Coming out pt 6: My best friend

It's been over a month since my last coming out post. You guys definately deserve an explanation. I'm currently taking summer classes. I signed up for 9 credit hours worth. 6 of those hours were crammed into a 5 week period (one of those weeks I had to miss and make up for). On top of that, I had to move into my new house and fix all of the problems that came along with that (neither the past tenets nor the landlords cleaned the place after they moved out). Essentially, I've had no life for the past few weeks.

I told my brother that I came out to my dad. I also told him that I neglected to mention that my brother and sister already knew. He warned me that I need to tell my dad that as soon as possible. I knew he was right, so I confessed that night. He was a little upset that I didn't "keep it under wraps" like he wanted me to, but we didn't discuss it any more. My dad didn't want to talk about it much. He suggested that I go see a therapist to sort out my feelings. I’m sure some of you are thinking ‘uh-oh’ at this point, but it wasn’t like that. He didn’t want to send me to an ex-gay therapist; he wanted to send me to a normal one. He told me that I still felt unsure, and that I needed to talk my feelings out in order to be sure. In other words, while he still loved me, he still hadn’t entirely accepted the idea and needed an external source to verify it, I guess. I agreed to going to a couple sessions because I actually did want to talk out my feelings with someone who probably had experience with this sort of thing. We hid the real reason for my therapy from my step-mom. Dad and I were still uneasy about her knowing. He told her that I was starting to feel sad about my real mom, whose death was approaching its 10 year anniversary. Looking back, I’m not sure how I feel about him using her death to cover up a lie like that. Then again, I went along with it, so I can’t judge.

I had promised to my dad that I wouldn’t tell anyone else for the time being, but I decided that I still wanted to tell my friends and broke my promise. I decided to tell my best friend first. I mentioned him in one of first posts. He and I have been friends since we were 1-2 year olds when our moms put us together in day-care. When we were little, we used to always play together. We’d build forts, have sleepovers, go sledding, trick-or-treating, everything. We steadily grew apart over the years (most of that had to do with attending different schools). Despite that, we kept decent contact and I’ve always considered him close regardless of how much we grew apart. He is the only non relative that I’m okay saying “I love you” to (well, him and his mom). I guess it’s because I consider them family. This year, we were actually hanging out a lot because we were in Confirmation class together and were in the same group. One night, our class time included going to the confessional. I told the priest that I was keeping secrets from people. He told me my penance and told me that I should trust the people I care about and not keep secrets from them. I wasn’t planning on coming out to my friend that night, but hey, might as well get a jump on that penance. Conveniently, my friend and I were two of the last people to leave, so we had a chance to be alone. Also, the topic homosexuality had been brought up in our group in some way (though I forget why and what was said). I used that to get on the topic and I tried to lead to telling him the truth. I noticed that the more I lead up to it, the more uncomfortable he got and tried to change the subject. I didn’t want to let up, so I eventually blurted it out. His reaction seemed to be a mixture of shock and discomfort. He didn’t know what to say at first. I don’t remember much of the conversation, but I remember that it was short and that at some point he said that he might be a little bi. I didn’t know what to think or say about this. I know that I didn’t believe he was actually bi. I guess I figured that he was just saying it to make me feel more accepted, or maybe he had in fact experience some degree of bisexuality at some point like I did, but wasn’t any more. I remember one of the last things I told him was that lots of straight people experience I bi phase at adolescence (that may be a true statement, but it was probably a jackass thing to say). My friend was overall supportive, but it seemed clear to me that he wasn’t ready for me to come out. I decided that it must be too much to expect a 16 year old from our area to be ready and mature for this kind of thing. I decided that I wouldn’t come out to anyone else for a long time. Still, the fact that my best friend was uncomfortable had me extremely worried. I was afraid that if my best friend wasn’t completely comfortable with the idea (and he was one of my more liberal friends), then maybe there was no chance for my more conservative friends from being supportive.

For those of you who read one of my earliest posts, titled “My best friend is gay,” then you probably have a good idea of what was really going on with my friend when I came out to him. As it turns out, my best friend is also gay. I don’t know what level of self-acceptance he was at when I came out to him, but it was probably way behind mine. He only came out to his family earlier this year. When I was building up to my own coming out, he may have thought that I had figured him out or something. When I came out, it must have been extremely confusing for him. I know that I felt unsure about things when I found out about him. He hasn’t officially come out to me. His mom told me, assuming I already knew. I’m waiting for him to bring up the subject himself, because I don’t want to deny him the experience of coming out to me. As awkward as it was when I came out to him, I’m glad I had that moment.