Finally came out to my best friend!

Hi everyone. First time posting here really although I've been a long time lurker. Thanks to everyone who has posted their stories so far as they are so inspirational and I'm hoping mine will be too.

So I'm 20 years old and have pretty much known I was gay since I was about 12 but looking back I definitely have been my whole life. Little things from when I was around 5 and 6 just make a whole lot of sense to me now (e.g. staring at and being fascinated with naked guys in the changing room when I used to go swimming every Saturday night with my family :eusa_ange) and I was definitely born this way. Only really accepted it myself about a month ago and I've been dropping hints to my best friend over the last few weeks.

So my story really starts about 2 weeks ago when after a night out, me and my best friend were walking to get a taxi and I was talking to him about a girl from my work who used to fancy me. I was saying how I never did anything with her because "she's not my type". Then I added "to be honest, I don't really have any type and never have done" and he asked me what I meant. Before I could answer we had arrived at the taxi rank and both got in separate taxis and went home. When I got home, for some reason I was annoyed I'd missed my moment and so sent him a text saying "I was trying to tell you something there but it can wait for another day." He replied asking if I wanted him to ring me to talk but it was about 2am and my parents were asleep in the next room so I declined.

I met up with him a few days later in our town and we were sitting in McDonalds and he brought up that I had said I wanted to speak to him. I told him it was personal and not really something I wanted to talk about in McDonalds. We also went back to his house after that and I kept trying to bring it up but then getting scared and not doing. By the time I was leaving, I knew I had to somehow make myself do it so I said "about what I wanted to tell you, it's kind of a huge thing and something I need to talk to you about for a while after" and he said that was fine. At this point I pretty much knew he had to be at least suspecting that being gay was one of the possibilities of what I had to tell him.

We again met up a few days later but with a few other friends and whilst I was confident he would be fine with it, he would make certain comments at times which made me doubt it. For example, we know someone who wants to join the navy and my best friend said "oh he wants to be a poof?" Things like that really made me question whether it was the right idea to tell him but he has also said other comments that made me think he was really tolerant, such as he often would say homophobic and racist people are stupid and close-minded.

So that brings me to today. It was just me and him that met up today and we were at his house alone in his conservatory. He then said this would be a perfect time to talk about what I had wanted to tell him. Conversation went something like:

Him: So what was it you were wanting to tell me?
Me: Oh that? Yeah I don't think I will tell you anymore.
Him: Why not? I'm pretty sure I've guessed what it is.
Me: I just think you might not like it.
Him: You think I'll think lesser of you?
Me: Yeah.
Him: Do you want me to ask you?
Me: Ye.. no!

At this point I could feel my face going red and my mouth completely dry. Could barely speak and asked him for some water lol. After a bit of dithering, he said "I really don't care you know, doesn't matter at all". After this, we had both realised he was right with his suspicions and there was no point me flat out saying it or him even asking me. He then just went on to ask me a few questions like how long I had known, if I liked anyone in high school, what my plan was now and if I was gonna tell anyone else. He also said at one point a few years ago he had thought he was gay which was a bit of a shock. And he told me that it's not a big deal now like it used to be and that pretty much everyone knows someone who is gay.

So he gave me a big hug as I was leaving and was really glad I told him. He said nothing is going to change between us and he apologised for any comments he might have made that offended me but assured me there is no malice behind them and just slips of the tongue. He is pretty tactless so I completely understand lol.

I'm feeling so elated right now and so lucky to have a best friend like him. Sorry for the long post but I hope it helps people even just a little. I'm not sure where I'm going now, think I will wait a while before telling anyone else because this was such a big deal. Thanks for reading if you got this far.