My introduction to wrestling was interesting. My parents had me when they were around 17 years old and my father wrestled in high school, so I have been around wrestling since I was a baby. I always say, "I knew how to wrestle before I knew how to walk."

After I was born, my father quit wrestling and dropped out of high school to get a job to help support my mom and I. When I was four years old, I started actually wrestling: I got my first pair of shoes and was out on the mat running around.

It's been 18 years and one of the best parts of my wrestling journey has probably been the space to meet my closest friends and the opportunities that wrestling has given me. It has provided me with a platform to advocate for queer athletes in toxic masculine environments and spaces. And I love how it has helped shape and mould who I am today. I wouldn't be here at the University of Virginia if I hadn't wrestled.

That being said, wrestling is definitely one of the most toxic masculine sports there is out there. I do think there's toxic masculinity in every sport that we have. But in any community that you go to, you'll find your own group of people who will support you and who are unique.

In wrestling, I have found a community and people who have always been there to support me and never saw me as any different for being gay. They’re the people I've held near and dear to my heart, especially through my journey of wrestling. They’ve helped push me to be a better wrestler and pushed me to continue wrestling.

Granted, there have been people who have been out there with their opinions about queer athletes. That hurts, but at the same time, there will always be people who won't agree with you fully.

You just gotta push through it and continue to do what you love and don't let them stop you.

In wrestling spaces, I felt the need to leave my identities behind

Growing up, I was always really scared of what people would say about my identity in the wrestling community. It’s been one of the biggest reasons why I came out so late, in 2018, after my senior year of wrestling. I was scared that because it's such a physical and high-contact sport, people would think that I wrestled because I was gay.

I didn't want that to be the reason why people saw me any differently. So entering the room, I always felt like I had to leave some identities behind and that stays true even after coming out.

I struggled with so many questions: How do I tone down some of my identity before going into the room? How do I not make people feel uncomfortable? How do I go in there and just be a wrestler and not be myself?

It was always a battle that I had internally with myself and I hated it. I hated that I had to feel like I had to hide some identities and that I had to hide and tone down who I was.

I would hate for anybody to ever have to feel that and I know some people do. It's really sad that we have to do that when walking into a space, where we should feel like we're comfortable and safe.

It's definitely an internal and external battle, to be sacrificing some of your identity in order to continue to do something that you love.

Our identity isn’t grounds for shaming or criticizing us

I was the only out individual on my team, so I had to be an advocate and an educator at the same time. But sometimes it didn’t feel like a space where I could continuously provide energy to educate people.

It wasn’t that I felt harmed or that I was in a dangerous environment. It was more of ignorance that got to me, along with the locker-room language: basic things where I would be like, "Hey, you guys should really think about something before you say it and be considerate of who you're around. You never know what somebody's going through."

I still have that privilege where I don't have to feel unsafe, versus somebody else who can be in an environment where it can be really unsafe for them. I see that a lot with trans athletes nowadays. It's really heartbreaking that we have to hear of instances that are happening on these campuses and in these locker rooms.

For suggestions or recommendations for working around this, I would love to say that we can come to a solution. But the hard truth is that I think there are always going to be people who are not willing to change or see things from a different perspective.

It's really huge that we educate and emphasize the importance of creating safer environments. It starts with educating individuals because a lot of the time it's the first time athletes are seeing or interacting with queer identities. It starts with safe training spaces and modules that help athletes see things from a different perspective.

I see sports as a business and as a job. We're all there to do the job, and whoever can do the job the best, earns that spot.

Our identity shouldn't be the reason to hold us back, or the grounds for shaming or criticizing us.

My battles with toxic masculinity and sexuality were internalized

During my third year at UVA, I struggled a lot. I didn't know a lot of people who were athletes and out, that I could talk to. All of my battles with toxic masculinity, sexual identity, and sports, were all internalized. It wasn't until I was going into my fourth year, that I started talking to an advisor.

I realized the athletic department doesn't have anything for queer student athletes who are out and looking for resources to support. We have a queer center on the grounds, but they're not really affiliated with athletes. Plus, walking into a career center can be scary for somebody — you never know what kind of space they need, and what somebody would think if they saw them, even if they were an ally.

So I wanted to create a space within the athletic department and I wanted to create modules that help educate student athletes.

My advisor was really great at helping me with getting the ball rolling. So the summer going into my last year of college, I was working my butt off, trying to figure out how I can implement these modules: How could I start meetings? How could I reach out to other athletes who were out? But how did I do that if I didn't know who was out and who wasn't out?

It was really hard to navigate, but eventually, I found another student athlete from the field hockey team, who wanted to help me. We co-founded this organization called Athletes For Equality, to create a safe and more welcoming environment. Our first-ever event was called "Pizza and Pronouns", where we had a couple of student athletes come out and we had somebody from our queer center facilitate a module on pronouns and their importance.

I thought it was amazing because I learned so many things in that module myself. It was awesome to see something come out of it.

I hope more student athletes become aware of issues affecting us

Athletes For Equality led to the school’s first-ever Pride event at our women's soccer game and our women's field hockey game, and I really enjoyed it. One of the most significant things my advisor told me is, "Don't be so fixated on the numbers. Don't be so fixated on who comes out and who shows up. Be happy that it happened, and then we can work from here."

The events were a success, and I was super happy. They continued on to the next year, and that’s what I was hoping for, longevity — something that continues and is not just a box that the school can check off and say "We did that, we're diverse".

In the past four years, I’ve been watching the sports world shift, introducing and revoking policies that ban trans athletes from young ages up to the collegiate level. We’re seeing a lot more policies that are not protecting queer athletes.

I'm fortunate that I have a small platform here at UVA to be able to advocate, but I also get a lot of inspiration from a lot of other student athletes, who are out and who aren't out and might be struggling.

We are the next generation and I really hope that more student athletes — our allies, our teammates, and our competitors — start to become aware of these issues and how they’re affecting us. At the end of the day, we're all humans and I just hope people understand that we want what’s best for everybody, not just for certain individuals.

Going forward, I hope people continue to do what they love, be passionate about it, and don't ever stop.

If somebody else thinks that you don't belong here, prove them wrong. Actually, don't even prove them wrong because you have nothing to prove to them. You continue to exist and continue to do what you love and be the opposite of what they think.

Go out there and be happy, and do it for yourself, not for others.