MyWords: Living My Truth

I have a tattoo on my left bicep that serves as a testament to the most important moment in my life. It’s a constant reminder of the love that I felt after I told those closest to me that I’m gay.

It’s an equality symbol with the sound waves of all my family members saying “I love you” filling the top bar. The bottom bar? The most powerful day of my life. Dec. 26, 2015. The date I came out to them, written in Roman numerals. My favorite part of it all is that I can scan it with my phone and it will play the sound of their voices back to me. I do it every year on that date and it always brings me indescribable joy.

My family made it very clear to me that day that they had my back. In fact, my brother and sister-in-law followed me to Madison that December day to make sure I was OK, to continue the conversation — the first of many with my parents and siblings — and to reinforce their support. My mom came down to see me a week later. We talked and we cried.

There were a lot of questions. As any family would, they wanted to make sure that I was protected. Mom’s and dad’s biggest fear is that I would get hurt and experience hate and they wanted to protect me. I’m so blessed that I had the support that I did from my family because I know there are people whose families didn’t embrace their child like that. Every conversation I’ve had since then has liberated me more, even to this day. Sitting down and writing this in the midst of Pride Month is liberating.

This is my third go-round with the men’s basketball program. I was the head student manager for the Badgers during the first of consecutive NCAA Final Four appearances in 2013-14. Then came two years as assistant director of operations where I worked with Kat (Vosters) Wodajo, who, at the time, was one of three women to work as director of operations for a Division I men’s basketball program. Another trailblazer.

I was a manager at UW when I first began to think about an administrative career in Division I men’s college basketball. I’ve loved the game for as long as I can remember — I played two years of varsity ball in high school and was all-conference as a senior — but the more I wrestled with my secret identity the more I struggled with how to navigate those waters.

I looked around men’s college basketball and there was no one else “out” like me. I wish I had someone like that to aspire to, look up to and connect with. Someone who could answer my questions. How are you doing it? Is it OK? Do they treat you differently? Do you have to pretend?

That’s what I want to be for somebody else, hopefully, even if it’s just one person. I don’t want anyone else to have to go through those feelings of maybe having to change careers because they can’t be openly gay and work in major college men’s basketball.

After telling my family for the first time, I spent the next six months telling friends and relatives as I saw them. I wanted to be sure to answer people’s questions because I’d lied to people for a long time. That really bothered me. I like to think of myself as a truthful person. I hadn’t been living my truth for so long. Where’s your girlfriend? I’d just lie. I’d make something up. I’d been telling lies to different people and I needed to make that right.

The backing I’ve gotten from my UW co-workers has been incredible. Coach Gard evaluated me for my current job just like anyone else and that’s all I could ask. There wasn’t an asterisk next to my name. It was “Can he do the job?” I was fortunate that he chose me to come back and it’s been an incredible experience since. The guys in the locker room have been so supportive of me. It’s a two-way street for a lot of them because I may be the first gay man they’ve ever met or talk to. It’s been an education for all of us.

I was raised Catholic, so my journey in the church has been one of my biggest challenges. I’ve prayed on this more than I’ve ever prayed about anything in my life. I truly believe that God wouldn’t have made me this way — made me gay — if that wasn’t what He intended. I know there’s a lot of people in the church, who believe the Bible, who’ll strongly disagree with me. But at the end of the day, only God can judge. That’s been a hard journey to navigate because finding your place in the church can be difficult.

My talks with family and friends continue to this day. I doubt that will ever change. Last summer my family and I were vacationing at a cabin up north. We finished playing Euchre around 10 or 11 at night and we found ourselves talking about it again five years later.

The questions they asked me then were different from the ones five years ago. It’s a growth process. I’m constantly developing. You’ve got to grow into the space you occupy and you only get more comfortable as you go through it. It constantly keeps getting better. The longer I’ve been out, the better the experience gets with my family, with my friends, with my co-workers. Everybody.

Did you enjoy reading this? Read more My Words stories from the Badgers here.