Bit of a small one here, but one that still looms over me today.
It was mostly that I had to do certain things or have certain traits. You see it in movies all the time, gay men are social butterflies that have perfectly styled hair, wear only the latest fashions, know Madonna's discography and jump at any opportunity for sex with a man I could get.
None of it felt right for me, sure I like guys...but did that really have to dictate other things for me? What does me paying more attention to the football players than the cheerleaders have to do with liking certain music or dressing a certain way? It just didn't add up to me, the lines didn't connect at all.
After I met a group of gay men I thought were friends, my fears were confirmed. They really didn't like the fact I didn't watch Real Housewives (it gives me a headache tbh), I was a heretic for not listening to Britney Spears, a pox on my house for waiting for the right guy to have sex for the first time! (I wish I could tell you I was being dramatic, but they invited me out to hang out one time, just to ditch me because I wasn't up to their standards).
It stung...like, it actually really hurt that a group of people were so cruel to me because I didn't like everything the liked. It was all very ironic to me, because I always knew growing up that LGBT+ people dealt with a lot of rejection, in one form or another, and to turn around and do that to someone else in the same position as you just seemed doubly awful. It made me kind of feel that, not being that way or adhering to certain traits just meant that I wasn't cut out for this whole thing.
Luckily this story has a happy ending though. My family is incredibly supportive of me, I have some great friends who don't expect me to be their "gay best friend" and be an expert interior decorator or what have you, and I'm open and happy with being a prudish, disorganized, frazzled person. Sure, I know not all gay men do this, not even the majority, but at least now I can live with the knowledge that if it were to happen again, I still have people who care about me.
Sorry if this was a little long winded and sappy, just thought I'd put it out there :P