For The Record

Nina Yau really got me thinking about this. She wrote this at the beginning of 2011 and more in her letter.ly, The Heart of What Matters. The whole idea has been mulling around in my head for over six months now and I've decided to share. Here's my version.

The other day, less than a month before my wedding, I changed the "Interested In" section of my info on Facebook. Previously I had just left it blank, but, the other day, I checked the "women" box in addition to the "men." Nobody commented; I wonder if anyone noticed. The change is on my wall, but I wonder if it ended up in anyone's feeds. I wrote this to post as a note on Facebook, but decided to just link a blog post instead.

I thought I would explain the change, as I know it comes at a funny time, with my wedding coming up so soon. I've been bisexual ever since I can remember, and I never really thought it was a big deal, or the business of the general public. While I'm more apt to prefer men (obviously), I've only recently realized the internal struggle I've been having with the other half of the picture.

It makes more sense to me now that I didn't really have any close female friends growing up; it's because I didn't tell anyone that I was bisexual. I knew that nobody really knew it about me, least of all my girl friends. Regardless of whether or not I was actually attracted to them, I was always kind of worried that they would find out and end our friendship.  I've only fully realized this today: As a result of hiding such inappropriate thoughts, early on I took to trying to mold myself into the person I imagined others would like me to be, rather than just be the me that I am.

You may have noticed that I've been interested in self-improvement and optimizing happiness in my life and the people around me. I've come to the conclusion that at least one path to true happiness is being honest with yourself and others.

I, purposely or maybe by lucky chance, feel like I'm right in the middle of an epic turning point in my life - getting married; losing my job a few months ago and really questioning what is best for me do with the time I've been alloted here; striving for the past year to find a small place for our family to live to experiment with minimalism; the baby becoming more of his own person and less reliant upon me for basic survival, allowing a little bit of "me" time; getting to know more supportive, positive people; among even more amazing and awesome things. Finally with Nebberz I feel safe that things are going to be okay. :D

Even though I don't really feel like it's anybody's business and even though I think it's kind of silly to "come out" as bisexual, especially while I'm in a committed-forever heterosexual monogamous relationship - I feel like it's my only option if I really want to be authentic and able to realize my full potential as a human being, instead of keeping secrets and hiding parts of myself just because I'm scared of not being accepted.

While I'm at it, I may as well mention I beleive I may also be polyamorous. I suppose I can't say for sure without ever having much resembling a polyamorous relationship, and it may be a moot point given the aforementioned committed-forever heterosexual monogamous relationship, but maybe just by supporting the idea and being honest and open about the way I think and feel, I can help others who are interested in exploring that type of life. I'm willing to bet that I'm not the only one who has felt like the ability to love more than one person at a time is more of a curse than a blessing! It can be a really frustrating and horrible feeling, and if just being honest has even a slight possibility to help someone else and, as far as I know, it won't hurt anyone, I think it's definitely worth it. :)

Obviously Nebberz has known about all of this for years already, and it's only with his good word that I am posting this. Although we aren't really taking the whole "marriage" thing terribly seriously, having already considered ourselves married for a long time now, I'm still really excited about making it official that I am (we both are!) "all in" and fully confident in the success and strength of our "committed-forever heterosexual monogamous relationship." ;P

If I've offended anyone, I apologize. Likely more than a quarter of the way through my life, regretfully I'm finally coming to terms with the fact that I can't make everyone happy all the time. Even though I still try sometimes, I'm learning that it's not my place to "make" people happy; I've got a hunch that happiness is merely a conscious decision that a person can only make for themselves, so it's impossible to "make" people happy anyway. I can, however, do my best to be respectful and help others as much as I am able, and that's really important, both in an overall humanitarian point of view and on a person-to-person basis, I think.

Any questions are welcome. :)

me