Gay Shame and the Trials of Coming Out

Dear Margie,

I hope you can help. My boyfriend is upset because I don't feel like I need to come out to my straight friends. I feel like if they ask me about it I will tell them the truth, but I won't just throw myself out to the unknown of losing my friends or worse. My boyfriend is frustrated because he thinks I can't talk like I am in a relationship around my straight best friend, and that I should not hide myself or hide him away from my friends.

Could you please help?

Let me begin by saying that one has a right to come out in his own time. Pressuring a person to do something before he is mentally and emotionally ready to handle it can have really damaging effects.

However, as you are in a relationship with someone you call your boyfriend, it doesn’t sound like you’re unable to face the truth about your sexual orientation. What it does sound like is that you’re feeling ashamed of your homosexuality, that you haven’t really embraced the whole concept of who you are within the world, and how your homosexuality impacts your work, family, friends and entire identity.

I know that can sound harsh, so ask yourself these two questions:
1. Why are you keeping this to yourself?
2. Where did you learn this kind of behavior?

Perhaps this is how you learned to deal with difficult issues in your family— by not talking about them, ignoring them, and isolating them. It’s the old adage that there is “an elephant in the room” and everyone is ignoring it. The problem is that when you ignore something that may cause conflict or an uncomfortable situation, you get no feedback on the situation or circumstance. That internalization can cause shame.

It sounds like this is how your partner is experiencing you. You’re ignoring him and his feelings by not publicly acknowledging the relationship. Keeping silent about your shared reality is, essentially, lying to the public about it and making him feel like he isn’t important. For your partner it creates another dilemma. He’s being forced to reject a major part of who he is because he isn’t allowed to be himself in relation to you.

Thus, your partner is asking you to deal with that shame by coming out about your sexuality to your friends.

In order for two people to make a meaningful “couple” relationship they must find a spiritual and soulful connection between them. They do this by being vulnerable. So I would imagine this is a major problem with your relationship, and it probably impacts your sexual lives as well. One can’t be vulnerable with somebody who isn’t being honest about who he is in the world. It becomes all physical and not emotional. Your partner won’t be able to get a really deep, loving, soulful connection with you because you aren’t making yourself vulnerable and fully committed to the relationship. You’re closeting it.

To help you process this situation, you might want to journal about what it is you’re not talking about in your life. After that, write about the ways you’d like to talk to your friends about being in a gay relationship. Journaling can really expose our deeper feelings, where they come from, and the bondage of unhealthy attitudes and beliefs.

I don’t want this to sound judgmental or as if I’m talking down to you, but please listen to this: Your vulnerability and your authentic living is your strength. You haven’t learned that yet, but I can assure you that if you embrace this principal you’ll feel empowered. When you speak your truth and are vulnerable, you are empowered, and the rewards of that are high self-esteem, self-confidence, no resentments, no shame, and real intimacy in your relationships.

Margie Mirell, LMFT and life coach, has been working in private practice with the LGBT community in Santa Monica, California for more than 20 years. She focuses on relationship issues, addictions, and co-dependency.

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