Thank you for writing this piece, Jadon-Maurice! It was heartbreaking on so many levels, including how so many of your experiences from childhood and adolescence mirrored my own.

I'm probably about 8 or 9 years older than you, but I wish you and I could have been friends in high school. Although I was closeted, I certainly would have embraced the opportunity to connect with a gay bro in private (especially in my heteronormative rural town). I had one specific classmate whom I'd always suspected was gay; about 12 or 13 years after we graduated, we reconnected on Facebook, and it turned out my suspicions about him were correct. In fact, his first FB-message to me (presumably after reading my "Interested In" identifier on my profile) was literally, "When did you know?" We had a little bit of really nice dialogue; and I wish we could have more...but I guess my shyness and gawkiness from childhood still seeps through.

Every person who insists that LGBT oppression "isn't as severe" because it's "mutable" needs to read this piece of yours!