‘My Story’ Part 1 - He’s Gay. Is He?
“For a very long time I had a real emotional struggle with the concept of being gay.”
I have chosen to stay anonymous in this story as I am still working through some challenges with my family. I am also still in the process of inviting in other important people into this part of my life and want to focus on this first.
I am hoping one day very soon I will be able to share my identity and put my name to my story. This is part 1 of 4.
Part 1: He’s gay. Is he?
I don’t quite remember when exactly I realised I was gay. But when I think back, I can’t actually remember a time where I didn’t know that I was. When people used to ask me, I would quote the age of 15 as an arbitrary age as I guess that’s when I was at high school and those feelings (and hormones) are a lot more active within you. But really, it’s something that has been with me ever since I can remember, be it consciously or subconsciously.
For a very long time I had a real emotional struggle with the concept of being gay. Not coming to terms with it. But what it actually meant to be gay and live in a society where it wasn’t talked about or accepted. I have vivid memories of going to family weddings as a teenger, sitting in the gurdwara (the Sikh temple) watching the couple have their Anand Kaaraj (the Sikh wedding ceremony) and thinking that will never be you, you will never have that for yourself. Even a few years ago I had another one of those moments at one of my closest cousin’s wedding. We were at the wedding reception, the dance floor was packed, my cousins and I were having the time of our lives. But for a few minutes amongst all that euphoria and happiness that same thought came over me even after all these years. I looked around and thought to myself, you will never have this for yourself and I was filled with sadness for a few moments.
Growing up I spent a long time being full of fear not knowing or being able to picture what kind of a life I would have. There was nobody I was able to talk to about it and didn’t really have any role models to look up to either. It was scary. But amongst all that fear, when I look back, I never tried to deny who I was to myself. I never went through that internal struggle which so many gay men experience. At the core of myself, I have always known who I am.
I went through high school without really feeling like I had to deal with it. I didn’t tell anyone. There were boys (and a teacher or two) who I had the hots for. But I kept it all to myself and pretty much slipped under the radar for most of it. I had two friends up until year 11 and then in sixth form made a third friend. I was never one of those popular kids who had a lot of attention on him and I was lucky to not be bullied either. I guess I just blended into the background. I cared very little about what anyone thought of me and I guess that means I had some level of confidence. There was no speculation about my sexuality (that I was aware of anyway). So I didn’t really have to deal with it.
University changed the game. Having been very comfortable at high school (as I guess we all are having been there for so many years) I was suddenly in an unfamiliar place. I struggled to make friends and felt like I didn’t really belong or fit in anywhere. I spent a lot of my early time there feeling massively insecure. I didn’t realise it at the time but looking back now, the fear I held within me about anyone finding out I was gay stopped me from being able to show my real self to people.
Half way through my first term I eventually met one of my best friends. At the time I didn’t realise we would be friends for life, but what I did know was that we had really clicked. As our friendship grew in those early days I began to feel more and more comfortable around her. More and more myself. She was in the year above me and as we spent more time around each other I also started to be around her friends more. As they weren’t really my friends at the time, again I felt like I didn’t fit in or belong there. And in those early days they all wondered who is this new kid from the year below who’s hanging around all the time? Why is he here? Those insecurities all played out along with speculation about whether I was gay or not. These things were never mentioned in front of me or to my face, but I very strongly sensed they were happening. And now years later when we’ve all sat together as a group of family more than friends, it’s been confirmed to me those questions were being asked behind my back.
“One night my best mate and I were out in a club and when we were both very drunk, she point blank asked me to my face if I was gay. We sat and spoke about it the next day and I sat there lying through my teeth telling her I wasn’t.”
Meanwhile she was the most open minded person I knew and already had gay friends. So it wasn’t like she was going to have a problem with it. So why at that point didn’t I just tell her? I was still so fearful of having to deal with it, something I still hadn’t really done or had to do. After those early days of not feeling like I fit in, things settled down. I became a little more comfortable in the friendship group and I guess they felt more comfortable having me around too.
I finished uni and got myself a job at a leading professional services firm. Being part of a graduate programme was all very social. A lot of the early days were spent in college studying for the ACA accountancy qualification. It was like getting paid to sit in a classroom and have a laugh with your mates all day. It was a lot of fun. After qualifying I had my feet very much under the table. I worked very hard and had earned a little respect around the office and most people knew who I was.
The more you work with people the more the conversation turns to personal matters. These were conversations I didn’t ever feel like I could participate in. On a Monday morning people would be talking about what they got up to at the weekend with their boyfriend or girlfriend or partner and kids. I was single so didn’t really have much to contribute. But it was more that I just wanted to avoid any involvement in talking about my personal life outside of work out of fear that it may force me to talk about my relationship status or dating. Having any kind of conversation related to that was just out of the question for me. There was one occasion where I was driving home from a work dinner and I offered to give someone a lift. They asked me what I look for in a partner. And truth be told, I hadn’t really thought about it at that point because it wasn’t a part of my life I had acknowledged. I don’t remember exactly what I said but it was some generic garbage I just made up on the spot.
Looking back, again the fear I was carrying played out in my relationships at work and held me back from developing deeper relationships with colleagues. I realised it was happening and that I needed to do something about it. But I didn’t really know the way forward. I would ask myself questions like do I need to accept it. But I wasn’t in an internal battle of acceptance so that didn’t feel like the answer either.
The more and more I thought about it and these situations played out, I realised that by not vocalising it and being open I was keeping a part of me locked away and in doing that denying myself the beauty of experiencing deeper connection with others be that family, friends, work colleagues or anyone I was meeting for that matter. Something had to change. I couldn’t do this to myself any longer.
Thank you for reading my story.
Anonymous
