Warning: Discusses abuse of minors, trauma, family violence and mental health crisis. Reader discretion advised.
By Paul Brzeski
Wise people say it takes time to fall in love, but that isn’t how things go in my experience. For me, love is like a calling that I feel with every fibre of my being like magnets, getting stronger till I can’t pull myself away. Maybe I’m just a fool and sure I’m a bit obsessive, but everything that happened happened because I listened to my heart. This is my coming out story.
I remember being in my grandfathers apartment in Poland during a fight my parents had, I can’t recall why but they weren’t speak to each other and I was going between rooms trying to get them to make up. Both told me not to talk to the other. I was only four or five years old, I definitely hadn’t even been to school yet.
Speaking of school – throughout my childhood I was punished by teachers and principals for being too naughty and disruptive in the classroom. My parents had created a toxic home environment usually fighting one another and trying to use us as pawns to upset the other. When I got into trouble at school though, they were a team again and put on their Sunday best to make sure the school never thought they were at fault.
When we got home after some principal or teacher told my parents about how bad I was – I’d get verbally abused for weeks and months, my life would become a living hell. As this happened none of my teachers had bothered to enquire about my state of mind, what I was going through. I am resentful to this day that had anyone bothered to talk to me, I could have gotten help. We moved a lot so we are talking about teachers in multiple schools, cities and even countries doing nothing. As a grown man myself today, I think their actions and attitudes were pretty sad.
Growing up I wasn’t aware of what homosexuality was or that I was one. We were a strict conservative Catholic household – e.g. my parents would casually call people with tattoos criminals and junkies even though today they’re just… tattoos. People who aren’t even full nerds get Triforce tattoos because they enjoyed Zelda once when they were eleven… Anyway, by the time I was twelve years old in the year 2000, I knew well that not only was I a gay male – I was a pariah in this world. As a nerd I hid myself in video games, programming and comics. I really had a thing for American guys.
Unable to find anyone to talk to at school or at home, I went online into IRC and Yahoo Chat. That’s where I met my first real crush – Jay. In hindsight, I’m mortified that as a twelve year old boy I was talking to grown men online and looking for a connection – but I think that’s what happens when traditional mindsets preclude parents from discussing certain subjects with their kids.
At one point, I even told my parents I was talking to a man online who wanted me to move to Michigan, USA, to live with him. They weren’t at all concerned about who this stranger was grooming their child on the internet. I guess processing obvious facts staring in your face was beyond them – something I wish I’d realised before I eventually built up the courage to come out. At some point I decided I didn’t want to talk to Jay anymore, he was getting emotionally erratic and very sexual in the conversations. Again, as an adult I am horrified at my own past experiences. I don’t understand why it’s better to push religious bullshit like the Australian chaplaincy program than actually ensuring kids have someone safe to talk to at school.
2001, I was 13 and in my first year of high school. Having decided it was time to try to convert myself to be straight because everyone I’d spoken to online was overly sexual and not interested in my feelings. There were a couple of girls that I’d had crushes on when I was eleven and twelve so I surmised it must be possible to will myself to be heterosexual. The danger I felt of being bullied for being gay in a new high school environment was overwhelming, I didn’t initially go to the same school as the friends I graduated primary school with so it was daunting being in a whole new social context with a secret that could turn you into everybody’s enemy.
I remember spending months not being able to sleep and crying at night fearing my classmates would find out I was gay and that then my parents would find out because teachers would tell them what I was being bullied about. When doing that deed that guys do before they sleep alone, I’d try to think about being in an MMF threesome and then trying to steer myself to the girl.. it kinda worked because at that age everything made my horny… but I have never felt anything romantic for a girl or woman in my life, that’s for sure.
It had only been 3 months into my first high school year and my parents had already spoken to the school about my behaviour problems. Eventually I couldn’t take it anymore and I made up a story about being bullied so I could move to the other school where my friends were. This helped for a little while but by the end of the first year of high school I realised I was definitely gay – there was no chance of changing.
Over the summer of 2002 I turned fourteen and started my second year of high school. Online research led me to a local support group for gay teens called The Freedom Centre. This volunteer run building provided a safe space for LGBT people not old enough to hit the scene to meet one another in a safe, adult supervised space. Well, mostly supervised… but hey teenagers doing stuff they shouldn’t is the normal teenage experience right?
Anyway, I remember hiding a Hawaiian shirt in my school bag and walking to the old Freedom Center on Stirling Street in Northbridge after school. My route home went through the city so I reasoned that if my parents asked where I was I could pretend I’d gone to the library or the shops for a bit before I went home.
The Freedom Centre was hidden in the commercial edge of Northbridge, right upon the red light district. A tiny old house converted to be a space for youth, it had just two rooms in the front for people to hang out in, a kitchen and an office for admin stuff. The toilet was a gross outhouse in the parking lot. I credit this place for saving my soul by showing me a way to accept being gay and finding connection through shared experiences.
After a few weeks of going to the Freedom Centre nearly every day, I went from hating myself and the world to feeling like I had a future again. Meeting other gay people and talking to them made me realise I could belong somewhere. Everyone could just be themselves and say what they had on their mind without fear of persecution – a new way of living I hadn’t experienced before. I had spent my whole childhood worried about upsetting my parents and didn’t know myself at all.
One afternoon while hanging out with one of the guys who went here, let’s call him Chester as he reminded me of the singer from Linkin Park. I recall 17 year old Chester being the coolest guy in the room – everyone else was a bit soft but he was punk, rock and a raver. His wallet was on a chain attached to his belt on 1970s style flared jeans and he had a small spike piercing in his labret, that’s how cool he was. He had his own place as he had to move out of home young – I admired him. That afternoon the sunset was reflecting off the nearby office buildings creating a golden fog through the window. We were on a worn out red couch and I don’t 100% recall the context for why this happened, but I had my first kiss and fell for a guy for the first time.
When you’re a kid you don’t realise there are huge differences between adults – I just thought my parents were a pair of average people. I had no idea what a conservative or a progressive was – although I’d certainly formed an opinion of what good and bad was. After spending time with other gay people and feeling at ease with who I was – I thought it was time to tell my parents so one night after dinner I went for a walk with my dad saying I wanted to talk to him about something.
As we circled the public gardens near the apartment, I was so frozen in fear that I was making a mistake that I couldn’t say the words so I wrote “I’m gay” on his phone’s SMS app and showed it to him. The dramatic fella he is, dad paused for a moment, closed his eyes, exhaled and stared at the sky but he seemed to take it well.
It all went to shit when we got home and told mum.
I’d seen my parents fight all my life so I was well familiar with the scene, it was just the first time I was the entire focus of it. Sure dad had shouted insults at me and my little sister and broken our toys while arguing with mum, but I was not used to having to argue against the insane logic they took in order to just win a point in the conversation. My mum started to scream at me saying we could go see a psychologist to fix me and my dad’s initial accepting reaction quickly descended into uncertainty.
I still wanted to go to the Freedom Centre, probably needed the support more than ever, so I asked my parents and they said no. Feeling trapped in a life of despair, I packed a bag and climbed out my bedroom window (ground floor apartment). That night I ran away from home and tried to go where I knew Chester lived. It wasn’t exactly the easiest walk for a fourteen year old boy to leave home, in the city, at night and walk to an unknown location for shelter. When I got to what I knew to be his door, I wasn’t sure if there was anyone in the apartment but I remember knocking and begging for Chester to open the door. In retrospect, I can’t imagine a more terrifying needy response from a younger guy than kissing him and having him show up at your door in the middle of the night wanting to move in. It wasn’t much better for me as the boy either – after he didn’t answer for about 15-30 minutes, I walked back to the city.
Feeling like going home would just put me back where I started, I decided to stay out the night and went to the all night McDonalds for a warm drink. I was afraid to sleep anywhere because I’d heard people attacked the homeless in their sleep, so I slept on a bench at the bus stop across the road so that the staff from the McDonalds could keep an eye on me in case anything happened like bad people setting me on fire.
Keep reading in Part 2: Run, Survive, Repeat.