I have had some wonderful response to my
coming out story, but I have also received several people asking me a few questions. "What happened after you came out?" "What was it like a s a big man to come out?" "Did you find your soul mate?" and more. So I am going to continue my story today and try to answer a few of these questions. Where I left off was the reaction of family and friends. What I should explain further was the effects of coming out and how they effected me. As I stated, I was 27, but felt 17 again. Here I am finally accepting myself as a gay man, and those around me now know and accept me too. It was an euphoric feeling. I starting hitting all the bars in LA. At first I was just so excited to be with my own kind of people! The music was better. The drinks were better! The people were better! But were they really? As the blinding excitement began to fade I noticed something rather odd. All the guys around me were thin, well built, and as hot as they looked, they were rather cold in their personalities. I went to my first gay pride in Palm Springs. I had a great time with a few of my new gay friends. That was until we were at one of the clubs in the evening. My friend and I were dancing on the dance floor when I was approached my a few people filming the action in the club. He said to me, "Uhm could you move off the floor so we can shoot the hot guys." I felt punched in the face. Here I was, hiding who I was all these years for fear of rejection from those different from me, yet now I am being rejected by those that are like me. I stopped going to the clubs. I felt I left one closet, only to be put into another. I had to hide from the gay world that, I was like them. Then one day I came upon a personal ad. I won't use his real name, we will just call him Joe. Joe was looking for a chubby guy. I had to respond because for all I knew from what I saw at the clubs, I was the ONLY chubby gay. Joe and I talked back and forth for a while. He lived only 30 miles away so we quickly set up our first date. When we met for the first time it was like "Wow!", I could not believe this hunk wanted someone like me. He took me to a bar near his home and he bought me a drink, and asked me to play a game of darts. After a while it became obvious he was trying to let me win. He would touch my arm when he spoke to me, compliment my throw, even if it did miss the board. I had never had this type of attention before. When we got back in the car, he looked at me and smiled. "Did you hear what I said?" he asked snapping me out of a magical daydream I was having about him. "Oh, uh, no sorry." I said. He laughed and said, "I said you are a very beautiful man." Much like today, I did not take compliments very well as I never know what to say and always doubt the sincerity. He then leaned over and gave me my first real gay kiss. I saw fireworks. I could not believe I found this man and he liked me as much as I liked him!. Over the next few months I would see him every chance I got. We introduced each other to the our families. I was finally living a life I always wanted. That was until Joe got addicted to Meth. I had not known he was once addicted before we met and that some old "friends" had reintroduced it to him. Soon all the time we would spend together was time he was looking to score some drugs. He ended up draining my savings and when I told him that was it, I wanted my money back and him to get clean, he got abusive. Hit me with a pair of brass knuckles he pulled out of his pocket and the pulled a gun out of his backpack and pointed it at me. We were in my car at the time and I noticed a cop up ahead, so I pulled over and threw him out of the car. I secretly wanted the cop to see and knew he would run from them. I never wanted to see him again, yet at the same time couldn't think of nothing else but him. He was so different when we met to what the drugs did to him. He was my first love and will always be remembered for that, they way he was in the beginning. I wore out so many CD's of Cher's "Believe", I even bought one that simply had 12 different versions of that one song, and listened to them over and over again, using it as my anthem, telling myself there was life after love. But it took a long time. After a while I then allowed some friends to convince me to go to some bars I had not been to yet. They assured me I would like these better. That is when I discovered Faultline in LA. It was my introduction the Leather Bear Community. I was very timid still and even though these guys were more like me, I remained the wallflower. With what I went through with Joe, I developed a dislike for alcohol as any form of inebriation reminded me of how people change from who they really are, so I would usually just watch and be the driver as my fiends let their hair down and had a good time. One of these trips I was standing near the door drinking my water when I noticed this handsome guy walk past and into the phone booth. As usual I looked, I admired, I wrote him off as out of my league. Next thing I know he is standing next to me and saying something, I looked to him and said "what?" he then said again, "Is that all your drinking?" I explained yes and that I was the DD. He then offered to get me another, I said sure. To this day I have no idea if someone is hitting on me or just being nice, so I assume the later to be safe. When he came back, he suggested we got to a quieter section of the bar. He introduced himself. Again I will use a fake name, Mike. After a few minutes my friends came to me, way too drunk to take care of themselves so I had to say goodbye to Mike. He asked for my number. I was surprised when he called me a few days later wanting to meet again. And I will continue this story tomorrow. Thank you for reading this far and for all your support. Love to all.
Burly Bear Chris
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