It Is Trish

One of my clients said something poignant about coming out as queer that has stuck with me ever since. “I don’t want to tell my family that I’m queer, not just because I’m afraid it will make them love me less, but because it might make me love them less.”

This immediately rang as true to my experience, but it’s something I was never told about or warned about, something I couldn’t conceptualize or understand at the time. Now, I think I get it.

After I came out to my parents, I asked my mom to tell other people about the fact that I was dating a woman. In a lot of ways, that is maybe unfair! But for two people in particular, it felt entirely necessary. My grandma and grandpa are two of my favorite people in the entire world. I look up to them, and they have always loved and supported me. I did not think they would abandon or hate me for being queer, but I had a huge fear that if I had to be the one to tell them, I would overanalyze any facial expressions or comments they made. I didn’t want to live with the knowledge of their first reactions. And it turned out to be a wonderful idea. I have no idea how that conversation between my mom and her parents went, and I don’t want to know. Instead, I know that Grandma called me to tell me she loves me, and Grandpa logged onto Facebook to do the same. I got to experience their second reactions.

Would I have loved them less if I’d seen disgust pass across their faces? Maybe. In the sense that love and fear are intertwined, and my particular brand of anxiety isn’t great at letting those moments float away. It might not have diminished my love for them, but it certainly would have colored it.

This idea also makes me think about all the Christian people from my past, and how I interpreted their social media silence as rejection. For some, I think my interpretation was correct. But last year, I experienced something that made me wonder if I were also part of the problem. Rachel came home to Peoria with me, and while we were visiting, my family-away-from-family, the Monahans, hosted a games party. Everyone was incredibly welcoming and normal, and I thought my heart would explode at having another opportunity to tease each over games, share book recommendations, and extend the party to watch just one more YouTube video. This happened four years after I came out. Had it been possible all along??

I don’t know if they needed time to process my queerness (goodness knows I did), and I don’t know if that easy socializing was available the whole time. But I do know that I avoided seeing friends when I visited my hometown because I was afraid of rejection. I diminished my love for them, and it cost me. Self-protection is complicated. What helps us can also harm us, and that’s why boundaries are meant to be flexible.

So what does it mean, that a fear of coming out can be based not only on fearing the loss of other people’s love, but on fearing the loss of your love for others? I’m not exactly sure, since this is a reality I’m only starting to piece together. But a start might be to try to protect your love for others where you can, but not so much that you close yourself off to the possibility of love entirely.