Becoming Who You Really Are with Deb Porter

GuestDeb Porter — Founder, HOLDWebsite: https://www.hearingoutlifedrama.comCollaborative ResourceBecoming Who I Really Am — A free identity exploration guide for 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals navigating identity change. No email required.https://www.hearingoutlifedrama.com/identity-exploration-guideHostSafrianna Lughna, LCPC, MS — The Queer-Spirit GuideWebsite: https://Safrianna.comEmail: [email protected] hub: https://the-shadow-side-with-safrianna.captivate.fm/listen---In this episode of The Shadow Side with Safrianna, Safrianna sits down with Deb Porter, founder of HOLD — a confidential, judgment-free listening service — to explore what it really means to become who you are. Deb brings a unique perspective to the conversation: a former United Methodist pastor who walked away from her ministry when a family member came out, unwilling to stay in a role that would have required her to say no to love.Together, Safrianna and Deb unpack the layered process of identity exploration, with a particular focus on 2SLGBTQIA+ experiences. They discuss the courage it takes to come out in today's world, the particular grief that can accompany later-in-life identity shifts, and the exhausting weight of masking and code-switching. The conversation moves through what it means to truly listen — and why most of us were never actually taught how — and into the nuances of allyship: knowing when you don't have the lived experience, and going to find people who do.Deb and Safrianna also share vulnerably from their own lives — Safrianna on coming out as polyamorous and the spectrum of family responses, Deb on challenging her own father's harmful words and the grief of a family member never feeling safe enough to bring their partner to gatherings.The episode closes with an invitation toward permission — permission to evolve, to keep questioning, to stop explaining yourself to people who haven't done their own self-love work yet. Safrianna and Deb also introduce their collaborative free resource, Becoming Who I Really Am, an identity exploration guide created specifically for 2SLGBTQIA+ people navigating identity change.