My family is a bunch of competitive over-achievers that hold strongly to bigoted disapproval for their success. The holidays make me feel estranged. I know you can't change people to be what you need them to be. I am over it. I don't compete with them, I don't really even associate with them, though my mom sends a bulk email every week, which I read. I guess I'm just venting. I hurt. I am the youngest of a large family and a lot of my identity was intertwined with them. Their bigotry was so painful and defining for so long. I wish things could have been different-- either I removed myself sooner, or they cared about who I am more. Regrets... Young people, please protect your identity as it is developing. You do NOT have to share who you are with people who are outspoken about rejecting that part of you. It is so damaging to hold that fear or experience that rejection.
I'm sorry you've had a rough time. Judgmental families are hard. My dad's family is like that. They think everyone should be like them. I agree that disengaging is the best way to protect your heart.
I relate quite a bit with what you have to say. My parents are homophobic. Then, there's the emotionally harmful things they tend to do, but that's a whole other can of worms. So, needless to say, I'm out to everyone except my family right now. If they knew that I'm pansexual, they'd disown me. Easily. That makes me feel quite small sometimes. Unfortunately, I'm not financially stable enough to leave their house, so I just have to deal with it for the moment. The hardest thing about living in the same house as them is watching their influence on my younger brother. Their hate impacts his thinking; I try to open his mind as much as I can to other perspectives, but I'm just one person. And I'm so scared that when I inevitably leave them, my brother will hate me too. And he's one of the best things in my life. Hate destroys people: it destroys relationships and it can destroy lives. I'm sorry what you've been going through, @UMedusa. I wish you the best and send you good vibes.
Right back at ya, Estelle. Thank you very much for the kind words. I'm sorry you can relate and you're stuck there with them for now. I have definitely seen some siblings retract like it's contagious and others surprise with acceptance. I hope your brother is accepting and able to see beyond the fear-based hatred you are both being subjected to. Sometimes it only takes one person to make the difference in perspective. -Peace-
I don't depend on anyone whatsoever for emotional support. So called family have shown themselves to be either unreliable or outright abusive and neglectful too many times.
@UMedusa The biggest, warmest hugs coming your way. I totally understand. I am having Thanksgiving completely alone this year for the first time. Just know it is their loss. You are a wonderful person, so supportive of everyone else. You deserve to have someone that loves all of you and treats you with full devotion.
I was literally about to make a similar post. I’ve been visiting my family for less than two days now and I want to cry. I have felt increasingly lonely in their presence and I’m really starting to feel the weight of being closeted around people who you’ve loved and known your whole life. I guess it’s just a hard time of year. I’m sorry you’re going through it and I’m sorry that so many people can relate.
Good way of putting it... closeted around people you've loved your whole life. People just don't seem to understand that it's about more than sex. It's... why we are who we are.
Thanks, weary. I hope you have a nice enough Thanksgiving alone. That was me last year. I had a little Native American dance party with my cat and went out for Indian food.
I think a lot of people who are gay themselves have a hard time seeing past the sexual part of it too, and I think that makes it harder for us to recognize and accept who we really are. It feels like we're admitting to being highly sexually charged in a perverted way. I know that my parents would think it was a phase if I told them I was gay right now, since I've been going to a liberal school for a while, and they're quite conservative. I feel like they already don't take me seriously and they could so easily dismiss me if I came out to them. But it's all I think about around them. It is very heavy in my heart. Because we are closeted around the people we've loved our whole lives, but they're also the people who have loved us our whole lives. It's hard enough finding a way to love ourselves as we truly are, but the thought of being rejected by the people closest to us, or reduced to sexual objects, or dismissed as going through a liberal rebellious phase after going through years of trying to find some semblance of peace within ourselves, is all very heavy in our hearts.
((Leah)) I totally get that. It's not a phase. I think the reason they think it's a phase is because we were never really understood in the first place. It is really freeing to present your "whole" self to the people you love/who love you. My sister is one person in my family that is supposedly an advocate for the LGBTQ+ community, despite our upbringing, but when I told her, she thought it was a phase, a mockery, and I was losing my marbles in some sort of identity crisis, and basically we haven't talked since. A text or two, but no connection. I didn't realize until that happened how much it hurts to be dismissed like that by someone you honor with the knowledge of coming out to. I anticipated outrage from the bigots, but not being understood by her really hurts when I think on it.
@UMedusa @Leah061 My question to everyone here - Have those we consider our family Really loved us our whole lives when they never knew us really at all? I think once we accept that they haven't - they loved only the person they wanted us to be or believed us to be, then we can move past that hurt and make new friends and new loved ones that do love us for who we really are. That's how I see it anyways. I really hate being alone this year on holidays, but a lot has changed over the past two years for me. I actually love myself and don't mind spending time alone with me. It doesn't bother me that my family doesn't accept me or shuns me because in my mind they never knew me anyways. That's not love; that's a fallacy. So I can't lose whatever was not real to begin with.
Sympathy and t-giving hugs to you @UMedusa. I know many people in the same boat. My own parents (RIP) were very understanding. "Well, are you happy dear?" is what Mom would have said. I recall (not to hijack the thread) a wedding when all the "family females" got together for a photo. One of them, who was living with the groom's brother (my cousin) politely stood aside. My mom said "Get in here, come on, you are family!" This is the same mom who wouldn't let me share a bed with anyone under her roof even when I was a full adult. (Who was I to argue?) But she knew how to make people feel at home.
I’m so sorry that happened to you. That’s what I’m afraid will happen to me. I’ve been so caught up on whether or not I’m bi or just gay and I realized one of the reasons not knowing gives me so much anxiety is because I know that when I come out to my family I have to be 1000% sure because they are going to dismiss it. I think you’re right though, that’s what they’re going to think when we’ve never been our “whole” selves around them before. It’s hard when we haven’t even figured out who our “whole” selves are ourselves either. I guess all we can do is just know that it will pass and eventually the holidays will be over. I just miss the days when I could be around them without feeling this weight on my shoulders.
@Melancholy I'm sorry. :-( I hope you are safe and doing OK now. @fadedstar Ideally, I can get to this point with my family. I don't depend on them anymore, and they are definitely unreliable and neglectful/abusive as well. But, that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt to have that void and lack of connection with people. When family sucks, it does make it harder to want to open up and connect with other people in a meaningful way. @beenthrdonetht I am sorry your parents have passed on, but how awesome that they live on in your life still from their exemplary love and principals. Your mom sounded like the type of consistently loving person I hope to be remembered as. Thank you for sharing. @Leah061 It is a weight, and a wedge. There is anxiety that can be hard to quell. I completely agree that the general population is not very understanding about bisexuals. It can be very hard to understand it myself, in a way, without picking apart gender identity, and how it applies to sexual attraction. Even just deconstructing the way I was taught and allowing myself to be gay/queer/etc. has shifted things around quite a bit. These things take time, fools rush. I really clung on to the hetero aspects of my personality and felt all that other stuff about me was either a perversion, or a form of mental disorder. Like, someone would have to be "damaged" or confused to honestly conclude that they're bi. The stigma created so much denial and shame. The good thing is, the more you are at peace with who you are, the more of an advocate you can be for who you are. Until you are ready to really come out to them and feel confident enough doing so, it's OK to take your time with it. But, yeah, the void is real.
I'm so sorry you're having a lonely holiday! I honestly think this is a great idea. Maybe do a come one come all event and let people come and join. Particularly people who have no one to spend their holiday with. I'd gladly host something like that.
