Meeting the MoHo's

First off, can we please come up with a better word for MoHo. I can't help by laugh when I see/write/say that word. Oh well. I guess I came out a little too late to have any influence on the lingo that exists in the gay Mormon world.

Anyway, the past week has been absolutely nuts. As I was coming to terms with my future and considering the various paths my life could take, something unexpected happened. A local MoHo (Max Power) contacted me and invited me to dinner with him and a couple of other MoHo's. I couldn't believe it. I was barely starting to open up about my sexuality and then just like that I was invited to meet other MoHo's. I was mostly excited to meet them, but a little nervous that I would fall in love with one of them and never be able to contain my emotions. I also felt a little uncomfortable opening up to 3 stranger about this since I had only come out to my mom before then. But for the most part I was stoked to meet other Latter-day Saints who are trying to live their lives within the bounds of the gospel, while being open about their feelings and struggles. We agreed to meet for dinner on Wednesday.

Meeting these three guys was absolutely nuts. All of us had very different experiences to share, but what really struck me was how normal these guys were. I was expecting to meet 3 super weird dudes, but they were all cool, relatively normal people. And I would have never really pegged any of them as being homosexual (although I apparently show up as a large blip on the gaydar). I sat and listened to their experiences and felt so relieved to finally be able to relate with somebody about one of the biggest issues in my life. I also solicited advice from the more "experienced" Moho's about coming out and the best way to let people know. I felt a strong connection with each of them for different reasons. At the end of dinner, my head was still spinning from the whole experience.

As we left dinner I could not stop thinking about what had happened. Literally just a couple weeks before, I felt like I was on verge of a breakdown. At that point in my life, every option except for activity in the church seemed like the best one for me. When I left the restaurant on Wednesday though, I left with a renewed sense of desire to remain active in the Church.

I slept better that night than I have in weeks. I have felt an amazing sense of peace since meeting them. I have exchanged emails with all of them since that night and am feeling a lot better about life. I'm not quite sure what God' plan is for me, but I am more dedicated to finding it in my life. I mentioned at dinner that I had never talked to a priesthood leader about my same-sex attraction, and one of the other MoHo's encouraged me to do so. and so today I did. I was still nervous about talking about it with my bishop, but am so glad I decided to talk to him. My bishop is the nicest guy on Earth and was very understanding. He talked about my options in life and was very understanding that this trial will probably never go away and that it would be near impossible to live out my life without sin, so I should not set that as an expectation. That was about the last thing I expected to hear a bishop say. Anyway, overall it was a good experience for me, and will hopefully help me to continue strong.

Tomorrow should be interesting. One of the last girls that I tried unsuccessfully to date, talked to me at church today and said the could tell that something has been bothering me for a while, and that she wanted to talk. So I told her we would go somewhere after FHE tomorrow and talk. Can't wait. She'll be the first non-MoHo friend I tell. Oh, and I really am looking for a good opportunity soon to let the room mates know. I feel like they might have an idea, but I guess we'll have to see.