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Family ignoring my relationship, need help.

Discussion in 'Family, Friends, and Relationships' started by bjspencer, Jul 5, 2013.

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  1. bjspencer

    bjspencer
    Regular Member

    Joined:
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    Gender:
    Male
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    I'm BJ and I came out to my family about a year ago after years of struggling with accepting my sexuality. I've been in a relationship with an amazing guy for a year and a half now. I had hoped that when I came out my family would accept it and embrace my relationship with my boyfriend. It didn't turn out that way, my mother was very upset and considered not allowing me to go back to college because she didn't want me to be with my boyfriend and she felt like he made me gay. She finally decided to let me go back to school, but when I got there, she didn't talk to me at all for my first semester and when I came home for Christmas, we never talked, but by the end of the break we had started to talk a little more. We texted every now and then when I went back to school for second semester. Now that I'm home for the summer, our relationship is pretty much back to normal. We talk to each other all the time and things feel just like they did before I came out. The problem is that she never even addresses what happened last summer with me coming out and telling her about my boyfriend. I do not drive yet due to an intense fear of driving that I hope to get over soon so I asked my sister if she could take me to visit my boyfriend a few weeks ago, but she said no because my mother would disapprove. I really want to spend time with my boyfriend before I go back to school in the fall because he won't be there because he's doing an exchange program at another school. How do I convince my mother to stop ignoring the fact that I'm gay and accept my relationship? Do I have to sacrifice my relationship with my mother to keep my relationship? I don't know what to do, please help.

    Thank you.
    Bj
     
    #1 bjspencer, Jul 5, 2013
  2. Chip

    Chip
    Board Member Admin Team Advisor Full Member

    Joined:
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    Location:
    northern CA
    Gender:
    Male
    Gender Pronoun:
    He
    Sexual Orientation:
    Gay
    Out Status:
    Out to everyone
    Basically everyone goes through a process of accepting loss (in this case, loss of perception that you're straight.) The process is 5 stages, denial-anger-bargaining-grief-acceptance. In your case, I think your mom is staying in denial basically because she's able to. She's taking a don't ask/don't tell approach. But at the same time, she's had plenty of time to consider this and so the denial is probably not that impenetrable at this point.

    I think the best approach is to find time to talk to her where you can have a fairly lengthy, uninterrupted conversation with her. Treat it essentially like you're coming out for the first time; perhaps write her a letter, or prepare some bullet points to cover. And gently say that this is who you are, that it isn't going to change, that your boyfriend didn't make you gay, and it's really interfering with your relationship with her, and you need to get it out in the open and stop treating it like an elephant in the room that no one speaks about.

    Expect anger, tears, disagreement, and unreasonableness... but at the end of the day, if you are calm, sincere, and gentle but unyielding, she'll come around. Since she's already had time to think and process it, it may be not a big deal at all, or it may take her some weeks. But the first stage is to start the conversation, and see where it leads.
     
    #2 Chip, Jul 5, 2013
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