ZEITGEIST 2 FINAL

Friday, April 27, 2018
You Are Zeitgeist
Dear Perpetuanos:
A LITERARY MAGAZINE
p.23
Hi. You do not know who I am, but I am just like you; the only difference is that I am attracted to people of my same
gender. I still remember the first time I told myself that and was actually proud of it. It felt so good to finally admit
something to myself that I have been running away from for so long. For years, I had been trying to figure out who I was.
As a kid, I used to always look at girls and I thought that they were “cute”, but I also looked at boys and said that they
were “cute”. I did not think much of it at the time; I did not really know what the concept of sexuality meant. In middle
school, I was going through a rough time in my life, so I did not really pay attention to others, especially in a romantic
way. When I got to high school, I began to notice that I spent more time looking at other boys than girls. I wondered what
this meant, and I kept doubting myself unceasingly. I did not want to believe it. Consequently, the rest of freshman year
was spent being ashamed of these thoughts that I was feeling and hiding them away. I struggled with coming to terms with
who I was because of fear. I was scared to admit something so drastic. Months went by until one day, I realized that these
thoughts were things that I can’t control. As hard as I tried to hide them, they always kept coming back. I finally began
understanding what was going on in my brain, and eventually decided to admit to myself that I was different from others in
an equally exceptional way.
I knew very few LGBTQ people in my life; the only ones I knew about were Ricky Martin and my older brother. Which
brings me to the next problem I faced during my journey… coming out. I finally accepted who I was, so the next step was
to be open about it. I wanted to tell my parents, but the thought of telling them terrified me. I guess I did not want them to
be ashamed of me.I felt like I would disappoint them. I felt that I would not live up to their expectations… I felt lost and
alone, thinking that there was nobody I could talk to. So I hid my identity for a while longer. I eventually worked up the
courage to start coming out to my friends. If telling myself was hard enough, now I had to say those words to someone
else. Announcing who you are to the world is very terrifying because there exists the possibility that the world might not
accept you. Nervously, I told my closest friends one by one, and I began to gain confidence because of their wonderful
responses. I still remember every single time I told one of them. However, my confidence was shortly broken afterwards;
someone told another person, and my secret eventually reached someone I was not ready to tell. She was a very important
person in my life, and I wanted to tell her myself. I never got that chance… it was taken away from me. This destroyed me,
and I stopped telling people about my identity.
I remember the times people would come up to me and ask me uncomfortable questions. My heart would stop instantly,
and I would get nervous about people questioning my sexuality. I thought to myself: “Oh no,” “They are onto me,”
“Someone told them,” “I can’t trust people anymore,” “People are judging me,” etc. But, suddenly, I told myself: “Who
cares what they think?”. I realized that what mattered was that I was proud to be who I am, and I did not care for other
people's judgements. I slowly regained my confidence. Junior year came by and I was proud to be myself. However, I still
needed to tell my family.