How Gay Men Learn to Hide—Even After Coming Out

Subtle messages teach gay men to stay small, but healing helps us to expand.

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KEY POINTS

• Many gay men grow up learning that acceptance comes with staying quiet about who they are.

• Conditional acceptance can lead to self-monitoring, code-switching, and shrinking in relationships.

• Integration begins with small choices to stop editing and start being.

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Some messages are loud and explicit. Others are quiet and subtle enough to slip in under our radar. One message that is particularly pervasive that many gay men get is: It’s OK to be gay…just don’t flaunt it.

For many of us, this message shows up after we come out. It might not be something we’re explicitly told, but we see it in the split-second facial expressions when our voice lifts, the reactions when we gesture too freely, or the subtle shift in energy when we speak with too much enthusiasm or flair.

So many gay men are taught to read these micro-reactions like survival skills—quiet corrections that signal we’ve crossed an invisible line. It’s a kind of conditional acceptance—“You can be who you are, just as long as you don't make me uncomfortable.”

I didn’t realize how much I had internalized this message until I began noticing how often I code-switched depending on who I was around. I live in Los Angeles, but whenever I would visit my family in Arizona, I noticed my voice would drop and my mannerisms would shift. Especially around straight men or in unfamiliar environments, I’d instinctively adjust myself—without even realizing it.

It was like my nervous system had learned that being “too” openly gay wasn’t safe, even if no one had explicitly said something.

I remember once getting a manicure, and near the end, I casually asked the nail technician about polish colors. We’d been chatting warmly, getting to know one another, and she had even mentioned that her son and I shared the same name.

After I asked about nail polish, she laughed and said, “Oh, you don’t want nail polish! People will think you’re gay!”

I just smiled and didn’t say anything—not because I agreed, but because it felt easier in the moment, and I didn’t want to disappoint her heteronormative assumption.

I was also put in a position where I had to decide whether or not I wanted to come out to a stranger at a nail salon. That can take a lot of energy—and honestly, sometimes I just don’t have the bandwidth.

Experiences like these aren’t isolated moments. They’re part of a larger pattern—the subtle, persistent message that shapes how many gay men learn to move through the world.

That’s what this message does. It teaches us to self-monitor. To scan the room. To anticipate rejection before it arrives. And it tells us, time and again, to stay small—not for our safety anymore, but for other people’s comfort.

Even after coming out, many gay men carry this internalized message: It’s OK to be gay, just not that gay—don’t hold hands in public. Don’t talk too much about your relationship. Don’t use that voice, wear that outfit, post that picture, or take up too much space.

This kind of self-policing isn’t about shame in the way we might have experienced it as closeted kids. It’s more insidious. It sounds like “tone it down,” but what it really means is “don’t be too visible.” And the moment we buy into it, we begin editing ourselves in ways we may not even realize.

I’ve heard it from clients, too—gay men who are out and openly gay but still feel like they have to manage how much of themselves they reveal. One client recently told me, “I’m out at work, but I don’t talk about my partner. Not because it’s a secret, but because...I don’t know, I just don’t want to make it a thing.”

But why shouldn’t it be “a thing”? Straight people talk about their partners all the time. They wear wedding rings, post anniversary pictures, and share weekend stories with ease. Yet many gay men, even in seemingly accepting environments, second-guess how much is “too much.”

We internalize these messages not because we’re weak, but because we’re adaptive. We’ve learned to scan spaces for danger, to minimize risk, and to keep ourselves emotionally safe.

But the coping strategies that helped us survive aren’t the same ones that help us thrive.

We don’t need to apologize for how we love, speak, dress, or show up. And we definitely don’t need to shrink ourselves just to make someone else comfortable.

Healing from this message takes conscious awareness and practice. It means noticing when we’re editing ourselves and asking why. It means remembering that discomfort isn’t danger and that our visibility isn’t a threat, but a gift.

For me, healing started with small actions: letting my niece paint my nails despite some family member’s disapproval, not caring if my voice rose a little when I got excited, and letting myself take up space in conversations, relationships, and rooms.

Each choice was a way of helping myself unlearn the message: “Don’t flaunt it.”

Because identity and self-expression aren’t “flaunting”—they’re just being. Human being.

Featured on: Psychology Today