The Long and Winding Road...

I know this is a bit long, but every time I try cutting it down it ends up being longer...

After reading quite a few posts on here with various titbits of advice and just general chit chat which have helped me work various things out, and start my own coming out process I thought I'd add my story to the pot too in case it can help just one person....

Basically my own coming out process has pretty much taken place over the last twelve months or so (obviously with odd bits before then) – especially the bits where I start accepting myself for who I am. But without some of the background it doesn’t make sense. A lot of the stuff that’s happened in the last year was absorbed at the time, but I only really understood it after coming out for the first time and the fog in my head cleared – all the stuff from my family certainly falls into this category - I'd seen or heard it but not really registered it).

As well as the resources on this site, reading the blog posts for Coming Out Documentary and watching his trailers, and watching the videos on the It Gets Better Project website have also helped me see things clearly.


In the beginning...

Going back to High School for every time I was called by my own name I was also called one of "poofta", "queer" or "spaz" and while I knew what "spaz" meant (short for Spastic, meaning Spastics Society - a charity helping disabled kids - in my context this was used to refer to my difficulties processing language which meant I used to go to the support classes most lunch times) I didn't know what the others meant (being both slang and during the section 28 era these weren't in the dictionary).

As my fellow classmates started to get interested in girls (I never did get what did they saw in the “news papers” the Daily Sport and The Sun) I never did, although I never got interested in boys either. However in my last year of school when I was 15 we got this book which offered advice on a number of topics from college, university, employment, sex and relationships. One part of this was a glossary on various terms and "Poof" and "Queer" both said "Homosexual (male)" and that said something along the lines of "men who are sexually attracted to other men". Just this simple statement got me wondering if the reason I wasn't interested in girls was because I was one of the "poofta" / "queer" people my classmates kept calling me.

16 yo - The first year at college I finally started to be somewhere where I was called by my own name all the time (yay) and finally had someone in the support department who was able to find things that worked for helping me process language better and because of this I just felt happier and started to throw myself into college work and in the main part got twice as many distinctions as I needed to get that as an overall grade!

17 yo - Awakenings & Denial - The second year of college, this was the first time I started realising guys were attractive (well this one lad on the bus to college who I kept catching myself checking him out) but I kinda ignored this a bit and thought it might just be a phase, but to be honest checking him out on a daily basis and then checking the lads out in the lunch queue most dinner times means that since then I’ve known deep down that I’m gay, but I haven’t been ready to accept that - although I do remember buying a copy of Gay Times from a newsagent in town (one where you just read the price off and they keyed it in so they didn't have to look at what you were buying) and even saying to the bathroom mirror "I am Gay".

18 yo - Then I moved to a new city for university. I remember choosing the uni based on them having a gay club/bars etc in the town (one of many criteria - was deffo not a major one) and an LGBT Soc (which I never went to - I guess I was too scared to go to them in-case there was someone there in my flat/course who would be able to out me and I wasn't ready for that (which of course is stupid as anyone there will be gay themselves, or at least think they are (or friendly to the gays anyway) and therefore it wouldn't be an issue, but I only realised that a few weeks ago after reading another post on these forums http://emptyclosets.com/forum/1118970-post4.html )).

This was where I started crushing big time on one of my (straight) flatmates "P" and we (quite a few of us) used to get a bit tipsy playing Playstation and then start wrestling which I always used to enjoy (the man on man contact - shallow or what?) - then after Christmas we were in a nightclub and he was getting very close with this guy and I thought I saw him kiss him (on a few occasions after this night I saw this again and realised he was actually passing him drugs :rolle: and they were not actually kissing) and soon after started to make a move on him and I think he realised what was happening and pushed me off (not in an aggressive manner though, more you're drunk aren't you?) then a few nights later we (the 9 of us in the flat) were chatting about various rubbish in a game of spin the bottle meats truth or dare and one on question that came up was "If you were gay who in this flat would you fancy?" - of course not wanting my flatmates to know about my crush on "P" I answered "T" (the only other attractive lad in the flat) and I think both him and "P" might have realised that I was gay as T hardly spoke to me after that and the play-wrestling with S stopped (everyone else who got this question just downed the rest of their drink).

A few weeks later we were in the kitchen and one of the girls thought it would be a good idea to watch a porn film, as you do, and the lads were really getting into it, but looking at the girls on screen I felt absolutely nothing, but noticed one of the lads was kinda hot.

20 yo - As the first year ended I went into denial big time, and suppressed all my feelings for a good 18 months (now living with "P", "Bn" and "D" for a second year ("P" for the third year) during my student placement) and then one night I was on a colleagues leaving do and when I started to walk home I accidentally headed towards my second year house, and as I got to the edge of the centre realised and started to head the correct way - this involved walking past the cities gay night club and for some reason I decided to go in. I ended up with a lad and after a bit of kissing and stuff we ended up heading back to mine and sleeping together and I enjoyed the night, and then waking up in the morning with another guy in my arms left me with a nice warm feeling. However my housemate "Bn" then got up and jumped in the shower (the first time any of my housemates had been up before midday on a Saturday since we'd moved in) and I basically ended up forcing the lad out the house and taking him to the bus stop so he could get home. When I got back twenty minutes later all my housemates were up and in the lounge watching TV and wondering where I'd been (to Boots to get some paracetamol was the factual, if only partially correct, answer)

A couple of weeks later, and not for the last time, I was in the kitchen and "P", "Bn" and "D" and they cornered me and asked if I was gay, of course I replied no and wanted to get out there ASAP and then felt like shit for the rest of the day. After another half dozen of these cornerings I decided that if "Bn" or "D" asked me on their own I would tell them the truth but of course they never asked me again.

21 yo - At the start of the year I managed to injure myself at the start of it and was on crutches for a while, and as I struggled to get in the basement to get food out the freezer I ended up having take-out every day and started piling on loads of weight, being a bit down in the dumps and struggling with uni work meant this year was a bit of a shitty one. Anyway as the end of the year approached my housemates moved out (they finished uni, but I had year to go) and I started to walk to and from work in the glorious summer sun. One night I decided to go to the gay night club again. But no-one showed us any attention and I left after a couple of hours (putting on weight, being down, and being sober when I arrived so a bit uptight obviously didn't help) and ended up going home a bit down.

22 yo - Now I entered my final year and threw myself into my studies I suppressed everything again until one night when I was out with some friends - one of them tried to set me up with this girl - I was chatting with her for a while and his brother then showed up. I pretty much only saw his back but then went to the bar to get some drinks. When I got back from the bar a couple more girls had joined the group I was able to recognise him from his underwear, jeans and bum, but could I remember anything about the girl? No - I ended up giving her drink to one of the new arrivals by mistake. I then realised that I was 100% gay! As it was coming up to my exams I just ignored that for a bit and finished my course. (Since that night the lad I was with had asked me a few times if I'm gay and has even smsed from a gay bar in town as he saw my picture in there :bang: )

23 yo - Now I've reached the end of uni and all the people I care about have moved away from uni so I have no one I feel I can confide in so look at gay support groups in the town and find this one for people under 25s - I kept intending to go but something always came up (see also the comments about the LGBT Soc at uni) which stopped me from going and before I knew it I was 25 and again had nowhere to turn to.

26 yo - Soon after I got in contact with a couple of childhood friends on Facebook and found out through this that two of them were gay (that’s two of my four best friends from when I was little, and the third switch high schools after he couldn't take being called queer and poofta any more) and over the next couple of years I started to see photos in my friend stream of them with their boyfriends, their families and what not which made we want to have the same, but I didn't know where to turn. I even remember having dinner with my mum one day and she asked "Do you have a girlfriend?" "No", "Boyfriend?" "No" - her friend then turned to her and gave her a look implying "did you really just ask your son that?" to which my mum replied "well he never tells us anything how on earth should I know?"

29 yo - The Final Countdown

Last summer just after my birthday I started realising I was getting towards the end of my 20s and realised little had changed in the past decade, and I decided I need to do something about it. Therefore I have started to exercise more which has made me fitter and more confident, while also helping me fit into stuff that has been too small for a number of years. I also decided that the other elephant in the room needed addressing and after stumbling on this site I joined it and started the homeward bound leg of my coming out journey.

Just after I joined this site I downloaded a location based dating app for my phone (after watching a repeat of Stephen Fry talking about it on Top Gear!) to be a bit nosey and see if there were any gays nearby or at work - of course there weren't. However when I went home for a cousins’ wedding a few weeks later I fired up the app and found one of our neighbours (with whom we used to play with when we were kids and whom I'd seen chatting to my sister when I got home) was gay and there was a lad "G" about 300 meters away with the same surname as my cousin (who's wedding I was home for and who's mum lived about 300 meters away...). Fast forward three hours and we were waiting for the coach to take us to the wedding and the very same lad shows up and starts taking to my uncle, telling him about this lad he's met and where he was going to take him on a date tomorrow night. This was the first time I can ever remember anyone in my extended family talking about anything gay and they were completely sound with it.

The following week we got a new lad "S" starting at work (kinda my assistant) who was openly gay and shortly after another one downstairs "B" and these two lads started to become friends with various people in my work-friends circle and me. After the Christmas party our work-friend circle ended up in a gay bar (our first night out as it happens) - and of course the "so are you gay?, are you straight?, Asexual? Bi?" question came up - now the problem with this question is that I had got to the stage where I couldn't bring myself to lie any more, but couldn't bring myself to tell the truth either so had to use my difficulties processing language as an excuse to pretend I couldn't hear what was being said (I do struggle somewhat when there are multiple voices going together).

Then I went home for Christmas and while we were having Christmas dinner with my parents, siblings, and my uncle when the topic of "G" came up and how he was having to work xmas day and that "G" and his fella were going away for a couple of nights in the new year to have there together time. Never in a million years would I have expected something like this to have become Christmas dinner conversation and I went into the new year realising that if I was ever going to have that I would need to come out. I started reading various LGBT books and this kinda made more determined to finally be honest about myself. Since then I have noticed my dad post a number of posts on Facebook in support of LGB issues (mainly criticism of the church/government). I also made the New Years Resolution to "come out" by my 30th birthday. (I hadn't defined coming out very well and therefore ending up making it seam like "to everyone" rather than "to someone" which was way too much pressure).

The questions "who are you attracted too" / "so are you gay?, are you straight?, Asexual? Bi?" kept coming round (and again it was always in a group situation - argh!!) and there are only so many times you can ignore this. Anyway when we were at "S"'s birthday night out we ended up in the gay club and I was asked by him and a former colleague (who was his friend but I didn't know too well) when we were on our own if I was gay or what, and they were telling me that I didn't need to worry and all that but I couldn't say it so replied "I dunno" - yeah like any straight boys use that answer!

A few weeks later and a few colleagues and I went out for a meal and a couple of them (not "S" or "B" - they only ever asked outside the big group situation) took it upon themselves to try and get an answer out, all I can remember if feeling like I wanted the world to open a great big hole and swallow me up), and to their credit "S" and "B" managed to steer the conversation in a different direction, and later on that night "S" took me to one side to check if I was okay and mentioned that if he had been put in that situation he would have hated it but if I ever wanted to chat I knew where he was. Anyway we ended up in the local gay pub where the people I were with ended up chatting to various people inside and outside the group.

A couple of nights later I was watching the film "Prayers for Bobby" which made me cry something rotten, and I realised that my parents/family will probably be okay eventually. (Seriously though – do NOT watch this film just before you go to bed, ended up getting to sleep really late and needing to watch a couple of Russell Howards’ Good News’ to make me laugh and take my mind off it) The following night I happened to notice a post on Facebook from my Aunty about the week she had just spent with her best (female) friend (from the city she used to live in) and her (female) fiancée and it made me realise that I've been quite naïve when thinking of my families response would be (they have generally been quite liberal and always told us off whenever we used language which could be considered racist or sexist and why it's bad to use words like that - also when gay stuff has been on TV there have never been any negative comments or the channel changed).

I then decided that I needed to tell someone and kept trying to get hold of "S" at the end of the work day to tell him but this always failed. Then on the last day of my 29th year we had a little get-together at work (cake, crisps and juice) to say happy birthday to me and one of the girls asked "so where do you see yourself in ten years then?" to which I heard yet another one of my colleagues say "with a nice boyfriend" to which I thought "you don't know how right you are" while pretending to have not heard him.

30 yo - I then had a couple of days off work and me and a select few of my colleagues (two gay, two straight) when out for a birthday night of drinks, of course being undeceive as usual we went on our normal bar crawl of all the gay friendly / gay bars / gay nightclub. All night "S" had been trying to find out who I was attracted to and at one point I went to him "that guy over there is well hot" - but as I said it he kind spotted a boy a chasing after him, and therefore I wasn’t sure if he’d heard me.

As I was off work the following week I wasn't sure if he had heard or not. However during that week I saw this post http://emptyclosets.com/forum/coming-out-stories/64970-how-can-i-motivate-myself-come-out.html and in specific this piece of advice

This cleared my mind some what and I decided to forget about how everyone else would react and just tell him if I hadn't heard.

When I got back to work he didn't mention anything about that night, so I figured he hadn't heard. However he did ask (me and the rest of our mini group) if I wanted to go to Pride at the end of the month (I dunno, we'll see). For the rest of that week I went to work every morning with the intent of trying to arrange an after work chat with him, then bottling it every day. On the Friday I wrote an SMS and sent it to him - of course the blasted phone decided to say "Message Sending Failed" - argh!!! The following week I kept trying to send it to him but couldn't press the Send button.

Then on the Thursday morning I put the radio on and they were playing The Feeling - Strange [youtube]Ue65TyCjFzE[/youtube] and I ended up hearing the lyrics

and I edited the SMS again and tried to send it but couldn't.

About 30 minutes later I was travelling to work and the same song came on my phone and I ended up stopping and taking a look at the skyline of the city and opened the SMS, edited one more time and pressed "Send", Of course it felt like the elephants on my shoulders decided to have a party in my stomach straight after I pressed send.

Anyway after work I went round to his and told him, and started chatting about random stuff and I felt a smile come over my face as I realised I was no longer having to be guarded with every single word I said. During the chat it transpired that the only reason he'd asked if I were gay in the first place was because I wasn't able to answer the damn question - there hadn't been any other sign. As I was leaving I was asked again if I wanted to come to Pride and ended up giving the same answer as before.

That night I got home and pretty much fell asleep straight away and for the first time since my birthday got a full nights sleep, and when I woke up in the morning I just felt happy and after about twenty minutes realised that for the first time in weeks the first thing on my mind wasn't me needing to come out. What I have also realised in the following days is that the fog in my mind has vanished and the various bits I've mentioned above mean my family might be okay about it, and have probably considered the fact I'm gay, especially considering that I've never had a girlfriend (or even pretended to have one).

Alas the following evening I get home from work and just as I open the back door The Simpsons is starting and the Shockwaves ad bumpers are playing out (with a couple of lads with perfect skin, fashionable clothes and styled hair), to which my housemate (who I'd not seen for a couple of days) shouts his usual "faggots"

The following Friday (the day before Pride) morning I took that same route to work as the preceding week and took a moment to pause and look at the very same view of the city skyline, and it just looked so much clearer and less fuzzy (okay it was sunny vs overcast the previous week, but it matched my mood exactly and left me contented for the rest of the morning). That lunchtime I was listening to the radio while having my dinner and there was this fit lad (who I’m sure I’ve seen in one of the gay bars a few times) running alongside the canal and he grinned after he spotted me checking him out, and then Whitney Houston’s – The Greatest Love of All
[youtube]gvPYXHM94DQ[/youtube] came on the radio and the lyrics

spoke to me, and said go for it - and at that point I texted "S" and asking what time we were meeting up in the morning, I felt butterflies in my stomach after sending that it has to be said, but at least it wasn't an elephant!

As it turns out from our friend circle only "S", "B" and I were going, but we ended up meeting up with some of "B's" friends and after a while we ended up chatting about our work with one of his mates where he goes "So 'B' is gay, you're (me) gay, and you're (“S”) gay - how many of you work there? - about 20 - that's quite a high percentage then" blah blah. A few minutes later "S" asks, did I miss something? Have you told them then? I was like, No - he just assumed correctly didn't he and I thought what's the point of trying to deny it? A few of his other friends (and their mothers) over the course of the afternoon then assumed that "S" and I were boyfriends and we corrected that one (we're not), and by the end of the night I realised that everyone there except "B" has, correctly, assumed I'm gay and therefore if "B" asks I'm not going to deny it. Of course we end up in the cities gay nightclub again and he asks do you like "titties" or "bum boys"? and then he doesn't hear my reply, before asking again a minute later, this time hearing my reply (seriously, please tell me I'm not going to have to tell everyone twice?!) to which he just smiles.

So I get up this morning feeling rather hung-over but even happier than before and go downstairs where the house-mate from before is watching the Olympics coverage - Ian Thorpe comes on, which predictably results in "faggot" being shouted out just as I'm walking into the room, and then ten minutes later when a swimmer is on the starting blocks in his pink swim shorts I hear "whys he wearing pink the faggot".

(great a second high followed by a homophobic low :bang: )

So in nine days I've gone from no-one knowing to about a dozen (although only two I knew before hand) and feel so much better, but feel like there's no way I can tell my housemates any time soon (I think one might be okay as he stays silent when gay stuff is on TV - doesn't groan at it or turn over etc, and his best mate is a supporter of various LGBT groups on Facebook and has a few pictures inside gay night clubs so might well be gay (his mate that is), the other two use the word "faggot" way too much), and despite being reassured that my parents will be okay I'm still not ready to tell them, think I need to tell some straight friends first, but don't know who to tell as I’ve kinda pushed them all away by not being honest about who I am! As I was writing this Green Day Good Riddance came on the radio and the line "Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road" seams to sum up my current status well (as you might have noticed Music does speak to me a lot, Darren Hayes, Savage Garden, Adam Lambert, Orphans and Vandals, and others beside have certainly helped me come to terms with myself).

And as a final aside, are there really any straight boys who are unable to say yes/no when asked if they are gay/straight/bi but are more than happy to go on a bar crawl round all the gay friendly / gay bars and clubs for their birthday night out (especially when taken in the context that all of our nights out this year have ended in gay bars/clubs and some have started there too)? I sometimes wonder if any of my colleagues think I’m actually straight.

 

Indeed - I can't quite read him, he comes out with racist remarks quite a bit (which we keep pulling him up on), but always says he's just quoting films/songs - but then the only girls he's ever been out with have been black.... Hmm racists comments but loves black girls, homophobic comments wonder if he really fancies black boys? (my other two housemates have suggested that at him before and it normally shuts him up a while). Then again letching over the female beach volleyball and female gymnasts... (shallow or what? - he says while watching the men's swimming just after checking when Matt Mitcham is on :badgrin: ). The third one seams to be one of them people that just agrees with other people, when he's on his own he doesn't bother saying anything, but when that guy is in the room he'll often be the first to make the predictable comments.

As for remembering the details I have a shockingly poor short term memory, but my long term one is awesome (I can remember my first day at my second primary school (age 5) very vividly, ditto being up all night aged 7 watching the Berlin Wall fall) - often requires prompting to get the details though (music normally - the Black Legend song You See the Trouble with me brings back all the college stuff (it used to be played on Radio 1 all the time while we were on the bus to college)), a lot of it has been played over and over in my head over the years, and it was after I went on a 50km cycle ride and managed to spend the whole ride with all this playing through my mind that I first started writing that SMS.

Just been reading through it again this morning and realised I've left a few bits out - including watching Queer As Folk under the bed covers on my portable tv on S4C (who showed it an hour later than Channel 4 which meant my brother (with whom I shared a room with) was asleep).

I've also got a nagging thought at the back of my mind that my brother found "the folder" (one that had the copy of Gay Times in it, the Uni of Coventry (a uni I applied to and visited but didn't go to) student mag (with a double page spread on an LBGT Soc event which I think was also on the cover) and Stephen Gatley's coming out news paper article (and a few other bits). I can remember running downstairs and grabbing something off him (which sticks out as I usually just ran off with something of his instead until he gave me my thing back), but what was being said and what it was I can't for the life of me remember. There's a few things he's said over the years and the choice of birthday cards which makes me think that was it but I'm not 100% sure. Labelling folders with the names of last years modules doesn't help keeping nosey people out it would seem.

I also remember at the time his (he was two and half years younger) half of the bedroom wall being full of posters of girls (well Lara Croft and Baywatch mainly) and mine was full of cars and guys (Well F1 and BTCC drivers, two sports I liked) - really not hiding this well was I? Hmm....

(&&&)

 

Darn, that was a long pair of posts wasn't it?!

Alas since then nothing much has changed, although the second lad I came out to has apparently asked the first one if I was gay as he thought he'd imagined the response I gave him (well that's what happens after drinking for 16 hours straight!); and another of my colleagues seams to now be working on the assumption that I am gay (tbh as I've never been able to answer the gay/straight question he's always gone girl/boyfriend(etc) when asking q's, but is noticeably dropping the "girl" half of the time now); all my work friends also know I went to Pride (not from me mind - alas alcohol talks); and I also overheard the first one talking to another of my work friends and saying "don't ask him .... when ..... ready" - said work friend hasn't asked his once every two/three week question of "do you fancy guys/girls? are you gay/straight" since then either. I'm not sure if I'm just over analysing things I hear now or if the vibe really has changed though. Argh, why can't I bring myself to tell him (He's one of these guys who has to keep "coming out" (normally after a few minutes flirting) as straight as guys keep hitting on him and girls don't bother as they assume he's gay - and I know he'll be cool with it)?

Now for the main reason for posting today....

So today was the pride event in the nearest city to my home town and there were quite a lot of Facebook posts from my cousins who were there with their mates, and various other people who I grew up with (including one girl who was there with her girlfriend - seriously are any of my childhood friends actually straight - I now know at least 2/3 weren't!?!) and it's brought all the thoughts and worries back - especially as the week after next I will be visiting my parents for a whole week - the longest I'll have been with them for over a decade, and also the first time I have seen them since I started to come out.

When I last saw them I was so down (looking back it was actually that weekend that finally spurred me into telling the first person as I couldn't go through it again) and now I feel so happy (which everyone has been noticing) I know they are going to wonder why - and while deep down I know they'll be cool with it (Things I can vaguely recall them saying make me think they already know on some level) I'm not actually sure I'm ready to tell them yet - but if they ask me outright I'm not actually sure I'll be able to deny it (it's not exactly been something I've been good at for the last few years as it is).

Not sure if there really was a point to this post other than just needing to write it down, but there it is!