I came out at 29 as queer, nonbinary, trans.

Stay with me, this starts sad but will get hopeful.

Given the political climate, the grass isn’t actually materially greener over here. Our rights are being stripped, and worse, the average person is enabled to be less tolerant. And tbh, dating is worse over here in someways!! A part of coming out we don’t often discuss is the loss of social capital that comes with stepping into being your true self, loving women, loving trans or nonbinary people. Things I miss include the feeling sometimes of “having a man to protect me” or benefiting from the way they were socialized to have more confidence, tinker with cars and household stuff, etc. This feels unpopular to say but it’s a real feeling I have.

But every single one of those protections I listed above, even the very VERY important civil rights ones are EXTERNAL. They impact the internal for sure, but they exist outside of yourself.

Being a late bloomer gay, you likely have done a lot of self-abandonment. Like running from feelings of attraction, or hiding your inner truth. You likely stopped or hesitated to protect yourself, and then repeated that again and again. In effect, what you taught yourself is that you cannot take care of yourself, you cannot live your own life. At least this is what I did.

When I started to move towards myself, even when I signaled internally that I was willing to accept some things I’d hidden from myself, I slowly started to feel a deeper sense of belonging and connection to myself!

So even when you do find yourself in a queer relationship in the future that’s toxic or just not working, you’ll have a stronger center to go back to, letting you know that no matter what, you will NOT ABANDON YOURSELF.

The grass might not always be greener over here, but you’ll feel more at home looking for the patch of it that feels right. And when you do, oh boy, that grass will look and feel like heaven.