Amacy L

ATTENDED BYU (‘11–’12)

What was your experience like at BYU?

When I was first attending BYU, I think for the first month or two, there was this great high of being there, like everyone around me believes the same thing I do. I got into the school that I wanted to go to. I’m here, I’m making new friends, I’m not that person I was in high school anymore. I’m not limited.

And then, I started to feel these pressures around me, and I started to feel that I wasn’t being authentic to myself. I was being pressured in a lot of ways to date girls. I was being pressured to socialize more in a masculine way. I was being pressured to choose my major, go for it, go all in, and try and live the dream, try and get it all.

Why did you end up leaving BYU?

My first year at BYU, I was at Heritage Halls, which is an environment in which you’re interacting with your ward a lot. The people all around you are going to the church with you and sometimes they have classes with you, so it’s a really tight knit community. And I got pretty close with my bishop. And then after my first year after I realized that I was gay, then I started to date somebody.

When I came back in the fall, I continued to talk to my bishop, since I considered him a confidant and a friend. And at some point he said that I should probably leave because he insinuated that he was going to talk to the honor code office. And I wanted to avoid all of that myself. I was already pretty vulnerable. My life was changing a lot, so I decided to leave. I wasn’t asked to leave, but it feels like it was kind of the same thing.

Can you describe your “coming out” experience?

When I came out everything kind of broke into a million tiny pieces. I remember I got on my knees and prayed for a really long time, as one does, and asked, “Is it okay that I have a crush on this guy that I really like?” And, the answer was yes. It was like a spiritual answer for me, where I’d received those kinds of answers for questions before, and so that was super confusing for me. What does this mean? Everyone says this is not okay, and yet I’m feeling the tingles, I’m feeling everything telling me that this is right for—not just that it’s okay, but it’s what I should be doing.

What did “coming out” look like for you?

I had a very distinct moment myself when I put the label on my experiences and kind of came to terms with what that was going to mean for my life. And then a couple months after that is when I started coming out to people. I went home to visit my family for a few weeks over the summer and came out to my mom, and then my dad, and then my brother, and then my sister. All separate conversations, all terrifying and painful, but exciting to start getting it all out in the open and figuring out how to move forward.

How did you realize you were queer?

Well, it was bubbling up for a long time. For my whole life, I mean, you know how it goes, like other kids around you are talking about the girls that they like or they’re talking about more and more what it means to be a young man or to be becoming an adult man. And I just never really found authentic ways to engage in those conversations in spaces and to socialize myself.

And then my roommate my first year at BYU was gay. And that whole year I’d kind of flirted with going to USGA, Understanding Same-Gender Attraction Club [now Understanding Sexuality, Gender, and Allyship]. And I knew that people out there were gay and I was thinking, “Maybe this is me.” My roommate came to me near the end of the year and said, “I need to leave BYU. I guess I probably owe you an explanation.” And I said, “Yeah, I’d like for you to tell me.” And then he told me he was gay and it just burst open. I’d never really been able to talk about it before, I’d never really been able to think about it before. Before that point, even though I was going to the USGA Club, and I was watching these videos and reading online about what it means to be a gay person. It was all still really subconscious for me. It was really weird. I couldn’t have talked about it, unless someone had given me the words. And he game me the words by saying it himself. And then right then I was able to say it out loud, and I knew that it was true.

What did “coming out” look like for you?

Coming out, I thought would be like a single moment when you say, “I’m gay, here I am everybody.” And then it’s over.

But what I found was that that first night when I came out, when my roommate came out to me, and then I was able to then come out back to him, I kind of thought like, this is the after moment. Everything has changed. Now I will become so much more authentic and all of my problems will just fall into place and I’ll have all the solutions.

It was a few months later that my family found out, but they kind of dragged me out of the closet a little bit. It’s actually kind of a terrible story. We were at a family party and my parents pulled me to their bedroom and read conference talks at me and then asked me if I had same-gender attraction. And I said, “Yes.” And they said, “That’s okay, we’re here to help you through. We’ll help you work with this.” and then they suggested that I should probably try and make a relationship with one of my friends who I’d met at BYU that first year, and see if I could ask her if she would marry me.

At first, I said, “I don’t think that I need to be fixed,” but I had also only had one conversation about being gay, and that was with this person who was my roommate. I didn’t really have a support group. I didn’t really have words or literature that I’d read. So I kind of couldn’t defend myself, I guess you could say.

What do your relationships look like today?

My family, I am living with right now, which I never thought would be possible. I always thought we were going to be fighting. I always thought there was going to be a problem. I never thought that they would be okay with me being gay. Not that I need anybody to be okay with me being gay. That’s something that I’ve decided on and that’s something I’ve decided to hold my own strength there.

It’s been a process of holding my ground and of letting them know in every situation that this is who I am. And never letting them take any ground from me. I’ve had to be a little bit defensive to be honest with you. Because at first they’d say things like, “Are you still reading your scriptures?”, “Are you still going to church?”, “Have you met any girls?” And I’d have to say every time, “Mom, I don’t go to church anymore.”, “Dad, sorry, I don’t read the scriptures. I don’t believe these things anymore.”, “I’m gay. I don’t date girls. I’m dating a guy though.” And that was really, really hard for them. They’d never been through it before.

At some point, I learned that it wasn’t serving me to be angry with my family all the time. It actually served me to be a little more patient with them and just learn how to take deep breaths. I think they slowly started to get used to that. It’s really just taken me holding my ground and knowing who I am in situation after situation. And communicating to them that I don’t want to lose my connection with you, I don’t want to lose my place in this family, I want to be a part of this group, and it hurts me that you want to disconnect from me because I am trying to be my most authentic self. If you care about me, I would like for you to accept this part of me that I didn’t choose.

Can you describe your experience around your gender identity?

My whole life I’ve always felt different than other boys. And when I came out as gay, I thought, “Oh, this was it, this is why I felt so different.” And in the years since, I’ve realized there were a lot of things that I had to learn how to do, resting in this new identity.

There were a lot of times before where I’d walked into the clothes store and wondered, “What side do I go to?” I go to the men’s side. I gotta be honest with you, sometimes I go out of the house and I’m presenting a little bit more feminine because I decided I’m going to wear a shawl today or I’m going to paint my nails or I’m going to put on a little bit of eyeliner. And then the first person I talked to, I think, well shit, like that was the wrong choice for me today.

Through all of that, the only thing that stays constant to me is that I am a person who is alive. I deserve to be here because I was born, and I deserve to take up the space because I still breathe. And it’s more important for me to say that out loud and for me to go everywhere I go and to take up that space because if I don’t, then I’m not honoring that connection that I have with myself. It’s something that I have to discover every single day. I think that’s true for everybody, but especially for gender queer people, it can be really, really tough. You walk into a space and from all directions people are asking you questions with their eyes. They’re saying, “Why did you choose to wear this?” They’re saying that they don’t agree with something that you’re doing, or on the flip side, they’re trying to shower you with accolades or they’re trying to relate to you because they think what you’re wearing is cool. All of it’s embarrassing. All of it is super embarrassing because you’re still gaining that experience. Like, I didn’t get to try on eyeliner in eighth grade with all of the other girls and like get it wrong and come to school and have that be okay. I’m doing that as a 27 year old person.

What’s a piece of advice for a current queer student at BYU?

Spend some time with yourself every single day. Spend some time just with yourself and let your thoughts happen, and just take deep breaths, write in your journal. That may sound like cheesy advice, but I think it’s really, really important, when I think back to the times that I felt the most stressed, I didn’t have any time for myself, and even when I got alone, there were racing thoughts, or I had to distract myself, or I had to run away somewhere, or I had to get involved in something.

There’s something inside of us that already knows what is right for us, and if you’re not able to live in authenticity then that voice, it won’t be quiet. So, take a minute, just with yourself, and just listen.

Answers to the questions are transcribed from Amacy’s video interview and lightly edited for clarity.

Posted June 2021