So What Was the Point of Coming Out to These People?
Ever since Mikey first asked if he could tell people I was his boyfriend (it was totally cute, people), I’ve started wondering what the future holds for my relationship with my family. Let’s start with my parents. Mom and Dad have refused to even acknowledge Mike’s existence, and Mom recently sent me a very carefully worded e-mail asking me not to mention being gay or ex-Mormon (even though I hardly ever do) because it would make conversations with me easier on her.
Now, today (late yesterday evening?) my sister wrote, saying that she and her husband had decided not to meet Mikey because they didn’t want to give me or anyone else the impression that they condoned my “decision to be homosexual.” She still wants a brother/sister relationship, but it “will have to be on terms that are comfortable to both of us.”
My question is, why would I want to continue a relationship with people who expect me to bend over backward to spare them the slightest twinge of discomfort, at the complete expense of my peace of mind? Does my mother not understand that having to censor my life and avoid the subject of my significant other makes conversation with her extremely onerous for me? Does my sister not realize that any kind of brother/sister relationship I would be comfortable with would involve her eventually meeting (and liking, and accepting!) my boyfriend? Maybe the kind of relationship they are willing to tolerate will eventually turn out not to be one I want to be in. And who wants to be tolerated, anyway?
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May 19th, 2006 at 10:38 am
Wow… that’s really a tough situation. It’s hard to believe that people in this day and age still act this way. I didn’t come out to my family until I was 30 and already had a boyfriend-on-the-verge-of-being-partner, so I sort of presented them with the whole package at once.
I think what your sister said “that the relationship would have to be on terms you were both comfortable with” is key. I think your response might be something like “how can she consider herself your sister if she doesn’t want to know or hear about a huge part of your life? Or how would she feel if you didn’t want to know anything about her husband or family.” Good luck!
May 29th, 2006 at 10:49 am
You know there are these really secret conversations that happen behind your back when I talk with other missionaries. I have a horrible complex that makes me to keep track of all I know. I don’t know why, but that is besides the point. What I was going to say is that I’ve detailed a few of those conversations with you, the one that hurt the most was probably with Mike (Nelson).
There are very few things I can not or plain just refuse to wrap my feeble mind around, unfortunatly for me intolerance is one of them. I truely wish that I could understand the processes of synapses that fire to cause the blood to flow, the cheeks to flush, and the hatred to boil over.
I have my own share of issues with the homosexual culture as I do with the heterosexual culture or the hispanic or whatever. I have my hang-ups and bigotry, I’ll be the first to admit them and also be the first to be willing to talk about them. I care more about why people feel and think the way they do than I would ever care about why I don’t like them. I don’t know if that made much sense. Also I really don’t know where this post is going but maybe I’ll make a salient point at soon.
As far as coming out, I don’t know. I don’t have a closet to come out of, well maybe the horrible jack-mormon most of my friends are going to not like this closet. But I can’t imagine a birthing from such closet to be anywhere near a sexual orientation situation. So I don’t see the point of coming out as your title so wryly states. If someone askes me of how my testimony is doing I tell them “now you do realize that I have sex and I drink like ‘all the alcohol in the world is going to be gone tomorrow and I will be sad when it is.’”
I never picture that moment in time anything different than what it is. They are always caught off guard. There are some of the perforated coupon cutter answers that always come up. “You served a mission.” “You wear garments.” (Ha! Fuit Of The Loom) “You have a testimony of the truthfullness.” “You are unhappy.” So the intial shock I guess with your sister she could simply block she didn’t have to face up to it. Instead of allowing her “well groomed” thought process of what is acceptable to rip through your once strong relationship ala Bonnie and Clyde (I’m thinking more Sonny’s death in The Godfather, but then again I’m an Italian.) She just brushed it off as sureal. She now has to own up. She has finally realized that this is deeper than yes even your relationship with her. So the line was drawn to protect what she cherished/s about you. She is protecting her mental image she has of you growing up and your relationship up to this point. I don’t mean to play a psychiatrist, heaven know’s that I’m not that smart.
Then again this could the work of a couple, not merely the words of you Sister is coming through that statement. From my experience most males have a huge phobia problem with homosexuals. Not that they fear they themselves are gonig to get some kind of transmitted disease but more that they have to delve into something that they don’t want to even think about, it’s unimportant and shouldn’t be thought or talked of. I don’t know why most straight men are like that, hell men in general are like that and I don’t know why. I just know that maybe the institution of marriage has reared its ugly head and spat “on terms that are comfortable to both of us.”
Like I said I’m not smart I just like pretending I am on T.V.