First post, partial life story, and want advice!
11-26-2014, 12:06 AM
I'd like some advice from fellow gay men and it's probably important to let you know my back story. I've never sat back and just written out these experiences but I don't know what else to do and I think it'll help get some solid advice.
First off, I'm not openly gay. I live in the US in a state with gay marriage and a liberal reputation but that literally means nothing in that there are many lower class people here and many religious / militant conservatives here and I would be in danger physically, reputation-wise, and mentally if I were openly gay. I also just don't plain feel comfortable letting the average person know I'm gay because I feel the first thing people tend to do is judge you on what they first find out and act around that in their own beliefs and experiences, I've dealt with the ignorant far too much to want to deal with that. I'm 26, currently quite disabled with medical issues, cannot work, and live at my mother's house with her husband who does not work and is mentally ill but refuses to get help. (He talks to himself, yells to himself, talks to inanimate objects, has fits of rage out of no where at nothing, steals peoples possessions, and does many other strange things he claims he doesn't remember, because of this I have a padlock on my door when I won't be home for an extended amount of time.)
So, the beginning:
I had my first homosexual thoughts in middle school. There was a boy I liked and one night I kept thinking about him and started to pleasure myself. At the time I was being raised conservatively with religion being pushed on me a lot and I felt guilty afterwards and confused. I kind of ignored this and didn't really focus on my sexuality again or have much of any gay thoughts until after I graduated high school.
In 2009 I came out to my mother. I needed to because after having a close friend online for over a year we had formed a relationship and I planned on him to visit. I had told one of my brothers slightly earlier and he was perfectly accepting. My mother, however, despite always claiming to be liberal, saying she had gay friends and acquaintances, and being open and accepting to gay relationships, marriage, etc, she was not very accepting. She told me I was confused that I wasn't gay and that 'she knew who was and wasn't gay and I definitely wasn't.' I felt crushed, betrayed, insulted and frankly humiliated. None the less, my then boyfriend came and we enjoyed our time together, and I lost my virginity to him. After he left, my mother and I fought quite a bit, mostly over my sexuality, again trying to 'prove' to her that I was gay and the fights were me mostly arguing to her that you can't tell another person their sexuality and you can't decide it for them. I became depressed and detached. The rest of my family didn't know I was gay and I couldn't (and to this day have not let him know) tell my father I was gay as he was and still is very conservative and religious and I know for a fact he does not accept homosexuality, nor does his wife. Eventually I suffered a sort of mental break down and attempted suicide. I was taken to the hospital and ended up going into the mental wing and staying there for a while. It wasn't fun. I assume they gave a sort of summary of why each person was in the wing to the nurses and staff as every day various nurses and psychologists would come to talk to me. It didn't help I had one nurse that came in and asked me about the arguments I had with my mother and decided to tell me that homosexuality wasn't a real thing and that I was just "gay because I was mad at my mother." Eventually I was let out of that wing and had post-hospital care in a group meeting setting though I never really told the group my problems or let them know I was gay I did meet with an individual psychologist who knew and was much more accepting. Eventually I got out of that and while I still feel depressed sometimes, I feel I've healed a lot.
I've had a couple interests online since then, but nothing else that turned to real life as locally I don't feel comfortable seeking out other gays. I've tried it twice before and frankly people where I live are not very nice people. To this day the only people that know I'm gay that I know of who know I'm gay at least, is one of my brothers, my close friends, and my mother.
This leads me to my home life, like I said earlier, I am disabled and can't really work. I'm deep in financial debt and have many expenses and bills, thus am trying to get government assistance, though what I'd ultimately like is to get a bunch of my friends to be room mates and get an apartment with me, though no one really seems to want to do this, so I'm trying to figure out what to do. Regardless, being home all the time I deal with my mother's husband a lot. As far as I know, he doesn't know I'm gay but he might. As embarrassing as it is, I do have sex toys. I keep them hidden of course and not in the open, but about a year and a half ago before I had a lock on my door, I had come home to find the bag I keep them in (which is buried under some other things) open and them strewn out on top of the bag. No one else was home so all I can assume is that my mother's husband had gone through my stuff and for whatever reason found and examined my sex toys. I didn't know what to do, was humiliated and angry at the invasion of privacy so I had told my mom that her husband went through my things, her reaction was essentially 'so what' and feeling the need to explain why it was such a disturbance to me other than privacy I told her they were sexual things without going into detail. She was of course upset (but what else was I to do?) and said he wouldn't do that and blew it off. I put my things away and stewed in anger and humiliation for a bit.
Like I said earlier one of my brothers knew I was gay, I had trusted him but he may have leaked information to my oldest brother as that year at Christmas time my oldest brother (as he always does) was being an ass to me. He however struck home when he started making gay jokes towards me, at the time we were around my father at his home and I was afraid either he had told my father or was trying to hint to my father I was gay, but I wasn't sure if he actually knew or was just being an ass. I had told my mother about this not sure if either my other brother or she had told him, and she said that he had asked her if I had had a boyfriend at one time and she responded that's up to him to tell you. So I guess he knows?
Today I went to the bank, twice unfortunately to try and sort out some issues with my account. Both times I left my laptop on, and didn't bother locking my door, the second time I came back my laptop was in a new window that I know I didn't open that was a folder of personal pictures of me and my first boyfriend that were fairly sexual in nature that we had taken for private use... since the only other person at the house was my mom's husband, obviously he was going through my laptop. I am offended, angry, and humiliated all at the same time. I don't know what if anything I should do. I feel like all I face here is humiliation, degradation, and insult most of it stemming from my sexuality. The obvious answer is to move out but like I said I'm disabled and I don't have the money or resources and I'm 26, not exactly young, I know I shouldn't still be living at home and everyone else does too but until I get some sort of government assistance, that's not an option.
So in the meantime my question is how should I cope with this? I feel like every chance my family gets they can and will insult and humiliate me. Has anyone else dealt with similar family situations?
I don't know who to ask or talk to about this stuff so I apologize if this post is scatter brained or inappropriate or too long, I just need advice and maybe a few words of encouragement. :frown:
First off, I'm not openly gay. I live in the US in a state with gay marriage and a liberal reputation but that literally means nothing in that there are many lower class people here and many religious / militant conservatives here and I would be in danger physically, reputation-wise, and mentally if I were openly gay. I also just don't plain feel comfortable letting the average person know I'm gay because I feel the first thing people tend to do is judge you on what they first find out and act around that in their own beliefs and experiences, I've dealt with the ignorant far too much to want to deal with that. I'm 26, currently quite disabled with medical issues, cannot work, and live at my mother's house with her husband who does not work and is mentally ill but refuses to get help. (He talks to himself, yells to himself, talks to inanimate objects, has fits of rage out of no where at nothing, steals peoples possessions, and does many other strange things he claims he doesn't remember, because of this I have a padlock on my door when I won't be home for an extended amount of time.)
So, the beginning:
I had my first homosexual thoughts in middle school. There was a boy I liked and one night I kept thinking about him and started to pleasure myself. At the time I was being raised conservatively with religion being pushed on me a lot and I felt guilty afterwards and confused. I kind of ignored this and didn't really focus on my sexuality again or have much of any gay thoughts until after I graduated high school.
In 2009 I came out to my mother. I needed to because after having a close friend online for over a year we had formed a relationship and I planned on him to visit. I had told one of my brothers slightly earlier and he was perfectly accepting. My mother, however, despite always claiming to be liberal, saying she had gay friends and acquaintances, and being open and accepting to gay relationships, marriage, etc, she was not very accepting. She told me I was confused that I wasn't gay and that 'she knew who was and wasn't gay and I definitely wasn't.' I felt crushed, betrayed, insulted and frankly humiliated. None the less, my then boyfriend came and we enjoyed our time together, and I lost my virginity to him. After he left, my mother and I fought quite a bit, mostly over my sexuality, again trying to 'prove' to her that I was gay and the fights were me mostly arguing to her that you can't tell another person their sexuality and you can't decide it for them. I became depressed and detached. The rest of my family didn't know I was gay and I couldn't (and to this day have not let him know) tell my father I was gay as he was and still is very conservative and religious and I know for a fact he does not accept homosexuality, nor does his wife. Eventually I suffered a sort of mental break down and attempted suicide. I was taken to the hospital and ended up going into the mental wing and staying there for a while. It wasn't fun. I assume they gave a sort of summary of why each person was in the wing to the nurses and staff as every day various nurses and psychologists would come to talk to me. It didn't help I had one nurse that came in and asked me about the arguments I had with my mother and decided to tell me that homosexuality wasn't a real thing and that I was just "gay because I was mad at my mother." Eventually I was let out of that wing and had post-hospital care in a group meeting setting though I never really told the group my problems or let them know I was gay I did meet with an individual psychologist who knew and was much more accepting. Eventually I got out of that and while I still feel depressed sometimes, I feel I've healed a lot.
I've had a couple interests online since then, but nothing else that turned to real life as locally I don't feel comfortable seeking out other gays. I've tried it twice before and frankly people where I live are not very nice people. To this day the only people that know I'm gay that I know of who know I'm gay at least, is one of my brothers, my close friends, and my mother.
This leads me to my home life, like I said earlier, I am disabled and can't really work. I'm deep in financial debt and have many expenses and bills, thus am trying to get government assistance, though what I'd ultimately like is to get a bunch of my friends to be room mates and get an apartment with me, though no one really seems to want to do this, so I'm trying to figure out what to do. Regardless, being home all the time I deal with my mother's husband a lot. As far as I know, he doesn't know I'm gay but he might. As embarrassing as it is, I do have sex toys. I keep them hidden of course and not in the open, but about a year and a half ago before I had a lock on my door, I had come home to find the bag I keep them in (which is buried under some other things) open and them strewn out on top of the bag. No one else was home so all I can assume is that my mother's husband had gone through my stuff and for whatever reason found and examined my sex toys. I didn't know what to do, was humiliated and angry at the invasion of privacy so I had told my mom that her husband went through my things, her reaction was essentially 'so what' and feeling the need to explain why it was such a disturbance to me other than privacy I told her they were sexual things without going into detail. She was of course upset (but what else was I to do?) and said he wouldn't do that and blew it off. I put my things away and stewed in anger and humiliation for a bit.
Like I said earlier one of my brothers knew I was gay, I had trusted him but he may have leaked information to my oldest brother as that year at Christmas time my oldest brother (as he always does) was being an ass to me. He however struck home when he started making gay jokes towards me, at the time we were around my father at his home and I was afraid either he had told my father or was trying to hint to my father I was gay, but I wasn't sure if he actually knew or was just being an ass. I had told my mother about this not sure if either my other brother or she had told him, and she said that he had asked her if I had had a boyfriend at one time and she responded that's up to him to tell you. So I guess he knows?
Today I went to the bank, twice unfortunately to try and sort out some issues with my account. Both times I left my laptop on, and didn't bother locking my door, the second time I came back my laptop was in a new window that I know I didn't open that was a folder of personal pictures of me and my first boyfriend that were fairly sexual in nature that we had taken for private use... since the only other person at the house was my mom's husband, obviously he was going through my laptop. I am offended, angry, and humiliated all at the same time. I don't know what if anything I should do. I feel like all I face here is humiliation, degradation, and insult most of it stemming from my sexuality. The obvious answer is to move out but like I said I'm disabled and I don't have the money or resources and I'm 26, not exactly young, I know I shouldn't still be living at home and everyone else does too but until I get some sort of government assistance, that's not an option.
So in the meantime my question is how should I cope with this? I feel like every chance my family gets they can and will insult and humiliate me. Has anyone else dealt with similar family situations?
I don't know who to ask or talk to about this stuff so I apologize if this post is scatter brained or inappropriate or too long, I just need advice and maybe a few words of encouragement. :frown:
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to the forum. 
Capricorn
