Je’Jae, 24 years old (non-binary)
“At 18, I was sent to Israel on some heritage trip like a lot of young Jewish people do. I went through 2 years of shaming from our Rabi “therapist”. It’s what they call “Conversion Therapy”. It took me nearly 2 years to have the courage to leave that place and to tell my “therapist” that I didn’t want to hide anymore nor I wanted to be a part of this community. This man, who was supposed to be my mentor, shamed me. He said that I would grow up being alone, that I was a sick and an unnatural person."
A 2017 study by Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago found that LGBTQ youth become homeless at a significantly higher rate than the adolescent population as a whole. They have a 120% higher risk for homelessness.
About 40% of youth experiencing homelessness in NYC and other large cities identify as LGBTQ.
LGBTQ communities often get reduced to stereotypes and youth is a vulnerable part of it. Not only are they dealing with pressure from friends, peers at school, and society trying to tell them what “normal” looks like, but too often, kids who come out to their parents as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender are rejected or thrown out of their homes.
I wanted to give LGBTQ youths a voice. I wanted to put a face on this under-discussed issue and get the public to understand the tragic scope of this problem and the profound influence that family acceptance plays in the lives of LGBTQ youths.
This project was published in the HuffPost
Alexander, 24 years old (man with trans experience)
“I started transitioning at 18. In Florida, at the time, trans identified people were not really protected. I was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder and also gender identity disorder. My mum was not accepting of me. But me liking someone of the same sex or gender was not the biggest issue. The problem was more me representing very masculine. She said to me once: “ if you are going to like girls then why don’t you look like one?"
Rose, 19 years old (trans woman)
“I realized from a very young age about my trans identity because I was surrounded by a lot of things in my childhood that forced me to mature early. I think that is why I began transitioning so young at age 13. To get money, I was doing sex work. I did it on and off because I have a lot of social anxiety in general so trying to find clients to have sex with for money was difficult for me."
Cyrus, 18 years old (trans-male)
“I didn't even know what being gay or being trans meant until I was about 15 years old because it was a bad thing to know in my family. Even though I knew my whole life that I was attracted to women, I didn't know there was a label and I didn’t know it was normal.
Before I came out as trans I was identifying as a lesbian. And when my parents found out, it didn't go well at all for me.”
Eli, 17 years old (gender non-conforming)
“I grew up in an Orthodox family. So when I was discovering my identity, I had to keep a lot of things secret and during my last year of high school I came out to my parents. They weren't supportive of it.”
Frankie, 19 years old (non binary trans)
“My parents tried to ignore what they called “my life style” and pretended that it would go away. Growing up, I started to be more unapologetic with who I am. I wasn’t hiding. So the tension at home just kept rising until one day my mum just exploded on me. She told me to leave and not come back.”