Coming Out, Hot Friends, and Facebook Chat

by A Queer Chick

I am a 32-year-old lady in a relationship with a dude. I have known I was bisexual for ages now but I am starting to think that I’m actually a dyke.

In the last few years I’ve become more and more interested in other ladies. I’ve never been especially feminine, except for a few things — I do like makeup and pretty shoes and clothes, but I love my short, low-maintenance hair. I feel protective of my lady friends and I’m the first one to offer inappropriate violence toward any dude who has done them wrong. I love MMOs and other RPGs and I have a strong tendency to play dyke-y characters who are mostly femme looking but who are cocky ass-kickers who love to be big damn heroes and get the ladies.

So here’s the problem. Like I said, I’m in a relationship with a dude, and have been for about a year and a half. We live together, he has a 17-year-old daughter who is an awesome person, and we have pets. I love him and he is a good person and I very much don’t want to hurt him. We haven’t had sex in months, and before that, it had been really infrequent for a long time. I’ve asked him about it and he says he’s happy, but I don’t know if he’s just saying that. I was hurt about it for a while, but then I realized that I didn’t miss it. I need to extricate myself from this relationship in such a way that I minimize the damage done and we (me and the guy as well as his daughter) can hopefully still be friends. The other part of that is that while I can afford to live on my own, I don’t have the funds for apartment deposits and stuff like that.

The other thing is coming out to my family. My youngest brother I know will be fine, and I’m so grateful to have someone like him in my family, we’ve always been very close, but the rest of my family is various shades of fundamentalist, Assemblies of God, Jesus Camp Christian. My mom would be heartbroken, and my other brother who is the most conservative of the bunch might stop me from seeing my niece, which would break *my* heart. I very much want to be the awesome aunt who tells her that it’s OK if she wants to work outside the home and get an education and wear pants and BE GAY and not be a baby factory.

This is a pretty long letter but damn, I don’t know what to do. I have a bunch of supportive friends who I am very lucky to have and I know I could talk to them, but… well, I’m afraid that if I talk to them about it then this becomes something I can’t be in any kind of denial about anymore and I have to actually start doing something about it.

Wow, there’s really a lot going on here. First of all, you’re obviously not in too much denial to write to me about it (although you’re still too afraid to say “I want to fuck women,” and instead provide your hairstyle and video game characters as proof of your queerdom). That means you’ve moved past the pushing-it-all-down-into-your-subconscious stage and are dealing directly with the issue, even if so far it’s only in your own head. Once you’ve done that, I’m sorry, but you’re committed to doing something about it one way or another. It’s going to drive you crazy if you don’t.

The first thing you have to do is let go of the fantasy that you can leave your boyfriend without hurting him. It’s not going to happen. You live together — that’s a high level of emotional entanglement and you just can’t sever it painlessly. It will be awkward and terrible for everyone if you try. Please have enough respect for this dude to NOT be like, “Hey, I’m moving out, but want to go bowling next week?” Be direct, tell him why you’re leaving (which, again, is because you want to fuck women, not because of your haircut), and start packing up your shit.

Before you do that, please confide in one or two close friends. Tell them you need their help in finding a cheap place to live, and possibly crashing in one of their guest bedrooms until you save up the cash for a deposit. If there’s really no one whose couch you can sleep on for a few weeks, go to Craigslist and see who’s looking for a roommate. This, obviously, will suck, as it will probably mean sharing a house with college students who drink shitty beer and watch TV loudly at four a.m. But it’s preferable to staying in a sham relationship just because it affords you a higher standard of living. Let your friends know that they are on call to go out to dinner with you whenever you absolutely can’t stand your place for another second. In the meantime, keep squirreling away cash for an awesome apartment of your own.

OK, that gets you through the first major steps. Regarding his daughter: The chances that she’s going to want to remain friends with you after you dump her dad are pretty slim. However, at 17 she’s old enough to have an adult conversation about why you’re leaving, so sit her down, explain what’s what, and tell her that you still care about her and hope you can stay in touch. After that, let her take the lead in determining how much of a relationship you’ll have.

Finally, your family. I absolutely believe that it is in the best interest of all queers, everywhere, for more people to come out. Increasing visibility of our numbers can only help — it’s the “if they know us, they don’t vote against us” thing. On the other hand, your first responsibility is not to The Gays, it’s to your own well-being. Plus, your brother sounds like a gigantic douchebag and quite frankly I’m not sure he deserves to have you confide in him. And I agree with you that if your niece is being raised by someone like that, she’s going to need an aunt like you in her life.

Ultimately, you’re going to have to listen to your conscience on this one. None of the choices here are unmitigated awesome, but which is the one you can live with? If you find a lady and fall in love and start living together, is hiding her from your family going to make you miserable? Is being part of your niece’s life an acceptable trade-off for lying whenever you’re with your brother? Can you confide in your younger brother, the non-terrible one, and see if he has any advice?

You’re dealing with a lot of complicated issues right now, and you’re going to need your emotional energy. I recommend holding off on coming out to your family until you’re single and financially stable. At that point, you can reexamine the situation and possibly look into some tasteful letter-pressed “Guess what, I’m a dyke!” stationery. Good luck with everything.

I’m dating a guy who I’m pretty sure is gay or bi. We live in a country (and neighborhood) where coming out would be way harder than in the US, and I think he’s super repressed. (It’s not a country where he would get arrested or killed for coming out, but it would definitely make his life a lot harder [he’s from this country, but I’m from San Francisco].) He brings up gay friends all the time and tells me about gay coworkers who hit on him. He seems fascinated by gayness and pretty open minded about it (although I’ve told him I’m bi, and he’s skeptical of the concept). I asked him if he’s interested in men and he denied it vehemently, but the fact that he keeps mentioning it seems significant. A lot of the time he seems preoccupied about something vague, and he worries about drinking too much. Aside from that, our relationship and sex life are awesome. I really like him, and I’d like to be with him for a while longer (but probably not forever, because I’m only staying in this country for a couple years). Also, I think he does like women, but he might like men more.

OK, so here are my questions:

1) First of all, do you think he’s on the DL? I’m really paranoid about this from reading Savage Love. The fact that he worries so much about drinking (although he doesn’t really drink to excess) makes me wonder if he needs liquid courage to hook up with dudes. He’s responsible about protection but maybe he wouldn’t be in a drunk/repressed shame situation. I’m getting tested soon, and we always use condoms, but should I be worried about my safety?

2) What can I do to help him (assuming I’m right about this)? As I said, I really really like the guy, and regardless of what happens with us, I hate to think of him feeling miserable about himself for the rest of his life. It would be challenging but totally possible for him to come out, and I think he would be happier. But he seems so freaked out about it that I’m not sure he could even admit it to himself. And I can’t talk to him about it directly. Is there any way to make him feel like he can trust me and talk to me about it without being like “Are you a homosexual??”? I talk about my liberal Bay Area views a lot (i.e. gender is a construct, anything you’re into is OK (except adult babies)), but he kind of laughs it off as wacky Americanness. Is it even my business? Should I just dump him and let him deal with it without involving me? Am I in for a lot of heartbreak if he does come out?

3) And finally, the part that makes me feel like a jerk: I’m really turned on by the idea of him having secret gay inclinations, and it makes our sex life better for me. In theory, I would love to have a threesome or let him hook up with guys and tell me about it, but this would probably shock/horrify him. Do you think there’s any way for both of us to enjoy the kinky aspects of the situation, or am I using him unfairly?

Sorry this is insanely long, but it requires a lot of backstory to make sense. Thank you!

And yet, even with all the back story, I still have no idea why you think your boyfriend might be gay. Expressing curiosity or “fascination” with what the queer folks do seems to me like a fairly normal reaction to living in a repressive culture where such topics aren’t talked about often. You said your sex life is great, which implies to me that he doesn’t have to lie back and think of David Beckham in order to get there, and I suspect you would have mentioned if you’d actually found him in bed with David Beckham. So where is all this “is he gay” stuff coming from?

Ohh, OK, I get it. You really want him to be at least a little bit gay, because the thought of him engaging in boy-on-boy action gives you a boner. Well, in that case, I’d advise against pushing him too hard on this issue, lest one day he snap and say “Would you get over it already, I’m not into dudes,” thus killing your boner. I don’t want that to happen to you. I want to Save the Boners. I am a Boner Conservationist. (Let’s play a game of “How Many Times Can I Say Boner In One Column,” shall we?) Also, while we’re on the topic of boners, it is the official position of A Queer Chick that everyone’s kink is OK as long as it involves consenting adults, so don’t hate on the adult baby fetishists. Actual babies: no. Adult babies: if that’s what gets you off. (I personally have the same policy on adult babies as I do on actual babies, which is “not in my vagina.”)

But back to you and your problem: I think it might be better for you to leave well enough alone in real life, so you can continue to enjoy your “suspicions” which are actually fantasies. However, if you think you can’t live without acting out those fantasies, bring it up as something he could do for you, not as something you’re doing for him. Tell him the thought of seeing him with another dude gets you so hot, and then fuck his brains out to demonstrate how hot it gets you. Any time he agrees to indulge you by talking about your fantasy, fuck his brains out again — this is called positive reinforcement! We’re doing science, here. It is possible that after a little while of this, he’ll agree to actually get down with a guy and tell you all about it, or let you watch. It’s also possible that that will never happen, because he’s just not into dudes at all. In that case, you’ll have to let it go and either resign yourself to hot straight sex, or find another “secretly gay” dude to boink.

Oh, and if he fucks another guy and then leaves you for him, he was gay all along. My bad.

I am a lady who is dating a man. I’d told him that I’m attracted to girls and he responded by telling me he wouldn’t consider it cheating if I were to do things with other girls. Awesome. I’ve been super honest with him every time something’s happened, and he’s still cool with it. Except now I’m starting to realize that I’m probably a lot less bi and a lot more gay than previously thought. Man and I are not technically in a relationship, as we haven’t yet had The Talk, but it’s pretty clear that’s where he thinks we’re headed. I’d tell him next time I see him that I can’t be with him because he has a penis and that’s just really not doing it for me anymore, but he’s in Africa right now for his job, and won’t be back for about 6 weeks.

Here’s the actual question part: Is it worse to break off an almost relationship via Facebook chat while he’s away, or act like everything’s peachy for the next month+ and then hit him with the news when he gets back? Also, should I probably stop exchanging texts with that cute girl until I’m officially back on the market? Advice would be super appreciated.

Man, I don’t understand you kids today. How can you have rules about what constitutes cheating with someone with whom you are not in a relationship? Anyway, yes, I think it is preferable to end things with your not-boyfriend now, rather than wait until he comes back. Actual Relationship breakups should always happen in person, obviously, if you have any kind of a soul. But if you’re just sort-of-dating, I think it’s okay to call or email and say “listen, I’ve realized that I need to live penis-free, fly safe.” Never ever ever over text. Never.

Also, your letter is a couple weeks old now and it will be a couple more weeks before it actually runs, so if your not-boyfriend is already back from Africa and you’re still waiting on me to tell you what to do: Sorry about that, go ahead and dump him. You should be aware, of course, that the next time this dude dates a bicurious girl, and she tries to institute the It’s Not Cheating If It’s With Another Chick rule, he’s gonna be like “Hell no! That’s how it starts!” And she will be pissed at you for ruining things for her. I hope you can live with that.

Regarding the cute girl you’re texting, did she know about your not-boyfriend? Do you mention the person you’re not-dating to the person you’re thinking about not-cheating on him with? Weren’t you already on the market, if he was never really your boyfriend at all? I DON’T UNDERSTAND HOW ANY OF THIS WORKS. But if she knew you were seeing a guy, you should let her know that you’re not seeing him any more, and then you should text to your heart’s content. In case you need to know how to make an emoticon vagina, it looks like this: ({i})

Queer Chick, I have a problem. About a month ago, I broke up with my first real girlfriend, after a year of me basically being her therapist/orgasm giver. (Oh man, that sounds so sad. It wasn’t always bad, though.) The thing is, I know she still has feelings for me, but I definitely don’t feel that way. On the contrary, I’ve started developing feelings for this other girl. I don’t know her all that well, but we’ve really bonded in these past weeks, despite knowing each other for about a year or so. We get along really, really well, she’s super intelligent and funny and also, well, good-looking. And she talks a lot about how she wish she could be as brave and open about her sexuality as I am. So, as I am an over-analyzer of extreme proportions, I read all of this as flirting and start to think about her in that way.

But then, the last time we met, she was being really cold and seemingly not at all interested. We got pretty drunk together with our friends, and I, of course, told her that I wouldn’t mind having sex with her. (Wait, that sounded so douchy. I said it in a nice way, OK?) It wasn’t the smartest thing I’ve done, admittedly, but to me it wasn’t such a big deal; I’ve told other friends the same thing, without hard feelings.

Well, she said that she was flattered and seemed genuinely happy for a while, but after a little while she went home almost without saying goodbye. Dis.

So, Queer Chick, as you can see, my situation is confusing. One, should I try to avoid relationships/hook-ups altogether for a while, or is a new romance not such a bad idea? And two, how will I ever know if this girl is into me or not? I’m still pretty inexperienced when it comes to dating girls, or, really dating anyone, and sometimes I find it so hard to read signals, especially when it comes to other girls. Please, please, please, help me. I desperately need some Queer Chick Advice.

I mean, you basically propositioned her, right? And she said she was flattered, which is kind of different from saying “Do me right here and now,” and then she left. Among all the other signals she’s given you, this is the one that matters: You gave her a clear opening and she didn’t take it.

The thing about how she wishes she were as brave as you — yes, that suggests she has stuff going on in her heart/vagina that she isn’t ready to deal with. (With which she isn’t ready to deal? No, that sounds ridiculous. I’m leaving the preposition where it is.) Maybe she’s queer and can’t admit it; maybe she really does have the hots for you. It’s totally possible! You sound awesome! But if she isn’t ready to deal with the consequences of sexing up a lady, that’s her call.

Having just gotten out of a relationship in which your lady used you as her therapist, it doesn’t seem like a great idea to throw yourself into this chick who needs her hand held through the coming-out process — if that’s even what’s really going on with her. New romance in general isn’t a bad idea, but new romance with this girl doesn’t sound like it’s even an option. And if you continue pursuing her, the likeliest possible outcome is that she’ll shut you down harder than she already has, and you’ll feel like a jackass.

If she really is struggling to come to terms with her sexuality, what she needs isn’t a girlfriend, it’s a friend — someone who’s been there, and can be her example of an out, proud dyke with her shit together. But in order to be that person for her, you have to actually get your shit together. That doesn’t mean that your love life has to be perfect and free of complication, but it does mean you need to stop pursuing uninterested or unattainable girls and look for someone who reciprocates your affections.

Maybe you’ll be such a good role model that she’ll come out, on her own schedule, and finally take you up on that pass you made. Maybe not. But either way, life is too short to wait around for her to wake up and smell the pussy. You need to start looking elsewhere.

Previously: Bisexuals, Clingy Exes, and the Return of the Heart/Vagina.

A Queer Chick is a queer chick who knows everything. Do you have a question for A Queer Chick?