My childhood growing up in New Jersey was marked by the somewhat confusing feeling of being both on the inside and outside of my social world. I was always overweight, which I cle...

by Daniel Smith

I, as a 14-year-old boy, was sitting next to my mother as she drove us home from school in Valdosta, Georgia. We came to a red light and she stopped the car. I turned to her and s...

by Brandon R.

I grew up knowing that I never really fit in in my hometown. I believe the first time I heard the word “fag” being used against me was when I was in 7th grade. I remember the ...

by Eli Effinger-Weintraub

Before I opened my car door, I triple-checked to make sure I had everything. It was my first time – I was so excited. But I felt nervous and guilty, too. What if someone saw me?...

by Hubert Dorsett

I should never have made it, according to the doctors who treated me so many years ago for third degree burns on my back and buttocks after I was run over by a car at the age of 5...

It’s fall and I drive through the winding countryside squinting slightly as the warm late afternoon sun hits the golden leaves. Suddenly I am brought back to a memory… I was i...

by Scott H.

I was living in my parent’s house in the pleasant lifestyle of suburbia with all the other little happy families. When I was dating my first boyfriend, every time he would come ...

by Jon D.

Junior year of high school: Since things were getting dicey using the family computer to satisfy my curiosity, and having no computer of my own, I decided to print out some gay re...

I went to an all-girls high school. I hope I don’t have to explain that the school wasn’t the making of my sexuality, but perhaps it helped to be in an environment where girls...