Coming Out to My Mom

I'm usually not one to brag. I could win the Nobel Peace Prize and stay shrouded in my all black wardrobe and not tell anyone. That has nothing to do with humility; as an English major I'm naturally pretentious. It more has to do with not liking being visible.

But anyways, I'm going to take a moment to brag the living crap out of my mom and make her, as a super rad advocate and ally mother, very visible in hopes of inspiring other parents.

So I came out as bisexual to my mom this week. And she could not have responded in a more perfect way. And working as an activist and social justice advocate I'm often hyper-aware of language and responses from people. So for me to be able to say she responded perfectly is a huge thing for her to be proud of!

Here are some things that she did/addressed that were extremely supportive and totally eased my mind about being out to my family:

1. She didn't force the conversation 

My coming out to my mother just kind of slipped into a phone call we were having. My mom guided the conversation to the topic, expressed her love and support, and guided the conversation away from it.

I've been writing about my sexuality a lot online simply because I'm more comfortable doing that than verbally saying it to my family. My mom clearly already knew but she let me take my time with telling her. And, because she's got that witchcraft mother's intuition, she's probably known since I was in high school. God knows how long she's waited for me to come out. Hell I was probably born and she immediately knew this baby is most definitely bi. But she never ever forced the conversation. So major parenting kudos to her for that.

2. She didn't bring our religion into it

Although my family isn't extremely religious, we all had a religious upbringing. It was something that bonded my family and continues to be something that influences our lives. Strides have been made by various religious groups to be inclusive of the LGBTQ community yet, many religions are still hostile or exclusive.

It was relieving for my mother not to mention any religious backlash that I might get from other members of my family about being bisexual. She also never even thought about mentioning the idea of my sexuality going against god's will. Wherever my mother is at with her own spiritual beliefs, it was amazing for her to not include it at all in my coming out process.

3. She talked about future grandchildren 

I'm effing stoked to have children one day. It seems like a magically glorious adventure into a whole new realm of life that I can't even fathom at this point in my life. But my sexuality means that I could possible fall in love with and marry a woman one day. That would be so rad. It would also make having kids a little less traditional.

My mom was such a baller because she said that she didn't care if she had biological grandchildren or if I chose to adopt with someone. I cannot tell you the amount of pressure that took off of me. Even at my age now, the thought of adopting instead of having my own child is something I wrestle with. But if my mom can be so calm and collected about it, then so can I. And I can focus on truly falling in love with someone and not worry about how my family will react to my future family's dynamic.

4. She focused on my health 

My mom said that all she wanted was for me to be happy and healthy. She said happiness contains a huge variety of things but my physical health doesn't. My happiness can come from loving a man or a woman or myself but my health comes from actually having healthy habits, unfortunately.

My depression has led me to pick up a lot of unhealthy habits and my mother knows this. A lot of parents treat sexuality like it is some form of physical defect, something wrong with the brain, a mental disorder. But my mother knows that it most certainly fucking not. She separated my sexuality from my health and placed more importance on me taking care of myself than adhering to societal norms. And that was some serious motivation to hit the gym....for like 2 minutes...baby steps, right?

Growing up totally sucks. Well like 99% of it does. But the other 1% is the part of growing up that allows my mother and I to become close friends. As I creep closer to the impending doom of death, I become more confident with myself and I'm able to share that with my mother. But I wouldn't be able to share things with her if she wasn't the total bamf that she is.

I am so incredibly grateful to have a supportive ally and advocate as a mother. I know that the coming out process can be incredibly painful for some people so I appreciate my experience even more. And now I know I'll be able to bring my future children around grandma and not worry about her being a homophobic old loon. Congrats mom, you successfully made it through the process of one of your children coming out. Parenting success.