Be proud of your pride

OWN EXPERIENCE
You need to be very comfortable with your sexuality, and open about it. When I decided it was the right time for me to be open about my sexuality, I firstly wrote down what I would like to say to my parents. So basically creating a ‘speech’ if you like. I would gather facts from other people’s perspective.  To do this I would research other’s way of opening up to their loved ones. I would have written down some notes then from this create my own comfortable way of opening up!

When the time was right for me, I went to my parents and asked them to sit down and just listen to me, respect me for who I am and my choices. They agreed. So, I took a deep breath and just let it out. And let me tell you, it felt so good to finally be ‘free’ from all this build up of stress, thinking what on earth will they think of me etc. And it all came down to just my parents saying “We accept you, whatever you are. Whatever you decided is best for you, we are here to support you”.

Personally, as a bisexual, I tell people a lot, because it helps others to feel secure about expressing their own sexualities. Particularly bisexuals are seen as inferior, or just ‘in a phase’ so it’s good to talk about it a lot, to involve yourself in LGBT+ events and clubs, go to Pride, make sure you are visible and there for the community.
As soon as people are aware of you, and your openness, the gays will flock to you. Whether it’s for friendship or something more, the LGBT+ community is a group of minorities, and there’s solace in finding others like you. So, be proud of yourself, be open about your attraction to girls and boys, let other people hear you speak about it, and the ones that feel the same will bond with you.
That’s the best advice I can give you for finding girls that like girls. Then, if someone in particular catches your eye, tell them! It’s a lonely thing, being gay and not knowing how to relate it to others. People will want companionship, or relationships as much as you! Be brave. You can be the very thing that helps someone in the same situation, simply by being yourself.

STAY TRUE TO YOURSELF
Staying true to yourself means that you should ‘put yourself first’. For me, this is very hard as I always put others before myself and I’m sure there are other people out there too who do this. I always get told by my family that I care more for others than I do myself and sometimes this means health. You may think keeping a secret for so many years won’t affect your health, well it can. Like I said before I’m bisexual and I didn’t come out till four years ago. I believe I knew I was bisexual from a young age as I loved being a tomboy and hanging around with boys. But that doesn’t always mean ‘Oh she must like girls’. Not necessarily. That was just me and I didn’t want to change for anyone when I was ten. I was happy being me and that’s all that matters. But that changed when I came into my teenage years. I started to get bullied, I would have name calling like ‘Dyke’. This would lead onto me changing myself for other people and not because I wanted to. I wasn’t accepted for who I was and I believed that was my own fault, when in fact it was society’s fault. Society made teenagers believe that being ‘different’ was not acceptable and that these teenagers who were like me would have to pay a price for it, bullying.

I came out in my last year of high school and let me tell you I was terrified but I knew it was the right time for me. No one else, me. And when I did tell people it felt so good to finally get all this pressure and weight off my shoulders. To finally be my true self! To be accepted for being Melissa. So when this happened, this circle of positive energy got created when I thought of positive memories.These thoughts manifested as positive actions. Then, those actions made me feel good and think of good thoughts. So then this created a cycle of positive energy.
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Mel