6.
“I still do it now at 34 years old. I think I always knew, more or less. When I think back to my childhood, I did some of the same stupid things I did when I was gay before the internet, like spending long hours in the men’s underwear section at J.C. Penney or the Sears catalog. However, because I come from a strict Irish Catholic family, my family would argue that my mannerisms and behavior were “too gay.” My family tried to understand why I was like this. Combining this and how to cure me with other common emotional abuse and common derogatory comments about LGBT issues, I learned to suppress and hide or suppress most of my emotional impulses.
“High school was tough, but I tried to find any way I could to not accept who I was. I dated girls, I tried to fit in with my friends, but deep down I hated myself. I didn’t see a future for myself and honestly wanted to end things, but I didn’t have the courage to really go through with it. I think it was all Catholic schools. I tried to join the military, but I was relatively newly diagnosed with Crohn’s disease, so I couldn’t.”
Throughout college, I continued to date women with little success. They can be extremely cruel to men when they are not completely healthy or only 5 feet 7 tall. So between the feeling that if I got what I wanted (a man) it would mean losing everyone I ever knew, and the feeling that I was the most unattractive man ever to women, my self-esteem went to shit. My undergraduate years were filled with a lot of rough and isolated emotions. It was the first time in graduate school that I was around people who didn’t really seem to care or treat people differently because they were gay. At this point, I had been hiding in the closet, mainly telling my long-time friends and family that I had just been busy with schoolwork, and I think it served me well. I told several people about it before I graduated, and they were generally well received.
It took me until I was in my 30s to be able to discuss this with my family. I know they scared me because they made me feel like I had to hide myself so hard, and they made me think that if I messed up, I would get more disowned or more beaten. But I don’t care anymore. I have missed many milestones and lost a lot of time. I see the lives of so many people, both young and old, that I can no longer remain a bystander. When you shut yourself off like I did, a part of you really breaks down, and I don’t want to break down anymore. It starts and ends with me. ”
Source: BuzzFeed – LGBTQ – www.buzzfeed.com
