Twenty-two years ago, I asked my dad if he was gay. Then he was gone.

Contents:

• HOW I ACCINTALLY FOUND OUT MY DAD IS GAY
• MY DAD COMG OUT AS GAY CHANGED OUR LIV — AND GAVE ME THE COURAGE TO BE MYSELF
• GROWG UP WH A GAY FATHER – CONFSNS OM A STRAIGHT SON
• THE GAY FATHER I NEVER KNEW
• IM GAY AND IM ATTRACTED TO MY FATHER..
• AFTER 20 YEARS OF MARRIAGE, MY DAD CAME OUT AS GAY
• I'M 57 YEARS OLD AND MY FATHER JT DISOWNED ME FOR BEG GAY

HOW I ACCINTALLY FOUND OUT MY DAD IS GAY

My brother picked up the word for "gay" – a word my dad repeated several tim durg that that pot, my parents had told they had problems their marriage, but a few months later, when I was around ne years old, we still went on our annual fay summer holiday to France. Until, out of nowhere, my brother sudnly asked, "Dad, are you gay?

MY DAD COMG OUT AS GAY CHANGED OUR LIV — AND GAVE ME THE COURAGE TO BE MYSELF

"There aren't a lot of gay people out there wh a wife and children, " he told me. I once tagged along wh him to his favoure gay bar, where I met all the iends he's ma there over the years. I'm gay.

I n't remember exactly what I unrstood of the word "gay" at that pot my life, but whether me om hearg my classmat e to disparage our peers or the nate unrstandg that s existence our life meant plete and utter change to our fay dynamic, I stantly registered the word as synonymo wh "bad. The word "gay" was not a taboo word our hoe. I never hated to pull asi even the tought bulli after hearg them make fun of our gay classmat to give them a piece of my md, and I preached csantly about why the f-word should be dropped om everyone's vobulari anytime was uttered my prence.

We would se together as adults and share stori om our childhoods about our gay parents that others wouldn't unrstand. It's te that children of gay adults tend to grow up quicker than most bee we e to know a different world at an early age that some adults are not yet able to fully prehend. But I knew he was gay by the time I was 7 or 8.

GROWG UP WH A GAY FATHER – CONFSNS OM A STRAIGHT SON

So this is my story of growg up wh a gay father.

Growg up wh a gay father, particularly one who was aaid to e out, prented challeng our abily to get emotnally close. I don’t rell a time when I didn’t know my Dad was gay. From my earlit memori of my Dad around age 5, I thk I always knew my dad was gay.

THE GAY FATHER I NEVER KNEW

Th I never had that aha moment of realizg “I have a gay father”! To hear both of them tell , my Dad beg gay wasn’t a factor the spl.

How my Dad me to terms wh beg gay. I don’t thk anyone knew yet that my Dad was gay. After all, he was the son of a Baptist Preacher and there would not have been much tolerance the 1940’s or 50’s for him to e out as gay.

In talkg to both of them over the years, they both claim they had no ia my Dad was gay. In retrospect, the fact that he was a cheerlear his bt iend was a male hairdrser (who was openly gay) that my Uncle Buddy nicknamed him “Percy” (which my Dad hated) and that my Dad went on to open a home furnishgs store might have been a clue. Realizg his sexualy and beg a gay father the late 1960s, pecially wh me a long way away, mt have been really transformative for my Dad.

IM GAY AND IM ATTRACTED TO MY FATHER..

He lived and around the Oak Lawn area of Dallas (long a predomantly gay or at least gay-iendly neighborhood).

He was meetg lots of openly gay people & gog to clubs where was OK to be openly gay. Beg a gay father the 1960s. My Dad never actually me out as gay to me or to most people.

I’d known my Dad is gay for some time, but we’d never discsed . My Dad, of urse, was sistent that no one would obvly know he was gay (which also ma Tom and I lgh).

AFTER 20 YEARS OF MARRIAGE, MY DAD CAME OUT AS GAY

Are you a gay father stgglg to e out? In Loren’s se, he didn’t e to terms wh beg gay until the age of 40 and was married wh children at the time.

How growg up wh a gay father affected me. The one benef to always knowg I had a gay father is that there was never I time I rell thkg was wrong.

I first realized my Dad was gay when I was around 7 or 8, and I have no rellectn of him beg wh my Mom. Almost all his iends were gay as were most of his employe (those 2 groups pretty much beg the same people). That beg said, I was probably spared a lot of bullyg at school sce no one there knew I had a gay father.

I'M 57 YEARS OLD AND MY FATHER JT DISOWNED ME FOR BEG GAY

I feel que sure I got lucky this regard and that many kids wh a gay father were picked on for their parent’s sexualy.