A Lifeline For Older Men Coming Out

When I began my coming out journey, I spent literally years in therapy.  First, I had to shed the religious brainwashing, shame and guilt inculcated into me by my Catholic upbringing.  After that bridge had been crossed, my nest stage was to figure out how to live a fulfilling life as a gay man.  My therapist were a life line for me and they pushed and forced me to find inner strength and to let go of so much old baggage.  Despite this help, there was a lack of books and other resources aimed at those coming out in mid-life.  In fact, my last therapist said repeatedly that I should write a book for those coming out later in life.  He said a friend of his was writing a blog as a method to accumulate material for his upcoming book.  He suggested that I should do the same.  Thus, Michael-in-Norfolk- Coming Out in Mid-Life was born.  Eight years later, I still have not written the book, but I have tied to share my trials and tribulations along the way as I have made my journey.  I remain more than happy to communicate with those seeking advice or shared experiences via e-mail and/or telephone calls. A piece in Huffington Post looks at a new book that tries to help fill the void I found in terms of resources.  Here are review highlights:

When my therapist, Adam asked me who I could talk to about coming out, I pointed at him. "Of course," he said "But, what I meant, was a friend or a family member." I looked up as if the answer might have been written on the ceiling. Not finding it there, I looked down at my shoes, shifted uncomfortably in my chair and then said "No one." At forty-three years of age, nobody really knew who I was. I was alone.

I was a father, a husband, a son, a brother and an IT Director. I had friends, but none of them close. When you're in the closet, you worry that every word, glance or gesture might give your secret away. How could I have developed an authentic relationship?

The closet seems like a vestige from a darker time. Many young LGBT people never experienced the repression, but there is an older generation of men who closed the door decades ago and now find themselves transported through time, tentatively stepping out into a terrifying, exciting and puzzling world. They often feel alone.

If you are coming out late, you are not alone.  Fashionably Late: Gay, Bi, and Trans Men Who Came Out Later in Life is a collection of stories that sheds light on a large and largely overlooked segment of the LGBT+ community. The anthology offers affirmation to older men coming out of the closet. I am honored to have an essay included.

I had the opportunity to speak with Vinnie Kinsella, the publisher and editor from Eldredge Books, who created this anthology. 

Q: What prompted you to create this book?  KINSELLA: The biggest prompt for me was the surprising growth of the meetup group I started for men who came out later in life: . . . I expected maybe twelve men in my city would ever join. When we exceeded a hundred members in just a few months, I was floored. I had no idea there were that many men in my city who identified as coming out later in life.

Q: How do you think this book will help LGBT men?  KINSELLA: My hope is that the book will be a strong tool for combating shame. What I hear from a lot of men coming out is a lot of shame for what they didn't do. Shame for not being honest with friends and family about their sexuality of gender identity. Shame for letting fear keep them from living an authentic life. I think this book combats shame by sending the message of, "Don't beat yourself up for coming out a bit later than the norm. Celebrate the fact that you came out at all!"

Q: Is there a void in the market for this type of book or these stories?   KINSELLA: Yes. When I looked for books that could help me early on in my coming out, I found that most of the resources for coming out are youth-focused. I think the belief is that coming out as an adult is rare, but that's simply not true. The culture is so different today from what it was thirty or forty years ago. For Baby Boomers and older Gen Xers, the support system for youth coming out wasn't like it is today, so many men from that era stayed in the closet. . . . That's the void this book fills. It's not a how-to guide. It's more like an "It's Gets Better" campaign for men.

Q: Do you expect this book to help the families of LGBT men? KINSELLA: Indirectly, yes. It will offer insight into what goes on in the mind of a man coming out, which can helpful for spouses, kids, grandkids, and others who have lots of questions about what might have prompted their relative to come out.

As Kinsella notes, there are LOTS of us who have come out or who are in the process of coming out later in life.   We all need to help and support one another.

Andrew Sullivan to Leave Blogging After 15 Years

The husband and me with Andrew Sullivan at a fundraiser

Out gay blogger Andrew Sullivan - who I have had the privilege of meeting - has announced that he will be leaving blogging in due course.  Some days Andrew outrages me, especially with his refusal to face the reality that the Roman Catholic Church is systemically flawed and his opposition to hate crimes laws, but other times he amazingly sums up a situation in prose that I can only wish I could author.  In a post today, he summarizes the reasons behind his decision.  Here are excerpts:

Why? Two reasons. The first is one I hope anyone can understand: although it has been the most rewarding experience in my writing career, I’ve now been blogging daily for fifteen years straight (well kinda straight). That’s long enough to do any single job. In some ways, it’s as simple as that. There comes a time when you have to move on to new things, shake your world up, or recognize before you crash that burn-out does happen.

The second is that I am saturated in digital life and I want to return to the actual world again. I’m a human being before I am a writer; and a writer before I am a blogger, and although it’s been a joy and a privilege to have helped pioneer a genuinely new form of writing, I yearn for other, older forms. I want to read again, slowly, carefully. . . . . I want to write a book. 

I want to spend some real time with my parents, while I still have them, with my husband, who is too often a ‘blog-widow’, my sister and brother, my niece and nephews, and rekindle the friendships that I have simply had to let wither because I’m always tied to the blog. And I want to stay healthy. I’ve had increasing health challenges these past few years. They’re not HIV-related; my doctor tells me they’re simply a result of fifteen years of daily, hourly, always-on-deadline stress. These past few weeks were particularly rough – and finally forced me to get real.

I can completely understand the burn out aspect Andrew describes.  Likewise, my husband can understand the "blog-widow" statement since, even though I blog at nowhere the level of Andrew, each day, more or less 365 days per year, I spend numerous hours scanning the news and stories and then writing posts.  Oh, and the hunt for daily "male beauties" likewise can be time consuming since I strive to never disappoint. 

Will I follow Andrew's example and end the blog?  I really don't know.  It is hard to describe, but over the last almost seven years of daily blogging, I have made amazing connections with people literally from all over the world including Europe, Australia, across the USA and most recently a reader in Ghana.  The other aspect of blogging is that it can be a great way to vent as some of my truly long time readers can recall from the dark days of my coming out, suicide attempts and an unpleasant divorce.  If and when I decide to stop blogging, I will let readers know.  The other option is to take on some co-contributors, as

summing anyone would be interested.

When The Dish ends, it will join another former favorite, Pam's House Blend, which ended when blogger friend Pam Spaulding finally burned out. I wish Andrew the best and I hope he can finally come to terms with his inability to walk away from the Catholic Church.

Goodbye Pam’s House Blend After 9 Years

One of the things that I have enjoyed most is the wonderful people that I have been privileged to meet via this blog, particularly the other attendees at the 2008 LGBT Blogger Summit in Washington, DC, financed in significant part by Microsoft and Progressive Insurance.  Among those - and there were many - I was privileged to meet and come to call a friend was Pam Spaulding, the blog mistress of "Pam's Hose Blend."  Indeed, for me Pam became a model of what I hoped to achieve as an LGBT blogger.  Often her wit, charm and amazing use of language made me break out laughing out loud.  Now, after nine (9) years of blogging, Pam is calling it quits for a number of reasons, some of which I well understand, especially the amount of time involved in trying to post meaningful information 365 days a year.  Here are excerpts of how Pam explains her decision:

All good things must come to an end, even after numerous awards and accolades, it’s time to acknowledge that I cannot continue to run on fumes alone. The Blend could continue limping along, but my health and well-being come first; over the last few years burning the candle at both ends with a full-time offline job and PHB. It has taken a severe toll — most readers have learned that I am dealing with chronic pain conditions — fibromylagia, and in the last couple of years, aggressive rheumatoid arthritis.

My decision to close the blog is just as reality-based as its content has been. If I cannot produce material at the frequency or with the same level of quality, enthusiasm and effectiveness, it’s really time to close the doors to this coffeehouse — and work to ensure it continues to have a life as an archive, a snapshot in our digital political history. Pamshouseblend.com will redirect to archives.

Looking back, I churned out pieces at an incredible pace — up to ten posts a day– many long-form pieces, commentary, curating news articles I thought my audience should check out, and occasionally (and increasingly) doing citizen journalism at news events and conferences. All of this while holding down a full-time day job with no connection to politics or activism. And most of of those posts were done in the wee hours, so I didn’t get much sleep over the lifespan of this blog.

Political blogging changed mainstream journalism in many ways. Save for a few who were able to monetize their blogs or who were cherry picked to help traditional outlets get their feet wet in new media, the vast majority of citizen journalists and opinion-makers toiled with little hope of quitting that day job. The LGBT movement was energized by the speed and reach of new media, and at times appeared quite threatened by it — mostly because it was a venue where Beltway orgs, and even the White House, didn’t see any possible way to co-opt or control what was being produced by this first generation of online political rabble rousers and activists. I’ve made a lot of great friends and met a lot of people along the way, and hopefully opened a few eyes, particularly with my posts about the intersection of LGBT and race.

The Blend sat in a unique place in all of this — I brought the perspective of a black lesbian living in the South to the dialogue — broadcasting a voice certainly not represented in the power structure of the LGBT movement. It was the first major blog to feature a transgender contributor, and it was important to me to bring talent to the blog from under-represented regions and voices.

By the way, I’m not disappearing into complete obscurity (though that would be OK as well), I’ll continue to be active on social media and make time to mentor folks as I can. It’s just time for someone else to pick up the ball and run with the daily activist grind, and forge new ground in an ever-shifting new media.

Speaking of which — on FDL, a rebranded blog will debut on the channel with my talented current contributors Laurel Ramseyer, Alvin McEwen and Autumn Sandeen. Look for more information on that effort soon.

I’ll have a “goodbye” post on July 1 that takes a look at some of PHB’s nine-year history.

Pam will always be one of my heroines and I hope she knows how much I love and respect her and all that she has done.  For non-bloggers and activists, it is hard to convey the intensity of some of the cyberspace friendships that can be made.  I myself have thought of shutting down this blog, but so far cannot quite let go of it.  I wish Pam the best of everything and I want to convey how much she will be missed, not only in her posts but quick and dirty advice when e-mailed and asked for information or her take on things.