My Story as a Gay Man

Accepted by Society, Hated by Myself

My road of being gay hasn’t been rough on the outside, it has more been an inside battle against myself. When coming out as non-straight the worry is always if you’ll be accepted by your friends, peers, and family. There are horrible accounts of non-acceptance and violence by some, but in most cases, the fact that one is gay is a non-issue. What one doesn’t hear much about is the internal struggle against your own acceptance of being who you are.

The question if homosexuality is a choice or if you are born with it, is something I’ve asked myself many times. I know the proper way to answer the question is to say that I was born with it since that is the main argument I have against the few bigots out there arguing e.g. for conversion therapy. However, when I was young, around the age of 11–12, I was one of the first one in my class to discover adult videos online. Of course, the only kind we watched was straight porn. I had girlfriends — platonic by adult standards, but still partners of the female variety.

It wasn’t until I was around 13 that I started questioning my own sexuality. After having switched schools to another town, my new friends — all females — asked me constantly if I was gay. I wasn’t — at least not at the time. The first time I started questioning my sexuality was after watching soft-core gay porn on YouTube. I was, of course, ashamed of this and didn’t admit it to a soul.

After a year of dealing with this, I came out to my best friend and to my mother as being bisexual. That was how I defined myself since I had previously liked girls, and now liked guys. I hadn’t put much thought if I still liked girls or not, but this seemed to be much more socially acceptable to say, so I went with it.

Over time this changed. I started to become much more interested in guys, and not all interested in girls — which I at one time had imagined to be married to one. After my first boyfriend at the age of 16, I also came out to my father — this time as gay. A few short months later I started a new school, and on day one I came out to the entire class and I haven’t looked back since.

In movies and stories, this is usually where the characters live happily ever after, since in such plot lines the coming out phase is the big hurdle, and once that is done nothing can stop him. Though, in reality, this is where the real struggle begins — at least for me.

I’m now 21 years old, still living at home, and haven’t had a boyfriend since that first one back when I was first coming to terms with it myself. Not for lack of trying to find another — it just hasn’t happened.

Statistics show that around 10% of the population is some variant of being gay. That is around one in every ten people. This makes hitting on people and flirting in real life a real challenge. It is not like in the movies where you can spot a nice person in a coffee shop and give them your number. You have no idea whether or not he is one of the 10%, and even if he were gay, you’ve been lonely for so long you’ve started to doubt your self worth, so instead you decide not to put yourself at the risk of being rejected — once again.

Instead of trying to flirt in real life, my — albeit failing — strategy has been to chat with guys over Messenger, text messages, etc. I’ve talked with them after having met in real life about something which happened when we met and then try to lead the messages towards if they have a significant other, they are interested in guys, and questions of that kind.

All of my friends I’ve befriended after lower elementary school are girls. This may seem cliché, but that how my social circle has always looked. Now, if I enter a new social circle and a guy is friendly with me, I — rather than accept a new friend — start to worry about my actions. I start to question if he believes I’m hitting on him. I do not want to ruin a new friendship, but I do also not want to miss my shot if he happens to be one of the 10%. So I try and chat him up online, and then be terrified about him not wanting to be friends anymore if he finds out I’ve been trying to decipher if he happens to like guys.

Now, my only worry is that I’m going to grow up to be old and never had a real boyfriend. To live all my life alone and unloved. I know others say I’m only 21 and that there is plenty of time. The problem is though, I’m living right now. Right now I’m worried about my future. Right now I do not see a future — at least not where I’m happy. No amount of reminding me that I have my entire life in front of me will clear these worrying thought.

I should be putting myself out there more. However, when the dating field has moved from physical locations to online platforms like Grindr and Tinder, the really good looking guys prosper, and the rest are left behind. It might be an over exaggeration, but when you can’t seem to find anyone after years on those platforms, the self-loathing starts to become too much. You start to think “why should he press my image when the guy next to my icon is much hotter?”.

I know it isn’t healthy to think like this, however, I cannot not think that there is something wrong with me. I see all my girl friends cycle through boyfriends after boyfriends. Some of them settling down, some not. I — in spite of all the positive words my friends tell me — still think like this and — most importantly — I am still alone.

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