I tried coming out at 18. It didn't go so well. I told my best friend... who then never spoke to me again. It was embarrassing, we were doing the same training scheme and would bump into each other. He completely ignored me.
I was glad when that year was over, I went off to university and never saw him again. I do wonder about him sometimes, and did a little digging. He appears to have completely vanished.
After that, in my first year at uni I had an awful experience and nailed the closet door shut until I was 26.
I had a seizure that was... misunderstood by the people I was with and my own escape was to clam up completely about it for some years.
I did eventually talk to a therapist who gave me a good explanation, it just took some time.
Easy. I waited until 1994 when I moved away to go to college. I hid it from everyone in my small town, even though I knew what I liked by the time I was about 11 years old. I decided to wait until I could far away from that place. I told my mom over the phone and she said, "Yeah, I knew that already." Super easy. So was I in college. When I moved away to go to college, I stayed away most of the time. I found work to support myself to avoid coming home for the summer every year until I graduated. After graduation, I worked to stay away. I came back home for holidays only. My older brothers were a real problem for me, plus the people in the town I was afraid of. One of my brothers confronted me, yelling at me at Christmas in 1995. He attacked me and I kicked his sorry ass. After that, no issues. I found back then that it was very helpful to your own cause coming out if you could fend for yourself, depend on yourself, and keep the homophobes at a distance.