I Hid My Queerness For 15 Years To Avoid Further Marginalising Myself

I came out as bisexual when I was 30, and now identify as pansexual, but it wasn’t the result of some “aha” moment. I had known for 15 years that I was attracted to more than just cisgender men, but as a Latina woman, I was wary of going public about having yet another marginalised identity. I didn’t need statistics to tell me that I’d be “othered” even more than I already am. So at the time, I felt that staying quiet about my sexuality would be my best bet.

As one of the only Latinas at my Kansas high school in the early aughts, I experienced xenophobia regularly. I had slurs written on my locker. Another time, school officers came to my house to question me after someone had anonymously made bomb threats at school. And once, the vice principal complimented my English despite me being a student at his school for three years — and not in a program for English as a second language.

Around the same time, I learned personally how sexism influenced the way that my achievements were measured compared with those of my male counterparts. I often felt as if I was considered lesser than my male classmates by educators despite skipping a grade, receiving excellent marks, and scoring high on standardised tests.

When I started to have crushes as a teenager, they were on both boys and girls, but I didn’t let myself explore those feelings for a decade. Even then, at 25, when I started matching with women on dating apps, I never got the courage to go on a date with any of them.

Because I’m femme and straight-passing, I was able to mask myself as a heterosexual person, which kept me safe — but it quietly ate away at my soul.

“Not allowing yourself to be fully authentic by hiding your sexuality can affect self-esteem, identity formation, and overall well-being, which may increase stress, anxiety and depression,” says Marina Kerlow, a Maryland-based marriage and family therapist.

Still, queer Black people, Indigenous people and people of colour, Kerlow tells me, may choose to conceal their sexual orientation as “a form of self-preservation” within a society that frequently subjects them to multiple layers of discrimination and violence. My focus was on maintaining autonomy over an aspect of my identity in a world where I often felt powerless.

But playing that role took a toll on me. Concealing our sexuality can cause a sense of inauthenticity because we’re essentially living incongruently with our true selves, says Niloufar Esmaeilpour, a mental health counsellor based in Vancouver, Canada, who foundedLotus Therapy. But, Esmaeilpour adds, hiding our sexual orientation can indeed be a survival strategy for queer minorities.

“It’s a way to avoid confrontation, discrimination and potential harm,” she says.

In 2020, I finally felt safe to come out to family and friends, as well as publicly. At the time I was living in my fatherland of Uruguay, where same-sex activity has been legal (with an age of consent) since 1934. As I began a relationship with my first girlfriend, it felt liberating to finally live my truth and to do so in a place where both society and legislation are supportive of the LGBTQ+ community. I now live in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, a location I chose as my new home base since it’s also very queer-friendly.

Though I’ve come this far, I know that there are so many other people of color like me out there who have spent years worrying about living openly queer lives.

“Hearing explicitly racist comments, microaggressions and prejudice were things I experienced growing up. I knew how it felt to be ‘different,’” says Jamie-Lukas Campbell, an American based in Ireland and the founder of the TUS Initiative, which creates solutions to help marginalised folks with “taking up space.”

“I stayed in the closet because I didn’t want to be the recipient of discrimination and judgment more than what I had already been subjected to for being Black.”

For Campbell, the fear of facing more than one type of discrimination created a heightened sense of vulnerability.

“I couldn’t hide my Blackness but I could conceal my same-sex attraction,” says Campbell. “The closet shielded me from the double weight of being Black and gay.”

I get it. Regardless of how solidly we own our identities and how proud we are of our cultures, having multiple marginalised identities can condition us to feel like we don’t fit — and like we’re never good enough. I’m seen in halves — half Indigenous Latina, half white; half gay, half straight — but also not Indigenous enough, not white enough, not gay enough, and not straight enough to belong to those communities. Coping with that constant sense of being an outsider can feel really heavy.

“This can manifest as hyperawareness in social situations, anticipating discrimination, or worrying about personal safety, which diverts mental resources away from other cognitive tasks,” Esmaeilpour says.

Though I do regret waiting so long to come out, it was the right decision for me to wait until I was in a space where I felt safe, around people who would help me thrive. Queer BIPOC have every right to come out of their own accord. There’s no shame in not being publicly queer if you’re worried that your safety will be in jeopardy. Coming out has been a tool of empowerment for me and permitted me to live authentically.

And now, I refuse to see myself in halves — I’m whole and enough exactly as I am.