I have this recurring dream where I tell my parents I’m seeing a guy. They’re curious about him– What’s his name? Where did you meet him? They’re excited to meet him– Invite him over, I can’t wait to see what he’s like. In this dream they celebrate this part of my life, the part of my life that I thought about extensively when I was a kid watching rom-coms. I bring home a stand-up guy and not only am I happy, but my parents are too. When I wake up, a heaviness settles over me that lingers throughout the day. In my dreams, my parents love me for somebody I’m not. Somebody who isn’t queer.

People have told me countless times to be proud and happy of who I am. I think as queerness has (somewhat) become more accepted, people forget the struggle many of us still face. Being told to be proud of who you are is easy when you’ve grown up without shame surrounding who you love or like. It’s an entirely different story growing up with an idea of what your life would look like and realizing that you’re not going to get it. I grew up with this wish that I’d marry somebody like my childhood crush, Percy Jackson.

As a little girl, he was everything I ever wanted in a boy. A funny, sweet and a little dumb dude that’s protective of those he loves. The media I consumed as a kid all contained the same standard formula. There’s a boy. There’s a girl. Somewhere along the way they fall in love and live happily ever after. If there was an anomaly to this equation, it was never given the same acceptance or attention.

I remember Glee being my first introduction to queer people which should be a crime but it was all that I knew back then. Out of the queer characters in Glee, the one that ultimately got the most coverage was Kurt, an out-of-the-closet boy in high school. So even then, my reference for queerness came back to men. At school, everybody had crushes. My friends and I would sit in a little circle during break and discuss which boy we thought was cute. At home, my mother teased me over the crush I had on a boy we travelled with. This equation was inescapable. Movies, books, school, home. Everywhere I looked, I only saw one option. Me + a nice boy = a happily ever after. I never considered any other possibility.

I set about to find my real life Percy Jackson, thinking that surely if I find a boy like him, I’ll be happy and that the stomach churn I got when I imagined being with a boy would go away because this one would be everything I wanted. It took me a long time to realise this isn’t something I’d ever get, and not because somebody like him doesn’t exist somewhere out there. It’s just because I don’t like men the way I was taught to. The way I so badly want to. The way my parents so badly want me to.

I saw a TikTok about how queer kids who know from the get go that they’re queer are the nepo babies of the community, because yeah, I’m not saying that life is easier for you but at least you have surety in who you are. You don’t spend years stacking building blocks upon one another to create your imagined life only to watch helplessly as it crumbles before your eyes. Queer people grieve an infinite amount and it’s not talked about enough. Nobody prepares you for the fact that you might not get the fairytale ending you desperately wished for. You’re not going to get the acceptance and applause love stories about straight people get. I think a lot of people interpret this grief as embarrassment when that’s not the case. Even though it’s taken me years to get here, I’m comfortable with the fact that I love women. I’m less comfortable with the fact that my relationship with my parents has forever changed. 

Just because I know liking women isn’t wrong and evil like I was taught doesn’t mean I don’t still hope I wake up one day with a change of mind because I’m tired of grieving what I’ve lost. Even at 25, I look at one of my beloved K-Pop idols and I think maybe if I find somebody like him I won’t be a lesbian anymore. Maybe if I try a little harder, I don’t have to lose my prince and princess ending. Maybe I haven’t lost my parents’ approval. Maybe I won’t have to grieve anymore if I find this impossibly perfect man the media I consumed told me to want, I’ll be happy.

I still feel anxious about writing this because I don’t have lesbian friends so I feel isolated in this experience. My brain likes to do this thing where it reminds me of the fictional and celebrity male crushes I have to point out that I can’t be lesbian. It completely ignores the times in real life where I was approached by men and had panic attacks at their advances. It reminds me of all the boys I’ve kissed drunk, and naturally forgets how physically sick I got following the encounter.

It looks for any doubt I have on my sexuality and latches onto it with hopeful hands, choking out any sense it takes to remember how happy I was dating a girl or how kissing one didn’t make me ill for months after. 

I go through the five stages of grief about my sexuality regularly. I deny it all the time– I can’t be a lesbian because I had boy crushes. I’m angry– Why do I like women? What’s wrong with me? I bargain– If I meet a guy who doesn’t want to have sex with me, all will be well. I’m depressed– I wish I was born differently. I wish I wasn’t queer. I wish I wish I wish. And on a good day, I accept– I love women and I’m okay with that. It’s a vicious cycle. The only times I’m sure of myself are when I’m with my friends who remind me who I am. When my brain tells me I can’t be gay because I’ve had a boyfriend, my friends are the ones to remind me how miserable I was when it happened.

For those of us who haven’t been accepted by the ones we love, I’m not sure if the cycle of grief ever ends. It’s disheartening to come to terms with, especially if you’re surrounded by the people who deny you like your family. I’m not entirely sure what the healing process for this looks like yet.

This article was written because I found myself in another cycle just when I thought I was ready to accept my losses and move on. When I came out to my parents the second time, one of the things they said to me was, “You’re taking something away from me.” I’ve turned this phrase over in my head a thousand times, feeling the guilt and loss at what I can’t give them. But what about what’s been taken away from me? A celebration of who I love. The ability to tell them I’m seeing somebody without breaking down in tears. No shifting eyes or deflection when they talk to their friends about their daughter. Love without conditions.

When I say I wish I were straight, I don’t mean to imply that liking men is better. I’m not ashamed or embarrassed of being queer. The little girl inside of me who knows she’s meant to be with another princess is just sad that she’s lost so much in the process of figuring that out. What I’m trying to say is that when I wish to be straight, I really just mean I wish I could stop grieving.