Ok so here is my thing. I'm 22 years old and a union construction worker. I have been working for three years as a boilermaker and my father work for 40 years as a boilermaker as well. So I have been around the trade for all my life. I dont want the guys at work to know about me being gay just because I know they would give me shit all the time. They already tell gay jokes all day and its getting really old. I mean old as in I want to start yelling at the next person that says a joke or some comment about gays. But here is the thing every one at work knows my family really well. They always ask what I'm up to, who I'm dating and things like that. Its getting so bad that they even are starting to know when I'm lying to them. I dont know what to do here. Does any one have advice on how to hide your real life from people at work? Thanks for any advice.
You lie. And you keep lying. But that gets old before very long. And I think people start to see through it too. Here's a thought. Who says you can't be the first openly gay boilermaker? Your dad is respected, you seem to be well liked. Perhaps you can change some hearts and minds regarding gay people by coming out. Something to think about.
Hi there! Jim pretty much summed up my thoughts already. The more you try to hide, and pretend that you are not gay, even if it is just at work, will have an impact on you. In fact, in can cause or create even more stress for you at work, because you are actually spending a significant amount of time with your co-workers and have to interact with them. Do you have one co-worker, who you know would or could be supportive? If you do, try to come out to that co-worker and use him/her as a support base. Hope this helps!
I was once in a somewhat similar situation. True, I was in Colorado rather than Alabama, but then again, that was back when Colorado had the nickname "the Hate State" for its passage of anti-gay legislation. And I was in the auto parts business, which may or may not have been as presumably anti-gay as your workplace. Then again, it was (yikes) nearly twenty years ago. But I came out. And no, they didn't instantly drop the gay jokes and decide "it's OK to be gay". Some of them looked at me askance for awhile. But I did my best to prove that I was still "just Lex". Most of the jokes I heard weren't meanspriited after that - they were the same sort of jokes we'd make about Tom's age, or Randy's crappy driving. We had a woman working for us who would go and work with clients to help square their accounts away. It was a bit of a running joke that we sent a female in the hopes that they'd be more prone to pay if a female asked them to. But one client was really slow about paying their bills. One guy joked, "we should send Lex down next time - maybe they're into that sort of thing." My response? "Forget it. I'd want them to buy me dinner first, and according to their account, they ain't paying for nothing." Everyone laughed, and we went on to talk about something else. Just "Lex being Lex". I don't know if it'll be like that where you are. But I think if you own it, if you're relaxed about it, chances are good that they'll come around. Lex
