I Cat we all need to be supportive.  I lived in San Francisco and now live near Cincinnati and I know the attitude is worlds apart!!!!  Be bless my friend!!!!

  Hey there! I live in NC and I know how you feel. But anywhere you go you will have people who don't support who you are. I have been out for 5 years and yes, you will have people who roll their eyes, say "I could turn you", or completely disregard your presence, but there are sooo many more people out there who WILL support you and commend your decision to come out. It gets better, but you have to start with step one...the longer you wait, the harder you will find it gets. you just have to get to the point where you say, you know what, this is who I am, I will not hide it anymore, like me or not and think what you want, i will never change good luck sweetie hope I helped

I am  very out and open in a small town in Michigan,  where there is only a handful of lesbians and they don't socialize with eachother. When I moved here from the city i was a little shell shocked to say the least, but I played the pronoun game for a few weeks when talking about my partner,  but I got tired of it real fast and figured if they had a problem with how I lived my life, it was their problem and not mine. Almost 10 years later I'm still here and I'm still with my partner and I won't ever apologize for being me and living my life in a way that makes me happy.
I'm grateful to now have a place to go and share my stories with others who understand and live their lives just like me.

Hi everyone!
I am very grateful for celebrities like Chely and Ellen who have a large platform and are willing to be authentic in front of millions of people. I think it normalizes us in the eyes of the world. I also think I do my small part by living with my partner of many years in our small rural community in the mountains of North Carolina. Our neighbors see us walking our dogs. They see us taking care of our property. And they experience our kindness. We help normalize things, too, by living a life that is authentic to us.

I am a professional writer and wrote a novel about coming out later in life called Seeking Sara Summers. (www.SeekingSaraSummers.com) I wrote it because back when this was happening to me--married to a man, mother of two little girls--I couldn't find any books that talked about what I was going through.

Now I frequently get emails from women who have read the book who tell me that I have written their story. As the main character discovers, being authentic requires a lot of courage, but I think it's something we all have to do.

All the best,
Susan Gabriel

I'm a newbie...in soooooo many different ways...never done the forum thing before, never reached out in any way to the gay community, only recently being open with a small number of family and friends...so, pretty new.

I guess I am just trying to reach out to others like me.

So Heyo from the aus living in canada west side!