My name is Jase and I am a 21-year-old cosplayer from Germany. I’ve always felt a bit different than the other people around me. I wore boyish clothes, wanted to cut my hair short and I mostly played with boys outside. You know, the stereotypical ‘this girl is a lesbian‘ things. Both my mother and my stepfather didn’t really support the LGBT community. They acted a bit distant to those kinds of things. So, I never really thought that being gay was even an option for me.
“It was a feeling I was forbidden to have”
Around 8th grade, I felt feelings I did not recognize around girls. At the school camp that year I found myself alone in a room with another girl, which caused me to panic – I slowly realized that I liked girls “a little bit too much” and it made me really afraid. I felt that it was wrong, it was a feeling I was forbidden to have. In the following weeks, I cried a lot and was afraid of going to school.
My mom slowly noticed that something was wrong with me and when she asked about it, I lied to her saying I was afraid of my exams. She sent me to a psychologist where I didn’t dare to tell the truth and lied for every session I had. After this period of my life, I slowly started being more active with cosplaying, dressing as other characters from games or TV shows. I met many new people through that hobby and also got contact with the LGBT community through there. I began to dress up as characters of the opposite gender and started to explore my own androgyny.
“I was 16 years old, confused and really afraid of the reaction from my family”
Against my parents’ wishes, I decided to cut my hair short and called myself a tomboy. After I did this, people started to misgender me and thought I was a boy, which I actually really liked. I found a lot of LGBT friends through the cosplay scene and this made me feel so much safer. I even met my first girlfriend at a cosplay convention. At this time, I was 16 years old, confused and really afraid of the reaction from my family.
The first person I’ve ever told of my feelings and my girlfriend was my grandma. She always was quite open to everything and she reacted really supportive when I told her about my feelings for girls. I was really happy that it was out but I still was scared about the reaction of my mother. At that time, she ended the relationship with my stepfather so she was basically the last person that didn’t know about my feelings.
I thought for many days about how I should tell her that her daughter was gay – but when I finally had a good idea how to tell her, she came into my room asking me if that was true what she heard from my grandma. I felt even more scared. My mother was really confused so I tried to explain the situation to her, that I felt scared and sad. She tried to understand me but told me it was just a phase. This angered me a lot. I never really felt understood by her, but the most important thing was that she respected my relationship.
Now, 5 years later, she fully respects who I am and supports me. My life changed a lot during this time. I am more active in the cosplay community and trying to find my way into the drag king scene. Through the cosplay community, I found a new girlfriend and we have a long-distance relationship together for 2.5 years. She lives in the Netherlands which is 6h by car away from me.
“All ended well after all”
My grandma and my mother support us and even helped me to meet her for the first time. Since then, I fly to my girlfriend once a month. In 2 months I’m going to move in with her and my family is there for me to help and support us. All ended well after all.