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A day in the life after you've been kicked out for being LGBTQ.

Youth homelessness is an epidemic, especially for young LGBTQ people. Here are three of their stories.

Image by Michael Calcagno/Upworthy.

As darkness blanketed New York City, Skye Adrian sat alone outside his parents' apartment, devastated and left with very few options.

He had a feeling it could come to this, he tells me. His parents had warned him he better start looking for another place to stay, after all. Still, nothing quite prepares you for the moment your parents kick you out because you’re gay.


"I had nowhere to go," recalls the now 21-year-old of that spring night in 2015. An immigrant from Jamaica, Adrian had just moved to New York and had nowhere to turn. "I didn't know anybody. I'm not from here."

Queer youth homelessness remains at crisis levels in the United States. Research suggests up to 40% of all youth who are homeless identify as LGBTQ, with a disproportionate number of them being transgender and people of color. That’s an alarmingly high figure, considering just about 9% of all youth identify as LGBTQ.

Why are so many young LGBTQ people homeless? The heartbreaking reason, advocates say, is that many are rejected by parents who seem to think it's more acceptable for their children to sleep on the street than to be gay.

For kids like Adrian, once the sun goes down, safe options are few and far between.

You might be able to couch-surf at friends’ houses for a while — like Adrian ended up doing — but that’s no permanent solution. If you’re lucky, you might find a shelter that’s both safe and has an available bed. You might snag a spot on a subway train or a public place like the library, neither of which is ideal. There’s always a sidewalk, of course, a particularly dangerous terrain that leaves you vulnerable to anything from violence to freezing temperatures.

Or there’s the option of "survival sex." As the term suggests, it’s an exchange someone in desperate need makes in order to stay alive. It’s a tactic homeless LGBTQ teens and young people resort to more often than their straight, cisgender peers. For a time, Adrian — who eventually ran out of couches to crash on — began using a hook-up app on his phone to find guys looking for one-night stands and willing to let him stay overnight. The constant stress of finding new partners took a toll on him, though. He was exhausted in more ways than one.

"Of course, if you wanted to stay there, it had to be sex," he tells me. "I got tired of that."

Image by Michael Calcagno/Upworthy.

As the sun came up over Los Angeles, Ashlee Marie Preston knew it would bring another exhausting day simply trying to survive.

As a transgender woman of color living in L.A., Preston found herself relying on meth to keep up. Without a place to call her own, she didn’t see any other way to manage a dizzying way of life that required staying alert and engaged throughout the night, relying on survival sex and keeping up with a group of friends who often resorted to prostitution. It made sense that her sunrises and sunsets eventually began to blur together.

"Here we are, 7 o’clock, 8 o’clock in the morning — I’m nodding off and drinking coffee — then we’d go to the drop-in center to sleep in the chairs," she explains. It was never supposed to be like this, though.

Preston moved to L.A. from Kentucky in 2004. She wanted to live in a safer city, a place more accepting of people like her. But even on the liberal West Coast, Preston underestimated the barriers that would stand in her way.

Being black and trans, finding a job was tough, as it is for many people in her shoes. Even when she’d land one, keeping it proved to be just as difficult. Employers wouldn’t necessarily know she was trans when they hired her, she says. When they found out, things would take a turn — "they would find different reasons to get rid of me," she says.

Unable to find steady employment or a stable living arrangement, she eventually lost all the things she brought with her from Kentucky, including many friends who weren’t accepting of her transition. She was completely devastated.

That feeling of complete loss is what a lot of people don’t understand about homelessness, Preston reveals. It’s not just about losing a physical place, "it's mental, emotional, and spiritual displacement," too, she says. "I felt like I had nowhere to be in the world."

That’s when she would end up at the drop-in center, trying to get some shut-eye as the rest of the city began a regular morning.

She'd wake up in a chair, hopefully be able to take a shower, and do whatever she could before the space would close its doors on her again. Often, she couldn’t find a shelter that would accept her overnight — men's shelters cited safety liabilities, and women's shelters argued that the fact that she'd been assigned male at birth disqualified her from taking one of the beds. It’s a dilemma that's all too common for homeless trans people.

Regardless of the reason, the end result was always the same: Preston and her friends would be back out on the streets just trying to make it through another day. "We had to do it all over again," she says of the exhausting cycle. "It was like rinse and repeat."

Image by Michael Calcagno/Upworthy.

It’s a chaotic day in Manhattan when Giovanni Lamour picks up their phone.

Lamour, who is genderqueer and uses they/them pronouns, quickly apologizes to me for the background noise (an ambulance siren is blaring and kids are screaming nearby), but they’re happy to discuss their difficult past, even during a busy afternoon on-the-go while preparing for their future.

Their life might not seem like most other 24-year-olds’ at the moment — Lamour is living in an emergency housing facility in Queens when we chat — but they’re putting all the pieces together to get there.

Lamour, who grew up in Spanish Harlem, had just come from a clinic visit to make sure they’re staying on top of their health. HIV and hepatitis C testing is just one of many services provided by the Ali Forney Center, a nonprofit committed to helping homeless LGBTQ youth. Lamour has received counseling and college preparation help, benefited from the center’s housing programs, and worked on their job readiness skills (like résumé-writing), all courtesy of Ali Forney.

"I always want to learn something new and problem-solve," they explain. "Where there’s a will, there’s a way."

After Lamour's mother died when they were just 15 years old, they went to live with their father. Their relationship with their dad "really wasn’t the best," they say, admitting they’re in part to blame for a handful of rebellious teen years. But still, Lamour vividly remembers their father’s habit of locking them out of the apartment on summer nights. Feeling unwanted was painfully normal in Lamour's house.

In the decade or so since Lamour’s mother passed away, a series of strained and complicated relationships — with their dad, uncle, friends, and significant others — gradually fell apart. With nowhere else to go, Lamour became homeless. "It’s entirely depressing," Lamour says of their blood relatives, whose intolerance forced them to create a new family. “I’ve really, like, chosen my family — my friends around the city."

Image by Michael Calcagno/Upworthy.

As the sun slowly drops in the sky and families settle into their living rooms across the country, thousands of young, homeless LGBTQ people are left wondering.

They wonder if they’ll eat dinner. They wonder where they’ll rest their heads once the sun disappears. They wonder if the future has any room for them in it.

While many homeless LGBTQ youth struggle in a continuous loop of basic survival, some — like Adrian, Preston, and Lamour — get the help they need and are able to find their way out. "The struggle that you’re going through is real," Lamour wants those young people to know. "It’s real, it’s common, and there’s help there for you."

Today, Lamour is one of Ali Forney’s youth advocates, working to draw more attention to the crisis of LGBTQ youth homelessness. They helped the nonprofit prep for a queer youth summit, for instance, and are leading the charge on various new projects to further Ali Forney’s mission. They’re determined to get back into school someday to prepare for a future in public advocacy. They dream of studying abroad.

Last fall, Adrian, who is living in transitional housing, also began working with Ali Forney. He’s helped the center on various initiatives, like an HIV prevention campaign and the fight to get more shelter beds for young LGBTQ people.  

"I want to be a beacon of hope for all LGBT youth," Adrian explains, noting he’s focusing more on helping other young, queer immigrants like himself who’ve experienced similar struggles. "Regardless of you being homeless, you can still do what you need to get done."

And Preston? One day, she decided she deserved better, and she hasn’t looked back since.

"I remember thinking, 'You know what? I don't know what the plan is — I don't know what God, the universe, whatever, has in store for me,'" she says. "But I know it's no mistake that I'm still here."

The day we talk, Preston is prepping for a meeting at Facebook’s headquarters in San Francisco. Now she’s a media advocate and diversity speaker, focused on elevating the conversations around youth homelessness.

Adrian, Preston, and Lamour aren’t just overcoming their own battles — they’re fighting to save more young lives along the way.

Each and every LGBTQ kid should know they’re loved, after all.

They deserve to wake up to a better tomorrow.

To learn more and help fight LGBTQ youth homelessness, support organizations on the front lines of the crisis, like the Ali Forney Center, the Happy Hippie Foundation, and My Friend's Place.

A dad got a sweet note from a fellow father after camping with his kids.

One of the hardest parts of being a parent is never being sure whether you're doing a good job or totally bombing it. If you're conscientious enough to even wonder if you're a good parent, you probably are, but parenting entails a million little choices and interactions, and there's always a lingering voice in your head saying, "What if you're really screwing this whole thing up?"

Reassurance and encouragement are always appreciated by parents, but not always received, which is why a note from one camping dad to another has people celebrating the kindness of anonymous strangers.

"You are killing it as a dad."

Someone on Yosemite Reddit thread shared a photo of a handwritten note with the caption, "To the man who left this thoughtful note on my windshield at Lower Pines Campground this weekend, I extend my heartfelt gratitude; your acknowledgment of my efforts to be a good father means a great deal to me."



The note reads:

"Bro,

I camped in the spot behind you last night. Let me just say, you are killing it as a dad. First off, I watched your wife guide you in as you backed up your trailer and nailed it on the first try without any yelling. Then your kids unloaded from the truck and were mild-mannered and well behaved. You told stories around the campfire and I had the pleasure of listening to the sounds of giggles and laughter.

From one dad to another, you are killing it. Keep it up.

P.S. Whatever you cooked for dinner smelled delicious!"

How often do we share these thoughts with strangers, even if we have them? And who wouldn't love to get a surprise bit of praise with specific examples of things we did right?

Everyone needs to hear a compliment once in a while.

So many people found the note to be a breath of fresh air and a good reminder to compliment people when we feel the urge:

"That would make any daddy's eyes water."

"It’s always nice, as a guy, to get a compliment."

"I complimented a guy's glasses at work (I'm also a guy, and btw they were really cool glasses, I wasn't just being nice) and now he keeps trying to tell me where he got his glasses and how I should get some. But I'm just having to be polite because I already have glasses and I'm not in the market. I finally had to tell him I'm not going to buy them lmao I just like them on him.

Made me feel like that's the first compliment he's had in years because he can't stop talking about it. Also I mainly liked the glasses because I think he's cute but he really thinks it's just the glasses haha jokes on him that cute bastard."

"I was in the store with my wife and one of our 'adopted nephews' yesterday (we’re close friends with his parents and we’ve known him and his brother since they were newborns and 2yo, respectively). A woman came up to me at checkout while my wife was running out to the car and said 'I’m not sure what your family relationship is here, but I just have to tell you how nice and refreshing it is to hear all the laughter and joy from the 3 of you. You both seem like such a good influence on him and it warms my heart.' It’s such a small thing but as a dude, I can’t remember the last time someone gave me a compliment in public and it made my freaking day."

"10/10 letter. The and not yelling part gave me a good chuckle lol."

"We need so much more of men getting such heartfelt and sincere compliments. Thanks for sharing. ❤️"

"I’ve never considered leaving a note, but when I see a harmonious family with good parenting, it’s healing for me. My childhood was awful."

"Such an awesome compliment! Even though I don't have children myself, I like to remind my friends too that they're doing great & it brings them happy tears."

"This made me cry. I love that you are getting your 'flowers.' My dad sucked, I’m so glad you are one of the good ones."

"This made me cry too. It’s so hard to be a human. Let alone a parent. Getting a good job sticker every now and then really means a lot these days."

"I'm a big bearded guy and I would cry if I got this note. More people like this, please."

The best part of this story is that no one knows who the dad who wrote the note is, not even the dad who shared it. It wasn't written for clout or notoriety, it wasn't to get attention or make himself look good. No name or signature, just an anonymous act of kindness to uplift a stranger whether he needed it or not.

We all need to hear or read kind things said about us, and sometimes it means even more coming from an anonymous stranger who has nothing to gain by sharing. A good reminder to share it when you feel it—you never know how many people you may move and inspire.

This article originally appeared last year.

LGBTQ parishioners and Richard Hays.

Richard Hays, an ordained Methodist minister and the 27-year dean of the Duke Divinity School, passed away on January 4, 2025, from pancreatic cancer. Hays was known for his 1996 book, “The Moral Vision of the New Testament,” which was taught in seminary schools and embraced by conservative evangelical Christians for its repudiation of same-sex marriage. “Homosexuality is one among many tragic signs that we are a broken people, alienated from God’s loving purpose,” Hays asserted in his book.

However, in his final months, Hays dramatically shifted his public views about LGBTQ people and their place in the Christian faith. In September 2024, Hays and his son, Chris, released their book “The Widening of God’s Mercy,” which claims God continually extends his mercy to those who are outcasts in the Bible and that LGBTQ people should be accepted in the church.

“The biblical narratives throughout the Old Testament and the New trace a trajectory of mercy that leads us to welcome sexual minorities no longer as ‘strangers and aliens’ but as ‘fellow citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God,’” the authors wrote, quoting the Book of Ephesians.

Hays’ theological change of heart was controversial in some evangelical circles.


3 Reasons Why Richard Hays believes the church should accept same-sex marriages

In a speech given at CenterPeace Conference 2 months before his death, Hays shared 3 reasons why he believes the church should accept LGBTQ people and that same-sex marriage should be blessed.

1. His experience with LGBTQ Christians

Hays argues that we don’t know what the word of God means until we see it “embodied” by others, and he saw terrific examples of LGBTQ Christians with his students and at a Methodist church in Durham, North Carolina. “I was, of course, encountering students both from my time teaching at Yale and time at Duke students who were of alternative sexualities minority sexualities who were there to learn and to seek to serve in the church they were smart, they were committed, and they were gay and lesbian,” Hays said in his speech.

- YouTubeyoutu.be

2. Reading books

Hays read accounts of life as an LGBTQ Christian by Wesley Hill (“Washed and Waiting”) and “Scripture and Ethics” by Karen R. Keen. “That book led to a series of extended conversations between Karen and me. We would go get coffee and sit and talk for a long time about what both what Karen had written and about her own experience, and it just helped me to move off the place where I had been stuck,” Hays said. He also read theological books that defended traditional Christian marriage and found their positions “unconvincing.”

rainbow book art Photo by Edson Rosas on Unsplash

3. His mother’s death

Hays says that the tipping point was “nearly 5 years ago” when his mother died, and his family wanted to have her funeral at a Methodist church where she was the organist. However, the church was a reconciling congregation accepting of LGBTQ people and flew a rainbow Pride banner out front. Hays’ brother refused to attend a service in the church, so the family decided to move the funeral elsewhere. The family disagreement made Hays wonder why LGBTQ issues, which aren’t central to Christian doctrine, held such a firm grip on believers’ hearts. “I thought, why is this such an issue, you know? This is not about a dispute about the doctrine of the Trinity. It's not about justification by faith,” Hays said. “This is not a matter that stands at the heart of Christian doctrine. Why can't we agree to disagree about something like this? But [his brother] couldn't; he felt it would compromise his principles. So for me, that was the personal tipping point where I said damn, I've got to write something to set the record straight.”

Ultimately, Hays’ dramatic final proclamation was a brave act that will be a big part of his legacy. The man who justified antigay policies in the church later came to believe that LGBTQ people deserve to be accepted and their marriages blessed. Let’s hope his change inspires others to rethink their anti-LGBTQ views and create real change within the church.

woman holding baby Photo by Margaux Bellott on Unsplash

There's a big change at the 98th meridian.

Have you ever wondered why the eastern half of the United States is densely populated while everything west of Omaha, save for a few metro areas, is no man’s land?

Most people would assume that it’s because people first settled in the east and moved west. Or, they may believe it’s because of the vast desert that takes up most of the southwest. Those are some decent reasons, but it’s a much more complicated issue than you'd imagine.

A 20-minute video by RealLifeLore explains how topography and rainfall have created what appears to be a straight line down the middle of the country on the 98th meridian that dictates population density. Eighty percent of Americans live on the east side of the line and just twenty percent to the west.

RealLifeLore is a YouTube channel that focuses on geography and topography created by Joseph Pisenti.

In the video, we see that several large cities border the American frontier—San Antonio, Austin, Fort Worth, Oklahoma City, Wichita, Omaha, Lincoln, Sioux Falls, and Fargo, as well as Winnipeg up in Canada. To the west of those cities? Not much until you reach western California and the Pacific Northwest.

Why? Watch:

The major reason why the population drastically changes is rainfall. It rains much more on the east side of the line versus the west. The reason for the drastic change in rainfall is that the Rocky Mountains create a colossal wall known as a rain shadow that prevents moisture from passing from the Pacific Ocean. This has created a large swath of dry land that’s not conducive to larger populations.

Though the eastern U.S. is more densely populated, it doesn't mean the west doesn't sometimes feel crowded, especially if you live in Los Angeles County. What side of the line are you on?

This article originally appeared three years ago.

'Total Eclipse of the Heart' music video (left) Robert Eggers' Nosferatu (right)

Bonnie Tyler’s epic power ballad “Total Eclipse of the Heart” is a staple of rock n’ roll, but not many know that its actual origin stems from musical theatre. Vampire-centric musical theatre, no less. The year was 1982. Tyler had only recently acquired her distinctive rasp as a result of nodule removal surgery, and was looking to put the voice to good use by signing with record label Sony and aiming to transition from country rock to rock.

In a 2023 interview with The Guardian, Tyler shared how she had been inspired to work with composer and lyricist Jim Steinman after seeing Meat Loaf perform ‘Bat Out of Hell,’ which Steinman wrote and produced, on the BBC. Her reps looked at her like she was crazy (or “barmy,” as the Welsh singer put it in the interview) but nonetheless, the meeting was eventually arranged.

And Steinman, who was unsurprisingly won over by Tyler's raw and gritty voice after she sang a couple tunes for him, had just the song to bestow upon his new collaborator—a little ditty inspired by the lunar eclipse he had started writing for a prospective musical version of the 1922 vampire film Nosferatu, titled The Dream Engine, years prior, but never finished. It had originally been intended for Meatloaf, who had lost his voice (something he would famously lament for years to come) and was aptly titled Vampires In Love.


media1.giphy.com

"If anyone listens to the lyrics, they're really like vampire lines. It's all about the darkness, the power of darkness and love's place in [the] dark. And so I figured 'Who's ever going to know; it's Vienna!' And then it was just hard to take it out,” Steinman would reveal in an interview with Playbill.

I mean, not much argument here. “Once upon a time, there was light in my life/now there's only love in the dark.” C’mon. Plus, there are apparent vampiric themes in the song’s dazzling melodramatic music video. “We shot the video in a frightening gothic former asylum in Surrey. The guard dogs wouldn’t set foot in the rooms downstairs where they used to give people electric shock treatment,” Tyler shared.

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

Thanks in no small part to Tyler’s unforgettable vocal performance necessary of a song like that, “Total Eclipse of the Heart” went on to be a No. 1 hit and sit at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks in 1983, in addition to earning a Grammy nomination for best pop vocal performance, solidifying its rightful place as an iconic 80s power ballad.

Plus, Total Eclipse of the Heart did eventually end up in a vampire musical in the late ‘90s and 2000s, when Steinman debuted Dance of the Vampires, a stage adaptation of the 1967 Roman Polanski film The Fearless Vampire Killers.

Musical theatre tends to be fairly alienating. Not everybody can get behind the overly pronounced articulation and "nasal" tone placement that is often associated with the genre. But in actuality, it encompasses a wide range of vocal styles. Plus, it’s all about emotional builds and epic storytelling, which lends itself nicely to virtually any genre, but particularly rock. I mean, just look at Queen’s discography. So it seems very appropriate that “Total Eclipse of the Heart,” which incorporates a variety of both elements—theatricality, grit, shamelessness, romance, an oh-so satisfying key change—would go on to be so timeless. In many ways, the best art is an amalgamation of many different sources of inspirations, formed to create something new. This is a great example of that.

Three government agencies are ensuring that veterans have a home to go to.

A new report from the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs (VA), the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) is showing promising news. Due to hard work and investing in housing initiatives, the number of unhoused veterans has decreased by 7.5% since 2023 and 55.6% overall since 2010!

Veteran homelessness has been a growing concern for decades. Since 2009, the three agencies have been monitoring the situation using an annual Point-In-Time (PIT) count to gauge the issue. The PIT Count is a yearly count of the sheltered and unsheltered people who are unhoused within a single night in January. The data collected in 2024 showed that 32,882 veterans experienced homelessness, of which 13,851 were completely unsheltered. These results are lower from 2023’s data, in which 35,574 veterans were unhoused in total and 15,507 were without any shelter period.

An unhoused veteran sitting with a sign asking for changeThe number of unhoused veterans has lowered by 55.6% since 2010.Photo credit: Canva

The VA credits the Biden-Harris Administration’s investment in specific “Housing First” programs aimed toward unhoused veterans along with HUD and USICH initiatives to combat homelessness in general. Some of these initiatives include $800 million worth of grants given to unhoused and at-risk veterans and policy changes within HUD that allowed veterans easier, less expensive access to housing.

“This data shows that with the right investments in housing and health care, and with strong leadership and coordination across government, homelessness is solvable,” said USICH Director Jeff Olivet in a press release.

“Today, thanks to interagency efforts by the entire Biden-Harris Administration and our partners on the ground, we are proud to announce a significant decline in Veteran homelessness this year,” said HUD Deputy Secretary Adrianne Todman.

A veteran sitting down as a woman in a white coat talks to himThe VA, USICH, and HUD are helping more veterans gain access to housing.Photo credit: Canva

While this is certainly great news of progress, homelessness is still an issue in the United States. While there were only 32,882 unhoused veterans recorded in 2024, that is still a large number of human beings that require homes. And that’s just unhoused veterans, not the entire homeless population.

According to a report by the National Alliance to End Homelessness, there is still a lot of work to be done. From 2019-2023, the number of people who entered an emergency shelter for the first time increased more than 23 percent. A vast number of factors create unhoused people, from economic hardship to drug addiction to mental illness. There are also incidents and natural disasters that make a person unhoused overnight such as a wild fire or a hurricane.

So what is the solution? Well, to Thomas Byrne, a professor of social work at Boson University, the answer is simple. To quote a phrase he heard from a head of a homeless services agency, “The solution to the problem is in the name of the problem.” In other words, to help the homeless, we have to just provide them homes.

A hand holding house keys in front of a homeThe key to solving homelessness is literally house keys.Photo credit: Canva

It’s a simple solution that has complex political issues and red tape all around it. But it’s a solution. We only have to work on the “how” now. Fortunately, based on what’s being done for the veterans in this country, the “how” appears to be more and more doable as time, effort, and work is put into it.