May 1987
I hesitated several times as I approached the front door of my mother’s house. How was she going to react when she saw me for the first time since I announced in a letter to her that I was gay?
After ringing the doorbell, her footsteps seemed to take forever to reach the front door. It was as if life had gone into slow motion, making me wait even longer to find out her reaction.
“Why did it take you so long to tell me?” were her first words as she flung her arms around me. “The kettle’s on, and I’ve got your favourite biscuits in,” she started to sob.
I’d been expecting a completely different reaction, expecting to be on the next train back to London, but ended up staying a few days.
“Do you have a boyfriend?” she asked as I took my first sip of tea. “When can I meet him? I’ve always wanted to go to a gay bar. I hear they’re so much fun and much safer than the bars around here where women get hit upon all the time.”
“Mum!” I said astoundingly.
I couldn’t quite believe that my mother was treating me as if she’d known I was gay all my life. She probably had, but the fact that nothing had changed was a welcome relief. Her love for me was as evident as it always had been. I crossed my fingers and wished and hoped that all my family would react like my mother did.
“Have you told Phil?” I asked.
Phil was my stepfather, and the way my mother was acting, I doubted she had told him.
“Oh, yes,” she announced. “He can’t wait to see you. He’ll be home in about an hour.”
But not all my family were like Mum and my stepfather.
September 1987
‘Your mother has told me’ were the first words after ‘Dear Hugh.’
From there, the letter I’d opened went downhill quickly.
‘People like us are not homosexual or gay or whatever you want to call it. Nobody here is homosexual. You don’t belong here anymore. It’s not the sort of thing that happens to men in our family or area…’
I couldn’t bring myself to read anymore. I tore the letter up and threw it away.
How could a member of my family say that? Thank goodness I was living and working in London. But I was concerned that the letter writer had my address. My mother had probably given it to him. Should I tell her what he’d written? I felt that the family member who had written the letter had just blown my family apart. It brought me down to earth with a painful bump!
But it didn’t end there. A few weeks later, another grim situation hurtling towards me at a hundred miles per hour finally caught up with me. But this one was different. It was a silent rejection where nothing was said. But the reaction to me coming out as gay contained all the words that told me what was about to happen.
It would be over 30 years before I saw or said anything to my father again. Not even a surprise visit from two of my aunts (his sisters) some months later could heal the division, although, to be fair, I don’t think they really understood the whole picture.
Sadly, that was the last I saw of one of my aunts. She passed away before my father accepted the situation of who I was and not who he wanted me to be.
The other aunt was more tolerant when I visited her for the first time after reuniting with my father. However, there was no mention of me being gay. Not even the partner I’d been with for over 20 years was mentioned. But during other visits, things gradually came to the surface.
“Isn’t it about time I met John?” she asked. “I’d have thought he would have wanted to meet me by now.”
Crosswires came to my mind. I hadn’t wanted to push things. While all my aunt was doing was wanting me to take the lead in introducing her to my life. We both ended up laughing about it.
Days before she passed away, she’d tearfully told me how hurt she had been by not being allowed to stay in touch with me for all those years. ‘I couldn’t take sides,’ she told me. I never found out what she meant by that.
The one I had to allow to get away
My grandmother was the family member I thought would be the most accepting of my coming out. But, sadly, I never got to tell her. Life had dealt her the dementia card, and I didn’t feel it was right to tell her, even when she was in the early stages of this horrible illness.
Ever since I can remember, I felt she was looking after me and guiding me. Even after she died in 1994, I continue to feel her presence (not something I’ve felt with anyone else). I guess being her first grandchild has something to do with it.
Directions and decisions
After visiting my mother in May 1987, visits home became less frequent. Unfortunately, most of the family had not reacted kindly to me being gay, and I had decided that the best thing I could do was to keep away from those who were upset by the life that I was proud and thankful for. In turn, I accepted that I had to allow them to live their lives as they wanted.
As the years passed, I regained contact with some of those family members who had not accepted me and, thankfully, had the changing face of society and the improvement in attitudes towards gay people to thank for bringing us back together. It was tough, but I was thankful that things were changing and that my family accepted me for who I was.
Other family members
The fact that, in the past, there had been other male members of the family who had never married never seemed to raise any suspicions that our family could have had gay people as a part of it. It may have been talked about, but never while I was in the room.
“Isn’t it obvious that there must be gay people in all families?” I’d once asked an aunt. She only nodded her head and would quickly change the subject.
I doubt if any of those bachelor male family members ever ‘came out.’ It would have been difficult at the times they lived. I was thankful that attitudes towards the LGBT society were changing. Plus, of course, it was no longer a crime to be a gay man.
This made me more determined to live my life how I wanted to, not how others wanted me to. Family or no family, I was who I was.
Notes from the author.
‘You can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your family.’ I hear this quote often and always tell myself it whenever I find myself outside of the family circle.
I’d always been independent, which helped me get through the parts of my life where I had little contact with other family members. During these times, friends and even work colleagues were my new family.
Fortunately, I was never short of friends. Most people seemed to take a liking to me, and I never worried about those that didn’t. Just as those who had not accepted me as gay, it was their loss, not mine.
I was lucky. I always had friends I could turn to when I needed them. Talking always helps and has always got me through difficult times.
Today, I am lucky and thankful to be surrounded by family I know care and love me very much. And while many of those family members who rejected me when I first came out as gay have since left this world, I forgave them for the directions they took. Things were different back then.
But thank goodness that things for the LGBTQI community in the majority of the world have improved and are much different today. Family, though, that’s a different matter.
There is an abundance of support available for the LGBTQ+ community. One fantastic resource in the UK is the Gay Switchboard, where individuals can seek assistance and guidance. They can be reached by phone at 0800 0119 100 or by email at hello@switchboard.lgbt.
Please feel free to share support details for LGBTQI people in other countries in the comments section. Let’s spread positivity and acceptance together!
Next month: – Friends. I always found it easy to make friends and developed many friendships over the years. Some were great fun, while others led me to situations I’d never thought could have happened.
If you enjoyed this entry, you may also enjoy reading, ‘True Stories: Gay Memories – The Day My Life Changed.’
Last month, In this series, the subject was Jobs. Click the link below to read it.
True Stories: Confessions Of A Gay Man – Jobs
In the 1970s, I faced discrimination in my first job for being gay. Progressing to a more accepting workplace in the 1980s, I finally came out openly to colleagues. But even today, despite the changing times, fear and discrimination still persist in the workplace.
This is my story, but have you faced fear or…
Please feel free to ask me any questions by leaving me a comment.
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