Coming Out: Sometimes It Doesn't Go To Plan

Coming out is monumental for anyone who identifies as LGBTQIA+. There’s no right or wrong way to do it. Some people write letters, others bake rainbow cakes covered in sprinkles. How I came out isn’t nearly as well-planned or delicious. 

Early last year, I found myself falling in love for the first time. I didn’t see it coming. We’d been friends for a while, but literally overnight, something shifted in our friendship. I found myself on a crazy, passionate and utterly terrifying roller coaster with another girl.

Before her, I’d always identified as heterosexual.. But I wouldn’t be telling the truth if I said I’d never been curious.. With her, it became crystal clear that I definitely wasn’t straight.

She was witty, talented and beautiful. Sometimes I felt like I’d won a prize to stand next to her. Neither of us were ready to be out, but for the first time, I had to accept a side of myself that I’d ignored. 

Months passed and the more sure I became of her and our secret relationship, the more doubts seemed to creep into her mind. Eventually, she broke my heart.

At first, I tried to hide my heartbreak from my family and friends. It was 3pm on a Sunday when I knew I had no other option than to tell them - I wasn’t coping and I couldn't hide it anymore. Before I could change my mind, I stumbled into the kitchen and tried to tell my mum the secret that had been hanging over me for months. I choked on the words. For the next half an hour, she just held me until I could whisper what was wrong:

            I was in love with a girl.

           The girl had just shattered my heart.

           I was sorry for lying to her and dad and I hoped they still loved me.

What happened next is something we all hope  for. My mum smiled and told me whoever I decided to spend my life with would never stop them loving me. In fact, she’d guessed months ago and had been prepping my dad for the revelation. I went to bed that night knowing how unbelievably lucky I was. 

I came out to my friends next. Some were extremely hurt – they felt like I’d lied to them, and didn’t trust them. For a while, our friendships were difficult and rocky. I felt huge amounts of guilt because of this. Maybe if I’d come out ‘properly’, when I was ready and had planned to, they’d have taken it better. Despite their feelings, they still dragged me out for coffee, bought me bath bombs and told me it’d get better.

And it did. Happiness seeped back into my life. But this notion of not coming out 'properly', in the way I wanted, kept tormenting me. As the time passed, I started to realise something important. No, I didn't get to come out the way I hoped to, but that really didn't matter at all. In all of this, I had missed the most important point:

Coming out, for any reason, in any fashion, sets you free.

Tips for coming out:

1. Beforehand, binge watch every gay or semi gay tv show – OITNB! The L World! Queer As Folk! When We Rise!
2. Only come out if it's safe to do so - your safety is more important than anything else.
3. If it isn't safe, bide your time. Make plans, start saving money, and know that one day, you'll be able to. 
4. Don't let anyone pressure you into coming out.
5. Expect to feel elation, followed by surrealism, followed by exhaustion.
6. You might find it easier to come out to strangers at first, rather your friends and family. Don’t feel guilty – it’s a practice run.
7. People will ask a lot of questions. Don’t feel that you need to answer anything you’re uncomfortable with.
8.  If you’re like me and don’t ‘look gay’, you’ll have to come out again, and again and again. That’s okay – you’ll get super creative with your methods!
9. If your family and friends truly love you, they’ll keep loving you, even if they struggle to understand it.
10. You’ll find life is suddenly a lot lighter and brighter when you’re not hiding anymore.

Finally, don’t feel bad if you’ve read this blog post and you’re worried you won’t ever be ready. A year ago, I’d have said the same thing. You’ll know when the time is right.

         Advice Websites:

   

            LGBT Foundation - Coming Out Support

          Stonewall - Help and Advice

         

          Stonewall Youth

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There's something I've been meaning to mention...

So I vaguely hinted several months ago that I wanted to write a post related to Faye's post about her asexuality but then didn't actually write that post for whatever reasons (usually because I'm awful at getting my posts done ahead of when I'm meant to be posting and I didn't really want to rush this one). Yes I may be writing this at 11pm but I can't avoid doing it any longer.

Several of my friends already know this about me as it's something we've discussed at several points over this year, I've gotten more comfortable with owning this aspect of myself although it's probably not something I will be explaining to my parents any time soon because they will likely be a bit confused as to what it means for my long-term relationship. But I digress.

I'm Demisexual. Also Bi (whether sexual/romantic I'm not entirely sure).

Image source

Yeah. That. If you don't happen to frequent the internet bubbles that I usually inhabit, Demisexuality may not be a label that you've come across before. Simply put; if Asexuality is the absence of sexual attraction/desire then Demisexuals reside partway along the spectrum back towards hetero/homo/bi/pan-sexuality. For a super cool comic on Asexuality here's Alice Oseman being staggeringly talented as always.

Demisexuals like me tend to only feel sexual attraction to people we have strong emotional bonds to, e.g. people we're in romantic relationships with. For me it also means that even within a relationship I don't often feel the desire for sex (with a partner anyway but that's another thing...). Until recently this lack of desire bothered me because I thought something was wrong or defective with me that I didn't want to have sex as often as I thought "normal people" should.

I'll be honest, I was fairly late in ditching the imaginary V-card. I was not far off 20 when I "fled the nunnery" as I termed it at the time despite being two and a half years into what ended up as a three year relationship (first of only two long-term bfs, nearing four & a half years with Le Boyf). Not that we were chaste little chaps for all that time but we didn't actually do the entire deed until 2010 and after that no more than a handful of times before we split up.

Then followed 18 months of singledom. Which was fine. When I met for drinks with some school friends during this time they'd lament to me how terrible it was that they'd not had sex for two weeks, I sat there and shrugged saying "talk to me when you're over a year." In actuality I was probably getting off far more than they were and I didn't need or want a bloke for it. I had myself.

I'm sure a lot of Safe Space readers know of Grace Latter and her infamous & brilliant blog post on Female Masturbation. When I read it I was like "yas!" only I was waaaay earlier to this game. At the age of 26 I can actually say that I've been getting mine for half my damn life. All through high school I was never interested in having sex because I didn't really see the need for it when I could dole out my own pleasure as and when I wanted it. No reason to deal with messy teenage boys at all!

In some respects I wonder if this influenced my demisexuality because in the years I wasn't having sex I'd been imagining what it would be like but then when I actually did it, it never felt as mind-blowingly awesome as I'd thought it should and that feeling has persisted. It morphs into anxiety & over-awareness of what I'm feeling and that I'm not enjoying it as much as I think I ought to be which is obviously only going to make me more tense etc.

So I don't have sex very often. And that's totally cool, it doesn't mean I love Le Boyf any less or that our relationship is without physical affection, that's just how I roll as a Demisexual. You get me?

But I should talk about the other flag I fly under. It's become very apparent to me in the last year or two that I don't just find men attractive. I can't tell you how many times I've been scrolling through tumblr, seen a picture of Daisy Ridley and thought "my god, could you *be* any more glorious?" I could start a list of the actresses I find attractive but then this post will be even longer than it is.

Identifying as Bi is slightly more complicated for me as the Demisexual aspect means my attraction to men or women is less "I wanna have sex with you" and more "I am super enthralled by your face/clothes/personality/creative skills and want to mildly stalk you on the internet". Obviously being in a committed long-term relationship means that any attractions I do have will not be acted upon but that doesn't mean I can't flail about on Twitter that I want to marry Kate McKinnon (who doesn't?).

I hope this long-winded tour of my sexuality has cleared up a few things. I know I have confused folk in the past :P It's also really good to get this all out there. *and breathe*

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My Sexuality.

I’ve known that I was a little different to other girls in regards to romance and sex from a fairly early age. I remember having sleepovers at 13 and we’d all go round in a circle and confess who our crush was. And when it came to me, I always drew a blank. I had no answer, and my friends thought I was being coy and no fun. But the truth was that I just didn’t like any of the boys at our school.

As a teen, I put this down to having a lot going on in my life and not having the time to focus on sex and boys. I mean, my mum was sick with cancer and a lot of my free time was taken up with that, which was a perfectly viable explanation for my lack of hormones and attraction towards guys right?

Over my school years I was asked out by a few guys, all of which I turned down. Partly because I was point blank terrified of commitment, but also because I wasn’t attracted to them. When people asked me about celebrity crushes, I grabbed for names and said the obvious ones like Zac Efron and Sam Claflin (although I’ll admit, both of these crushes were pretty genuine). When we talked about ‘girl crushes’ though, I became so animated. I had about 5 actresses and musicians ready to go in my head, and I remember having these ‘girl crushes’ as far back as the age of 12.

Turns out, they were just the regular kind of crush.

I didn’t realise I was bisexual until I was about 18. When I tell people this, they’re pretty shocked and often respond with ‘Surely you knew sooner?’ and maybe subconsciously I did. But heteronormativity is rampant in our society, and whilst I supported LGBTQ+ rights from a young age, I never let myself think that I was maybe a member of the community too.

As soon as I realised this, everything in my life made so much more sense. All that jealousy about when some of my friends got boyfriends, all the actresses I looked up to and adored, all the female characters I loved and were obsessed with. As soon as I realised I was attracted to girls, there was no way of denying it.

It’s taken me two and a half years to become fully comfortable with the label and myself. There have been many times I’ve questioned it, and I’ve spent a lot of time, especially in recent months, questioning whether I am in fact bisexual or gay, but I have and do sometimes experience attraction to men – just not nearly as much as I do with women.

I still struggle telling people in real life sometimes. There are a number of times in the past four weeks at University I could’ve just told people, but instead I sat back instead, stumbling over the words. I told myself before coming to University that I wanted to be totally open about my sexuality, but when it comes to the crunch I panic. It almost makes me angry that I even have to tell people, that people just assume I’m straight unless I explicitly state otherwise.

My journey with my sexuality has been long and one that is still ongoing. But I know that even compared to last year I am so much more comfortable and happy with who I am, and hopefully that can continue into the future.

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