THREAD: Just read it’s been a decade of @ItGetsBetter. Until now I haven’t shared my story.

Here goes!

Ryan Warner: The San Francisco Treat

Bullies printed that on business cards and distributed 100s on campus. School leaders seemed mystified as to how to handle it.

I was a swishy and awkward teen. And I was visible. I anchored my high school’s televised morning announcements. It made me a target.

“F@gg0#!” I remember hearing as I walked between classes. The slur once came from a kid who went to my synagogue. That one really stung.

Then came graduation — when the valedictorian singled me out in his speech. As he listed what he was grateful for, he said “no more Ryan Warner on the Action News!”

I only learned this after. I was in France my senior year on an exchange. Anything to get away from that school...

I’d also accrued additional credits at every turn so I could graduate early and escape.

I scratched out the yearbook photos of those who’d made fun of me. There was a lot of ink.

I was tormented for being gay in high school, but hadn’t yet come out even to myself...

At 16, I landed @Mizzou where I found The Triangle Coalition & supportive friends. Oddly, I had to leave California’s Coachella Valley (home to the gay epicenter of Palm Springs) to find acceptance. I think kids in a gay place didn’t know how to deal w/actual gay people back then

Today I’m the (still swishy and awkward) host of a public radio show @CPRNews — surrounded by brilliant and accepting colleagues.

I hope gay kids today @pdhsofficial have it easier than I did.

Know this: It eventually gets better.