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Happy National Coming Out Day!

October 11th, 2008

Fifteen years ago this October, I started becoming aware that I was attracted to girls as well as boys. I still have my journal from that fall. The entries are rambling and melodramatic and tortured. They'd be ridiculous if they weren't so full of self-loathing.

Now I'm thirty, happily married to a man, comfortable with my attraction to both sexes, and, unfortunately, assumed straight by the average person on the street. I'm not whining; I'm well aware of the preferential treatment society and the law give me simply because my partner is a man, not a woman. I don't even have to come out.

But being bisexual is part of my identity. I've made peace with it, and I want people to be aware of it. Because my connection to my husband is so visible, so obvious, so easy, I've found it hard to combat the assumption that I'm straight. I worry that it's irrelevant. I worry that I won't be taken seriously.

This week, I found this personal essay on the Human Rights Campaign website, " Coming Out as a Happily Married Bisexual." Jesse Liberty, a bisexual man, writes:

In my mid-20s, I married a woman, and now, 21 years later, we are still monogamous and happy. The people we meet assume I am straight. This has always bothered me, but until recently I couldn’t see how it was anything but my own private business. Without really thinking about it, the closet closed around me.

Wow, I thought. That's totally me.

I'm not as brave as Jesse, to come out as universally and overtly as he describes. But for those who read this blog, I hope this post will help explain why I'll talk about my husband one moment and launch into GLBTQ issues the next, and why I'm so invested in writing books with queer main characters. (Not that there aren't straight supporters out there who do the same, e.g. the marvelous author Ellen Wittlinger. Thank you, straight supporters!)

So there you have it. I'm a writer, I'm a librarian, I'm bisexual. Happy National Coming Out Day!

I encourage you to check out the HRC's NCOD materials as well as Lee Wind's coming out links. There's tons of stuff on Lee's site, so do a find-in-page for "Coming Out?" to zero in on it. Author Brent Hartinger's personal essay is especially worth reading.

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Comments

On October 11th, 2008 carey said:

word, word, a thousand times word (but you knew that, of course).

i struggle a lot with how much i want to make people aware of it, or how appropriate it even is to do so in any given situation. at my last job, the other female coworkers would talk about which dads they had crushes on (yes, preschool teachers do discuss the relative hotness of their students' parents), and i would chime in, but i would not mention any of the moms. (even tho there were some crazy cute moms.) or before class a few weeks ago, some friends and i were discussing a mutual girl-crush, and for a few minutes, i was thinking, "awesome, this school is not half as rigidly straight as i had assumed!"...and then everyone realized what they were saying and fell over themselves trying to explain that no, of course, they didn't mean a crush LIKE THAT, IN THAT WAY, and i was left sitting there confused, thinking, "well, i did!"

but it came out (ha ha) at band practice recently that, before they met me, my bandmates all thought i was a lesbian. (you know, because of that song.) and it led to an interesting conversation, and i ended up coming out--or, as h. said, "half-coming out") to them. and you know what? the world kept turning.

anyway, there is much more i can say about this, but i will stop blathering in your comments section for now, anyway. :)

On October 11th, 2008 Lisa said:

Ha! I was hoping you would blather in my comments section. Knowing you and our other bi-identifying friends has been so great in helping me come to terms with things (namely, that just because I'm married to a man doesn't mean "those feelings" go away).

On October 11th, 2008 Jen Robinson said:

Happy National Coming Out Day, Lisa. I think that sharing this on your blog is brave.

On October 12th, 2008 Lisa said:

Thanks, Jen!

On October 13th, 2008 Rie said:

Happy belated coming-out day! I'd wondered myself if you had a particular connection to the GLBTQABZ community, and it's awesome that you chose to write about it.

I just came out over on my blog...I don't think anybody will be too surprised.

On October 14th, 2008 Lisa said:

Thanks, Rie! Your comment also reminds me that it's time I updated my blogroll again... :-)