Crossing the bridge: Growing up LGBTQIA+ on Sydney’s Northern Beaches with Sienna Witkamp
Photos by Gabby Griggs; words by Natasha Gillezeau
Sienna Witkamp, 23, grew up in Narrabeen, before moving to Avalon in year 7. Her parents separated around this time and her Dad moved up to Newcastle. She describes her Mum and Dad’s parenting style as lenient and chill. With two older sisters, she’s the baby of the family.
Sienna didn’t know what it meant to be LGBTQIA+ in primary school. This changed in highschool, at Mater Maria, but her exposure was still limited to the idea that guys could be gay, and girls could possibly be bisexual, but that’s where the story ended.
At the time, the idea of being queer was more of a curiosity than a reality. In Sienna’s words, it was like “oh, I wonder who is going to be gay? Because you read the statistics and you’re like oh… 1 in 10 people are LGBT. And you’re like, huh, I wonder who it’s going to be.”
It wasn’t until her first year at the University of New South Wales (where she was then studying a Bachelor of Design) that she clocked that she was gay. It’s been a process, but both by connecting with her sexuality and coming out to her family and friends, who have made a lot of effort to understand and support her, Sienna’s confidence has dramatically changed for the better.
Sienna loves hiking, skiing, and “attempting to surf”. She has a delightful demeanour with an easy laugh. Here, Sienna shares her story in the third instalment of a One Eighty series called “Crossing the bridge: Growing up LGBTQIA+ on Sydney’s Northern Beaches”.
I ask Sienna how her journey with her sexuality has correlated with her mental health journey.
“I used to be so shy. All through high school, I just wanted to be that person in the shadows, who just gets by, and doesn’t want to be noticed. I had quite a lot of anxiety when it came to things like social situations,” she says.
“In the last couple of years, I’ve come out of my shell so much more, just as I’ve become more comfortable in my sexuality, sort of owned who I was, started going to all these pride events, and just working it,” she laughs.
“The difference in just being comfortable in my own skin has just shown through everything else. Even my family were like ‘woah, who is this?’ It’s definitely important that you just accept who you are, and just embrace it.”
But all this wisdom and confidence didn’t crop up overnight. So how did Sienna get to where she is today?
During highschool, Sienna dated guys because she thought she was “meant to”.
“I remember we’d go out when we all turned 18, and my friends would be like ‘oh, hook up with that guy! You should go home with him’ and I’d be like ‘uhh I don’t know, I don’t wanna’. And I thought I was just frigid, like shy, and didn’t want to do that. But it clicked,” she laughs.
“There is a lot of pressure. I know it’s not intentional by your friends. They want the best for you, and they also want you to have fun. Since then, they’re all so much more open about it, because I’ve sort of created this awareness for them. So they’re like ‘that guy, or that girl’, could be either!”
Things began to make sense at university.
“I remember crushing on girls at Uni, and I was like ‘oh my god, I think I might be gay’,” she says, recalling a sudden realisation she had one day driving home.
She also started using Tumblr. Online, her world opened up to a whole new queer community, one where she could read about other people’s experiences and ask questions anonymously. Tumblr was key, she says, because she assumed there was no one on the Northern Beaches she could relate to and talk to about the feelings she was having. She even met her ex girlfriend via Tumblr.
The two began a long distance relationship. Sienna would fly up to Brisbane to see her, not telling her family. Only a couple close friends knew where she was going and why.
At 20, Sienna moved to Brisbane to switch university courses and be closer to her girlfriend at the time.
She loves Avalon’s beach culture, going into Woolies with no shoes on, and the sense of community that comes from “everyone knowing everyone”. But on the other hand… everyone knows everyone. Moving to Brisbane felt like an opportunity for a fresh start. “It was super different not knowing anyone, but I kind of loved that. Especially because I was newly out of the closet, I was able to be myself, I was able to hold my girlfriend’s hand in public without being stared at,” she recalls.
“I had never seen two girls hold hands on the Northern Beaches, ever, in my entire life. And when I moved to Brisbane, just walking through the mall, I’d see like five different lesbian couples, and I’d be like ‘yes! I am home!’” she laughs.
Coming out to her friends and family has been a positive thing for Sienna because it meant she no longer had to hide such a big part of her life from them. But it took her time to do so. Particularly with her Mum.
“It wasn’t that I thought that they wouldn’t accept me. I guess saying it to them made it real. So it was kind of me having to accept it myself. And them knowing me my entire life. I guess it was a shock to them – it was a shock to me as well. And it’s like, you think you’re surprised? You should have seen me in the car driving home from Uni that night!” she laughs.
“So, I knew that they would accept me, and they’ve all been really great since they found out, but my Mum was the last to find out. Out of everyone.”
Was this an accident, or was that an intentional thing?
“I think it was intentionally. Just because I cared the most about how she was going to react. And so, the only reason that she was upset was because I hadn’t told her,” she says.
“But yeah, my sisters sort of forced me to tell her. We had an intervention in my room, and sat her down and she was like ‘are you pregnant?’ And I was like… ‘far from that…’,” she laughs.
I ask Sienna what she thinks could happen on the Northern Beaches to make it a better place for young LGBTQIA+ people to grow up.
It’s a hard question, she replies, because there is no one answer. But in terms of feeling fully “welcome” and like she can be herself, she says where things are at today aren’t “ideal”.
She thinks the answer to what would help is predominantly education. For example, having queer sex education in schools, so that everyone, LGBTQIA+ or not, could have the same baseline level knowledge. Because right now, she says, a lot of people seem to forget that queer people even exist on the Northern Beaches.
“My boss from one of my workplaces, when I came out, he didn’t really know what to say. He just sort of awkwardly asked me what dating sites I used, and I was like, ‘well it’s the same, I can use Tinder or I can use Bumble,’ and then he was like, ‘oh ... aren’t they all in Newtown?,” she says.
“He was just shocked, because he just assumed that all lesbians live in Newtown. And I was like, well, that’s a stereotype, it’s true [laughs], but also, we do exist on the Northern Beaches. It’s just not spoken about and no one is aware.”
Another moment Sienna describes as kind of exemplifying where she thinks the beaches’ collective consciousness is presently at on the question of LGBTQIA+ awareness is how her two older sisters initially reacted to her coming out.
“One was like, ‘You’re gay! That’s soooo cool!’. And the other one was like… ‘I don’t know any gay people.’ So that just summarises the Northern Beaches right there,” she laughs.
Her journey has been both an interior one and a path that has relied on the support of others.
“I couldn’t have done it by myself. No one can do anything by themselves.”
“You need people to support you, so I guess once I sort of accepted it, I was able to come out to people easier,” she says.
“I found when I was in Sydney, in my workplace or whatever, I would feel weird coming out to people. But as soon as I moved to Brisbane it was like yep, let’s slot this into the first conversation that we have, and because I was able to come out quicker, I could also find others in a similar situation. Besides, it’s a good conversation starter. But lots of people are still shocked when I tell them. But for me to be able to slot it into conversation much earlier is such a milestone for me,” she smiles.
“Since coming out, I have been able to accept and grow within my own sexuality and become a part of such a large, accepting LGBTQIA+ community. I feel as though I am more knowledgeable and open minded than ever. I have been able to find friends that may not tick all the ‘typical’ Northern Beaches boxes. Friends that are non binary, transgender, asexual, pansexual, or simply don’t have a label. I feel that it is so important to expose and educate our own communities, it is so easy to unknowingly exclude others.”
She celebrates the growth of her friends and family, too.
“It’s just all about educating people. Like even with my family, I have to teach them about what LGBT means, and I’m like, there are lots more letters to that… but we’re going to start small [laughs]. So yeah. Even just in terms of that. There have been a lot of shows on TV like on Netflix or whatever that have even opened my family’s eyes, like Mum will be like ‘ooh, let’s put this on, it’s gay!’” she smiles.
What is one thing she would want to tell her younger self?
“‘Honey, you’re gay…’”, she says. “And also stop trying to please others. In the end we only get this one life, so why waste it apologising for being who we are.”
Any information on this blog is not a substitute for professional advice. It is written from personal experience and research only. If you are in crisis, go to your nearest emergency room, call lifeline on 13 11 14 or dial 000.