Thoka Maer

“In a perfect world, I believe that members of the LGBT community shouldn’t have to come out,” says New York high school student Amanda Gundel in a 2018 TEDx talk. “We should all be able to co-exist in our little bubbles and go out and do our own things.”

Unfortunately, we don’t yet live in that world, and LGBTQ+ people continue to face the pressure to come out.

What’s more, coming out isn’t a one-time act. After you come out for the first time, you’ll probably have to keep coming out to new people — new friends, new coworkers, new family members — for the rest of your life. This can feel overwhelming, so it’s crucial to take it one step at a time.

While there is no simple formula, there are people in the queer community who are glad to share their experiences as a guide.

Below, Gundel, now a writer and student at Binghamton University in New York, and queer therapist Daniel Tehrani, whose NYC psychotherapy practice at the Institute For Human Identity focuses on gender, sexuality, trauma and substance abuse, provide some insight:

1. Sit with yourself

We live in a society where heterosexuality is the norm. In fact, most people you meet probably assume you’re heterosexual and also cisgender (your gender identity matches the biological sex you were assigned at birth).

Queerness is an exception to these norms, so queer people can often end up questioning themselves and wondering how they fit in. In the coming out process, taking time for self reflection is important because it gives you the opportunity to define yourself on your own terms.

“The Q, or Questioning, part of LGBTQIA is so important, because we are all ‘Q’, or Questioning before we are firmly gay or lesbian, etc.,” explains Tehrani. “Whether it was for one second or several years, there was a moment where we thought, ‘I don’t know.’ That’s in part due to the fact when we grow up, we’re told we are straight, without being able to really think ‘Wait, what? Am I actually straight?’”

So step one is to sit with yourself. Consider who you are outside of all your social, cultural and familial expectations. In a world that is quick to tell us who we are and who we should love, reconsidering and reclaiming your own identity can be a radical act of self love. Ask yourself what your truest wants, needs and feelings are.

2. Come out to yourself

Stand in front of a mirror, recommends Gundel, and “look into your own eyes and come out to yourself.”

This might sound unnecessary — isn’t the whole point of coming out to be out to other people in the world? Gundel explains: “If you can’t bring yourself to say it when no one is around, there’s no way you’ll be able to go further than this step.”

Maybe you’ve known you are trans since preschool. Maybe you started to question your sexuality in your 60s after your heterosexual marriage ended. Regardless of where you are in life, the most important person to come out to is always yourself. Start there, and hold yourself with patience and kindness. “Be patient with it, and don’t rush it,” says Tehrani.

3. Come out to a pet or a plant

Next, practice coming out to something that lacks the ability to judge, such as your dog, cat or plant.

“The great thing about coming out to your pet is they really couldn’t care less; your pet will still want affection from you,” says Gundel. “No matter what you tell them, it won’t affect them in the slightest.”

Tehrani agrees. He says, “If you have a cat, dog or goldfish and say to it, ‘I’m gay,’ it’s still gonna be like, ‘OK, do you want to cuddle? Do you want to give me a treat? Do you want to go for a walk?’ They really don’t care, which is something our human family members could learn from.”

4. Find a support system

Now that you and your non-human companions know you’re queer, it’s time to find your crowd.

“This is the most important step, and I cannot stress this enough — you must find people around you who will love you, regardless of your sexual orientation or your gender,” says Gundel. “It’s toxic to be around people who will not accept you. Get away from those people, if possible, and surround yourself with others.”

Of course, finding your crowd — the strangers who become friends and eventually form your chosen family — is not always easy. Don’t feel discouraged if the people you reach out to don’t immediately welcome you, says Tehrani. He explains, “People who are members of the queer community may have their own difficulties and traumas, and they’re trying to figure things out just as you are.”

He suggests you search for local events held by LGBTQ+ organizations, follow queer activists on social media (you can find them via hashtags or through queer celebrities’ accounts), and if you’re a student, join your school’s Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) to connect with your peers and access resources.

On the value of finding your crowd, Tehrani notes, “Coming out is kind of a dance with shame — ‘I have the shame of being a person who represents a marginalized community that is literally targeted by governments, by society, by religious organizations, by peers, by bullies. I’m a person with a target on my back, and I’m ashamed of this.’”

His advice: “A really good way of reducing shame is by knowing a lot of queer people, loving them and thinking, ‘OK, if they’re not ashamed of being who they are, why should I? They’re not that different from me. I love them, they’re so important to me, and I would never want that pain for them.’”

It’s sometimes easier for us to empathize with others than with ourselves. By befriending, supporting, accepting and loving people in the queer community, you’re also telling yourself that you’re worthy and deserving of friendship, support, acceptance and love.

5. Come out to someone in your crowd

After you’ve found your crowd, the next step is to open up to them about your sexuality or gender identity. During the coming out process, your physical and emotional safety should remain your priority, and revealing yourself to someone in this group should keep you safe.

6. Come out to someone outside your crowd

If and when you come out to someone who’s outside your crowd, both Tehrani and Gundel suggest you take your time to decide whether it’s the right person and the right time to say something. Sound them out: Ask them about their current feelings on LGBTQ+ rights, or mention a queer celebrity who’s posted something supportive on social media. This can help you decide who to come out to first.

Again, your physical and emotional safety should be in the forefront of your mind. Tehrani emphasizes that you should come out only when it’s safe for you. “There’s a significant risk that’s associated with coming out, and so it’s really important to assess whether you’re safe to do so before you do,” he says. “I have to say that safety probably takes priority over coming out, even if it means your delaying it for several months until you have a place to stay that’s safe or you have enough money in case you are kicked out of your home.”

Research from the University of Chicago found that LGBTQ+ young adults have a 120 percent higher risk of reporting homelessness, compared to youth who identify as cisgender and heterosexual. As Tehrani notes, “coming out for someone with more resources is very different versus coming out for someone with no resources.” Additionally, people of all ages who come out risk being ostracized, rejected or judged by others in their communities, which threatens their emotional safety.

Once you’ve decided who you want to come out to, prepare yourself for the worst. “Let your friends — the people within your crowd — know what you’re doing, and think of a place you can go to in case things go really badly,” says Tehrani. “Have the resources on hand in case you feel as though you’re in emotional danger — such as the phone number of a friend, your therapist or a loved one.”

Just so you know, it took Gundel about 2 years to go through these six steps; it might take someone else 20 years. It’s possible that as you explore your sexuality and gender expression throughout your life, your identity will continue to evolve, and you may decide at some point to come out with a different identity.

“Our sexualities are just like our personalities; when you were 10, you weren’t the same person that you are at 20, 30, 40,” says Tehrani. “Our sexualities can change and develop too. They are very fluid. So it can be quite uncomfortable to have to come out with a different identity several times. But it is OK.”

He adds, “I don’t want to say ‘It gets better’ because I think it’s a little overused, but it does get better. Keep pushing, don’t lose hope, and keep looking towards a future where you can be yourself. There is nothing more meaningful in this world than feeling safe enough to just be yourself.”

Watch Amanda Gundel’s TEDxWCMephamHigh Talk here: 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Paula Carrizosa is a writer and media fellow on the TEDx team at TED.

This post was originally published on TED Ideas. It’s part of the “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from someone in the TED community; browse through all the posts here.

Rose Wong

Today, it’s not enough to have one birds-and-the-bees talk; it needs to be an open, ongoing conversation. Author and activist Christa Desir explains why and how.

The first few times I talked to high school students about sexual assault, when we got to the Q & A section, I was inundated with what I call the “Does that count?” question.

“What if we’re both drinking, does that count?”

“What if she said yes but then in the middle she changes her mind, does that count?”

“What if neither of us remember the next day?”

This happened with different high school groups, and eventually, I realized that something was wrong with my presentation. I said, “You know what? Let’s reframe this. Let’s put the legality of this aside, and let’s look at this from the perspective of our own values. Do you want to have sex with someone who doesn’t remember it the next day? Do you want to not remember it the next day? Do you want to be someone’s regret? Or, would you rather be someone’s enthusiastic ‘yes’?”

With these questions, the conversation changed. It got much more open, honest, authentic and vulnerable. It turned out their questions weren’t what was wrong; I was. I was too busy pointing out all the scary and dangerous places where sex can go that I forgot to talk about the wonderful, amazing, awkward and beautiful places. And I’m not the only one.

By only talking to our kids about the dangers of sexual violence, we’re leaving girls feeling afraid and boys feeling indicted. We need to give them the chance to explore their sexual curiosity, and we need to guide them through this very complicated, modern sexual world with transparency, honesty, non-judgment and vulnerability.

Unfortunately, we put sex in the same category of risky behaviors as vaping, texting while driving, and sniffing glue, instead of as something that many of us will do throughout the course of our lifespan. Furthermore, we’re failing to give our young people a language around consent. We are not helping them develop a voice to unapologetically own their “No”s and enthusiastically declare their “Yes”s.

How do we do this? Here’s a 4-step guide to help start these important conversations:

Step 1: Teach consent

Create an understanding in children around consent. This understanding needs to start young. They should learn about good touch and bad touch and the difference between them, that their bodies are their own to make decisions about, and that we are listening to them.

This might mean when you bring your child to a big family party, you don’t insist they hug and kiss every single person in the room. In schools, if it’s not a safety issue, perhaps we don’t require that they hold hands with the person next to them in a circle. What kind of message are we sending kids if we tell them, “Your bodies are your own to make decisions about, but you have to hold the next person’s hand because that’s the nice thing to do”? This is a mixed message, and it’s not good for kids. We also need to give kids the opportunity to say “Yes.” In my house, that means I’ll say to my son, “Hey, buddy, you look kind of sad. Could you use a hug?” and he’ll tell me if he does.

Step 2: Advocate for sex education in schools

We adults need to be advocates for comprehensive sexual education in our local schools. That includes positive representations of LGBTQI youth, information about birth control, instructions on how to use birth control, and information about STI’s. If you can’t make sex ed part of the school curriculum, then make sure it’s taught elsewhere in your communities or in your places of worship. And, of course, we must always keep having these conversations in our own homes.

Step 3: Make it an ongoing conversation

We need to accept that there is not just one sex talk we have with our kids. This should be an ongoing conversation, and you should continue it every opportunity that you have. So if you’re driving to school, listening to the radio, and your 11-year-old hears the morning DJ bring up porn — as morning DJs are wont to do — and your kid asks, “Hey mom, what’s porn?”, you might turn off the radio and then distract him by finding out what he wants for dessert. Or, you could answer the question. You don’t have to give him a full treatise on sex workers’ rights, but you could answer this one question and allow him to ask another one. That’s honesty.

The nice thing about sex being an ongoing conversation is if you muddle it the first time, you’ll always get the chance to do it again. In these discussions, we just need to be as open and non-judgmental as possible and admit that we’re not the captains of the ship who know everything. In fact, we are learning as much as our kids are.

Doing this makes you a person who is safe to talk to, and that’s who you want to be with your children. If they tell you, “Oh, hey, mom, I have this crush,” you could say, “Oh really. What are they like? What do you like about them?” instead of assuming that the person is a he or she.  Similarly, if they tell you that their best friend is a “non-binary aro/ace,” you could say, “Oh really! What’s that?” If you know what that is, you could say “What do you think that means? What does that mean to you?” That’s how you open the conversation and how it keeps going.

Step 4: Embrace the discomfort

Acknowledge that it can be uncomfortable at times to talk about sex. A few months ago, I had my 14-year-old son in the car with me. It was just the two of us, and this never happens. So I thought I would take opportunity to talk, and I turned to him. I said, “Hey, buddy, I just want you to know that if you have a wet dream, it’s totally normal. It’s very common. This happens to adolescent boys all the time. Just let me know because I can make sure we get the laundry done right away so it’s not a big sticky mess for two weeks.” He said, “Yeah, Mom, I know how to do my own laundry, but can you just pull over here on the side of the road? I’ll walk the rest of the way to school.”

As you can see, sometimes it goes wrong, but that’s all right as long as we keep showing up. With these conversations, we’re building the scaffolding — however rickety it might be — beneath our children so they can lead healthy sexual lives that are rooted in open communication and enthusiasm.

This piece was adapted from Christa Desir’s TEDxOakParkWomen talk. Watch it now:

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Christa Desir writes contemporary fiction for young adults. She has volunteered as a rape victim activist for more than 10 years, including providing direct service as an advocate in hospital ERs. She is a founding member of the Voices and Faces Project, a nonprofit organization for rape survivors that conducts an international survivor-based writing workshop.

This post was originally published on TED Ideas. It’s part of the “How to Be a Better Human” series, each of which contains a piece of helpful advice from someone in the TED community; browse through all the posts here.

On the first day of the high school Sexuality and Society class that I teach, I don’t pass around anatomy drawings or hand out pamphlets about safer sex — although those are stacked on a table near the door. Instead, the first thing I do is establish ground rules in the classroom: People should speak for themselves, laughter is OK, we won’t ask “personal history” questions, and we’ll work to create a community of peers who care about and respect one another. Then, I introduce the Question Box — a safe place where students can drop any question they have about human sexuality. The Question Box (an old shoebox with a hole cut into the top of it) usually stays in the back corner of my classroom, next to some scraps of paper and some pencils.

Below are some actual questions from students and my answers to them. I haven’t done any fancy editing; these are the questions just as the kids asked them. They run the gamut from innocent to downright technical. My answers are exactly as I gave them, to show how even a simple question allows for both information and value clarification to be offered in response. Here goes:

“Why is sex so good?” There are two ways to answer this question. From the biological perspective, sex feels good for an important evolutionary reason. If a species, like ours, is going to reproduce sexually, then there’s an advantage if that action also feels good. As I’ve often said, if sex felt like getting your tooth drilled at the dentist, people wouldn’t have it very often, and that could eventually threaten the survival of our species. Our bodies have evolved so that our genital regions, as well as many, many other parts of the body, are sensitive to sexual stimulation.

A part of the body that brings sexual pleasure when stimulated is called an erogenous zone. This does not mean just our genitals. All of us have many places on our bodies that result in sexual pleasure when stimulated. Knowing your own and your partner’s erogenous zones can lead to much more fulfilling sexual experiences. The mechanisms of sexual pleasure involve a combination of nerve impulses, blood flow, and muscle tension. To find out more about this, you might Google the phrase “human sexual response cycle” and look at the work of Masters and Johnson, two famous sex researchers who studied the body changes that happen when people get sexually excited.

The second reason sex feels good is that humans have developed the emotional capacity to feel love, intimacy, and passion. These emotional states highlight and deepen sexual pleasure. While pleasure can exist without these emotions, it is much more significant when they are present.

“When is someone emotionally and physically ready for sex?” I wish I had an answer that would be right for all people at all times, but the real answer is “it depends.” We are all unique individuals, and our relationships are all unique. Because of that, there can’t be a standard answer to this question. Wouldn’t it be great if we could say, “The Thursday following your sixth date is the most appropriate day to start having sex”? But, of course, that’s not the way it works.

I think it’s appropriate to start being sexually active with a sweetheart (and remember: I define sexually active as being involved with someone else’s body for the purpose of giving and receiving sexual pleasure) when intimacy, commitment, and passion are established and both people have pretty equal amounts of these feelings for each other. I don’t think these things develop quickly, so I don’t think sexual activity is appropriate on a first date or early in a new relationship.

I also think people aren’t ready to become sexually active if they can’t talk about it with their partners in a serious way, and also talk about safer sex practices, contraception (if appropriate), and possible positive and negative consequences and how they’d deal with them. Emotionally, a person has to be ready to face other people’s response, positive or negative, to the sexual activity, and be willing to share those emotional reactions with his or her partner.

As you can see, I think it takes a lot for a couple to be ready to engage in sexual activity. If any of the above things aren’t in place, I’d say you’re not ready.

“Could you use a balloon as a condom?” Short Answer—ABSOLUTELY NOT!!! UNSAFE! UNHEALTHY! DANGER! DANGER! Longer Answer: OK, I’m calmer now. Condoms are made to be condoms; balloons are made to be balloons. Both can be made of latex, but that doesn’t mean they’re interchangeable. You wouldn’t use a pencil eraser as a car tire even though they’re both made of rubber, would you?

Condoms, when used correctly, are an essential tool in reducing the risk of pregnancy and STIs. They work so well because they’re designed for that purpose. No condom substitute (balloon, plastic baggie, sock — whatever) will provide the same level of protection, and some can do more harm than good. So insist on the original! Sometimes people ask about condom substitutes because they don’t know where to get condoms or are embarrassed to get them. Condoms can be purchased at any local drugstore; there are no age requirements for buying condoms and no prescriptions are necessary. Free condoms are available from many health clinics, sexual health agencies, and even some schools (although ours does not provide free condoms at this time).

Here’s an important thing to consider. If a person doesn’t feel confident enough to acquire condoms, then maybe they shouldn’t be having intercourse. Being ready for sexual intercourse means being able to handle all aspects of the situation, including protecting oneself and one’s sweetheart from unwanted consequences. Remember my rule about sexual activity—“ If you can’t look your partner in the eye and talk about it, then you can’t do it with them.” My rule for condoms is, “If you can’t take responsibility for securing condoms, then you’re not allowed to have the kind of sexual activity that calls for using condoms.”

“How can you tell if a guy likes you?” I know you’re really hoping for a clear-cut answer here, but that’s just not the way it works, I’m afraid. People can react in all kinds of ways when they like you. Some people get really quiet around you. Others will make sure you notice them. Some will tease you or act annoying. Some will just silently stare at you (yes, that can feel a little creepy).

The best way to figure out if a guy likes you is to ask him! Might it feel awkward to do that? Sure, but it’s also a way to get a clear answer. You might want to resort to the middle-school tactic of asking your friends to ask his friends if he really likes you or not, but that makes the whole thing so much more public than it needs to be. You could try using Facebook or texts to figure it out, but they’re not great ways to get clear information.

Why not try the kind of “I message” we use in class? In an I message, you describe the situation, say what you feel, and say what you want or need. Below are two different I messages you might try (or make up your own!).

#1: “I’m trying to figure something out and I could use your help. I’m feeling a bit confused about what you think of me. I’m wondering, can you be honest with me and tell me whether you like me or not?”

#2: “It’s hard for me to figure out if someone likes me or not. I’d be a lot less anxious if I knew for sure. So, I was just wondering, do you like me?”

Asking such a question might seem scary, but remember, the worst a person can say is no, and you’re absolutely strong enough to hear that and be OK. Believe it! Then go ask him.

This article is adapted for TED-Ed from the Ideas.ted.com article, and excerpted with permission from the book, For Goodness Sex: Changing the Way We Talk to Teens About Sexuality, Values, and Health. Watch Al Vernacchio’s TED Talk: Sex needs a new metaphor. Here’s one.

Featured image via iStock.

To learn more about health and human development, watch this TED-Ed Lesson series. To learn something new every week, sign up here for the TED-Ed Newsletter.