So if you hadn't gathered by the title, this is kinda a second attempt at coming to terms with my sexuality. A job I'd figured was over, but the further I go into it, the more complicated it becomes. Online feedback seemed to give good guidance before, so your reading this is much appreciated. So I'm 27yo, Australian, married to my high school sweetheart and love of my life, a father to a school age girl and all round man-of-the-house. I'm 6 feet tall, 200 pounds, fit, wear a large beard and long hair, and play heavy metal guitar. I drive a V8 car, ride a V-twin motorcycle and take shit from nobody. I like being a grown man, I got picked on a lot when I when I was a kid so being able to hold my own amongst the men is a powerful feeling for me. Although I always feel as though it is because I keep a secret..... I'm bisexual. Now it's not a complete secret. My wife has been a friend of mine since we were 12. She'd known, as I was growing up, I was confused about my sexuality and has been with me as long as I've been exploring this. But when we started dating seriously at 17, I have never been with anybody off the same sex again. She's bi too and had always identified as such, but I never really spoke about my "man-on-man action" until I was about 22. It's not that the attraction to men had disappeared, I was working in Gold Mining at the time and straight was the best for me to be. To be honest, I'd sort of hope that the feelings would just go away and it'd be something I could put down to experimentation. But eventually I had to say it out loud and my wife said it first, I just sort of agreed, bashfully. But I figured I didn't really need to "identify" as such as I wasn't going out picking guys up. Plus the things the guys at work and socially say, made me feel as though it was dirty and a perverted fetish best left a secret. It's hot that my wife is same sex attracted, gross for me. But over the last couple of years I've began to tell my very closest friends, the ones who tended not to join in the trash talk. Most of them have been supportive, but absolutely shocked! It has alienated a couple of friends, but it was probably for the best anyway. But this has also brought with it a new dilemma. So the people who are important to me know now, good. My wife is very proud of me being who I am and trying to be happy about it, good. But I feel as though I don't really fit in to a category now. I thought I'd found my category, my metal and redneck friends. But as we age it's becoming more apparent that, while we share a lot of common interests, we have very different view points on things. I want to challenge the culture I'm surrounded by and try to find my kin, but the more I look, the more alienated I feel. So a couple of weekend back, my wife and I went to Sydney for the gay and lesbian Mardi Gras. We figured, it's the biggest LGBT event in the country and one of the best in the world. There must be people like me there. But I had never felt more like I was being looked at in my life. It was like I'd walked into a Klan rally in a Boy George outfit! I'm not sure if it was because I was there with my wife or because I look like a biker, gay people were looking and giving me strange looks. How I reacted to different people in my circle, was go over and say hello. They might be really interesting and tell me about worlds they come from I could only read about. But the whole weekend, I hung out with my wife and felt like an outcast. I was pretty disappointed. The whole weekend 500,000 people and I didn't see one cool car or hear some heavy music. Well there was these two lesbians we met on the drive up, but that's another story. But on the Sunday morning outside the hotel, 3 young gay guys hit the nail on the head for me. I was saying how left out I felt and how I didn't feel the Bisexual men were well represented in the festival. They whole heartedly agreed and added, it's a question the gay community is always asking. Where are the bi manly men? We're out there, but if we all keep it a secret and complain about being the last of the damned, what the fuck do we want? I've since read some literature on the subject and was shocked by what I found. Bi men living as married straight men are far more likely to commit suicide (I attempted once, but again, another story), develop Drug/Alcohol problems (been there), much more likely to contract/transmit STDs and STIs and much less likely to seek professional advice. There's a good reason for this. It comes down to how much research is done on people like me, which is pretty much none. The statistics available are considered a gross underestimate because most of the men live in secret. So I suppose this might me some sort of declaration for me. I want the silence to end and if nobody else is gonna put their hand up. Why don't I? Besides my Mechanical Trades, I studied nursing when I was young, and I'm pretty bored with my job. Only a couple more years and I could be a practicing sexual health nurse. This would of course mean coming out to my family and publicly too. And a one man crusade like that? I'm not sure I have the strength of character for that. P.S. Sorry for crappy grammar, I'm doing this on my phone... Not great for typing. My garage needs a computer!
