Just as relevant at any age...

I had a weekly column in the gay paper "insideout" when I lived in Nashville. Actually you can google my name, Terry Lee Derrick and pull up the article on my theory about PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) with gay men. I was wondering when I started this blog if the issues I talk about are relevant to young gay men. I know the issues are relevant with my age group give or take fifteen years.
    So the other night I was at a bar in Dallas called The Grapevine. Grapevine is an interesting bar in that it is very eclectic and a completely mixed clientele of gay and straight and I presume all inbetween. There you will find educated, creative and interesting people hanging out, getting their party on and just exchanging ideas.
    I was by myself so I sat down away from the small crowd there that night to observe and figure out what I wanted to do there. I spotted two attractive young guys that I figured were gay and having a conversation. One was blond the other brunette. As it turned out their difference in coloring turned out to be a metaphor for the difference in their experience which was just as day and night.
   I went over to their table and interrupted by saying "Hey guys how's it going? I just wanted to come over and find out what you guys are talking about tonight." They were intrigued so I told them I'm a writer and would love to just find out a little about how they are experiencing their lives. They were very open and nice about it so we proceeded to talk.
    The main thing I wanted to know was how they, at their age which was about twenty two or so, experienced coming out, being gay and having relationships. What I found out was amazing and so informative.
    The blond said he came out early in junior high, dated openly and felt he was pretty well adjusted. The brunette said he waited until becoming an adult to come out and felt he would have had a lot fewer issues if he could have only come out early like his friend. So here were two young men with completely different experiences and the "late bloomer" wound up having much more in common with me, who is old enough to be his dad than he did with his contemporary.
    I talked with them about how gay men more often that not, especially in the past, don't have the opportunities to grow and mature emotionally in childhood and adolescence that most heterosexual people take for granted. The average straight boy or girl is not impeded from dating, getting their little hearts broken and just generally growing up as it were. Gay kids more often than not do not get to have such a free and easy leeway to that experience and it leaves them with tons of issues.