I first want to say thank you that this website exists at all and to all the people here. Being able to find advice here has been an enormous help for me to finally come to terms with being gay. Anyway, I came out last month to my parents (the first people I came out to). It went incredibly well. I am very happy and relieved about that. It is just that now I feel a bit like a fool. Why the hell did I wait so bloody long?! Now I am a 26 year old guy with absolutely no sexual or romantic experience. All around I feel like I am 10 years behind everyone else my age. Through high school I knew I was attracted to other guys. I just thought it would pass and I would be 'normal'. In university I still didn't really want to deal with being gay, I couldn't even think of myself in that way and having a relationship never seemed much of a priority to me. So, I focused on getting the grades I thought I needed to get a good job. I even started to think of myself as asexual for awhile. Graduated as the recession started, finally moved out from my parents home, only to end up living with my grandparents. The last three years were taken up by helping care for my aging grandfather. Between the stress of numerous hospital visits and other issues related to caring for an elderly person, and then not being able to find full time work I slipped into a nasty bout of depression last autumn. The previous few years I was so angry and unhappy, but this depression was something I had never experienced before. I hope to God never to experience it again. But doing so forced me to come to terms with this part of myself I had ignored and repressed so long. I am much happier now that I can be honest with myself and others. It is just now sometimes I look in the mirror and think who the hell am I? It is so frustrating that this took so long. I have kept so much to myself so long. Lost touch with most of my friends. I get angry at myself for making everything so hard for myself. Looking for resources about coming out, so much is geared towards teenagers, obviously as it should be. Yet, I feel a bit left out and very embarrassed that I am entering my late twenties and I am so inexperienced. Ah well, it is the way it is. All in all I am just thankful I have been blessed with a very loving family and I just have to pull up my socks and finally start living my life. It would be so much nicer if there was an instruction booklet to life, especially if you are gay. Please excuse my extended ramblings. It just feels good to get this off my chest. If anyone does takes the time to read and respond, thank you ahead of time. (!) I had add this, it makes me smile everytime.
First, Welcome to EC! You are the same age as the guy in my profile picture. If I had known then what you now know about yourself, my life would have been very different (yeah, AIDS was raging at the time, but that didn't stop a lot of people coming out anyway). Stop beating yourself up; you did awesomely good things with your life, i.e. taking care of grandfather, etc. Now it's time to focus on you and where you will go from here. It is so important that you have the support of your family. Now you have ours as well! Here's a good place to start: http://emptyclosets.com/forum/famil...king-relationship-simpler-than-you-think.html Cheers! (!)
Hey, I read your post and I can relate to it almost entirely. I came out at 25 to a loving family and felt a sense of regret that I did not act earlier and that I had effectively lost years of my youth to the closet. But you cannot look back to the past, because the future is so much more exciting. The whole world of gay sex and relationships is really a learning experience and you should acknowledge that. Nobody is going to be an expert. As you say, you should celebrate your new sense of honesty and freedom. We move through life at our own pace and at 26 you should not compare and contrast yourself to others your age. Just live it!
I'm at about the same stage as you and look at my age Seriously, there's absolutely nothing wrong with coming out at this stage in your life. Will there be grieving for the missed time? Absolutely. But you have to get through that grieving process, and when you accept that you can't change it, and can't change the past, just live your life now. Celebrate your newfound identity, and enjoy the search for Mr. Right!
