Support for Parents & Gay Kids During the Neverending Coming-Out Process

Anger And Hurt

Our son Ted had cautiously suggested earlier that we meet his lover Dan. Initially, we had no interest in that suggestion because when we stopped blaming ourselves for what had happened, we began blaming Dan. I was angry that this catastrophe had befallen our home; was sure it was going to ruin our lives. I had always felt we were good parents, hardly deserving of this. My anger toward Ted was seldom expressed to him, but it was there for me to deal with.
Anger and hurt are probably the most frequently expressed feelings. They are often surface feelings that seem spiteful and cruel. In order for your parents to make progress it is better that they say them than bury them and attempt to deny their existence. They will be hard for you to handle. You may be tempted to withdraw, regretting that you ever opened this issue.
Hang in there, however; there's no turning back now. When they begin to express these feelings they're on the road to recovery.

STAGE 5: MAKING DECISIONS

The Fork in the Road

As the emotional trauma subsides, your parents will increasingly deal more rationally with the issue. It's common at this point for them to retreat for a while and consider the options that lie ahead.
It's like reaching a fork in the road that has a number of paths from which to choose. The choice each person makes is a reflection of the attitude he or she is ready to adopt in dealing with the situation.
Both parents may not necessarily choose to take the same path. A number of factors will influence which path is chosen. Reading about homosexuality and talking to other parents will probably encourage them to take a more supportive position. Their religious orientation will play an important part. The general liberal or conservative position they usually hold will also have some bearing.
The importance of the restoration of their relationship with you is a major factor. A variety of factors will affect them as they formulate a compatible posture for dealing with this. Three kinds of decisions will be described:

Supportive

Most parents continue to love their child in a way that allows them to say "I love you," to accept the reality of the child's sexual orientation and to be supportive. In fact, now that the relationship between parents and child is on a level of mutual honesty and trust, most parents say their relationship is better than it ever was. All parties begin to feel better about what has happened.
Although they may have had some glimpses prior to this time, supportive parents are increasingly aware of your needs. They become concerned about the problems that you have to face. Although we'd had some glimpses prior to this time, my wife and I became more aware of our son's needs and what he'd been through. In fact, we were amazed that he had handled all the tensions and problems as well as he did for all those years.
Our awareness and love for him soon involved us in offering to begin solving some problems in an effort to reduce some of those tensions: a single room at college would enable him to live his life without having to offer excuses or explanations to a roommate. Dan was invited home more often and gradually became an important member of our family. When Ted told his brother, we were able to talk to Louis and support Ted.

This Far And No Farther

Sometimes parents respond by making it clear it's an issue that no longer requires discussion. Although they can discuss the matter, they are quite fragile in dealing with it. They have progressed this far and wish to go no further.
This does not necessarily reflect a negative attitude toward you. They know their limits and don't want to be pushed beyond them. Although you need to respect that stance, you can still make efforts to reach out to them.
Let them know that you love them -- in word and deed. Cautiously let them know some things that you do related to your sexuality; i.e., gay groups you're involved in (community center, religion, athletics). Make it a point not to let them drift away from you.
Introduce them to some of your friends; meeting other homosexual persons (in small numbers) will help to break down the stereotypes they may hold.

Constant Warfare

In some instances your sexual orientation can be the staging area for constant warfare. Everything you do and say is viewed as a symptom of your "problem." The hours you keep, your language, choice of friends, vocational selection, school grades, etc. (However, in reality, it may reflect a parent's feeling of personal inadequacy.)
As long as this condition exists, both parent and child are in a no-win position. Generally speaking, if one parent assumes this extreme a position, the other parent may have difficulty choosing a role that is far from it. When relating to their children, parents are often outwardly supportive of each other -- even if behind closed doors they don't completely agree between themselves.
I'm convinced that most parents who attend a parents' meeting or who enter into personal conversation with a supportive parent greatly increase the chance that they'll not remain negative. If they won't attend a meeting, maybe they'll meet with some parents at a quiet restaurant. If all attempts fail, don't let the situation get you down. Find a parent substitute or friend to whom you can turn for support.

Relapses

A word about relapses is important. Problem-solving and changing personal attitudes often can be diagrammed as two steps forward and one backward.
It's not at all uncommon for parents to slip back a step or two to rehash something you thought was behind you. Allow them time to rework it. It will be disappointing to you when this happens, but it's the way change usually comes about.

STAGE 6: TRUE ACCEPTANCE

Not All Parents Get This Far

Some parents get this far. Most may love their child without finally accepting the child's life. Many reach the point where they can also celebrate their child's uniqueness. These fortunate ones view homosexuality as a legitimate expression of human sexuality.
When asked if they wish that their child could be changed, they respond, "I'd prefer to change our homophobic society so my child could live his life without rejection and fear."
Parents at this stage face up to their own guilt, that they are a part of a guilty society, a homophobic society. They reflect on the gay jokes they've told and laughed at over the years. They begin to understand the problems they unknowingly created for their child. This coming to terms with themselves may lead them to view the oppression of all gays and lesbians in a new light.
They begin to speak out against the oppression; they talk to friends about the issues involved as a means of educating others. They support gay friends of their son or daughter; they attend parent meetings to help other parents. In short, they become committed to a cause and find a way that is comfortable for them to make a positive contribution. Some do it boldly, others work at it quietly.

Our Own Story

About two years prior to knowing about Ted, we began to sense that our son was drifting away from the family. We thought it was simply a stage he was going through; as soon as he completed this "stage," he'd come to his senses and his life and ours would come back together.
In an effort to help him we tried at different times to reach him. One month we'd try to be his friend, interested in what he was doing and allowing him considerable latitude. When that didn't work, we tried bringing him to his senses by being confrontive and demanding. To our mutual frustration, nothing worked.
My wife became increasingly aware that we were "losing" him. What we thought was a typical teen-parent communication gap seemed to be getting out of hand. We knew he was unhappy and were frustrated that we were unable to help. It never crossed our minds that his being gay and our lack of understanding related to the problem.
I've often thought about what has transpired since then; I've looked upon it as an unplanned journey. It was thrust upon us; we'd hardly have signed up for it if given the option of choosing something else.
Unplanned, however, does not mean unwelcomed. Today we can say "We're glad we know." We've been able to support our son on his journey. We hope that he can say, "Unplanned, but not unwelcome."

Piece #2:
Step 4 - Mourn it
When you can't deny it, explain it, or change it, the only thing left is to mourn it. Parents have two choices at this point, and both of them involve some form of death. On the one hand, you can choose the death of rejection and separation from your child. You can say, "If that's the way you are, you're no son of mine." You can cut off relations as though
the child never lived or as though the child has died. That's an option many parents have taken and an option many congregations have taken in response to their lesbian and gay members. But quite frankly, that was never an option for us because we could not believe this son we knew so
well was in any sense a perverted person.

The other option is to suffer the death of your own ignorance, prejudice, opinions, attitudes and misunderstandings. Then you mourn the loss of a nice and tidy worldview in which everything fits neatly into
boxes of black or white, right or wrong, true or false. And you mourn the loss of security provided by a few biblical passages that can tell you which is which so you don't have to take the responsibility for making a judgment.

Along with those losses goes the death of your hopes and dreams of ordinary happiness for your child, particularly as that comes through the joys of marriage, children and a life approved by family, friends, church and society. And in our son's case, there is also the probable death of any hope for ordination into the ministry to which he has always felt called by God, unless he is willing to sacrifice for it all
experiences of human love expressed through physical intimacy.

During the process of mourning, his mother and I came to realize how close we were to shifting the focus from our son's struggle to our own. That final form of death for parents is to recognize that their pain is secondary to their child's suffering and to take up their role as supporters of the life they brought into the world, the life their child
has to live out in the world. When that happened for us, the question became, "How is he handling this in terms of his own life, health and happiness?" It is his problem, not ours. He doesn't need us to increase his struggle by making the problem our own and then looking to him for a solution.

•Step 5: Accept It
When he came to the place where he could accept the reality of his sexual orientation as given, we were able to take the next step and accept it. It was at this point that we remembered one version of the Serenity Prayer: "Lord, give us the serenity to accept what cannot be changed, the courage to change what can be changed, and the wisdom to know the difference."

For us that has come to mean the acceptance of something in the being of our son that neither we nor he would have chosen, something neither he nor we can change. More than that, it has come to mean seeking change in those things which can be changed, namely the attitudes toward and understandings of homosexuality that remain dominant in both church and society. For we have come to realize that the biggest problem in being gay is not the gayness, but the reaction of heterosexuals to it

And last but not least, a wonderful analogy:
A Journey to......WHERE???
by Gloria Ferguson . Originally taken from St. Paul/Minneapolis PFLAG

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a gay child - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it feels. It's like this.......
When you are having a baby and raising a child, it's something like planning a fabulous vacation trip to Italy. You buy a bunch of guidebooks and make your wonderful plans - The Coliseum, Michelangelo's David, the gondolas in Venice. You learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very well planned and exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives and your journey begins. Much, much later, the plane finally lands. The flight attendant comes on the air and says, "Welcome to Holland!"
Now, there are some choices to make. You may scream, "Holland? What do you mean, Holland? I signed up for Italy and by God, Italy it will be!"
You may refuse to get off the plane. But no matter how long you stomp and fume, no matter how long you rant and rave about your plans and all you've invested to get to Italy, it's still Holland.
You may even go so far as to try to convince the Dutch that deep, deep down, they are really Italians operating under some delusion. You press your handbook of handy Italian phrases into their hands, hoping that if they repeat, "Buon Giorno" often enouogh and practice gesturing significantly and enthusiastically when they speak, they will eventually discover their true nature.
A surprising number will try to accommodate you, because your happiness is important to them, but the truth is that this is Holland and they are really Dutch.
On the other hand, you might hear "Welcome to Holland!" and choose the easier, and I believe, more respectable course. "Holland?" you say, "Really?? Imagine that!"
And with your heart pounding in your chest, with a suitcase full of clothes meant for Italy, and useless guidebooks and dictionaries, frightened and disoriented, you walk off the plane and into a country you never dreamed you'd visit.
And after you've been there a while and had a chance to catch your breath, you look around you and begin to notice that Holland has lots of windmills and tulips; Holland has Rembrandts and dikes! And, best of all, Holland has a whole new group of people you would never have met if you hadn't landed there. You find new guidebooks and dictionaries and find that most of what you brought with you will do just fine, after all.
Of course, nearly everyone else you know is busy coming and going from Italy, and they're all talking about what a wonderful time they had there. And that's okay - because though you may wonder, from time to time, what it would have been like to go to Italy, you have come to love the very special beauty of Holland.

Final Words of Advice to Parents:
For my own son, the realization that he was gay was like finding the missing piece of his internal puzzle. Remember, your child is the same person you knew before and the problems your child faces are because of an intolerant and uneducated society. Sadly, a gay child is the only minority that is still a minority within his/her own family. Homosexuality is also the last legal discrimination. Changing society has to start in our homes. And once we have realized that our kids are entitled to the same rights and protection as other citizens, we may be able to project our faces onto this stereotyped minority, helping to erase irrational fears and increase tolerance, one heart at a time.
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