Coming out’ was easily the hardest

Coming out’ was easily the hardest period of my life. I’m very lucky, and so pleased to say I’ve come out the other side of it now. I’m comfortable with my sexuality and very happy. But the journey to get there wasn’t much fun.

When I was in my early teens, I was watching a film, with a gay character in it. Totally randomly, my heart jumped and I remember being overcome with sheer terror. “What if I’m gay?” My mind started racing, it was filled with questions, panic and I really didn’t know what to do. So I decided to do the obvious thing. Take the dog for a walk, and forget about it. A flawless plan, I’m sure you’ll agree…

For the next five or six years I would go through phases. My teenage years were pretty manic, so sometimes I’d be really busy and the issue wouldn’t be in my head at all. But sometimes I’d think of nothing else. I’d lie awake at night worrying, thinking my life as I know it would be over if I turned out to be gay.






"Surely my family wouldn’t want to know me, my friends would look at me differently, I’d be exposed to a seedy and creepy world, I’d never marry, have kids or a family, I’d be lonely all my life, and as for a career, well no one on the news is gay right? Umm…"







At the time I was racing Karts at quite a high level. It’s a male dominated, macho sport and I remember thinking that I couldn’t POSSIBLY be gay. I wouldn’t classify myself as camp, I like football, motor racing, had a large group of straight male mates; being gay just wasn’t me!

When I reached 16 or 17 and girls started to come in to the equation, it was a weird feeling. My mates would talk about people being fit, or fancying someone etc. Inevitably I kissed girls, but found the whole process really awkward. I had a girlfriend for a brief period and remember kissing her and thinking ‘I’m not sure I like this’. I realised I was different, but just thought that I was a bit less of a ‘lad’ than most of my mates and hadn’t found the right girl yet.

It took me a long time to realise I wasn’t in to girls, and even longer to realise that I am in to guys. My girlfriend dumped me after three months (who could blame her?) and when I went to uni I put huge pressure on myself. You see, what was going to happen was that I was going to move to Nottingham, meet lots of girls and all the doubts about my sexuality that had haunted me in the back of my mind for the last five or six years would disappear. It didn’t work out like that, strangely!






"I spent my first year of uni trying desperately to be straight, attempting to push these doubts out of my mind, feeling awkward when the subject of girls came up. And as first year came to an end, it all started to get a lot more difficult."





Battling with these doubts was becoming harder. I started to worry hugely about the possible consequences of being gay. The worries were becoming more frequent, intensifying and all the feelings I’d been experiencing over the years were getting more severe. I felt like I couldn’t battle it anymore but at the same time didn’t know what to do. I was scared and it was all just becoming too stressful to cope with. I was desperate not to be gay and had spent a long time trying to convince myself that I wasn’t, but during one sleepless night I decided that was it. I said to myself, “OK, let’s stop battling this now and see what happens”. That was a big step.

From there I started to develop feelings towards guys, and slowly learned to not feel guilty when those feelings arose. I plucked up the courage to tell a couple of close friends at the time about the doubts over my sexuality, and without a doubt talking helped, I should have done it a lot sooner. I got some good advice and slowly but surely the mist started to clear, until I eventually started to accept the fact I’m gay. But that very quickly led me to feeling more scared than I ever had done. Not only did I have to start the process of accepting it on my own head, a process which I can only describe as weirdly having to get to know myself again, but there was also the small matter of how the hell was I going to tell my parents.








My Mum and Dad are bloody awesome. I’ve been bought up in a very close family. I’ve been offered nothing but love and support from the minute I was born. I could'n't ask for anything more from my amazing parents and the fact I had something to tell them that I knew could have an effect on my relationship with them, the relationship I cared and still care about more than anything else in the world, was terrifying.

The more I thought about it, the more of a state I worked myself up in to. Until one day after an almost sleepless night, when I was downstairs crying my eyes out, my Dad out of nowhere arrived home early one afternoon. He’d come home to pick something up on the way to a meeting. I was in such a state I knew I had to tell him there and then.



Picture



He knew something was wrong from the minute he walked in. I think he knew it was serious (not least because I was in in a total mess). We talked, and through the tears I eventually told him I’m gay. His reaction was everything I hoped it would be. “Oh mate, it doesn’t matter” he said, almost with a sense of relief as he hugged me. He asked me if I was sure, and when I said I was, insisted I told my Mum that evening. When she came home from work we had a chat and while I think Mum knew deep down, it was a shock and naturally it took a little while for things to return to normal






"Over the months, I began to realise that perhaps my revelation had affected Dad more than he first let on too."





For my folks it took some adjusting. They’d never really known any gay people well and I think for that reason had quite an old fashioned way of looking at the gay community. In fact now that I think about it, they probably had a lot of similar thoughts to the ones I listed earlier, when I was in my early to mid-teens. They’d always seen me as growing up to have the traditional family set up, worried for my future and I think almost in the same way I did, had to re-get to know me as a person a little bit. It was a tough time for us all.

When I went back to uni for second year I was really worried about telling my close friends, particularly my flatmates. I needn’t have been. They were brilliant, every single one of them. As I worked my way round them all, telling each one individually, they couldn’t have been more supportive. “I couldn’t give a shit” and “will you still celebrate Christmas?” were the responses from the first mate I told (again I was in tears, but this time after a row over washing up tipped me over the edge, what a diva) and his good humoured response helped a lot. The response from my friends was just magnificent. They made it clear that it didn’t change the way they looked at me, who I was and wouldn’t change our friendship. Like everything in our friendship group, they approached it with humour and that really helped, almost normalising this big massive thing I’d been worrying about for years. It all meant so, so much and from there it all started to get, well easier.

Suddenly I had more people to talk to when I had low points. I underestimated how long it would take for me to get to know myself again, and that’s why I understood that it was difficult it was for my parents too. But of course, we got there. It took time but things didn’t just return to normal, they were eventually better than normal. We started to talk more, gained a mutual sense of understanding, and things improved week by week. I told my brother who was great, and the last hurdle to get over in terms of family was telling my Nan. She took it really well even if there was a few tears. After telling her, the last key family member, the sense of relief was unbelievable.






"My family knew and progress was really being made there, and as friends and colleagues got to find out it was brilliant. Nobody was treating me any differently."










Picture


That second year of uni was a real landmark one for me. The shackles had been released and being at uni really gave me the freedom to explore the scene with a couple of gay friends who were a big help. Over the year I slowly started to come to terms with it all. I met a guy who I saw for a few months and he even met my parents who were brilliant. He, like me didn’t fit this stereotype that so many people (my former self included) have inaccurately in their mind and I think that helped things with the family. Almost before I knew it my relationship with my parents was stronger than it ever had been. They now knew me better than they ever had done before, the awkwardness of the whole girls issue was gone, we’d been through such a big thing and come through it and it really felt like we were even closer as a family.

My career was always a big worry. I was working very hard to become a broadcast journalist, and I didn’t want anything to get in the way of that. I got a break, started working in radio and when I made the, at the time what felt like quite big decision to be open about my sexuality, realised that there are lots of gay people in the industry. I quickly realised there are outstanding gay broadcasters, in news, sport, presenting, reporting, management, the list goes on.






"Again no one treated me or judged my abilities any differently and it was quickly becoming clear that this whole gay thing wasn’t going to be as big an issue as I thought."





As time went on I became happier and happier. My previous relationship didn’t last, but it allowed me to do the whole dating thing and eventually in my final year of uni, I met the person who’s become the final piece of my jigsaw, my boyfriend. Two years later we’re still together and he’s given me the relationship and the happiness I’d always dreamed about and hoped would one day come. He’s fitted in to my family per

Kết quả (Việt) 1:

Sắp ra ' là một cách dễ dàng giai đoạn khó khăn nhất của cuộc đời tôi. Tôi rất may mắn, và rất vui mừng để nói tôi đã đi ra phía bên kia của nó bây giờ. Tôi cảm thấy thoải mái với tình dục của tôi và rất hạnh phúc. Nhưng cuộc hành trình để đạt được điều đó đã không là nhiều niềm vui.Khi tôi đã ở thiếu niên đầu của tôi, tôi đã xem một bộ phim, với một nhân vật đồng tính trong nó. Hoàn toàn ngẫu nhiên, trái tim tôi nhảy lên và tôi nhớ được khắc phục với tuyệt khủng bố. "Nếu tôi là đồng tính?" Tâm trí của tôi bắt đầu đua xe, nó đã được lấp đầy với những câu hỏi, hoảng loạn và tôi thực sự không biết phải làm gì. Vì vậy, tôi quyết định thực hiện rõ ràng. Mất con chó đi dạo, và quên nó. Một kế hoạch hoàn hảo, tôi chắc chắn bạn sẽ đồng ý...Trong năm tiếp theo năm hay sáu tôi sẽ đi qua giai đoạn. Năm thiếu niên của tôi đã khá Hưng, vì vậy đôi khi tôi muốn được thực sự bận rộn và vấn đề sẽ không trong đầu của tôi ở tất cả. Nhưng đôi khi tôi nghĩ rằng không có gì khác. Tôi sẽ nói dối tỉnh táo lúc đêm lo lắng, suy nghĩ cuộc sống của tôi như tôi biết nó sẽ là hơn nếu tôi bật ra được đồng tính."Chắc chắn gia đình của tôi sẽ không muốn biết tôi, bạn bè của tôi sẽ nhìn tôi một cách khác nhau, tôi sẽ được tiếp xúc với một thế giới seedy và đáng sợ, tôi sẽ không bao giờ kết hôn, có trẻ em hoặc một gia đình, tôi sẽ là cô đơn tất cả cuộc sống của tôi, và đối với một nghề nghiệp, cũng không có ai trên các tin tức là đồng tính quyền? UM... " Lúc đó tôi đua xe kart khá một cấp cao. Nó là một môn thể thao thống trị, nam nhi tỷ và tôi nhớ nghĩ rằng tôi có thể không thể được đồng tính. Tôi sẽ không phân loại bản thân mình là trại, tôi giống như bóng đá, động cơ xe đua, đã có một nhóm lớn của bạn bè trực tiếp tỷ; bị đồng tính chỉ không phải là tôi! Khi tôi đạt 16 hoặc 17 và cô gái bắt đầu đi vào phương trình, đó là một cảm giác lạ. Bạn bè của tôi sẽ nói về những người đang được phù hợp, hoặc fancying ai đó vv. Chắc chắn tôi hôn cô gái, nhưng tìm thấy toàn bộ quá trình thực sự khó khăn. Tôi đã có một bạn gái một thời gian ngắn và nhớ hôn cô ấy và suy nghĩ 'Tôi không chắc chắn tôi như thế này'. Tôi nhận ra tôi đã khác nhau, nhưng chỉ cần nghĩ rằng tôi là một chút ít của một 'lad' so với hầu hết bạn bè của tôi và đã không tìm thấy các cô gái phải được nêu ra. Nó đã cho tôi một thời gian dài để nhận ra tôi đã không là ở với cô gái, và thậm chí nhiều thời gian để nhận ra rằng tôi đang ở cho guys. Bạn gái của tôi bỏ tôi sau ba tháng (những người có thể đổ lỗi cho cô ấy?) và khi tôi đã đi đến uni tôi đặt áp lực rất lớn về bản thân mình. Bạn thấy, những gì sẽ xảy ra là rằng tôi sẽ di chuyển để Nottingham, đáp ứng rất nhiều cô gái và tất cả những nghi ngờ về tình dục của tôi đã ám ảnh tôi ở mặt sau của tâm trí của tôi cho cuối năm hoặc sáu năm sẽ biến mất. Nó không làm việc như vậy, kỳ lạ!"Tôi đã dành năm đầu tiên của tôi về uni cố gắng tuyệt vọng để được thẳng, cố gắng để đẩy những nghi ngờ ra khỏi tâm trí của tôi, cảm thấy khó khăn khi đối tượng của cô gái đã đưa ra. "Và như năm đầu tiên đã chấm dứt, tất cả bắt đầu để có được khó khăn hơn rất nhiều."Chiến đấu với những nghi ngờ đã trở nên khó khăn hơn. Tôi bắt đầu lo lắng cực kỳ về các hậu quả có thể là đồng tính. Những lo lắng đã trở nên thường xuyên hơn, tăng cường và tất cả những cảm giác mà tôi đã trải qua trong những năm qua đã nhận được nghiêm trọng hơn. Tôi cảm thấy như tôi không thể chiến đấu nữa nhưng cùng một lúc không biết phải làm gì. Tôi đã sợ hãi và nó là tất cả chỉ trở nên quá căng thẳng để đối phó với. Tôi đã tuyệt vọng không phải là đồng tính và đã dành một thời gian dài cố gắng thuyết phục bản thân mình rằng tôi đã không, nhưng trong một đêm không ngủ, tôi quyết định đã là nó. Tôi nói với bản thân mình, "OK, chúng ta hãy ngừng chiến đấu này bây giờ và xem những gì sẽ xảy ra". Đó là một bước tiến lớn.Từ đó, tôi bắt đầu phát triển cảm xúc hướng tới kẻ, và từ từ đã học được để không cảm thấy tội lỗi khi những cảm xúc nổi lên. Tôi ngắt lên can đảm để cho biết một vài thân lúc đó về những nghi ngờ hơn tình dục của tôi, và không có một nghi ngờ nói đã giúp, tôi nên đã làm nó rất sớm. Tôi đã nhận một số lời khuyên tốt và chậm nhưng chắc chắn sương mù bắt đầu rõ ràng, cho đến khi tôi cuối cùng đã bắt đầu để chấp nhận một thực tế tôi đồng tính. Nhưng rất nhanh chóng dẫn tôi để cảm thấy còn sợ vụ này hơn tôi bao giờ đã làm. Không chỉ làm tôi phải bắt đầu quá trình của việc chấp nhận nó trên đầu của riêng tôi, một quá trình mà tôi chỉ có thể mô tả như là weirdly có để tìm hiểu bản thân mình một lần nữa, nhưng cũng có vấn đề nhỏ như thế nào địa ngục là tôi sẽ nói với cha mẹ tôi.Mum và cha của tôi là đẫm máu awesome. Tôi đã mua trong một gia đình rất gần. Tôi đã được cung cấp không có gì nhưng tình yêu và hỗ trợ từ phút tôi được sinh ra. Tôi could'n't yêu cầu đối với bất cứ điều gì nhiều hơn từ mẹ tuyệt vời và thực tế tôi đã có một cái gì đó để nói với họ rằng tôi biết có thể có ảnh hưởng đến mối quan hệ của tôi với họ, mối quan hệ tôi chăm sóc và vẫn còn quan tâm đến nhiều hơn bất cứ điều gì khác trên thế giới, là đáng sợ. Càng tôi nghĩ về nó, các chi tiết của một nhà nước mà tôi làm việc bản thân mình lên ở để. Cho đến một ngày sau một đêm không ngủ gần như, khi tôi đã được ở tầng dưới khóc mắt của tôi ra, cha tôi ra khỏi hư không về nhà sớm một chiều. Ông sẽ đến nhà để nhận một cái gì đó trên đường đến một cuộc họp. Tôi đã ở một nhà nước tôi biết tôi đã nói với anh ta có và sau đó. Hình ảnh Ông biết cái gì là sai từ phút mà anh bước vào. Tôi nghĩ rằng ông biết nó đã được nghiêm trọng (không kém bởi vì tôi đã ở trong một tổng mess). Chúng tôi nói chuyện, và thông qua những giọt nước mắt tôi cuối cùng đã nói với ông tôi đồng tính. Phản ứng của ông là tất cả mọi thứ tôi hy vọng nó sẽ là. "Oh mate, nó không quan trọng" ông nói, hầu như với một cảm giác nhẹ nhõm như ông ôm tôi. Ông hỏi tôi nếu tôi đã chắc chắn, và khi tôi nói rằng tôi đã, nhấn mạnh rằng tôi đã nói với mẹ tôi tối hôm đó. Khi cô trở về nhà từ công việc chúng tôi đã có một trò chuyện và trong khi tôi nghĩ rằng mẹ biết sâu xuống, đó là một cú sốc và tự nhiên, phải mất một chút thời gian để những thứ trở lại bình thường"Trong tháng, tôi bắt đầu nhận ra rằng có lẽ sự mặc khải của tôi có ảnh hưởng cha nhiều hơn ông lần đầu tiên cho trên quá."For my folks it took some adjusting. They’d never really known any gay people well and I think for that reason had quite an old fashioned way of looking at the gay community. In fact now that I think about it, they probably had a lot of similar thoughts to the ones I listed earlier, when I was in my early to mid-teens. They’d always seen me as growing up to have the traditional family set up, worried for my future and I think almost in the same way I did, had to re-get to know me as a person a little bit. It was a tough time for us all. When I went back to uni for second year I was really worried about telling my close friends, particularly my flatmates. I needn’t have been. They were brilliant, every single one of them. As I worked my way round them all, telling each one individually, they couldn’t have been more supportive. “I couldn’t give a shit” and “will you still celebrate Christmas?” were the responses from the first mate I told (again I was in tears, but this time after a row over washing up tipped me over the edge, what a diva) and his good humoured response helped a lot. The response from my friends was just magnificent. They made it clear that it didn’t change the way they looked at me, who I was and wouldn’t change our friendship. Like everything in our friendship group, they approached it with humour and that really helped, almost normalising this big massive thing I’d been worrying about for years. It all meant so, so much and from there it all started to get, well easier.Suddenly I had more people to talk to when I had low points. I underestimated how long it would take for me to get to know myself again, and that’s why I understood that it was difficult it was for my parents too. But of course, we got there. It took time but things didn’t just return to normal, they were eventually better than normal. We started to talk more, gained a mutual sense of understanding, and things improved week by week. I told my brother who was great, and the last hurdle to get over in terms of family was telling my Nan. She took it really well even if there was a few tears. After telling her, the last key family member, the sense of relief was unbelievable. "My family knew and progress was really being made there, and as friends and colleagues got to find out it was brilliant. Nobody was treating me any differently."Picture That second year of uni was a real landmark one for me. The shackles had been released and being at uni really gave me the freedom to explore the scene with a couple of gay friends who were a big help. Over the year I slowly started to come to terms with it all. I met a guy who I saw for a few months and he even met my parents who were brilliant. He, like me didn’t fit this stereotype that so many people (my former self included) have inaccurately in their mind and I think that helped things with the family. Almost before I knew it my relationship with my parents was stronger than it ever had been. They now knew me better than they ever had done before, the awkwardness of the whole girls issue was gone, we’d been through such a big thing and come through it and it really felt like we were even closer as a family. My career was always a big worry. I was working very hard to become a broadcast journalist, and I didn’t want anything to get in the way of that. I got a break, started working in radio and when I made the, at the time what felt like quite big decision to be open about my sexuality, realised that there are lots of gay people in the industry. I quickly realised there are outstanding gay broadcasters, in news, sport, presenting, reporting, management, the list goes on. "Again no one treated me or judged my abilities any differently and it was quickly becoming clear that this whole gay thing wasn’t going to be as big an issue as I thought."




As time went on I became happier and happier. My previous relationship didn’t last, but it allowed me to do the whole dating thing and eventually in my final year of uni, I met the person who’s become the final piece of my jigsaw, my boyfriend. Two years later we’re still together and he’s given me the relationship and the happiness I’d always dreamed about and hoped would one day come. He’s fitted in to my family per