A Slow Journey

Hi,

I happened upon this site yesterday while "googling" about coming out later in life. I'm an Asian American in his early 40's who only started exploring his interests in men about 4 years ago. While I knew I had interests in some guys since I was in my teenage years, I always thought that I was just interested in them because they were more athletic than I and that I wanted to have a body like theirs. I was the bookworm type, skinny and wore glasses (and still do, although cooler looking ones). Furthermore, the word "gay" was foreign to me until when I went to college. Even then, I wasn't exposed to the idea of what gay really was.

Growing up in a very tight-knit family with over-protective parents who demanded their children to excel in school and to not date until after college, I didn't even experience dating a woman until after my mid-20's. I'm what you would probably consider to be a late bloomer. In fact, the woman that I dated had to ask me out. That's how bad I was in the dating department. In any case, while initially dating her was very sweet and I enjoyed being "in love", things did not work out after only 6 months of long-distance dating. After her, I dated a few more women during my next 9+ years, almost all of who have become good friends of mine. While they were all nice and beautiful women, I never felt the urge to proceed any further with them beyond platonic friendship. In fact, I never even kissed one of them. It wasn't until about 4 years ago that the urge to really explore my interest in men came full force. Prior to then, I've continued to occasionally look at nude / half nude pics of men once in a blue moon, which can be every other year or so. I did have "crushes" on straight guys that have been either my college classmates or colleagues, but didn't really know what those feelings were about.

In any case, about 4 years ago, I was dating a woman that I would be the "ideal" woman that I would marry if I was interested in woman. But, sadly I did not even have the urge to kiss her even though we had many moments alone that can be considered romantic. As such, I decided that I really needed to explore my interest in men. While I'm not proud of it, the first guy I explored being with a guy with was a married caucasian I met on craigslist who was working at an Asian country that I visited with family. I was really nervous when I invited him to my room at the hotel. All sorts of things came to mind, including the possibility of being mugged, beaten up, etc. Fortunately for me, he was a nice guy and very patient with me as he knew I was new to this. We ended up just exploring each others' body by touching each other. We did not even kiss. I remember I felt very guilty after the experience and swore to myself that I would not do this again. Well, it wasn't 24 hours before I reached out to him again the next evening, but due to our scheduling conflicts, we did not meet up again before I headed back to the States.

Since that experience, I met a couple more guys and explored a little bit more, including kissing and oral, before dating another guy in a long distance relationship. He's also not out and was exploring so we had that in common. We would meet about twice a month either in my city or in his, and chat on the phone for hours every weekend. It was really nice until he said to me six months later during one of our weekend phone calls that he's not feeling in love any more. While I did not have any negative feelings at the moment of the call and even consoled him, it hit me a few days later while I was on the subway platform that I just got dumped. It was definitely not a good feeling, especially since it came out of nowhere.

In the months to follow, I resorted to one or two online sites to meet guys. In many cases, they were for a one "night" stand so to speak as the urge to explore continued to be strong. I continued to be very grateful that the people I met were all very nice and patient. While meeting these guys sort of satisfied my need to explore and learn how to satisfy a guy, I soon realized that they become meaningless because they did not have the emotional intimacy that I sought. I also found out that for the couple of guys that I ended up seeing more than two - three times over the course of a month to two months, I would fall "in love" with them very fast. In retrospect, this is probably because I ached for that emotional intimacy and to be in a relationship really badly. Needless to say, those two experiences did not end well as my expectations far exceeded where they thought the dating process was, especially since I'm not out to my friends or family yet.

During this time, however, I did meet another guy that was very patient with me as a friend (with benefits). I've known him now for over a year and about 6 months ago, I realized what a great guy he was and asked if he would consider dating seriously. I was especially appreciative of the fact that he did not mind that I'm not out yet and was supportive in my gradual process of coming out. I went from being reluctant about hugging him in public to now entertaining a peck on the lips once in awhile. He's older than me by about 10 years so there's a certain level of maturity that I appreciate. I can definitely say that I'm in love with him, but the fact that I'm not out yet and that my parents live with me, there are challenges with spending time with him. Again, while not being proud of it, I've had to give various excuses to my parents for staying over at friends while I was really staying over with him. He and I try to go out at least once a week, and we text each other a few times almost everyday. We unfortunately don't chat on the phone because he's usually not in the mood to talk after a long day at work. I do miss not having the chance to talk to him more often, but I have to respect his decision on that. As I'm almost always the one to initiate texting him each day, I do find myself wishing he would just initiate it from time to time to show that he was thinking about me. Of course, I understand that I think this way because I'm still new to dating men and per my track record, I need some reassurance more often than not that he's still in love. As such, I try to think logically, but it is very difficult to not let one's emotion take over that process. Afterall, love is not logical. I must say though that dating men is so much more difficult than dating woman.

On my part, I know that I can only be fair to him and give us an opportunity to grow our relationship if I come out sooner rather than later. As such, I've been mulling over coming out to a select few close friends in the next few months. I think it will, however, be a longer time before I come out to my family though. I know all this needs time, but it's so difficult when all I want to do is to move in with him and be with him.

 

Nick, Chouchou: thank you both for your kind responses.

I think it's both the sense of responsibility for taking care of my parents and the reaction from them that are primarily holding me back now. But, having said that, I'm well aware of what I want to and need to do. It's just about the execution. When I look back at where I was a few years ago, and where I am now, I'm sometimes amazed at how much has transpired with me during these past few years. It's all good, regardless of the number of hurdles that I have and will encounter.