I knew from my early teens that the way I was attracted to women was different from the way my friends were attracted to women. With them it was an adolescent crush, but my feelings were more than that and I struggled to suppress them. An all-girls school can be a cruel place. I dated men (boys) because it was expected of me to do so, many of them I enjoyed as good company and we had some great times - but attracted to them? No. Envisioning the rest of my life spent with any of them? No.

I had my first fully-fledged, sexual relationship with a woman when I was 16. She was 28, married, with three young children. Our relationship lasted for nearly four years, through my last two years of school and first two years of college. During that time I hid the relationship from everyone, fighting conflicting emotions. On the one hand, what I was doing felt totally natural and right - I knew that what I was feeling was what my friends were feeling with their boyfriends. On the other hand, I knew that family and friends would perceive it as unnatural. Inevitably it ended messily, given the circumstances of my partner's situation and my own youth and inexperience.

So, I pretended to be straight for a while, ever hopeful that some man would come along who would light the same fire. Of course it didn't work. By this time I'd moved away from home and was living independently. I interspersed male and female partners - the men were for show, but I had deep and loving attachments with the women.

What of the "coming out", you ask? Well, quite early on I had come out to a couple of friends at work who supported me when a relationship broke down. In another job, whilst in the midst of a long-standing (ten year) relationship with a woman, I was lucky enough to be working for a head of department who was openly gay. I happily came out to him and, even more happily, found that no-one else in the organisation cared less. From there, with the confidence gained from these two experiences, I felt more comfortable with letting other people in my life know about my preference. I came to realise that if some people knew, then everyone needed to know - otherwise I'd have to remember to keep some people away from others on the basis of what they knew about me. I neither like nor need these complications in my life.

Meanwhile my parents, a couple of hundred miles away, were, as far as I knew, oblivious. That is, until my then partner and I went to visit them. I cornered my mother in the kitchen, took a deep breath, and said something like: "you know Jo and I are lovers, don't you?" She sighed indulgently and replied, "yes, of course I do", as if I'd just told her what day of the week it was. This was back in 1993 and I was the grand old age of 43.

I'd always assumed that because my mother knew of my sexuality, my father did too. She died three years ago and it's only since then that I've realised he has no idea. At the grand old age of 53 I'm still having problems with the thought of coming out to him.