'Getting caught forced me to come out'

This piece was originally published in full on SameSame.com.au, on July 21st 2015, available here.

-------

Coming out is hard to do. For gay men like me, it’s an exercise in owning who you are, enough to tell people about it – your friends and your family – in a society which actively instils a sense of shame and wrongness into our gay youth. Coming clean with your truth in a world that actively fights against people like you is no small feat.

I’ve been a young boy, confused and afraid, grappling with who I was. I have thought about suicide. I remember being twelve or thirteen years old, and every night staring up at my ceiling from my bed, praying to God or whatever sentient being watched over this world, that I would wake up and be normal. I remember telling that being – that omniscient presence – that if they would turn me straight; if I would wake up the following morning and not be gay, that I would devote myself to them.

I would have done anything to get rid of that loneliness, that self-hatred, and I swore I would never tell a soul. Because I was ashamed. Many gay men out there feel the same. We know they do, because we’ve been there, and we’ve lived so much of their pain. The anguish of living in the closet, before coming out to the world, is real and devastating.

For some gay men like myself, the coming out experience goes a little differently.

I was fifteen years old. I’d just started dating someone new – I would have been with any boy, so long as I had a chance to feel an intimacy I’d craved. He liked dressing fancy on thirty-five degree days in suits and ties. I had a sweeping side fringe that covered my eyes – my “security blanket” – and I was totally smitten by the fact that someone was paying attention to me.

On one particular scorching summer day – forty degrees on the scale, no less – he agreed to come over for a swim in our backyard pool. He arrived, and we splashed about in escape from the heat, while my parents were inside. Every now and again, he’d pull me behind the cover of a pool toy, and plant a kiss on my lips. It was new. It was nice. But we had to be careful.

At one point, we went inside to “watch a movie” – quotation marks necessary – and as soon as the lounge room door closed, we couldn’t keep our hands off of each other. It wasn’t safe, however, so I suggested we do the sensible, mature thing – and take our business to a nearby park.

Well, the park idea got scrapped once we felt the goddamn heat, so we settled for around the side of the house, under the cover of trees and shrubberies. At which point we got right down to business, right next to a pair of big black bins.

Little did we know, however, that the family freezer had exhausted its supply of Cornetto ice creams to help deal with the summer heat. We’d run dry, and the freezer needed a restock and clean up – but not before the family had disposed of the trash. This was where things went horribly wrong.

Dad wandered around the side of the house to put some Cornetto boxes in the bins – and walked in on his fifteen year old son sucking some dick.

Try getting a Hallmark card for that.

There was no explanation needed. It’s hard to deny the reality of your sexuality when your own father has caught you in the act of fellatio. He drove my “friend’ home – and a couple of hours later, the sit-down family conversation was terribly, disgustingly real. They were confused at first – obligatory “are you sure you’re not bisexual?” and all – but ultimately, they were fine with it. I’d already come out to my friends, and the rest of the family followed thereafter without my consent (as is the nature of gossiping Greeks).

I’m 22 now, and I am fantastically, unapologetically gay. I am fortunate enough to have a family who love and support me. I am out in the open – homophobia be damned – and life is fucking good.

I suppose I’m lucky that the opportunity to personally ‘come out’ was robbed from me – because with that shame lingering in the forefront of my mind, it might have been years until I came out of the closet.

The closet is a dark and lonely place – but the reality is, the fear of isolation and distress is too often misplaced. Coming out – living openly as who you truly are – is a liberating, beautiful experience. If you are lucky enough to have family who accept you, then that’s bloody fantastic. But if you are not… well, as RuPaul once said of gay people: “We get to choose our family.”

And to any young gay folk reading this, who might feel alone, confused and afraid, deleting your browser history with every few clicks, I’ve got this for you:

Don’t be afraid. Don’t torture your soul any more. Be brave.

We’re all waiting for you.