(no subject)

[bluflamingo]

You know, I'd actually forgotten that shaky, freaked out feeling that comes with coming out to family members.

I can't say I'm enjoying remembering it all that much.

In other words: while I'm out to my mother, my father, my sister, my sister's boyfriend, and both my grandmothers (my grandfathers are dead), I haven't ever come out to my aunt and uncle (my mother's brother and his wife). Mainly because my mum felt my aunt wouldn't take it well. Personally, I think that's rubbish and also that they've probably figured it out for themselves. Regardless, I just hit the point where I decided this was stupid, and sent my uncle a text saying 'you know I'm gay, right?'

So now I'm sitting here shaking, waiting for a reply (I don't do coming out over the phone, and I can't do it face to face because next time I see them will be with my elderly and infirm grandmother and my very stressed mother, so if it goes badly, not good timing). Oh, how I didn't miss this feeling!

On the other hand, that covers all my family except for the great aunts, who I guess will find out at my sister's eventual wedding (assuming she doesn't ban me from giving the real reason when nosy family who I never see ask why, as the oldest, I'm not married yet).

Should have done it by letter, like I did to my father's mother, when he kept saying I couldn't tell her because she'd freak (yes, that's always my family's reason. I prefer not to think too hard about why they say this) and I got sick of that and wrote to her. Apparently she called my mother to ask if she knew! Then she wrote to me and said okay, fine, thanks for telling me, and now asks if I've met any nice women. My grandmother was in the WAAF in WWII, so she's not as sheltered as my father seems to think. Interestingly, that was four years ago, and my father doesn't seem to have noticed that I've done it yet.

Comments

[averzierlia]

*hugs* I hope they take it well. The family of mine that knows all took it well, which isn't surprising (at least for my mother's side of the family) since my maternal grandmother is gay. The few on my dad's side of the family I pretty much told by accident, and they took it well. They're your family, I'm sure everything will be fine.

[bluflamingo]

Thanks! They did take it well - my uncle phoned not long ago - but, ugh, that's one thing I hate about being gay, the scary bit between telling and the reaction where you wonder if you totally misread the other person and they're not going to react as well as expected. And it doesn't help, of course, that some people have taken it shockingle badly when I thought they'd be fine about it.

Glad your family took it well from you as well.

[averzierlia]

I'm glad they took it well! And I'm really glad my family took it well from me, I was worried about telling a few of them.

[rhi]

{{hugs}} and I hope it goes fine.

[bluflamingo]

Thanks - just got a call from my uncle who was very cool about it, and now I can dust off my hands and go 'right, that's the family done' (unless my sister ever decides I need to tell her boyfriend's family, but I think she's more likely to insist I never do, which is a whole different argument!)

[rhi]

Oh, good! I'm so glad it went well for you!

[spillingvelvet]

I've read in the comments that it went well! So, lovely!

I definitely cried when I told my mom, and she was all, "oh, sweetie, we have suspected for a while." and I was like, "...oh! Alright, then! Moving on."

So, here's to happy coming-outs. <3

[bluflamingo]

My mum was the first family member I told, and I was shaking. I did it in the students' union coffee shop, in case she took it badly and I needed moral support (I used to be a union officer, so I knew most of the people there), and of course she was totally fine about it, and, like your mum, already thought so.

[spillingvelvet]

I had told my sister a while before my parents, and she actively encouraged me to tell them, because she knew that it wouldn't be a big deal.

I'm extremely lucky that it's very much a non-issue for my entire family, with the exception of a few cousins that are kind of horrible when it comes to all social issues.

But, yeah, my Great-Aunt Gertrude has lived with her "friend" Mary-Ann for... thirty years. :D

[bluflamingo]

Oh well, Great-Aunt Gertrude helps then probably :) My godmother lived with her 'friend' for decades, but my family get horrified when I suggest that perhaps friend is not the right word! Sadly, I haven't had any contact with her since I was 18.