I wake up most mornings to a few dozen messages on my various social handles. Some of them are simply congratulating me on my Tedx Talk enquiries to engage me for talks or to put forward my views/opinion pieces and some are deeply personal messages, often painful to read.
“I don’t know what to do anymore. I think the only option is to kill myself”.
“Sometimes, I feel like my life is over and this is how it will be for me. Darkness”
“There are times, I am tempted to kill my family and end it all. For me and them”.
“I am imprisoned by my own husband. I want out. What do I do?’
I talk, chat, mentor, offer support, find them the appropriate help – but it leaves its mark. Deep marks in fact.
It brings me back to my days when it was painfully, tragically hard when I had come out. I felt alone. I felt this was it, and there would be no light in my life ever again. I felt fear. I felt pain. I felt despair. But mostly I felt, hopelessness.
Today, in 2021 as we all celebrate #PrideMonth and celebrate #ally-ship and celebrate the courageous stories of all our journeys, please do not forget to pray for those who are still struggling or are put through very horrible, inhuman emotional, physical, mental abuse, simply because our loved ones do not understand us and are not willing to educate themselves and accept. There are families who put our community through inhuman #conversiontherapy in the name of ‘curing’ us.
Please hold out a hand to those who reach out to you – by supporting a person from #LGBTQ+ community, you will not become ‘gay’ I promise you.
But, you will make a queer person feel loved and accepted and that would be enough for many of us.
Our ‘Coming Out Stories From India’ series was launched to create positive role models of people with lived experiences. Please do subscribe, watch and share. We need to change this narrative. It is our collective responsibility. One story at a time.