ARTHUR Gourounlian has reflected on life growing up as a gay man, declaring: “I thought if people knew, I would be dead.”
The Dancing With The Stars judge teamed up with BootsIreland for an honest interview about his journey with sexuality in honour of Dublin Pride week.
Arthur took to Instagram today to share a clip of his interview with Boots Ireland ambassador Jessica Copeland.
The celebrity judge opened up about his early life experiences growing up gay.
The 44-year-old told: “It’s so weird to say this, but I became gay when I was 20-years-old.”
He continued to explain that growing up as an Armenian, he “never knew there was gay people out there”.
Arthur described a time when he was in a nightclub dancing in Antwerp at 19.
He turned to one of the dancers and asked “where are the girls?”, the dancer laughed and told Arthur that he was in a gay club.
The Armenian star added: “So I was literally discovering gay life through club life. I still hadn’t kissed a guy and I was still dating a girl and I hadn’t even realised I was gay.”
Arthur told how he would say to himself “no, I refuse to be gay, I’m not gay” and emphasised: “I thought if people knew, I’d be dead.”
The TVstar choked up as he added: “So that’s my story, that’s what people don’t know, I was only 20 in 2000 when I became gay.”
The now dad-of-two detailed how he had to tell his family and highlighted that his mother did not talk to him “for a year” after he came out.
An emotional Arthur said: “That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, not talking to my mom. She is my best friend. But after a year, my boyfriend at the time invited her to visit us.
“My mom immediately said, ‘I love you, I miss you’, but when she arrived, and I will never forget this, she said, ‘how are you going to have kids?
“She knew how much I wanted a family, but I just said, ‘lets just enjoy the now, I don’t know how but I will have kids one day.'”
The celebrity judge is now married to Big Brother star Brian Dowling and they have two kids together, Blake, one and Blu, who arrived just last week.
Surrogacy journey
The happy pair welcomed their children through surrogacy, with Brian’s sister Aoife acting as their surrogate for both children.
Jessica was quick to ask Arthur about his journey with surrogacy in Ireland and how he managed the experience.
He said: “It’s weird because I was against surrogacy at first, because coming from a refugee background I always wanted to adopt. I wanted to save other lives.
“But when we started calling companies and you say your age and you tell them you’re gay they put the phone down.”
‘Want to help’
The RTE star described how worried he was that himself and Brian would “struggle” to have an opportunity to have a child of their own.
However, he added: “One day, my sister-in-law she said, ‘I want to help you guys.'”
Arthur finished off his interview by telling those who are part of the LGBTQ+ community that “they can and will have kids one day”.