I go back and forth with what I have learned about dealing with life. There are times when I adhere to the new ways of thinking about my life. Other times I revert back to my old ways of worrying myself to death about something I have NO control over.
For the past month, I've been testing my patience. There is someone in my life that I have learned to care about so deeply, but I am now brought to question my own motivation for putting up with all the hurt and pain that goes along with trying to love him. I am at an intersection with several take-offs. I've been standing here for a long time. Very indecisive because I am trying to assess all the feelings I have and weigh them against each other. It's very difficult. I thought I heard my heart say to stay. I hear other voices telling me to leave. Others press me to move on, but keep him somewhere in my mind. Then again, another group tells me to move on and forget. I am quite lost. I need to sit and find my own way. Listen to the truest voice inside of me. Listen hard, listen carefully... it whispers.
"How do I deal with you? How do I deal with me? When I don't even know myself or what it is you want from me." I truly don't know myself and I'm finding that quite difficult to figure out. I carry around a lot of emotional baggage and it weighs me down so much... it hurts. This feels somewhat like a journal for me, but writing something down is always a good way for me to deal with things... whether it be prose or in my poetry. Isolation is a common feeling I have... no matter what the context. I'm alone and have been alone for a majority of my life. I don't know if my friends know that I feel alone even when I am with them. I don't confront people because I am still shy. My shyness may be a learned behavior and it is so difficult to learn how to be a little more outgoing so that I can function better in life.
Time to be myself. There is no need for me to hide behind facades as I have been doing
for quite a long time. No one is quite aware of who I really am... and I haven’t really been
aware of who I really am. I am starting to shed some light on the subject and discovering
who I am. This month of March has been a march towards discovering myself. The
beginning of the month saw that I became involved in meeting other students who are
acknowledging their sexuality through the Gay Bisexual Lesbian Transgender Commission
(GBLTC). Sitting in the office for a few hours every day, I have encountered many new
people with different stories to share and different experiences with which we may relate.
I’ve also gone through an attitude change. Something more healthy for my life. I have
given up on finding romance through meeting guys online. As honestly as I would portray
myself, there was still something that was artificial about what someone knew about me
and it was quite evident that someone trying to find affection online may not divulge the
complete honest truth about himself. I have received a great deal of advice about life --
some of which I have taken to heart. Life is truly what you make of it and sometimes you
have to take a chance or take a risk and go after what you want. Even dying my hair has
given me a different perspective. “Nothing really matters. Love is all we need.” --
Madonna. I am happy with who I am. My hair color has changed, but I am still the same
person. If someone were to ask me if I am gay, now I would just be honest and tell that
person the truth. I shall not deny a part of who I am any longer. I am learning to be a
little more outgoing and I’ve engaged in sharing really personal experiences with people
whom I have become very comfortable around.
This is not gonna make sense. This is just me rambling to fill space with the thoughts that flow through my mind. I’ve held so much inside of myself that I cannot deal with on my own. I’ve been sitting here crying for the last hour. Why do I find myself questioning the things in my life? My friends. My family. Myself. It just doesn’t make sense to me. I’m confused and I don’t know where to turn. I have all these emotions. All these feelings. These things I want to share with someone. These feelings I want to feel for someone. Feelings I hope someone would feel for me. It seems that every damn time I meet this wonderful guy it’s one of these scenarios: 1) I’m not his type. 2) He’s already involved.
3) I can’t tell if he is straight or gay. 4) I get mixed signals and can’t tell the fucking difference.
The dating game SUCKS!!! Especially for this 20 year-old college student who finally started to peek out of the closet almost a year ago. Heh. Why do I call it a dating game when I haven’t even been a contestant or participant or whatever the hell the term is? I’ve
been alone all my life. Yes, I’m aware that I’m still young, but what the fuck? The friends I have online actually provide me with a feeling that people do want to talk with me and see how I am doing. It’s not fair of me to put up this comparison, but what about my
friends in real life? Does the phrase “out of sight, out of mind” ring a bell? I am sorry... I may not mean these words I have written, but this is the way I am feeling at this moment.
Childhood is usually something people think of fondly. My childhood was a different story. I hear all these stories people tell about the fun times in their childhood. I hear all the stories about what people did over the weekend or what they did since the last time I
heard from or saw them. The phrase I hear often that also hurts me is “Oh, you weren’t there with us?” when it is realized that, well, I wasn’t there. Many of these events that took place without me I never received any notification of what was happening or being
planned. The first time I would ever hear about it would be when people are talking about it with fun memories. What’s embedded in my mind? A great assortment of bad memories. I’m sorry that I can’t forget these memories. They comprise most of what I remember from my earliest memories to what I can remember up to the present. I am
depressing and that’s what deters people. I can’t continue with these thoughts. So I’ll stop them for right now.
I stepped up to the greatest challenge I have faced in my life so far. This being a year after
I began the process of coming out, I have come to the pinnacle. I never imagined that I
would do it so soon after I began, but I have come out to my family. In all my years of
life, this has been the most trying experience. This life scared me at many points along the
way. At my darkest moments, I contemplated committing a cruel crime against my
person... the taking of my own life. Somehow I mustered my strength to resist making
any attempts on my own life. Now, I sit here after calling upon my inner strength yet
again. I found the courage to tell my family that I am gay. I doubted that I had enough
strength to overcome my fears and share this part of me with my own family. I dreaded
the reaction they would have. I knew that it would be a negative reaction... something I
hadn’t experienced when I came out to my friends. I arrived at the conclusion that they
would find out sooner or later. It was a secret I couldn’t hide forever. I told myself that it
wouldn’t matter when I told them... the reaction would be the same. It was time to suck it
up and just “drop the bomb.” I wouldn’t allow myself to continue living a lie around
them. It was obvious that there was tension between my family and I... not only due to
the whole parent-child relationship, but also to the lack of an open and honest line of
communication. It was too much to bear not being able to share a part of my life that was
making sense... a part of my life where I was beginning to see that I can experience
happiness. I’ve always had the capacity to be happy... it was only a matter of chasing the
clouds away to see that the happiness is inside of me. More importantly, I found that I
have the capacity to love myself and expand that capacity to love others. I was told I had
such a big heart with a capacity to love others, but I needed to see that it had room for me
to love myself as well. I am on my way to fully capturing that aspect within me.
Coming out to my family is the best thing I have done in my life. It’s also been the hardest
thing. It was a real shock to my family. My younger brother was the first to be informed.
It was an interesting method, but effective. I began the thoughts about the issue of
homosexuality by putting an article with headline “I’m gay damn it!” in the pile of job
applications we were going to submit that day (June 15, 1999). He was quite oblivious to
why it was there. So I asked him if he knew what the rainbow represents (showing him
the rainbow necklace I was wearing). He said he didn’t know. I kept asking a few more
times and all he could come up with was “It means you’re colorful?” I gave it a rest for a
while and then asked one more time. He still had no idea... so I just said “It represents
being gay.” Then he asked, “So you’re gay?” Relieved that he finally asked, I said “Yes,
I’m gay.” There was a short period of silence and then I asked him if he was okay. He
said yes. In the car, I asked him what he thought of me now that he knew. He said that
he didn’t think of me any differently. A great burden was lifted off my shoulders.
The big day came around (June 17, 1999). I resolved myself to come out to my parents. I couldn’t figure
a way to come out to them. But I told myself that it must be done. I had a book entitled
“Coming Out As Parents: You and Your Homosexual Child” ready with me. I read it
prior to coming out to my parents to make sure it said the right things about what I was
going to tell them. I wrote a message on the first page addressed to my parents. It
essentially said that I’ve wanted to share this secret with them because I love them and
wanted to open an honest line of communication with them to establish a healthier
relationship with them. I waited for them to come home. I was on the phone with a friend
when they came home. They found the book and read the message. I was still on the
phone... afraid to hang up and confront my parents. They got ready for bed and were
practically in bed when I got off the phone. I got ready for bed... and decided to get
online before I went to sleep. My parents knocked on my door around 11pm. I invited
them in... knowing what they wanted to talk about. The first question was “What is this
book you gave to your mom? What are you trying to say?” I was a bit surprised at this
question, but answered it... thus began the first conversation of my sexuality... so I
thought. I was taken aback... the majority of this conversation was not focused on my
sexuality... it was focused on academics and financial issues. My parents were under the
impression that I wasn’t going to continue my studies or graduate from college and that
my spending habits were only influenced by my being gay. I was totally confused. I
couldn’t interject and make them talk about the true issue at hand. They were a tag team
and the whole night was spent discussing my academics and financial habits. When they
finally left my room, I just couldn’t believe what happened. Very rarely did they mention
my sexuality in that entire discussion! I could not sleep that night and I had to send an
email to my friends to let them know what had happened... I was seriously upset. I cried the
entire night until I finally fell asleep early the next morning. Then, the first thing I did
when I woke up was to start crying again.
That morning (June 18, 1999), I received phone calls from the first friend I came out to in
person (Valerie), one of my newest friends (Sara), and an even more recent friend (Chris).
It was a great comfort to know that I have friends who care about me. I also appreciated
all the responses I received in my email. I knew that I needed to get away from the tense
environment of home. It became more apparent when my mom and I got into an
argument about my friends. I couldn’t stand for the harsh things she was accusing my
friends of having done to me. In anger, I left home with my younger brother. I felt sorry
for leaving my baby brother behind. He didn’t understand what had been going on. I
stopped by a friend’s house (Cesar). I came out to him that day as well. I felt I would
need a place to stay for the night. He kindly offered and then I thought that I should
rendezvous with Chris that afternoon. I set our meeting in motion and we finally got to do
so. I met him at the mall with my brother tagging along. We met Anica there, too. She
was waiting to start work. Anica got to know Chris a little bit. Then, she had to go to
work. My brother and I thought we’d check on the status of our job applications. Chris
and I started getting to know each other, too. My brother thought he should go home
because my mom had threatened to cut off my phone line which was used for Internet
access as well. I couldn’t face going home knowing that she was probably still angry so I
let my brother drive home and I went with Chris. We hung out the rest of the evening
together. I got to meet some of his friends. We were both pretty hungry so we set out for
dinner. Chris, the sweetheart that he is, picked up my tab assuring me that I owed him
nothing. He was glad to be there for me the day after I came out to my parents. He was
definitely willing to be there for me for much longer than that. Let’s just say that he and I
hooked up that night. Yay! My first boyfriend. :)
Chris had to drop me off at my friend’s house where I had hoped to stay the night. It was
hard to leave his side, but I had to do it. Cesar’s mom was there and she knew I was on
my way because I had called before Chris dropped me off. She could tell that something
was upsetting me and offered to talk to me about it. I came out to her that night. I
reviewed my parents’ reaction to my coming out with her. She was very understanding
and supportive as I recapped what had happened the previous night and earlier that
morning. I wouldn’t call home until Ceres had arrived home. We talked for a while
before I called home to let my parents know where I was. I pleaded with my dad to let me
stay where I was, but he insisted on picking me up. I didn’t feel I could return home... I
heard my mom yelling in the background. My dad dragged me home against my wishes.
When we arrived home, I got ready for bed and heard my parents having a conversation...
basically having an argument. I hopped into bed trying to fall asleep... knowing that I
wouldn’t get any sleep with the argument going on in my parents’ bedroom. Then my
parents came into my room to have a talk. My mom did most of the talking. What I was
hearing was not what I was expecting. She was ranting about personal issues I had never
been aware of between herself and my dad. She made little reference to what I had done
that day and the previous night. She was crying and yelling, my dad was trying to calm
her down, and I lay in bed crying at what I was listening to. My coming out had the effect
of bringing up all the issues my mom had held within herself and never talked about. It
was early in the morning hours after midnight that they left my room. I was still crying
and they went back to their bedroom. I stayed awake crying for a while. I heard my mom
still crying and yelling in their bedroom. I don’t know when I finally fell asleep.