Lone Wolf: Coming Out

Hello I'm Stephen, I'm 19, from Northern Ireland. I first only really thought that I might be gay when I was 16 or so, I didn't realise it at the time but looking back I actually had a crush on one of my friends but I didn't even think about it, I thought I just really liked him as a friend, (looking even further back I think the first person I ever fancied was a guy back when I was in primary school in P5) anyway, I had constant internal battles with myself for about 2 years before I could finally admit to myself who I was, It did cause me to have depression and I would shy away from everyone, I thought all sorts of things, any excuse that meant that I wasn't gay, but eventually something just clicked into place and I accepted it.

I came out last year to everyone. I had actually told one good friend (Alison) before that, back in early 2009, We always got the bus together and I managed to sort of bring the topic up and she said she didn't have a problem with gay people, so that's when I considered telling her. I was still so INCREDIBLY nervous though. I actually told her on the bus coming home from school, she took it really well, and it felt so good to finally have someone that I could talk to.

From telling her all the way back in about March 2009, I never actually managed to get the courage to tell any of my male friends, I was too scared too, but the worst thing was that I really wanted to tell them because I always had to shy away from conversations if they were talking about girls, which was usually incredibly often. Then eventually on 5th of January 2010 (I still have the old phone I sent the texts on which is why I know the exact date), that night I sent a text to one of my closest mates Luke, I was physically shaking, it seemed so hard, just to press the send button, but Alison was also texting me support. Anyway, I wrote a pretty detailed text explaining how I'm still the same person, and he sent a really nice reply back saying he didn't care, as long as I was happy, and it gave me the confidence to hit send to all my mates. So I managed to come out in one fell swoop to all my friends.

As for telling my dad that was even tougher, it was about the time I came across bgiok, and I wrote a letter to Jason on the problem page of the main site, asking for advice about coming out. It still took me 3 months since I told my mates before I could actually tell him. In fact I had actually went to a gay club and kissed a guy for the first time during those 3 months. I just sat down with him and sort of choked on my own words for ages before I sorta mumbled it out, and he said he still loved me regardless and we hugged.

I always think of the worst case scenario and it ended up being an anticlimax. So that is my coming out story, hope it was enlightening, thanks for reading ^_^