im gay but y do i still hate it

Hey dekki48, welcome to EC!

Many of us have struggled with not liking the way we are, whether it be body type or sexual orientation...You have come to the right place to explore your feelings about this. You will discover, at the very least, that you are not alone in feeling the way you do.

Post often and get to know us, you won't be disappointed!

 

Being gay wasn't something that I even considered a possibility (or even understood) when I was a teenager, even though I looked at boys all the time and thought about them. in my world, you got married and had kids, and I was too naive about sex to even realize that I was "supposed" to be interested in girls, or that what I felt for boys was a sexual attraction. By the time I realized all the implications of what I was feeling, I was terribly afraid of not fitting into the gay community, based on almost no information whatsoever. That, and a horrible bunch of deaths in the family made me decide to go for the straight life to rebuild the family that was gone, and keep myself "safe" from the great gay unknown.

Well, guess what? It didn't go away, and the unknown is still out there, but now that I'm over 50, I've realized that it's better to accept who you are and be honest with yourself, than to hide because being gay is something you never wanted to be. I wanted blue eyes, too, and I could wear contacts to make them look blue to the world, but at the end of the day, they're still brown, and the contacts start to rub and itch after awhile, and cut down on the field of vision.

No, like you, I didn't want to be gay. But I am, and trying desperately NOT to be gay has made me far more miserable over the years than I had to be. Telling myself, at my age, that it's OK to be gay and I can live this way, has made me a much happier person. You're over 20 years younger than I am. Don't waste all those years hating who you are. It's so much better to look in the mirror and like and accept who you see.

 

I agree with Choirboy. You are relatively young and the faster you can truly accept its ok (in fact its more than ok its wonderful) that you happen to be gay, then the better life will be. Its very easy to procrastinate and find excuses to not face this basic fact about yourself. You could do this for decades - like I did (I didn't fully come out until I was 48).
I am not saying it will be easy for you, but at least you have taken the first huge step of coming out to everyone. I don't know how that process went for you? If you have been lucky, like I have, may be most people may have responded positively or at worst been neutral.
What I found however, after doing the hard work of telling other people about myself, was that the biggest issue wasn't what they thought about it me but what I thought about myself. My internalised homophobia was much worse than any real homophobia from friends and family.

Growing up and knowing (consciously or unconsciously) that we are somehow different from how society tells us we should be is a big burden to secretly live with. It affects us many subtle ways. We feel shame, self-disgust, judgement and we can't talk to anyone about. In my experience we can't just dismiss all this simply by starting to tell other people we are gay. We have to go back and be brutally honest with ourselves about all this accumulated negative emotion and then deal with it. I have done with by seeing a therapist and attending group life coaching workshops for gay men and talking to others on Empty Closets. There is no short cut and it can be hard BUT it is worth the effort.

For me one of my huge issues about why I didn't want to be 'gay' is that I didn't want to be seen as effeminate or camp or 'weak'? I didn't realise that the only common thing between people who are gay is they find people of the same gender sexually attractive, in every other way we can be and are as different and varied as anyone (gay or straight). Weirdly once I accepted this I found myself enjoying feminine aspects of my personality.

Any way there is so much more I could talk about and I am sure others will be happy to discuss all the many other nuances and challenges we face…
You are not a bad person for finding that you are gay. Its a long journey and there are no short cuts but facing our issues is all we can do. Hiding and denying and living with the burden of shame is not good for any of us.

Good luck - we are all here to help and support. Asks loads of questions

 

Both of these comments are very, very true. That sense of isolation that you feel about considering yourself "different" does pretty awful things to your self-esteem and your image of yourself. And forcing yourself to stay in the closet only makes it worse, because of the terrible fear of being found out. Telling myself I was gay and it was OK, even good, was amazing; telling my wife, even knowing that eventually huge changes would come out of it, was even better, because the fear of being found out is gone.

As to being seen as effeminate or whatever - I spent 50 years on guard because I thought people would think my behavior was effeminate or gay, and now that I've come out to a few people and have started acting however the hell I want to, I've been amazed to discover that people don't perceive me as gay-acting at all, and are actually MORE comfortable with me because now I'm more relaxed and sure of myself, and not so tightly wound and visibly uncomfortable. Being who you are is really the best way to be happy.

 

I hate it because I don't like being a minority, because you can't fully trust what other people think of you.

 

*Use* this experience to learn about what other minorities experience...they don't particularly like being minorities either, despite perhaps having pride over who they are!

To the OP, I've never experienced particular dislike for my sexual orientation...since I realized I was bisexual, it just jived with my overall outlook on things. I don't love how stigmatized LGBT people are generally, or bisexuals within that (even within the LGBT community...being a minority within a minority). But again, use that to learn about what it means to be in a minority, and to learn sensitivity to the experience of other minorities.

But I think this is the thing...and it's where the OP might find a sense of pride to cling to on this raft of life. As LGBT people, we have been through such a crucible of self-exploration, self-discovery, etc. ...I have never met straight people who are half as self-examined or self-actualized (or at least on the road to self-actualization) as the queer people I've known. The vast majority of straight people I know go through life half-asleep...LGBT people tend to be wide awake. That is special.

The self-realization gives us other benefits as well...we tend to have a better sense of humor, we're better-looking, and dammit, we're just more fun! (ok, being a little facetious toward the end there...but suck up the compliment!)

 

Hi,

There are people who will reject you for a myriad of reasons;

Hair color
Skin pigment
Body type
Handed ness
IQ
Theology
Politics
etc, etc, etc...

Not to like yourself based on the BROKEN, IGNORANCE of individuals or society is self destructive.

Self worth, self love is primary. To give that away to others... To allow their stupidity to harm you with your own power... No words

I am not touting Christianity here but taking theology out of this it is still powerfull sh@t;

"3. Jesus said, "If your leaders say to you, 'Look, the (Father's) kingdom is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you. Rather, the (Father's) kingdom is within you and it is outside you.

When you know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will understand that you are children of the living Father. But if you do not know yourselves, then you live in poverty, and you are the poverty.""

Take your power back, know yourself, love yourself.

Tom