My Life Story - Coming out Deadline Approaching!

So to give some background... and maybe to help someone else out there? I couldn't really find many stories that I could relate to on here or after many Google searches.

I'm 22 years old and am currently in college. However, let's start back earlier.

My childhood and relationship with parents...
First off, I had the most picture-perfect childhood anyone could have asked for. I grew up in a small community and made a lifelong friend (15 years now?). My parents were always self-employed so they were always around and most of the time I was an only child (adopted my sister out of foster care when I was in middle school). Since I was always with one or both of them, I fostered extremely strong relationships with both of them. Independence was always encouraged with me, and showing any signs of weakness was instantly discouraged. This ranged from play-fighting with my Dad where he would pin me down and the more I struggled/fight or flight kicked in the more he would hold me down, to feeling like if I cried at my Grandma's funeral when I was 5 that I would be a major disappointment to my Dad. Crying was unacceptable with my Dad - he would never say anything but if/when I did, I would feel horribly ashamed of myself. I hated confronting him with anything. Feelings were never discussed. I don't think my Dad has ever once in his life said that he loved me, even though I always knew he did (and still know). I could get into how horribly abusive my father's parents were, but you as a reader may have already figured that part out.

Even with all of that, confrontations rarely occurred and I spent most (99%?) of my childhood playing with friends on the beach, going boating, fishing with my Dad in the morning, swimming, basically the life! I always got straight A's (or close to it) with little effort. My Dad always stuck up for me at school - anytime I ever got in trouble he would always be there and always sided with me. I can recall a particular story where I got sent to the principal's office and my Dad came down and ripped the principal a new one so badly that the principal himself came out and apologized to me for ever suspecting that I was the one inciting riot in the bus lines (by the way, I was completely guilty). I never got caught doing bad stuff, because my Dad always taught me to keep my mouth shut. As you can see, I got nearly all of my street smarts and practical thinking from my Dad.

My parent's relationship...
My Dad and Mom have a polarized relationship. Neither of them are religious. I do share a Jewish heritage with my Mother (100%) but we rarely celebrate the Jewish holidays. Sometimes I think my Dad was victimized by someone gay (maybe a sibling or religious leader of some sort) in the past with how much he makes fun of them and his insecurities about anything that could even marginally be deemed as non-hetero. My mom however, falls into a more rational viewpoint. Just the other day she told me about one of her employees that she hired who turned out lesbian. My mom felt bad for her because the employee could never tell any of the residents (she runs an adult family home) about her sexuality. Old people tend to be extremely against anything other than "the norm." During my childhood when my parents did fight, they were epic. Some of them traumatized me. My Dad never hit my mom (at least that I can remember) nor did my Mom ever hit my Dad. I remember a particularly bad one where my Dad smashed something up in the kitchen and my Mom stormed off to the room crying. I sat in the closet in my room covering my ears and crying. Neither of them ever knew/saw any reactions to when they fought. I maybe cried in front of my parents a dozen times in all of my childhood/middle/high school for emotional issues (stepping on a nail that went through my foot and getting a concussion playing on the beach were exceptions).

Elementary/middle school...
Starting with elementary school, I can remember the first guy I had a crush on in 1st grade. He was our neighbor and I remember we were out in the woods once and I was fascinated watching him take a piss on a tree. At the time I didn't realize what those feelings were, but they were definitely there. Middle school was probably the most confusing part of my life since I felt the incessant pressure to chase after girls, but no desire to do so - EVER. I had countless crushes on probably half of the guys in my grade, but silently kept it all to myself. In elementary/middle school I was probably one of the most popular guys in my grade.

High school...
When I was in high school, I spent my entire time completely closeted and occupied myself with as much stuff as possible (grades, extra-curricular activities, club presidents etc) to take my mind off of liking guys. However much I tried, it still found ways into my day. Whether it was a casual glance, or a crush I couldn't avoid it. I hated myself and did everything I could possibly do to make myself not like guys. I became a porn addict at a very young age - middle school if I remember correctly. I would come home from school and hole myself up in my room for hours on end all the way up till freshman year of college. I almost wish my parents would have monitored my internet use (however then I would have never started the career I have today). My sophomore year of high school my parents made me get rid of my childhood dog because they didn't want her to live in the house we were moving into. That completely devastated me and that was when I started my "year in review," - a once a year one page journal that I still do every March 19th (the day we got rid of her).

In high school I started my own business and worked for the local parks and recreation department. I believe that my job with the parks and recreation department is the only thing that kept me from killing myself. I loved my childhood so much that when I got to play with kids and experience that again, it relieved an enormous amount of my depression if only for the few hours a week that I worked there. There were two kids that I am still watching grow up (started working for parks and rec when I was 13 and I am now 22). I still love to see them and I've coached/officiated many of the games/sports that they have participated in.

COLLEGE...
After high school I moved off to college. The first college I went to I only lasted about a month - I had a girlfriend at the time that I missed and I hated the school. Thus, I returned home to my family and her and applied/got accepted to another college about 45 minutes from home. When things started heating up with my girlfriend, I honestly couldn't perform. I just wasn't interested - as much as I wanted to be "into" her and desire her sexually, it just was not there. The idea of a relationship, babies, family enthralled me - the physical desire was just completely absent. I believe at this point was the final deciding factor on all my sexual frustrations.

After I moved out for the 2nd time (1st time was in August, 2nd was in December, so not far in between) to go back to college, was when I really started having problems. I no longer had parks and recreation to relieve myself. I was in a new place with no friends (save a few from high school that went to the same school as me), and I chose to live by myself in a nice studio apartment. After the first couple of months I was nearly 100% supporting myself, which is pretty rare for a freshman. Scholarships from high school paid for my tuition the first year and a half so my parents hardly played for anything. With all this time to myself came a huge amount of problems.

My 3.85 GPA with all honors/AP courses got me into college no problem. However, after I got in my grades started to tank immediately. I hated going to class and having hardly any friends and not able to make any in the dorm life (which I regret not having at this point). My porn addiction went from bad to worse. Even with being gravely depressed, I never let on to any friends or family that I felt the way I did. I felt like killing myself at least once a week, if not more. I was becoming very successful with my business despite all of this, and eventually saved up enough to take flying lessons. 42 flight hours later I had my private pilot's license. This again carried me through a very rough patch - I finally achieved my childhood dream of flying an airplane (something I had been obsessed with since age 5?).

Starting after my 20th birthday (6 months in give/take), things started going downhill even faster. I started out the year on academic probation, and started drinking heavily. I fell asleep (passed out really) several nights a week. I still didn't have much of a social life outside of when I felt like occasionally going to class or doing homework. Again, I still managed to make ends meet (usually having money left over still) with work and no support other than occasional tuition money from my parents. This just made my booze habits even worse. I remember coming home from a end-of-school small party at a high school friend's house a walking distance from my apartment. I passed out in my doorway and nearly asphyxiated on my own vomit. Luckily I managed to roll over enough to get the puke out of my mouth and on the floor.

When I turned 21, drinking started to become a daily occurrence. Consequently, I started making a good group of friends (mostly people my age I met from the bar). I had my first crush on a guy January 28th 2012. As most first gay crushes go, I got way too clingy and pushed him away. It devastated me for about 2 weeks but I got over it. During this period, I'm pretty lucky I didn't end up dying from alcohol poisoning. Nonetheless, it was a major turning point - I realized I could like a guy openly (I told a friend about it) and the world wasn't going to come crashing down on me. Also within a week of me turning 21, I bought my first handgun (Kimber 1911 .45 ACP for those of you who are gun people out there). Between the booze and ready access to a firearm, I still am lucky I never fully committed to killing myself.

In March I bought a sports car (again, I stress the "I" as I never felt entitled to anything from my parents and would never accept handouts). I remember being down at the local gay-friendly bar and getting totally smashed. All of a sudden I felt really insecure and the old depressive stuff started coming back, so I immediately left. I got in my car around 1AM, got on the interstate and hit 140 MPH while texting my friend about how fast I was going. I drove all the way back to where I grew up as a child and passed out with the top down. Luckily I saw nearly zero cars on my drive, and I had two lanes to swerve erratically across. I woke up in the morning getting rained on wondering how I got there and after looking at my text messages, realized what I did. To this day it is probably the most reckless thing I have ever done and I feel fortunate to have lived through it. This however, was the peak.

After that, I started becoming more and more open with about liking guys, up until now where I am out to everyone except my lifelong friend, parents, and immediate family. I'm basically living two distinct lives, and it is driving me nuts. My drinking is now under control as well and I have not driven a vehicle with any alcohol consumption for the last several months. My antisocial tendencies inherited from my Dad's upbringing started to wear off. The summer of 2012 was probably the best summer I have ever had. I would go golfing, fly airplanes, go to the shooting range, drive my convertible across multiple states on road trips, camping, you name it. I had crushes on guys and felt way more open to talking about it with people.

TODAY...
This holiday season I went crazy with gifts and holiday(ness) - which my parents oddly noticed since I'm usually the one wrapping my gifts the night before in newspaper. I bought my little sister a puppy (Border Collie), and spent an entire day finding the biggest Christmas tree I could (19 ft tall!) which I cut down and brought home to my parents house. I'm sitting on the couch looking at it as I write this. I bought front row tickets to the Nutcracker and took my Mom down to Seattle to watch it. I bought my Dad a security system for his new building he just constructed. Tomorrow we're going to a indoor water park for two days with my Mom/Dad/sister and me (This wasn't my idea, but you get the picture). Really all of this is just one last hurrah to have something good to remember before everything changes.

MY RESOLUTION...
At 12:01AM on the 1st of January I am committing 100% to coming out. A bunch of my friends know already and nobody has been put off by it. I am planning on sending out a mass text message to my parents/friends/family that do not know and then turning off my phone and going out partying at the local gay-friendly bar.

I know that my Mom will accept me being gay, but I know she isn't going to be the same after. I don't know what my Dad is going to do. Since my Mom brings in the money, he will eventually have to fall into line. My Mom unconditionally loves me, and I know/appreciate that. But I just know that it won't be the same - for lack of better words I don't know how else to put that. My family outside of my parents I could really care less about, and my lifelong friend *should* be okay with it too, I think.

Honestly at this point I am emotionally stable and secure enough financially and mentally to accept total dis-ownership from all of my family/friends. I am happy the way I am and am loving life more and more each day.

IN REGARDS TO SUICIDE...
The only thing that really kept me from killing myself was knowing that I always had an "out." I decided that if I ever felt so hopeless that I could no longer live in my situation, that I could always run off and do something else. I would much rather die doing something I enjoy, such as flying an airplane or going fast in my car. Realistically, you could look at my speeding in my car story as a suicide attempt. Nonetheless, knowing that I could always choose to leave, or become homeless and go on an adventure kept me sane enough to get through the hard times.

Anyways, that is my story. I will post up on how it goes. I hope it can help someone out there.

 

Wow after all the feedback maybe I should write a book, haha. I only spent about 90 minutes writing that stuff last night.

 

Well one of the things I've been considering is whether it might be better to come out to my parents over a phone call rather than a text... not sure if a text is kind-of insulting to the most important people in my life? The text is fine for other family I think...

 

Thanks for the feedback guys. I'm really a big fan of the short and sweet method, but I get how impersonal that can be.

 

Yeah. I'm planning on calling my parents and just sending out a serious text or picture message of me holding a sign saying I'm gay or something. I'm a total jokster most of the time so I get that it is important to come out lightly but seriously. Most people are going to be caught completely off guard as I am very hetero acting... which I don't plan on changing. I am who I am.

---------- Post added 30th Dec 2012 at 02:19 AM ----------

And as far as drinking goes, I'm going to be with a bunch of friends on new years, so we're all going parting anyways. I've always been able to control my drinking too, so it's not really a biggie. I plan on addressing everyone in the morning, I just want a carefree night of fun with people I enjoy spending time with.

---------- Post added 30th Dec 2012 at 02:25 AM ----------

I don't want to come off as being a depressed suicidal person either... like most people I've had my share of ups and downs. The downs were just extreme with my sexuality problems, mostly in high school and a bit my freshman year of college. I never attempted suicide before, ever unless you consider my wreckless driving habits. I tend to be a thrill seeker though, so who knows what to tie it to.

I love all the feedback though guys. I really hope this thread can help others out there. That's my main goal with this posting as I have never considered talking openly online about my life, EVER. I've always been extremely self-relient and resilient to change my ways. I'm trying to open up more.

 

I went through the isolation phase when I was around 20. I also tried countless times over the years to change what I desired, with zero success. I feel for ya man.