Anonymous' Story
I'm so happy this person decided to share their story. It's beautiful, brave, sad at times, honest, and hopeful. Enjoy.
Accepting reality is hard sometimes. It has only been the past year or so that I have done the soul searching that accompanies accepting that I’m gay, and that process isn’t a pleasant experience. It’s not pleasant, but it’s important. I have learned so much about myself, and not just the gay part.
Looking back, there were the typical “signs” one notices, but I had no context for what being gay meant, or even that being different from the other boys was that big of a deal. Throughout childhood and my teen years, I was oblivious. I hadn’t allowed myself to consider why I might feel different from how my peers seemed to, I just kept my head down and moved on. I’m grateful that I didn’t have to come to terms with being gay then, because life growing up was hard enough for me and I didn’t need one more thing on top of that.
I was raised fairly religious in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but in a moderate-conservative, NPR-listening sort of way. However, being gay was not an option in my family (sort of still isn’t in some ways), and sex was not discussed at all, so I was really living in the dark about all of this. In a way, I feel some resentment for not being helped through this because I’ve had to figure it out on my own. I’m working on allowing grace for others, because I hope to be forgiven when I “know not what [I] do”, too.
I’m grateful that I got to just be a kid and didn’t have to confront my sexuality then. I was a safe date as a teenager. Moms loved me. I also loved that I was confident that I would never be anything but a gentleman, but there is also no moral high-ground for resisting something you don’t even want to do in the first place. Throughout my youth, I was very unaware and ignorant of anything sexually, and I’m still not sure if I’m grateful for that or not. Well, I guess not totally unaware, because the men in love scenes in movies were a little distracting, as was the underwear aisle. But, I had nobody to talk to about it, so I just kept it to myself.
Going on a mission was great because I got to ignore my own problems for two years and help people with theirs. They call it “the best two years” for a reason. I think it’s a blessing from God that being gay was never an issue for me while serving, but I think it was mostly the repression working its magic with the help of the Lord. Never thought I’d consider that God was in the details of my repressed life, but I also hadn’t before considered a lot of things that I have in the past year, so here we are.
Life after the mission meant going back to college and getting married. I did great at the first one, not so great at the second. I was a serial first-dater. I had no issue asking women on dates. On some level, I think I sort of knew I wasn’t going to have to be vulnerable, so there was no pressure. I also knew I wouldn’t be tempted to do anything physically inappropriate either, and that fueled my confidence. I would go out a time or two, but make an excuse that I just wasn’t feeling it. To myself, I blamed that “just not feeling it” on a lifetime of being given reason after reason not to trust people. But on some level, I knew there was probably something more to it than just that. Those experiences haven’t helped, but they aren't the whole story.
Life continued on in the following years and I became successful in my career, I focused on that because it gave me a sense of purpose and an excuse not to let anyone in. I was busy growing a company and I got to forget my own life while doing so. My dating life slowed down and stopped, and I stopped praying to marry a woman. However, I continued to pray to be the best I can be. I had tried to make dating women work, but it didn’t seem fair, to them or to me, so I quit. I still have a lot of guilt for what I feel was leading them on, because I broke some hearts along the way. But mine never did, and that’s why I feel especially guilty. I obviously was never invested enough to allow myself to be broken by the process.
Time went on, and then suddenly everything seemed to come caving in. I developed some major anxiety that layered on top of my high-functioning depression, which I’ve had for most of my life, and that spurred my process of discovery. What was my life? Why am I so lonely? What if I never get to love someone? Why do people love other people? Do I even know what that is? Am I lovable? All of these questions led me to consider something I’d never allowed myself to before: being gay. It went a little like “I’m gay…I’m gay?.. I’M GAY!”
It was a relief, but it also made the cards come crashing down. What does this mean? Who even am I? This can’t be right, that’s not how I was raised. This doesn’t happen to my family. But the more I allowed myself to consider the possibility, strangely the more comfortable with it I was. I’d denied questions before, but suddenly I was ok with it. It’s like God had finally answered my prayers for years to help me love myself. All the years of self-loathing seemed so trivial and silly. I finally could love myself because I wasn’t some screwed up straight man that allowed his trauma to rob him of happiness, I was simply a gay man that was trying to make something work that he didn’t really want anyway. Allowing myself that grace healed a lot of heartache and anger.
So, now that I’ve accepted being gay, I’m left with the all too common dilemma for LDS LGBTQ members: Where do I go from here? And here’s where a new paralysis kicks in. I’m terrified of making a choice. I’m afraid of doing something I shouldn’t, but also of not doing something I should. Is part of my “becoming Christlike” moving beyond myself and learning to love completely? Or is my life staying single (and possibly as miserably lonely as I’ve been) and not getting to have a partner how I’m refined? Scripture is rife with seeming contradictions between what is “doctrine” and what is given by personal revelation. Do you see how confusing this is?
I worry that I’ll be a disappointment, to others, to God, and to myself. I think mostly to myself, but I’m proud that I’m considering that now because before I was so far down the priority list of my own life. It’s getting better. It’s weird, but being worried I’ll disappoint myself is a form of getting better.
Because it has been “wrong” all my life, I’m terrified that I may actually allow myself to fall in love with a man. And I’m afraid that I’ll like it. Do I accept the heartbreak of loving someone now if eternity doesn’t get to include them? Is that my refiner’s fire? Do I set myself up for that, and him, too? Or do I just “wait on the Lord” and keep some of the commandments while missing out on a pretty big part of becoming Christlike? That feels a little like settling for making some shitty lemonade out of lemons that nobody asked for.
As I type this out, I can’t help but feel like I’ve got to make a choice. I have to move forward and trust that the Lord knows me and understands why I would make the choices I’ll make. What’s the point of having a Savior if there’s nothing to save? Life’s course is supposed to cause a need for a Savior, because that’s where the growth lies. If I’m sincerely trying to be the best me I can be, I have to choose faith that my “best me” won’t always be acceptable to everyone else, but somehow acceptable to the Lord. If the Lord knows that I’m trying, He can make the adjustments to get me where He needs me. We believe in grace as we are doing all we can do, so at what point do I stop living in fear and try to live and do all I can? I hope for the courage to try.
Looking back, there were the typical “signs” one notices, but I had no context for what being gay meant, or even that being different from the other boys was that big of a deal. Throughout childhood and my teen years, I was oblivious. I hadn’t allowed myself to consider why I might feel different from how my peers seemed to, I just kept my head down and moved on. I’m grateful that I didn’t have to come to terms with being gay then, because life growing up was hard enough for me and I didn’t need one more thing on top of that.
I was raised fairly religious in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but in a moderate-conservative, NPR-listening sort of way. However, being gay was not an option in my family (sort of still isn’t in some ways), and sex was not discussed at all, so I was really living in the dark about all of this. In a way, I feel some resentment for not being helped through this because I’ve had to figure it out on my own. I’m working on allowing grace for others, because I hope to be forgiven when I “know not what [I] do”, too.
I’m grateful that I got to just be a kid and didn’t have to confront my sexuality then. I was a safe date as a teenager. Moms loved me. I also loved that I was confident that I would never be anything but a gentleman, but there is also no moral high-ground for resisting something you don’t even want to do in the first place. Throughout my youth, I was very unaware and ignorant of anything sexually, and I’m still not sure if I’m grateful for that or not. Well, I guess not totally unaware, because the men in love scenes in movies were a little distracting, as was the underwear aisle. But, I had nobody to talk to about it, so I just kept it to myself.
Going on a mission was great because I got to ignore my own problems for two years and help people with theirs. They call it “the best two years” for a reason. I think it’s a blessing from God that being gay was never an issue for me while serving, but I think it was mostly the repression working its magic with the help of the Lord. Never thought I’d consider that God was in the details of my repressed life, but I also hadn’t before considered a lot of things that I have in the past year, so here we are.
Life after the mission meant going back to college and getting married. I did great at the first one, not so great at the second. I was a serial first-dater. I had no issue asking women on dates. On some level, I think I sort of knew I wasn’t going to have to be vulnerable, so there was no pressure. I also knew I wouldn’t be tempted to do anything physically inappropriate either, and that fueled my confidence. I would go out a time or two, but make an excuse that I just wasn’t feeling it. To myself, I blamed that “just not feeling it” on a lifetime of being given reason after reason not to trust people. But on some level, I knew there was probably something more to it than just that. Those experiences haven’t helped, but they aren't the whole story.
Life continued on in the following years and I became successful in my career, I focused on that because it gave me a sense of purpose and an excuse not to let anyone in. I was busy growing a company and I got to forget my own life while doing so. My dating life slowed down and stopped, and I stopped praying to marry a woman. However, I continued to pray to be the best I can be. I had tried to make dating women work, but it didn’t seem fair, to them or to me, so I quit. I still have a lot of guilt for what I feel was leading them on, because I broke some hearts along the way. But mine never did, and that’s why I feel especially guilty. I obviously was never invested enough to allow myself to be broken by the process.
Time went on, and then suddenly everything seemed to come caving in. I developed some major anxiety that layered on top of my high-functioning depression, which I’ve had for most of my life, and that spurred my process of discovery. What was my life? Why am I so lonely? What if I never get to love someone? Why do people love other people? Do I even know what that is? Am I lovable? All of these questions led me to consider something I’d never allowed myself to before: being gay. It went a little like “I’m gay…I’m gay?.. I’M GAY!”
It was a relief, but it also made the cards come crashing down. What does this mean? Who even am I? This can’t be right, that’s not how I was raised. This doesn’t happen to my family. But the more I allowed myself to consider the possibility, strangely the more comfortable with it I was. I’d denied questions before, but suddenly I was ok with it. It’s like God had finally answered my prayers for years to help me love myself. All the years of self-loathing seemed so trivial and silly. I finally could love myself because I wasn’t some screwed up straight man that allowed his trauma to rob him of happiness, I was simply a gay man that was trying to make something work that he didn’t really want anyway. Allowing myself that grace healed a lot of heartache and anger.
So, now that I’ve accepted being gay, I’m left with the all too common dilemma for LDS LGBTQ members: Where do I go from here? And here’s where a new paralysis kicks in. I’m terrified of making a choice. I’m afraid of doing something I shouldn’t, but also of not doing something I should. Is part of my “becoming Christlike” moving beyond myself and learning to love completely? Or is my life staying single (and possibly as miserably lonely as I’ve been) and not getting to have a partner how I’m refined? Scripture is rife with seeming contradictions between what is “doctrine” and what is given by personal revelation. Do you see how confusing this is?
I worry that I’ll be a disappointment, to others, to God, and to myself. I think mostly to myself, but I’m proud that I’m considering that now because before I was so far down the priority list of my own life. It’s getting better. It’s weird, but being worried I’ll disappoint myself is a form of getting better.
Because it has been “wrong” all my life, I’m terrified that I may actually allow myself to fall in love with a man. And I’m afraid that I’ll like it. Do I accept the heartbreak of loving someone now if eternity doesn’t get to include them? Is that my refiner’s fire? Do I set myself up for that, and him, too? Or do I just “wait on the Lord” and keep some of the commandments while missing out on a pretty big part of becoming Christlike? That feels a little like settling for making some shitty lemonade out of lemons that nobody asked for.
As I type this out, I can’t help but feel like I’ve got to make a choice. I have to move forward and trust that the Lord knows me and understands why I would make the choices I’ll make. What’s the point of having a Savior if there’s nothing to save? Life’s course is supposed to cause a need for a Savior, because that’s where the growth lies. If I’m sincerely trying to be the best me I can be, I have to choose faith that my “best me” won’t always be acceptable to everyone else, but somehow acceptable to the Lord. If the Lord knows that I’m trying, He can make the adjustments to get me where He needs me. We believe in grace as we are doing all we can do, so at what point do I stop living in fear and try to live and do all I can? I hope for the courage to try.
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