I'm curious if any of you can relate to the feeling that being gay is something that is truly okay for everyone else on the planet, but not okay for you. My family is not religious in any way. Nor are they homophobic, or ignorant. But somehow I feel down to the core of myself that what they will accept from others, they will not from me. It's difficult to articulate--it's as though somehow my family has always set one standard for themselves, and another for everyone else. We're not rich, famous, or special in any particular way, it's not a feeling of being "better than". It's more this dynamic in which the core family members (my mother and older sister) form a committee to decide what is acceptable and what is not, and it's everyone else's job to fall in line with the Committee or face the judgement and pay the price. This dynamic has gotten much more pronounced since my father died 8 years ago, but I know it was always there in some form or another. And just writing this I have come to see that although they would deny it, perhaps it is a feeling of being "more proper" than others. In my family, you don't make waves, you don't get emotional, you don't confess strong feelings unless they are of happiness over a Committee-approved goal. You don't do things my mom and sister would consider "in poor taste". You never EVER discuss intimate details of your personal life. In my youth, I had the foolhardy nerve to buck the Committee, and do reckless things. One result was that when I attempted suicide, none of my family members came to see me, or ever brought up what had happened. My mother was in a period of not speaking to me because I was such a disappointment to her. (that lasted 2-3 years) She did send me a "Get Well Soon" card in the mail a few weeks later. I was 17. I know this probably sounds very stupid, or lame. But there it is...Can anyone else relate to this family dynamic? Or perhaps more importantly, how to deal with it without going insane?
Well I can relate but I'm not sure I'll be able to help. Unlike you I come from a very religious homophobic family, but my family definitely fits the way you described. I feel like I can't share personal life information with them. Sex was never discussed when I was younger, political discussions were only there to bash democrats, religous discussions only involved talking about how "wrong" other religions were. I guess I just always felt like (and still do feel like) I'm playing a game of politics around my family, unable to be even remotely genuine. They don't know about me transitioning, but I did tell them I had a boy friend a couple years ago. My mom had an emotional breakdown and told me this was worse than her dad dying, blamed me for her hurting her, and told me NOT to let anyone else find out especially family including my sisters =/ Much like your attempted suicide, my sexuality has never been addressed again. Its just a skeleton in some closet somewhere that can't be discussed lest we bring shame and sin down upon my family. When I first started questioning being transsexual (long long ago) I remember seeing transsexuals in movies and stuff (usually for humor in comedy movies or what have you) and I'd be so jealous. But at the same time every time I saw it it was clearly made out to be a dirty thing, something very weird and taboo. The word tranny would be used and the one message I got from these early introductions was, "This is bad, this is dirty, no one wants to be this 'tranny' thing, this can't be what I am." So while I knew I wanted it, and I was actually quite jealous of them, I told myself that that CAN'T be me. Luckily places like EC and getting an introduction to the LGBTQ community helped me to relealize how irrational and untrue my thoughts and fears were. Unfortunately when I'm still feeling especially depressed they come back and I have to force myself to push them away. I think just being here, you are on the right track to accepting yourself. I'm still dealing with family issues myself, and unfortunately as a result of that I don't feel like I can be of any significant help to you or others dealing with family problems. I hope hearing someone relate to your plight has helped though, and I wish you the best of luck (*hug*)
Thank you for your thoughts and good wishes. It does help to know someone else has seen this happen in their own family too.
I grew up with a pretty dysfunctional family too. Both my parents look at things in either 'black or white,' to them, shades of grey don't exist. It's like, you're either right or wrong and there is no excuse. My dad especially is very closed minded. My mom is wishy washy, she has always told me that she will support me no matter what as long as I'm honest with her. Then I try to come out as questioning and needing help, and she totally stabbed me in the back. My dad told me I was disgusting and that I would be kicked out and that I'd have nothing more with that family (basically saying he'd disown me). My mom nearly cried and kept asking, "how can you do this to me, what would the rest of the family think, why are you breaking my heart?" (why the fuck should I give a care what our distant family members WHO WE DON'T EVEN TALK TO would think???) It was an epic fail and I felt like I was shoving myself back into the deepest darkest corner of my lonely closet. They didn't even want to listen to me, or try to understand what I was going through. To them, homosexuality is wrong and sick and only something that "those Americans" do. UGH don't even get me started on that one. It's like, they'll only support me if I do what they deem as "good" which is go to school, get a job, don't fuck around before marriage, get married, have babies, settle down, blah blah all that boring stuff. If I'm "bad" then no family support, which I guess I'm secretly bad because I've had sex before marriage, I drink, I smoke weed, I party with friends and strangers, and a ton of other stuff that would probably give them heart attacks or make their blood boil. And lo-and-behold, I still do well in school. Basically, you're not alone. lol
