- Keep it low key,
so there is something quite big,
I've been meaning to tell you guys.
This isn't my natural hair color.
(dramatic music)
I've been dying it since I was 15.
It's kind of mousy brown,
but it goes really ginger in the sun,
and I prefer it to look dark,
there it's out there, you happy.
(laughs)
Oh there is something else.
I'm gay.
Which depending on who you are,
you might have already known,
or it could have been a surprise,
Surprise! (laughs) (celebratory music)
That's how I should have told my parents.
Part of me just wanted to make this a five second video,
where I just did this.
(closet door slides open)
Hi (laughs) I'm gay.
(closet door closes)
Ow. (jazzy music)
But it thought it'd be nice to talk about it here
because some gay people, like, most gay people
have a pretty similar story.
Which some people might not realize.
And even if you don't totally relate to my story,
you might learn something, or change your view.
Or just feel like you're not alone with something
that you went through.
So i've known I was gay since I was about 12 ish.
And (laughs) I think I thirst noticed.
Thirst?
Thirst.
I think I first, well it was thirst. (laughs)
When I (laughs) was on a beach and I saw a beautiful,
hot, shirtless guy walking past me
with his stunning girlfriend.
And I think most of my guy friends would have been like,
"Wow, I want to be him." (upbeat music)
Well, I was like, "wow, I want to kiss him."
(record scratching) Wait...
Due to the attitudes around me,
and my young life in my small northern town.
I felt a bit ashamed when I realized this,
and I just thought that I'd been born wrong.
And as I was starting a new school aged 12,
I thought it would be best to keep this on the DL.
Just be quiet about it for now because you know,
it might be a "phase" or "I might grow out of it?"
Spoiler alert.
I did not. (laughs) (buzzard sounds)
I grew into it. (dramatic music)
That was weird.
What? Sorry. (laughs)
So, even though I was gay. I totally hid it away.
Wow that rhymed.
Yo, if you're gay don't hide it away.
Okay, that was the worst thing (laughs) I've ever done.
So fast forward like age 12 to 18.
I'd just pretend to like girls,
when my friends were talking about them.
Wow, yeah, that side boob.
It's really great. (sultry music)
I wish I could see more of that specific boob.
Me being a mousy brown head, nerdy teen,
no one paid that much attention to me like,
at all. (laughs)
At school.
So thankfully my sexuality wasn't a big issue.
This helped be avoid conflict,
which I appreciate.
But being forced into silence,
and not being able to have fun.
Or just do all the things that my straight friends
were doing made me really sad.
All my friends are having first girlfriends,
and first kisses.
And I just felt really left out, and weird.
I even thought that if I tried to be straight,
it would just magically fix me and everything would be fine.
I even had some girlfriends...
Some, two, for a while.
A while, a week each.
(laughs)
I mean it didn't last very long.
Because when it got to the kissin,
it was pretty obvious I wasn't interested.
I think my brain was just drifting toward
geography homework, I hadn't done.
I missed out a lot of life experiences.
I had all this guilt, and shame about my big secret.
And that made me really anxious and stressed.
But it's crazy,
because there is nothing wrong with being gay.
Yet, you still feal really guilty about this secret
that you're keeping.
I did have a few life experiences with some of my straight
friends, because we were a group
of massively hormonal teens.
And we would occasionally play spin the bottle.
They were like, "yeah, I'll kiss a guy to impress the girls.
Not in a gay way."
And I was like, "yeah, totally, not in a gay way.
Sure.
I still didn't tell any of them though,
despite being really close friends for years.
And them all being super nice people.
I just felt like it was such a big deal.
I didn't know what to tell them, or when.
Or how, so I just kind of left it.
So I decided moving to university would be a great
time to have a life reset.
Totally new town, new friends, new hair cuts;
most of those were a mistake.
And I figured a college campus would be somewhere
that would be more accepting with things like,
LGBT societies where I thought "ooh, there's others."
So, one night after a lot of drinking,
I sat down by University housemates in the kitchen.
And I just said, I like guys.
And they were thankfully, thankfully totally cool.
Uni felt like the safe bubble,
something more sturdy than a bubble, a shield.
And that just gave me the freedom to experiment
with this new life away from my old town,
and everyone I knew.
I even put myself on a dating website.
And no, I'm not talking about Grindr,
I wanted to go on an actual date.
Does that make me lame?
Until one fateful day, (dramatic sounds)
one of my northern friends found me on the dating site.
And then they texted a screenshot of my profile
to all of my friends back home.
It wasn't malicious. They didn't think it through.
They thought it would be fun, or scandalous.
But obviously, to me, it was a huge deal.
It totally outed me before I was ready.
And it made me so scared to go home and see these people,
I thought I'd be best to just explain it all at once.
And thankfully, we're in the golden era of MSN.
So I just added them all into a group chat,
and said, "yes it's true. I'm gay."
Some of the guys were saying,
" Yeah, as long as you don't fancy me or anything."
And I was like, yeah, you wish.
(crickets chirping)
And after that, they were totally cool.
I was lucky to have them as friends.
My parents kind of found out themselves around this time,
from the people I was hanging out with,
and (coughs) staying the night a lot.
So that saved me from having to tell them, I guess.
These days, my family are accepting,
and generally lovely people.
And I slowly continued to come out to more people,
like, friends, family,
people I randomly work with, people I live near.
I wish I could say everyone's super accepting,
and lovely all the time.
But sadly, especially 10 years ago,
this is just not the case.
What I'd say to someone that encounters this,
is it's not always like that forever,
in the same way that I was ashamed of being gay as teen.
So people have been taught for various reasons
that being gay is bad too.
If these people know you and care about you,
they can hopefully change their beliefs.
So you can try to educate them,
and explain it.
Cause especially old people,
have some totally misguided views.
But if it's more than that, and its emotional to them,
I think it can be more about time because the world
is gradually becoming a better place.
And with that, people are gradually becoming more accepting.
So people might react badly at first.
But that's because,
we're all victims of this cultural brainwashing,
that puts these feelings in our head,
in my experience,
they can come around, but if they can't,
Unfortunately,
there might not be room for them in your life,
until, they can,
because, it's not something you should put up with.
And it's part of who you are,
and there's nothing wrong with it.
It's funny, though, you never stop coming out to people,
because it's not like you do once and then everyone knows,
and it's no big deal.
Every time I make a connection with someone new.
I'll have to come out at some point.
I mean, it's not relevant.
But, sometimes you gotta slide it into conversation.
No, I don't think I'll settle down with a nice GIRL
one day, lady in the shop. It feels weird.
I need to keep doing this,
as someone who's pretty open since I was a student.
But that's the world we live in.
This channel for me over the last 10 years,
has been about being creative,
or entertaining people rather than sharing my personal life.
I'm not going to be a daily vlogger anytime soon,
and broadcast myself washing my underwear
to millions of people.
But now I do feel like it's important to share that I'm gay,
because hopefully my story will help some of you,
and representation is important.
I think teen Phil would have liked if he could see someone
on the internet that was just like him.
This won't be the last time I have to come out.
I'll probably have to do it tomorrow if I meet someone new.
"Hello, got some mail for P Lester?"
"Hi, yes, I'm gay by the way."
What?
Well there we go.
I'm gay it's great. (laughs)
I'm happy, and hopefully you're happy for me too.
If not,
I hope you ever think about why you want a fellow
human to be unhappy, and not choose who they are.
And if that is a healthy mindset to have,
it doesn't make much sense.
It's okay to be gay.
And anyone watching this,
that is worried about their sexuality,
or is not out yet or is scared.
I would say don't worry.
There is no rush.
The world is clearly becoming a much better place,
very quickly.
I mean, there's still issues. (laughs)
But I think the future is bright.
So stay hopeful.
There are people out there for you.
Even if it doesn't feel like it now.
It will get better.
There you go.
That's enough about me and my story.
I mean, I'm no expert. (laughs)
So I'll leave some links in the description.
For some help,
and advice from some things that I think are great.
Thanks for listening.
And I will see you guys very soon.
Goodbye.