If I could go back 10 years and talk to myself what would I say?
Chris, come out already. You will lose some of your friends, and you may cause a rocky relationship with your parents, but you will be much happier. Your truly good friends will still be your friends and those that are not really your friends, well they are not really your friends. You will also gain new friends.
Tell your best friend when you are considering suicide. Let them help you and do not try to deal with it alone. Your friends will be there for you just like you are there for them.
Make your parents buy you new running shoes more often. As soon as your shins start to hurt it is time for new shoes. Otherwise you are going to injure yourself and never be able to take up running again.
Tell your parents you are not Catholic. Don’t be afraid about how they will react. They probably already know and continuing to go to church every Sunday with them is just going to depress you.
When you get into nasty fights just leave. It is better to walk away from it for hours rather than create a grudge or piss your parents off. Never come back from one of these walks before you are ready. If you do not take the time to cool down it is going to be even worse when you go home.
When you turn 17 your metabolism is going to slow down. Stop eating so much when it happens.
Never buy the first car your dad wants you to ride. It will be a huge mistake. Also, when you are driving to your internship make sure to get new tires first.
Screw money and work at the summer camp more summers. You love working there even though it pays like crap.
Yes, you love computers, but you love a lot of other things too. Consider careers in one of those other things. I am not saying do not go into computers, but consider your other options too.
When considering schools consider at least one school in Colorado. You want to live there so consider going to school there.
But most important do what makes you happy. Do not do what makes your parents or your friends happy.
I will get back to my introspection series next week. Currently I am taking a little vacation. However, I did want to take a few minutes and state my comment policy. I have had to reject several comments over the past several weeks.
To start I am the ultimate decision maker on all comments. If I determine a comment should not be displayed on this site I reserve the right to remove it at anytime. There is no recourse or appeal of this decision.
I do have a few simple rules. Breaking these rules will definitely get your comment removed and could possibly get your email address banned from posting comments.
First and foremost is NO ADVERTISING. Comments like “I just started a blog mygaylife.net. You should check it out.” or “I signed up through Alternative Entertainment Inc.” and then linking to Alternative Entertainment Inc in the comment URL will immediately get your comment removed and your email address banned.
Second, stay on topic. Any comments that are off topic are removed.
Third, contribute to the discussion. A comment “I agree.” will be removed; however, if you state I agree and then go on to explain why the comment will not be removed.
Fourth, keep it civil. I hope I do not have to explain this one.
Also, I know a lot of people like to comment as it provides them the opportunity to link to their own site. I have no problems with this, but the first comment you make will receive extra scrutiny to make sure it is not a thinly veiled attempt at advertising.
I welcome and encourage comments. But please try to abide by these few simple rules.
To most of my readers, sorry for this minor interruption and their have been some very good comments lately. However, I have gotten really tired of removing comments that are quite clearly advertising.
So despite being out of the closet in most aspects of my life I am still in the closet around my family. Why?
Well honestly it is two fold. First I have not had a boyfriend to take home for Christmas or Thanksgiving yet. As long as the questions about girlfriends do not get too much I do not see a reason to add that to my families life and risk my relationship with them. Once I have a serious boyfriend, I feel that I will have the emotional support I need to do this.
The second reason is although I have an idea of how my parents will react, I have no idea how the rest of my family will react. I do not want to go home for Christmas or Thanksgiving an be shunned or be the center of attention. I do not want my being gay to be a big deal at family events. I have a very large family and there is already too much drama at Thanksgiving and Christmas I do not want there to be more.
I know both of those reasons seem shallow, and they are. I do not have a deep reason. I think it is just who I am, I happen to be gay, but gay is not who I am, so not being out is not a big deal to me. I have frequently considered flying home to my parents just to come out, and I suspect I will do that some day. That day simply has not come yet. In the next 12 months will I do that, maybe. In the next 24 months right now I would say more than likely. In the next 5 years, I certainly hope so. But I am not planning this too hard. I will do it when I am ready, and until that day it will be this way.
I know my last few posts have been very upbeat and I definitely should have written this post earlier, but I honestly forgot.
During high school I attempted suicide three times. My definition of attempt may not be the same as everyones, but there were 3 times that it was a very serious option. I thought about suicide on at least a weekly basis, but it was on a very few occasions where I started to act on those thoughts.
I cannot remember for any case why I started to act on my thoughts of suicide exactly, but I know it was a few general things. Underlying to all of them was my being gay, but it was not a specific incident related to being gay that ever set me over the edge. Being gay just had me hovering close to the edge. I never had any resources to talk to about being gay, so it took me a long time to accept that being gay was OK. Note this is different than accepting that I was gay.
What generally sent me over the edge to the point of starting to act was always a fight with my parents. When I was in the bottom of a cycle of depression and got into a nasty fight with my parents I did not see any reason to continue to live. I got progressively further in each of my attempts.
The first attempt I pulled out the knife and held it in my room. I would walk between my room and the bathroom, but every time I got to the bathroom I could not do it and turned around. I did this every night for close to a week.
My second attempt I actually got to the bathroom and stayed in the bathroom, but could never get myself to turn on the water. Unlike my first attempt this only happened once.
My third and final attempt I turned on the water, got in, and was holding the knife to my wrist. I even slashed a few times, but could not get myself to put enough pressure to actually cut.
I do remember from all of these attempts what it was that prevented me from going through with it. I could not stand the thought of what taking my life would do to my friends, my youngest brother, my mom, and my grandparents. My middle brother and my dad were never part of the reason. I could not stand imagining my friends at my funeral, I could not handle the grief I imagined they would face. I could not imagine my friends lives going on without me. I wanted to end my life, but I did not want to hurt my friends, my youngest brother, my mom, or my grandparents. And that is probably the reason I am alive today.
I eventually learned when I had these fights that sent me over the edge, to leave the house and go for a walk. It made me happier, it was better, and I did not have to imagine what would happen to those I cared about. I once went on an 8 hour walk because I was that mad and needed to get away that bad.
If you are reading this and contemplating suicide, please reach out for help. There are many great resources out there including the Trevor Project. Talk to someone, anyone, about your thoughts. I cannot guarantee it will help or change your mind, but you owe it to yourself, your friends, and your family to try.
Well I finally came out in 2009, so how has my life changed since?
From a day to day perspective, not a whole lot has changed. I still put my pants on one leg at a time, work 5 days a week, eat, sleep, and cook. I do not make a point of coming out to everyone I meet, and really only come out when the topic of girlfriends come into play. Gay is a part of me, but gay is not who I am and I do not feel the need to make everyone know that I am gay. That does not mean I live in the closet, it just means that I do not shout it from mountaintops either.
Some of my neighbors know I am gay, others do not. Either way I really do not care, if they have a problem with it they can move. At work I am currently on a 10 person team, 4 of us are gay and one of my team mates has a lesbian daughter. Pride Fests, boyfriends, and gay political issues are a somewhat frequent topic during small talk. I am depressed a whole lot less than I used to be and will vocally and actively stand up for myself and others.
I have become a lot more involved in gay politics, actively challenging politicians on gay issues. I write letters and call my elected representatives and inform others of their views.
I still avoid gay clubs, but clubs in general have never been my scene. This has hurt my dating life, and I am still hunting for a long term boyfriend.
But most importantly when I am out somewhere and someone says a derogatory thing about gay people I speak up and challenge them. I know I am not going to change everyone’s mind, but every mind I can change is a step towards equality.
After college I moved to Indianapolis for my job. Honestly, I never really made friends in Indianapolis so I had no one to come out to. I was committed to coming out, but did not feel safe coming out at work yet, even though there were 2 gay coworkers in my office.
After a year in Indianapolis I moved to Colorado Springs. This move really started my coming out process. Shortly after moving I came out at work one night when a group of us were on the road and sitting on the hotel patio having drinks. Someone asked me if I had a girlfriend and I just got tired of answering this question and responded that I never will have a girlfriend. When asked why I proceeded to say that I was gay. Nothing happened, nobody told me I was going to hell, and I also knew that I now lived in a state where I could not be fired for saying that.
Soon after that it just started to cascade. I frequent a local bar because I get tired of cooking for myself all of the time. I came out there without giving it a second thought. I continued to come out at work, but I did not make a big show out of it. Every time I have come out at work it is because a coworker was asking me about a girlfriend. I have come out to my friends in Colorado Springs. And much much more, but I will save that for a later post.
I think looking back on it, I was beyond ready to come out. I was sick and tired of living in the closet and was frequently depressed because of it. I hated answering questions about girlfriends and that I was too afraid to step up when someone said something derogatory about gays. For me I was independent, did not have the concerns about relying on others, and was just ready to do it.
I know this is a very short and high level story, but the detailed stories can be found elsewhere on this blog. I am writing this post for myself, not so much for you. I know the details and that is enough for me right now.