Forever Tomorrowland

What is it about snow that makes me want to say it. What is it about the chill in the air and the ice on the windows that says tell her.

I was watching crossing Jordan with my mom and on an episode in season 6 their was a lesbian couple. The episode ended with detective Hoyt saying why do people have to use the bible against others, and Jordan quoted a passage about love.

My mom said "well their a bit heavy handed today" or something like that. But the tone of voice and look on her face says it all. And in moments like these, against maybe better instincts I want to say I'm gay. I've stopped ignoring the signs that tell me she probably won't be okay with it, and instead there's a burning fury when she casually says something about gays/lesbians because I want to shout "hey! That's me your talking about"

We are all looking for something; whether that’s love, money, things etc. for me I’m always looking for reason. Reason why do this and that, and I spend my time thinking where everything started. As you can imagine that takes up a lot of time, and for the most part I’m able to see obstacles in my life, and able to avoid them in the future, but that doesn’t stop me from falling.

This feeling for reason is a culmination of things; I want to know why I feel like the only one who got hurt/damaged by my church/school, why am I the one who escaped my birth family and am probably alive because of it. in the end its easy to get bogged down by the why’s of life, and get lost in the forest while looking for the trees.

Most recently I’ve been struggling with someone internally and its really been causing me to look inside and deeper than I ever have before. Pains and nights I didn’t know of, and parts and pieces of me that were locked away. I ask, why can’t I let this go? I ask, why can’t I move on? I ask, why do I let people have so much control of me? I ask, why am i so afraid of being me?

For kindergarten through eighth grade I spent my life in a figurative bunker. It was not a physical one, but mental. I attended a religious school for the better part of my school years and the amount of clean up will last my lifetime. I was told to not dress like that, don’t talk like that, don’t do that etc. and I kept doing it, I really didn’t care what they thought, even if it made me cry.  and even after as little as five years+ in a toxic environment the damage was done.

My questions today, and on dark nights aren’t why I do or don’t do some things, but why I let them have this power. Even when I physically left it was like they were still there, in my head. It wasn’t in what I did do after I left, but what I didn’t do. I tried to be everything they hated, which was both me but also a little bit of them.

Most of my, oh crap, moments come from watching a TV show. I watched mad mens “the suitcase” and finally realized just how terrified I was at the time of loosing my brother, and countless other mad men episodes have revealed what’s happening inside.

This time the honor goes to unbreakable kimmy schmiddt. Kimmy finally realized that even if her mom apologized it wouldn’t give her those 15 years back. And in that I had to ask myself, what am I so afraid of? Another video I watched on YouTube, was from a young girl and her mom and the mom was reassuring her daughter about how cool she is, because she felt like she had this thing about her. Mom says we all have this thing, we all have a thing that drives us, makes us and is us but it doesn’t make us any less. And I’ve felt like this is my thing, and it makes me undesirable or less for it. and still at 21, I can’t move on from this thing.

Going to bed soon, and its one of those nights were i stepped back and realized i have a lot to be thankful for, and really looking at how great this year has been and that it all can get even better from here. 

Going to Film School i have finally found “my thing” i’ve never worked harder in my life to learn terms and use equipment and volunteer for so much work, like being on other students sets when i barely know what i’m doing, with people I’m just starting to get to know. its strange to me to have a place where i feel i belong and i have people that want me around and i want to be around them. 

The second thing is more personal, and that is that i’ve finally accepted that i am gay(with help of a lot of gay you tubers, mostly Shan/Cam) and because i’ve finally let go of what i’ve been denying i feel more like me than i ever have, and more happy because i’m not forcing myself to wear this or that, or talk about guys or do other stereotypical things i felt i had to do to maintain the facade of being straight. 

Tonight I’m being a little introspective, just looking and thinking about how I feel. Tonight’s biggest takeaway is that I’ve realized all these things I didn’t want before was not because I didn’t want them at all, I just didn’t want them with a male. It’s a very strange realization because all the sudden being with someone sounds exciting, and everything that dating entails also sound exciting which previously I had dreaded.

 My mom has always been a believer in the right man will come into your life and then your set, and her and some of her friends proceed to tell me this every so often and I’ll smile and nod but inside I know it won’t be. I get excited because I want someone to be with and introduce to family eventually but on the flip side its like I’m not sure If I’d ever get that because I don’t know how my mom will take this.

I’ve been thinking lately..and i find myself at odds because i want to be out, i am so done with being in the closet and people assuming i’m straight. its not like people ask me everyday but once in a while people will ask if i have a boyfriend and it oddly ticks me off. Even when it comes to friends I want to be out because it is a part of me, and its a part that i’ve hidden. 

What i’m finding odd is that i want to be out, i’m pretty sure i’m ready, there is just one person i don’t want to come out to(at least yet) and that is my mom. there are loads of reasons that I have for not coming out, but it always ends in that i do want to tell her. its this weird i want to don’t want to. 

I want to be able to have gay friends and start being the me i’ve tucked away for a long time. 

So I just watched a video, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k51cdYDoOUw, and it feels like the next step and is definitely what I needed. This whole year (the little that we’ve had) I’ve really debated coming out to some friends, and mostly my mom but have really had troubled with anxiety about what’s going to happen. In my mind friends and family accepting me was like a gift, and it wasn’t until this video that I realized that’s a really bad way to look at. For both straight people and gay people we need to stop dramatizing the coming out process because for a lot of people, at least me, I feel like its going to be dramatic because that’s what I’ve heard, in a way I’ve been taught that people accepting me as gay is a gift not something that should just be.

 The second thing the video helped me with is this feeling I have that I need/have to tell people, like if I don’t tell them and they find out later like they’d be insulted I didn’t tell them when I met them. the biggest anxiety I have is over the fact that I think I need to explain myself to everyone I come out to which is why I haven’t really told anyone. In my mind when I tell someone it means questions and I think I have to have the answers. Realizing I don’t have to tell people, and shouldn’t have to make them feel comfortable or in the loop or explain myself has really changed my mindset and has relieved a lot of stress I was feeling.

https://forevertomorrowland.wordpress.com/2016/03/22/group-assignment-1-the-odd-couple/

Today it hit me again. Surprising and disheartening and I can’t let it go.

I was having a conversation with my mom about my brother who’s getting married in may and how soon it will be till he’s got a kid on the way. I have this kids outfit I bought for my second brother who got married four years ago and has a two-year-old but I never mailed it.

 I said that I love it so much I am tempted to save it for myself and she said I’d have to have a boy, and a husband who’d want a boy and like the outfit. It’s a moment where I realize where I am, which is in the closet. I know I’m gay and so in my head I already see myself with a girlfriend and maybe one-day wife, and in these moments I have to lie or stay quiet about getting husband/boyfriend.

I had a anxiety attack that has drained me for the last two days, and so here i outline the motions of what i’m trying to do to help myself. 

reason: i watched a movie where girls were outed and it didn’t end well

 One thing I have to do is not think about it, which is as hard as it sounds but I’ll think about a movie scene I really like recently or play a tv show scene over in my head, and I also figured out reading helps take my mind off myself and focus on the book in hand.

 Another thing I tried is something I picked up from unbreakable kimmy schimdt, in that I’ll count to ten, and start over and count to ten and start over, and count to ten. As kimmy says we can stand just about anything for 10 seconds. 

 The third thing is re working my negative and nervous attitude about coming out into a positive and hopeful one.  I had watched Cam’s video with her mom and their advice to kids/people coming out and that sometimes you need to believe in people. That was reiterated when she was answering questions on tumblr and said that a lot of the time coming out becomes so painful because over time we imagine the worst possible things and possibilities and I for one know that’s what happens to me.

 I’ll catch myself thinking about coming out let’s say on a Friday, contemplate it all day and night I’ll write a mock up letter and notes, and then watch videos I find encouraging on Saturday and listen to motivational music whilst trying to muster the courage. Then something happens where I loose motivation and fear creeps in and takes over. The fear suffocates the hope and positive as you start to imagine everyone in your life leaving you. Now I’m at rock bottom, crying at random intervals as I think about what could happen, and by Sunday I’m a mess because I think the world will end.

Just finished watching the first episode of gaycation! I recommend it highly; its engaging, moving, powerful, inspirational and uplifting as well as eye opening. 

The ending was so emotional, and encouraging that i had no words, and only tears.