Considering telling my parents that I'm not completely straight (after I left my husband! we have a child!) I'm sure they will be surprised (or not), but somehow I feel like my mom's always known...since I did tell her at age 11 that I thought I liked girls (she said ok, but the look in her eyes was taken aback so I left it). Also, I'm pretty sure she knew that I had a crush on a friend of mine when I was 17...also I did sort of come out to her a few weeks ago, she was laughing and saying "I guess you won't be dating guys for awhile now (after the bad marriage experience), maybe you will date girls!" And I said "That's not a bad idea"- she went silent, but then said "Well, no relationships at all for awhile anyway" (does that count as coming out?) I'm not sure what she thinks now! I've heard people say that the moms always know....has this been your experience?
Anecdotally, it seems that most of the time, moms do have an idea. It may not be conscious -- they may be shocked at first -- but when they look back and think, most report that they realized that they really did have awareness early on, but either disregarded it or put it to the side.
The first thing my mom said to me when I came out was “I knew.” I was shocked. I was a very straight person not very long ago, I was boy crazy and obsessed. I seemed like the last person anyone would expect to be gay including myself. And yet she said she knew? I still don’t know how but yeah, I think they must all know or something because she wasn’t nearly as shocked as I would have expected. Though I will say maybe what started to tip her off was my definite uncomfortableness that I felt with the guy who kinda took me out and how I literally ran away from another guy who tried to pursue me. I’ll admit this behavior was a bit strange but yeah, I thought she just assumed I was kinda odd, not that I was gay. And oh I guess I did always like really feminine men as a kid, and she did remark it was odd how into that I was so maybe that contributed as well? I really don’t know.
If she's making references to it and you've mentioned it before I don't think she'll be surprised if one day you tell her that you have a girlfriend. That being said, my mom was clueless.
