The Times seems to be on a roll, with some truly excellent writing. I loved a piece from Damian Barr on 23 July, in which he used a word new to me – ‘gaybourhood’, to denote an area with a large gay population. The following extract really made me smile:
‘I first visited Brighton as a teenager in the late 1980s to take part in a national schools quiz competition. Our team didn’t win but I barely noticed as I gawped at the exotic sight of men holding hands – men who weren’t blind and didn’t need help crossing the road. These men looked unafraid. Happy, even.
Our consolation prizes were book tokens, which I immediately spent buying all the Tales of the City books in the local Waterstone’s. I then went gome and announced to my mother… that I was gay. She politely pretended to be shocked.”
I loved ‘politely pretended’, with its implication that she’d known all along. It made me wonder how my parents would react if I explained my somewhat alternative lifestyle – poly and a spanko. Do they already sense that there must be so much more to my relationship with the ‘best friends’ I mention so regularly? Would, given my suspicions about at least my dad’s kinky inclinations, they be at all surprised to know about my interests in spanking?
I rather suspect not. But much as I’d like to ‘come clean’, there’s still a reluctance to be fully open. Poly equals there must be something wrong with their once-divorced son’s second marriage; spanko equals abusive towards women – neither being in the least part true, but I can well imagine them speculating and worrying.
Much as I’d like to be open and honest, if one assesses these things on a ‘need to know’ basis, do they really, given the risks that’d they could end up shocked and stressed? I’m curious to know whether have others crossed this particular bridge – especially if they’ve done so not as a youngster but after years of keeping their true self hidden.
I think I’ve got more and more relaxed over the last couple of years, I’m not totally open with my family about my kinky activities but they must have a very good idea and if I was ever asked straight out I wouldn’t lie…
My online/social networking presence is not huge but I don’t use a false name and the few pictures of me out there show my face, so i’m not hiding anything. I know my brother found my twitter account and discretly decided “not” to follow me, we had a brief chat about this and he didn’t asked many questions and I didn’t volunteer much information other than to let him know that my friends on twitter are real and highly valued friends and we enjoy similar past-times. We left it at that, with him happy to leave it at the “whatever floats your boat” point of view.
I’m sure my mother and my children have a pretty good idea of my interests (actually they’d have to be blind and stupid not to) but we’ve never discussed it… so while I’ve not “crossed” the bridge in telling family about my kink I am definitely standing on the middle of the bridge having a lovely game of “pooh sticks”
well, apart from my husband… no, none in my family knows.
Actually just telling DH was a bit of a “coming out of the closet” – I married vanilla.
He doesn’t understand, but is willing to play along – he likes to see me get all ….uuhhmmm, you know… hot…. but… he doesn’t get it. And how can I explain something I don’t understand? I was born like this. It’s not something that happened along the way, it’s just built inthere. Maybe some wires in my brain is crossed so that pain and pleasure gets all mixed up?
We love each other, and was married for 8 year before I told him. This kink of mine is an extra “spice” we sometimes add.
Reading this blog and others are helping me understand myself a little bit better too. “Subspace” was a bit of a revelation. It has a name! wow…
ups sorry am rambling. will shut up now
I’ve told my dad, and I think he’s told my mom, as she uncharacteristically asked no questions about these friends I was visiting in England…
I don’t think Dad’s reaction is very different than my those of my vanilla friends, though he definitely asked for fewer details! If he did disapprove or worry, he probably wouldn’t tell me, though. I just emphasized that I was careful, I’d met lots of nice people, and I was having fun. I emphasized the careful part especially to my dad, but a couple of vanilla friends have mentioned that issue recently, two whole years after I told them. I hope they were reassured by a quick tutorial on scene safety practices!
Thank you all for sharing so openly. Really interesting to read others’ experiences. Helpful – still wrestling with the issue personally. though…