Dove Cameron Said It Took Years to Feel Like She Belonged in the LGBTQ+ Community

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Actress and singer Dove Cameron is celebrating her first Pride Month as an out member of the LGBTQ+ community, and she says it's been a "special" experience so far. It's a relief after she hemmed and hawed for years about coming out publicly as queer, which she did via Instagram in August 2020 and again last month via Gay Times.

"This is going to be my first Pride Month, like, really, really out," Cameron told Entertainment Tonight on June 7th. "My friend texted me the other day and was like, 'This month is for you,' and I was like, 'Oh...wow.'"

She continued, "I feel different being out and having people say things like that to me, like, 'Happy Pride Month'...I'm usually the one wishing happy Pride Month and counting myself like an ally. "

"So yeah, it's special," she said. "It's special. I need to figure out what I'm going to do."

Cameron also candidly shared that for years, she would ask herself, "Do I belong here?" referring to the LGBTQ+ community. But eventually, she felt a sense of belonging.

"Even if you've known who you are your whole life, I think there's sort of a common feeling of like, 'Oh, I can't enter into the LGBTQ community because...' [of] all these reasons that we make up in our head," Cameron told ET. "There have been a couple times in my personal life where I've told somebody who I was, and it was received with skepticism or some kind of misconception about what sexuality really means to someone."

She went on to say that this skepticism made her fear she would have to "constantly defend" her sexuality. Cameron said she asked herself prior to coming out, "Am I ready to feel that way all the time? Am I ready to constantly go to bat with someone who doesn't even deserve my energy around this because they're going to question something that is so intrinsic to me?"

But since coming out publicly (twice!), Cameron says the response from her fans has been "really, really wonderful," though it's also been "an adjustment to being witnessed in that way by people who aren't important to you."

"It's been an interesting week, processing that with the amount of text messages I got and lovely, lovely support," she told ET. "[I got] a lot of support from my queer family, my LGBTQ family, and important people in my life, or people who I barely know."

Cameron continued, "The world has an opinion about something that is so just natural...I feel very new. Suddenly, there's loads of things that I feel very in touch with that aren't just my identity, my sexuality."

Happy Pride to Dove Cameron, who can now say "thank you" without batting an eye.