The Secret Is OUT
The Secret Is Out tells the coming-out stories of LGBTQ people — from celebrities, athletes and musicians to people whose stories you may be hearing for the first time.
Hosted by Stan Stadig, who came out later in life himself, each episode goes beyond the moment someone said “I’m gay.” We look at the life before it: the families, faith, careers, relationships and expectations that can make living in the closet feel safer than telling the truth.
Some stories changed sports, music or popular culture. Others changed one family or one life. But they all have something in common: there was a secret, there was a reason for keeping it, and eventually, the secret came out.
These are LGBTQ coming-out stories about what it takes to hide who you are — and what can happen when you finally stop.
The Secret Is OUT
He’d Rather Die Than Come Out: Kane Evans
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He’d Rather Die Than Come Out: Kane Evans
For years, Kane Evans believed there were worse things than living a lie. Coming out was one of them.
He built a life that looked the way it was supposed to look — masculinity, family, faith, career. But underneath it was a secret he was convinced could cost him everything. At his lowest point, Kane believed he would rather die than tell the people he loved that he was gay.
In this episode of The Secret Is Out, we explore what it was like for Kane growing up with faith and expectations that left little room for who he really was, being a closeted professional rugby player, and eventually reaching the point where hiding was no longer something he could survive.
This isn’t a neat coming-out story. It’s about fear, religion, sports, family, and coming out later in life — and what happens when the life you worked so hard to hold together is the very thing keeping you from being yourself.
US Suicide Hotline: Call or text 988
References
Nine Network — 100% Footy, James Bracey interview with Kane Evans, June 8, 2026. (Primary source)
ABC News Australia, Nick Campton, “Rugby league must rise to Kane Evans’s level of courage,” June 9, 2026.
Associated Press, “Rugby league international Kane Evans comes out as gay in a TV interview,” June 2026.
Reuters, “Rugby league — Former NRL player Evans comes out as gay,” June 9, 2026.
ABC News Australia, “Kane Evans coming out ‘may have saved many lives,’ says Sydney Roosters great,” June 9, 2026.
The Guardian / Australian Associated Press, “Former NRL player Kane Evans finally ‘free’ after coming out as gay,” June 9, 2026.
Sky Sports, “Kane Evans: Former Hull FC prop comes out as gay in emotional interview,” June 8, 2026.
http://NRL.com, Tony Webeck, “Evans latest to credit Fijian influence,” February 12, 2016.
The Fiji Times, “Evans ready for Bati campaign,” June 18, 2017.
The Fiji Times, “Kane, joker for Bati,” November 19, 2017.
New Zealand Warriors, “Vodafone Warriors sign giant Eels prop Kane Evans,” August 12, 2020.
ABC Religion & Ethics, Andre Afamasaga, “Kane Evans, coming out and the words Pacific Rainbow people long to hear,” June 12, 2026.
Before we begin, a content warning. This episode includes a discussion of suicide, suicidal thoughts, addiction, and substance abuse. If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, in the United States call or text 988 to reach the suicide and crisis lifeline. Help is available 24 hours a day. Please take care while listening. Kane Evans had three goals for his life. The first was to play professional rugby league. The second was to make enough money to buy his parents a house. And the third, the third was to die. Not someday when he was old, not after some terrible diagnosis. Kane planned to end his own life. He had known he was gay since he was about 15 years old. And somewhere along the way, he had decided that there was a way to live the life everyone expected of him, to become successful, to take care of the people he loved. But there wasn't a way to live as himself. So he made a plan. Play rugby, buy the house, and then leave. And then there are secrets that become so big and so heavy that eventually we begin organizing our entire lives around keeping them. Kane Evans carried his for nearly 20 years. And it almost killed him. If you live in the United States, you might not know the name Kane Evans. In Australia, particularly if you follow Rugby League, that's a different story. And before we go any further, I'm gonna confess something. I'm an American. Rugby is not exactly my area of expertise. I'm the guy who has to watch for a while before I can figure out who even has the ball. But I know enough to understand this. Kane Evans was not playing a gentle sport. He was a prop forward. The big guys in the middle, they're the men expected to run directly into other very large men and somehow keep moving. Kane was built for it. Six foot six inches tall, around 240 pounds during much of his professional career. Strong, aggressive on the field, intimidating enough that one of the nicknames attached to him was The Undertaker. Now, I'm a competitive guy. I love sports, but staring down this guy on the other team, hmm, no thanks. Kane was born in Sydney, Australia in 1992. His father was an Australian. His mother was a Fijian and had moved to Australia when she was just five years old. That Fijian side of the family mattered deeply to him. Years before anybody outside his closest circle knew he was gay, Kane talked publicly about his grandfather. His grandfather had been an engineer. Kane remembered hearing how hard he worked, how he would walk long distances to his job carrying his lunchbox, and how eventually he saved enough money to buy a house for his family. Kane admired that. His parents weren't rich, he said. They weren't poor either. They worked. They took care of their sons, and apparently that example stuck. Work hard, succeed, take care of your family. Kane's father had also played professional rugby league, and Kane started playing as a kid. At first he said it was just for fun. Then he got good. Really good. By 2011 and 2012, he was playing for the Sydney Roosters youth team. He represented New South Wales at the under-20 level. He played for the junior kangaroos. He was becoming exactly what a young Australian rugby player dreams about becoming. And at the same time, there was another part of Kane's life that nobody in those stadiums could see. He was fighting what he would later call a war within himself. That war had started when he was about 15. That was when Kane says he knew he was gay. And he didn't want to be. There is another part of Kane's story that I think matters. Faith. I want to be careful here because Kane has never, at least in anything I could find, blamed Christianity for what happened to him. So I am not going to do that for him. But faith was clearly part of his life. So was his Fijian culture. And for Kane, the two were connected. In 2013, when Kane was 21, he was selected to represent Fiji in the Rugby League World Cup. For him, it was more than putting on another jersey. It connected him to his mother's family, to a country and a culture that were already part of him, but that suddenly became much more real. A few years later, Kane talked about that experience with National Rugby League's own website. He said his Fijian culture was based on God, and he said something else. After going into camp with the Fijian World Cup team, he said his life had turned around. He was proud of being Fijian, proud of his family, proud of his faith, and apparently still terrified of one part of himself. I don't know what Cain prayed about during those years. I don't know what he asked God to change. I don't know whether he begged God to make him straight. Cain hasn't said those things publicly, so I won't put those words in his mouth. But I do know what he has told us. He knew he was gay, and he spent years trying to escape it. Meanwhile, the rugby career kept getting bigger. On March 15, 2014, Kane Evans made his National Rugby League debut for the Sydney Roosters. He was 22 years old. Think about that moment. Years of training, youth leagues, weights, practices, injuries, games, everything it takes to get to the highest level of a sport. And suddenly you're there. One of those three goals Kane had set for himself could be checked off. Play in the NRL. Done. He would eventually play 74 games for the Roosters. Then Parramatta. Then the New Zealand Warriors. He represented Fiji 13 times internationally and appeared in two Rugby League World Cups. Eventually, he went to England and played for Hull FC. 131 professional NRL matches. 13 international appearances for Fiji and a professional career that lasted nearly a decade. And all those years the other life stayed hidden. King Letter said he tried to build walls around it. That's the word he used. Walls. He tried other avenues, other ways of being, other versions of himself. Anything that might allow him to escape the thing he already knew. He was gay. But remember, rugby was only the first goal. There was still the second. Buy his parents a house. His parents had been renting the same house for 23 years. And in early 2016, Kane Evans was 24 years old. His professional career was taking off. He was playing for the Roosters, he had represented Fiji. He was making a living doing the thing he had dreamed about doing since he was a kid. And he bought his parents a house. Goal number two. Done. I think that detail matters because when Kane told this story 10 years later, those three goals weren't some vague list of things he had once thought about doing. Then he did the second. He became a professional rugby player. He bought mom and dad the house, two goals down. And now what? Because according to the plan Kane had made for his life, there was only one goal left. This is where Kane's story became personal for me. When I first heard about him a couple months ago, it broke my heart. And I know how ridiculous the comparison might sound at first. Kane Evans is a 6'6 rugby player, and he played professionally. I did not. I assure you, nobody has ever confused me with a professional athlete. Nor could I ever dream of being one. Our lives happened on opposite sides of the world, different countries, different cultures, different careers, different generations, even. And still, when I heard Kane talk, there was something about him that felt painfully familiar. Because underneath all those differences was something I understood. Shame.
SPEAKER_00Not embarrassment, shame. The kind that tells you the problem isn't something you've done.
SPEAKER_01The problem is you. Kane Evans told this story just a couple of months ago in 2026. That is what broke my heart. Because somewhere right now, there is another 15-year-old boy doing the same math. Maybe he's an athlete. Maybe he's sitting in church. Maybe he's growing up in a family he loves so much that disappointing them feels worse than disappearing. Maybe everybody around him thinks he's fine. Maybe he's already started building his walls. And maybe, just maybe by some miracle, he found this podcast. For Kane, those walls held for a long time, at least from the outside. There were cracks. Some people apparently learned his secret. And Kane says some tried to use it against him. There were threats, attempts to blackmail him, people threatening to out him. Imagine that. You've spent years convincing yourself that one truth about you is so dangerous that it can destroy your family, your career, and maybe everything you have built. Then somebody else discovers it. Now the secret isn't entirely yours anymore. Someone else has it. Someone else can decide when it gets told. Kane would later say those experiences piled on more fear, more guilt, more shame, and so he kept running. Professional sports careers don't last forever. Eventually, neither did Kane's. After leaving the NRL, he finished his professional career with Hull, FC in England. And then in May of 2023, Hull released him early. Kane returned to Australia. And for most professional athletes, retirement brings a question the rest of us rarely have to answer in our 30s. Who are you when the thing you've been your entire adult life is over? Kane tried something new. He went into business. He and a partner opened a coffee shop in Sydney called Bestic Espresso. For a while, there was another identity. Former professional athlete, business owner. Then the cafe failed, and Kane's life began falling apart. Alcohol had already been a problem. Drugs became part of it. Looking back, Kane would say he realized there were deeper things he had been masking. The business failed. Debt piled up, he began couch surfing. Then even the couches disappeared. Kane Evans became homeless. This man who had played professional rugby in packed stadiums, who had represented Fiji in international competition, who had once been one of the most physically imposing men on a rugby field, was sleeping in parks and using drugs and drinking. And hoping eventually not to wake up. There is something terribly lonely about that image. A man sleeping in a public park. Not because nobody knew his name, plenty of people knew his name. Not because he had never accomplished anything, he had accomplished plenty. In fact, he had accomplished the two things he had said he needed to accomplish before he could leave. The rugby career was over. His parents had their house. And the plan he had carried inside himself since he was young had reached the place he had always intended it to reach. There was only one goal left. Kane later said that while he was sleeping in parks and using drugs, part of what he was doing was trying to die so he wouldn't have to face the thing he feared most. Coming out. Not dying, but coming out. That's how frightening the truth had become. Then somebody came looking for him. His name was Joe Galavayo. Joe knew professional rugby. He had played it himself. By then he was working with the Rugby League Players Association, helping former players make the transition into life after the sport. He met Kane while Kane was living in the parks. Sometimes they met at a cafe. Joe would buy him a coffee. They would talk. And one day, Joe said something to Kane that apparently got through. He told him that he deserved to live a good life. He deserved healing. It doesn't sound revolutionary. It probably shouldn't be. But when you've spent most of your life believing there is something fundamentally wrong with you, being told that you actually deserve a life can be a pretty radical idea. Cain sat with it. What would a good life even look like? What would healing mean? And for the first time, another possibility began to occur to him. Maybe death wasn't the plan. Maybe he could get help. Kane would later say something about Joe that I find especially interesting. He thanked God for him. Not despite God, he thanked God. Joe and the Rugby League Players Association helped Kane get into rehabilitation. He got sober. And while he was beginning to put himself back together, somebody else from his past reached out. Trent Robinson had been Kane's coach with the Sydney Roosters. Robinson was the coach who gave Kane his first shot in the NRL back in 2014. More than a decade later, somehow he got Kane's number. He called. And he told Kane that the Roosters were still his home. Whatever he was facing, they had his back. After Kane got out of rehab, Robinson invited him back to Rooster's headquarters. Kane brought his best friend and one of his mentors, and Robinson showed him around. Then they went into his office. And Robinson told Kane they were going to help pay for his mental health treatment. Then Robinson reached into his own pocket and covered four weeks of Kane's rent just as Kane was getting back into housing. I keep thinking about that. Because for years Kane had apparently been afraid of what would happen if people really knew him. Would they leave? Would he still belong? Would there still be a place for him? And here was the coach from the beginning of his professional career telling him, This is still your home. We've got you. Kane was starting to discover that some of the things he feared losing were still there. But one thing remained: the secret. By June of 2026, Kane had been sober for 135 days. He was alive, he had a place to live, he had people around him. And there was still one thing he hadn't done. He had not publicly said the words. So on June 8th, Kane Evans sat down with Australian sports journalist James Bracey for the television program 100% footy. There is no bravado in the interview, no big announcement, no carefully polished celebrity coming out statement. Kane looks scared because he is. He says what he's about to do is basically his worst nightmare. Then this man who had spent his adult life running directly at some of the biggest men in professional sports did the thing that frightened him more than any of that ever had.
SPEAKER_00He surrendered. He said it.
SPEAKER_01Just five words. After almost twenty years. Five words. And suddenly, the secret was out. Kane talked about knowing when he was young. About the walls, the addiction, the parks, the people who had threatened to expose him. And then he talked about the three goals. Play professional rugby, buy his parents a house, and die. Except now we know something his listeners might not have known. He had already accomplished the first two. The third was the one that nearly killed him. And then he explained why he was finally telling the story. Because he knew somebody else was living it. Maybe if he talked, he said he could save a life or two. And something happened while he was talking. The thing Kane feared for most of his life began losing its power. Think about the people who had threatened to out him. What could they threaten him with now? The secret only worked as a weapon when. While Kane was willing to hide it. Once he told it himself, they had nothing left to hold over him. Kane described it as breaking chains. The fear, the guilt, the shame. They didn't own the story anymore. Kane did. And then the rugby world responded. Ian Roberts had been the first elite Australian rugby league player to publicly come out as gay. He did it in 1995. Think about that for a second. 1995. Bill Clinton was president. The first Toy Story was in theaters. Most of us didn't even have email yet. And somehow, more than 30 years passed before another male NRL player of Kane's stature publicly said he was gay. Roberts watched Kane's interview. He understood immediately. He remembered his own fear, and he publicly supported Kane. Former teammates did too. Rugby great Anthony Miniciello said Kane might have saved lives by telling the truth. The response Kane had spent years fearing finally came, and it wasn't what he expected. A few days after Kane came out, Australian writer Andrei Afamasaga wrote about the story for ABC Religion and Ethics. He focused on something I had noticed too. Kane's family. Because even in the darkest version of Kane's plan, his parents came before him. Remember the order? Play professional rugby, buy mom and dad a house, and then die. And now we know he really did it. In 2016, while his career was still climbing, Kane bought the house that allowed his parents to leave the place they had rented for 23 years. Even when Kane didn't believe there was a future for himself, he wanted to make sure the people he loved were taken care of first. There is something beautiful about that. And something terribly sad. Because Kane clearly understood that his parents deserved a home. Joe Galavayo had to help him understand that Kane deserved one too. Not a house. He deserved a life. Probably because I spent a lot of years carrying some of my own. Shame has a strange way of making predictions. If they knew they would leave. Cain built walls. I built some too. A lot of gay men and women have. And maybe that's why this story hit me as hard as it did. Because I know how easy it would be to look at a six foot-six professional athlete and assume he couldn't possibly understand the fears somebody like me carried. Turns out, shame doesn't care how big you are. It doesn't care how strong you are. It doesn't care how many people cheer when you walk onto a field. It doesn't care what country you live in. It doesn't even particularly care what year it is. It just needs you to believe that the truth about you is worse than whatever it costs to hide it. For Kane Evans, that cost nearly became his life. There is one more thing Kane said after coming out that I don't want to miss. He talked about looking in the mirror. For years, that had apparently not been an easy place for him. Now he thought he could look at himself and smile. Not because everything was fixed. It wasn't. Recovery doesn't work that way. Coming out doesn't erase addiction, it doesn't pay debt, it doesn't undo homelessness, it doesn't give back 20 years. And it doesn't magically resolve every complicated thing a person believes about family, culture, or faith. But Cain was alive. He was sober. And for the first time in nearly 20 years, he wasn't hiding. After the interview, Kane posted a message publicly. The first part came from Scripture. No weapon formed against me shall prosper. Then Kane added something of his own. And then, thank you, God. I love that. Because somewhere along the way, Cain Evans had apparently believed that being the man he really was and being a man who believed in God couldn't occupy the same life. And there he was, gay, sober, alive, and thanking God. Maybe that is the part of Kane's story that stays with me the most. The secret wasn't that Kane Evans was gay, not really. The secret was that he believed telling the truth would destroy his life. And for almost 20 years, he was willing to destroy his life himself rather than find out if he was wrong.
SPEAKER_00Then he found out he was wrong. There were people waiting for him. A former player with a cup of coffee, a coach on the telephone, old teammates, his rugby community, and people he'd never even met before.
SPEAKER_01And now somewhere, maybe a 15-year-old kid who sees a six foot six Fijian rugby player and thinks him too?
SPEAKER_00Maybe that kid puts down whatever wall he was about to start building. Maybe he waits another day. Maybe he tells somebody. Maybe he lives. Play professional rugby. He accomplished the first. And maybe now there's room for a fourth.
SPEAKER_01To live an amazing and authentic life. I'm Stan Stadig, and now The Secret Is Out. If you enjoyed this episode of The Secret Is Out, please take a moment to rate and review the show. Follow or subscribe wherever you listen, and share this episode with someone you think should hear Kane's story. Every rating, every review, and every share helps more people find these stories. And if Kane's story brought up something difficult for you, please don't carry it alone. In the United States, you can call or text 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline 24 hours a day.