At International House Philadelphia’s LGBT Pride Day, Braeden Lange spoke about his experiences as a gay lacrosse player. He discussed moments such as coming out, getting bullied and the inaugural lacrosse game held in his honor.
During the Oct. 7 event, Lange was surrounded by his parents, Scott and Mandy, and his three siblings. Lange read notes from his tablet and shared messages he received from a wide audience, including an 18-year-old heterosexual inspired by his story and a 25-year-old who gained the courage to come out after hearing it.
Meanwhile, Lange is only 12 years old.
His story began Feb. 9, a date he can recall with ease. He was in a group chat with 15 of his friends and one friend’s homophobic comments offended him.
“I felt like the only way I could really make people stop using the word [‘gay’] as ‘stupid’ or ‘lame’ was to come out myself so I could just make them realize what they were actually doing and that it was actually hurting people,” Lange said.
To monitor Lange, his parents receive their son’s text messages on their iPad. The same night Lange came out to his friends, his parents started to receive several of his friends’ responses.
While his parents were supportive immediately, Lange still dealt with bullying from his peers.
“It just really bothered me knowing that it took me so long to come out,” Lange said. “I felt like I wasn’t getting the respect I deserved. I thought after I came out, people would be supportive but it wasn’t like that right away.”
These moments included when Lange downloaded the app Ask.fm and received anonymous questions such as whether he performed sex acts for money. It got to the point where Lange started to have trust issues and pushed some of his closest friends away.
“He did eventually come back around and became ‘Braeden’ again but there was definitely a period of time where it was hard to watch him kind of destroy all of his relationships because of his insecurities,” Mandy said.
To help his son, Scott searched the Internet and his wife reminded him of the 2005 SportsCenter piece about openly gay lacrosse player Andrew Goldstein. After watching the piece, Lange said he cried tears of joy because he finally found someone who went through similar troubles as he did. Scott sent Goldstein an email telling him about this.
“I’m pretty sure [my dad] just expected [a response] along the lines of, ‘Oh ,I understand what you’re going through. It must be hard’ but we got something that we could’ve never imagined,” Lange said.
Goldstein sent Lange a video in which he commended the 12-year-old’s courage and a helmet from his time with the Long Island Lizards. The helmet was inscribed with a message telling Lange to live his “truth with pride.”
“That’s up on my shelf sitting in my room so when I wake up every day, that can be my inspiration,” Lange said.
That’s not all Lange received from Goldstein. In addition to the helmet and the video message, Goldstein reached out to every gay lacrosse player he knew and put on the inaugural Courage Games with the help of Lacrosse All Stars and You Can Play. The May 24 event supported LGBT youth while promoting awareness for LGBT equality.
With more than 300 people in attendance at the first Courage Games, Lange gained many positive memories, such as scoring a goal and seeing teachers, his principal and old friends in attendance.
“It was just really amazing knowing that all of those people stood with me and it made me feel really good,” Lange said.
While the Lange family hopes to make the Courage Games an annual event, they also want to take advantage of the attention Lange’s story has been receiving.
“We thank God everyday that Braeden was born into our family,” Scott said. “If we can help other kids, help other dads, help other moms who are struggling with this, that’s what we want to have come out of this.”
Mandy is in the preliminary stages of establishing the Courage Home, a homeless shelter for LGBT youth. She has been reaching out to local organizations for help in achieving this goal.
“Braeden was born into our family and we embraced him and supported him and he still got to this low point where he contemplated suicide,” Mandy said. “I think if he had been born into a family who did not support him and accept him, that things would have turned out very differently. I can confidently say that I don’t know that he would even be here right now, coming out at such a young, vulnerable age.”
Meanwhile, their son is also looking toward the future. Lange would like to pursue a career in public speaking and share his story to inspire others. Since that night on Feb. 9, he recognizes how far he has come.
“The difference between then and now is that, today, I’m proud of who I am and I’m really happy with the way that I’m helping people,” Lange said.