Some questions to older gay people who came out to themselves after 21

Hello heythere999,

I'm a 51 year old male and I only Came Out within the last year.

It sounds like your real issue is with your uncle, is that accurate?

 

Well, I don't know if it is as simple as that, heythere999.

You can't judge other peoples' reasons for remaining in the closet. And until you've been in their shoes you can't truly understand them or their reasoning. They may be in denial about their homosexuality. They may be too afraid of the social stigma and just want to survive without conflict by 'acting normal.'

I doubt most people that remain in the closet, but get into heterosexual relationships or get married in a heterosexual marriage set out with the intent of screwing anyone else over.

 

I commend you with coming out. i can tell you being on the other side of a relationship where I am Bi, but my BF recently told me he is 100% gay. It sucks.

You can have children with a same sex partner. I have a couple of same sex friends with multiple children.

Staying closeted for a heterosexual relationship leaves a path of destruction. Especially later in life when you have more people to answer to (possibly children).

My now ex bf is 53 and just coming out, had long term hetero relationships, a marriage, and now me in the transition of coming out. In my honest opinion, I feel this late in the game he was being SUPER selfish. Because nomatter what your sexuality, you should be able to control yourself physically to NOT got into a sexual relationship based on lies. This would apply to any sex couple being faithful to one another.

I know I went off on a tangent, but you asked about later in life coming out and I just wanted to give my opinion as the other side. To me the younger you come out the better for yourself and everyone!!!

 

Heythere999, I can't address the part why people keep getting into straight relationships knowing that they are gay b/c I have never been in a relationship. But I can tell you why it took me 10 years to come out to my family (18-28).

1) When I was growing up same sex relationship was always portrayed in an extremely negative way. I first read about it in a book where an older man was paying for sex with an underage boy. Not the best introduction! When I was older there was a case in my city where a girl fell in love with her straight female friend and ended up killing this friend out of jealousy. A typical evil lesbian story and I remember the newspaper sensationalized the hell out of it. I can keep coming up with more examples but I am already getting upset so I will stop here!

2) I had a huge crush on a straight female friend and was rejected when I was in college. It was a brutal rejection where she implied I was perverted. I had no support system back then and was convinced that no female would ever love me back. Combined with the first reason, I decided to not ever come out.

But I changed my mind and I am glad I did Not saying all queer people remain closeted for these reasons as I am sure everyone has a different story.

 

heythere999,

I've been thinking about your post ever since you posted it. It's a really good topic that you started here, and as Quantum suggests, it's really not simple. Everyone has their own reasons for being closeted, and I can only describe my experience with my sexuality.

First, though, is that we don't experience sexuality in a vacuum. The context of our experiences have a huge impact in our thoughts and behaviors. The context of your experience is vastly different from mine. Many factors contribute to the context: geography (where you live), time period when you reach puberty, sexual education, LGBT acceptance in your social/family circles, cultural attitudes about LGBT, and many others.

You were born in the 90's, and reached maturity well after 2000. I was born in 1968 and was 13 years old in 1981. Geographically, I grew up in a generally conservative area but more progressive than places like the deep south. Attitudes here were not accepting of LGBT in that time period. It's better today, but still not great. Sex education for me in the late 70's, early 80's include zero discussions of LGBT in any way. When I was taught in sex ed classes that boys about my age will begin to feel attractions to girls, and absolutely no discussion of what happens if my attractions were to the boys, this made me feel like a freak, that I wasn't normal, and I felt that I had to hide my feelings. In my social/family circle, there was some anti-gay sentiments (mostly in the form of jokes/innuendo), but it mostly just silent about the topic. It just wasn't discussed in my family. In my extended family, however, there were several very homophobic members who constantly expressed their anti-gay views and it made me even more fearful and increased my need to hide. Cultural attitudes in the 1980s were about as bad as ever. There were extremely few openly gay celebrities (there were some that identified as bisexual, or were rumored to be, and eventually most of them admitted later that it was a cover for being gay), but most popular culture attitudes were negative. On TV, for example, the only gay characters were either the butt of the jokes or the bad guy (frequently a pedophile). The emergence of HIV/AIDS had a huge impact on cultural attitudes about the gay community. It certainly increased my fears and beliefs that if people knew about me I would be shunned. I actually believed at the time that if people knew I was gay that I would have to move to San Francisco - because that's where I thought gay people lived. Isn't that crazy? Because of all the news coverage about HIV/AIDS and pride marches, etc. I actually thought that gay people only lived in San Francisco. Of course, I was only 12-13 at the time.

I don't think you can really understand how it felt to be gay in a culture that was so completely unaccepting of me. This was pre-internet, pre cell phones, pre Ellen, pre rainbow flags.

I get this from your perspective, but it's terribly unfair. Until you've walked in our shoes, and grew up in the culture we did, you simply cannot understand. You will probably never truly understand. Even without truly understanding, however, you can still be compassionate and respectful of other people's journeys. Your disgust is unfair, and your pity is unwanted.

I grew up in a time of 8-track tapes and only 3 channels of TV to watch. It was a time of All in the Family and The Waltons. It was a time of Jack Tripper pretending to be gay so Mr. Roper wouldn't kick him out of the apartment. It was a time when words like faggot, queer, pervert, sissy, and others were used daily in my social circle. It was a time when even the rumor that someone was gay in school was enough to scare the shit out of me.

No, you really can't understand. Perhaps you don't really need to. It would be good, though, if you could muster up some compassion even without truly understanding.

 

Just something worth thinking about is the fact that the world is becoming progressively more tolerant. Your uncle is presumably a member of a older generation that grew up with less flexible ideas about what was acceptable....and how life should be lived...back in the day homosexuality was a mental disease not an orientation...and further back it was illegal...you get the picture....you were born in a far more liberal age...an age of openly gay celebrities...of gay marriage etc. hip hip hooray....

Don't be angry with him. Pity him.

 

Wow.........everything Imgay47 said just captures it all perfectly. I was born in 1977 and I remember pretty much all of that stuff.
I remember as a kid too, one kid thinking I was sitting too close on the bus and turns to snidely ask "Are you gay or something?" I freaked so much on the inside because I always worried someone would see this secret I had inside. That was in Elementary school and that just always stuck with me.
I was with my children's mother for 15 years when we separated, and as much as she would believe otherwise, I never intended things to be like this. Sometimes you try so hard to be what others expect of you and you start to truly believe in the facade you've (unwittingly) created. For me, I just figured I could keep those thoughts in check and be the man I felt I needed to be. I never stepped out in the relationship tho, I couldn't live with myself for cheating if I did. Over time, the facade starts to crumble and that desire to be out overrules the potential pain and hurt it will cause. Sometimes it is simply unavoidable.
My ex is very bitter, but fortunately I know my mother and kids are fine with it and that's really all that matters.
Coming out late as I did, it is not about wanting to hurt anyone or fuck anyone over. It is simply about living the life I never felt able to live when younger.

 

We are on opposite ends of a generation. You're a young millennial, I'm an old one. We didn't have the Internet in my house until late high school. We were taught that gay people died of AIDS. We used "gay" as an adjective for anything deemed uncool.

I grew up feeling different, with difficulty relating to other women because I cared about different things. The sciences, not makeup. Grunge clothing and alternative music, not heels and dresses and dances. I just thought it made me better than other girls. I liked guys, I guess, and when I met my now husband I saw an opening into a life that I never thought I could have. A guy actually liked me! I love him too...who cares that the sex has fizzled when you can be with your best friend?

I spent a decade blaming myself for not appreciating my husband enough because I couldn't make myself desire him. We have an active sex life because that's what the books say to do, if you love him you'll try. I started developing panic attacks, anxiety, depression. I pour myself into my children because the love I have for them I don't have to force into something it's not. I started taking anti-anxiety meds once the strain of our sex life bled into other parts of my life. I've withdrawn from others and have few friends, none who know the real me. The nerd, the writer, the tinkered, the gamer....the not-entirely-straight person.

I haven't even fully come out to myself yet. And I still blame myself for letting our marriage get so far without identifying this as the possible source problem. I'm still just not sure. Am I just trying to make the symptoms fit?

But I can't deny what I dream about and what I long for...that it's possible my difficulties and possessiveness with female friends is all bound up in unrealized attraction.

I feel guilty, don't worry, I do. But what else was my alternative? Give up a relationship when I didn't even know what was wrong? When everything in my heart screamed at me to marry and hold on to this man who I admired and genuinely loved?

 

1. 45 3/4 years old.
2. Never been married. Never dated, either.

Item 2 is probably a miracle. If my life had been more normal, I might well have ended up with a wife...

As far as why I didn't come out to myself until I was 42...

A lot of it is just growing up in the 80s. It was not acceptable to be gay. Plus there was the AIDS crisis which was beyond terrifying. HIV is treatable now, but treatment options were seriously lacking in the 80s. It seemed pretty much automatic that you got HIV, you'd be dead of AIDS sooner or later.

Then there was lots of denial. In my case, it was a thought of envying other guys, or else the fact that I was lonely wanted friends. Later, I used the thought that I liked women whom I knew, so I was straight. Even though the liking in that case had zero sexual attraction.

 

Absolutely this.

OP, there are simply SO MANY possible reasons for people not to figure this stuff out till later. Now I agree that the messing around thing is bullshit, but not being able to accept a part of yourself, well, that happens. And without knowing someone's full story, you can't understand the full motivational state/denial/lack of self-awareness that person went through. Often these things are mixed up in other issues of identity/trauma and so forth.

As stated, be compassionate of other people's journeys. Especially if you don't know the full story behind them

 

Times have changed dramatically. Homosexuality was extremely stigmatized when most of us older folks were kids. As just one example, in 1978 California had a hotly contested ballot measure (that would have amended the state constitution) to ban gay people from being school teachers. Then in 1981 AIDS was discovered and the diagnosis was usually fatal until 1995 and HAART drugs were introduced. Even until the early 2000's some states arrested people for engaging in gay sex, even if their own homes; eventually (in 2003) the Supreme Court held that these laws were unconstitutional. So you can see how this history would shape people's outlooks.

Another thing that continues to drive gay men into the closet (for lack of a better term) is that life for many gay men continues to be very lonely and frustrating. The unfortunate reality is that gay men tend to be (although not always) very judgmental of one another and there is a lot of harmful behavior (e.g., cheating, substance abuse, promiscuity) that ends of scarring a lot of guys. While it's true that a lot of straight people also engage in these behaviors, most straight people ultimately want to settle down and have a stable life with a committed partner. I don't think that this goal is desired by most gay men (this seems not to be the case for lesbians). So if you're a guy attracted to other guys and you want to have a more traditional (for lack of a better word) life and not end up being the weird, permanently single uncle, it often seems the only option is to repress the homosexual desires and seek out a female partner. And this of course skews the population of "out" gay men more toward the non-monogamous, non-traditional, unstable characteristics (I understand these are generalities, but there is some validity to them).

So, in my opinion you're wrong to criticize gay men who closet themselves, because a lot of the responsibility for the current situation is caused by the gay community itself.

 

I am 37.
I´m in a straight marriage but I came out to my husband very recently.

Like others say, people stay closeted for so different reasons.

Growing up, there was no one gay around me. It was never talked about. It was considered odd.
I got into a serious relationship pretty young. I finally got married at 23, had my first baby at 24, still in university this whole time, then another baby, started working, then another baby and started working again. Got lost in life and never thought about that I always seemed to look more at women than men.
About five years ago (when my youngest was 2 years old), I started addressing my feelings. I finally had time to look up from my busy life. The more I thought about it, the more I didn´t want to be gay. I tried to ignore - didn´t work.
I finally came out to myself last December and told my sister about it. After that, there was no going back. Stress, anxiety, guilt, self-hate and all that piled up until I was literally at a breaking point.
I came out.

I live in probably one of the most accepting countries in the world so that´s not my reason for staying closeted. I simply didn´t realize until later in life. Although looking back, of course I should have. I just never addressed those feelings. A straight relationship was the normal thing and down that path I went...

 

Many people (especially younger gays and lesbians) are told that same sex attraction is a fad - a phase that we grow out of, and very often they believe it. Many times I have read agony columns in newspapers and magazines where the so called expert dispenses the same tired and damaging advice... "it's just their hormones"... "all young people experiment with their sexuality"... "they will grow out of it". As a result the young gay person dismisses their feelings towards people of the same sex and seeks out relationships with the opposite sex, and for a while it even seems to work out. They marry, have kids and play happy families until the feelings they previously dismissed as a hormonal fad/phase return with a vengeance.

How many members of the later in life gang can relate to this?

So, people don't necessarily enter into straight relationships will bad intentions or ideas of screwing someone over, and even when the relationship/marriage falls apart, the love and affection doesn't. It's entirely possible to move on with integrity and maintain a warm and friendly relationship with a straight ex, so there is no sense of feeling "screwed over".

 

I think you are still not getting the generational issues around homosexuality and bisexuality. I agree with everything that Imgay wrote and can completely relate. I am close to ten years older than he. Things have changed so much in the last couple of decades in understanding same sex attractions. I do think you are not being fair and perhaps being a bit judgmental.

When I was in my early twenties I knew I had sexual attractions to men. I had pretty much known this my whole life. We were taught that those attractions were wrong and you could change yourself and set them aside and live a normal life. I could compartmentalize my gay desires as just a secret thing.

I've been married over 30 years. Yes, I set aside those urges and lived as a straight man. My marriage is the best one I know of. Even now, as I have come out to my wife, after all these years, she is completely accepting and we are remaining married.

Every situation is different. None of us got into our marriages with any intention of hurting anyone. Some of us didn't even understand what same sex attraction meant. I surely didn't. Some of us developed opposite sex relationships that are nurturing, caring and real.

 

You know how some teenagers are afraid to come out because their parents might kick them out or hate them, and at the time they need their parents support to be able to have a place to stay, food to eat, get through school, etc? It's kind of been like that for us, but instead of parents we were dealing with, like, the world. I went to a religious college where a combination of policies meant I could be kicked out of school if I came out. I worked at and lived at a group home for teen girls for several years, and I was worried that I would lose my job and my housing in one fell swoop and get outed to my parents. (Very few states even now protect employees from orientation based discrimination. In my state they don't even have to give a reason for fireing you.) Also, I was strongly subscribing to religion that told me that if I acted on these desires I was sinning and breaking my relationship with God. I have had other jobs where I literally signed a paper when I was hired that said in could be let go based on my personal sexual conduct. Almost all of my friends and aquaintences until recently have been super anti gay, so I also thought I might lose all my friends and personal support if they found out.

There was and is a lot of reason to stay in the closet. And, it causes a lot of cognitive dissonance. It's hard to function with that level of internal conflict all the time. So, our brains sometimes try to help us survive by blocking it out. Being closeted to ourselves. Staying in denial. Whatever you want to call it. It's kind of like having a wall in your brain so that you can't always access the sexuality stuff so that it won't bother you all the damn time.

I would have gotten married given the opportunity. I would have had kids given the opportunity. At the time, I would have been praised and applauded by my family, friends, church, etc. And, I was committed to not dating women for the reasons listed above and more, but that doesn't mean I want to be single and never have a family. I just assumed I would do my best with the sex part and be awesome at all the other things about being a wife and mom.

Self protection isn't selfish. Our situations were/are different. I grew up around people who said "That f****t deserved to die. I would have done worse than dragged him behind a truck." We have made choices we have thought were right at the time, and we have made choices we needed to in order to survive.

 

I can relate here absolutely. I dismissed my attractions are simple experimentation and that it didn't mean anything. I thought that being gay was a choice and I could simply choose to live a "normal" life. When I said "I do" to my wife, I meant it completely. I had every intention of being married to her forever. I still had that intention until 3 months ago.

 

Logical arguments start from certain premises, let's examine those the OP has outlined above:

and:

To state that the person "is unsure" is quite an assumption, why couldn't the person simply be mistaken and willingly enter into a commitment because, well, because that is what is often expected? There is a great quote attributed to Robert J. Hanlon which goes as follows:

Or a similar quote from Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther:

It is a common fallacy to believe that people are somehow evil or wicked when they do things of great consequence, when what it is we believed about ourselves was simply, and tragically, wrong.

Whether gay or straight, we often enter into relationships without sufficient knowledge of ourselves. Here is a clip on why we often marry the wrong person:

[YOUTUBE]zuKV2DI9-Jg[/YOUTUBE]

With divorce rates at more than 50%, are people entering into marriages because they are unsure about how they feel about their spouses? And if they are so unsure, is it an ethical breach to marry anyway? The expectation that there would be feelings of love and romance before and during marriage is a relatively recent phenomenon, say over the past 150 years or so. In times past, marriages were simply contractual arrangements between the husband to be and her father...(it's why in traditional marriage ceremonies, the father still hands over his daughter to the groom) sanctioned by religion and the community, were those marriages somehow fake too?

The OP's other premise is also on shaky ground:

I do agree that if you have reasonable certainty with regard to sexuality you shouldn't marry a member of the opposite sex. The problem is getting to reasonable certainty...Most competent psychological assessments of sexuality indicate that it is on a spectrum between gay and straight, in other words, there is no black and white, there is a whole grey zone between perfectly straight and perfectly not straight. Given this, one can still enter into a relationship with a person of the opposite sex and invest a great deal of affection and kindness. Two people who marry are embarking on a common project, usually the creation of a family. The script is already there, there is no struggle, and hetero-normative society makes it easy.

I doubt anyone is reasonably certain about anything doing with something as nebulous and hard to measure as sexuality. With deep uncertainty comes a greater propensity for error (see first point).

It was never about malice, or seeking to ruin another person's life (why would any relatively normal person do something so cruel?), most if not all of us entered into our marriages with sincerity of purpose and commitment. Before reaching for explanations of malice, one should simply, and tragically, accept that we were truly mistaken, chiefly because we have never really known who we are until it was too late.