Coming Out Late: Accepting My Sexuality Without Clear Milestones

Going Off The Script

Most gay men seem to have a story of coming to accept their sexuality. It might be long or short especially depending on their generation and other factors, but most I’ve spoken with regardless of having come out “late” or not have definitive moments they realized they were gay and the moment they accepted that difference, eventually capped off with a story of telling their friends and family. Not the last time they’ll come out but a story generally of three parts.

They might have been thirteen or sixteen or what have you when they noticed a boy their own age was attractive. They might have been ten and realized that a male musician or a actor was “hot” and the gears turned and they realized they were at least different even if they didn’t land on the word gay or queer until later.

If they came from an unaccepting religious faith or an environment that was hostile towards queer people, they might have chosen to hide it. They might have chosen to deny it even to themselves for a time. In a lot of cases men my age who came out later not only chose to hide from it, they married women and had families. Only coming out later in life after having finally accepted that they were gay and would no longer accept a life in the closet.

If you’re seeking them, there are a lot of coming out stories online. In the past couple of years, even after coming out, I’ve listened to a boat load of them between YouTube, various podcasts, and conversations with other gay men. And most of these stories are awash with definitive milestone moments. Even without a specific event most at least have an age they came to understand their difference from the larger population.

No Lightbulb Moments

And each time I’m struck by the feeling that I don’t have my own personal list of landmark events in my coming out late narrative. On one hand, in kindergarten I already felt “different” in a way I couldn’t describe. I’m still not entirely sure that was entirely being gay. Although that was unquestionably a major part of it. There were clues I see better in hindsight. And as I have mentioned before, if there had been any positive queer representation at all, I might have had my eureka moment much earlier in life. Instead of a lightbulb moment, it was a long, glacial build-up of feelings and signs. Ones that, in hindsight, were obvious but that I consistently shrugged off or buried without truly examining.

I have actually heard the occasional gay coming out story where things were a bit less concrete, and even more commonly so with bi men and women. That because of heteronormativity some individuals missed the little clues until finally developing a crush on someone of the same gender. In the case of the gay group, some coming out stories I’ve listened to I’ve heard a few people say that they just didn’t realize the magic that was missing from their opposite sex relationships until they found it in a same-sex one.

Friendships with Queer People

For someone who only knows me through my blog, it might be a surprise, but I’ve had friends who were somewhere on the LGBTQ+ rainbow most of my adult life. I’m not certain if the universe was throwing them into my path or if I was subconsciously seeking them out but most of the time they existed in my world. I rarely asked many questions about their experiences. The one exception was the first friend who came out to me in the early 90’s when I was I think 19 or 20 years old. It still wasn’t a deep heart to heart, but I remember asking him the usual “how did you know” type questions.

In grad school, I even briefly had a gay roommate. I ended up in the last available apartment, with three roommates who I didn’t meet until I moved in. And one of those men was gay. In a different world, living with an out gay roommate might have been an affirming experience. Suffice to say, the least notable thing about him was being gay. He shared bizarre stories – like drinking blood and sleeping on his grandmother’s grave – tales which the roommate who knew him from high school, believed were not simply for shock value. He was eventually evicted for not paying rent. While I didn’t take him as representative of all gay men, the experience could have been so much better.

In my first two years living in Atlanta, I lived just off Cheshire Bridge Road in an apartment that balanced “affordable” with “I probably won’t get murdered.” It was the first time in my life that queer people seemed to be more commonplace. For example my gay apartment manager who introduced himself as “an old queen,” and the trans cashier at the grocery store where I shopped regularly. Yet, this period coincided with Matthew Shepard’s murder. I know I’ve heard some say this was the event that gave them the push to come out. Yet as I’ve written about before, that murder made me more disconnected and eventually was a memory I buried.

Before I was really old enough to know I was gay, it was an identity that meant death from AIDS. And now in my mid 20’s it was all over the news that that a young man lost his life just for being gay. In the time since I’ve come out, I’ve often wondered if things might have unfolded any differently for me if that shadow hadn’t been cast.

With the exception of that one roommate, most of my queer friendships and connections with LGBTQ+ folks were positive. Even if I didn’t fully recognize it at the time, they were little glimmers of what could be possible in my life. Collectively, those people who seemed so fearless in comparison managed to shine a light into my gay closet of anxieties – a blend of my social anxiety and my very closeted life.

Lack of Confidence & Outsider Feelings

In my case, my social anxiety and a huge lack of self confidence led to my being very isolated in school. I didn’t do dances or parties throughout my teens and young adult years. I didn’t date at all until after college. I have always felt like an outsider and quite frankly unattractive. I had neither the motivation nor the self-confidence to even dream of asking anyone out until so much later.

In grad school the only reason I finally developed a small circle of friends was sheer determination. I had done six years in undergrad (constantly changing majors) and in the end I didn’t have one enduring friendship. I was determined the next chapter would be different. And it was a tiny baby step forward.

In school and as a young adult, I remember feeling developmentally behind. Not physically but emotionally. I’m not sure if it was simply down to not having had the typical adolescent experiences because I felt so disconnected. There have been times I wondered as well if I could be neurodivergent. I’ve pushed the idea aside several times but when I took the HSP test I scored very high and there are some people that think HSP is a form of neurodivergence.

Or perhaps it was simply a combination of a lot of things that were working together and not in a vacuum. Maybe it was the environment I grew up in combined with how my particular brain works whether or not its an exotic brain. I may be looking for a single root cause when there were elements of my life working in concert that I will never entirely understand.

It’s hard to even fully explain what I mean sometimes. It wasn’t just that I lacked the confidence to say “I’m gay.” It was deeper than that. I didn’t feel like I fully understood who I was, or how I fit into the world around me. For a great deal of my life, I felt more like an outsider looking in, an observer rather than an active participant in my own story. I felt like I struggled to find a place I fit in, and every failure to feel that sense of connection with individuals or a sense of real community caused me to try a little less.

It felt like a perpetual motion machine of isolation. My inability to connect with others made me more anxious and hesitant to try, which only deepened the sense of disconnect. It was a feedback loop where each part fed into the other, making it harder to see any exit. I had many years ago simply decided that I was meant to be a solo act in basically any sense of the word. And once you reach a place like that you’ve arrived at a dead-end.

Even now I’m not entirely clear on what finally broke that stalemate. I certainly think part of it was the pandemic even though again I was delayed by a few years. I also think it was slowly losing the small family I had. First my father died following a stroke and then almost immediately I started losing my mother more slowly to dementia. When she reached the point of needing full time nursing care, it was suddenly just me and the cats. And I was alone with my thoughts more than I ever had been.

Even coming out late, it was still a slow unraveling of the cocoon I had built around myself over the years. I can’t pinpoint a specific day or moment when I decided to come out. True to my nature, it began with extensive ‘research’ – reading books and watching countless YouTube videos. Gradually I came to understand what I needed to do. It was a period of discovery and a period of starting to reintegrate the unexpressible part of me that I had never given the love or acceptance it deserved. But there was no single lightbulb moment. It was more like a swarm of fireflies – each small glow of insight eventually coming together to light the path forward.

Confidence: Some Assembly Required

Of course, coming out didn’t instantly unlock confidence but it started a shift. For years I worried about being perceived as awkward. It was something I avoided so thoroughly that I think I began to blend into the woodwork. The therapist I was working with suggested something to the effect of leaning into the awkwardness I felt, to embrace it as a part of my personality rather than attempt to hide it. It took nearly a year to internalize his suggestion but eventually I began to loosen my grip on how others might see me. I realized that whether I’m actually weird or not, I needed to learn to be myself fully and authentically. And honestly how else would I ever find people in the world who appreciate my quirkiness without letting it shine?

In concert with embracing my awkwardness, my confidence has grown through the way others have responded to me. While external validation isn’t the ideal foundation for good self-confidence it turns out it was what I needed the most. I’ve mentioned before the concept of second adolescence – that LGBTQ+ people, especially ones from previous generations, after coming out navigate the feelings and experiences that the rest of their cohort experienced in their teen years.

There’s nothing more adolescent than the awkward feelings of wondering if someone you like could possibly like you back. For someone who’s felt socially awkward and unattractive for years, realizing that another man saw something in me was a huge confidence boost. If I’ve ever had a lightbulb moment, this was it. I’m not in any danger of developing a massive ego, but it made me believe there’s an audience for what I bring to the table. That morsel of authentic validation made all the difference.

The Story Continues

This essay came out of a question I’ve been asked more than once in the past year, and one I’ve often struggled to answer even to myself: when did I know, and why did it take me so long? I don’t know if I’ve fully answered that question here, but I’ve done my best to explore it.

In some ways, I think I’d resigned myself to life as it was. It felt too late to even address the matter. Now, I know that plenty of others my age and older have their own stories behind taking the long way out of the closet. There’s still the occasional feelings of grief – especially when I encounter gay couples who’ve been together for decades. I can’t help wondering if I missed my chance. But, as I told a friend recently, I wouldn’t have come out at all if I’d given up hope that it was still possible.

And in any case, I’m happier now. I certainly hope for more of the experiences I missed, but having friends who truly know and appreciate the real me has been life-changing. Even the friends who thought they knew me before never really did. Because for a long time, I didn’t know myself. Friendships are often undervalued compared to romantic relationships, but they can be just as vital. The support, trust, and connection I’ve found in my friendships since coming out has been healing in ways I hadn’t expected, especially after years of not fully being myself with anyone. So this new chapter is a win, regardless.