Coming out soon...

LegacyUser

I'm a guy, 21. I've been lurking around this forum for a while. I plan on coming out soon, when I feel I'm totally ready. I've been through the whole jazz - doubt, self-loathing etc. but at this stage I've actually had it up to here with feeling guilty. Wasted enough years of my youth.

I've tested the water by admitting to one of my male friends, drunkenly and in tears, that I am 'bisexual' (I'm pure gay but remember I was just testing the water). He was incredibly understanding about it, I was very surprised, and I didn't even know this guy that well at the time. I still lied with the whole bisexual thing, but I wasn't ready yet to come out completely.

As far as I know, nobody suspects that I am gay. Most of my friends are straight guys that I hang around with and have a good laugh with. You could say I'm 'one of the lads'.

One of my main questions is this..... Are there gay men here who have a group of straight male friends that accepted you when you told them about it? The way I see it is that if I tell them, they're going to think I fancy all of them and they'll be freaked out. That's not the case. I prefer hanging with them than I do the girls, cause I enjoy the humour more, even the gay jokes they make I find myself laughing at. I couldn't think of them in a sexual way cause they're my mates, and that's the honest-to-god truth.

I'd like to think that it wouldn't matter to them. I know it wouldn't matter to me if they told me, but that's probably because I'm gay myself. My closest friends are all straight guys - proper men's-men who I can imagine being weirded out at the idea of my homosexuality. This is what makes coming out so difficult - my social circle is kinda against me in that way.

Question two - how to tell the parents? I don't mind telling my mum much, she'd probably be grand with it. It's my dad that I'm worried about. While he's a great dad and a cool guy, I'm not as close to him as my mum, and I always want him to be proud. I don't expect him to be immediately happy... he's not really one for either confrontation or sentimentality, so I don't know how he's going to handle it.

I'm sorry if this post is long, but I'm just getting it all off my chest. I know I'm not obliged to tell everyone that I'm gay. It's nobody's business, but the more people that know the better, so I don't feel pressure to keep scoring girls and such. But yeah, if you can answer those two main questions, that'd be deadly.

PS: Did any of you fancy girls as a child? When I was young, like 7-11 years old, I fancied both girls and boys. I had a massive crush on a certain girl for years. This is why I was so confused as I got older, because I knew I had the ability to feel attracted to girls, but I've just never felt it since.

gibson

Some of my situation before I came out was similar to yours - nobody at all suspected and all my friends were straight. I hadnt a clue how anyone would react and felt like I didnt really have anyone to talk to. Like you though I just said one day well Ive wasted enough time so to hell with it its who i am. I dont think I really fancied girls when I was younger, I think I probably thought I did or made myself believe I might but I was only lying to myself.

I kind of did what you did as well when I came out to the first person, I basically said Im not straight as apposed to saying out right im gay, probably a way to ease into it as well.

After that though it got easier and easier and can honestly say with all my straight mates both male and female not one had a problem and were totaly in support.

We always make it out to be worse in our head than it really is

Best of luck!

Untense

Heya,

The first people I came out to were my straight friends. Also 'proper mens-men'. They were all absolutely okay with it, except for one guy. Everyone else had lots of questions and were interested about it.
Meanwhile this one person was very quiet.
When conversation had quietened down a bit, he said he had no problem whatsoever with me personally and wanted to stay friends, but he thought being attracted to guys was sick and disgusting.
I was absolutely okay with this and told him that's not a big deal to me, mainly I was relieved and glad with how everyone in general had taken it, and one relatively negative reaction among several was an absolute cakewalk compared to the horrific outcomes my mind had been torturing me with, prior to actually coming out.

Things went back to normal with my mates. Except that after coming out I was later propositioned by that one guy on more than a few occasions. "I'm not gay or anything but..."
The reason I'm pointing it out is that the one negative reaction in a bunch of straight lads was from the one person who was obviously struggling with his own personal issues of denial, self loathing, etc. And I suppose his actions were partly projecting on to me his own dislike of that aspect of himself, and partly announcing his dislike of homosexuality to the group in an attempt to throw the others off the idea that he might actually be that way himself - not that it worked on anyone, actually everyone thought there was something odd about his reaction to my coming out .

So you can read in to that how you want. I see two points in that; One is that the people who are comfortable in themselves are generally open and understanding.
For the other point I'll fall back on the saying, "point a finger at someone and three point back at you". We tend to put great importance in people's opinions and comments, yet whenever any of us have a positive or negative reaction to somebody, it always says much more about us and the story we personally associate with them, than it ever does about that them.

Had I come out to just that one person I might have been discouraged from opening up to others. It's a shame when you think this can and does happen, but I guess it's a good reason to choose carefully the person you first tell. But regardless, be aware that someone else's reaction is never about you, even if they believe it is.


I don't know how to answer your second question. Coming out to parents is a personal thing for everyone and what works for me might not work for you.

For me there was no easy way to tell them, so I went in to the sitting room, asked if I could speak with them and turned off the television. When I came out to my parents it was very difficult, even though they took it reasonably well. And I didn't get the great relief when I came out to them as I did when I came out to my friends and siblings.


To answer your last question, yea when i was a child I had many crushes on girls. In retrospect they were all very androgynous, most memorably Tasha Yar from Star Trek - The Next Generation.

Undead

Its 90% straight fella mates for me and ive never ever ever had one bad experience, with a mate or even strangers, since i came out nearly 2 years ago.

So go for it, one of the best things i done in my entire life was coming out:)

smileykey

From my own experience and that of all of my friends i can say that the fear or anticipation (for want of better words) of coming out always seems to be worse that actually doing it. There's no harm preparing yourself for the worst I guess but hopefully that preparation will be unnecessary.

Its a good way to start a new year and a new chapter in your life. Good luck with it!

windhover

Hi TVandMirror,

I can recognise and identify with many of the things that you've written in your post.

I'm a 29 yo man and for the last six months I've also been lurking around the boards looking for advice as I too intend to come out. Unlike you I haven't told anybody face to face, but something I did do a few weeks ago was to ring the Gay Switchboard. I found this helpful because I knew that the person I spoke to would most likely have been on the path that I now find myself on. It gave me the opportunity to speak through my fears (which I still have by the way but now much diminished) with another human being. This has laid the ground for coming out to friends and family, and has prepared me for negative reaction (if there is any).

For me I've yet to make the first step as I'm still working through issues related to work (where someone coming out is most definitely not the norm) but I am committed to coming out. Having been through a few heterosexual relationships where I felt utterly dishonest and knew I could never be 100% with the other person about feelings this is the only clear choice for me. Good luck with your road, hope everything works out for you.

LegacyUser

Thanks to all of you for your great replies!

It's very interesting to hear Untense's story because of the unexpected twist it took. What I'm hearing from you all is that most of your friends, being either gay or straight, accepted you for who you are, and that is a huge confidence booster for me.

Windhover, I really hope that you manage to break through as I am trying to do right now.

Tonight, the friend that I originally told about my 'bisexuality' asked me if I had talked to anyone else about it. I decided to tell him the truth, that I was completely gay. He was really good to me about it and encouraged me to tell as many people as possible, although he sure doesn't understand how difficult it is to do that so quickly.

Nevertheless, his enthusiasm gives me a lot of courage. Since he knows, I can't let it linger. I even told him to mention it to people if he wants, to save me telling them myself. It doesn't matter anymore, it's not a big deal. I'm just eager to see what happens. I'm going to try telling them myself sooner rather than later!

Sir Ophiuchus

My straight friends were all totally fine with my coming out. We still tell the story of how it went:

"Em, guys, there's something I want you to know. I'm gay."
"Cool. Pass the salt."

Seriously though, none of them had any kind of a problem. An old schoolfriend (not in that circle) reacted badly, mostly just not knowing what to say, but he got over it and now pesters me with questions about my love life. :rolleyes: I'd thought they might worry about me fancying them, but it never became an issue, though one guy's mother worried for a while I was about to seduce him!


I though my gran would have a problem, considering she's in her seventies and set in her ways, but it was quite the opposite. She'd been suspecting for a while, asking me at one point why all my friends seemed to be male (awkward conversation!), and wasn't surprised at all when I told her. In fact:

"Gran, do you remember when you said to me how all my friends seem to be guys?"
"...I think I know what you're going to tell me."
"Yeah, I think you do."

She actually told me she'd no problem at all with it, and I was still a favourite of hers. What a relief that was!


Re the parents, I'd normally say they'd probably have a good idea anyway, but my mother always insisted she never knew. Pro tip: don't come out to your mother while she's driving. My parents were absolutely fine with it, just worrying that I'd be happy and not get beaten up or whatever.


And re the crush on girls? Yeah, I had a crush on one girl for years, from when I was something like eleven or twelve right up to fifteen or so. Still don't know why - she ended up going with me to my debs (well, I had to ask *someone* - still wish it could have been a guy though) and spent the whole night with her friends. :rolleyes: Maybe I just felt I ought to have a crush on someone and picked her as a "safe" target. I've no idea. I get on well enough with my female friends anyway (take that, gran! ) that people who don't know me well have thought I genuinely was crushing on them, so maybe that's it - I just couldn't tell the difference at the time.


In any case, best of luck with whatever you decide to do, and I hope all goes well with your friends and parents. Fair play to you for coming to this stage in the first place - I can certainly identify with the wasting-time feeling. I'm only 21 and've been out two years, but it feels like I missed a lot when I was younger. What I did is resolve to make up for it in the future!

jady88

You have to go for it, not to sound to Oprahish but you'll only be happy if you live the life that you are meant to.

My friends are all straight males and girls, I've one gay friend who I've known since he was "straight" and my boyfriend who I also knew since he was "straight" and then for the month or so that he was "bisexual". I prefer to hang out with straight lads not that it's a conscious decision it's just who I get on with.

No I never felt anything towards a girl, like i understood that they were beautiful and could tell who was hot etc but it just never occurred to me that I should you know... get stuck in there. Lads on the other hand I always wanted even Bart Simpson when I was like 8... the shame.