2016 Review And 2017 Expectations

| Many researchers feel that recognition of one's feelings of same-sex attraction begin as early as  self recognition .

But as my life progressed, and as I encountered more challenges and experiences, I realized who I really am. The experiences of liking the same gender or the opposite gender have somehow helped me in determining what and who really am I. Confusions are starting to be a realization of my self identity, it has already answered some of my uncertainties on my self identity. And that is why I believe that life will always pave a way to answer our uncertainties, and life will not always be full of questions, life can sometimes also be filled with

Around my middle school years, I knew something about myself was unique, but I could not quite put my finger on it. No one in my family was gay, the word gay was rarely spoken and I did not even know queerness existed. My family lived a very heteronormative lifestyle and I always assumed I would marry a girl and have children. I remember very clearly a day when I was in sixth grade, I was standing in the hallway after class and someone asked me, “are you gay?” I did not know how to react, I did not even know what the word “gay” meant. I immediately replied “NO” as the term gay was always used synonymously with stupid. After school that day, I asked my grandma what it meant to be gay and she described what it mean to be gay. In that moment,

At the age of twelve I knew for sure that I was gay. I struggled with this internally because I knew that socially it was not normal. Many people made fun of gay people, and they made some people feel very bad about themselves. The first task of coming out was not to let people get to me in

The RPS Gender-Sexuality Alliance has tried to understand and share the struggle of not being sure of one’s gender, but that’s difficult when there is no one who has experienced it to contribute to the discussion.

As a young African American girl I matured for the most part on time right before my 12th birthday in the sixth grade. My mother had just given me a crash course of what to expect, why and what to do. So I felt as though I was prepared however, being that I was held back a grade I was not sure if my same sex classmates had reached their menarche period yet and so psychologically that made me feel a bit awkward. My teachers were very supportive nonetheless and by summer break my close friend and I shared a purse with scented pads at camp. I believe that my close ties to female cousins and friends who went to the same school, were my age

Where will my busy life take me and when will it feel worth it? 8 am, I was getting ready for work, 9am-5pm I was at the Vision Care Center, 6pm-11pm I was at the Express at Town East mall and by the time I got home, I was already fed up with life but had three courses to finish by the end of the month. Obstacles were everywhere and my mind was the worst one. I will try making an effort to view and think more positively. I hope to have a better perspective about everything around me. I will squeeze in dinner with the family and find a day off to feel a bit of freedom. The resources I could start to use more is the library, instead of getting home from work and feeling tired, maybe the library would motivate me to stay awake and finish more exams/assignments. Overall, I’m really glad that I had the chance to experience this particular assignment because it triggered me to see that the world doesn’t have to feel like such a busy place. Having this time to type out my thoughts is the freest I’ve felt in a while.

For the next two years I struggled with the concept that I might actually be gay. By junior I was certain that I was in fact all the things that I was called in middle school, but because of the negative memories I decided it was a secret that I was better of keeping to myself. That was until the spring semester of my senior year in high school when I decided that I was going to live my life the way I wanted to. I would no longer allow people to scare me into being anything other then what I wanted to be I would live my life openly and honestly. On the evening of February 16, 2014 I came out as Gay on literally every social media platform I owned. The following morning, to my surprise, my classmates for the most part greeted me with open arms. As I walked from class to class I received a staggering amount of compliments and support. I was quite frankly overwhelmed when I did get a negative comment and a dozen people rushed to my

Seeing as I am a freshman, I can only discuss my expectations and notions for the coming year. Currently, my emotions swing on a pendulum between anxiety and eagerness, but I am pleased to admit the latter outweighs the former. I am enthused to live on my own, nervous about making friends, and expect collegiate academia to challenge me exceptionally more than high school, which I understand and fully accept.

It hasn't been easy since then. My whole life has been pretty much a moment of feeling ashamed of who I am. Daily micro-aggressions have made me feel different. People asking me, "you're from Ecuador? But you speak English so well!" Or "why don't you play soccer? Aren't you from South America?" Have made me feel like I'm

My sexuality first challenged me between the fifth and the sixth grade. What a weird

The attitude toward the opposite sex changes as you get older. When you are younger you think that the other sex is gross, annoying, and has “cooties”. As you go into adolescents you start to get more interested in them. When you get into the adulthood and older adulthood stage you come to realize that you need and want someone of the other sex that you just might spend the rest of your life with. You need them if you ever want to get married and have family.

Once I began high school, I began noticing little things that didn’t seem quite right. Most of them centered on the fact that I seemed to find guys more attractive than girls. Ashamed of myself, I pushed these feelings to the furthest reaches of my mind. Boys had girlfriends; girls had boyfriends. It was the way things were meant to be; anything else was wrong and perverse. Despite constant self-reassurance that I was straight, I never really convinced myself.

When I think about the next five years of my life, I like to think that I will be getting on my feet and succeeding in life. It has taken me a while to figure out what I want to do with my life and what I would like to do for my career. Over the next five years, I am going to have to do a lot in school and outside of school to prepare for my future career .

Many use their middle and high school years as a path of self-discovery, whether they know it or not. Like most people, I spent most of my life feeling I was like everyone else that was around me: cisgender and heterosexual. In middle school, I began to learn that there was even such a thing as having a different sexuality, though at that age it was all being ridiculed in front of me, and I shrugged the whole ordeal off as being something that had never and would