Why Coming Out Was the Right Thing

Any readers who have been following this blog since its early days will know that coming out for me was a very wrenching experience and that it carried a very, very high cost. As I recently posted, looking back some six years later, I believe I did the right thing and would do it over again even though admittedly, I would handle some aspects differently with the benefit of hindsight. A reader who is currently in the closet and struggling with what course he should follow recently directed me to a blog called "Kids of Queers" and an interesting post by Anna, daughter of a gay man who came out after many years of marriage. I do not know if my children would identify with the writer's final conclusion, but from my prespective I believe much in the post is directly on point especially in terms of the cost of not coming out. In my own case, I am pretty confident that had I not come out, I'd be dead now. I recommend reading the full post, but here are some highlights:

*

I mentioned in my previous post that I think my dad coming out was the right thing to do. Being on the family side of the coming out process, that is a hard position to take, a hard one to explain, and one that took a loong time to feel comfortable with. . . . I wish my dad wasn't gay. I wish he liked women, and I wish he wanted to be with my mom, and I wish they were still married and still in love. . . . But it's important for me to separate out the divorce issue from the gay issue. The gay issue caused the divorce issue, but the divorce is what robbed us of all the things I just mentioned. I would still miss those things if they'd divorced for another reason.

*

But he is gay. I don't believe this is a choice. I believe this is the way he was born, and because of circumstances of his youth (upper crust Boston brahmin growing up in the 40's), he couldn't admit it to himself for a very, very long time. What's hard to measure is the untold price had he NOT come out. We know the price of his coming out, and it was very high for all of us. I'm coming to believe it was high for him too. But how bad would it have been if he never had come out and had lived with the secret forever?

*

As for my dad....who knows if he would have made it? It is not uncommon for closeted gay people to become suicidal, and we all know the stories of closeted gay men who act out in dangerous ways that put their health, safety, and reputation at risk. Not to mention that there is always a fundamental benefit, even if it takes a very, very long time to see it, to honesty and personal integrity. Life is so, so, so, so short for all of us. How can I not wish for both my mom and my dad to be leading authentic lives? And had they stayed together, both would have been living a lie, even if only one of them knew it.

*

Grace and strength can only come from truth. There is no shortcut, and there is no workaround. It may be impossible to believe, but everyone in your family will be better off in ten years than they would be if this secret remained in the dark. It took me years to believe this, but I finally do.

*

If they do not feel this way now, I hope in time my children and my former wife will come to see the truth of Anna's conclusion. Living a false life and pretending to be who you are not, and hating yourself every day of your life because of it is so terribly destructive. A decent analysis of the stages of coming out can be found here.