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tw// religion, depression, suicide, anxiety, homophobia, transphobia
it’s a lot, but I have to say it. I don’t want to think about it anymore i just want to feel better and laying it out for strangers on the internet might help so whatever 1/23
it’s a lot, but I have to say it. I don’t want to think about it anymore i just want to feel better and laying it out for strangers on the internet might help so whatever 1/23
I’m not close with my family. They taught me nothing besides academics. I had no moral compass or sense of what was right or wrong in the world outside of child behavior. My friends from school were quite religious, and they wanted me to join their youth group
I complied, and the pastor was the one who instilled my moral compass and my way of thinking. When it was 2015 and I had just hit puberty, he lectured us on sodomy, corrupting this group of /children/ to be homophobic. It seems like I was the only one who ended up being so
that was the first time i even heard of people being attracted to their own sex. then i discovered it applied to me (just assume I’m a cis girl for this part). i was terrified. I hated myself and I felt disgusting and gross.
I pulled away from my friends, not even trusting myself to touch them or be affectionate. I thought they would find me out. 3.5 years of this passed. It’s fall 2018. I thought I had it under control. Then it happened: I fell in love
also during said 3.5 years, I was bullied. For what? thinking I was perfect. The irony is that I hated myself and needed every possible thing I could control to be perfect to make up for the bad parts. I’m the same way now and I’m STILL being called out for it. such is life.
i digress, I never let myself get close to anyone, and sure looking back on it I had had crushes before then, but I couldn’t leave this one. We sat in the back of class by ourselves, and she was perfect. I had a daydream about kissing her and that’s when I knew I was fucked
I stayed in youth group after convincing myself I could be panromantic asexual, because I didn’t want to sleep with anyone but I specifically couldn’t sleep with girls because of religion. A few months later, I stopped going to youth group.
this was completely unrelated, he said that mental health issues weren’t real and then compared having anxiety to that of adrenaline, and I had been having anxiety attacks for half my life, and I was just done. It was January 2019
At this point I also started recognizing the lurking gender dysphoria. until middle school i was living in a utopia where I didn’t even know there was a difference between boys and girls and when the reality check came I was already suppressing all my feelings
I just kinda ignored it when it arrived, assuming it was a byproduct of testing my sexuality, and at some point I remember not believing that trans people were real, because no one could possibly be happy with their assigned gender.
anyway i left and then i got really depressed and suicidal. i knew that i was attracted to girls, and now I didn’t even have church to save me from the sin I was doing by existing. I planned my suicide. I had dates set. I distanced myself. The day I picked was in March.
I procrastinated it. I couldn’t find what I wanted to use because I was terrified of blood. luckily poison never crossed my mind. I was like this for months. I pushed everyone so far away from me wanting them to hate me like I hated myself
then it was June 2019 and suddenly @danielhowell drops basically I’m gay. also credits to @MacDoesIt because it was this vague tweet that made me click on dan’s @
i procrastinated my suicide enough to witness this coming out video, and it let me know something important. I’m not the only one in the world like this. I even had words to put to what I felt: internalized oppression
our stories are different. I experienced all my trauma in my own head due to nonviolent conditioning. I can’t imagine what it could have felt like in his shoes because I could barely survive my own story. he’s so unbelievable strong and inspiring for that reason
I still feel the internalized homophobia and transphobia even almost a year later. I still can’t show affection, I still feel a whisper of disgust in regards to myself every time I see a religious symbol. I still get suicidal sometimes.
It’s still painful for me to tell people anything affectionate. To do anything affectionate. I can’t even bring myself to say the words when someone is clearly asking. Luckily the people I have are so great and understand that my limitations due to my past include affection.
as well as having a role model who’s a little bit like me, I have my own Phil: my best friend who came at a time when I hated myself and had no friends, refused to leave when I tried to push her away, and knows when to listen and when to tell me I’m listening to false thoughts.
Every time I feel really bad, I bring out the video and rewatch it and then make a list of people I can help with my story if I stay alive like he did. I did it a couple nights ago when I had another breakdown post-nightmare about my pastor again, and now I’m posting my past
Dan saved my life. In response I admittedly don’t do much. my middle name, patience with his project, and stan acc pale in comparison but I’m also giving him this thread bc he said in his video that he hopes that he’s helped at least one person
ik I’m not the only one, I’m still here because of him. I’m so grateful that he posted the video at that moment of time, even if it was later than what he originally wanted, because I needed it desperately at that moment
okay I’m clicking tweet all and then going tf to bed because I swear if I get a single bad comment I’m probably going to cry for a week I’m sensitive as you can tell. I’ve revised this over and over and I’m tired in so many ways
