How a Crush Saved a Queer Person’s Life. “Falling in Love Was the Catalyst for Accepting Who I Am.” [Video]

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When Grey moved to Philadelphia, she started developing a crush on a girl at her church. There was only one problem – Grey was homophobic herself and not at all accepting of queerness. But as the crush grew stronger and a mutual affection began to develop, Grey started wondering if being queer and living a happy life were even possible. After a near brush with self-harm, Grey realized that she needed to balance her approach to religion with her queer identity. After a lot of introspection and research, Grey found the happy life she had dreamed of, including a committed long-term relationship with that girl from her church.

Transcript provided by YouTube:

0:05
Hey, so my name is Grey. I grew up in Florida.
0:08
I grew up in a church and in a family that was very conservative Christianity wise. They’re
0:18
also Caribbean. There’s also the Black culture, and so overall, not very accepting of queerness,
0:26
but I definitely have always felt like queer inclinations. And I was even homophobic,
0:35
I will say. As friends would start coming out throughout puberty and stuff like that,
0:39
I would talk to them and be like, “Hey, this is not real” or “Are you just trying something
0:45
because you know this is not okay.” When I moved up here to Philadelphia,
0:52
I was in a worship team at this church. I met this girl and immediately was drawn to her. I was like,
1:02
wow, she’s so cool and so edgy, and I really want to know everything about her and ask her
1:07
all the questions. So I started having those feelings toward her just thinking that she
1:11
was cute or whatever. But all the while, not at all leaning into them, I’d gotten to the point
1:18
where I was like, All right, people have queer thoughts. It’s fine, just don’t act on them.
1:22
We actually became good friends because I texted her while I was in distress one day.
1:29
Around that time, I was going through a lot of depression so I texted her and I was like, “Hey,
1:33
I know we haven’t really had deep conversations like this before, but you seem like a trustworthy
1:38
person to talk to you. Can I just tell you some things that I’ve been going through?”
1:41
She was immediately like, “Yeah, what’s up?” And I literally just spilled everything to her,
1:48
not any of the queer stuff, but just I feel like I’m doing everything right, I’m waking up and
1:54
reading the Bible and meditating and praying, and I was like, I’m still not… I’m so sad.
1:59
And she was just so receptive throughout the whole thing. She was just like, “Yeah,
2:02
that sucks.” And we talked for a long time, and at the end of the conversation she said, “Yeah,
2:10
I mean, you can talk to me anytime.” And I was like, “All right, sure.”
2:14
And she was like, “No, I’m serious.” And I was like, “Well, if I can text you anytime,
2:19
I’m going to text you at five o’clock in the morning when I wake up and I’m already depressed.”
2:23
And she was like, “All right.” Like clockwork the next morning, five o’clock, the depression hits.
2:29
I text her and she’s like, “Hey, what’s up?” I was like, Wow. She really does mean anytime. And from
2:35
that point, we were just texting, texting, texting nonstop. And it got to a point where I was like,
2:40
Wow, I feel extremely connected to this person and this person is cute. And I’m like, all right,
2:47
I will admit that I have a crush on her. So yeah, me, the crush and our friend had a
2:55
sleepover at my apartment, and for some reason we started talking about kind of queer related
3:01
things. So I think they were talking about Pride, and I said, “What do you think about Pride?”
3:07
And my crush was like, “What do you mean?” And I said, “Isn’t it not okay?”
3:13
And our friend was like, “What do you mean not okay? It seems so much fun.”
3:17
And I said, “No, but because it’s gay people, and we should not be celebrating that.”
3:24
And my crush was like, “That doesn’t make any sense. I don’t care.”
3:28
I did end up telling our friend the day after the sleepover that I had a crush on my crush.
3:35
And the friend said, “Oh, you should just tell her. It’s not that big of a deal.”
3:40
And I said, “Okay.” A week after the sleepover,
3:44
I texted her and I said, “Hey, I have something to tell you.”
3:48
And she said, “Yeah, what’s up?” And I said, “So I have a crush on you.”
3:54
And she was like, “Okay.” And I was like, “Is that weird? Do
3:59
you want me to give you space? Is it awkward?” She was like, “No, why would it be?” And we
4:04
just continued talking as friends and as very connected friends.
4:08
A month after I told her that I had a crush on her, I flew back to Florida just to visit my
4:15
family. One night I was texting her from Florida and I said, “So I think I’m in love with you.”
4:22
And she said, “I feel the same way.” And I was like, “No, no, no.” Because now
4:30
it’s scary, because now it’s a real thing. Three days later,
4:35
I came back from Florida. She picked me up from the airport, and once she got to my apartment,
4:40
I said, “Hey, do you want to come up?” And she was like, “Yeah, sure.”
4:44
And we were just talking and hanging out, and it just felt really great to be back
4:48
in each other’s presence. As she was going to leave, we turned to have a hug, and we ended
4:56
up hugging for three hours. And then we said goodbye, which was still very hard, still hard
5:03
after saying goodbye for three hours in a hug. But then very quickly, the religious upbringing,
5:11
indoctrination, programming kicked in. It felt clear to me that it’s like, all right, I either
5:19
live a life that I was taught to live and be super duper depressed the whole time, but then
5:30
maybe die and be happy, or I just can’t live it all. And I literally walked like 20 or so blocks
5:42
down to a bridge. I did end up calling a friend while I was up there and was able
5:48
to process some things through. All the while this woman I love was texting me and trying
5:56
to call me throughout. I did eventually answer her phone call and she talked me down even more.
6:01
So after that, I walked home. As I was processing what had very seriously almost happened
6:12
throughout that next week, I kind of just started this mantra of I’m just doing my best and jumping
6:20
from this point of I’m just doing what makes me feel like I don’t want to die. So for me, that
6:26
meant trying to find community to survive with. Honestly, I just looked up on Instagram, queer
6:35
faith, or queer Christians or queer spirituality. I came across some queer Christian pages where
6:43
they were preaching and queer pastors who were preaching. So it kind of got to this place where
6:52
I was like, all right, it seems to me that no one has the answer. So once again, I’m going
6:58
to do what makes me feel like I don’t want to die. And so that meant leaning into the queer theology.
7:09
So that led me to finding community online, then finding community in person, and then coming to
7:18
a place where I can accept and be proud of who I am. And that has brought me to where I am today.
7:23
So I did eventually come out to my parents. It went about
7:28
as expected. I’ve had top surgery. I’ve come to accept myself more, even just gender-wise. That
7:37
person I love, like we are definitely together now, and it’s been a couple years. We have a dog,
7:44
we have two cats. We plan to move in together next year. Falling in Love was the catalyst
7:51
for accepting who I am. That’s inseparable from
7:58
accepting myself, from coming out to myself, from even simultaneously falling
8:04
in love with myself. It was definitely a rough journey, but I have to say it was worth it.

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This post was previously published on YouTube.

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