Recently, I decided to speak out about an experience that I thought would stay within the confines of my own existence, frankly for the rest of my life. Never in this lifetime, nor in the next thousand lifetimes, did I ever think I would have the courage to speak openly about my experience being outed. My seventh grade year has always been an immense source of shame for me; I haven’t felt ashamed of my sexuality since voluntarily coming out nearly four years ago, but I have ALWAYS felt ashamed of the time that somebody else took that moment away from me. While, again, my sexuality hasn’t been an outward source of shame, this origin story has been to blame for my deeply internalized homophobia for nearly a decade now. No matter how it manifests, shame due to internalized homophobia, as a queer person, is truly debilitating.

Being that almost my entire social circle is filled with heterosexual people, I have been the token gay friend since October 11th, 2016. But, as harmful as tokenization can sometimes be, I’ve reveled in it. I love being the token gay friend, I love the attention it brings me, I love that it makes me unique amongst my friends, I love that I can completely make something up having to do with sexuality and none of them will know it’s untrue. That said, though, it can be hard at times having no one to relate to. It can be hard to express certain things that I know won’t be understood, but are killing me to keep bottled up. My friends are some of the most accepting people I’ve ever known, and I know that I can always go to them to talk if something comes up, but sometimes it just isn’t the same.

Since being back on campus, I’ve been spending a lot of time with the people who are in my social circle, but that I wouldn’t always consider my social friends; not that they aren’t social people, just that our social paths don’t normally cross. In this group, I’m not the token. In fact, this group is so far advanced in their understanding of sexuality, I don’t feel as though I need to hide a single thing. Not that I feel the need to hide from my other friends, but there are certain things I just wouldn’t feel necessary to bring up in my normal social settings. In the last week or so, I have felt more comfortable in my own skin than I ever have before. I feel heard, I feel seen, I feel valid, and I don’t feel the least bit different. And it’s really nice to be able to feel that after years of subconsciously feeling, for lack of a better word, alone.

All of this is to say, surround yourself with the people who make you feel like it’s okay to be unapologetically yourself. Surround yourself with people who you can relate to, people who make you feel good about who you are. Not everyone in your life needs to be relatable, in fact, as I’ve seen for the last four years, it’s sometimes better to surround yourself with people who are entirely different from you. But ideally, everyone should have both.