Big Gay Closet

By 14, Matranga, didn’t want to pretend anymore. So she handed a note to a classmate at Theodore Roosevelt Middle School in Kenner, scrawled with the words, “Pass it on.”

Inside, she wrote: “My name is Jeannette Matranga. I am gay and I’m proud of it. If you have any questions or comments, meet me at the second tree during second lunch.”

via Gay people are coming out younger | NOLA.com.

YESTERDAY, as our daughter left to spend 10 days with my sister, she announced to me that she is gay. As we literally only had minutes before she had to go, I hugged her, told her that I loved her, and said we would talk about it when she got home.

She’s due back shortly and I’m scared about how to handle the situation, what to say. She is 15, but has led a very sheltered life. My husband and I were both quite young when she was born, and we fear she is still suffering the consequences of our early immature parenting.

I feel she is too young to make such a radical decision. She doesn’t even know any boys her own age, let alone know that she isn’t attracted to them. Recently, she has been spending a lot of time alone in her room with her computer. I’m worried she has made this decision based on things she has found on the internet.

I would like to tell her that she can make an informed decision when she is older, and that we will support and love her no matter what. But for the next few years, I’d like to say, she should just mix with girls and boys, enjoy life, and not worry about her sexual orientation. Is that a good way to go?

I don’t want my daughter to make a decision now that could rule out things she may decide, too late, that she wants — like a husband and children.

She is a quiet and nervous girl, and very shy with people she doesn’t know. I feel she needs to socialise more. How do I encourage her? She isn’t sporty, has no interest in clothes or shopping. I’m worried.

via Our daughter, 15, has just told me that she is gay – Health, Frontpage — Irish Independent

Wow. I can’t tell you how annoyed I’d be if my mom wrote into the paper with that story.

And I get that she’s having trouble accepting it, and she sounds like her first instincts are good, but “she needs to get out more”? Come on!

“I definitely lost some friends,” he said, “but no one really made fun of me or called me names, probably because I was one of the most popular kids when I came out. I don’t think I would have come out if I wasn’t popular.”

“When I first realized I was gay,” Austin interjected, “I just assumed I would hide it and be miserable for the rest of my life. But then I said, ‘O.K., wait, I don’t want to hide this and be miserable my whole life.’ ”

I asked him how old he was when he made that decision.

“Eleven,” he said.

via The School Issue – Junior High – Coming Out in Middle School – NYTimes.com.

Benoit Denizet-Lewis won a GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Magazine Article for his New York Times Magazine article “Coming out in Middle School” which chronicles the experiences of a 13 year old boy as he goes to a gay dance (without his closeted 14 year-old boyfriend), explores the stories of various middle school-aged kids who are not only aware of their sexual orientation, but are coming out, processing it, and getting on with their lives.

His hope-filled article discusses the bullying, the outing(sometimes by internet history) and the difficulty in naming your identity at such a young age.

It’s well worth a Sunday read if you — like me — missed this treasure the first time around.