I've been dating a girl for almost nine months. I can't come out to my family, but I really want to tell my two best friends. They've been my best friends for three years and they're also my roommates at uni. I feel bad keeping such a big secret from them. They'll both be coming to my house to stay for a weekend in a few weeks and I want to tell them then. I'm worried that it'll change the way that they feel about me or that they'll be awkward around me. A mutual guy friend of ours recently came out to all three of us and they seemed to take it well, but it's not quite the same situation. One of my friends is an open-minded Catholic. I think she has trouble handling homosexuality with the way she was raised. She was the first one our friend came out to and she said she was perfectly fine with it. She handles homosexuality in the media well. The only thing I'm worried about is how she'll take me being bi. She can't understand "gay ships" (same-sex pairings of fictional characters, usually not appearing in the actual show/book) for characters that are supposedly straight. I don't know if she just doesn't like thinking of those characters together, if she thinks canon is the end-all be-all, or if she doesn't realize that sexuality isn't black and white. (That might sound kind of strange, but it's one of the ways I "tested the waters" with them, so to speak.) My other friend is also religious and open-minded. She reacted well to our friend's coming out, but I have no idea how she'll react with me. Despite going to an extremely large public high school in an extremely large city, she's a very sheltered person. I've had to explain a lot of sex slang with her, mostly because I'm terrified one day she'll get into a relationship with someone who will take advantage of her lack of knowledge. Any advice on how I can raise the subject with them? Anything I can do to make it easier? I've mentioned my girlfriend to them before, but always by name. I've tried not to refer to her as "my friend" so it won't feel like as much of a lie.
You've said they've reacted well in the past to other people coming out and they're both open minded, so I don't think you'll have that much of a hard time. Maybe you could begin by discussing homosexuality in the media, and then just work from there. Discuss characters that are bisexual in canon, or bisexual celebrities, and explain that you relate to them because of your shared sexuality. Something like that? When I come out, I tend to just tell my friends I need to tell them something, and then just tell them, though I understand that doesn't appeal to everyone. I hope it goes well for you!
