National Coming Out Day: MongoDB employees share stories and advice
Four employees from Europe, Asia, and North America, working for Mongo DB, have shared their unique advice and personal stories surrounding coming out.
Shane O’Brien, Senior Manager of EMEA of Employee Experience; Cian Walsh, Diversity Recruiting Programme Manager; Tara Hernandez, Vice President of Developer Productivity Engineering; and Aasawari Sahasrabuddhe, Community Triage Engineer, are all active members of their community. At Mongo DB, the place of work for all four, they are part of the employee resources group called Queeries. We asked them for their advice on coming out and to share their unique perspectives ahead of National Coming Out Day.
Do you celebrate National Coming Out Day?
Shane: Over the last two years, I only started to get to know about the day and have been really overwhelmed by everyone’s stories. They have inspired me to be more involved. For a lot of people, the day they come out can be the start of the journey to truly finding their identity. I don’t know anyone who has come out who hasn’t felt that a massive weight had been lifted off their shoulders. It is always that phrase. The day can be an opportunity for us to shine a light on the good and then take learnings from the bad.
Aasawari: I never really celebrated it, and even after being a part of it and coming out to my nearest and dearest, I never had the courage to celebrate this day. Although I did celebrate Pride month, never National Coming Out Day.
Cian: I’ve started celebrating National Coming Out day over the last couple of years. My US colleagues really celebrate it, and I think it is a beautiful concept. Every member of the LGBTQ+ community has at least one thing in common: the idea that they have to come out and sometimes repeatedly so. The concept of coming out can be very daunting. I was twelve when I realized that I was gay and sixteen when I came out, and for those four years, I always wondered what my life would be like. Would people still talk to me? There wasn’t a day that I didn’t think about it and how coming out would impact my life. I’m very aware that being LGBTQ+ is different all around the world, so by celebrating that, I can demonstrate that there is a community there waiting for others.
Tara: I do celebrate the day, though these days I mostly do it quietly at home by perusing social media and responding to all of the joyful coming out announcements of folks finally living their full selves out loud and proud. I’m one of the people that drives those engagement numbers up and makes sure they all feel seen.
What is your coming out story?
Shane: I feel like I came out so many different times. I’ll be frank, the first time I told someone I was gay, I was 17 and on my leavers holiday with friends. I was staying with my aunt-in-law, and she very politely asked me did I like boys or girls. I was really taken aback and said I liked boys, and I don’t think I’m bisexual. That was the first time I uttered anything along those lines, and she just said “cool”. It was a very positive experience. However, I wasn’t so comfortable coming out in the professional realm, and it took me a long time to actually get to the point of being unapologetic and unequivocally who I am.
Aasawari: So, my story has had some interesting revelations, which my younger sibling and I have bonded over. One day when our conversation turned really deep, and we talked about how important it is to be in a place where you are not being judged at all. That’s when I told her about how I am trying to understand myself better and decide how I identify. She was completely supportive of me and made me realize there is nothing wrong with accepting who I am – the way I have always been.
Cian: I grew up in a small town where nobody was openly gay; if you were gay, you moved away. My journey in the closet was really isolating. My early days in high school weren’t the easiest, and I was bullied badly for being different and for not playing sports. People did ask me if I was gay; I would say no and had to defend that all of the time. Honestly, I was terrified of being bullied. It took a huge toll, and I really withdrew from everything and everyone around me. That experience pushed me until I just couldn’t take it anymore. I told my mum and then my dad later the same evening. They were shocked, but genuinely their reaction was neither good nor bad. My parents were supportive, but I was met with phrases from other people, like “you’re going to have a hard life”, because of the lack of representation and the biases around the community.
Tara: I wasn’t really interested in dating in high school, and I had one long-term boyfriend in college – a lovely man with whom I shared many interests, but eventually, I realized my feelings felt far more friendly than romantic. In the meantime, a classmate was convinced I had sapphic tendencies, and she pestered me about it for years. She was very smug when I finally came to the same realization during my senior year of university. I was incredibly fortunate in that I had no reason to fear a bad reaction from friends or family, though, to my extreme annoyance, not a single one of them expressed any surprise and wondered why I had taken so long to come out. I wish they had clued me in earlier!
Do you have any pieces of advice on coming out for other people?
Shane: I would say, look, you may have heard this before, but everyone’s journey and comfort levels are different. There is nothing that anyone should or shouldn’t do, but it can help to look at the support network you have around you. If you have friends around you that you trust, for example, and if they are true friends, they will stand by you. That might be a good sounding board ahead of telling your family. That could help you mentally prepare to tell them or anyone that you’re more nervous about. For me, I couldn’t live my life authentically without coming out. If someone said to me that they didn’t need to come out, I would 100 percent respect their decision. I hope that would come from knowing they have that unequivocal support rather than from a place of fear.
Aasawari: The only advice I have for people is just to be yourself. The day you start doubting yourself, the world will accompany you in doing the same.
Cian: My advice to anyone is to definitely come out in your own time. For me, I knew it was right as I couldn’t sustain the existence that I had in my early teens. You can compare the thoughts in your head to the reality you experience, and we tend to build things up and think of worst-case scenarios. Nine times out of ten, it will always be worse in your head. When I came out, my friends said it was not that big of a deal. I would recommend telling people you trust first; tell someone that means a lot to you and that is a person you feel comfortable with when you’re ready.
Tara: You should never feel obligated to do anything you’re not ready for, and there’s no rule set that must be followed for how or when you choose to make this choice to share something deeply personal about yourself. But I definitely hope everyone feels like they’re worth celebrating as the amazing human they are, and there are a lot of people out there who will celebrate with you!
How about similar advice but specifically on coming out in the workplace?
Shane: There is a very stark difference between keeping your private life genuinely private and hiding. There are many heterosexual people that prefer to keep their personal life out of the workplace, so a queer person may want to do exactly the same. If you do want to come out and the environment seems safe to you, then go ahead and share. Many employers also have tools and groups that can help you on that journey. Look around for this, as well as policies for a measure of how you might be treated; that is the bare minimum. When I came out at work, I was very nervous around how my seniors would view me and how it might harm my career – that may seem extreme, but it is genuinely how I felt.
Aasawari: Personally, I consider a workplace to be an important part as we spend most of our time in or the other way being with colleagues or working on a project together. Choose your comfort first with your work friends and then decide on how this would turn out. Being a part of the queer employee resource group at the workplace, I was given an opportunity to speak about my coming out journey. After keeping it inside for so long, I found this to be the best platform to speak myself out and hence this is what brings me here.
Cian: I would say you still need to feel comfortable and come out if you feel comfortable doing so in the workplace. From my own experience, I had a job in college, and I never told anyone there that I was gay, as it didn’t feel like a safe space. You need to look at the environment you are in and see if it feels inclusive. Are there groups you can join? Perhaps there is someone there you can talk to first?
Tara: Again, don’t feel obligated. You have the choice to share as much or as little as you wish about yourself. That said, as you choose places to work, asking what kind of employee resource groups exist at the company can give you a good idea of what their culture is like and whether it’s a place you could confidently be your whole self. If you do choose to be out, also make sure you know your rights in the workplace wherever you live.
Shane: I would ask myself the question – what do I need from my workplace in terms of my identity? If you need something specific, then yes, you will need to be vocal. I wish someone had told me that it can be such a joy to be part of a community within a minority.
Tara: I can’t emphasize enough the volume of resources and people available to help these days – whoever or wherever you are, your tribe is out there.
What are you doing on this year’s National Coming Out day?
Shane: I will be with my Dublin colleagues having a watch party with all our other queer colleagues around the world.
Aasawari: Since this year has been a life-changing year for me, I have thought of going to seminars where I can learn more about the people from the community who have been doing marvellous work and breaking the barriers for themselves.
Cian: This year, for National Coming Out Day, we have put a lot of thought into what we’ll do and how Queeries, our global employee resource group, and our hundreds of members will celebrate. We are launching a video on the day and have a panel discussion about being a member of the community in a modern workplace.
Tara: Probably perusing social media again and reading good anecdotes people share aloud to my wife. Or, more likely, letting my 12-year-old daughter do it. She loves coming out stories.
Mongo DB is a proud partner of myGwork, the LGBTQ+ business community. Find out more about job opportunities at Mongo DB.