BACK TO SUPPORT CENTER | HOME

Do you have a coming out story you'd like to share with other Gay Haven visitors. If you do we'd all love to hear it. Just send your story to cuteteen01@hotmail.com and put in the subject 'coming out story and your name' and Joe will try to put it up as soon as possible. 

Here are the stories we've collected up to now. Please read and enjoy these coming out stories.

I am a 19 year old boy from Cape Cod, Massachusetts. I grew up in a family of all boys. We were always pressured into playing sports. Even though I never enjoyed them. I always felt I was a little different, and last year I realized I really was. I had my first encounter with another man. I always wondered what it would be like, and one night I had a sleepover with one of my friends and one thing led to another. I continued to have a relationship with this person. I always felt guilty about it. After a few months though, I began to realize it was just the way I am.

My family always made comments about gay people, I guess that's what made it so tough to come out.

Finally I decide to though. I took my whole family in, told them everything that was happening, and that was it. My family was shocked , but also understanding. My best advice to people coming out is to just get it over with. Waiting to tell makes your life a living hell. You will feel much better when you get everything out in the open. Thanks.

I am a 57 year old gay man and have acknowledged to myself that I am gay since I was about 18. I grew up in Texas and the South in small towns and in a very fundamentalist Christian home. My father was a Baptist minister to be exact. All through high school I was confused. I liked girls but I never dated. I was fascinated by boys though and certainly never dated them. I had heard of gay people (although the word was "queer" which is why I still loathe that worked.) I was a bit of an idiot I guess because I felt that sometime things would click I would become like all the other guys and like girls. I kept waiting for that to happen, but it never did. I had no sexual contact with anyone. When I went to college I continued in this rather confused state. It simply would not be possible in this day and time, but in those days it was. There was just no information available and in the environment in which I lived I knew almost nothing about gay life. Gay people were sad old men who hung in bus station restrooms what about the way I looked at it. Pretty dreadful. Eventually, about my junior year in college a friend visited me from when I had been in high school. We slept together but did nothing although I wanted to. He had told me earlier that he was gay and I was fascinated. To this day I can't imagine how resisted my obvious advances there in the bed but he did. I never saw him after that. But that experience did have the effect of making me realize I was gay. I was rather surprised by the fact, but it didn't exactly overwhelm me. I found it rather a relief to finally know why the magical transformation had never happened where I would lust after women.

I accepted the fact right off the bat and simply proceeded to make sure that I kept my secret hidden. I did deliberately go out shortly after that to meet a guy on street to see what it was all about. It wasn't a very pleasant experience at all. That was it until I graduated from college and joined the navy. Pretty awful, huh?

In navy I quickly made up for lost time. I had many encounters there but never with anyone in navy. From then on I remained very active sexually but also very closeted about being gay. I led two separate lives which I worked hard at keeping very separate. This caused me far more psychological damage than I knew at the time. It was just more than I could bear but I did it anyway and thought I was doing fairly well. I was not.

Only in the past couple of years have I had the desire to be more public about my being gay. I had told my parents during a major psychological crisis about fifteen years ago and soon everyone in the family knew. It was fairly well accepted, at least above board, although I know my father and mother were never comfortable with it. It was just not discussed. Occasionally my father in a fit of rage would make some terrible remarks but that was about it.

I live in a small town town in South. I have become increasingly unhappy with not being who I am. I have no gay life any more whatever other a few net friends. I see no one who is gay and simply don't have sex any more. Oddly enough, even though I was once extremely active, I don't really miss having relationships. I've always been something of a loner anyway. But I don't like having to pretend I'm something I'm not. I have found, however, that in this day and time everyone knows everything. If you are gay, people tend to know it, especially if you are my age without having married and with my interests. People are fairly comfortable with it, I think, as long as it's never brought up.

So recently I wrote a letter to the editor of a the major regional paper which made plain where my sympathies lay on gay issues. People have said nothing yet, except for one person whom I didn't even know. But I already regret having come out. It is going to affect me in the small town where I live. It may help other people, but it will do little but harm me I feel. It's a very touch situation.

I am very comfortable with who I am. I have a very profound sense of the injustice which we as gay people must endure. I admire people who have the courage to come out publicly, but I think my own circumstances mean I should have not come out when I did. I regret having done so. It's a tough situation and I don't know if I am looking at it correctly, but that's the way it is. I think one's personal circumstances need to be taken into account very carefully before one decides to come out publicly.

You know everyone of us have skeletons in the closet, and for the first 18 years of my life I found myself standing next to the skeleton too afraid to move. It wasn't until I went to college at the University of Oklahoma that I began to realize that if I kept hiding in the closet that I would be miserable for the rest of my life. By the time I went to college I was no stranger to the gay lifestyle. I had a friend who from the time we were 11 had been messing around, I think that at the age 13 we had our first really sexual experience. It was one of those unspoken things that was never discussed, never talked about, and most definitely never referred to as GAY! So like I said when I went to college it was the perfect opportunity for me to act on the impulses that I felt so strongly. It took me 7 months to tell a soul, and when I did it wasn't one of my friends that I had attended high school with, it was one of my fraternity brothers, yes I am in a frat, anyways imagine my surprise when he said "It's cool I am too" thus our friendship got stronger. Then it came time to start telling friends I had go new to High School with, the first of which was the very guy I used to have sex with, he surprising did not take it well, I guess if I was gay then there was a chance that he could be too. Then came my very best friend in the world Ruby, she loved and is very supportive to this day, then something snapped in me it was like a flood gate opened I wanted to tell everyone. This which include my Southern Baptist parents who did not take it well, my advice to you in this type of situation: be well read, be ready to have to got to therapy, and try to understand their point-of-view. Anyways it lead to a big source of conflict between my parents and myself which is still very evident today. I guess what I would like to say is, coming out is a exhilarating process, but make sure when you do it you don't rush into, and for the love of god make sure you are emotionally stable enough to deal with what ever comes your way.

I knew I was gay since I was thirteen. But because of the small town I lived in, the narrow minded family I belonged to, and the church I attended, there just wasn't any benefit in coming out. All around me I saw what people thought of gay's. They were ridiculed and made fun of in private and often to their faces. So it wasn't until my twin brother and my older brother individually but on the same day were taken to emergancy rooms with heart problems that I realized I was going to die hiding my secret and living an unfulfilled life, ALL because it was easier to be something for everyone else instead of just being me for myself.

All that changed in the summer of 1998, when I met a wonderful man who showed me that he loved me for who I really was, a gay man. Finally I knew I could be loved as a gay man, that despite what others might think of me, I was capable of being accepted for who I really am, not just for who I pretended to be for the sake of others.

So, in August of 1998, I came out to my wife, my church and my close friends. It meant losing all the 'friends' I had (not a good sign when a so called friend turns their back on you because you are gay), breaking up a seventeen year marriage, being fired from my job because the owners were also members of a fundamentalist church, and risking losing my eight year old son. It WAS worth it. My son accepted me for who I am without a second thought and he accepted my lover instantly. I got a new job where I am out and the people are much better to work with. The divorce, while it took six months and almost went to trial, did not restrict my access to my son. My mom still hasn't dealt with it, and my brother thinks I'm really off the deep end, but my sister is great!

The only reason I can think of for not coming out sooner if I had the chance to do it over again is that I probably wouldn't have such a great son. Other than that, I wish I had came out when I was younger because when you wait until you are almost 40 to come out, it's like learning to walk again. In so many ways you start over with your life. If it wasn't for a fantastic partner and his understanding, I'd be out and single and probably very lonely.

I encourage young people to be true to themselves as soon as they can. Whether that means coming out or not to them is for them to decide. Just don't be afraid to come out because you fear losing friends, family etc. REAL friends and caring family will accept you (sometimes it takes a while). And living OUT has a freedom that nothing else is like.

Well, now that I am finally 20 I can continue on with my coming out experiences. Well, at the time one year ago I was forced to come out to my friends,man that was difficult. But over time throughout 1999, i was starting to come to grips that It would be best to tell me best friends whom i graduated with. Thankfully, I was able to tell my best friend Monique at a restaurant, and she was very supportive of me. Later on that month (JUNE 1999) I came out to my sister, who also was ok with it.

Well, I had a very difficult rest of the summer, not getting along with my parents, ending bad relationships, and ending bad work experiences. So, as I wasnt getting along with my parents, I also was wanting to tell them about my homosexuality. But i couldnt, and it hurt bad.

Thankfully, I was able to have a long discussion with my dad in December of '99 and we cleared the air on my attitude from the summer. Telling my mom was very difficult. As a matter of fact we had a "family discussion" or should I say bitch fest....yeah complete bitch fest. Seeing as though my mom has no tact, she asked me directly, bluntly if i was gay, and there was no hiding it, i had to fess up.

That was probably the worst experience ever. I wouldnt wish that upon anyone. However, one thing I learned from that was how much my parents really do love me. After all, I am the same boy they raised, I am the same boy thats in college studying, and I am the same boy who is still going out there and being the best person i can be. So, what difference does it make that their boy doesnt have the same feelings on relationships as they do?

I had always known that I liked men. I knew I liked their bodies anyway, at least from the time I was four years old. But that is another story. No, no bad sexual thing ever happened to me when I was a child.

When I was 16, I saw Kevin for the first time, I saw him from across the room and I knew I loved him. I looked at his long dark hair, dark eyes wonderful 15 year old body (he was on the track team) and I knew. I felt like I could see through to his soul, that we could really feel each other. All this from the initial glance across the little theater.

We did start to see more of each other and had sex and all that. He seemed so much more innocent than me. Anyway, during the year we went out with each other a lot happened. I suppose not the least of it was that I came out to my whole high school. All 6500 students, though Im sure only a couple thousand heard about it at most. To tell the truth, it was never much of a big deal for me. No one ever gave me a hard time about it. It felt good to be honest about it. It seemed to me that after I "came out" that a lot of the guys started doing it with each other and everyone had to tell me about it.

Kevin was of course outed in the whole process he was ok with that. It didnt seem to bother him. We went out for a year and in 1977 he told me that he wanted to date Gary H. Ok. I cried, it was over. We were friends after some months. Close friends. I graduated, the next year he didnt, drugs wound up screwing up his life, in 1991 he died of AIDS complications. He was beautiful.

Once, when in New York, I went to the Pyramid Club down in Alphabet City with Dennis. In 1983 this was a rough part of town. It was weird to discover people from my High School in Eastern Massachusetts at this club. This included Barry, my class president. I was told that he was gay too. Anyway, as it turns out, Gayle was on stage doing a performance art piece. She had been in the Drama Club with me and Kevin. At one point she said, "I wanted to go to the prom with Kevin F., But so did David O." She sort of looked at me.

I guess the point of my story is that it was no big deal for me to come out to my family, the school, anyone. It took courage I guess, but it would have taken so much stamina to lie about it. I think everyone knew about me and no one much cared. I never really did. I'm a fairly successful person. I figured be yourself, you know, to the extent possible. I still hide my sexual orientation a little bit if money is on the table. Call that hypocrisy if you want, but that's how little I care.

I grew up in a small jersey shore town, my father was just out of the army, my mother was a nurse. i was the only child for five years. I always knew as a young child that i had sexual attraction toward my own gender, but i never gave it a second thought i did not have a word for it , even though i had heard the word gay around my house, because my mothers cousin is gay although somehow i always knew not to talk about it. my family always went to church every Sunday. (Episcopal) Soon my younger brother was born, then a sister, then another brother and many years later another sister. through my childhood things got rough, my father developed an alcohol/drug addiction my mother was working two jobs and going to school. and i lost in the mist of all this surronded by al my siblings was starting to realize just how diffrent i was. I got older and things at home got worse, dad took off, mom finally graduated so she was home more often. i went through high school in what seems noe like a foggy haze, that never really existed. I never drank i never did drugs, i also never talked to anyone. everyone labled me the freak, and the guys called me a faggot, it was not until highschool that i ever even heard that word. it cut through me like a hot knife in butter. that word for some reason hurt me so bad. and it only made me shelter myself more. junior year, i finally started to deal with life. i called myself bi-sexual for about a month, even though i still had never been with a man. then through my church choir, a met these two womyn, for some reason i stuck to them like glue, they made me feel so loved, one of them took me against my will to a g/l/b/t youth group, that was the turning point of my life. i kicked and screamed my way "out" of my shell. for the first time i allowed myself to have friends. and they were and still are more than friends. they are a special family to me. I soon came out to the very few people I talked to at school. then I went away one weekend to the Episcopal diocese convention, and I left behind a letter for my mother.When I got home boy was my mother pissed off. She was so angry because i did not trust her enough to talk with her, and because I endured this secret for so long. She assured me she loved me, and that being gay was no diffrent than having blue or brown eyes. she told me that God makes people the way God wants to and God does not make mistakes. She then told all of my siblings, and extended family. I was lucky, my story has a happy ending, I have so many friends (Family), I have good self-esteem, and a positive outlook. And as God is my witness I will never, ever allow anyone, to put me or my people down, because they are ignorant.I would encourage all who seek coming out to first establish, yourself in the community, believe me you will be accepted with open, caring and most important understanding arms. then work on your family and friends. Good Luck and always remember "It is better to be hated for who you are, than loved for who you are not."

I remember standing in field behind our apartment complex with my step-brother. I was newly 18 - he was a vastly older brother at 19. I had dragged him there after dinner to tell him some 'really important news'. We'd been there for nearly an hour. Me unable to form the words and he passing the time by trying to guess it out of me.

"Are you really a woman?" he asked.
"No," I answered slightly exasperated.
"Do you have cancer?" he asked.
"No," I replied wishing he would make this easier by hitting on it.
"Are you dying?"
"No," I said, "it's nothing like that."
"Do you like guys?"
"Yeah," my voice quivering slightly, "it's a lot like that."

I wish I was one of the people who could point to the exact moment when they realized they were gay. I can't. At some level I knew I liked other boys before I knew I was left handed. It was just there. No earth shattering moment in high school or college when you look at the person in bed with you and think, "Ohmygosh! This is another guy! I must be gay!" In a way I'm envious of those people who were fortunate enough to remain oblivious to the fact until they were ready to handle it.

I also can't remember when I learned that being gay was somehow bad. And evil. And sinful. But I guess I was lucky enough to have picked up on that early on too. So from early adolescence I had the knowledge that I was different than everyone else but I was young and I had time to fix it.

Seventeen years wasted. Down the drain. Gone and ain't coming back. Seventeen years I spent trying to push my sexuality pendulum in the other direction. If I hung posters of near naked women on my walls in my bedroom. If I forced myself to think about having sex with girls while I jerked off. If I watched straight porn and pretended that the women with their silicon balloons flopping all over the place were the source of my erection and not the virile hunks who were mounting them. If I prayed enough.

My sexuality is probably the biggest reason that I was the only member of my family to seek out religion. I was never forced to go, in fact I went alone. I would call churches when ever we moved and ask if they could provide transportation. I wonder now what they thought of this little kid who was so faithful and even remembered to bring a dollar every week for the Sunday School offering. By the way, I decided that I was Southern Baptist. And since I sought them out for so long I consider the emotional damage they did to be self-inflicted.

But I developed my relationship with Christ there. And I knew that God would not forsake his faithful servant. So I spent a lot of time in prayer begging God to take this curse off me and let me be like everyone else. Some weeks I could even fool myself in to thinking it had worked. But I was always back the next week chanting the same mantra. I swear I must have bored God to tears.

Every gay person, before they tell anyone about their sexuality, fantasizes about how they're going to tell people. My fantasy was my will. My dear, beloved family would be gathered around to hear which part of my fortunes they would inherit and my lawyer would have instructions to end the session with, "And he was gay!" There would be a collective sucking in of breath (most noticeably my wife) and that's about where the fantasy ended. Having told everyone at a point when it was of no use to me but having won the battle anyway because I didn't take it to my grave. The reality was somewhat different if not more comical.

The summer of '88 was the turning point. I was on summer vacation visiting my father in Colorado. I remember going for a walk in the mountains by myself when something inside me cracked. I sat down and said, "I'm gay." I said it out loud. For the first time. I waited a moment for the lighting to strike or the earth to stop spinning. When that didn't happen I said it one more time to make sure God heard me (maybe He was distracted by a war or something just a that instant - you never know) and then I fell back and cried my soul out for what seemed like hours. Aged seventeen years I was ready to grow up and accept myself

At that point my prayers changed. I explained to God that I had waited for my entire life for Him to answer my prayer (and when your seventeen you feel as if you've been hanging around for at least a couple of centuries) and apparently He wasn't going to do it. So I prayed for God to at least give me the courage to accept myself and to help me find the strength to tell my family. You know what? When you pray for the right things, God really does answer them!

Home coming was hard that year. I found myself back in Chicago surrounded by all the people I loved and wanted to tell. But my insides felt like they turned to cement at the mere thought of doing it. The closest I could come was to keep telling my step-brother that I wanted to tell him something that was really important to me. He’d stand there and wait. "Not now!," I would almost scream. So he went on with his business not realizing I really was hoping he would just figure it out on his own.

In the end I told my girlfriend first. We had dated on and off since before we started high school. We talked marriage a lot. Had our kid’s names picked out. We’d even felt each other up. In fact, we’d done just about everything except ‘IT’. I’m sure she didn’t realize that we’d never gone all the way, no matter how often she hinted that it would be okay with her, because I was deathly afraid that if we tried it, certain parts of my anatomy would fail to rise to the occasion and my secret would be out. Note of girlfriend’s after-me-life: she has just gotten married for the second time and has a beautiful baby daughter. I’m very proud of all of them (I worked with the current husband back in high school). Husband number one married her shortly after high school and moved her to Maryland where he was stationed in the Navy. I’m sure you see this one coming… after a couple years he moved ‘his’ boyfriend in and she promptly moved out. Honest engine! I couldn’t make up something as ironic.

But back then I was now pushing eighteen and had only managed to tell one person. And them came the movie Dirty Dancing. Remember the scene when Jennifer Grey turns on the record player in Patrick Swayze’s bedroom. He’s standing there bare-chested and she walks up and runs her hand all around his torso while she circles him. It wasn’t so much an attraction towards Patrick Swayze as it was that moment of watching Jennifer run her hand along him and he letting her have her way. Just the idea of being that in love with another guy that he would let me run my hands were they wanted was almost too intoxicating. I went to my room, locked the door and laid on the floor. "God, please give me one chance to fall in love that deeply and I’ll never ask for anything again." Again God was listening.

Some time later I was reading the Sunday paper. I don’t know why I was in the classified ads but my eye caught an ad and it stayed glued there. It was like destiny had led me to this point. The ad read ‘ARE YOU GAY? Call…" And there was a phone number that followed. WOW! The doors were being flung open and soon someone would tell me all about being gay and what exactly I was supposed to do to be gay. I was certain this was divine intervention. I was also so completely ignorant that the significance of the phone number beginning with 1-900 was completely lost on me.

I remember my hands shaking as I called the number. I got as far as hearing the recording say "To leave a message press one, to listen to other messages press two…" and then I hung up. I spent nearly an hour rehearsing my message. I didn’t want anyone to pick up that I was about the most ignorant thing to fall off the truck this week but at the same time I wanted to convey that I was a little scared and needing some direction. My message went like this, "Hi, my name is Jason and I’m 18 and I’m looking for a relationship," and I left a phone number to reach me. I decided that too little information was better then blowing my cover by rambling on about things I didn’t know about. I called back a third time and pressed two to hear how my message would sound to everyone else. I never got to my own message. By the second caller I listened to I realized with dawning horror that I had just called a phone sex line. And messages stayed on the system for three days! And I le! ft my phone number! My parent’s phone number!

I’m not sure if it was the fact that I said I was only eighteen or if the phrase ‘relationship’ had some hidden meaning. But the phone started ringing five minutes later and it rang almost non-stop for the full three days. At first I just let the answering machine take the calls and I listened and then diligently erased the messages. Going to work was a struggle. Fortunately I was working part time at the same company where my Mom worked so I knew where she was at all times. I felt I could still take care of erasing the answer machine by calling from work and entering the code. I took the phone off the hook in my bedroom before we went to sleep so it wouldn’t ring during the night. But on the second day Mom called in sick and stayed home. I was so scared (and worn out from trying to catch the phone every time it rang) that right after dinner I took my brother outside tell him my ‘important news’ and enlist his help.

So the conversation went as it did at the beginning of this story. Fortunately his reaction was ‘So?’ but I was too preoccupied to grasp the significance that I just told someone close to me and he didn’t care. I blurted out the story of the phone line and he promised to help keep the phone away from my Mom. I was so relived. But ignorance apparently runs deep and it didn’t occur to me to wonder who was answering the phone while we were outside. When we got back in my Mom walked up and gave me a list of all the guys who called in the past hour. I don’t remember how many there were but I said "Thanks, I’ll give them a call back" hoping she would think they were friends from school and I had magically turned popular in my senior year.

The next morning my Mother was standing at the kitchen sink doing dishes. When I came in she asked me who all these men were that were calling. My answer, "I don’t know if you realize it or not but I’m gay and I don’t want you to take my calls anymore." She asked me to repeat that and I did, word for word so it’s burned in my brain. What a dorky way to tell your mother that your gay and yet I said it. Twice! At that unfortunate moment of awkward silence my older sister managed to show up for a visit. She opened the door and just stood there in silence with us. My sister mouthed "What’s going on," to me while she looked at my Mom staring out the window. "Just leave," I mouthed back. "I’ll call you."

I don’t remember much of what my Mom and I talked about that morning. I remember agreeing to see a therapist but that’s about it. My sister called later and begged me to tell her what was going on.

"I came out of the closet," I said.
"And…" she prodded.
"And Mom freaked out"
Confused silence
"Well, what were you doing in the closet?"
Like I said, ignorance runs deep.

After I explained to my sister that I didn’t jump out of a closet and scare Mother half to death, she didn’t react as well as I hoped. I don’t remember her initial reaction but I know that she promptly called most of the rest of the family to tell them the news. At that point I didn’t care. I was actually relived that everyone would know and I didn’t have to tell them in my will.

The rest of my senior year is a blur. None of it very good. I ended up on a Greyhound bus at midnight right after graduation. I was going to Colorado because I felt my life was in danger if I stayed in Chicago. I won’t go into the whys because it’s too painful if it’s true and too ridiculous if it was paranoia. But I found myself back in Colorado with my Dad and a family who accepted me. And life was good.

God didn’t forget me or my prayers either. Shortly after I moved here I met John. I was still 18 and he a wise soul of 24. Today John is 35 and I have a few more weeks of being twenty-something before I also hit thirty. John and I have shared a loving, monogamous relationship for more than eleven years now. We had a church wedding last year on our tenth anniversary. And every morning I see him sleeping I thank God for answering my prayer to give me just one chance to love someone that deeply.

As for the rest of my family, time heals all wounds. I am now closer to everyone than I’ve even been before. While the coming out process was not entirely painless it was worth it. Every single bit of it. I’d do it all again in exactly the same way (except that I might find a less stupid way to tell my Mother).

Kevin

Adolescent "exploration/experimentation" is what it is commonly known as. I just know that I have been attracted to other males since I reached that period in my life! I also knew I was NOT like the stereotypical "queer" everyone used to put down (myself  INCLUDED!)

I grew up in rural/small town mid-Michigan in the late 50's/early 60's and there were no "OUT" gay people for me to associate with, learn from or emulate. There weren't a whole lot (I don't think) ANYwhere during that era! For this reason, I lived a lie that I didn't even realize consciously WAS a lie, for about 32 years!

I went through the fairly common period of calling myself "bisexual" and, still consider myself that way to a certain extent. I believe we all "fit" some place between the two extremes, some lean more strongly toward one direction or  the other and some actually fit very comfortably in the "50/50" bracket as TRUE BI-sexuals. I consider myself as 85% gay and 15% still confused! Since I've never "gone all the way" with a woman, I can't say for sure how strong that attraction is in my life!!

In 1982 I took a class at San Diego City College, taught by a very WONDERFUL (and STRAIGHT) psychologist by the name of Ruben Naiman, Ph.D., called "Intro To Personality", a Psych 101 course. I wrote a paper for that class that I termed an "Autobiographical Self-Analyisis". In it I "came out" to the world.... and to MYSELF! I went a little berserk for a couple of years, feeling the "weight of the world" FINALLY off my shoulders! I joined the San Diego gay pride group, became a volunteer phone counsellor at the Lesbian & Gay Men's Community Center.

Two years later I fell in love with Anthony Allan Pope and had seven wonderful and tumultuous years together before he died of AIDS. Fortunately, because we met in 1984, there was enough information already out there that I did NOT contract the virus and remain virus-FREE to this day! I am now ready, after many years of widowhood, to start looking for HUSBAND #2!!

Mike

My story isn't about the first time I ever came out of the closet, nor is it about the first time I ever realized I had feelings for men. Instead, it's a story about coming out to one friend in particular, who has since become my roommate and a huge part of my support system. I hope you find some kind of lesson behind it.

I met my friend in a Spanish class I took at the University of Maryland. At first glance, there were a number of reasons you would never think we'd end up being more than classmates. I was starting my second semester back in college after working full time for two years. I was 24, and since I felt old, I wasn't sure I really belonged in a college classroom again. He was almost 21, more of the stereotypical college student age, and I later found out, he was a fraternity member.

More importantly, however, I was about to come out to my father and his partner and he was straight. However, different things conspired, like a chance pairing for a class project and my own propensity to show genuine concern for someone I barely knew led us to spend a lot of time around each other that semester.

In the course of several conversations, he told me about his acceptance of several friends who were gay, and I eventually told him about my father. However, for some reason I can only wonder about now, I just didn't feel comfortable coming out to him. Even though he left several clues that he'd be supportive, my own fears prevented me from seeing them.

One incident highlighted my problem: I was waiting for him outside the front porch of the fraternity house while he was doing something upstairs in his room. Meanwhile, his fraternity brothers started peppering me with questions, some getting a little too personal for my liking. Eventually, one of them asked me if I was gay. I didn't answer the question then, which was as clear an admission of my sexuality as answering yes would have been. However, I hadn't told him yet, and I was only recently ready to admit it to myself.

I found out much later that he had suspected I was gay before and that incident sealed the deal for him. However, he wanted me to say it specifically before he did or said anything else. I wasn't ready to, and it nearly cost me a friend. I found out later that another classmate told him I was gay and that I wanted him "in that way." Needless to say, that freaked him out and it made him act more aloof. I'm still not sure what made him decide to stop.

In the course of several e-mails, he hinted at already knowing, but then would write something that would make me think he didn't know. Shortly after the incident in front of the house, he even asked me to rub his back when he had serious back pain! We were unwittingly playing a chess match in which he already had me at checkmate, though I didn't realize he had.

A year after the infamous incident at the fraternity house, we met at a nearby bar and that's where I finally had to tell him, since I wrote him I had something important to tell him. He obviously asked me what it was, and I got really nervous. It took about three minutes before I finally drew up enough courage.

Drawing up every ounce of courage I had, I said, staring straight ahead, "I have one more thing in common with my father than I had told you before," looking only to see his facial expression. It didn't change at all, and he was as supportive of me as he had been of the other guys he had told me about.

Nearly a year later, he asked me to move in with him and another former member of that fraternity, also a straight guy, and I agreed. I wouldn't say things are necessarily harmonious, but we still count each other as friends.

I still look back in disbelief when I think about all the wasted time before I finally got the courage to tell him something he already "knew!"

Mikey

Diana Ross said it best "I'm coming out I'm coming I'm coming out... I want the world to know Got to let it show I'm coming out I want the world to know I got to let it show There's a new me coming out And I just had to live And I wanna give I'm completely positive I think this time around I am gonna do it Like you never do it Like you never knew it Ooh, I'll make it through The time has come for me To break out of the shell I have to shout That I'm coming out I'm coming out I want the world to know Got to let it show I'm coming out I want the world to know I got to let it show I'm coming out I want the world to know Got to let it show I'm coming out”, in this song she sent a very positive message to me about my life, originally released in 1980, it wasn’t until 1998 when I heard it and it meant the world to me.

My own coming out was late in arriving - I was 23 years old. While it seemed sudden to me at the time, in the time since I've been able to look back and see the signs that I was "not like the other boys." When I was ten or eleven and living in Del Cerro, A predominantly Jewish suburb of San Diego, California. . I am Jewish. I was born Jewish, I was circumcised on the eighth day of my life, I went to Hebrew school and became a Bar Mitzvah when I was thirteen. I was indoctrinated with Jewish culture and values, and those values have a large influence on my life. Two of the most important to me are to "Love thy neighbor as thyself" and "Justice, justice, shall thou pursue". I long ago separated the moral and ethical commandments of the Bible, which I attempt to follow, from the ritual commandments, where I pick and choose. Spiritually, I do not believe any religion in the world is correct on a literal level and accept all as being correct on a metaphorical level. I have for the p! ast thirteen years been a member of Tiffereth Israel Synagogue, a San Diego synagogue which my family built and is very supportive of. On an occasional Friday night, you might find me present at the Shabbat services. If you could hear what is going on in my head however, you would understand that I pay little attention to the literal meanings of words of the service, but use the mantra like qualities of the prayers to enable myself to quietly reflect on the imponderables of existence.

I remember going to the private Jewish school pool during the summer; sometimes it was almost as much fun to hang around the men's locker room as to swim with my friends. I don't think there was any desire there, more of a fascination with what other men looked like without their clothes on. Middle School and high school found me a social butterfly - I did well fairly well classes because I had my grandma to write my papers for me or supply me with Cliff notes. Friday nights were reserved for D&D with (male) friends. I was dating girls off and on but thought of boys none the less.

I graduated and moved on to college. First attending a Junior College graduating with an Associate of Arts Degree in General Education & Film. My undergraduate years were for the most part spent at California State University, Chico were a mixed bag, socially. I never dated guys and girls and went through that difficult experimentation period. I immersed myself in classes and extracurricular activities (television production and film) as well as an internship with the Chico Chamber of Commerce as A Film Project Coordination intern, to the point where I didn't have any free time - and certainly no time to worry about which gender I was more attracted to. I spent a lot of time online with American Online, chatting away to male students nearby and occasionally met a few in person, some of which will be my best friends forever. I also for the first time felt comfortable with my sexuality enough to attend the new gay bar in town, 2201. At first I was "the new face” in town and ever! yone wanted to try me out…I had fun with various partners and realized I wanted more of a committed closeted relationship. By the time I graduated from Chico State, I knew inside something was different and I was ready for the first time to acknowledge it.

I moved to back home to San Diego and got involved in the "gay scene” here… Quite frankly, it occurred to me that I might be gay ­ few friends had asked me. When I first came out onto the scene I loved it, no less, I was in this fascinating new world and I just couldn't get enough of it, I wanted to be out all the time. But now I tend to rarely venture onto the gay scene because I detest it. Why? What could I possibly abhor about the gay scene? Well, let's begin at the beginning...First off, it has to be the plethora of pretentious, vacuous queens who would sooner spit in your face than talk to you. Come on, you know who I mean. They usually sit in a group in the a corner of the club, bar or pub, wearing there Armani briefs, Diesel jackets, Gucci belts in a cloud of cigarette smoke and vodka and orange vapors, bitching about everyone else who does not fit into their warped Spice Girl worlds, whether they deserve it or not. And there's just no talking to these people and why would you want to anyway, what's the point? Secondly, let’s move onto the bar leeches. Oh yes, the bar leeches, you must have encountered these! Those repugnant, old trolls (old nasty perverts) who stand at the bar drinking their pints attempting to catch your eyes any way possible so that it gives them an excuse to approach you and begin a conversation, or even worse to feel you or kiss you (this happened to one of my friends). And what can we do about it? Well, we do have to remember that they are human beings to and that they have feelings.... Yeah, right, we know this but it doesn't stop you wanting to tell them to fuck off or severely slap them about the face and neck. Conversely we can use this phrase, with a polite shake of the head, "If you put your hand on my leg, or any other part of my body again, you'll never be able to use your genitals for the rest of your life/I'm going to rip your still beating heart from your chest and hold it in front of your eyes so that you c! an see how black it is before you die" (delete as appropriate). Personally, I would like to see an exclusive gay youth scene, and I'm not talking about segregation, I'm talking about a choice, whether to be surrounded by just boys and girls or a mixed group. The scene is most definitely entirely based on sex, okay we know this. A couple of weeks ago I was sat in the Euphoria (a gay coffeehouse in Hillcrest) with a guy I was seeing Nick and you could sense that everyone in there had nothing on their minds but sex and how to get it, with darting eyes, lascivious licking lips etc. I'm not sure about you, but when I go out, I like to be able to sit with my friends without feeling as though I'm on some kind of meat-rack. This would be great if I was just out hunting for anonymous sex, which I'm not against, but I like to be able to talk to the boy before and after I have sex with him, and usually in bars and clubs the music is too loud anyway to do anything but shout. When I meet n! ew people now who have never been out on the scene, I tell them that I have four words that sum up the San Diego gay scene: predatory, bitchy and pretentious, and strung out.

In just a short time, I had a close circle of gay friends, some of us are lucky, I happen to be very lucky to have many wonderful diverse friends from all walks of life that accept me for who I am and at the same time offer all the support that they can. Not everyone is as lucky as I am. And on top of having to deal with homophobia in school, many have to deal with it at home with their own parents. Too many gay youth are kicked out of their houses with nowhere to go. Some even become prostitutes in order to survive. But with no form of support in school, in the home, or even from the Gay Community at large, what would you expect. I then became more active in GYA (Gay Youth Alliance) Queer youth…so neglected…so deprived…so depraved….so not taken seriously. According to many people, Queer youth don’t even exist. We’re just "in a phase” or "experimenting”. There’s no way possible that we could be sure at our age. How would we know? We haven’t even experienced life. A lot of us ! have never even had sex. So we couldn’t possibly know if we were Gay or not. Well let me tell you, that a bunch of BS. Just because so many of our "experienced” generation went through a denial phase, doesn’t mean that we have to, too. This goes back to my earlier statement that being Gay isn’t just about sex. Most Queers will tell you that they’ve always known, but they didn’t realize or act upon it, ya whatever…If I’m only attracted to men at this current stage in my life, I fantasize about men, I fall in love with men, that makes me gay. Even if I’ve never had sex with a man. I hate this label, I just wanna be known as Mikey, maybe the rest of the people out there are just jealous, we didn’t have to go through a denial phase to be able to accept ourselves…, and I was fairly secure in my life. But something was missing. During those years, I felt that I had finally found a group of people who would accept me as I was. I slowly came to realize that the face I was presenting wasn't the real me. I had to nod appreciatively when someone pointed out a beautiful woman. I had to ignore (studiously) another man stripping in front of me in a changing room. I had to hold back any statement that I thought might be effeminate or non-masculine. I realized that I had been doing these things for so long that they had become second nature - a reflexive facade. And after a while, it started to hurt. It was emotionally exhausting, and it kept me from feeling close to those who I cared about. Something had to change. A digression here.

I read a lot, mostly fantasy and science fiction. When I look back at what books resonated with me - the books that really meant something to me as I read them - I can see clues that I might have been less-than-straight even at an early age. One of the first fantasy books I ever read was Nancy Springer's Books of Sun series ("The White Hart," "The Sable Sun," etc.) While homosexuality wasn't mentioned, there was a bond between the two male main characters that was clearly more than brotherly, however platonic. The idea that two men could care for each other that much captured my heart. I remember (with a rueful grin) browsing in the bookstore at Obelisk Books and coming across a book by one Gordon Merrick - it was a trashy romance, but it was a GAY trashy romance. I remember going back - not just once, but several times - to the store to stand discreetly and read and reread the overwrought romance and sex scenes. And still I had no clue. Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt, honey. And the darker side of growing up in the homophobic South: Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover books contain homo-, hetero-, and bisexuality, stated very matter-of-factly. I remember being in high school and reading through the series, and finally reading one ("Thendara House," I believe) that was very open about homosexuality. I took all of the books that I owned from that series (twelve or more, I think) to the GYA gay youth alliance book drive in November of ‘99, fearful that someone might think that I read them because I was -gasp- GAY! My friends and I swapped books frequently, and we all read David Gerrold's War Against the Chtorr series, which features a rather unlikable protagonist who happens to be gay (it really is incidental, if I recall correctly). They, good God-fearing Jews, reviled the books for even mentioning homosexuality. I just shut up and enjoyed the story. When I first came out, a net-friend recommended Mercedes Lackey's Vanyel trilogy: "Magic's Pawn," "Magic's Promise," "Magic's Price." I've never cried when I read a book - these made me cry. Homosexuality is an issue, front-and-center, and Lackey deals with it in a rational, accepting, and tender way. Loves are found, loves are lost, and loves are found again in one of the most romantic fantasies I've ever read. I highly recommend these books to anyone coming out or already out - they actually made a difference in my life.

Back to the story. A dear friend was breaking up with another friend, and I had given her much support during the process. I think, had I been straight, we would have gone out (...and it would have been a bad idea, but you know that now, don't you Sweetie?). As it was, we leaned on each other, and provided mutual support. One night this friend Cori and I after dinner out (and a few beers - I wasn't that brave yet), we sat down on her bed and I told her the two hardest words I ever had to say: "I'm gay." She was quiet for a moment, then she took my hand and told me that I was who I was, and it didn't matter who I loved, she valued me for who I was. I'll always love her for that. After that night, I told another friend, and another, and another. Soon, all my close friends knew that I was gay, and I never heard anyone say anything about bad it. Could this be that I selected my friends before I came out on the basis of their lack of prejudices? It very well could be - I'll never know. After a few months, I was the typical newly out activist. I got into an argument in a restaurant with a new fellow to the GYA (Gay Youth Alliance) group because he stated that there should be straight pride parades as well as gay pride parades. I jumped all over him - Listen, I said, if you want to see a straight pride parade, turn on the TV. Look at Congress. Go outside and look at Mission Beach boardwalk ( a strip of beach front property on the ocean, in which you see straight couples hand in hand strolling by the waves on bikes, roller blades and foot). Go to the mall. Everyone is straight, or assumed to be. Gay pride is about being proud you are unique, not ashamed because of it. I was shocked when, after thorough discussion and consideration, he agreed with me. Jason changed my life because he showed me that sometimes what appears to be prejudice is simply ignorance, and that many people are willing to learn and dispel that ignorance. And for this, I'll always care for him (well, that and the fact that he can deep throat a Sierra Nevada bottle. Tease :-)

So I was out, right? No problems right? Wrong. There was the rest of my family. Well that was easy, in fact easier than I had wanted it to be. It was now January 1999 and mom and I decided to have a big party for my Grandma & Grandfather being that they were getting older and it was time to get the whole family together (well moms side anyways) so we had a big party at the house. It went really well and I enjoyed seeing all my cousins and aunts and uncles, etc. Mom tells me two days later, by the way, I told them (my whole family) all about you when I invited them to come to the party. Great, not really! Now every conversation that I had must have been misconstrued! Oh well I have a very accepting Jewish Mom I should be so lucky right? I was always on the defensive, not wanting to reveal too much about what I had done or what I was feeling. My parents became downright worried - it was obvious to them that I was hiding something, but they didn't want to pry. I was a mess, emotionally - after a phone conversation when I told my mom I had had my tongue pierced, she said, "It's not as bad as something you could tell me." By itself, it's a fairly innocuous statement, but in the emotional state I was in, it devastated me - I walked around the house at midnight and cried. I was very fortunate to have a net-friend who kept me sane and e-mailed me through the tough times (Bless you, Drew!). He advised me to seek counseling, which I did (briefly) and to have a support network of friends when I did come out to my family (and he was exactly right). How I came out to my family, though, was a textbook case of bad timing. Mom asked me why I had been so secretive the over the past few months. I denied any such thing. Finally, after a few minutes of this, she finally asked the question that had worried her for quite a while. "Are you gay?" What followed then was a long, agonizing conversation, with the familiar questions ("How do you know?" "How do two men..." "Are you a virgin?" You know, the questions that you wouldn't ask even your closest friend but when someone says their gay instantly spring to mind - and mouth).

By the time we reached Paul, things were pretty much in hand, though I was admonished, "Whatever you do, don't tell your dad, I said. It'll hurt him terribly and I have always wanted to be daddies boy, although not into sports like my siblings were, and although I don't think he understood then, he was willing to accept me as I am, which is more than I could ever ask. I didn't have to break the news to my brothers; Mom did that not long after I told her. Not my first choice of how to do it, but I'm over it.

That was two years ago. It doesn't seem that long. In that time, my family has come to accept that I am gay. Mom points out cute guys, and we are able to discuss how my relationships are going, as I discuss hers. Dad has resigned himself to the fact that I am out, he tells me not to out myself in the workplace, and that I refuse to go in the closet no matter what. I think he's even OK with that. My two brothers have been extremely accepting and I've found it to be better if we don't discuss it. Although my 20 something college-frat brother Jordan, always pokes fun when he get the chance. Like at a family celebration of Fourth of July this year, he said” Pass The Wieners to Mikey, We All Know There His Favorite, He Likes Eating Wieners. I’ve learned to take his insults like a grin of salt and realize that’s his way of dealing with the situation! They have never made that big of an issue of it, or expressed discomfort, so I'll be happy with that for now.

In Conclusion, although my life is a constant work so this paragraph will be extended and revised time and time again - A few weeks after I had posted the above text, a dear friend pointed out to me that something was missing - analysis. How does one analyze one's own life? It isn't easy. In retrospect, I can say that I wish things had been different. I wish I had realized my sexual orientation sooner; I wish I could have come out earlier. But things would have been very different - I would have had to deal with coming out in a very likely hostile environment, with little support. And that is something I would never, ever wish on anyone.

As for my coming out process - I can't think of anything I would have done differently. Yes, it was difficult for my family, but I took things at my own pace (as I had to) and kept myself sane by doing so. I was very fortunate to have had (and still have!) friends who provide love and support when I needed it, and a family that loves and accepts me for what I am. If there is one thing that I would say to anyone who reads this, one thing for them to take away from this mass of verbiage, it's this: Always remember, even when things are the bleakest, that there is someone who loves and cares for you. It may be your family, or a friend, or someone you've just met on the net, but no one is alone - and that's the way it should be. Now in February of 2001 I’ve realized that I'm coming up on the second of my coming out. That's surprising to me, really - it seems like I've been out for far longer than four years. The most important thing that has happened to me since I last updated this page is that I have an actual, rather than theoretical, love life for the first time in my life. If anything, this has made me rethink some of the complacency which had snuck into my life. The very idea that I have to look around to see who might be offended if I want to hold hands with or hug my sweetie is appalling, and a further reminder that queers still have a long way to go before we achieve equality. I've been through a lot in the year 1999 and my life has just begun. I found out what breaking up was like. It's not an experience I recommend for entertainment purposes, and yet it has a necessary place in life. I still care for Nick very much and, it was short but sweet, I caught him on the rebound and the distance thing killed us but we are on excellent terms. Mom still craves his Spanish Potatoes though, =-). I consider myself very fortunate, and would not give up that time that we had together for anything. I have re-experienced the joy of finding new love again, and found that love can continue, and grow, and becomes something better. I now have a boyfriend that I love more than I ever have loved anyone man or women before. He is closeted and we are best friends and a couple in one! We don’t hang out too much in the gay community but sometimes its better that way. His name is Jimmy and mom calls him and introduced him to her friends and family as her "son-in-law” I’m so lucky to once again have such an accepting mother. If I could have looked ahead five years ago and seen me where I am now...I wouldn't have believed it possible. I've learned and grown a lot in those last five years, and through the love and support of my friends, boyfriends, and family, I've found a happiness I never thought I'd feel. Being a gay man is integral to my identity. I wouldn't change it if I could; it makes up too much of me. But my physical and emotional attraction to men has landed me in the middle of a community I have mixed feelings about. I have been and am very active in the gay community . Pride Parades, the Gay Youth Alliance, Youth Pride Committee, H.Y.P.I. founder and president, now on the San Diego Pride Board,and Queerplayers, I keep myself busy…. lots of charitable giving, etc. are a few of the ways I'm involved. But oddly, the community as it stands falls short (other than in politics) of meeting a lot of my needs as a gay man, much less my needs as an individual.

We've managed to create a community which is so aware of its differences that each subgroup feels it must be listed separately in the title of every organization. Or worse, we have to list not only our subgroups, but also all policital allies. The result is a lack of focus to a lot of groups, often to the ultimate detriment of the group. I've been in more than one organization that tried to be too much for too many and ended up crashing and burning.

If we want to create a truly inclusive community, we do that through actions, not words. When starting the H.Y.P.I. Group (Homosexual Youth Positive Influence) , my best friend Sean and I wrestled long and hard over the name. The reality is that HYPI will be targeting youth issues in the workplace and how to proceed for they are the future!

We need to worry less about categorizing ourselves and more about determining and meeting our needs!

And finally, in the time since last updating this, I have received many, many letters from the readers of this page. I have read many moving stories, and have offered what advice I can. If you wish to comment, or chat, or just say hi, feel free to email me I'd love to hear from you.

I think I had it a lot easier than most gay guys do. I knew I was gay since I was 6 and I was in my moms closet trying on her high heels. I think we all did at one stage or another. But when I started watching movies and paying more attention to the handsome, attractive actor instead of the beautifully, stunning actress, I knew something was up. All through school I thought that I was the only one......the only guy who was attracted to other guys. You didn't hear other kids talking about it, and if they were they were making fun of someone. Calling them names like "fag" or "sissy" or "queer". The funny thing is I was never called those names. No-one throughout my middle school or high school suspected me of being gay. I always had a girl friend, I played sports, did all the normal crazy things high school boys do. Hahaha....if they only knew.

My first experience was when I was 19, YES 19, and afterwards we dated for almost a year. His name was Dan and he was a year younger than me. He had had one previous relationship with a guy that lasted a couple of months but nothing serious. He was out to his parents so there was no pressure or secrecy on his part. As for me, my parents did not know, none of my family knew, and none of my friends knew. That was all about to change in the next couple of months.

Things started getting bad with me and my parents so I moved out with a few friends, Tammy and Priscilla. They were two girls that I worked with, both of which I found later out wanted to hook up with me, that needed a roommate. So I moved in and things were alright for the first month, then Tammy suugested that we go to Tracks one night. Tracks was a local gay club that was very openly.....GAY. At that point when she mentioned that, I pretty much knew she and Priscilla knew. How I didn't know but I figured they did. Well, at Tracks I met Dan and at first I didn't like him. I couldn't stand him to be honest. He seemed to be very egotistical and obnoxious......qualities I would later admire and even mock. We started dating and next thing you know, we are at Tracks 4 nights a week. Well Tammy and Priscilla get sick and tired of going to this gay bar and pretty soon its just me going to meet Dan and his friends. About a month later, Tammy and I get in a huge fight and I move all my stuff out in one day without telling anyone and move back home with my parents, which was where I lived before I moved in with them. So once I was back home and Tammy had a couple of days to think about things she calls my mom and tells her that I am gay and that I have been seeing this guy named Dan. Well, my mom didn't take well to hearing that over the phone and started going off on Tammy telling her she didn't know what in the hell she was talking about and that her son was straight. Later that day when I got home, she told me what had happened and asked me if what Tammy had said was true. She told me that she would love me no matter what my answer was because I was her son and she would love me unconditionally for the rest of my life. I lied and said it was not true....that Tammy was trying to get back at me for moving out.

About 4 months later, I was still living at home and Dan and I had become very close. I loved him very much and it was becoming harder and harder to hide what was going on and who I was. May 4th, 1997, I was in a bad car accident and I had to be taken by helicopter to the hospital. My car had been taken to an auto shop where my mom went 4 days later to go through it to find love notes Dan had written me along with cards, pictures and gifts. She waited to show it to me once I got home and asked me what it was all about. At first I didn't know what to say but what she said next shocked me. She thought that Dan was stalking me and wanted to know if I wanted him arrested. I almost started laughing but at the same time almost wanted to cry. I knew I couldn't go on with this lie forever so I went ahead and told her everything right there laid up in my bed. I told her that we had been dating for almost 5 months and that yes, I was gay. Tammy was right. She didn't cry, yell, scream, look disappointed or anything. She never has to this day. She has only told me she loves me every day she sees me and tells my boyfriend today of 1 year and 6 months the same. Dan and I didn't last but we are still good friends to this day. Sometimes I blame him for my "coming out"....but shouldn't I be thanking him? If it wasn't for being with him, I would have had to tell my parents without the help of them finding those things in my car, and I don't think I would have ever done that. So thank you Dan.....I'll always love you for that.

I was molested by my brother at the age of nine. That was my first encounter with a guy. Not to long after that my cousin and I started to experience in the gay life style. That acting out with my cousin lasted for five years. When I was in Jr. high, I had a friend stay the night and I reach over when we were in bed and touch him. After that night we were in a relationship all through Jr. high and high school. The relationship with him ended when I got out of high school. I guess he did not want to be gay anymore. After he hurt me by not wanting to see me any more, my sexual addiction became out of control by having sex with male or female to get what I wanted out of sex. I have not told any one of my family members that I am gay. Only a few friends know. I will never come out to my family. Just taking the time to write this about me is taking a lot. All the years of holding it in about being gay was pure HELL. Letting certain friends know help me feel a little better about myself. I was glad that they did not make me feel worse then I already felt. Going through life being very mixed up about sex at a young age was very hard on me. I tried to act normel when I became old enough to see that sleeping with guys was not right within society. It scared the hell out of me if any one in my school would find out about me being gay. I went to a school in California that was run my gang members. I saw a boy that was beat up just for being gay. The day I saw that happen I knew I would never let that happen to me. Now that I look back on the way handle being gay when I was younger. I wish I took the time to handle being gay a different way. The HELL that I went through as I got older I wish upon know one that is dealing with being gay. Any one that is dealing with being gay, just take the time to be honest with your self. That will make it a lot better when you get older. Take care my friends.

It was November 24th, 2000, when I uttered the words, "Mom, you know that I'm gay, right?" Much to my suprise she said, "Yeah, I know. I was wondering when you were going to get around to telling me."

A rather anticlimactic end to something that I had been trying build up the courage to tell her for several years. I'd wanted to come out before my father died in July of 2000 (Lung cancer cause by smoking. Nasty, ugly habbit.) but I just never found the right time, we thought that my Dad was going to be with us a lot longer than he was.

I came to the realization that I am a queer when I was in junior high, right about when I was 13 years old. I suddenly felt very out of place with my friends at the time. Most of them made up stories about girls that they were doing or the 'faggots' that they had beaten to a pulp and what have you. A very scary place to be when you realize that you're the very object of their animosity. It is at once rediculous to think that these 'friends' of mine were actually doing the things that said they were and frightening that they talk of doing these horrible things. 13 year old boys are jackals. I was at a small junior high were rumors travled fast so I just shut the hell up and burried myself in role playing game manuals as a way to hide, most of my friends just that I was a geek and left it at that.

High school was quite a bit different for me though, I was able to make a clean break then and there from the friends that I was in many ways scared of. Being a much larger school I was able to find friends that I could better relate to and were interested in the things that I was and soon I was pretty much lumped in with a very openminded group of close friends. After knowing them for roughly a year and a half we were all chatting late one night about random stuff and when it rolled around to the topic of sexuality I ventured forward and admitted that I thought that I was gay. I was happy to find that my new friends didn't reject me out of hand and were quite accecpting of it. It felt good to have people my own age that I could feel comfortable around and be myself.

Sometime in the few years that followed I let one of my two older sisters in on the secret. Though she was a bit freaked out by the idea that her little brother was a 'gay homosexual' she was honored that I chose to tell her instead of my other sister, whom I'd been closer too. It was a good feeling to have somebody in the family that I could openly talk to about my feelings. I think of this as having been step two of three.

I wanted to come out to my parents quite a bit sooner than I did but I just never could bring myself to do it. In some ways I was quite worried that they would be dissapointed with. There was also the fear that if I'd come out while living under their roof I'd be tossed out on my ear, which happend to a friend of mine. In the back of my mind I knew that I didn't really have to worry about these things happening but the uncertainty of it was there. As a result I didn't come out to my mother until I was 25 years old and my father had passed away.

Well, I'm ashamed to say there was a lot of serious denial. I told more truly cruel gay jokes than anyone else in my school, and probably inflicted a lot of misery on other gay students (if there were any) with all the awful things I said. For this reason I'm a bit more tolerant of kids today who say horrible things than some people are - I know it can be the defense mechanism of a truly frightened person.

I started having sex at 17 - and was so horrified that I was convinced I was 'really straight' after my first experience. The horror didn't last long, and soon I was getting around quite a bit. No interest in dates or gay culture - just sex.

A few gay men tried to befriend me and introduce me to their friends, but I was into horror movies and guns and vandalism - not your typical 'gay stuff' and I just never fit in. Basically I was fun in bed but too fucking weird and delinquent to get into the groove at anyone's party. Not only was I not straight, I wasn't a very good gay person either. Tough times.

Eventually it started to sink in that I really was gay, though, but I still had a lot of trouble finding people I liked. In college, the gay people I met were super-liberal and hopelessly addicted to musicals and politics - very much a clone community. I was politically conservative/nihilistic and (gasp!) didn't like dancing, so people politely turned their noses up and I gave up on trying to come out that way.

I had come out to a friend from High School, but not much discussion in followed, mostly because I didn't have the nerve to bring up the subject again (neither did he). In college there were a few similar experiences, but for whatever reason discussions never really went anywhere. Finally, determined to really put my cards on the table and force myself to talk, I joined a fraternity that required all its members to recount their personal lives in explicit detail. It sounds weird but boy did it work - when my turn came one night, I let 'em have it. People were stunned; they expected stories about making it with 'hot chicks' or something. Some of these guys were very religious so I didn't know what to expect. But they were great. All of them became great friends and we remain quite close today. I wish more fraternities were like this; they were a good group of guys who treated me honorably. Plus they liked guns and horror movies too...I finally had actual friends who I could talk to and were interested. Anyway, after that the floodgates opened, and more and more people learned. Some were shocked, but not one friend rejected me or treated me badly...I regard that night as my most important step in coming out.

My parents were among the last to know. I dropped a lot of hints around Mom without knowing it. We were debating AIDS or something and then she said "I thought you told me last week that you were gay." I said "no, mom, I didn't, but I am." Well, the shit hit the fan about a week later and Mom got really depressed for YEARS. Dad found out by discovering an erotic letter I'd written (poor guy) and nearly dropped dead on the spot but didn't say anything. Years later when I came out to him it was incredibly anticlimactic. I had suspected he might know because he had stopped making AIDS jokes and then told me how "poor Oscar Wilde had been treated unfairly." Talk about an about-face!

Anyway - Mom and Dad coped awkwardly for a long time, and both refused to get counseling from anyone because they didn't want to be preached to by some 'vacuous happy person' as Mom put it. Things got much better when I brought home my spouse, a big butch engineer who knew how to fix Dad's crappy car and didn't lisp or mince (their worst fear). Having a shrewish, unkind, high-strung sister-in-law helped too; my parents quickly saw that marrying a woman wasn't always good news for the family. My brother didn't care at all.

These days things are great. We spend more time with my parents than any other couple. I even listen to show tunes sometimes! Never in a million years would I have expected that.

I am a 18 year old boy from Auburn, Maine. If you want to Email me about anything at all I can be reached at Crazyhorse8e8@hotmail.com, I am willing to talk to anyone about any gay issues, I have dealt with quite a few. I currently attend Syracuse University (Rm 434).

Now, my coming out story. Hmmmmm. I never really thought I would be writing this. As a little kid I was always bombarded with negative criticism about gays. People made it seem like being gay was a bad thing. I always knew I was a little gay. So, I always kind of felt like there was something wrong. That has changed significantly now though. I know there is nothing wrong with gays, it is just a preference of sex. Most men like women, some don't. I am one of them, big deal! I like to make love to other men, that does not make me a BAD person. No person would ever know unless I told them, so what is the big deal. There isn't one, and that's what you have to realize before you can come out. I realized that two years ago and told each person in my family privately.

It all worked out though; my Mom, Suzanne, was the most accepting. She always had an idea, and she really doesn't think there is anything wrong with loving the same sex. I guess I just really don't see any big deal about being gay, it is just one of millions of preferences people choose. That's it.

Now, I have a new boyfreind, Ben, I met at a school Gay/Lesbien gathering, and we have been going at it for 4 months now. Everything is great, and a lot of people are very supportive. If they're not, we don't care. That's there preference!!! Mine is to kiss Ben, so there.

I'd like to thank all those people who have kept this site going, the stories are helping thousands, thanks a lot!!!!

Last Updated: Saturday, June 24, 2001
©2001 GayHaven.net. All rights reserved.