I'm in my late 30s. I'm a happily (hetero) married person. I love my wife and she loves me. We have a couple of lovely children that mean the world to us. I am attracted to both men and women and I don't think I'll come out to my family or most of my lifelong friends.Some Background:I was raised in a lower middle class, blue collar, very conservative, very religious, very straight household. The men did manual labor or carried guns for the state to put food on the table, the women were home makers or care-takers of one kind or another. Conservative Christian ideology and all of the guilt and fear that comes along with it were a huge part of my life all the way up to adulthood. Being called gay (or worse) at school or in the neighborhood was a call to action. If you didn't fight whoever said it, you'd be abused for time untold. My family was, and still is, tightknit and we've helped each other get through some real hardship.My parents worked hard for us. We lived in a rural, lower middle class part of a rural, lower middle class county. My mother was a teacher that picked up after school hours to make ends meet, my father was a combat veteran cop who would moonlight as bank security and directing traffic to keep us in our modest home. I was a latchkey kid, and took care of my sister. We were never well off, and new stuff was rare, but we were never hungry and I don't recall ever worrying about basics.The family was heavily involved in our local church. All of our weekends revolved around it, and we went to religious schools despite the cost. I was taught that I am a sinner, and we are all sinners, and sinners go to hell, but if you truly repented for your sins you may go to heaven after you die (but you're probably goin to hell, kid.) The religious indoctrination, especially the warnings against sin and everlasting punishment for sin, was and to a degree still is, an omnipresent specter. I would punish myself for thinking 'impure thoughts,' and was convinced that I was just a terrible person because no matter how hard I prayed, I still had those 'impure thoughts.'I grew up, went to a Christian University, moved away, met, fell in love with, and married my wife. We had two truly beautiful children together. My little family is literally everything to me. Every day I can not wait to talk to them, play with them, be needed by them, be loved by them, and to show them love in return.The rub:I've only told one person that is still in my life that I'm bi, and that person is not my wife.It's taken me decades, but I've finally worked through my baggage enough to be comfortable with the fact that I'm attracted to both men and women. I'm generally more attracted to women, and have certainly acted more on my hetero attractions, but there are men that I've been attracted to and was lucky enough to have hooked up with a few really lovely men when I was single and out on my own.I'm a monogamous beast. I don't share my humans well. I can't do it. I've never had a long term relationship with a man and most of my adult life when I was out of my family's house, I was in a relationship with women. I was extremely careful to not put myself in a situation where I my heterbros would run into me with the men I hooked up with because, again, I wasn't comfortable with it until I worked my shit out much later. So even my closest hbs don't know (or at least I haven't explicitly told them.) I love them (platonically) and don't want to have to wonder if they’re treating me weird because of it or if they’re re-imagining our friendships through the lens of ‘was he into me?’ (No I was not you boys are so very not my type.)I'm afraid that my wife would, I think justifiably, feel like I had lied to her by omitting this fundamental fact about who I am. I have no doubt she'd be supportive, but what's even the point of letting her know that I, too, appreciate Ryan Reynolds for more than just his wit? As I mentioned earlier, I could not be happy in a non-monogamous relationship and I don't feel the need to try. What's the point in telling her and possibly hurting her?My parents are incredibly important to me. Unfortunately, I feel like it could cause unnecessary harm to our relationships. I think my mother, who has come a very long way, would be supportive but concerned. I don't think my father would ever treat me the same way if I came out to them. He's too old, too conservative, has seen and maybe participated in too much violence done to people just like me over the years to be able to adapt.I'm wrestling with a whole world of competing feelings. Those of relief of relief that I am finally at a point where I can be honest with myself. Fear of being outed in some way and having that effect my relationships with my family. Longing to tell the people closest to me and apprehension that after decades of knowing 'straight' me, they won't accept me or that they'll start to act differently toward me, and finally resolution. If there's a cost benefit analysis to be had here, it's pretty much all cost. I could be more honest with the people I love and there's a chance it may make some of my relationships better, but there is a much better chance that, by letting all of these people know that I'm bi, it'll just complicate comfortable relationships.Time has a way of making fools of us all. Maybe one of my children will come out and I'll have something wonderful to share with them. Maybe I'll get brave and/or drunk enough to spill the beans to my wife. Who knows? As it stands now, the objectively 'best choice' is to keep it to myself.TL;DR - I'm a bi man that loves his hetero family and friends and I think telling them would cause much more damage than good, so I'm keeping it to myself.P.S. I realize this is incredibly privileged. I benefit from absolutely enormous privilege. I can live and have lived a happy, hetero life and have the luxury of choosing whether or not to disclose my sexuality without the cost of my happiness. To my siblings that can not shelter behind similar privilege, you are beautiful, you are loved and I'm sorry. via /r/offmychest https://ift.tt/2GIlwrX
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