2
THE COURAGE TO BE KIND TO YOURSELF
ALEXIS LEHRMAN
Life at fourteen years old is … let’s just say … confusing!
Our hormones are raging. That’s tough enough to handle. What’s worse is that this is the time when we become super-preoccupied with worries about what others think of us. As I learned the summer before ninth grade, when I went to sleepaway camp, this is often the age when some of us start “peacocking.” Basically, that term refers to showing off or acting and dressing a certain way to look more attractive—all in the hopes of gaining favor with the cool kids.
Others? Well, we just try to survive. Trying to figure out who we are and where we fit in.
At camp that summer I met Andrew Kohn, a fellow rising freshman silently struggling with his identity. At six foot seven inches, Andrew was hard to miss. Though he didn’t seem to have any interest in peacocking, fading into the background was clearly not an option.
Andrew quickly became known as the BFG (Big Friendly Giant). And friendly could not be a more appropriate description. Unfailingly kind and considerate, he was every camp kid’s go-to goofball. Everyone at camp knew Andrew. Yet, as he later confided in me, most of the time he felt alone in his secret struggle to know who he was himself.
Although we had different interests and weren’t alike in a lot of respects, the one thing we definitely had in common was a sense of humor. He could make me laugh like nobody else. And vice versa.
During the following school year, we kept in constant contact and grew even closer. Before long, he became my true friend and closest confidant. At the same time, even though Andrew had always been liberal in his compliments to me, he managed to avoid really talking about himself. After a series of failed efforts to get him to open up, I started to wonder, Maybe I’m not being a good friend? Then, in a brief flirtation with vanity, a new question arose: Could Andrew possibly have a little crush on me? After all, he did always seem to be holding something back.
Over the next summer at camp and the start of our sophomore year in high school, my questions were forgotten. At least, they were until one weekend early in the school year when, for the first time ever, Andrew turned the conversation to an apparently forbidden topic: himself.
Moments before, we’d been hanging out and having lunch at our favorite burger joint … chatting about me, of course. Then, as he finished the last of the fries, Andrew suddenly looked at me and calmly announced, “There’s something I need to tell you.”
There’s something I need to tell you.
I waited.
He paused for a beat, composing himself before continuing, “I’m gay.”
Before I could even think how best to respond, I blurted out, “When did you know?”
The story Andrew next related was not at all what I expected, nor was the wisdom he had attained as the result of an arduous journey of self-discovery—one I doubt any of us realized he was on.
Unlike his male friends, Andrew’s repeated attempts at liking girls kept failing. He admitted, “I kept trying because I didn’t want to be different.”
In fact, one of his toughest obstacles early on had been overcoming the shame connected to what it would mean to be different. That’s what had kept him from talking about his struggles—even with me. He was afraid of the truth, it seemed, until he could no longer ignore it.
The turning point had come during our previous summer at camp, when he and a small group of fellow campers embarked on a ten-day journey through the woods of North Carolina. In this Outward Bound–type program, they set out together with nothing but what they could carry on their backs. The most harrowing part of the trek is a twenty-four-hour solo stretch, where Andrew was on his own. Though Andrew knew the experience would be intense, he had no idea it would also be a defining moment in his life.
“The second I was on my own, it began pouring rain. Unfamiliar sounds surrounded me.”
Was he freaked out?
In one word, Andrew answered: “Terrified.”
He had spent so much time staying focused on friends and their issues that he’d managed to avoid looking at himself, other than occasionally wishing that his life was less complicated. Now that he was finally alone, that was about to change.
“When I couldn’t distract myself with anyone else, I was forced to face what I didn’t love about me. Not just what it was but also why I felt so sad about it.” Alone on the trail, Andrew had no choice but to take a hard look at the experiences that might explain why he associated something bad with being gay. “I had to relive my life leading up to that moment.”
There had been an incident in a floor hockey game in sixth grade that began when a player accused Andrew of fouling him. “Later on, in the locker room, the kid yelled at me, calling me weird and gay like it was an insult. I burst into tears after.”
School then became just a place to conform, mainly because he was scared of being singled out again. “I thought I was different, and different was no good. I didn’t want to be gay. I didn’t want to have to worry about this issue, so I denied it. I tried to go after girls, but no matter how cute they were, I just wasn’t attracted to them. And I just became more and more sad. I felt deprived of the things other kids my age had. I wanted to love myself and for someone to love me.”
As he began to consider what he denied himself for fear of rejection, Andrew reached an emotional clearing in the woods. It resounded in his awareness: There were things he couldn’t change.
“I am gay, I cannot change that, and I can’t force people to accept me. I can only be me. And not accepting myself won’t change anything or help anyone … including me.”
These weren’t totally new thoughts for Andrew. Yet, as he told me, those twenty-four hours of solitude allowed him, for the first time, to dig down deep enough to believe and accept that being gay was—and is—part of his true identity. Instead of dismissing his truth, he needed the courage to be a BFG toward himself. This revelation led to his resolve to not judge himself, to love himself enough to know, no matter what, that who he truly is can never be wrong.
This act of self-kindness allowed him to stand up, face the forest, and finally say the words “I am gay” out loud and embrace them. With those words came a taste of a life free from judgment and full of kindness offered to himself.
Alexis, thank you for sharing Andrew’s story; and he’s so right and brave—who we truly are can never be wrong. The path to finding out who that is can be bumpy—it was for me—and a friend can be so helpful in navigating that journey. If you’re struggling with coming out or hoping to learn how to support someone who has come out, check out our friends at the It Gets Better Project or The Trevor Project.
The hours on his solo trek flew by from that point on. Gone was the silent dread tugging at his core. In fact, he told me, “I couldn’t stop smiling.” And if there is one thing I can tell you about an Andrew Kohn smile, it’s that it is highly contagious.
Once he returned to civilization, friends, and school, he reclaimed his position as the center of fun, like the sun rising after a chilly night, casting warm rays of friendliness on those around him. Only now, he didn’t hold back. Accepting who he was made him happy, and that happiness was reflected in every life he touched.
Getting there took courage. As his friend, being able to observe this shift in Andrew was the best gift he could have ever given me. Because of Andrew, I’ve learned sometimes the person who needs your kindness the most, is yourself.
The more I watch Andrew interact with others, secure in the knowledge of who he is, the more I think about what peacocks really do and why we should all do it a little more: They strut their true feathers.