do be like that so my parents were like 100% Mormon in the church when I came out and they're not anymore wow and they're in their 60s and they spent their whole life in the church when I came out my dad went to his leader at the church like far up and he said listen my daughter is

probably going to get married to a woman woman and that's apostasy that means she's willfully going against the church and she won't be with me in heaven he's like that just doesn't work for me I can't see a heaven a place I would want to be without my daughter and that was the thing that allowed him to really question do my values align with this organization that I contribute to that I support that I volunteer that I give my life to I never in a million years would have ever believed they woul

d leave the church but you know what their love for me and and the the foundation that we built they knew who I was and I did not become a different person when I came out and I'm remarried to a woman now and my thank you we have seven kids together because we popped out the babies like the Mormon moms that we were bred to be a yours mine anday Bunch five boys two girls at my wedding my little brother gave a speech and he said Lena I'm so happy to meet you Sally it's it's great to finally meet y

ou like he saw who I really was now that I was able to be my full self you know it was just so beautiful to feel that that love fully myself and to have all those people there supporting me and it it is possible and I'm not saying it's going to happen for you I'm not saying your parents will for sure leave the church but you will find those people who will be your chosen family a lot of people have chosen family right and it's beautiful can we get the disagreer stuff forward my family is very li

ke we're like a small gang in the sense that like we do everything together and so I feel like even though they don't know like who I really am I feel like they still love me for what they know I kind of agreed with that that's why I kind of disagreed although hearing all of your stories I kind of changed my mind actually oh yeah the reason why I disagreed initially was more of well they don't know so it's hard but I guess if I look at it through my perspective then yeah because I'm not offering

my full authentic self so how can they love me fully like similar to what you were saying so I I I changed my mind so thank you all for that so I disagreed um mainly because I feel like I don't really have to change myself with like I am who I am I don't really change my behavior around my parents or around my friends I'm out with my friends I'm out out at school just not not my family not like people back home but I don't really this is just how I am like the one thing is with my parents I don

't uh like bring up relationships they always ask me like when you get a girlfriend when you get married when you have kids and so like I I I can't like say even though they don't know uh that I like men I I can't say that they that they don't love me fully because they have done everything for me so I really love what you said about like your parents still really deeply loving you without knowing that you're queer and I guess I was just wondering like for you is there any sense of that lingerin

g question with your parents of like but would they still but what if and how does that shape the way you experience their love right now that's a good question um I don't really know I you said the percentages earlier if my dad would be more like a 70 to 80 uh being like accepting my mom I'm more we like a 40 to 30 but I can't see them disowning me I can't see them I think the worst I could see with them is just like loving me because I'm their son and they've raised me but not like not agreein

g with my my choices on that um but I I I wholly believe that they still love me my sexual identity is in anyone's business you should cut off people who don't accept you we all were like cuz I agree to the extent that like I'm obviously speaking from a place where I am able to be independent and I know that I can I know that I can handle myself it's a place of privilege yeah exactly like I'm like I am 31 I like live in a different city from my family but I also am a kind of person that we tend

to treat family like blood family like it's the end all be all like they can never do anything wrong it's some of the most toxic Dynamics ever and you're expected to just stay or you're expected to keep giving that person access to you I I don't know have you guys ever had to cut anybody off you yep I kind of agree with you I'm like more 5050 of you can cut them off but if you think that they have the capacity to change or that they do you have to give them that space because I've also had famil

y where I've cut them off temporarily giving them that time to kind of step back and educate themselves a little bit and then after a couple years I actually had a cousin who came out as a lesbian and has had a girlfriend for a bit and that was kind of the thing that got them to change their minds and so actually over the holidays we were able to see each other again for the first time amazing so happy for you you and it but I also know that's a privilege for a lot of people yeah totally and and

that's saying a lot about you that you allowed them back in your life like you are showing a lot of Grace and understanding by you know respecting yourself but I I also respect that you were able to take that space in in my you know situation I no longer have a obligatory relationships in the church I was raised to show up and be friends with everyone because it's the right thing to do it's Christlike and now I am done with that if I can feel that they don't fully love me and and accept me then

I'm not willing to put myself in that situation anymore I value myself I know there are lots of people that will help me feel safe and I know that's a a privileged place to be in but I hope that for everyone I just it's hard to cut people off because like I have a lot of like really close friends that are like in the church who wouldn't agree with my lifestyle right but it's still very hard because we grew up with each other and we grew up together and it's just like it's hard to you know just

cut somebody off from your life that you knew all your life and it's just like a piece of you goes away so that's the only reason I disagree I guess kind of there seems to be two schools of thought when it comes to family it seems like family shouldn't be an obligation whereas it seems like no matter what family is family what do you two think about that mhm um this could just be the church and me talking but um my family is like everything to me me and on top of that relationships people that m

atter are very important um I actually went through kind of a situation where I had to cut somebody out of my life it was a mix of like different things of how I identified um who I was dating um and that was just a really hard experience for me and I can I can't say whether it was a better thing for me or a worse thing for me because I still reflect on that even to this day of like what did I do wrong in that situation and it's like to me cutting people out of my life is something personally I

don't want to do but I do recognize why other people would want to do it but I think just with what I've experienced it's been worse for my mental health and working through that has been a journey in itself when you were saying the guilt you feel around those things and has it helped or hindered that I felt for you cuz I have been working on self-compassion a lot and when you grow up in a religious background you're not taught to be self-compassionate you're taught just destroy yourself at all

cost because you were never going to be thef vision of a religious XYZ so if I would offer anything it would just be to give yourself a bit more grace and compassion of like why that relationship ended because it's not that you like it ended for a reason and that comes with time and trusting yourself more and that takes time to develop it's a really irritating muscle to develop I know you announced yourself with like a bang right as as you put it how did that go did you have to cut anyone off I

so there were some relationships where certainly the the final conclusion of that was people saying to me like I've decided to cut you off um and and so I mean I didn't have a choice in that matter like I had to be willing to receive that um but I think I think I have I have so much conviction that the only way to really love people as radically as you possibly can is to sometimes take the risk of being hurt and to trust uh that you will be loved more than you will be hurt um and so I think I've

chosen to let myself be hurt sometimes in hopes that my presence in the world can have a net gain of more love in the world than there is hate did you receive any specific examples of hate when you did come out yeah I mean everything from like the very public the online the whatever you know hate mail and so forth which is a real thing I'm not sure I I'm not sure I knew what it would feel like to receive it until I did um but I think the ones that were more painful for me were the ones that wer

e much more personal you know the people who I was like I've spent Christmases with your house like I hung out with your kids there was nothing sketchy about me until you suddenly realized that I was just not the person you imagined that I was that was really hard even to have people whose our lives were so embedded that I still had like things to remind me of them and I'm like oh this knife is is a gift I got from you and I'm still using it to cut my onions while I weep um like I yeah I had som

e of those some of those relationships that I had to figure out how to process yeah and and it it was hard it sucked I couldn't see myself being on the other side today I definitely couldn't personally just because I spent so much time in the closet just like in my teens and just had it slowly like chip away at my mental health and my well-being that I could never go back to that I felt so terrible about myself I felt almost kind of guilt too of you know my family not really knowing such a good

chunk of me and what was going on and even after I came out some family memb voice out of like you know I wish you said something sooner because I wish I got to know the real you earlier on agreed yeah once I realized what had been going on my whole life I couldn't unknow that and I can't live a lie I had a split second where I thought about putting it back in and pretending and moving to another cu the reason I figured out I was gay is cuz I fell in love with my now wife we were like Mom friend

s and our families were hanging out together and I realized that I had more than friend feelings with her and yeah I I dropped the babysitter off and I had a like my first panic attack because I thought I was going to have to move away and never see her again and I was was just distraught I could not live like that I would be miserable do you feel like you guys have had to make up for lost time or you weren't able to express yourselves fully we made up for lost time it's like a teen you're like

a teenager again when you like ReDiscover your like attraction and then you make some weird decisions I'm telling you music was made everything sounded so much I'm like now I get these lyrics colors were more vibrant it was like seriously like a movie I could not hook up with people one night stands I used to say like that's just not for me and then I slept with a woman and I was like what yeah I don't know it's like a whole new [Music] world I was like yeah I can't see myself um because that's

like coming out um at some point is kind of like what I want to do in the near future or future I can't say near at the moment I'm sorry um I'm just not ready for it um emotionally financially or otherwise I have a question for us on this side how different do you think your life would be if you were out I'm like what what is the other side for you like how would that look for you I think for me um because I talked about how there are times in which I feel like my the my parents's love for me ca

n feel conditional even though I know it's not if I were to come out and if they were to be accepting of that then I would have that relief that fresh breath of air that I don't have have to keep on guessing I don't have to keep on thinking like okay I need to present myself like this make sure that I say the right things because if they slip up one thing then it's going to cause other waves and stuff like I don't have to think much about that anymore so it's going to be a lot more freeing in th

at sense I don't think it'll be too much different I feel like I what I like now and like what I like when I'm out would be the same thing you know I like pizza I like you know I like different I think in the sense that like I would still be the same person out just I you just know that I like and that's it that's it I also want to say so this year um this past summer like in June I went to my first uh I went to a pride event in Denver and like I walked in and I just started to cry like just it

was just so great see like all this like love and support of just from everyone and like it just really made me like if I I just want I can't be on the other side so like it's because it's always there like it's always in the background when with the parents bring about relationships and all the dating and stuff and it's just it's always there and it just be nice to not have that hanging over so you were one of the only openly queer people to step forward I'm on the disagreeing side I'm curious

what your thoughts are yeah I guess so for me when I chose to come out it was a very like Robert Frosty and two roads diverging in a wood kind of moment where I felt like I could sort of see down both paths and be like oh I think I can Envision like here's what my life like might look like in 10 years 20 years 30 years I had written this book manuscript and I was like I either burn this thing or I publish it and if I burn it I stay closeted and if I publish it I come out I feel like I had a long

conversation with 12-year-old Greg and 12-year-old Greg was like I would have killed to like read this book and feel like I wasn't alone and I was like okay I don't I don't even know if I want to come out for me but I want to come out for 12-year-old Greg so that I think I think because I spent so much time trying to Envision what life might be like if I never came came out I feel I feel a lot of compassion for that imaginary sense of myself too even though I have to say I'm tremendously gratef

ul uh that that is not me I'm so much less worried about what people think about me because I've stopped I've stopped trying to control what people think about me the pain of doing nothing was less than change it seems like that's kind of what got you to go to the other side I think I think it was the question of which pain felt more meaningful like there's going to be pain in the closet and there's going to be pain out of the closet and so the question is not what's the path that doesn't have p

ain the question is like which is the pain that is beautiful and meaningful mhm so like everyone remind me asked me like if you like feel all of this like what makes you like want to be celibate for me uh celibacy is so much about if I'm really convinced in this Jesus guy then I want to figure out like what his invitation is for my life and so celibacy is my best understanding of what it looks looks like for me to be faithful to the way I understand Jesus um and I recognize I mean I've got dear

friends who disagree with that understanding of Jesus or just dear friends who are like I'm not into the Jesus guy and like I love both of those sets of friends um but yeah if if if following your heart is ultimately about finding the thing that you're most deeply in love with and saying like I'm going to do what it takes to be with that person I'm most deeply in love with I just feel like I'm kind of obsessive about Jesus you're making a face this is a hard one for me because uh I grew up lovin

g Jesus would your idea of a loving kind older brother savior want you to miss out onh romantic love and a partnership and having what everyone else gets to have but you don't get to what what's the deal I think I probably I I felt more of that anguish I think uh earlier in my journey when I was more convinced that being married or like being in that kind of romantic relationship was going to be fundamentally definitionally better more fulfilling like more full of love but I I increasingly have

found within singleness and celibacy a lot of the things that I think I most most thought I wanted out of marriage so like like this Valentine's Day I got to spend with like some of my dearest friends we we all got dressed up together and we had like a romantic dinner if you will and then we had a dance party in the living room and I was like this is like this is not the family I was maybe picturing for myself at some point but like this is family like this is love that's maybe even better than

the kind of love that I thought I would get so why is it that your family has to be the community family and not the relationship family like the single partner yeah I I think in my own heart I tend to think of it less as obligation like here's how it must be and try to more receive it as a gift like here's here's the particular thing that I get to have but why do you think Jesus doesn't want you to be with anyone oh oh that gets into because Bible says homosexuality is a sin are you trying to a

void saying that no I I would definitely I well number one I hate trying to understand what the Bible says with the word homosexuality because I think there's a whole lot wrapped up in that uh but yeah so I definitely wouldn't say homosexuality is a sin I mean I I understand myself to be gay and I don't think it I would say homosexual relations my understanding is that sex belongs exclusively in uh marriage context okay and and not even not even necessarily all that all sex within that marriage

context is good so in that sense I'm remarkably concern think that sex outside of a man and a woman who are married is wrong I don't think you're saying let yeah I I think I think for followers of Jesus I would say that's not what Jesus is asking his followers to do but again I recognize not everybody's trying to follow Jesus or some people are and their understanding of Jesus would be different from mine but would you say that if you were to find um another man who you would have romantic relat

ionship would that ever be a possibility for you oh yeah I I wouldn't see uh same-sex marriage as being a possibility for me yeah you wouldn't I wouldn't yeah why so do you think people who don't believe in Jesus are wrong I I think I think all of us I hope all of us have things that we hold with deep conviction and think people who disagree with us are wrong but I also think we should hold all our opinions with the intellectual humility to say I too could be wrong so you do wait so okay sorry t

hat a little bit you do you do think it it's wrong but you could be wrong that you think we're wrong correct yeah I think I I think I believe that Jesus is so beautiful that I would love it if everybody were following him but I don't think I'm supposed to obligate everybody to do that I like I like what you're saying like I mean I I like your perspective cuz you truly believe that it's wrong which I might disagree with but not trying to oppose it on others like you're keeping it to yourself and

you're think like you not until we're dead and in heaven then it will be imposed on us because Jesus will be there and is is that a we will all be Christian I just want to put out there um well I've seen a lot of religious people say the same thing and they're saying like oh like no like being gay is a sin but like I still love you as a person so you can still be who you are and stuff that still discounts the person and their identity because you can respect them as much as you can but if you st

ill think that they're going to like burn a hell or not be in the way of God then that's just going to be then that's not really respecting because then what is this respect that you're trying to give as well it's the whole love the sin or hate the sin I I guess so but then at the do you on this say I I openly have trauma and anger around this issue people have committed suicide uh the highest rate of teen suicides is in Utah and I cannot ever get behind the idea that someone that loves you is g

oing to tell you that loving someone else and doing what you're biologically built to do and you're not harming anyone else else is wrong I think that is abusive I I too am deeply concerned about suicide among queer people um I'm deeply concerned about the messages that exist I think especially in religious communities and so I think for me recognizing that not everybody's going to have a journey like mine recognizing that not everybody's going to have convictions like mine I think one of the re

asons I hope I hope that there's value in somebody like me also being out is that it just provides a bit more sense of the range of like there's a lot of kinds of queer stories like queer people are not monolithic um and there are a lot of ways within which you can be loved you can experience love as a queer person the way you're living your life inherently tells people that that's what you think that that's what's okay and what's not okay so you you saying celibacy is what Jesus wants and I don

't believe in I Think Jesus doesn't want two people to be married who aren't a man and a woman then you're telling kids that getting married to the their same gender or having sex with someone a queer sex is wrong well so would you then say that me wanting to be a follower of Jesus is wrong I'm saying that choosing Cel celibacy isn't wrong but I don't respect the belief that sex outside of the your context is okay I do not believe that's okay can I just get clarification sorry on cuz I'm mad con

fused okay so because I think I initially was approaching it from a non-religious perspective and just thinking okay as you were saying queer people come in many different shapes and sizes forms purely religious some might be ace romantic whatever so for you it's a purely religious perspective and your views on marriage in terms of queerness what sorry I just wanted clarification my understanding is that sex belongs for followers of Jesus belongs in marriage in marriage to a man and a woman and

so that's for you the religious reason of why you've chosen to be celibate and right right I yeah I am not interested in a marriage with a woman so I chose not to be in one okay so that's yeah these are the exact conversations that when I was meing like my these conversations come up with my parents and it makes me shut down and like back up it these exact conversations with it with like if you're in the church you don't get love I mean you don't get you don't get romantic love with a partner yo

u you just have to stay CIT you have to accept the community from the people around you you you can't have a family like a family with your own kids you're you're CIT you're single for the rest of your life this is clear the the the Jesus is never going to change his mind like gender is pivotal and vital to Christianity patriarchy uh the priesthood all of that if you don't have gender binaries there is no the Christianity Falls to its face so it's it's never going to change and it's giving false

hope I need to changed both you guys' bad before you start that sorry yes yeah think about your answer you found the real issue oh no I I like what Jack said earlier about everybody's Journey being their own Journey uh and I think I uh I both don't want to try to impose my journey onto anybody else and I think I also think there's value in US recognizing that queer experience is not monolithic um and just leaving room for people to have different convictions to to think that one another are wro

ng I mean I hope that Sally thinks that I'm wrong um I yeah you do um so uh if if we can if if we're inevitably going to at times think that each other are wrong then I think the question is like what does it look like for us to continue can we continue in in a way that is still in relationship with each other and I hope the answer is yes um especially uh for queer folks who want to try to support one another I think it to me it feels hypocritical um to hold your beliefs and also claim everybody

's journey is fine and right because you don't believe that yes you can say you respect everyone's journey and their timing and whatever but then on at this in the same sentence you say that this is what's right it can't you can't have both is that fair I I think I think we all have an understanding of what's right uh and I think the only the only way to love people and support other people on different Journeys is to recognize they're going to have a different sense of what's right than we do u

m so if we're if we're going to love across difference the point is we I me in Christianity you believe that the ultimate truth is the Bible and is what Jesus is saying that that is the ultimate truth so saying you believe other people have different ideas of what's right and what's wrong what's good and what's bad ultimately you believe regardless of whether or not what if we believe it's okay if obviously Sally believes it's okay um but like regardless of that you ultimately believe that it's

not that it's wrong for everyone for everyone you just not just you I I think I think I believe it's not what following Jesus looks like and foll Jesus is the right way I believe people get to choose whether or not they want to follow right for everyone if they were choosing the right thing it would be to follow Jesus I think it's what we're designed for I think it's where we find the most Beauty and the most Joy the truth let's move on to the next problem I've done both I accept myself I'm so p

roud of myself like how where I'm at where I've gone through I'm in med school like that's my dream I have a great community of friends people who accept me for everything everything about me looking forward to finding someone who can accept me too um but yeah I I do accept myself me as a person I'm very comfortable with me being bisexual throughout my life like I've gone through like a lot of challenges Elementary School middle school high school they've all been a lot of like lonely moments an

d I think it's especially because that I've gone through all these obstacles and stuff and the fact that I'm still standing to this day that I'm really proud of myself and just like really appreciative that I can truly say I'm accepting myself even though I'm like still like class and everything stuff I I still love myself a lot so you know seems like you came a long way yeah I have and I had a lot of amazing people to help me out too too my high school friends cuz I'm like hey yeah I can't tell

my parents but at least I can tell you guys right so I have people that love me just as much as I love them and love myself did any of you guys almost not come today I know some I think a lot of on the positive side haven't told anyone right I kept on replaying like because I kept on thinking to myself like is this real am I actually going all the way to La am I really doing this alone that's crazy this is not real I'm not here so yeah I'm I want to ask uh people on the openly queer side do you

think you can accept yourself fully if you haven't comeing out yet I think you can because it's like coming out is a lot about other people and having to tell other people that I feel like it's kind of more an internal thing to accept yourself whether you're closet it or you're not and how your identity is and how you you know present yourself that can change over time let's bring the disagree please the one the one I didn't say I didn't accept myself not to say I don't love who I am but I feel

like personally saying I accept myself now is saying I don't want to progress further into some big goals I have like coming out to my family coming out to the world being able to have relationships so you view accepting yourself was coming out fully I've had a lot of like skewed uh versions of myself myself that I've had to put out at different times like essentially masking myself to the point where I don't even know who I am um so I think it's important to go on that own self-discovery journ

ey and it sounds like a lot of people have um and I do feel like I'm still very early on in it um so saying I accept myself fully isn't entirely something that I feel like defines me obviously each individual case is different but I'm curious to hear from the openly queer side do you guys see yourselves in them before you guys did decide to take that step yeah religious uh upbringing it's just like based on fear based on guilt and shame like that's the whole thing so it's hard to undo that condi

tioning it's hard to feel accepting of yourself when you know that you have a lot ahead of you to change right yeah and we all make mistakes you know I'm not a perfect person I haven't done this whole process perfectly but learning how to find that grounded loving space Within Myself not attached to anyone else's opinions or ideas has been my journey and it's it's I feel like the purpose of my life is to learn how to feel alignment Within Myself and I think it's beautiful that you can have the a

wareness that you're not in alignment that your insides don't match your outsides and that that's something that you want to change and that you're working towards that and that that in itself is uh a beautiful awareness that will bring you more joy as you move forward yeah uh I know for me part of what's been really important in my own journey of self-acceptance is learning to accept like younger versions of me too like that there's a big difference between being like I'm okay with myself right

now and being like Oh and I'm also okay with the way I felt about myself when I was 10 like or the way I felt about myself when I was 13 and totally freaking out about being gay uh I think it's been easier for me to be okay with my adult self than it is to look back at younger versions of me and be like oh gosh that kid was going through it that kid was having some trauma but I love him too um not but but makes it sound like a contradiction like and I love him all the more I mean maybe there's

Beauty in that that you can totally accept yourself right now and also say Yeah in 5 years I'll be in a different place and I'll look back on this version of myself as I was sitting those lights and be like I like that person they're cool any last closing statements from either side I think I think something we've talked about we're all on our own Journeys we're all in different stages some of us are only see coming out as a far future distant thing some of us are still working on accepting ours

elves I'm so close to coming out I think um but it's just it's been so cool to hear everyone just speak about their stories and how like how they've been brought up their religion their parents their f friends and family has brought them to where they are and it's just been so cool to hear you guys so thank you either you or anyone else on the closeted side has this experience today pushed you even further to want to come out or has it changed your mind in any instance your perspective it's help

ing me get ready like it's coming so soon I'm like I'm so close just need to figure out how I haven't really been able to share my thoughts and opinions um because of the space I've been in the people I've been around so just being here has been in a way very healing this interaction showed me like what my life could be after you know it showed me like you know there there's there is like more life too than just like what I am right now so definitely just the question I just have to ask or want

to ask um do any of you guys do feel comfortable of getting rid of the blur not obviously no pressure I have been thinking about that is that going to be your day that be a good coming out story y'all oh oh my God be so cool I just want to be clear there's no I I've been wanting to I I have been thinking about that like since you guys said said uh to come here um I was like should I use my name should I not should I when does this when does this come out like when when this couple weeks couple w

eeks I think it should just come out in your own terms cuz I no no I know I'm ready my terms are I want I I don't want my parents to find out from like a video like this but you're ready to in the next couple weeks that's I'm thinking if if I in the next couple weeks if I can tell them you don't have to don't blare me don't BL don't BL don't BL my don't don't BL my face yeah what hell yeah how do you how do you feel uh just the next step is have to tell her the best any any closing state from yo

u um it's just been really cool what I said earlier it's just cool to see everyone's journey and like just seeing the other side just makes me feel like just ready to join that other side and not have to have that thing hanging over me when I'm with my parents do you feel like a weight off your shoulders I haven't done it yet but it will be yes it will be weight off my shoulders once once I do the that wow really proud of you um well thank you guys uh this was a great episode if you guys want to

embrace shake hands please do so oh we're not doing not every come over oh conrat I can not I cannot agree or respect your beliefs but I can still respect you as a person I have love for you