Hey guys I'm a 25 year old bisexual man and that fact has been clear for me since ever. I've dated girls and I've had several crushes with boys, but because of my current situation (in the closet, except for two close friends) I've never actually dated one. The thing is that I feel like there's a big part of me that is being repressed, and there's a lot of things I'm prohibiting myself to experience because of pure fear of taking that step out. I've always been a rather popular guy surrounded by lots of friends, and because of my personality, people would never expect me to be gay o bi. In fact, when I told one of my friends (my best friend for a long time now) he just didn't believe me for a while and thought I was just playing, and the other one said that the idea of me liking other men would have never crossed her mind if I she hadn't heard it from me. It was a big surprise for both of them but they were really cool with it, and we've become even closer since then. After that I thought I could do it. I had already told two of my friends and everything went fine, so nothing was stopping me of telling other people.. but things weren't that easy. It's been a year since that and I couldn't bring myself to tell anyone else, and today I feel really bad about it, bad about my sexuality and bad about myself. I've been little by little stopping paying attention to girls and boys alike, I feel so unmotivated that I'm not interested in having anything with anyone, even though I've had several chances but it's like I'm feeling nothing lately, and all of this is eating me from the inside out. I know that at this rate things will only get worse, so I may have to take a decision soon, even though I don't know if I'll have the courage that's necessary.. I wanted to share this, and I hope you can understand what I'm going through here..
Since you said you feel bad about your sexuality, think that it's probably best that you feel good about your own sexuality before putting yourself out there. I know I'm quite a bit younger but what helped me accept and love my sexuality was seeing people on the internet being happy and living their lives as gay, bi, trans, non binary and all other orientations (despite only fitting into one of those category's). The biggest factor in this was actually seeing the hashtag for Glasgow Pride on twitter since everyone there was so happy about their orientations. But obviously everyone is different and this may not be what you feel is the right step for you, don't feel forced to come out but I am aware that at some points thoughts on the subject probably reach obsessive at times (mine did). Anyway sorry for writing a huge block of text, hope my personal experience helps. Stay strong.
Yeah, usually taking the time you need to make sure you feel good and secure within yourself about your sexuality makes it better to come out, and you also shouldn't be hard on yourself for not having come out to everyone yet. Only you can decide, but do you think at this point, you could benefit from taking more time to feel okay about your sexuality? Whether or not you do, when you feel you are ready to come out maybe think of all the reasons you want to come out, reasons that will affect you positively, like being able to be open and happy. It may be hard at first, especially if you feel you may lose some security socially because of it. I guess if that's the case, I would say that if you fear losing some peoples' current opinions of you by coming out, then that's all the more sign that you should. Because if not, then how are their opinions actually serving you? They may seem superficially beneficial to you, but it seems they're doing more harm than good for you. You want to be free of that. That's an easy choice but often the hardest to do what you need to to get there. It's scary, and it can take time. But sometimes its time and feeling stressed that can be what pushes people to take that step. So think of what coming out will do for you, but also be super patient with yourself while you get there because you deserve that. Coming out is for you, not for other people. Best of luck
I attended a LGBT support group the other day. I'm not out to my family but I feel like attending the support group and having that emotional back up will help me when I do come out. Don't put so much pressure on yourself it ok to start slow with smaller steps.
Hey Nobodyhere, I strongly believe that you have to understand and accept your own sexuality before Coming Out to others – as Closed book and bubbles123 also indicated. Clearly, Coming Out is completely your personal choice and you can Come Out (or not) if/when you are ready and feel comfortable doing so. But if anyone challenges your Coming Out (“it can’t be true”, “it’s just a phase”, “you’re just confused right now”, etc), it can be hard to stand firm and not fall back into self-questioning again. Each of us comes to an understanding and acceptance of our sexuality at our own rate and in our own timeframe. There is also a difference between understanding our sexuality and truly accepting it. For myself, I didn’t really understand my bisexuality until I was 23 years old and it took me two more years to come to a true acceptance and be at peace with it in my heart and mind. If you are feeling bad about what you understand as you bisexuality, you may still be going through the grieving process. Because we live in a heteronormative society, we grow up in a society that expects us to be heterosexual and live a heterosexual life. Religious influences can also play a big role in creating roadblocks for us to accept our non-heterosexuality. When we start to realize that we are not ‘normal’ based on those influences, we might start to lose part of our confidence and our self-worth. We might feel that we are letting our parents and those we love down. But, of course, this isn’t true. We don’t choose our sexuality. We are who we were born to be and the way to deal with that (and honor our Maker, if you are a believer) is to live our lives being the best people we can possibly be. There are 5 steps to the grieving process. First comes Denial: in this case, “no, I’m not bisexual.” Next comes Anger: “I hate this and I hate myself! Why can’t I just be ‘normal’ like most other people? Why ME!?!” Then comes Bargaining: “So, maybe I’m bisexual, but then again maybe I can just live my life acting as a heterosexual. But, no I’m certain I’m bisexual. Or am I…?” After that comes Depression: “I want to be ‘normal.’ I wish I was just heterosexual. This sucks and I don’t think I could ever really live life as a bisexual. I know I can’t face my parents. I don’t even want to face society. I’m just going to hide somewhere until it goes away. Why did I have to be the victim of this cruel joke?” Until, finally, there is Acceptance: “Hmm… Maybe this isn’t as bad as I thought. Maybe I can accept my bisexuality, my same-sex attractions as well as my opposite-sex attractions. And you, know what? My sexuality is just a part of who I am, but it doesn’t define who I am. I am going to be the person I was born to be and I will do amazing things with my life!” The steps don’t always occur for any given person in that order and people sometimes go back and forth among the steps. Just some thoughts. I don’t know if this helps.
Hey guys, thank you for your replies! It's great to feel that I'm not completely alone in this I think the problem isn't that I haven't accepted my bisexuality, I know I'm bisexual and I won't be able to change that even if I wanted to, which I don't. I think the problem is that I've never experienced my sexuality freely (at least not the half of it that is so wrong in the eyes of society), and I may not be able to do it unless I'm out of the closet. I mean, everything is fine when it comes to girls but with boys is a completely different story, it's really hard to experience something real with another man in this situation so there's a part of me that remains unknown to me. So I don't know if I'm ready to tell the world I'm bisexual (without mentioning that it terrifies me) because there's so much I just don't know about that part of me which I haven't experienced in so many ways. Even though I've been intimate with other men a couple of times in the past, I understand sexuality is something much more complex than sex, and even if I've come to accept it I might not have come to completely understand it (if that makes sense..) Feels like I need to come out to be sure that I'm ready to come out :eusa_thin ... My head is about to explode haha Thank you all again for your words, they did help Maybe what I need now is some more time, and not to force anything to happen as long as I'm feeling like this. And yes, maybe I've been putting a lot of pressure on myself, I'll try to go easier on me from now on..
