My father and I don’t have the strongest of relationships in my opinion. I feel it is a communication issue. I know he knows it isn’t something you fix over night. Our ways of communicating is different in certain aspects, we won’t address something unless it truly concerns/bothers us or we just keep it to ourselves and hope the thoughts and feelings go away. It does make me wonder how this has affected our father-son relationship and development since the time of my birth. Today was exceptionally interesting and I keep playing the moment in my head.
Today I spent the evening with my father. Our one on one on my end always leaves me feeling tense. I feel this is a childhood “sixth sense” in fearing rejection or confrontation. Do I have anything to be confronted about? Nothing I can think of to be honest, but I always feel there is something on his mind and I was right this time around. He said, “I have something I need to get off my chest. I know you’re gay and I am not ashamed of it and I still love you.” You can imagine what I was feeling. I couldn’t move and I automatically could sense my breathing becoming rapid. I, myself, am not ashamed of who I am. It took a while to get used to being who I am, but I had come to realize that I am me, I am not who people want me to be, society will always have a certain structure in mind of how people should act or look, but it is us who has to become comfortable with ourselves. As long as we know what is right from wrong we should be happy with ourselves. I am getting off topic…
How this was brought up I am not sure. There was nothing really leading up to this conversation. It was quite sudden and I sat there to listen to it all. He has mentioned talking about me with one of his childhood friends he knew in Mississippi he visits from time to time. Her sisters are lesbians and I just popped up in the conversation. My father said he just mentioned I was gay and they talked about it like it was a normal every day conversation he would have with anyone. He also said that she is the only one he has mentioned this to. My uncle, grandparents and anyone else for that matter do not know. I wanted to tell him my brother knows. I wanted to tell him I was not sure what my mother thought of it considering we haven’t had a real conversation about it. I wanted to tell him so much he has missed in my life but this moment was something I was not prepared for. I want my father to have a very effortless relationship with me but my childhood fears of rejection and abandonment are still strong in my life. I know he has no control over my life. I am independent, pay my own bills and make my own decisions. I just can’t get over how he is now in comparison to how he was back then.
I feel he is getting older and to not acknowledge or accept me as his son the way I have always been is a lost cause. He realizes this and for that he is trying to make up for the lost time and the little communication we have together beyond work or stories we can relate to the current subject matter. When I was in high school I tried to come out to him. He was frustrated by my efforts. I remember I wrote it in a letter and gave it to him before I went off to school. He never addressed the letter. I was the one who had to bring it up and he said he still loved me as his son and I thought I was finally free of the denial and depression that chained me to my darker days. I was wrong… His love for his children is unconditional, but love and acceptance and supportive of your child is different. He loved me, but did not approve of my life. He restricted me. I was not allowed to have any guy friends sleep over when my brother would have his friends crash at our place freely. He said if he saw or heard or found out I was with any man, he would pull me out of school and send me to live with my uncle in America. My uncle lives in the middle of nowhere surrounded by many many pets. I love animals but this was excessive and the stories of people getting sent to a place that was farm-like in nature never ended well or happily for the most part. I know what my father is capable of and I did not doubt warning/promise. What confused me in today’s conversation was that he said he “always knew that I was gay.” If you always knew then why didn’t you support me? I honestly feel it would have development me differently and some of the decisions I had made would have been shaped differently. Would I have been a different person then I am now? I don’t know. Maybe I would have had a happier time in high school and struggled less afterwards. I can’t say, I am only making assumptions but I do know it would have impacted me somehow.
The only thing I can do now is move forward with my father. I know he is apologizing in his own way for how he reacted and treated me then. I can read in between the lines. Hopefully our relationship will become stronger and I don’t have to hide or become precautious with him anymore about my “gay life.” My life is what is it and he is missing a big part of it. But this talk we had… well, more so he talked and I listened made the best part of my day and I hope it is only going up from here.
