Ok I know a lot of you have done this in the past and Im wondering what worked best for you all. Im not sure if I'm going to transition but i think i might idk, this is a different discussion for a different post. I was just wondering what worked best for you guys. Ive heard letters are effective, emails, or just talking to the person face to face. Really curious to hear your experiences and how things worked out.

It often depends on who you are coming out to, and how that relationship is going.

Quote from: LordKAT on July 20, 2014, 08:06:48 PM
It often depends on who you are coming out to, and how that relationship is going.

For me telling my wife was sort of an accidental rush, I don't suggest that method. For my parents it was much easier for me to tell them face to face but only becuase I knew they might not understand but they would be respectful of it. For my wife's family that we felt should know, it was an email or letter, due to the possiblity or fallout and judgement that I was not willing to go through face to face.

I posted elsewhere about this, but I'll add something.

I decided to tell people face to face, and privately, with a handful of exceptions -- those who lived too far away (including a very close female friend) and then two organizations with which I was and still am involved. For the most part, those you tell privately appreciate your confidence and that you wanted to share with them. I took the approach: "I wanted you to know this is what's going on." I think my feeling was that if I showed them my respect and that I valued them, they'd reciprocate. This tended to be true. It also tended to mean I had people in my corner.

I also found that better your existing relationship was, the less the news made any difference. In some cases, the fact that I took someone into my confidences created a stronger bond. On the other had, one friend of 15 years or so was upset I hadn't told her at the start, and this affected our subsequent relationship. She felt betrayed.

There were a lot of acquaintances I didn't tell, but then it wasn't a great secret.  I decided to transition in place, so to speak, as I had roots in my community, I was close to neighbours, and this was the best place for me professionally. It ended up working out fine, though the fact of my past has affected my dating, but not my social life. It was interesting to watch how others interacted with each other about the fact of me. It wasn't so much about me as of them almost policing each other about pronouns and being inclusive. Oddly, there was an element of "it's in to have this happening in our group." In turn, it put pressure on others to accept me. 

I suppose it comes down to who you feel you want to tell, who you feel you ought to tell, and who you have to tell. I think I tailored what I said those three ways. 

It's hard to start sharing the information, but it gets easier once you have almost a set of talking points you use. I rarely tell anyone now, unless it's someone I haven't seen in years who somehow reappears in my life.