2016. január 6., szerda
(22/m) Trying to deal with my 'heartbroken' parents' reaction to me coming out is slowly leading me to lose my boyfriend and my mind. In desperate need of advice...
First of all, thank you so much if you're making the effort to read this. Being in the desperate situation that I am, my post is inevitably long with bucket loads of context so I apologise in advance.Background:I come from a country where homosexuality is massively frowned upon (not prosecuted, thankfully). In this society, marriage, keeping in touch with nuclear and extended family on a daily basis, and having children are unquestionable purposes in life therefore conflicting with popular perceptions of homosexuality and traditional values. Therefore, having realised I am gay since a young age, I was led to constantly (and unsuccessfully) suppress my feelings and tell myself that in the future this would be what my life would look like.After a point (at 18 years of age, I'm 22 now) I realised that this was impossible. For this and other reasons I ended up moving abroad to study in a far more tolerant society. While being here I got into a very loving relationship of 3 years (and still counting!) with another guy. Even though I was finally able to be myself in my direct social/personal life I wasn't able to come out to my parents, despite almost daily communication with them. This was extremely hard as they are extremely attached (this being a result of the aforementioned culture and me being an only child), therefore I had to make up all sorts of lies in our frequent contact.Obviously, both my boyfriend and myself were too tired of hiding which led me to coming out to my parents when they visited 3 months ago. Hell broke loose. My mother had a mental breakdown (literally! throwing up, fainting, hallucinating etc.) whilst my father was also not far from one. After a lot of quarrelling and discussions their convictions are as follows.I. They cannot and will not ever accept this because (a) it's against their personal values (b) it would make the extended family disown me and would prevent me from living back in my homecountryII. They cannot and will not acknowledge my relationship (they don't even want to know anything about it and treat it as if it doesn't exist)III. They believe that I am 'heading to destruction and loneliness' as they are convinced that without biological children this is inevitableIV. They believe I can changeV. They believe that the country in which I live is having a detrimental influence on meVI. They believe that all of my friends and acquaintances here (who accept my homosexuality) are having a detrimental influence on meVII. I have to move back home to get 'on a the right way'In addition, their behaviour since then has turned into constant emotional blackmail. 100% of things they say in our conversations when talking about irrelevant things to my relationship/sexuality are disguised digs about it. For example 'Look at how lovely X and his wife are'; 'When you come back home you can do this and that'; 'People can be very confused when they're young', just to name a few.At this point I should say that they are NOT religious/politically conservative nutjobs. Their source of denial seems to be largely coming from the fact that they think being gay makes my life difficult and that it wouldn't be accepted by the greater family (which they view as an unquestionable component of a happy life), plus extreme emotional reactions as they are not used to it.The problem:I love my parents. It might be hard to believe after reading this but they have always been there for me on all other matters, including tireless, genuine interest about me and huge financial support. It just appears that homosexuality is so outside the worldview they've been brought up in that their brains shut down at the thought.I know that some might say that I should be firm and that it's all their problem but even though I am prepared to be blunt, I can't be careless. I want to make sure that they can smoothly transition to the realisation that I am gay without wrecking them even more.So here's where the problems start. My boyfriend and I have always been dreaming of moving in together. We thought that with me coming out and getting things cleared up with my parents we might have a hope of doing it drama/hiding-free. Clearly, if I were to announce this to my parents anytime within the next months or the next year even, the consequences would be dreadful for both of us. Obviously, my boyfriend is rightfully starting to doubt whether this situation is ever going to work.So there lies my general predicament. I am hopelessly lost as to whether I should carry on trying to have my boyfriend wait until things get 'better' (if they do), or whether I should start ignoring my parents more (not sure how I could do that). You get the idea.I would be forever grateful for any advice on any part of this - at this point I am thinking of all this so much that I feel I don't have any other life beyond it. Again sorry for the length, and take care :)
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