What Pride means to me: David’s story

I spent my teenage years in a very rural community. We lived in a very small village on the coast so there were no openly gay people around. It wasn’t until I left there to go to university that I had the awakening that I am a gay man. 

Leading a double life

Coming out to my family wasn’t great. My brothers and sisters accepted my sexuality. My biological father unfortunately died when I was 15 and my mother struggled to accept my sexuality. She didn’t want to hear about my relationships and I had a whole side of my life that I couldn’t talk about. It was like leading a double life. 

Unfortunately, she died quite suddenly, so we were never able to resolve the fact that she couldn’t accept I’m gay. That really does have an impact on you and it feels like you’re not really able to get closure. 

Despite the difficulties I had coming out to my family, it was liberating. But the age of consent for gay men was 21. Even if you were over 21, you couldn’t kiss anybody in the street or hold hands with somebody you’re out with for fear of being arrested. So while it was an awakening, you still have that underlying fear that you can’t be openly gay in public.

Then, Section 28 was passed, which stopped any LGBTQIA+ issues being discussed in schools. We were also in the middle of the AIDS crisis, which I lost a partner to. They both led to a massive decline in attitudes towards the LGBTQIA+ community and attached a stigma to being part of it. 

Steps towards equal footing for LGBTQIA+ relationships

There was a real noticeable change when Section 28 was repealed. My husband and I look back now, having been married for almost 10 years, to a time when we would have never conceived civil partnerships or gay marriage. 

And although civil partnerships were a step in the right direction, you didn’t have the same rights as a married couple. So when gay marriage became legal, it finally felt like we had equal footing with straight relationships. 

And there’s been a significant change in attitudes in the workplace, too. If people ask me now, I’m very happy to talk about the fact that I’m gay, I have a husband and so on. But I’ve had jobs in other organisations where I didn’t talk about that side of my life because I didn’t want to face homophobic responses and have my career impacted, and I’ve experienced both of those in the past. 

I think it’s great that workplaces like Parkinson’s UK are taking a stronger stance on creating an equal space for everybody. There’s still a long way to go, but we’re taking steps in the right direction. 

A full-circle career

I’ve had a long association with Parkinson’s UK. They funded my PhD many years ago. Parkinson’s UK awarded the funding for my PhD and now I manage that team, so I’ve really gone full circle! Within that research, I identified some of the first major indicators of what triggers Parkinson’s, which has continued to influence research since. 

Then, I set up my research team at Imperial College London where we continued to look into the causes of Parkinson’s and treatments that may be able to stop the condition. In my latter years at Imperial, we managed to take drugs based on this research into clinical trials. I’ve been fortunate to have taken my research from a discovery stage all the way through to clinical trials. That’s quite a rarity.

However, the pinnacle of my career so far has been being recognised and promoted to ‘professor’. It’s a recognition of your work and standing in the research community by your peers. The bar is set high and you have 14 referees to impress, so achieving it was a brilliant moment for me. 

I also set up the Parkinson’s UK Brain Bank in 2002 when I worked at Imperial. Early on in my research, I was using donated human brain samples but it was quite difficult to get hold of them. So I got funding from Parkinson's UK to set up the brain bank. It's still going today and it's an international resource that supplies hundreds of projects, which I’m really proud of. 

Representation in research

Representation is important in any field of work because the more people from minorities are visible in these fields, the more accepting society will become.  I’ve had colleagues in previous roles tell me that working with me, a gay man, has changed how they see gay people in society, which is why representation is crucial. 

And it gives people from those marginalised communities a role model which we need across society and particularly for children in school. It can be a terrible place being a gay kid in school but having a relatable role model creates a sense of belonging and sends out the message that you can achieve great things, regardless of your background, sexuality or identity. That’s a major problem we still need to tackle, to address the root and avoid exclusion further down the line. 

Pride is learning to embrace who you are 

Parkinson’s UK marching in the London Pride Parade sends out a really positive message on inclusivity. As an employer, it’s important to advertise that so that people from any minority know that they will be accepted at Parkinson’s UK for who they are. 

Pride is a celebration of how far the LGBTQIA+ community has come, and the rights we’ve gained. It’s also remembering those who paved the way and those who we lost, particularly during the AIDS pandemic. 

When your family struggles to accept who you are you get to the point where you learn to be proud of yourself. You learn to embrace who you are and be proud of your standing in the community. That’s what Pride is for me.