Why I never Felt Gay Enough — And What I Did About It

You can come out as gay and still feel like you don’t belong in the gay community. I know because I lived openly as a gay man for about 15 years—and still never felt fully at home in the most visible gay spaces available to me. According to the anonymous Middle Men Survey, I’m far from alone. Only 1 out of 24 gay and queer respondents said he felt very at home in the mainstream gay community. More than 45% said they didn’t really feel like they fit within the mainstream gay scene. Coming out of the closet and finding a home are not always the same thing. In this episode, I explore why coming out didn’t automatically give me a true sense of belonging; what the Middle Men Survey reveals about gay loneliness, isolation, and mental health; and why some men still feel like outsiders in the communities they were told would become their home. I also share the deeply personal reason I created Middle Men, the research behind “intraminority gay community stress,” and what I did after years of moving between straight and gay worlds without feeling like my whole self belonged in either one. This is not an attack on gay men, gay culture, or LGBTQ communities. Those communities gave me freedom, friendship, and meaningful experiences during important chapters of my life. They simply don’t feel like home to everyone at all times. Middle Men is an additional room for gay, bi, questioning, closeted, fluid, and unlabeled men who want community built around more than sexuality—with no pressure to perform an identity, adopt a label, or change unrelated parts of themselves to fit in. **TAKE THE ANONYMOUS MIDDLE MEN SURVEY** https://www.middlemen-podcast.com/survey **EPISODE CHAPTERS** 00:00 Intro — Coming Out, But Not Coming Home 01:33 Why I Never Felt Fully at Home 03:23 What the Middle Men Survey Revealed 05:15 Why This Is Deeply Personal 07:20 The Emotional Cost of Not Belonging 08:17 Intraminority Gay Community Stress 09:30 What I Did About It 11:20 Building Another Room 12:19 Take the Anonymous Survey **JOIN THE MIDDLE MEN COMMUNITY** A private space for gay, bi, questioning, closeted, fluid, and unlabeled men to connect without pressure to fit a predetermined identity: https://www.middlemen-podcast.com/community **READ THE FULL ARTICLE** “Gay, but Not Gay Enough?” — the article that inspired this episode: https://www.middlemenwcfc.substack.com **GET THE NEWSLETTER** Articles, resources, survey findings, and content from the middle: https://www.middlemen-podcast.com/#newsletter **FOLLOW MIDDLE MEN** Instagram TikTok X Facebook **SUPPORT MIDDLE MEN** All of Middle Men is built and run by Brendan himself. Help support the podcast, online community, and future Middle Men resources: https://www.middlemen-podcast.com/donate **JOIN THE STRAVA CLUB** https://www.strava.com/clubs/middlemen **IF YOU’RE STRUGGLING** This episode includes a discussion of suicide. Middle Men is a peer community, not a substitute for therapy, crisis counseling, emergency care, or other professional mental-health services. In the United States, call or text 988, or visit: https://988lifeline.org **ABOUT THE SURVEY DATA** The Middle Men Survey is anonymous and self-selected. It is not a nationally representative sample, and its results should not be generalized to all gay men or all men. \- Gay/queer section: 24 respondents \- Reasons-for-disconnection question: 22 respondents \- Broader Middle Men questions: 85–89 respondents **RESEARCH SOURCE** Pachankis JE, Clark KA, Burton CL, Hughto JMW, Bränström R, Keene DE. “Sex, Status, Competition, and Exclusion: Intraminority Stress From Within the Gay Community and Gay and Bisexual Men’s Mental Health.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspp0000282 If you saw yourself in this episode, follow Middle Men so you don’t miss what’s coming next. And if you know someone who could benefit from hearing it, please share this episode with him. He may need it more than you realize.