Coming out
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I came out to my parents last night. They seemed to be very supportive, saying that as long as I'm happy, it's okay with them. My mom cried a little, but I don't think there was any way around that. I got kind of worried, though, because not long after I told her, she mentioned how disappointed she was when I told her I was atheist, and how she felt it was all her fault. I'm afraid she feels the same way about me being gay, and that she's going to try to change my mind about it the way she tried (badly) at trying to make me Christian.
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This is a followup. It doesn't seem to really bother my family. Actually, things feel pretty normal now. I came out to my sister on Sunday, but I really don't think she was surprised, not that she's ever seen me kissing other guys or anything. My family hasn't really talked to me about me being gay, except for a few times. Mom wouldn't refer to me as "being gay", she'd instead say "Remember what you told me the other night?" Duuuuuuuuh! She said that she doesn't really know many gay people, and she hopes that she can learn about it from me. She also asked if I know about protection, and we can ask the doctor if I have questions. This is like the most ackward thing to talk about with my mom, but it's very comforting to know that she's supportive.
I'm trying to figure out how I should come out to my friends. They were all really supportive when my friend in high school said she was bi. I wish I came out a long time ago. It would probably have been a lot more supportive to my friend if I had come out too. I wonder what would happen if I just set my Facebook "interested in" to men. It's been set on blank forever.
I live just south of Seattle and I happened to read the Wikipedia article the other night, and it says that Seattle has the second most GLBT percentage in the U.S.A. second to San Francisco. It's like 10%. That seems unbelievablly high. It's good to know I'm in good company. I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to find a boyfriend, but I just need to look.
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I'm not openly gay, because of my family. Although my sister is a lesbian, an open one at that; I still haven't told her. I guess she knows, but won't say nor do anything until I'm ready to come out. It's weird how after 7 years of not having a girl friend people still think I'm straight. As a matter a fact today my friend mentioned something about 2 guys kissing publicly in college and how he thought it was wrong, I just laughed hysterically and he asked me why I was laughing. I replied: "oh nothing" and told him how it was also wrong to exhibit yourself in public no matter your sexual preference and he agreed. The biggest reason to still "be in the closet" is because of my grandmother, at her age if she knew Id probably kill her of a heart attack. As they say in Spanish: "Tu eres mi ojos - mi todo" (You are my eyes - You are my everything) as she refers to me.
I'm not out to anyone in my family except immediate family, although some know.
But my granddad still asks if I'm "meeting lots of hot girls" and winks. That just makes me laugh. A lot.
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Not to revive an OOOOLD thread, but here's my take:
I've known I was gay, and interested in BIG guys since about… 12years old. It was then that the wrestling and World's Strongest Man started to have a different kind of appeal to me. Subsequently, I discovered sumo wrestling on an obscure channel on cable.
I couldn't really come out, and it was very interesting in an all boy's school, where half of the guys in my immediate vicinity were chubby/big guys. It was a bit hard to concentrate when i had a crush on a few of them, but i guess i muddled through alright. It was a mess for me because my mom worked at school with a pretty high position so i couldn't even leave the campus without some security guard radioing to the administration asking if i should be let out.
Sooooo while i didn't do any porn until after college (we had only one computer at home and heaven forbid anyone see me watching gay porn), i knew there must be some world out there. I guess at the time you could consider me in the closet - with a combination lock. Not easy in a family where three of us shared the same bedroom and the same computer.
When one of my best friends came out, I told my parents and brothers about it, and they all started cracking jokes about it. That was the first hint that they were at least homophobic. Then i started noticing that they always refer to the director of my dad's alma mater who was gay, in a disparaging tone. You know the kind of tone THEY use.
It was that way until i got my own laptop a few years after college. I turned on my computer at home and was able to hack into the internet of a neighbor. That was my first foray into the gay world, when i created an account on biggercity.
One time, I was chatting with an old friend, and he started singing in a falsetto voice, and my dad heard it because i was unable to shut of my sound quickly enough. Over lunch that day, he said in an angry voice "You want to be like him?!? You hang around with him and you will be like him!"
Had a few dates, (actually i was in further studies at the time) and my friends would wonder why I was disappearing at certain nights. Hehehe
I finally came out to my best friend two years ago. It was funny because we were both jobhunting and I had a date that afternoon. So i was making excuses and she wasn't having any of it. Finally i told her that i was gay, and i had a date with a chef. So she goes "Is this some kind of joke? It's not funny! If you're joking i'll kill you!" It took her twenty minutes to finally absorb what I just said, and then she says... "That's why I had difficulty in finding a girl who you'd be great with!" I got the same reaction from a few of my college friends, who just accepted it.
My officemates were another matter. They kept referring me to girls, and I had to keep saying no. eventually when they cornered me (we were under training at the time) i told them that i had a perfectly good reason for not wanting to be set up, so I told them. After that, they were happy because I was less quiet during mealtimes and more friendly. Furthermore, the girls decided that I was a safe guy, who they can talk to about anything.
I can't come out to my family until i can move out. so i want to buy/rent a flat somewhere that I can crash in case my whole life crumbles. I'm scared that my dad will go ballistic, and then my dad and mom will fight, and my brothers will be upset that I "caused" my parents to fight. They're not ready to accept that there are reasons why this sort of thing happens, and that sometimes, it's not a matter of choice.
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That was a nice read notquiteme, really hope you can get through this nicely with your family.
My story is quite an easy one. My first signs of liking men was at the age of 10 I think, there was this summer camp I went to once and a boy there that was very fun and cute. I always wanted to play with him and do everything with him, apparently I wasn't cool enough to join his little gang, but I always remember how I really wanted him to recognize me for some reason, and at this young age I didn't know what it was but now that I look back at it I see it as the first sign of my being gay. When I hit puberty all my friends were talking about girls, boobs and getting girlfriends, at the age of 12 hehe. I remember one friend of mine showed me a bunch of porn sites, and I dont know why he knew about this site but he showed me a gay pron site also. I remembered the URL for that site and when he had left the house I went back to the site to check it out, I was 12 and had no idea that viruses were all over these sites and the computer got infected. My mom asked what was going on when pictures of half naked men kept popping up and I made up some lie(i think it had to do with some chatsite that i used called Habbo), which she bought! Well I watched gay porn, along with straight porn. At the age of 14 it was all gay porn and I didnt want to accept that I was gay, because I didn't know of a single gay person in my family, friend group or that any of my friends knew, that's the thing that made me not come out at all, because I thought I was all alone. At 16 I was starting to stay at home all day and play computer games for as long as 12 hours! My mom was getting worried and asked if something was wrong and I just said "No"
At 17, in the summer of 2008, I had saved up courage for 6 months! to go to a youth GLBT meeting and that was the first time I saw gays at my age, it was awesome and 3 weeks after that I came out to my mom, I knew she would accept it cause she is very open minded. I told her and she hugged me for ages and said she was so happy because she knew there was something that was making me depressed. Then like 6 months later I told my dad, he also accepted it. And my granpa&grandma saw me in Gaypride 2008 and called me and asked what I was doing there, and I just told them. They were also cool with it. My friends were surprised but knew that I was still the same guy they had always known as. Being gay in Iceland is very nice, I have never been teased or looked down upon for being gay and all the workplaces I've worked at, the people there just say "Okay" and life goes on.3 years ago I was a closed depressed teenager who had no life outside his computer and now im a Gay happy 19yo' with his whole life ahead of him! Loving life and I do what I can to make others smile :laugh:
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In the Philippines, which is a predominantly Catholic country, they have the bad habit of mixing religion and sexuality. It goes without saying that we're not exactly well tolerated here.
I'm still hopeful, but everytime my parents disparage someone who's gay, they have no idea that I'm getting hurt. I know they don't mean to, but that's the way it is. If they were more openminded, then I wouldn't have this problem, would I?
Here i'm just treading water until i'm able to move out.
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When it comes to religion and coming out, I'm sure there are places far worse than mine for coming out… A Roman Catholic highschool ( hxxp://resurrection.wcdsb.ca/ in particular) isn't exactly the best place for coming out. All things considered, they finally saw things my way when I had my way with them with the courts. The short version is after coming out, I was continually getting jumped at my locker and on school property. After a few times of this happening, I finally stopped holding back and did some serious damage.
I sent one kid to the hospital with a concussion because he tried to jump me from behind at my locker, which resulted in him getting a face full of locker. The second kid that day didn't fare too well either. I managed to break one of their fingers, while at the same time fracturing a bone in the wrist. In my defense, I did not attack the gay bashers... When they attacked me, I merely just re-directed their swings towards the largest, most solid object I could find at the time.
The short version of how that ended was I had enough and got suspended three times for acts of violence in the school, while the bullies that were attacking me got off scott free. I had enough of this so I was daring enough to walk into the principle's office with a cell phone and tell her straight up how things were going to go down and that if she didn't like the way my rules work, she can answer to the police... The result: The Vice Principal that suspended me was hauled out of the office in cuffs, and the principal of that school magically never went back after the police investigation was complete.
The only one good thing about my coming out was that it resulted in the Safe & Secure Schools act, which on the most part (aside from a couple flat out stupid things) actually protects the students, leaving the administration accountable for the well being of all students. The difference is that now a school administration team can be held criminally responsible in the event that something happens to a student, regardless of whether or not the administration team had any knowledge of the subject. That was because in my case, one administrator claimed to have no knowledge, and the other failed to do anything about the situation before it resulted in a hospital trip.
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It's sad how sometimes someone has to get hurt first (other times several someones) before people get off their asses. I think officials/administrators have to take responsibility for the entire campus.
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The sad truth is that a lot of people can't really be bothered with such things because they have a "more important" schedule to keep, or otherwise want things their way. In these cases, it's unfortunate that something has to happen before anyone will do anything about it.
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From the story of MrMazda I'm gathering that the schools do not view 1 sided assault as a crime but when the victim decide to defend himself it becomes 1 ?
what kind of logic is that?But look on the bright side. You used the most eye popping way to force the school to change it's attitude.
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Simple. Two thoughts:
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he fought them off, so he must have started it.
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he fought better, so he must be violent. so let's suspend the violent guy.
I love school administrators' blinding logic and intellect.
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That's pretty much it in a nutshell… The kids that pick on other kids, especially bullying and trying to beat them up, can do so all they want, that's no problem according to the way the schools used to work until me... On the other hand, if the kid that they're trying to beat up fights back to defend themselves, they get suspended or otherwise penalized for acts of violence, when the ones who have been doing it for a loooooong time (who have been complained about multiple times) just get brushed off the administrator's shoulders like nothing is wrong.
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someone should bend them over and… spank them! hehehe
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Funny how I have started this topic hoping one day I would be able to come out to everyone and up to this point, I have only come out to a very secluded group of people which includes some gay people like me. One of them told me I was "one of the straightest gay" she has ever seen, i.e. I have done exceptionally well to cover my sexuality. Even though I have never gone out with a girl, no one has a slightest suspicion that I'm gay and question it. It has been like my second nature where I can sway any question on my sexuality to another topic smoothly and instantly. In exchange, I keep my secret safe and do not break any foolish girls' hearts. However, thanks to that, I have also excluded myself from also anything relating to the gay community where I live. That group of friends I mentioned is not even very close to me so I don't usually go out with them either.
How could I ever meet a gay guy and go out with him if I never visit a gay club? Or even talking about how handsome someone is to anybody else? Thanks to my cover, no one would ever think to introduce to any gay friend of theirs. At the moment, I'm excluded from the gay community and live in lies in the straight community. I'm stuck and very upset sometimes. I determine not to go out to any girls to pretend I'm straight since it's just too cruel for her, but it's very, very lonely at times. Sghhh…. -
you're here in GayTorrents, so I assume you have a profile on some other gay networking sites? If so, you can easily find a group of like-minded gays to hang out with from time to time.
You'd be surprised how welcoming a lot of us are. -
… I had my first feeling towards guys when I was 13 or 14 but didn't find it that disturbing at that time.
Thought it might be a phase I'm going through but wasn't to worried if it wouldn't.With 15 I left home and spent most of the time at the boarding school. At 16 I had my first gay sex expierience.
At 17 I joined a local gay rights group. The same year I planned to come out to my parents, but then my brother died
in an accident and I postponed it.Finally at 18 i came out to my parents. First to my mom who was actually relieved when I told her.
She thought I was in trouble cause I looked so stern. She told me she's not really happy because every parent wishes it's child the easieest an happiest life possible, to look after myself and have a happy life.
It took her another two years to be totally relaxed about my homosexuality.My father was next and this was far more easier then I expected.
He was absolutley relaxed about me being gay. He cherrished the new openness between us.
We sat down at the kitchen table and talked and drank all night.
One of the best nights of my life.I reallly love my parents for their education and their openness that made it so easy for me to find out who I am.
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sounds like a good story. now if only our culture (philippines) didn't have so many stories about beating the gay out of someone (literally) i wouldn't be so paranoid about it.
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hi guys!!!
i'm a new member of this community and i like it very much!!
i realized of being gay a little later than you, i was about 21 when i first noticed i was interested in boys. I had just ended a relationship with a girl that had lasted for three years, and when I started again to look around I realized that the boys made me a certain effect. i started dating with some guys, nut it was just sex, and I had not talked to any of my sexual tastes, until about a year ago, when I started an affair with one stuard (uniforms fascinate me a lot!) and I decided to talk about that with my best friends. for me it was hard to talk about but they reacted very well! in the months after I came out of the closet with other friends and now almost all of my friends know. all of them reacted very well and I am very happy to be able to talk to them openly without having to pretend.
the problem for me is to talk to my parents and my family. Now I'm 26 and I'm proud of who I am, I'm tired of having to lie and pretend and I am more and more determined to talk with them. the only thing that keeps me from doing it is the doubt of their reaction. they never made homophobic speeches or anything, in fact they have always shown respect towards homosexuals, but I fear that this behavior can be just a facade. probably I think these things just because I'm afraid of their reaction and in reality, things will be much easier than i think!
can you give me some advice on how to approach the subject with them? -
I think the hardest thing any Gay Man has to do is Come Out to his parents. Hard to imagine the results and judge reactions and none of us want to disappoint our parents.
I came out in 1973 in an age where no one would think of doing such a thing as openly admit to being Gay. My Mother really struggled with this fact of my life. There was trouble early on but within the year she and I were back to our selves and in fact better than before I came out. I was finally able to be the real Michael.
Have courage and faith that all will be well even if it takes some time. However, be prepared for other possibilities. :hug:
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I spent until I was 18 afraid to come out, when I told my parent in tears. they laughed and told me it was about time I came out to them.. whew
wish others had it easy. ??? :cry2: :love: :blink: :cheers:
