Last Edited on:

11/02/98

This is a section which, I hope, will be read by gay teens, their families, and their parents.  I also hope that those people who are out of the closet will share their experiences here as well.  In general, I want this to be a place where people can be anonymous if they wish to be but can express their ups, downs, concerns, fears, etc.   Of course, I can't very well expect others to write, if I don't myself.

My (Continuing) Gay Experience:

    Ever since I can remember, I have been gay.  I guess the earliest memory I have was at age 4, dreaming about Davy Jones of the Monkees without his shirt on.  Throughout grammar and junior high, I was the kid no one really spoke to.   As a matter of fact, in 5th grade, my teachers were the only ones who spoke to me.   I guess I was that kid most people hated.  I was the teachers' pet, good in school, and rarely misbehaved.  A lot of that stemmed from my parents' interest in my education.  They would take every opportunity to teach me something - sometimes cultural knowledge and sometimes practical(such as how to use a handsaw).  They would check over my homework overnight and explain to me what was wrong.  I know that some people are probably saying, well, look at all the education they had.  That's true, but I will also say that my mother never went to college and was raised in a very small farming town.  When she came across something she didn't understand, she would read about it in my text books, teach herself, and then help me.  They would quiz me on vocabulary words, expanding their own vocab as they taught me.  Anyway, I   digress(I'm good at that, or hadn't you noticed?)

    Since most people either totally ignored me or made fun of me, I understood very quickly what it felt like.  I made it my lifelong ambition never to make others feel like I felt.  This gave me problems later on when I refused to pick on other people, others thought I was weird.  This is not to say that I was a saint, as I am sure that my mother will testify to.  Anyway, I had always known that I was different somehow.  My early education just cemented that even further. 

As I moved to High School, still private, I met new people.  Everyone I had known from grammar school had ideas about me already, but the new people I met were wonderful.   It wasn't a crime to be smart anymore, and I actually started to have friends.   Unfortunately, like most other teens, I began to long for companionship.  I had my share of crushes on straight guys - none of which came to fruition(and for those of you in that situation, they most likely never will).  I of course, was heartbroken.   My junior year, I became very depressed, although I didn't know that's what it was.   I just knew that something was "wrong."  I never let on to my parents.   The stress of school just became intolerable.  I began unconsciously creating ailments that would keep me from school.  I ran up thousands of dollars of medical tests.  After all that failed I finally tried to commit suicide by taking an overdose of sleeping pills.  Luckily, I was found and treated for depression.  Things got better after that.  I graduated from high school and went to college.  It was at UGA that I began to accept who I was.  

I still was very lonely.  Friends told me "you're a wonderful person" and the like.  I would respond with, "If that's true, how come I am 21 and have never dated anybody, while so-and-so who is mean to his mates has someone?"  I began to wallow in self-pity, which is okay for a very short period of time.  After that, it becomes damaging(not to mention annoying to those who love you.  It wasn't until I was 23 when I found someone that I fell totally in love with.  He was my age and was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen.  I could be myself around him and didn't feel uncomfortable.  I had always been self-conscious about kissing someone or having sex with someone before, but it never crossed my mind with him. Physical attributes that I never thought of as being sexy, suddenly either were cute or didn't matter.  Unfortunately for me, things didn't work out.  I was probably too clingy at the time and he, self-admittedly, was afraid of getting too close to anyone.   He left.  It took me two years to get over it.  I continued on with medical school that fall. 

I fell victim to the widely held belief that "gay relationships don't last."   I thought that now I would finally be happy after admitting and accepting that I was gay, but then my first "love" fell apart.  I sometimes wonder if it is not these first few interactions with gay people that enforce that belief:  A person who is new to the gay scene comes out looking for love.  He finds someone who has been gay for awhile.  The experienced one takes the new guy home, has sex, and then dumps the guy.  This happens a few times, and the new guy decides that the "gay relationships don't last" theory is true.  Then he meets someone who is new to the community and does the exact same thing to the new guy that was done to him, and the cycle repeats itself.   Of course, then there are those guys who everybody wants to have sex with because they're new or very young.  The guys feel popular because everyone wants them, and they confuse that with love.  All this, of course, leads to dangerous behavior. 

I came onto the scene at the tail end of the massive numbers of deaths by AIDS.   The people today don't have lots of friends that they have buried, and they believe that all the new drugs will either arrest the disease till a cure is available or cure the disease - A VERY DANGEROUS IDEA.  I have even run into people who are of the opposite opinion.  One guy actually said to me, "I can't believe you're going to medical school.  We're all going to be dead [from AIDS] by the time we're 30 anyway."  

I should probably interrupt here and say that it is in the nature of most young men to want sex(gay men are no exception).  Perhaps younger gay men don't want relationships early on and want to sew their proverbial seeds.  As long as they are careful there is nothing intrinsically wrong with that(morals aside.  I try very hard to not bring morals into my discussion, because although, I don't like to sleep with someone just for the fun of it, I can't say that it is wrong for everyone else.)

Fast forward to the present now, and I'll try to get off my soap box(although, I guess this entire web page is sort of a soap box.)  I still am single, although that's probably a combination of being picky, not having the time to go out all the time due to medical school, and living in the heart of the Bible Belt in a very conservative city.   People have asked me, "Are you out?"  The answer is yes and no.   Those who need to know do.  As far as school goes, I don't hide it but I don't broadcast it either.  My reason for this is simple, being gay does not affect my ability to perform my tasks.  In the future, I think that it will help me in dealing with other people who are struggling with being gay.  Gay is a part of my life, not my entire life.  I am a gay male, a doctor-to-be, a son, a brother, an uncle,  a friend, etc.  That is not to say that I am slamming people who campaign for gay rights.  To each his or her own.  My contribution is that people get to know me and like me.  Eventually, people find out that I am gay.  By that time, they usually don't dismiss me just because I'm gay, because they have this nagging reminder of what kind of work I do, what kind of person I am.  Most people have told me, "You can't be gay. You don't act like . . ."[I interrupt at this point to fill in their sentence "like the people in the movies?"  As I have said before, I am only an individual and cannot speak for the gay community.  There are nice gay people, mean gay people, gay murderers, drag queens, gay professionals, gay athletes, etc.   just like there are in the straight community. 

Anyway, now that I have rambled on for ever and ever, I'll stop.  I currently am still single, sort of waiting for Mr. Right to come along but living my life in the interim.  If you have any questions for me or would like to share your opinions/stories please email me.  I would prefer that the curse words be kept to a minimum(although there are quite a few appropriate places).  Please let me know if I can publish your story so that others can benefit and if you want a link to your email address so that if someone else has a similar situation and would like your opinion, they can write to you.