On Coming Out
National Coming Out Day usually comes and goes without much thought on my part. It’s been a long process, but I’ve finally arrived at a point where my sexuality seems like a non-issue. Looking back on the journey of the past eight years, I wasn’t sure I would ever make any sort of “coming out” announcement. Early on, the idea of telling anyone about my “gayness,” let alone the entire world, seemed absolutely terrifying. Ironically, as I became more comfortable with my sexuality, I also felt less compelled to speak about it publicly. As part of a culture where coming out had become “all the rage,” I remember feeling befuddled by my lack of motivation to do so personally. Even as my fear of rejection continued to diminish, when pondering a “coming out” statement of my own, I couldn’t help but think, “what’s the point?” Most of my friends and broader social circle already knew, and frankly, I didn’t want to risk such an announcement seeming self-aggrandizing. I’d grown relatively content as a gay man, but for the most part, I found my sexuality to be irrelevant and as uninteresting as my hair color. So, why come out publicly now? It’s a fair question and one I’ve contemplated deeply over the past weeks. There are a number of reasons, but the most important ones are:
1) To provide encouragement to others who are struggling to come out.
2) To offer insight and perspective to those who are struggling to accept others on the basis of sexuality.
3) For convenience. Even to this day, having individual conversations about my sexuality can still be stressful—not nearly to the extent it once was—but hopefully everyone who still doesn’t know is reading this.
4) To complete the process of owning my sexuality, in the most direct, documented and all-encompassing way.
I grew up in a small town in Southeastern Wisconsin, and while my family has always been fairly socially progressive, that wasn’t the case for the culture at large. Christianity was common and a stigma surrounding homosexuality was the norm. It’s hard to say exactly how much these conditions shaped my story, but surely they must have to some degree. While a fair amount of socioeconomic variance existed among my friends, most were white, somewhat (or very) religious and raised on “midwest values.” My childhood was rich with myriad experiences, but I wouldn’t describe the environment as particularly diverse, accepting or forward-thinking. I know this created a “living hell” for many who didn’t fit in for whatever reason, and particularly for those who were closeted. I don’t recall knowing anyone openly gay until a friend came out the summer after high school. Like many such communities, it’s not that we didn’t have any queer people—it’s just that “to come out” would have meant signing up for a world of hate, rejection and bullying. But at this age, the idea that I might be gay was nowhere on my radar. Had I grown up in New York City or San Francisco, would I have discovered my sexuality sooner? Who knows, but it seems likely.
During my adolescence, I split time between outdoor physical activities and creative, artistic ones. I loved climbing trees, wrestling in the dirt and pretty much every sport imaginable. But I also loved to draw and paint, to play the viola and sing. I didn’t fit neatly into any particular category and I still don’t. I had the normal ups and downs signature of those awkward early teen years, but my sexuality was never in question. I imagined I’d grow up just like my other male friends—marry a woman, have children, etc. Because my story has proven to be fairly atypical, I’ve felt compelled to dig deeper for answers. When mining through memories for any clues, I do recall being quite interested in the anatomy and energy of the boys around me—perhaps more so than was “normal” for a straight teenage male. But at the time, it didn’t present as strange to me and certainly not as evidence that I might be gay. I guess I just assumed everyone else was having a similar experience.
My high school years were a blur of ski racing and youth orchestra, punctuated with periods of heartbreak. I had yet to explore my homosexuality, and found myself infatuated with several young women over the years, most of whom did not reciprocate my feelings. At 22-years-old, I moved to Reno, to attend college at University of Nevada. My days as a student were immediately numbered, as I soon found myself much more interested in songwriting and socializing than academics. The following autumn I moved in with a friend and began life in the “the real world.” I had no money, no job and quite literally lived in the front closet of the house. Perhaps a foreshadowing metaphor? Around this time, much of my social circle started pairing up with partners of the opposite sex, and while some were still single, I recall feeling increasing pressure to have a girlfriend. I still hadn't come to the realization that I wasn’t straight, but I was definitely beginning to suspect that something about me was different. Looking back, I had an unusually low level of concern for my physical appearance compared to my peers, which I now suspect was a subconscious attempt to avoid attention from the opposite sex. Denial can be very powerful, but it only lasts so long. My internal conflict was building more and more rapidly.
By 24, I found myself attending the local gay bar, “Five Star Saloon,” regularly with a few close friends. I can still clearly recall the incredibly powerful psychological and physiological sensations of entering the bar on those nights—it was almost like coming up on a drug trip. In hindsight, these “Five Star” escapades were undoubtedly the primary catalyst in my progression of identity from curious and confused, to bisexual and ultimately, gay. (Directly following my initial experiences with men, I identified as bisexual, but today, I identify as gay.) Back then, I still felt some degree of physical attraction to women, but over the course of a few months, it faded to effectively zero. As my environment changed and for the first time allowed me to explore my attraction to men, my true homosexual orientation emerged and was undeniable. While I find women to be stunningly gorgeous and commanding in presence, I don’t feel any physical desire. On some level, it’s possible this was always the case. Physical desire, for me, has never been a prerequisite for profound love and connection, and looking back, it seems possible that I confused deep filial love and emotional infatuation for an erotic attraction.
The summer of 2012 was filled with weekend nights at “Five Star Saloon” and on one such drunken evening, I met my first true love, Dustin. Neither of us were looking for a relationship—certainly not me, as I was just beginning to discover and accept my sexuality. Nevertheless, we fell quickly and deeply in love. Everything was so exciting, so new, so intense. We never formally stated our commitment to each other or announced our relationship to our friends—it just sort of happened. (Note: By the time we met, Dustin had already come out and I know that my insecurities around publicly acknowledging him as my partner were hard on him. Even so, he was extremely patient and gracious as I moved through this process, for which I owe him a huge debt of gratitude.) If you’d told me one year prior, that I’d be in a full-fledged relationship with a man, I would have called you crazy. But there I was. Now would come the hardest part: telling my family and friends.
Over the course of the next year or so, I began coming out to my closest friends and family and introducing them to my boyfriend, Dustin. I always knew the overwhelming majority of these people would accept me—I’ve always had an incredibly loving family and friend group, many of them musicians, artists and creative types. Even with this knowledge, for the first few years I had an immensely hard time coming out to people. I’d often intentionally get drunk in preparation for a conversation and would stumble over my words for hours before delivering the punchline—it really did take that much at times, just to utter the words, “I’m gay.” Each conversation took a massive emotional toll, but when I finally got to the announcement and I was assured that all was fine, I’d feel an overwhelming sense of relief and gratification. Ironically, the most difficult coming out conversations I had were with my closest male friends, my family, and my mother, in particular—all situations where I was completely confident that I would be received only with love and acceptance. I had no rational fear of wide-spread rejection; I knew that no one who mattered would care. So why were these conversations so difficult? I’m still not entirely sure, but I suspect the finality of the declarations weighed on me heavily. I was willingly facilitating the death of a version of myself that I’d never be able to reclaim, while presenting a new identity—one that I still hadn’t fully accepted or assimilated myself.
For years, I was terrified of being outed. I’d keep my distance from Dustin in public places—I didn’t want anyone who wasn’t part of my inner circle to know. I was afraid of losing work. I feared rejection from my childhood friends in Wisconsin, some of whom were more conservative. I feared rejection from my ski racing friends whose culture sometimes leaned a bit alpha male. But as time passed, I started to feel a little more ease and I gradually became less consumed with hiding. I began writing songs that addressed the issues I was living through directly (Check out “Above the Hiding” (video link at bottom of post) and “Prisoner of Your Mind” from my band, The Novelists). Penning these songs was invaluable in helping me process the emotions. While I did (and still do) occasionally encounter rejection, by and large my friends and colleagues accepted me and my career was unaffected. Around 26-years-old, I began to feel pretty comfortable identifying as gay to strangers, but it took a few more years before the anxiety surrounding telling old friends and loved ones had lessened significantly. Even eight years into this journey, there are still times when I’m nervous to tell a new friend (usually necessary since I’m rarely suspected as gay) or person from my past who doesn’t know. I’m hoping that writing this and putting it out publicly will help me get over this fear, once and for all. It’s time.
Over the next seven years, Dustin and I built a life together. At times, we struggled to find our center, grappling with the same issues all couples do. We contemplated deeply what a life-long partnership might look like. We also shared an array of monumental experiences: purchasing a home, traveling internationally, celebrating each other’s hard-fought accomplishments, and dealing with death and tragedy. Of course, we also had countless ordinary moments: making dinner, watching movies, going on hikes, etc. Whether profound or mundane, our journey together rarely had anything to do with our sexuality—just our humanity. Although we’re no longer together, I’m eternally grateful for those extraordinary and formative years we co-created. We grew so much during that time and explored each emotion fully—love, loss, euphoria, disappointment, excitement, disillusionment and every imaginable color in between. Our relationship was instrumental in shaping us both and I wouldn’t change a thing about it.
While the primary purpose of this blog post is to share my experience coming to terms with my sexuality, I feel like I’d be leaving out an important part of the story if I didn’t express a few things I’ve learned about relationships in general. Though the romantic in me totally relates to our culture’s glorification of finding “the one” till death-do-us-part, in reality, things often don’t pan out that way. We stand to learn so much from each of our relationships, as well as from our times of solitude and loneliness. Perhaps there’s some wisdom in embracing all of these flavors of our humanity. This isn’t to say that striving for a life-long partnership isn't a worthy goal; it’s just a reminder to be gentle with ourselves and our partners—past and present—if the experience thus far has been different. It’s often possible to part with a long-term partner lovingly and without blame. We’re all complex and unique beings evolving in unpredictable ways and sometimes life goals simply fall out of the requisite level of alignment for full-time, primary partnership—even and often when tremendous amounts of love remain. “Breaking up” doesn’t need to mean all is lost. Dustin and I remain exceptionally close, share our families and many of the same friends. It’s a modern family of sorts. If I’m proud of anything, it’s that we’ve found a way to re-define our relationship rather than willfully obliterate it, as seems to happen all too often.
Today, in fall of 2020 and at 33-years-old, I’m happy to say that I’ve overcome the majority of issues surrounding my sexuality. If I’m totally honest, some work remains, but I’m up for the challenge. I’m well aware of how fortunate I am to have been widely accepted by my friends, family and society at large. Tragically, I know this isn’t the case for so many LGBTQ people—even living in the West—who are still routinely disowned for their “sins” and/or are the recipients of discrimination and prejudice. Of course, in some of the world’s most intolerant cultures, being gay is still illegal and punishable by death.
I still hear routinely of families who’ve rejected one of their own on the basis of sexuality. Such stories never become less infuriating, but I’ve come to realize a certain complexity to these situations that I didn’t previously understand. In most cases, the rejection is born of ignorance rather than hatred and is motivated by what is thought to be a supremely moral position. Varying levels of fundamentalism exist, but to one degree or another, several very dangerous ideas are accepted as truth:
1.) That homosexuality is wrong and the symptom of some pathology.
2.) That they, or the gay person, will be condemned to hell for eternity, unless the gayness can be “healed.”
3.) That the gay person has the ability to choose otherwise.
These assumptions are so obviously insane to most of society in 2020, but a lifetime of indoctrination will still reliably convince good people to believe bad ideas. The antidote, however, isn’t shaming. Dogmatic fundamentalism thrives on a very narrow, rigid version of reality—but when other, better ideas are presented with enough frequency, they usually win out—at least eventually. For instance, resistance to the abolition of slavery, women’s rights and civil rights was largely motivated by fear and rooted in ignorance. Each movement took all of human history to arrive at a point where enough social capital had emerged for those policies to change. As better ideas begot better ideas, progress couldn’t be stopped. Obviously, we can’t afford to wait for the least progressive segment of society to simply “get with the times.” It’s critical that we fight like hell to make sure that those who oppose equal rights for LGBTQ people (or anyone for that matter) aren’t given the political power to affect policy. The fact that this issue is still being debated anywhere on planet Earth in the year 2020 is massively disheartening—as if there’s another position on the topic worth considering.
Early in the process of coming to terms with my sexuality, I thought of my gayness as an unfortunate, permanent hurdle I would spend a lifetime overcoming. But these days, I truly find it to be a gift. Being gay engenders a certain healthy skepticism and closer inspection of all things assumed to be true—whether by society, culture, science, or oneself; it begs the experiencer to ask the best possible questions, rather than the most boring and typical ones; it forces difficult conversations with people from opposing ideologies, providing an opportunity to cultivate courage and tolerance. Above all, it illuminates the inherent beauty of diversity in the world and encourages compassion universally—especially to those who don’t “fit in” for whatever reason. Having to overcome these obstacles and the subsequent lessons learned has proven to be fruitful time and again in navigating so many other aspects of life.
Of course, there are downsides. The prospect of having children of my own someday is more complicated as a result of my sexuality, and this can be depressing at times. But with society’s ever-evolving definition of what a family can look like, my attitude is generally optimistic. I’m not sure if marriage is in my personal future, but I’m certainly grateful that, as it stands in America in 2020, gays and lesbians are constitutionally afforded the same rights and protections as straight couples. This isn’t, however, guaranteed in perpetuity and if we care about protecting these rights, we need to act and vote accordingly.
To those boys, girls, men, women, non-binary and queer people of all kinds struggling to live their truth: Do not give up. It does get better. Be kind and gentle with yourself and try to be patient. Spread love and become love. Most importantly, as Oscar Wilde says, “be yourself—everyone else is taken.” Realizing that you don’t fit into any of the boxes society has built can be painful—but it’s also liberating. Will your journey be easy? Probably not at first. It will take time. But I promise you that it will be worth it. In being vulnerable, you’ll be met with increased respect and your relationships will only strengthen. When you’re ready to come out, let me assure you that there’s an entire world waiting to celebrate with you and committed to supporting you—just the way you are. Doors will open that you never knew existed. Maybe this is the gentle push you’ve been waiting for. I believe in you and I’ll be holding space for you. Perhaps it’s time?
To parents, family members, friends, and anyone struggling to accept others on the basis of sexuality: I don’t have any revelatory ideas that are likely to quickly convince you to re-think your deeply ingrained beliefs. l will simply implore you to challenge your assumptions once again, even more fully; to try as best you can to suspend judgment—just for a while. Seek out LGBTQ people in your community. Get to know them. Learn their stories. Listen carefully. You’ll probably find more common ground than you expected and that any negative stereotypes you’ve held are unfounded. I hope you’ll come to realize that a person’s sexual orientation has no bearing on their intrinsic value—or pretty much anything else for that matter. And if your religion or world view requires you to ostracize (or morally judge) people on the basis of sexuality, perhaps it’s time to consider finding a new one—that actually places a premium on love and compassion. Understand that whomever you’re struggling to accept is worthy of your love and support right now. Time is precious and nonrenewable. I hope the courage will find you to make this shift sooner than later. A deeper connection to our shared humanity awaits you.
Like so many of us, I’m forever indebted to the brave trailblazers who preceded us and fought for the rights we now hold dear as LGBTQ citizens. For their efforts, and for my luck being born in the Western World in 1987, I may love sincerely, openly, and without fear of persecution. While huge strides have been made across the globe on LGBTQ issues, we can’t afford to take this progress for granted. It’s critical that we continue to stand up for these rights and vote for leaders who will protect them and advocate for their implementation in less fortunate, archaic cultures around the world.
I hope that sharing my story and insight here may have a positive impact. It’s certainly been cathartic. If this helps even one person navigate their journey a bit less anxiously, provides that last bit of courage that’s been missing to come out, or convinces someone to revaluate a dogmatic viewpoint, then it’s been well worth it. Boundless gratitude to my friends and family for embracing my true nature and always supporting me in this wonderful life I’ve been so privileged to live.
Love to all and Happy National Coming Out Day!
Eric