Alexis’s Coming Out Story

My name is Alex, and I am queer. I prefer the term queer because it honors the fact that I exist somewhere in the middle of the beautiful, fluid spectrum of sexuality. My coming out experience was a really long and involved process, and so much of it happened without me really even knowing it. My journey involved a lot of self-exploration, self-doubt, confusion, and questioning.

When I was younger, I had crushes on boys like all my friends did, and I had no idea that I was different because I really wasn’t. I liked boys, boys liked me, and that was enough for me. The only thing I didn’t realise at the time was that I had crushes on girls, too. Looking back, I can remember specific girls who I thought I REALLY wanted to be friends with, who I put on a pedestal without ever really understanding why.

“I think somehow I subconsciously knew that I was queer before I could put a label on it.”

I never wanted to get changed in front of friends at sleepovers or in the gym locker room because I think I knew deep down there was some sort of intimacy I associated with those things that my friends didn’t. I remember always having a fear that if I hugged a friend or told them I loved them they would think I was coming on to them. When I look back, I realize that all these subtle signs were there; I think somehow I subconsciously knew that I was queer before I could put a label on it.

When I got to high school, I dated men because I thought that’s what I was supposed to do. I was fortunate to have the most wonderful boyfriend in high school, who I will always treasure as one of my best friends. I loved him in a way that I thought was romantic, and my relationship with him was one of the main reasons that I struggled with my sexuality for so long.

“I figured I was just going through a phase or experimenting. I thought most women did that.”

In college, I had a number of other relationships with men, both long and short-term, but I also had my first full-blown, head over heels, crazy in love crush on a woman. I was in a long-term relationship with a man at the time, and I remember thinking that if he and I got married, I would never know what it was like to kiss a girl. But I was in college, so I figured I was just going through a phase or experimenting. I thought most women did that. I went on with my life.

When that long-term relationship ended, I decided to finally take the plunge. I hopped on the Tinder and Bumble bandwagons and changed my settings to reflect that I was looking for men and women…and then I changed my settings to match only with women. I found that my conversations with women were deeper and more engaging than those I had with men.

I found myself connecting with people really quickly, and started quietly going on dates without telling anyone. I was fine keeping things under wraps for about a year, but then I met someone and I didn’t want to keep things quiet anymore.

“Each person that I told was more loving and accepting than the next.”

On National Coming Out Day in 2016, I crafted a text to my closest friends and told them that I’d fallen in love with a girl. I literally threw my phone across the room and left the house for an hour because I was so scared to read their responses. When I got home, I broke down in tears because I had received the most incredible, loving responses from every single person I had messaged.

Afterwards, I slowly began to come out to family members in person. When my dad asked me if I had a boyfriend, I told him no, but I had a girlfriend. He told me that was cool, he loved me, he was proud of me, and we went back to eating dinner. Each person that I told was more loving and accepting than the next. Once I told everyone who was really important to me personally, I posted about my girlfriend on Instagram, and from that day forward, I was out and proud.

“I honestly think so much of my confusion was a product of the fact that I didn’t fit the stereotype of what a queer woman was.”

Now that I’m out, I spend a lot of time looking back on when I was closeted, or before I even knew I was queer. I often wonder about how I missed the signs, which look so glaringly obvious in retrospect. I honestly think so much of my confusion was a product of the fact that I didn’t fit the stereotype of what a queer woman was. I though lesbians were short-haired, flannel-wearing butch women. I thought they were born knowing they were gay, and that they had unrequited crushes on their best friends. I was none of those things. I didn’t have a clue that I might be queer until I was in middle school, and I didn’t know anything for sure until I was in college.

I like wearing makeup and dresses and having long hair, and I never fell in love with any of my best friends. I struggled with my identity because I had dated men in the past, and I had loved them. What I realize now is that there’s no right way to be gay. Queer women come in all shapes and sizes and hair lengths and histories and they are all valid and worthy of love.

Much love,

Alex