My Story: Gosia Durkalec, Interim Head of Estates

I think I pretty much knew my whole life that I was attracted to women so when I met my first girlfriend and fell in love it was not a surprise just an excitement. There was no resistance, it just felt natural.?

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I lived in a small city and was never sure whether I could come out, but that didn’t worry me much. I was 16 and the only source of information and possibility to meet someone who may share the same feelings, was online. Things pretty much went from there.??

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I came out first to my friends at school and had a very positive response, I never really experienced anything bad from them. I had a bit of a set back from my family, although I think they were just concerned because I met my girlfriend online and she was older. However, I soon left my small town and moved out to a big city to study and move in with my first love.?

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Things between us fell apart after a few years but I knew my sexual preference and that nothing was going to change it. It was just who I was.?

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In the city I had moved to I met my wife and we have now been together for 19 years. We came to the UK together in 2006 and was impressed with the freedom and acceptance we have received here. Especially within Swan and Sanctuary now, as we pretty much both started working here in the same year.??

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We lived in London for most of the time and felt safe to show that we were together.??

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A few years ago we decided to have a family and buy a house, and this is exactly what we did. Now we have a gorgeous daughter though IVF treatment, she is nine and half and we couldn’t be happier.?

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We moved out to a small village in Essex a few years ago, where we have bought a house and I must say it wasn’t until few years ago that I felt scared or afraid of being a lesbian.?

Although in general we have received a very warm welcome from the closest neighbours, I overheard some neighbours passing by making comments towards us and that upset me.??

I think being a mum now makes me more fragile to things like that. I teach my daughter that love is love and we can be with whoever we want to be, as long as the relationship is respectful, and partners are supportive to each other. But overhearing these comments made me question the safety of our family and the safety of our daughter.?

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I would like her to be comfortable with who we are, who she is and who she will decide to love, but I can see now that in her school some kids can’t understand why she has two mummies. That frustrates me as it all comes down to parents who don’t know or don’t want to explain things like this to their children. Maybe because they do not understand it themselves or maybe because they do not accept it. We often tend to resist what we do not know or are not familiar with.?

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It does all start at home through grownups and siblings, as well as in schools and through the media too. We should normalise that families comes in different shapes and sizes. That it’s normal regardless of whether it is a mum and dad, two mummies, two daddies, a single mum or dad or setting up family through adoption, IVF or other circumstances.?

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I was never really an active member of the LGBT community but I now attend Pride with my family every year. I will stand for who I am and for my family, as well as for other families and the LGBTQ+ community and I encourage you to be an ally and do the same.?

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At the end of the day if you look pass gender, sexuality, skin tone and body image, regardless of where we are from, who we are and who we love, we are all the same.?

There is no reason as to why someone should feel ashamed or scared to show love and care to another person.?

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Love is love.?