It’s funny to think that I’ve spent more time with my family than any other group of people in the world. I grew up around them. They understand my strange traits and habits. They’re used to me. And yet, my sexuality has been a big gray area for them, an elephant in the room that’s becoming harder for me to address as time goes by. I’m not out with them and I don’t know when the right time for that will be.
My family found out I might be gay in a rather traumatic way. When I was in middle school, I used to have a stash of gay porn pictures I printed from the Internet. Up til then, I had been looking at stuff online and being secretive about it. I kept them in a folder and one evening, it happened to be on the carpet for some stupid reason.
My parents found it and immediately started questioning me about it. They asked me what that was, why it was filled with pictures of burly men giving each other blowjobs and other things. I lied that I was “curious,” that I was interested in how men looked and not in a sexual way. They didn’t seem to believe me. My mom was the one doing most of the yelling. She yelled that my sisters could have found it, that they didn’t understand. My dad, on the other hand, was largely quiet and later left the room.
Ever since then, my parents have been largely quiet about what team I play for. My mom asks now and then whether I’m gay or not. I don’t answer her directly and often change the subject. My dad never asks or acknowledges it, at least not to my face. In a way, I think finding out those pictures broke his pride and I feel a lot of guilt about that. This year, I tried to get their approval to let me move in with my boyfriend, when he moved down here. I think their anger and disapproval was less about me wasting money and more about having to acknowledge what I am.
I’m only out to one of my sisters, who’s probably found my Internet history telling. When I told her about my boyfriend, she didn’t seem pleased. The first thing she asked me was, “Can you not be gay?” as if I had chosen to be this way and that it would be simple for me to not be. Since she said that, I haven’t been close to her and I haven’t talked to her about my relationship. My other sister is a lot younger and I suspect she already knows but she hasn’t confronted me about it.
Since then, my mom has told me, in light of my frustration over my applications, that she loved me and that she would no matter what I did or what I was. I didn’t know whether that meant that she had come to accept the idea of me being gay. My parents have met my boyfriend and have even let him stay over. Still, I feel really unsure of how to do it or when.
Part of me wants to move out so I can continue pursuing the other half of my “double life.” Part of me wonders if being gay is actually choice. Part of me feels really disconnected from my other gay friends and the community because I am not out with friends or family and that I’m more cowardly for it. But the silence is deafening and it’s hard to hear what I really want in the midst of it.
from Anonymous