Cassie Stokes has spoken out candidly about her experience of coming out as gay to herself and her family.
The Xposé presenter has always been open about her sexuality, but now she has gone public with all the details of her coming out story.
When speaking about emigrating to Canada at 24, she says that she knew she wanted to travel and explore different parts of the world, but she didn’t knowingly move to explore her sexuality.
She told the Sunday Independent’s Life magazine, “I wanted to try somewhere else. I wanted to try out a city where nobody knew me. And Canada was where I had been happy.
“I knew that I wanted to go and explore and figure things out in some way.
“In retrospect, I imagine that I’ll look back and think, ‘Yeah that’s(moving to explore her sexuality) what I was doing: I was gay and I didn’t realise and i needed to go away to figure it out.”
The blonde beauty then went on to talk about how she believed everyone thought the same way she did about other women and it was only when she moved to Canada she discovered this wasn’t the case.
She said, “You know how Irish women always talk about other women? Like, ‘Isn’t she gorgeous or amazing or has an amazing figure?’
“Well, I thought the same, so I just thought that was how women thought about other women. Really. And then I got to Canada and realised, no, that’s not what it is. That’s something different.”
Once Cassie started realising she may have had a romantic interest in girls she came out to her family as bisexual and they were so supportive that when she realised she was fully gay there was no need for a second coming out.
She explains. “In the beginning I thought I was more fluid, and I came out to my family as bisexual.
“They were great and so supportive, because they saw me struggle, too. I wasn’t coming home all shouting, ‘Here I am; get used to it!’ I was getting used to it, too, and I was nervous about it, and even when I’d come back home with my girlfriend, I’d feel uneasy.”
However, nowadays a lot of time has passed and Cassie is more comfortable with her sexuality and she is delighted with the exposure her sexuality has been given after becoming an Xposé presenter.
“You know, I never had anyone to look up to when I was younger. I don’t know if that would have changed things, or if I’d come out earlier, but there was no one I could relate to, and if being public means that there’s one person who can relate to me -great.”
We’re happy to see Cassie has come so far and that she’s using her fame to help young girls going through the same thing.
