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My brother came out, I am gay too.

Discussion in 'Coming Out Advice' started by Onenation, Jan 17, 2017.

  1. Onenation

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    I don't know where to start with this other than from the beginning. I apologise in advance for the length of this thread.

    When I was 9 I knew I was different to that of my friends and family. I didn't understand it at the time and for years kept fighting it away. School was tough because you were beaten up if you were feminine or gay. I became so depressed that I remember at the age of 11 finding my father's revolver and its bullets and loading it up. My biological brother happened to walk in at the time and ran to my mom. Needless to say I got the hiding of my life, because I never forgot how hurt and I felt that I couldn't explain to them why I was doing it. I didn't understand these feelings of being gay myself was, because I didn't even know what the actual term "gay" meant back then, I was so confused.

    I was brought up to believe that having any sexual contact with the same gender was "disgraceful, sick, and wrong", and that any contact with another man in ANY way would contract the HIV virus. I was confused about HIV and was too afraid to ask in fear of someone might realizing that I am gay. I would watch my gran turn her head away in disgust as she saw two men together, which at the time, was pretty rare to see in public, I mean, they weren't even holding hands or showing any public affection or anything alike, it was just in their body language and clothing that they accentuated who they were. I couldn't stop staring at them because they were everything I wanted to be and watching them be who they were, made a part of me feel alive inside.

    As I grew older in my teens I became depressed, recluse, and an introvert. The stronger my feelings towards boys were, the more distant I became. Outside I was just trying to cope, inside I was dying.

    When I turned 19, my gran (mom's mother), my uncle (my mom's brother), aunt and two of their four children were killed in a head on collision. This resulted in their eldest two kids (my cousins) coming to live with us. Our whole family took this very hard. We were very close to them. My father buried himself in his work to avoid the pain, my mom became harder towards life which resulted in her having a nervous breakdown and becoming ill. Today she has dementia and major depression and on handfuls of medication. My biological brother threw himself hard into his studies and married a couple of years later and is now emigrating. These are all coping mechanisms my family did to deal with what had happened. Is this a long term solution to healing through this tragedy?!I don’t know! But at the time it was kind of working for them.

    We all (including my cousins) went for trauma and family counselling but this never worked, it made things worse for us all. I didn't have anyone to fall back on or anything to supress this tragedy towards other than what I was already supressing. My mom, in her state, put all her attention and focus onto my two cousins (which I now call my brothers) and pushed my biological brother and I aside. She literally cut us out. She felt guilty and responsible for the deaths, as they left our house to go home the time the accident happened.

    The relationship between my biological brother and I changed. We became even more distant than what we already were, to the point we had nothing in common to relate to other than our two younger brothers. My family as a whole felt sorry for the boys and pitied them, dis-enabling them to take responsibility for themselves in life to the point that they literally got away with just about everything they did. The eldest of the two was arrested later during the years for a criminal offense (and it was not a small offense too), and had been dropped because of his back ground history that my mom had been pleading to the courts on was a tragedy. The youngest, however, was the total opposite, he grew up recluse and introverted, didn't have friends, and grieved a lot about his folks and siblings that had passed away. He became very protective over our mom.

    When I hit my early 20's, dealing with what happened to us, I lost out on so many great opportunities in my life to grow spiritually, mentally and emotionally. Physically it made me withdraw a lot from society. For years I cried trying to fight these feelings of being attracted to men. For years I felt my soul deteriorate diminishing the light it carried. I became suicidal, depressed, angry and hurt. I was kicked out of home at 22. My mom's reasonings were that I am no example to the boys of what she raised me up to be, that I haven't any consideration towards my brothers in their time of need. She dedicated her life to them. My closest friend who loved and understood me so well, who often use to reason for me in the things that I did as a child, who always knew who I was but never said anything to me or anyone else, was my uncle who passed away in the accident.

    When I was on the streets, I dropped out of varsity, hung around with the wrong crowd taking drugs and got arrested, I just stopped caring. I hated myself and my life. I was angry at my sexuality for a long time too. This numbed my soul so that I didn't have to feel anymore. I went out with girls I had no love towards (almost became a father in the process). I had been beaten up a few times for even looking at guys. My 20's were rough for me.

    In my early 30's I struggled to keep a job. I lived in my car and would park at fuel stations to sleep for the night, use their restrooms to clean, change and freshen up and head for work. As I slowly started to build my life back again I worked myself up to a managerial position in a small corporate company. Things were starting to finally work for me. I met some guy on line and in the beginning we hit it off. After about a month I noticed abnormalities about him. He would call me every hour at work, send me video clips of me working at work, pitch up at my apartment at 4am in the morning and wait till he saw me get up and call me to see what I was up too. He became obsessed with me. This scared me to death. When I broke it off with him he hacked into my email at work, sent out a derogatory letter to himself on my account and a reply to it from his email, then sent this off to the entire company. I was fired. He hacked into my face book and posted the emails he wrote to himself from himself as me, and put up explicit pictures of men on my page, which not only did it shut my face book account down, but went across to all my friends and family. It was here that everyone found out I was gay. I got calls saying how disgraceful I was, how they felt sorry for me before but realised that I deserve what had come to me. I lost everything again. I battled finding work because it spread from corporate to corporate about the emails and the face book events. I just took it down to companies being scared of brand imaging by employing me.

    I am now in my mid 30's and just recently had my birthday. I started my own business a year ago and it is still pretty tiny at the moment but I am hoping it will eventually grow.

    My youngest brother (the younger one of the cousin's) has just come out of the closet two days before my birthday. He is now in his late 20's but has lost out so much on his own life by hiding his sexuality. He hasn't yet told me he is gay. He came out to his biological brother (with whom my youngest brother now lives with) and my mom. My mom is more accepting of him coming out than she was of mine. It is not because of how my coming out had happened, but because of how I didn't pity them. Don't get me wrong, I felt bad for them but at the same time I was going through so much self-worth of understanding who I was. I am hoping my relationship with him will be easier. He has always been quiet. I think he watched what I went through and decided to wait till he finished his degree and moved out of the house to come out.

    I guess in some way I am happy for him but in another way I feel sad. It might be because of what I have been though and not wanting him to have the same rejections as I did. I am seeing a psychologist to help me through these challenges I have been though. I want the best for him but I also don't want to take away his experience of life as a gay man. Maybe it is the elder brother in me. I don't even know if he is afraid to tell me. I won’t say anything to him. I will let him come to me first.

    This has been hard for me to talk about on here. I don't usually share my life like this especially if I don't know anyone who I am sharing my life too and because of my experience with the emails. I really want a good relationship with my brother, we now have something in common and I am hoping it will bring us closer. After all he is all I have as family right now.

    What should I do?


    Thank you for reading this,
    take care
     
  2. TravelerMe

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    Just when I think how tough my spot is I see how hard you've struggled to pick yourself up and live the life you want; inspiring.

    Seems to me you need him as much as maybe he could need you. On the surface it sounds like a wonderful opportunity to connect with him.

    Does he know you know about him? He may just assume you know. He also may see you in a different light considering your struggles and doesn't want to bother you.

    Whether he knows you know or not I'd just try to reconnect with him in general just as brother. Nothing to do with sexuality; you don't need to have a serious talk right off; be patient. Just meet him to reconnect and maybe begin to renew your relationship and after a while he may be ready to talk about more and allow you to be a support for each other. Be patient.
     
  3. Onenation

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    Thank you TravelerMe for your response.

    No he doesn't know yet that I know about him. You may be right that he sees me in a different light. I was thinking of that earlier about just reconnecting with him and thank you for confirming it for me. I have often been tested with patience and it comes in quite often, all the more reason to be it :slight_smile:

    I knew years back that he is gay, but none of my family member had an idea. My dad is still in shock and doesn't understand it nor do I think he ever will. But that isn't important right now, what is important, is that he isn't alone in this and that he is loved.
     
  4. brainwashed

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    Im going to engage with the person associated with this post. Taking a short break. Stay tuned.
     
  5. Conan

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    Just wow man, I can't imagine how brave you are, to bear all these things, I would've probably died, you are so brave, I wish I had the courage you have. My problems are 0% compared to yours. and your stroy is inspiring, thank you for sharing it.
    I can't help much, since I am not that experienced, but I hope you'll get the kind of relationship you want with your brother, you deserve the best for coping with all these problems.
    I wish you the best my friend :3
    Bless you and be in peace.
     
  6. brainwashed

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    Ok I'm back. My response will be mostly high level. (Macro response, small amount of micro response.) Please note, my response may sound terse but that is not my intent. My intent is to get to the main points.

    a) What hits me is the total lack of communication and openness. Get out in front of a situation, the situation being you are gay, or it will mull you over. That is exactly what is happening. Communicate openly and fully.

    b) If people are so small as to condemn a person for being gay, stop putting energy into them, you are not going to change them. If they want they will change themselves. So what to do. Go and get LGBT support group. And get gay friends. You may want to go find a gay friendly church.

    c) Personally I'd distance myself from the "family" thing. I know they are biologically related but thats it. If they dont have the maturity or life skills to relate to a gay family member, then thats their problem. Stop putting energy into trying to get them to love you - it appears to be bring you down. If you live a life that you want, live by values you believe in, then you are showing them, not telling them who your are. If they are worth anything at all, they may come around.

    Quite some time ago I came up with a life model analogy. It's like you are paddling a canoe up a river, against the river's flow, and into the wind. Thats really hard to do. Turn around and go with life's flow (go with the rivers flow) and have the wind against your back.

    Later man
     
    #6 brainwashed, Jan 19, 2017
    Last edited: Jan 19, 2017
  7. Onenation

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    Thank you Conan I appreciate your message.
     
  8. Onenation

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    LOL, So I will attempt this reply for the 3rd time. The past two I hit the wrong key and deleted the messages hahaha.

    Hi BW,

    Thank you for your message. I am happy who I am. In fact, I love my sexuality. :slight_smile:

    In my post I was merely explaining my past a few years back. Today I am very happy being who I am. My family still have their issues regarding the accident and the guilt that went with it, but I've learnt to walk away from it. Today I don't associate a lot with my family and it works for me.

    I explained my past in my post because my youngest brother has just come out of the closet and I want a good relationship with him. However I know my family is very overpowering and this has already suppressed who he is. He has seen what I had been through and lost out a lot on who he is because of being afraid to come out. Now that he has, it is rebuilding my relationship with him that I am more interested in. Not my family as a whole.

    :slight_smile:
     
  9. brainwashed

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    I really love the quoted material above. "I love my sexuality." Neat.

    With reference to family. Let them know where you stand. But you cant run their lives. With reference to your brother. Be there for him.

    Later
     
  10. Onenation

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    Thanks BW
     
    #10 Onenation, Mar 12, 2017
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  11. Makalaster

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    I realized I was bisexual when I was 13 told my sister I might be gay or bisexual. Figured out I was gay when I was 16; due to pressures of my anxiety and school. I wanted to kill myself so bad, but I couldn't go through with it. I was going to gas myself in a car, but I couldn't find the keys. I came out to my family and close friends when I was around 20. I've been assuming everyone knew I was gay and I figured out they dont. I was so close to come out, but he "Bro I knew you weren't gay" I died on the inside. He was making jokes about how gay sex is disgusting. He also used a stereotype and avoided even saying the word gay like its something to be ashamed of.
    I'm thinking about jumping off a bridge near my house. I just want to take acid just so it can justify me killing myself.
     
    #11 Makalaster, Mar 13, 2017
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  12. BadassFrost

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    Wow.. this is really.. moving. I really wish that your relationship with your brother will work out. We all need someone who we can relate to, and who can relate to us, so if you think your brother is that person, then go for it.
     
  13. Onenation

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    BadassFrost, my man, thank you so much for saying that!!