Coming Out - A Very Butchy Timeline

Today is National Coming Out Day.  Having a national coming out “day” is a little misleading.  Coming out is a process, and never occurs in a single day.  If you’re gay, you have to make decisions about whether you should “come out” every time you meet a new person, start working at a new job, or drive through Tennessee.

Being that I’m butch, I usually don’t have to tell people that I’m gay.  People take one look at my comfortable shoes and sensible men’s haircut, and they just sort of know.  But, I haven’t always been the masculine woman everyone knows and loves today.  So, in honor of coming out day, I’m sharing some of the highlights of my personal coming out timeline.

1978 – 1987:  The Why Do I Have To Wear Dresses Years

Me, first grade

 I can’t say that I knew was gay this early in the game, but I definitely knew that I wasn’t a typical little girl.  I liked playing with the boys and fighting with the boys.  I wanted Legos and toy cars, and had no interest playing dolls with other little girls. 

I remember pretending to shave my face as a kid.  And I remember crying myself to sleep in my sister’s lap when my dad shaved off his beard. 

It’s pretty safe to say that I wanted to be a boy during this time frame.  Since I grew up in a snake-handling Pentecostal home, I wasn’t allowed to cut my hair, and I had to wear disgusting froufrou dresses to church and on picture day at school.  My mother would curl my 4 feet of hair in giant pink foam rollers the night before church.  I remember Sunday services lasting for hours, and eventually getting restless enough that my mother would let me go outside with my dad and all the other sinner-men.  I’d hop on the tailgate of a truck with my dad, and he’d give me a little pocket knife and a cedar stick for whittling.  Sometimes, he’d even give me a little jaw-full of Levi Garrett.  So, there I’d sit:  curled hair, froufrou dress, bobby socks, and maryjanes, with a lap full of cedar shavings, spitting tobacco juice in the gravel.  Those were probably the moments I felt most like myself as a child – surrounded by men doing men things.

1987 – 1990:  My Born Again Years

Me, circa 1989, saved and unhappy

Like I said, I grew up with very religious snake-handling Pentecostals.  There were lots of traumatic things happening, and I felt like I was a little sinner bound for Hell.  Out of that fear, I “repented” and was “saved” and baptized in a creek when I was in 3^rd grade.  I remember my sister pinning my skirt together between my legs so it didn’t end up over my head when the preacher dunked me in the creek.

Despite my age, these were some of the darkest years of my life.

 

1990 – 1996:  My Coming Out Years

Me, 1995, before I cut my hair

By this point, I definitely knew I liked girls.  I started having lots of crushes on female teachers by the time I was in 6^th grade.  During my freshmen year in high school, I had serious crushes on female friends, and ended up telling my older brother I thought I was a lesbian.  By the end of my junior year in high school, I had come out to a few friends and a teacher or two.

By my senior year, I was about as out as a gay girl in eastern KY can be.  I was living with my older brother and his wife, who didn’t care if I was gay.  I started absorbing all the gay information my little sheltered brain could hold.  I subscribed to The Advocate and Deneuve (which then became Curve).  I watched my first lesbian movie (Go Fish).   I remember giving a presentation on gay/lesbian issues in my high school sociology class in front of my high school principal.  This was also the year when I finally said good-bye to my oppressive 4 feet of hair.

1996 – 2002:  The Heterosexual/Becoming Butch Years

At exactly the same time I was coming out hard and fast to the world, I met Jason.  It was our senior year of high school.  We were both smart, had lots of classes together, and were both a little socially awkward with dark senses of humor.  We hit it off pretty quickly.  Jason was one of the many people I came out to that year.

Then something weird happened just before graduation.  Jason and I were chatting, and he asked me what my “type” was.  I thought for a second, and said, “You know.  Somebody like you.  But without a penis.”  As a result, we gave the whole sex thing a try, and because it worked out well, we started dating.  He followed me to college, and we continued dating.  We ended up getting married during the summer between freshmen and sophomore year at college.

This, by far, was the most bizarre coming out phase of my life.  It was sort of a weird “going in”.  I had to try to explain my relationship with Jason to all the friends and folks I had previously come out to.  They’d invariably say, “But I thought you were gay?”  And the truth is, I still felt gay.  Despite being married to a man and having never had sex with a woman, I still felt like a lesbian.  Jason was just sort of a beautiful little anomaly in my life.    

During our relationship, Jason really helped me embrace my masculinity.  Since I was young, I never felt like a girl.  Jason allowed me to express my inner boy.  He didn’t mind that I wore men’s clothes and baseball caps.  He helped talk me through the anxiety of buying my first men’s wristwatch and first men’s wallet. 

Me, 2002, butch and married

Beginning to express outward masculinity had interesting consequences.  I started getting called “sir” frequently in public.  Kind strangers would tell me I was going into the wrong restroom when entering women’s bathrooms in public.  Jason and I would walk through campus holding hands, and rednecks would yell “faggots!” at us, thinking we were two guys.  We once had two girls hit on us, until they eventually asked our names, and then backed away in silent shock after I said my name was Tami.  I also had to deal with all the folks who would ask if Jason and I were married just for the financial aid.  

Everyone just assumed I was gay, which put me in a position of having to “come out” about my marriage and about actually being in love with the guy to whom I was wed.

 

2002 – present:  The Not Worrying About What Other People Think Years

After a few years of marriage, I realized I needed to test the lesbian waters.  I dabbled in polyamory and semi-open relationships, always talking about things and being honest in my relationships.  Eventually, Jason and I realized we’d always be family, but we couldn’t stay married. 

After a couple of lesbian relationships that didn’t pan out, I met Kate (who has a pretty interesting coming out story herself).  We’ve been together for 6 years now.  And I’ve never been happier.

Through all of this coming out in different ways about different things at different times, I’ve come to accept that life, love, sex, sexuality, gender, and relationships are fluid and complicated for me.  I’ve come to learn that I’m a lesbian who can have sex with a man and enjoy it.  I’ve learned that I can be a masculine woman who can love both power tools and Tupperware.  

Ultimately, though, as clichéd as it might sound, I’ve learned that accepting and appreciating myself makes it a whole lot easier for other folks to accept me too. 

Me, 2011, full blown gay