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Memories of Coming Out

On October 11 millions of openly gay Americans will reflect on the day they took those brave first steps out of the closet, providing support and encouragement to others who have yet to find their voice. In day one of our series on coming out, Lair star David Moretti (pictured), Big Brother's Marcellas Reynolds, and New York LGBT Community Center executive director Richard D. Burns share their stories.
An Advocate.com exclusive posted October 7, 2008
Memories of Coming Out

On October 11 millions of openly gay Americans will reflect on the day they took those brave first steps out of the closet, providing support and encouragement to others who have yet to find their voice. In this series of stories, some of the gay communities most visible performers, activists and personalities share their memories of coming out, and what the experience taught them about themselves.

***

David Moretti, actor, The Lair

Coming out, for me, was a very gray, hazy time in my life. I had been fighting it my whole life, and when I finally acted on it I hated myself. I had created such a guilt trip that I had been dealing with for a quarter of my lifetime that my actions almost pushed me back in the closet.  It took me another year to accept it and find good friends who assured me I wasn't the Omen child. 

Finally, after that time of guilt and feeling alone and wrong, I was able to enjoy my newfound accepted identity. That's when the coming-out speeches happened. 

One in particular was to my pops. It was Halloween time, and he was visiting me here in L.A. I created all this anxiety for myself because it was time to tell the alpha of the family, the guy who birthed me. And you never know how that's gonna turn out -- especially in patriarchal Italian "man eats and makes money, woman feeds and births" culture. That's obviously an exaggeration, but you get the point. So I took a deep breath, told him flat out, and counted the hours (read: seconds) of silence. 

All he said was "Wow -- hey, can I still get grandkids?" 

All I could do was laugh. He was a progressive liberal alpha Italian -- who knew! He completely deflated the "situation" with one sentence. I told him that kids were definitely a possibility, just not sure how soon. We later had lunch, and that was that. I was a very fortunate kid.

***

Marcellas Reynolds, actor/host, Big Brother / The Style Network

I never really came out to my mother. After a failed engagement to a woman one day, I simply stopped dating women and stopped talking about my relationships to my family. It just segued that easily. But not being truthful about myself and my life caused a rift in our once extremely close relationship. We began to bicker and fight about the past. The truth has a nagging way of wanting out.

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Reader Comments

These comments are reproduced as written by visitors to this Web site. They have not been edited for content, grammar, or spelling. The viewpoints appearing here are those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or views of advocate.com, The Advocate, or its affiliates.

  • Name: Duncan McKelvey
    Date posted: 2008-10-11 4:19 PM
    Hometown: Smyrna, Georgia

    Comment:

    55 years ago, when I first started becoming aware of my 'difference', everything was so much different than it is now. It took me until my mid-forties or so to 'come out'...., I'm sixty five now. What a long, strange road it's been. I'm so happy for the youngsters today who have the opportunity to realize themselves. While I realize everything is not 'peaches and cream' for the kids now my feelings are a lot like one of our congressmen from Georgia who happens to be black in describing his feelings about Obama running for president (paraphrase), "This generation has never known what we knew; the white only signs, the police dogs..., they're so fortunate and that's a good thing.." God Bless th' youn'uns. LOve, Duncan


  • Name: Larry Lauzon
    Date posted: 2008-10-08 8:02 PM
    Hometown: Ottawa, Canada

    Comment:

    I don't know, coming out was never an issue with me, I always knew I was gay and so did everyone else. In school I experienced bullying twice and that ended when I bedded both bullies, I always figured bullies were just closet cases trying to their own doors. In my family it was never an issue that had to be addressed, my parents realized that I was only going to live with other men. I gave them seven grandchildren, three mine, four adopted, I outdid my hertro brother in the parenting factor. Are we more enlightened in Canada or did I just come from a very strange family.


  • Name: Randy Judd
    Date posted: 2008-10-08 4:26 PM
    Hometown: Houston

    Comment:

    Times are changing, albeit in segmented portions of none of our choosing, but certainly of our desires. Having a coming out story similar to scores of us that include the self loathing, guilt and the hetro style picket fence deprogramming "package" to unravel, still found myself on the incredulous side witnessing my 15 year old nephews recent coming out, which consisted of " Mom, Dad, I'm Gay! What's for dinner? While my brother and I are thinking that this is such a big deal, because of my own experience we went through, clearly it wasn't and isn't the case with my nephew, and I realized that 20 years ago this was a dream and a goal, and today a reality on a small scale! I am a delighted to witness first hand, that creating an enviornment at home of tolerance is where it all begins, not schools, government, work place..but HOME. Yes, times are changing. RJ


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