Joe | 20 | Southampton, England | Student
So, lots of people who have these coming out stories have these beautiful little, “we sat down over dinner, my mum cried, my dad sat there smiled and told me it was okay and we all hugged it out”.
Not me!
Not me!
I was just turning 16, and had a ‘secret boyfriend’ who I would go and see. We’d spend the weekends at our friend’s house because neither of us was out. When we broke up he contacted my family on Myspace, because you know that’s what our lives revolved around back then! So yeah, he emailed my cousins, my brother etc telling them that on the weekends I didn’t use to party with my mates, I was with him and that we were more than friends. So just like that the majority of my family found out I was gay.
I don’t even know how to this day, but there was a photo of us kissing on my Mum’s computer and at that point I really wasn’t ready to come out; it was still a completely new idea to me so I tried lying and lying my way out of it. But it didn’t seem to matter what I wanted as my stepmum rang my mum the same evening to say that she couldn’t believe that I was gay, so then I kind of had to come to terms with the fact that I’d not be able to come out when I was ready. It was difficult at home for a while, whereas all my brothers who lived with my stepmum loved it! |
My little sister, who is still in contact with my dad, dropped me in it and told him a few months back. Considering that my dad isn’t the most forward thinking of people when it comes to diversity, I wasn’t expecting a loving father son moment to follow. I’m not going to write down here what his response was but let’s just say it was far from supportive. The two people I was most scared of telling where my grandparents. I grew up with them for most of my life because my mum (being a single parent) worked around the clock to provide for us. My grandad would always make comments about Dale Winton and Graham Norton whenever they appeared on the TV. My mum gave me an ultimatum last year to tell them but I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to think of my nan seeing me as anything different. Seems I needn’t have worried! My mum took me to one side and told me that the day she found the photo of me and got that phone call she had told my nan and grandad. Although I was relieved that they knew, me and my mum fell out over that because I didn’t think it was her place to tell them and to lie about it.
Just before I came out ‘officially’, I was walking home after a few drinks at our local social club with a few friends from home. The social was the place anyone under 18 could get served because they were only interested in making money! As we were walking home we bumped into a few kids from school. They were all a bit ‘aggro’ towards us, throwing the usual homo-abuse around. Myself and Jamie (who we all thought was gay too but isn’t!) weren’t the type of guys to want to get into a fight, so we just brushed it off and walked away.
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"The next thing I knew I had been punched to the floor and was getting kicked. I chipped a bone in my cheek from hitting the floor." |
Jamie was caught too and suffered a broken nose. That was the first and last time anything physical happened to me.
I came out to everyone properly towards the end of year 11 just before our GCSE exams. People where I live aren’t the most accepting and so I got ripped into day in day out. Even at work I’d have people coming up to me calling me a’ faggot’ and a ‘shit-stabber’.
"It came to a head when an old woman
came to my till at work and was like,
'I don’t want to be served by a Fruit,
get me somebody else'."
At this point the, ‘who the fuck do you think you are?’ part of my brain kicked in. So I walked from my school and joined another college and stuck at my job until people realised I wasn’t going anywhere. I know it’s a bit of a clash of stories, quitting school for being bullied, but staying on at my job, but whatever, moving to a new college was the best thing I ever did. There were already out gays at that school and sixth form so it was nothing new to them when I just turned up in September.
Since then I’ve always been 100% open about who I am. I get fag jokes thrown at me all the time but I’ve gone past the stage of getting upset by it. When I took my four year old nephew Alex into school on his first day with my sister they had to introduce who they came with. He told everyone, “This is my uncle Joe and he kisses boys”.
Since then I’ve always been 100% open about who I am. I get fag jokes thrown at me all the time but I’ve gone past the stage of getting upset by it. When I took my four year old nephew Alex into school on his first day with my sister they had to introduce who they came with. He told everyone, “This is my uncle Joe and he kisses boys”.
"I don’t understand how,
|
But maybe that's just a reflection of how far British society still has to go. I live in South West England, an area that has on of the lowest rate of ethnic minorities in the entire uk.
So my story has probably been a proper scrambled message and I apologise for that! It’s one of the worst feelings when something so important to you is taken out of your control. However, looking back, that ex of mine did me the biggest favour in the world by outing me the way he did. I’m not sure if I’d be sitting here writing this right now, as a proud, openly gay man, if it hadn’t been for him. |
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