Topic Tuesday // Pride Month: Connection and Growth // Tues 28th June, 2022 7-8:30PM AEST

Tell us your story please with dates and region to understand the times please ☕️

@Clawde is sounds like maybe you had similar experiences before my time? My experiences happened more recently. But I think a lot of us could relate to the feelings and coping strategies we used. How have you coped with these kind of experiences in your lifetime?

Hey @Clawde, just a little reminder of our Community Guidelines around anonymity. In order to ensure everyone's identity remains anonymous on the forum, we ask that our community refrains from sharing specific details about location or asking these of others.

Connecting with broader LGBTIAQ+ community can have profoundly positive impacts on mental health, especially if it follows a period of isolation.

@Former-Member, What have your experiences been like both finding community and building community?

For LGBTIAQ+ members: How have you found other LGBTIAQ+ people to connect with?

For allies: Are there ways you think you could use your voice as an ally to amplify LGBTIAQ+ voices and help create spaces for LGBTIAQ+ community to connect? E.g. advocating in a school P&C council to create a Pride group within a school for LGBTIAQ+ students to connect

For me, finding a community has been the #1 thing which helped me find my authentic self, and in turn, helped me to start my recovery.

When I was younger and lived rurally, this community was purely online but I’ll talk now a bit about what my IRL community has been like.

I think what finding a (small) community helped me with was feeling comfortable in myself and feeling less alone. And these people started off as just incidental friends really. People I met at work or uni and we bonded over the queer books we’d read or films we’d watched. These people became friends who’d go to queer events. For me, I had a lot of people in my life who weren’t LGBTQIA+ but never made assumptions about me and celebrated the real me.

And making new friends or finding a community can be really difficult. BUT community can look different to all of us. Some things which I did (and might help others) were

• Finding a local LGBTQIA+ bookshop and café (they held events)
• Join facebook groups or forums which were LGBTQIA+ AND intersected with another interest (like books!)
• Wearing a discreet pride badge to signal to others that I’m LGBTQIA+
• Trying to find a regular event in my area and just going over and over again. People slowly became acquaintances and then friends. It took a while, but it was great! I Also brought an existing friend with me to these spaces
• Doing all the things I already liked (like knitting and music) and searching for X + LGBT group

And it can be daunting to introduce ourselves to new people, and we all have our own coping strategies for dealing with that nervousness. But if there are barriers, jump into the forums and we can talk about them!

Resources

• Minus18: making queer friends as a young person – this is great for carers of young people!
• VICE: How to make more LGBTQ friends
• BeyondBlue forum post on making LGBTQ+ friends

When I was still on Twitter, I found a lot of other K______ Eve fans on there, a lot of them were also part of the LGBTIAQ+ community.

Sometimes they would have a live space going on. It felt really good to connect with others who also loved this tv show.

Hi Everyone 😊

sorry I missed it 😕 stupid time difference…

I’ll read it all later x

Hello @Former-Member @Former-Member @TideisTurning @anti_anti_meds @Former-Member if your coming out now in 2022 still be careful

I know it’s OK to be Gay but it’s like being a woman in a man’s worlds at work, you have to be twice as good at what you do.
no matter what. My coping strategies have been full on into survival mode. And no it’s not always about being queer, it’s not always about who your boyfriend is, it’s about fronting up and owning it, it’s not a choice it’s a thing, that gives you above the average person an energy that hard to explain , but that thing we all have is the greatest thing, that when we are alone with our own kind, it’s a place of ……. Strength and that’s probably why we are and will always be persecuted just because we are different

heck yeah @anti_anti_meds I love that show!

And I love online communities like that (and this!). Such a great way to connect from our homes ❤️

And welcome @petrichor we're just getting started really! Welcome, we're glad you're here ❤️

I've also really felt the value of online spaces and communities when I was first coming out to myself 😊 And its honestly something I still benefit from now! Just the sense of community in general I think is essential for our wellbeing