Most people don’t know this about me, but I’m not straight. I’m pansexual. No, I’m not attracted to pans – don’t even try that joke. “But, Izzy, what the frick frack diddly dack is pansexual?” you ask. Well, to put it bluntly, it means attraction regardless of gender. Yes, I know, that sounds like bisexuality. Well, it’s not. Bisexuality is attraction to boys and girls. But here’s the kicker. There are more than two genders! Yes, shocking, I know. There are many genders, and pansexuality includes all of them – transgender, non-binary, agender, bigender, gender fluid, and cisgender, to name a few. Now that I’ve tried to explain pansexuality, I can tell you my story.

When I was seven I learned what a lesbian was. I kept wondering, Am I a lesbian? Girls are cute, but some boys are cute too. Bisexual? But nothing really fit what I was feeling. Around 10 years old I learned there were other gender identities. I was like, “That’s cool, you’re all cute.” Then when I was 12, I met Kayla at summer camp. Kayla was pansexual. I thought that was cool, so I Googled it. It was what I felt. I had finally found it! After a lot of stressing about what people would say, I came out this year, at age 14.

Unlike in the media, people don’t just come out once. You’re always meeting new people. The first time I came out was to my best friend, Julia. We were looking through pictures and I said, “She’s cute.”

Julia replied, “No homo though, right?”

And I said, “Maybe homo?”

“Okay,” she said.

And that was that. I explained more later, but that was basically it. If you can’t tell, I’m the master at coming out.

The second time I came out was to my mom and brother. We had just left the McDonald’s drive-thru. My mom forgot my brother’s ketchup, and they were yelling about it. After a couple minutes I just snapped.

“I’M PANSEXUAL!” I yelled.

“Okay, honey,” my mom said hugging me.

Then they went back to arguing about the ketchup.

The third time I came out was when my class was brainstorming a project. I was nervous and my palms were sweating. These were my friends, my peers, and I didn’t want them to hate me. I figured I might as well do it; I’d have to tell them some time. Anyway, I’d have something to write about if I did. I waited for my turn to give an idea, as I internally screamed.

“Izzy, what are you writing about?” Ms. Noble coaxed.

“Mycomingoutstory,” I said quickly, the words jumbled together. Well, it probably didn’t sound like that, because I speak really slow, but it sounded like that in my head. Anyway, the class went deathly quiet. You could feel the awkwardness in the air. My specialty, awkwardness. Ms. Noble wrote “coming out of the closet” on the board, and inside my head I was screaming, “I HAVE THE POWER. THE POWER OF GAY.” The class started to talk again, and I started to breathe again.

Really, I’m the master at coming out.