Anthony, 21

It's a bit difficult to pinpoint an exact date when my mental health was affected, I just know that I reached a point in my life when I had so many irrational fears and such a heavy burden that they limited me from moving forward. This is how a dark stage began for me, where, without wanting to, I started moving away from those whom I loved the most, from what I liked to do the most, and even from myself. However, after having endured the pain and uncertainty, I began a slow path of self-knowledge that I continue on to this day.

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Maybe all my life I knew inside that I could also like a boy, only that I hid it for many reasons. At 16 I knew I was bisexual, then I fell in love for the first time with a boy, and life seemed not so bad. But my parents found out about my sexual orientation long before I thought of telling them, and their rejection brought about the worst days. "You can't like someone of the same sex, that's not normal! I would have preferred everything except a son like you! God doesn't like homosexuals" (even half), etc. Phrases like those I had to put up with for a long time, because, although I didn't want to, I had nowhere to go.

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Time passed, I graduated from school, started college, started working, and my parents barely touched on the subject of my sexuality anymore. In the blink of an eye, I was of legal age and had a normal life like any other boy my age. Although not everything was happiness. During this time I had fallen in love and had been attracted to various people, but never went beyond attraction and desire, because I felt something in me that prevented me from engaging in intimate relationships with someone else. Then I started to get frustrated because I wasn't living what most of my friends do: love.

 

"I understood that ever since what happened to me with my parents, I had been avoiding the possibility of falling in love and experimenting with my sexuality"

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That situation led me to become frustrated in many aspects. Then the pandemic arrived, and with it a global pause that prolonged the pause in which my life was already (at least emotionally). During that time I tried very hard to stay hopeful, but the reality is that I developed anxiety and depression, although at the time they were just feelings that I didn't know what to name. But not everything was dark, because the confinement helped my family and I get a little closer, and I also enjoyed a hobby again that made me rethink the career I wanted to study (reading made me realize that I wanted to study Literature). Covid-19 restrictions were being eased and life seemed to be back to normal.

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Thanks to my psychologist, I have made great strides. I learned that there is nothing wrong with my sexual orientation, but with society's prejudices towards LGBT people. I have recognized bad thought patterns and have transformed them into positive thoughts, I have forgiven, I have improved my relationship with my body and my mind, I have started to socialize more often, and step by step I am overcoming the situations that have hurt me, to return to my dreams with hope. Because, if I have learned something from not being straight, it has been that I cannot condition my life to the opinions or expectations of others, even my family, because my happiness depends on me.

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If you are reading this and you are going through something similar, I can tell you that you are not alone. Sometimes time helps, other times distance, in any case, live authentically, never stop doing what you like the most and try to do new things whenever you can, and, most importantly, love (yourself) a lot.

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