I am the girl kicked out of her home because I confided in my mother that I am a lesbian.
I am the prostitute working the streets because nobody will hire a transsexual woman.
I am the sister who holds her gay brother tight through the painful, tear-filled nights.
We are the parents who buried our daughter long before her time.
I am the man who died alone in the hospital because they would not let my partner of twenty-seven years into the room.
I am the foster child who wakes up with nightmares of being taken away from the two fathers who are the only loving family I have ever had. I wish they could adopt me.
I am one of the lucky ones, I guess. I survived the attack that left me in a coma for three weeks, and in another year I will probably be able to walk again.
I am not one of the lucky ones. I killed myself just weeks before graduating high school. It was simply too much to bear.
We are the couple who had the realtor hang up on us when she found out we wanted to rent a one-bedroom for two men.
I am the person who never knows which bathroom I should use if I want to avoid getting the management called on me.
I am the mother who is not allowed to even visit the children I bore, nursed, and raised. The court says I am an unfit mother because I now live with another woman.
I am the domestic-violence survivor who found the support system grow suddenly cold and distant when they found out my abusive partner is also a woman.
I am the domestic-violence survivor who has no support system to turn to because I am male.
I am the father who has never hugged his son because I grew up afraid to show affection to other men.
I am the home-economics teacher who always wanted to teach gym until someone told me that only lesbians do that.
I am the man who died when the paramedics stopped treating me as soon as they realized I was transsexual.
I am the person who feels guilty because I think I could be a much better person if I did not have to always deal with society hating me.
I am the man who stopped attending church, not because I don’t believe, but because they closed their doors to my kind.
I am the person who has to hide what this world needs most, love.
I am the person who is afraid of telling his loving Christian parents he loves another male.
I am the girl who cries in shame when she’s near her homophobic parents because I kissed another girl and liked it.
I am the young boy who was smacked in public for sharing a kiss with another boy; we only thought that’s what you did when you really liked someone.
We are the parents who will live in regret because our teenage daughter hung herself from her tree house; we would have loved her even if she told us she was dating her best girl-friend.
I am the teacher who still has his job even after the gay student I tormented with failing grades was hit by a car on the weekend.
I am the boy who searched every book in the library about homosexuality only to find that my only question wasn’t answered; is it wrong?
We are the siblings who were disowned when our parents found gay and lesbian porn on the family computer.
I am the boy who is always late to his next class, I refuse to get out of the showers until all the other boys are changed.
I am the girl who got sick of her teacher at her pristine Christian school coming onto me and finally screamed that I was a lesbian; I’m not allowed back in that school again.
I am the father who refuses to let his son date another boy because I know from experience that the world doesn’t want you when you love another man.
I am the boy who comes home from school with broken noses; my friends pressured me into drinking at a party and I told them everything.
I am the man who stares at his new wife and her grown kids every day with regret; my ex-husband and I thought it was best if we did what was ‘normal’ of us.
I am the mother whose daughter and friends came to for advice for having sex with another woman; now her friends’ mothers won’t meet me in the eye.
I am the girl who feels a part of her is missing; my twin sister thought we were different since she was into other girls so she went to live with our father and left me here with our mum.
I am the older brother who is trying to support his younger sister; our parents didn’t want her anymore when they walked in on her with another woman.
I am the teenage boy sitting in the hospital waiting room on my own, crying; my best friend just overdosed because he was to afraid to tell me he loved me.
I am the girl who is now shunned by people in my church because they not only found out that I supported Homosexuality, I am also Bisexual.
I am just one of the people who is trying to make a difference.
Ashley Strange 