For almost my whole life, I had been living in a world I felt I could not be myself. From day to activities like watching the news and seeing hate crimes, or walking the halls of middle and high school and watching bullying right in front of my eyes, I felt as if my secret was something I was going to have hide in my mind forever. Until I was away from my friends and family and alone at college did I finally realize that I didn't have to be someone I was not. I finally gained the courage to come out to my friends and family around me. I had struggled for years with my identity, asking myself questions like "why I can't I just be like the other guys that talk about girls" or "why are you not as masculine as the other males around you".
Living this way, not accepting myself for who I am put me in my darkest times at a very young age. I was alone. I couldn't tell my friends or my family for fear of rejection. I sometimes couldn't even tell myself because of the fear of being different. I didn’t want to go to school anymore in the sixth grade because of being bullied. Even in high school, the rumors were enough to keep me home for days at a time. Now I’ve realized that different is good. Different is what you should strive for. Be yourself. Don’t be afraid of other people’s ignorance.
Being on sports teams and thinking that you don't fit in because you are not like everybody else was one of my biggest struggles. I didn’t want to play little league baseball. I wanted to be figure skating if I remember correctly, but I did play little league to please my dad, to show him that I wasn’t different, that I was just like everybody else playing little league. That I wasn’t any different from my twin brother, who is also a student athlete at Saint Mike’s, but who also identifies as heterosexual. Being on an all girls field hockey team led many of my peers to jump to the conclusion that I was gay wanting to play a girls sport where they wore skirts. These fellow students had no idea that I was playing field hockey because of my sisters history with the sport, not because I wanted to be like the girls because of my sexual preference being the same as theirs. Their ignorance of jumping to conclusion also made me quit the sport. If i had quit because of them, I never would have made it to the U.S. Men’s National Field Hockey Circuit, one of my proudest moments and accomplishments in my athletic career.
Being an openly gay male student athlete on the men’s tennis team at Saint Michael's College is rewarding. Nobody will ever treat you differently because of your sexual orientation. You have an insight, a mind, and a view that many other student athletes don't have. You’re unique. You’re not different than everybody else. You will be pushed towards greatness, just like everybody else on your team. Being a gay student athlete, or athlete will not hold you back from anything in your life. You will be greeted with support from your teammates and your coaches, just like I have here at Saint Mike’s.
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