(STEREOTYPES) Proof I Was Born Gay… !

By: Tommy Duchemin


One of the biggest debates about gay men and women is whether we are born gay, or our environment influences us to be gay.

For me, and I’m assuming many other gay men, there’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that I came out of the womb destined to end up where I’m at today.


The biggest piece of evidence I have is simple…when I was younger I had no gay people around me. There were no gay TV shows. No out actors or singers in my age group. Gay wasn’t even something spoke of in our home.

The first time I heard the word was actually in elementary school when someone referred to me being gay on the playground. I laughed it off, but in my head I really had no idea what that word meant, nor did I want to know, or want to even ask someone what it meant.

That day on the playground wasn’t an isolated incident. I recall throughout school in different forms I was called gay. Some people would ask me if I was gay, some would refer to me as gay and some would just try to use it as a way to try and hurt me.

It wasn’t until my freshman year that I found out what the word meant. Men liking men? That definitely wasn’t me. I always had crushes on girls, had special connections with them, and I even had a poster of Cindy Crawford on my wall – are you kidding me! Gay? Not me.

My senior year was life changing for me. I had always been a momma’s boy and during my younger years I consider myself a “late bloomer” as I was naïve to many things (especially around sex)when I was younger. But I matured all of a sudden…I understood things that I didn’t before.

I started realizing that the connections I had with girls when I was younger wasn’t attraction or sexual…it was familiarity and acceptance. I could act the way I wanted (not the most macho kid on the block) without judgment from them. For lack of a better phrase I was “one of the girls”. I did realize I was attracted to men. And even looked back and saw how unknowingly I had crushes on cute guys through my pre-teen years.
By my senior year I knew I was gay, and looking back I was gay ever since that day some kid yelled it to me on the playground. There was something about me as a young kid that said I was gay, not having any idea what that meant, not knowing anyone who was gay, and definitely not being influenced by friends or family. People knew I was gay before I did.

If your environment or the people around you influence whether or not you are gay or straight, then I would not be sitting here writing you on gayguys.com. I would be at a bar drinking a Heineken (a beer) and reading playboy…for the articles of course. But I’m not. And nothing will ever change that because its who I am.
Being gay isn’t a lifestyle choice. It’s who we are. We’re born gay. I’m gay as I sit here writing you today, I was gay when that kid said it on the playground, and I was gay the day I was born and my mom said she would love me forever no matter what life had in store for me (she’s kept that promise).