Quote Originally Posted by Y View Post
What, specifically, is bothering you about him now that you know he's gay? Are you avoiding him, now finding yourself too weirded out by his orientation to interact with him? I'm going to guess it has something to do, as you implied, with the fact that he is a male homosexual. Rest assured he does not secretly have a crush on you and isn't going to molest you after a night of drinks. Talk with him about the subject and remind yourself that while it's been a struggle for you to come to grips with his identity (and there's nothing wrong with that) it's way worse on him.
Quote Originally Posted by dragonrage View Post
There is nothing wrong with you, he's a guy and a friend that you have know from quite sometime I am guessing. In someways you shared a lot of common ground, but now you're beginning to question that since he is gay and you're not. I'm inferring a lot of things here, but the best thing is to talk it out with him like Y said. Depends on where you live and your family as well it can be extremely hard for him to come out, if you're his friend and want to continue being his friend, talk it out.
Thanks a lot, guys.

I found that the hardest thing about accepting someone coming out is that the image you had ingrained into your mind of them got shaken. An example of this effect (but not as extreme) would be similar to your long-time friend telling you one day that he's a necrophiliac. I've seen many works and been to workshops about accepting LGBT individuals, but I've never really dealt with a friend coming out before.

I think it has a lot to do with first impressions. When I meet someone, I'll learn their names and create an character class of them. If I interact with them quite a lot, I can easily adjust to any changes as I go along when I learn anything new about them. It's just the revelation that had a lot of impact.

I can see myself in an alternative situation where if an individual I recently met told me that he was homosexual, I'd just add to his data that he's homosexual. It wouldn't have had any impact at all and I wouldn't speak anything of it.

Sexual tension came to my mind at first, as Bill said, but I'm just adjusting to a more social setting in college. There wasn't a need to talk to him because I slowly learned to accept him for who he is.