I'm so so scared to tell. I'm engaged but I'm tired of hiding.

Try to find someone who you could trust with anything.

 

Hello Mrgr8tday. You certainly are between a rock and a hard place. Fortunately, you are still at a point where you can stop, backtrack, and go a different route. It all depends on whether that's something you want to do. This is the time to ask yourself the tough questions, don't wait until you are married and probably with a family to start questioning things; that would not be fair to anyone involved. Breaking an engagement has to be a thousand times less hard than breaking a family.

For argument's sake, let's say that you will have everyone's absolute and complete support. Would you start dating men? And if that's the case, does this mean the only thing stopping you is the fear of being rejected by your close ones? Would it be fair to your bride being in a loveless marriage as long as you have your relatives approval? Again, if you are going to question things, this is the time, don't wait until it's too late.

 

You need to call off the engagement; even if you do not want to come out this moment. You are at this stage now where you are losing your denial, and the marriage will end in heartbreak if you do not tell her, and an engagement only after 1 year is already likely to fall apart regardless. Even if you want to hold onto this as long as you can, how fair is it for her for you to hold something so important from her?

 

I disagree with you guys. Don't you think calling off the engagement could be a bit hasty? If he calls off the engagement: A) He will need a reason and unless he is ready to come out (which I doubt currently, though quite understandable) he will have to lie and further push him into negativity. B) If he does come out there is a chance that he will lose friends and family because of it. (Though I doubt he would lose everyone)

Mrgr8tday - Do you love your fiancee? Did you get engaged out of love or in hopes of denying who you are? You may be scared and angry, and not want to trust anyone, but I believe the best person for you to talk to is your fiancee. It seems like asking much, but if you truly love her you cannot hide anything from her. Hell, she may say she's been dying for a 3 some - Sure my hopes are a long shot in that regard, but before you just up and leave the relationship, she deserves the truth. You identify as gay? Possibly Bi or Demi or Pan? Sexuality is so tough!!! UGH!

 

@WeWillOvercome I am not saying he has to call it off today, however:

I do think that going into marriage after such a short amount of time, and with such a burden on your shoulder that is unshared is not even remotely the right thing to do.

He understands that he has these feelings, he is denying them less… Pandoras Box has been opened. Can I guarantee that you will not lose any friends/family? No. Can I guarantee that you will still have friends/family? Yes.

If you want a reason to call of the engagement in the future that is not a lie, simple tell her, simply tell her the truth that you are not that into her, that the reasons for getting engaged may have been pressure, and/or that you are tying to figure your life out right now, and need some time.

 

Oi! Mrgr8tday you are only 21 as well! I agree if you feel you are denying yourself only to please friends and family, something has to give. And the best thing to give way, is that engagement. You must focus on you. Perhaps the engagement was a quick fix? A temporary solution? Personally I don't want you to get dis-engaged. I know you are going to have to lest you wish to never be happy.

I don't wanna be negative but you have put yourself in a bit of a predicament here. You can tell your fiancee you are just not interested in marriage currently, but then she will wanna still be together (if she accepts your dis-engagement). Also if you tell her you are gay/bi she may out you. I can't speak for everyone, but this forum will always be here. When things get rough in real life, use us as a crutch. Together we will overcome ^_^

 

This should be sign enough that you need to rethink things. Putting this girl through who-knows-what-hell down the road -not to mention your own misery- only to make other people happy does not sound healthy. You can have a conversation with your girlfriend to perhaps postpone things if you believe that breaking the engagement is too drastic. It is not my intent to place blame, but if you put yourself in this position by doing things too quickly, now you need to also be quick to try to prevent a bigger mess.

 

You don't say whether you're stationed in your home country or overseas, or whether you and your fiancée are currently living in the same place (whether the same city/area or literally in the same home). I think that's important info.

I admire your wish to live a normal life, by which I think you mean an authentic life. So that, in fact, is what you need to do.

Some resources:

- Does PFLAG have a presence where you are? If not, I'm sure there's an equivalent. Great resource, where you'll find people looking for the same kind of support that you are.

- There's EC, of course. What a loving, insightful bunch of folks hang around here! Everyone here is largely anonymous, but many will fast feel like you've known them--not how they look, or how they sound, but who they truly are--your entire life. You can give your inner self room to breathe. This is the safest place I've ever known. You can try to give words to your feelings. I've yet to run into people with their own agenda here. We all just want to help one another.

- Google is your friend. Search for LGBT Activities (or any other arrangement of those 4 letters) and LGBT Support, and let Google use your location. You'll be surprised. I live in a pretty rural area, 2 hours from a major city, but with a city of 50,000 or so about an hour away. And I found groups that meet for dinners once a week, groups that go for a hike or run every week, welcoming churches, and so on.

- Do you live near a college or university? If so, look for a Gay-Straight Alliance or similar group. Generally, these groups are not people looking to hook up. They're folks looking for a community they can feel a part of.

- Find a good therapist to talk to. If you can't find or afford one, find a gay-welcoming church, and talk to the minister/pastor. These folk are often plugged into the network you're looking for. So, in addition to being someone to talk to about your feelings, they're more likely to be able to help you find additional resources.

There's lots more to talk about, of course, and I'm happy to chat. But you also need to do some of the hard work required to figure out your own truth. You say you're in the military. Takes a tough guy to do that. You can be strong enough to do this. And you're at the right age to be doing it.

/Ed.

 

Mrgr8today,

I got married at the age of 20 knowing that i had gay feelings, i guess hoping they would go away (which they never did). Now, 23 years later, i can no longer deny those feelings and will be getting divorced with 2 kids.

All i am saying is that those feelings will never go away. Just make sure before you get married that you and your wife can be truly happy. As the other posts said, it will be a lot harder on everyone after you get married.

I am just speaking from my own experience.

 

I don't think you necessarily have to break off your engagement, but it's either that or you have to come out to your fiancée, have a true heart-to-heart discussion about it, and both still be comfortable. It's not fair to either of you to head into marriage while keeping a secret like this, especially since you're clearly unhappy already.

Good luck... =/

 

There is no point in continuing your engagement to a woman if you are gay. You are only heading down a road which is going to cause both of you trouble and end in divorce. Whatever reason lead you become engaged is not a reason to stay engaged. People break off engagements for many reasons. If you don't want to tell her the real reason why, you don't have to, but it will probably help her get over you if you do. If you want to see the kind of problems that result from what you are doing, go to the LGBT Later in Life section, and read the many stories about people coming out after getting heterosexually married and having children.

 

The longer you wait the deeper you get

 

Yeah, i agree with the posters that say that you are better off breaking the engagement with her now, rather than crush her heart after marriage.

I'm just speaking out of my own personal experience, where I did the same thing - denied my sexuality, thought I needed "saving" from myself & "converted" to Christianity, then settled into marrying a person who was not only not compatible to what I really find attractive, but it ended up being an abusive relationship. Not saying that forcing yourself into a marriage you don't want to be in would go this way - I'm sure I'm an extreme example of how terribly wrong things could go.

But aside from the abuse, the stress of not being able to really be me was 18 years of pure misery, and even though it was good for my health to leave from the abuse, I now I have to deal with the greater heartache that my children are involved. It hurts to know that this divorce is hurting them so much too.

Seriously, it will hurt everybody less if you stop things in their tracks now. I don't think you need to tell her that you are gay - you can simply say that you had a change of heart & that you felt it was best to part ways now rather than down the road. She will hurt, but she will be better able to move on with her life than she would from a divorce later.

 

Get out of this now just say u can't marry her for a different reason. And if u do tell your close friends and they disown u they're not actually your friend.

 

If you're not ready to come out to the world, or a large number of people, don't tell her. Depending how she takes the news, she may temporarily, in her anger phase, out you to a lot of people you're not ready to deal with (takes seconds to do that on twitter or facebook or email today). And let's say she's the most level-headed understanding girl on the planet, you will force her to lie to everyone about why the engagement is off. How confident are you she's going to keep that secret until you're ready?

Finally, if you're still intimate with her, before you tell her or even later, make sure you are proactively using birth control (i.e. use a condom don't just rely on her saying she is still on the pill etc...) - if you think your life is complicated right now add babies in the mix...

 

@Mrgr8tday: before you get deeper into this relationship, please take a step back and really evaluate where you're willing to go. Take a look at the "LGBT Later in Life" forum; it filled with those of us who either went into a straight marriage already knowing we are gay, hoping against hope that we could "make it work" and live the rest of our lives happily in a straight marriage; and the rest of the folks came to grips with their same-sex attraction sometime after getting married. Rarely do these relationships end well, and regardless of how good/bad you end the marriage with your spouse, once there are kids in the picture their concerns (especially at younger ages) take precedence (hopefully in the minds of both parents, else they be used as battering rams to bludgeon the other spouse... not much different than straight couple divorces, really.)

Like others have stated, you are not obligated to come out to her at this point. If you have doubts about marriage now, it will not get better after your vows. And it certainly won't get better when you take home your wife and baby from the maternity ward at the hospital. And it won't be easier to deal with 5, 25 years down the road when you realize how miserable you are and then start resenting your wife and kids when it is none of their faults, it's yours alone.

This is one time in your life when you really do have to think about your own long-term self-interests ahead of everyone else's.