My long story

I have been on this site for awhile now (on and off). But while showering this morning I decided to share my story. So here it is...

My name is Ethan, i'm 17 years old. I was born and live in Connecticut. I’m a varsity rower on my high schools crew team. I first really realized I was gay when I was about 14. But I really couldn’t even admit it to myself until I was 16.

I have heard everyone else’s stories of how they pushed away friends for fear of them finding out that they where gay. But i’m not like that. I can’t function without human interactions. I need to know that i’m wanted and valued by people. So to try and cover up my sexuality I distanced myself from it. I had a friend (Jon) who was good friends with an openly gay person (Zach). Let’s just say i’m not proud of some of the things I said about him. But the truth was I had a HUGE crush on him. When I finally decided to come out, I knew who I would tell first, Jon. I decided this for two reasons, the first being I knew he would be ok with me being gay. And that we always told each other anything that we wanted to, I just felt really comfortable talking to him. It took me a few months of failed attempts, but I finally told him. He was over my house for the night and we where going to bed. I was doing an impression of someone (I don’t even remember who) and for no reason I dropped into a really stereotypical gay voice. So I say (still in the gay voice) “I don’t even know why I’m talking like this”. And he says “well are you gay?” He said it jokingly but I was so determined to tell him and this seemed like a good opportunity. So I answered yes. He laughed (thinking it was a joke) and I sat there in the dark terrified of what I had just done.

When he had stopped laughing I said in as calm a voice as I could manage “I’m not kidding”. Again he thought this was a great joke (I just read back and realized that I kind of made him look like a jerk. But he really isn’t you have to understand that I would joke about stuff like this all the time. And that no one guessed I was gay at all (well kind of but ill get there later)). Anyway finally he asked me if I had told my parents yet I said no he was the first person I had told.

So feeling good I went to sleep. In the morning though, he asked if I had been serious. At that point I felt like I wanted to throw up. I had told myself that he would be the easiest person to tell and everything would go fine. But there I was unable to convince him that the whole thing wasn’t a big joke. Trying to hold back tears we packed up his stuff and waited for his mom to come and pick him up. While we where waiting he said he wanted to show me something funny on the internet. He showed me this http://youtube.com/watch?v=MFoyp71xw3w I was in anguish watching it. I felt like he was testing me or something. At one point he even made a comment on how hot the girl was. I was relived when his mom came to pick him up. It was the only time I have ever been happy to see him leave. Its not that I was angry at him, more like disappointed. At that point I almost went back into the closet. I would just tell him I had been joking and I would stay in my little closet forever. But I knew I couldn’t do that. I would just have to keep going forward.

He was all I could think about that day. Did he believe me or not? It was sheer anguish. Then finally I decided that I couldn’t do this anymore. So I called him and asked him if he believed me. If he had said no I had every intention of ending that friendship. Luckily though he said he did believe me. There’s no way I could describe the sense of relief and happiness that I felt at that moment so I won’t even try. But from then on all I wanted to do was be with him. With him I no longer had to wear a mask. I could act how I wanted, I could act gay!! I should note that I didn’t actually act any different, but the idea was awesome.

After a few weeks I decided I wanted to come out all the way. But first I wanted to tell Dan, I had known him forever and we were great friends. He had helped me out of a lot of tough spots before and I just wanted him to hear it from me. So I decided to call him. It was hard to even say the words but when I did force them out, he informed me that he already knew because he had been on my computer at one point and found a trace to a support site. So then I told anyone who asked. And that’s how I came out to my friends.

My parents where more difficult to tell. In fact I couldn’t bring myself to tell them face to face. At this point I had just created a facebook account. My profile said that I was gay. So I decided to send a friend invite to my brother who is at collage. It worked beautifully. Two days later my mom takes me aside and tells me that no matter what she loves me.

So that’s my story. Thanks for reading.

 

im glad you all liked how i came out over facebook:eusa_danc . at the time i was ashamed of it. I looked at it as the easy way out:bang: and hated myself for it. but thanks for all the support.

oh and in response to JSG. it was over the span of mabey two months.