How to Survive (and W) a Gay Breakup | GQ

Contents:

• HOW TO COPE WHEN YOU'RE GAY AND LONELY
• HOW TO SURVIVE (AND W) A GAY BREAKUP
• 30 FAMO GAY COUPL YOU PROBABLY FOT DATED IN THE FIRST PLACE
• 17 GAY SEX SNDALS THAT ROCKED AMERIN POLICS
• GAY RELATNSHIP BREAKUP CAN BE PROBLEMATIC. HERE’S HOW TO AVOID THE RISKS

HOW TO COPE WHEN YOU'RE GAY AND LONELY

Part of realizg you're gay, or bi, or trans, or non-bary, or anythg other than cisgenr and heterosexual is acceptg you’re different—and somewhat separated—om the majory.

Here he shar his journey to overe the sense of isolatn he felt growg up gay a small U. At the time, there were no real gay role mols except for Graham Norton and Jack om Dawson's Creek—and I certaly didn't intify wh him bee I wasn't a football player.

HOW TO SURVIVE (AND W) A GAY BREAKUP

I felt like I was pletely on my rried on until I was 16, when I started gog out to gay bars my hometown. I ma one gay iend, who I'm actually close to now.

30 FAMO GAY COUPL YOU PROBABLY FOT DATED IN THE FIRST PLACE

For the first time I've been able to form a good group of gay iends and create my own support work. I'd go on gay chatrooms but that was jt a facels nversatn wh someone who uld have been anyone. I thk if I'd had iends who were gay when I was growg up, my life would have been so different.

17 GAY SEX SNDALS THAT ROCKED AMERIN POLICS

I now know there were other kids at my school who were gay, but they didn't e out till much later. Us gays, wh our propensy for the dramatic, might wish that when a relatnship ends we'd bee Dty's Child and emerge om the tear-staed sea, cked mo, reborn strong and pennt "Survivor"-style, but realistilly you're gog to be a plete fuckg begs are predictable creatur. As the only out young gay kid at my school, I took the advancement of my sexual experienc to my own hands and I did what we all do: I bought a fake ID and h the gay clubs.

While I knew wouldn’t be like a gay llege eroti I’d read on (gay non, really), I rather naively wasn’t expectg the fall out. I realize I fell to that old gay adage of placg my feelgs on a person who, for whatever reason, was never gog to vt them back me. Worst of all, though, the shame attached to the memori of those first tim marred how I would approach sex for years.It was listeng to Years & Years’ new song “Sanctify,” and seeg the band’s out gay sger Olly Alexanr talk about how the song was spired his sexual trysts wh straight men, that I realized that the feelgs are way more mon than people let on.

Sure, I know all about gay guys havg sex wh straight guys, but felt reassurg to see him scribe the “sat and sner role” he embodied durg those experienc, and to hear the uncertaty and melancholy weaved to the song.More than anythg though, was the repeated lyril mantra of “I won’t be ashamed.” Bee as queer people, we’re buried lifetime’s worth of shame so vivid and searg that oftentim ’s cripplg. Wh theater doors bolted shut for the next…foreeable future, we’re thrilled to see some Broadway talent pop up the pilot episo of Boy•Friends, a new edy based off the My Gay Boyiend web-seri. The show centers around two llege roommat, one gay and one straight, and their “journey through llege and to adulthood to bee the homo-hetero power uple of the ag.

GAY RELATNSHIP BREAKUP CAN BE PROBLEMATIC. HERE’S HOW TO AVOID THE RISKS

My boyiend jt told me he is gay and broke up wh me. Instead- he tells me he is gay and n only see himself wh a man the future. C., and the forc of homophobia only amplify the nsequence when gay enunters make headl.