Today is “National Coming Out Day,” and it’s a day I’ve never particularly understood. I do understand the intent behind it, I suppose, but I find the entire notion that coming out is something one does in a day to be rather absurd. Coming out isn’t an event, it’s a process. Some people begin by telling a friend, others close family or a sibling, and others still by announcing it on a social media platform. (This option was not available “back in my day.”) I must also disclaim that it is a highly-personal thing, and my experiences are just that, mine. Someone else has had an entirely different experience. Also, thanks to generational changes, I’m told it’s much easier to come out today, and for that I am grateful. I also benefit from being white, living in the middle class, and having a (relatively) accepting extended family. Not all are so lucky.

I’d like to say I know where to begin, but it’s challenging, because there wasn’t a “day” I suddenly decided to “come out.” Furthermore, while there are moments of pain in this story, there are also moments of relief, joy, and welcoming, which are less attention-grabbing to people who scan a story quickly. Finally, the process of “coming out” isn’t something that really ends. Every time I meet someone new, I have to decide when or if I’m going to tell him (or her). Is it really relevant to a plumber fixing a pipe? (no).

So, I’m going to begin my story the first time I was outed, somewhere around the age of 15. Like most teenagers, I was coming to terms with my sexuality. Unlike most teenage boys, I wasn’t interested in girls. So, I cautiously went though my friends to decide in whom I could confide my confusion. I made a terrible selection. The friend I chose was more of an acquaintance, in order to reduce my exposure, and it turned out he was extremely homophobic. He would go on not only to tell my friends (most of whom believed my claims of heterosexuality over his claim I was gay) but also someone who sort of knew me, and that would lead to accusations that I was gay from my parents (which I successfully deflected)  in an attempt by these two boys to smear and hurt me. Worse was yet to come. Suffice to say, the closet door got further away as I pushed further backward into it.

Several months later, I was summoned to my high school guidance counselor’s office. I had only interacted with the man on the occasion I brought a note in from my parents when I was sick or late. He had to sign off on courses I would take, and help me apply to colleges, but I’d never been called out of class to meet with him. I remember that day like it happened yesterday.

He calmly asked me to shut the door, and sit down in the only chair in the room save the one in which he sat. He calmly looked at me, and said, “Your kind are not welcome here.” He then proceeded to tell me how it had come to his attention that I liked other boys, and if he found out I had “done anything with any of them” the next meeting would be with my parents, wherein I would have to explain to them why we were all there. He also said that “pedophilia is a sickness” and “perhaps I should seek medical attention.” I was too naïve to know that boys of an equal age liking one another when both are minors is not pedophilia. Accordingly, and based on his threats, I stopped participating in any extracurricular activities, and I avoided the one out gay boy in my class like the plague, for fear of my counselor’s intervention, to my everlasting shame.

I started dating girls with vigor, if not vim. I took them to expensive restaurants, and Broadway shows, and they thought me virtuous in wanting to wait until marriage before doing anything more than kissing. I find it ironic that this is the time I transitioned from having mostly male friends to mostly female friends, although at the time I didn’t take notice of the fact. My best friend, though, was another guy, and although I didn’t tell him I was gay for a long time, I felt that a far-better course was first to befriend and get close to someone and then tell him. Surely if he knew me better, the mistakes of the past wouldn’t reappear.

Like most gay men who came of age around the same time I did, I hated that I was gay. I didn’t want to be gay. I didn’t ask to be gay. I prayed for some miraculous transformation to occur wherein I wasn’t gay, suddenly. I subjugated who I was in order to avoid further discrimination. I saw how most people treated the “out” gay boy in high school, and I didn’t want that; of that I was totally certain!

During my senior year, I finally worked up the courage to tell my best friend. He told me that he needed a few days to think things over, because he hadn’t seen this coming. I was on cloud nine, though, because if he could accept me, I’d finally have an advocate and fallback if others rejected me: I wouldn’t be alone. And, a few days later, he called me and said he had found a support group, and we should go to it. Not wanting to rock the boat, I agreed. He drove us to a local middle school the next evening.

I’ve always hated lime green; probably because I don’t think it looks anything like a lime peel. The woman who was moderating the support group had a lime green blouse on with a matching lime green skirt. My friend introduced me to her, and she gave me a weird smile. He excused himself to use the restroom, and I sat down. They had a front row seat all reserved for me. After a minute or so, lime-green woman (LGW) called the room to order. I was starting to panic, as my friend had not returned, and as LGW started telling people about a “special guest tonight” it became clear that she was talking about me. I was called upon to go to the podium and introduce myself. It was the first time I had done any public speaking in years (a long time for someone who wasn’t 18) and I remember my sweaty hands grasping the podium after I had adjusted the microphone to my height. “Go on,” LGW prodded, “just tell us what you came here to say.”

I looked about the room desperately for my friend, but he wasn’t back. I decided it was time. “I’m Steve, and I’m gay.” It was the first time I had ever uttered those words, and having no frame of reference, I just assumed we came out like people do at an AA meeting. People started standing up one at a time and pointing at me. “Pedophile!” shouted one. “Spawn of Satan!” shouted another. “Abomination of Nature!” came another. I fled the room before anyone else could say anything, and it was on my way out that I saw the literature indicating I was at a Focus on the Family meeting.

Of course, my “friend” was nowhere to be found. He had abandoned me there intentionally (and given he wasn’t even slightly religious, with malicious intent) and full of guilt and shame, I walked the six miles home, certain that my life as I knew it was over. While he and I never spoke again, he surprisingly didn’t say anything to my other friends (to the best of my knowledge) as they didn’t bring it up. One thing was certain to me: I must never trust anyone again.

People of a certain age will remember getting AOL CDs in the mail as a weekly ritual. For me, they were a lifeline. I would sign up for my free one-month trial, and chat in the gay chat rooms with other guys late at night (under the auspices of doing homework). Some guys seemed nice, others wanted only sex. I was certain that if I ever had sex, I was doomed to die of AIDS (I had pretty much been told as much in high school) and so I never met with a single man. Every 29 days, I would cancel my AOL subscription, and return a few days or weeks later under a new screen name to begin the game anew.

Having started college, and thus getting free Internet access, a few months later, I learned of a new way of talking to people. Internet Relay Chat (IRC) was my first “permanent” foray into the gay world. I spent months in relative anonymity. I would chat with guys, and express (or feign) interest in them, and then abruptly end conversations with them. I had an excuse for everything. I felt extremely alone. By this time, most of my high school friends had gone to college, and thanks to sabotage from my high school guidance counselor, I had turned down scholarships and accepted entry into the wrong college. Despite heroic attempts by faculty at the University of Minnesota to get me retroactively placed into the right college, I was forced to spend two years in a non-degree granting college before transferring to the one that had initially offered me a scholarship.

While working in an emergency room as I prepared for medical school two years later, I met my first AIDS patient. There was nothing remarkable about him (he had a persistent cough) and he had his “partner” with him. The Republicans were waging their war against gay people as Newt Gingrich claimed how immoral the United States had become. One of the physicians reviewed the chart before going in and said with disgust, “everyone should feel free to triple-glove before dealing with this…patient.” While I admittedly hated the pompous ass, I was shocked by the absolute silence that greeted his remarks. It wasn’t that people stopped what they were doing, it was that they didn’t stop what they were doing. Nobody (but me, it appeared) seemed to think there was anything wrong with what he said. I knew two things: I could never tell anyone there that I was gay, and I never wanted to work with that man again. I went to HR and reported the incident. I don’t know what happened, but thankfully, I never worked a shift with him again, and wherever he is now, it’s not far enough away from me. I’m grateful that none of the other physicians with whom I worked ever acted in such a demeaning manner unbefitting of one sworn to “above all things, do not harm.” Thankfully, I’m still friends with some of the best doctors with whom I worked during that time – and they really are the kind of people you want to be doctors.

Amazingly, my encounter with the patient somehow helped me work up the courage to meet a guy for a date. The details of that encounter could be a separate blog post of their own, but suffice to say, he was nothing like he claimed to be (it was easier when descriptions were all text-based, and pictures were the exception, not the norm, as people didn’t have scanners) and I felt repulsed after our date. He was disgusting, rude, conceited, and nearly everything about him was a lie. It would be two more years before I’d agree to another date. Two more years of ignoring my sexuality.

On the positive side, I got great grades and excelled academically. On the downside, I became more reclusive and insulated from the outside world. I even stopped chatting with people online – even they couldn’t be trusted. During this time, I revisited fantasy novels, which kept me sane. Authors such as R.A. Salvatore, Ed Greenwood, Elaine Cunningham, and Diane Duane created works that helped me escape reality into world where magic was possible, and being gay simply wasn’t a thing. It wasn’t mentioned, and while some think it strange, I was thrilled with that. While I was never suicidal, thanks to their words via their works, I felt a little less alone. (Anyone who says an author can’t change a life will earn my eternal enmity. You have been warned.)

I was never a fan of Prince like most people from Minnesota, but driving home one day from school his song 1999 came on the radio. Since the year happened to be 1999, and the lyrics of the refrain resonated with me:

Again, this moment is seared into my consciousness, but unlike in my guidance counselor’s office, or my unplanned trip to Focus on the Family, or any of the other myriad abortive attempts, she squealed in delight, got up, came to my side of the booth, hugged me, and said, “Thank god! We were worried you didn’t know and were trying to figure out how to tell you!”

After that, I knew what was coming, and for that, I needed to move out of my parents’ house. So I did something heretofore unimaginable to me—I met up with another gay man from online in search of one or more roommates.  My friendship with him was purely platonic, but he introduced me to a world I’d never known before: gay men hanging out with other gay men where there was no judgment of being gay. It was the first time in my life where I was no longer in a minority that I could remember. It was liberating. After about a year, I found a roommate, and for another first time in my life, I moved out of my parents’ house. Many of my friends had been less fortunate, and had been kicked out of their parents’ homes when they came out. As I hadn’t yet come out, I never faced that test. (To be fair, I doubt that ever would have happened – more on that soon)

In the years since I had first rejected and deflected being gay to the (then-recent) year of acceptance both by me and my friends, It was time to tackle the family. I had been dating guys, but the thought of “bringing one home to meet my mom” was not an option—yet. So, I did the next best thing (to my twenty-something mind) and I had all of my gay friends over to my parents’ house for a summer-afternoon barbeque.

My mom is an intelligent woman, and she had questioned me a few times as to whether or not I might be gay during my teenage years. I had denied it, vehemently. My dad asked me once (I suspect at the prodding of my mom) but he seemed unconcerned about my answer either way – a missed opportunity perhaps, and one that may have saved me years of heartache and self-loathing. C’est la vie.

Regardless of my mom’s intellect, there was no way she could ignore that all of my friends there that day were gay. Some were what is called “straight-acting,” which is a polite way of saying not flamboyant. Others were just that. When my mother gets nervous, she fidgets. In this case, she was sitting in a rocking chair and rocking at an…accelerated rate. She made a comment about my roommate saying, “well, he’s obviously gay.” I replied, “yes he is.” The moment of truth had arrived, and I thought I knew what was about to happen. As expected, she said, “and are you?” “Yes,” I replied. “I see,” was her reply.

The following month was very unpleasant with regards to my mom and me. She made some hurtful accusations against me and I know I wasn’t much kinder back to her. Here I keep the specifics out of my story, except to say that they were hurtful, but in time I would learn their genesis, and it had nothing to do with me. My dad shocked me when I told him in saying, “I told your sister once that all I cared about regarding my children is that they are happy. As long as you are happy, I don’t care what you do.” (An important sidebar here: my mom is a Democrat and my father a (often overtly-racist) Republican, so to say that this floored me is an understatement, and a testament to the perils of prejudice.

Next up was my sister. Anyone who knows my sister or my relationship with her knows that she is one of the most important people in my life. My mom was not exactly supportive in my efforts to tell my sister I was gay, and warned me that I might lose her due to her faith. It turns out my faith (in her) was the one justified as she has never shown me anything but acceptance and love, and for that, I will always be grateful. My four nephews didn’t even blink, likely because all of them had at least one gay friend, and it just wasn’t an issue. Generational progress on social issues is a marvelous thing.

Finally was the extended family and family friends. I sat down and hand-wrote letters to many, and when my hands cramped, I turned to typing. I sent out over 40 letters, and of them, over 35 were responded to in some fashion of support. One aunt and her family (I’ll call her the religious nut job, because that what I think she is) didn’t have kind things to say to me. I was asked not to become “militant” and told that being gay wasn’t a choice by two (also religious) people who aren’t of any significance to me. A couple of letters came back with invalid addresses, so all in all, I think I did great. I wasn’t expecting anything other than what I received from the religious zealots, and from all other quarters, I received acceptance and love. Maybe this gay thing would be okay after all.

Roommate 101: if you don’t know someone, living with him or her is probably foolish. So, a few months later, when I came home and found my apartment (and the hallway outside) billowing with blue smoke, I learned my roommate was quite addicted to marijuana. I knew he smoked pot before, but he had never done it in our apartment as it was grounds for immediate eviction. I was incensed (no pun intended) and just as I thought my life was coming together, it all came undone. I gathered my friends (and I would lose some in this process) and strong-armed my roommates (we had added another by this time to help with rent) into signing a waiver to let me out of the lease. I moved the very next day – back to my parents’ house but this time, in the basement.

This was a very different house than the one I had left less than a year earlier: I was no longer in the closet. It was a difficult time for my mom as I “paraded” my boyfriends through the kitchen into the basement. Another friend of mine (who had been kicked out of his parents’ house after having the audacity to take his boyfriend to prom – literally came home to his stuff on the street and the locks changed) moved in with me. His boyfriend (at the time) was fantastic, and for each friend I lost during my exodus from my apartment, I gained a new one through him.

A few months later, I closed on a house, and moved out. I started dating guys until I met one with whom I had a relationship that lasted 13 years. I love his family and they were welcoming of me. So, here my coming out story ends.

Except it doesn’t.

With the beginning of that relationship, I now had responsibilities such as health insurance. Suddenly, I had to tell at least the HR people at work I was gay. Then I would find some coworkers (usually women) with whom I would bond. Almost inevitably, one of two scenarios would come up; they would ask me why “a woman hadn’t snatched me up,” or they would develop a “thing” for me. So, I started to tell coworkers I was gay. I went so far as to chair the diversity council at my job, and worked on promoting inclusiveness in the workforce. I had an amazing and supportive manager (two of them, actually) before I encountered my first round of intolerance in the workplace.

After my second manager left, she was replaced by a woman I will politely call a cow (as in, as stupid and vacant as what you see when you look into a cow’s eyes – apologies to cows everywhere) and a bitch (apologies to female dogs, everywhere) of a woman in HR. The next thing I know, I’m out of a job. The bitch contested my unemployment, just to make my life miserable.

One of the few benefits of all that time in the closet would get me is five undergraduate degrees, and most of a master’s degree at that point in my life. So, I landed a job with a new company and almost doubled my salary. I also got them to pay for my final semester of graduate school via a waiver on policy and got my master’s degree. Some people at work knew I was gay, and others did not. I was hired by a great manager, but he was replaced by a wicked one. Although it never amounted to anything, she was hostile towards me, and claimed I never told her I was gay. Apparently I needed to write some kind of a memo, because her boss knew, as did HR. Anyway, I had some amazing coworkers at that job, too. When I left that job for another one, this time with the State of Minnesota, I wasn’t really hiding it. I had reached a point where it simply wasn’t a thing anymore. I told people I felt needed to know, and I didn’t bring it up otherwise.

I had finally come out! Except I hadn’t. A couple of jobs later, I became a consultant. It was a great job, and I had some awesome (yes, I’m using that word a lot) coworkers. The first time I met my manager face-to-face (he lived in Chicago) was in a pub. He had a ring on, and was talking about hockey. He was only a couple of years older than me, and I had thought (based on our phone conversations) that he had to be gay. I decided my “gaydar” must be broken as he ordered a beer and shook my hand.

Two months later, I was at a client site in Illinois with yet another coworker. Said coworker informed me that we were invited to have dinner with my boss and his husband. “His husband?” I squeaked. “Yes, he’s gay. And if you have a problem with it, you don’t really belong in this company,” my coworker (who did not know I was gay) replied. I think I scared him when I burst out laughing (loudly). If LOL ever merited usage, that was the moment. Yes, it was time for me to come out to my coworker, for obvious reasons. And it was yet another lesson to me on the dangers of prejudice. Gay men can drink beer, like hockey, and wear rings on their ring finger. (Gay marriage had not yet been legalized, just for reference).

So, that’s where it rests to this day. My next job would have me talking openly with the CIO who hired me about my relationships (he was straight, married, with children) yet not discussing it at all with some of my coworkers. It was then that I realized that whom we do or do not sleep with defines a very small portion of our lives. When relevant, I bring it up, and when not, I don’t.

I haven’t been ashamed of being gay for a long time. I’ve accepted who I am for quite a while now, at least in that respect. But I’m still not done coming out. There are billions of people I haven’t met, and each one is a decision. When working for a conservative client in certain parts of the United States, or the world, it’s dangerous for me to be openly gay. If I travel to certain parts of the world, I can go to jail or in some cases, be put to death.

So, to all of those people who have been a positive part of my life (either directly or indirectly), I thank you. For those who have harmed me, I forgive you. (Exception to my high-school counselor, that’s one I don’t know if that’s a bridge I’ll ever be able to cross). I am in a great place in my life. I have a loving family, friends who inspire me with the things they accomplish in life, a fantastic education, a nice home, car, and an awesome job.

I’m thankful that people younger than me are far more likely to be accepted by their families, and for programs like Dan Savage’s It Gets Better project. But I end with the most important moral of my story – it shaped me into who I am today. I like who I am today, scars and all. But I didn’t “come out of the closet.” My friends, family, and support network in their own turn and in their own ways helped me get here. For that, and for them, I am eternally grateful.