I came out in high school at age 15. I experienced constant harassment, verbal, emotional, and physical abuse from Grade 5 until Grade 11, when I dropped out due to the harassment. No one really ever did anything. They just didn't care if I got an education. I just didn't fit in and through it all I just blamed my self.

I used to come home from school with pieces of gum which had been attached to my hair, food stains from food being thrown at me and bruises from people hitting me or being shoved into lockers. The emotional abuse was the hardest, for example everyone in the cafeteria laughing at me. My parents would want to know what had happened. I couldn't tell them that the students called me faggot or queer or fairy. I could tell them about the physical abuse, but I had no idea really why it was happening. I thought they were just picking on me, I thought I was a loser. Because my mom was really religious, I didn't want to have them even asking me if I was gay. I didn't even identify as gay myself yet. Later, I became "the faggot, the pervert, the cocksucker" of the school. They said I sounded like a girl, they equated me with a pedophile.

So my parents, trying to help me, on numerous occasions went to talk to the principal. He would pretend it was news and he had not heard it. He responded by telling my parents "What had he done to them (the other youths) to deserve the abuse, to bring it on to him. Is it really the whole school against him?" He ended up putting all the blame on me and saying I provoked it. He just didn't know how to handle the harassment with the other students. I was too afraid to fight or stand up for myself.

My parents became frustrated because they didn't know what else they could do to help me and we argued. So I ended up having to quit high school because of the harassment. I feel like it has affected my whole life, it's not something you forget. I felt that I was denied an education. Sometimes calling names, putting gum in persons hair or harassment of any kind, like saying that they will do something to you after school, can have terrible consequences. How could you possibly concentrate on your school business with this kind of harassment?

Actually, if you don't have an education then you have no chance to succeed, you end up being less than you could have been with an education. You end up having a life of poverty, become hopeless and sometimes end up committing suicide.

I think clubs, student council, teachers and School Boards should get involved to change the system and help students. Students just can't go from school to school, the staff and Boards need to get involved. I believe that every student is valuable and has a right to safety and an education. I know I would feel better if I could raise awareness and help people not to stereotype or generalize youth because sometimes you don't know the truth.

It's made me bitter and now I have problems with anger management and depression. It crushed my spirit and I wish this had never happened. I wish I had never gone to school.