When My Secret Got Out: Milo’s Story of Self-Discovery and Courage

“Milo, could you speak to me for a minute?”

I stared up at my teacher as she spoke to me away from my other classmates. I was terrified that I had done something wrong or had forgotten another homework assignment, but in my eyes what she had said to me was much worse than any of those things. Everything she spoke to me went in one ear and right out the other. I could feel my heart pounding in fear of what she’d say to me next and berating myself in my mind for leaving the paper with everything about myself out in the first place.

During the year 2021 when I was in 4th grade, I realized that me and my classmates were different in a way. They were all comfortable with their identities and embraced them, but I didn’t. I felt like the identity I held up to the public wasn’t me, which upset me. So, I researched everything in secret and wrote down my thoughts on paper to better understand what I was feeling. I wrote about how I felt about my gender, the way I looked, how I presented to the public, and the weird feeling of sadness and confusion I felt whenever somebody would refer to me as a female. I wrote everything down that I could, and I found out that writing was kind of therapeutic in a way. I felt happy writing, and it made the burden of keeping the secret of my identity a lot lighter. However one day during class the feeling felt particularly strong, so I wrote about it then so I could calm myself down. What I didn’t realize, however, was that if I was going to write about this in school I would have to properly hide it so my secret would be safe. And unfortunately, I had left it in my pocket which ended up falling out during gym.

Much to my dismay, my teacher had ended up finding it after gym and had seen everything I had written about. She saw the parts about my gender, the things I was feeling, and everything else that I had written about on the note. After seeing the writing she talked to me and made me tell my classmates and parents, backing it up by saying “Since you’re a minor, the school will tell your parents regardless.” since I was scared of my parents finding out through the school, I knew I couldn’t say no. So that day I told everybody she wanted me to despite my extreme fear of everybody finding out.
After that day, coming to school and facing my classmates and teachers became something I hated doing. After telling them everything she wanted me to say, some of my classmates started making rude remarks and telling me that I couldn’t just change who I was and eventually, I had started slowly believing it too. Everything that I feared would happen after telling everybody happened exactly as I imagined it, and soon enough I had lost two friends I had made this year solely because they had found me weird for just being open about who I was. Knowing how some of them felt about me made me feel ashamed and embarrassed about who I was, and it made me want to hide everything away in a box. I wanted to pack everything away tightly in the dark corners of my room so people would never have to see the embarrassing mess of a person I was and I could continue putting up the mask I had up before and hiding my identity. At least then I was protected from their judgment, right? However, I soon realized that if I just sat in fear for the rest of the year nothing would change. If I just hid everything away from the public eye it wouldn’t just disappear. it’d still be with me no matter what I did, and hiding away from the problem never solved anything. So I picked myself back up, and didn’t let the things people would say to me slide. I spoke back to them and defended myself no matter how scared or worried I was. Even if what they would say hurt me greatly and made me question if the way I felt was something to be ashamed of, I didn’t let them change me.

I stood up strong and eventually became proud of who I was. I realized that I shouldn’t let anybody change me no matter what, and how they think of me doesn’t matter because as long as I’m satisfied with myself that’s all that matters at the end of the day. I learned that even though people’s judgment can make you feel upset and can make you doubt yourself, you shouldn’t give in to what they’re saying because you’re the one who holds enough courage to be open about who you are, and that makes you stronger then they’ll ever be. Everything I faced that year I’m sure people can relate to because unfortunately some people get forced to out themselves often despite not being ready to and it can leave them scared or upset, especially if they know they end up being judged for it or aren’t in a safe enough environment to do so. After this experience, I learned that courage isn’t just being brave, but that there’s a wide range of definitions for the word that varies from person to person. To me, courage means to be yourself despite the judgment of others and standing strong even if you’re scared of what’s to come.

This story was originally submitted to MAXCourage, an organization that has provided a platform for teens to share their stories of courage for over 30 years.