at a pause in life, and my closets bolted shut :(

Instead of just balancing the pos. and neg. in your life, why not focus more on the positive?
it sounds to me that you are depressed... even if you're not, you have to realize that no matter WHAT, in life you WILL be judged.
but this is not necessarily a bad thing, you could be judged as a role model, a sweetheart, a nice guy, a good friend, etc.
If there are people that judge you negatively all because you are gay, then all you need to do is stop caring about who they are, and them in general.
No matter who you are, you cannot judge a person because of their sexual orientation.
especially your close friends.... if they are not willing to accept you for who you are, then you might as well just stop caring for them. they're not worth your time.

 

Hi there, and welcome to EC! :smilewave I hope you'll enjoy your stay here and that we can be of some help in figuring out what direction you want to take!

Since you touch on two things, I'll give my idea on those in order:

1) College or work

I think that the most important thing here is to make a pick and stick by it for at least a year. Don't get me wrong: it's good to balance pros and cons, and to have an informed decision. In my experience, however, the final two or three choices just keep being options indefinitely.
After school, I kept doubing between studying history or engineering, which uni to go to, or even to just take a year of going abroad. They all had good and bad points, but in the end, I picked engineering, mainly because I had to pick something. And sure, looking back, my life would have been different, but there is a time when you just have to accept that all options are equally good, and that keeping the stalling going is much worse.

So I'd say that if you have a course that seems interesting, is in an interesting location, and has relatively good job propsects, pick that one and don't look back until the year is over. No doubt you'll learn new things, meet interesting people, and broaden your horizons. Way better than being at home with only your own thoughts and a list of pros and cons to mull over. It's not easy (I'm a compulsive worrier and list-maker myself), but sometimes you need to just flee forward, so to speak.

2 Coming out

I'm having the impression you're doing the same as the above here: stalling, and trying to keep all your optons open. Again, I don't begrudge you that, as it is what I did until I was 25.
But frankly, that is overthinking it. You have friends who you know would be accepting. From that to your life being ruined is quite a big leap to make. a leap mostly informed by irrational fear. If you come out to them, it isn't going to be saying "I'm gay", and seeing them running off to tell the world. If they're close friends, they will most definitely talk about it, and wish to know what your plans are, and I'm sure they will take into account that you want to come out in steps and move at your own pace.

What helps here is to make it more concrete. What I did was sit down and write a letter, explaining that I was (and indeed always have been) gay, that I wanted them to know because I trusted them, and answers to all questions I could conceivably think of them asking (including the important: "who can/can't we tell, and who else knows?"). You don't need to send this letter, but it helps in visualising what would happen.

Obviously, once you tell them, this will take a bit to sink in. For a moment (from hours to days or weeks) they will probably think and rethink their mental image of you. But all the while, you'll still be there, being yourself. And they'll quickly see that nothing much changed, except they just know you a bit more. On the whole, if my friends think of me differently now, they seem to find me more open and fun to be around, now that I no longer have anything to hide.

And that's the first step of coming out, really. Don't try to think further than that at first. Getting support of good friends is the first step in getting a support network, and the steps to take after that will present themselves in time.



I hope these ideas already help a bit. Please do stick around and post some more, or check the Support and Advice section to see if there's any stories that you might find inspiring. And never hesitate to ask further questions!

 

Two days ago, i cameout to everyone but my parents and their friends. but everyone at school knows now, and i've actually had the best time of my life since hat happened. it was just something i suddenly realised about myself over the summer holidays. i've known i was gay for years, but i realized it didn't matter. If you know your safe, and you know you'll have friends, then i think the only reason someone really has for not coming out is lack of acceptance in themselves. just my opinion, but i had no idea i was internally homophobic until that happened. i've had litterally no bullying since then, and people treat me better for telling the truth.

 

Welcome to EC!

>>>With the above, I have another issue which is that I'm gay, but I just don't know how to go about coming out at all. I only have about 4 close friends since highschool has been out, and I know they wouldn't take it bad, but I'm still afraid of just having to change the way people think of me. I know being gay doesn't define me, but I can't get myself to actually tell anyone about it, I keep thinking if one person finds out, everyone will know and my life would be ruined. I have thought about suicide a few times because I don't like being gay but never anything close to taking real action, I don't hate being gay, but those people who say its a choice have alot to learn.

There's some rather contradictory stuff in here. Let me tackle it bit by bit.

"I keep thinking if one person finds out, everyone will know and my life would be ruined." OK, say one person finds out. And say they tell everybody else. How will your life be "ruined", exactly? You'll still have these friends. Maybe a couple of them will look at you a bit different, but that's hardly a ruination of your life. And worst possible scenario - you lose a friend. (This hardly ever happens, but let's go ahead and push things to the extreme.) Then your life was precisely where it was before, except you found out that one of your friends actually cared more about your presumed "straightness" than about you. Anybody who would drop you as a friend upon learning your sexuality isn't a friend. He's a guy you hang out with, but he's not a friend. And, not to put too fine a point on it, but it doesn't exactly sound like your life has much to ruin at this stage of the game. You're not in school, you're unemployed, and you're not exactly sure what your next step will be. Nothing wrong with any of this, of course - many of us have been in a similar spot. But it doesn't exactly sound like you've got a delicate and rewarding life to get "ruined" by your coming out, anyway. As Dylan sang years ago, "when you got nothing, you got nothing to lose".

"I have thought about suicide a few times because I don't like being gay but never anything close to taking real action, I don't hate being gay..." Then why the suicidal thoughts? If you really don't hate being gay, and you think your friends will be supportive...then what's the problem, really? Obviously SOMETHING is sticking in your craw about being gay if you contemplated suicide over it.

If I had to guess - and that's all it is - it's that you're really not fully accepting of it all. And I think that's where this site can help you a bit. Because none of us signed up for the gay thing. We all realized we were gay (or bi, or trans), many of us have accepted it, and many of us have simply gotten on with our lives. You're gay. BFD. It doesn't mean a damn thing in the long run. OK, you might have to look a bit harder to find a date on Friday night. And a couple people might look at you weird. It's not like the same people wouldn't look at you weird based on your race or clothing choices or something else, anyway. Those people don't matter. Dismiss them, and get back to living your life. Tons of us have done that, and we're living kick-ass lives. You can, as well.

Lex

 

Way better than it was a week ago, i have to add