So to start out with I guess I should give you some background. Up until the beginning of the year I considered myself straight and only dated women, I'm 24 now. After some discoveries about myself, which I don't want to get into here I ended up breaking up with my girlfriend of over 1 1/2 years. After some time from getting over her, I started dating again, this time trying online dating, I actually started dating men, I was still getting some dates with women, but not that many. I dated a guy for 5 weeks this summer before I found my boyfriend who I've been dating since late July. This is honestly the best relationship I've ever been in, and it is all well and good, but until last week I wasn't out to friends, anyone really except for people on the internet. Well a good friend of mine has this kind of annoying girlfriend, they both know me, and thought I haven't been dating since January, or thought I hadn't had any luck dating since January, either way, they wanted to set me up with a friend of hers. For some reason I couldn't bring myself to tell my friend about my boyfriend, and come out to him. After a while of him pressuring me, I figured it would be easier to just go out on a date with this woman and then make up some excuse why I didn't want to go out with her again. My boyfriend eventhough he thought it was dishonest didn't say no to the plan, and actually kept teasing me about it, he is actually a really nice guy. The date actually went well and she was really nice, which only made me feel worse about lying to her. Afterwards my friend tells me that she wants to have another date, even before she does, I guess her girlfriend told him. So at that point I really don't want to say anything bad about his girlfriend's friend so after being very nervous I actually manage to come out to him and tell him that I have a boyfriend. At first he seems to be confused especially since he used to know my ex-girlfriend and remember us together, but eventually he is all cool about it. He claims it won't affect our friendship, he seemed a little bit weirded out, but he seemed to be very supportive. In hindsight I should have come out to him sooner. I'm actually wondering now how I should come out to my other friends, and if I should come out at work, I live in California so I don't think people would care, and I would really want him around for the Christmas party the office has every year, but many people still remember my ex-girlfriend from last year, and I don't know if I could handle all of the questions. I also don't know how that would affect my career, I work in tech, for a big tech company in Silicon Valley, I don't know if coming out at work might hurt my career, at least the HR material is certainly supportive.
Oh boy that's a tough one. Well It's too bad you went out on the date with your fiends girlfriend, that made for an uncomfortable situation for your guy friend and probably his girlfriend. I think that was not a good idea but it's done and hopefully you can work you way around it and still maintain your friendships. He's probably going to need some time to process this new information. As to the work thing. Well, I came out at work about a year ago. I told about five people and of course there was one lady that just had to run around and tell a bunch of more people (there is always going to be one blabbermouth). I work for the federal government so I can't be hassled at all, or at least the reqs. say so. It sounds as though you also have protections. But let me tell you, you can still be treated differently. I remember about ten years ago (a long time before I came out) one of the supervisors at our business, who was going to be hiring a tech position, told me that he had two very qualified candidates but he thought one of them (which he said was actually a little better qualified than the other) was gay so he was going to hire the other one, which he did. I kept my mouth shut, but it made me sick to my stomach. At that time I was so far away from coming out that I just couldn't say a thing. But it hurt me badly to see this happen and feel like I couldn't do anything about it. So I guess I really depends on your situation. I have now been at the business for quite a few years and have made it to the upper ranks so I feel more stable. I think that is something to consider. IDK, maybe the Christmas party may not be the right forum to come out in. The flip side is that we shouldn't have to hide who we are but sometimes it may make a difference in our futures. That certainly is changing as time goes on. Good luck. I hope all goes well for you.
