Senior College Skier Comes Out in Social Media

 Liam Moya attends Rocky Mountain College in Billings, Montana.

In the spring of senior year, something gave me the indication that the athletes found out I was gay and I panicked. That ally from sophomore year was an athlete. I asked if rumors were floating around about me. He said no, but I was still paranoid.

The weird thing is that all of my fears were internal.

I went on my Facebook photography page and made a post announcing that I was quitting sports photography. Not many people saw it because at the time my Facebook page had a very small following. None of the athletes asked why I stopped taking pictures. I guess that was a good thing, as I wasn’t trying to draw any attention to myself.

The weird thing is that all of my fears were internal. Not a single athlete ever said or did anything negative to me. I just took photos of them and tagged them in the photos. All most of them did was hit the “like” button or make one of my photos their profile picture. A handful told me that they liked the photos, which I actually came to appreciate. But if I was not at any events, it was no big deal. No one asked me where I was. I bought into the idea that had they known I was gay they would have harassed me.

After the frustration of hiding it from everyone and all the social paranoia, I was planning to come out the day of my high school graduation ceremony. I figured I would never have to deal with my peers again.

I typed up a coming out message weeks in advance and posted it on Facebook at a friend’s graduation party the day after the ceremony because I forgot on the actual day of graduation, as I was busy. I clicked “post” and slammed the laptop shut and figured my classmates would either love it or hate it, and there was nothing I could do about that.

by Liam Moya

and outsports.com