We asked readers of LGBTQ Nation to tell us their stories of “conversion” to self-acceptance as part of March 2026 Issue. Here’s one of them.

Reader Van wrote to LGBTQ Nation about her journey to self-acceptance, which began in 2017, when she was living on her own for the first time and finally felt some freedom. She says that she grew up “surrounded by homophobia my whole life” and that her family “isn’t the most accepting,” so as she discovered that she was attracted to all genders, she just didn’t tell them about it. She needed some space to affirm her own identity so that her parents wouldn’t be able to “quash that side of me.”

What Van did next is something a lot of readers can probably identify with: she bought a lot of Pride patches – including, she takes care to point out, a Bi Pride flag – and put them on her jacket that she wore everywhere. She started going to Pride events and LGBTQ+ places.

“The acceptance and love I discovered here was unlike anything I’d ever seen before. I felt safe. I felt seen. I felt at home,” she wrote.

By the time her family found out that she is bi, she had enough support and strength that she “took the brunt of their disapproval. I gave it back.”

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“There were a few tense months where many of us didn’t speak to each other. But in time, they’ve slowly come to accept me.”

A few years later, she started to realize that she is trans. But the experience of finding community from when she learned to accept her bisexuality served her well: “This time, I didn’t hide. I immediately embraced that side of me.”

This is a story with a happy ending: “Today, I’m happily engaged to a same-sex partner. We live together, raising a beautiful baby cat. The support system I’ve cultivated through LGBTQ+ spaces gave me the strength to keep pushing on through my transition, and to cut off the more toxic friends and family that kept trying to drag me down. I’m so much closer with all my remaining friends and family than I had been before.”

Van says that “despite the current political climate and rising trend of transphobia, my personal life has been far more fulfilling and rewarding than it had ever been before. It has taught me empathy and compassion. It has shown me perspectives I would never had imagined.”

“I didn’t choose to be Bi or Trans. But it’s who I am. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

If you want to submit your story of self-acceptance, please use this form.

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