What to Do When Your Child Says: "I'm Gay" | Psychology Today

Contents:

• IS AN 8-YEAR-OLD TOO YOUNG TO KNOW HE’S GAY?
• THIS IS HOW I REALLY REACTED WHEN MY SON TOLD ME HE WAS GAY
• HOW DO I DISCS BEG GAY WH MY 8-YEAR-OLD?
• IS YOUR CHILD GAY?
• OUR SEVEN-YEAR-OLD SON TOLD HE WAS GAY
• HOW TO TELL IF YOUR SON IS GAY
• YOUR CHILD JT TOLD YOU HE'S GAY. NOW WHAT?
• EARLY SIGNS TO TELL YOUR CHILD IS GAYTIMOFDIATHE DIFFICULT JOURNEYUNRSTANDG, ACKNOWLEDGG, AND SHARG ONE'S SEXUAL ORIENTATN WH THE WORLD, IS EASY FOR SOME, WHILE FOR OTHERS THE JOURNEY IS LONG AND DIFFICULT.GETTY-IMAGCOMG OUT ISN'T EASYGAY YOUTH OFTEN FACE THEIR SET OF CHALLENG AFTER G OUT ABOUT THEIR GENR PREFERENC.GETTY-IMAGTHE ROLE OF PARENTSAS PARENTS, ALL YOU N DO IS PROVI THEM WH LOVE AND SUPPORT. THIS N START OM AN EARLY AGE IF YOU N INTIFY THE SIGNS OF YOUR CHILD'S SEXUAL ORIENTATN.GETTY-IMAG​DRSG UPIT MAY SEEM STEREOTYPIL, BUT SOME REARCH SUGGTS THAT KIDS SHOW THEIR CLATN BY THE WAY THEY DRS UP. GETTY-IMAG​SPEECHAS PER A STUDY, THERE IS A DIFFERENCE SPEECH OF KIDS WHO ARE CLED TOWARDS THE SAME SEX. THE CHANGE THE TONE N EASILY BE TECTED EVEN WHEN THEY ARE FIVE YEARS OLD. GETTY-IMAG​TOYS PREFERENCEWHEN ROLE-PLAYG, IF A BOY OFTEN TAK THE FEME ROLE OR THE GIRL LIK TO PLAY ROUGH GAM, THEN YOU NEED TO PAY A LTLE ATTENTN. GETTY-IMAGYOU MAY ALSO LIKECOVID: WAYS TO STRENGTHEN YOUR KID'S IMM...
• WHEN DO GAY KIDS START “ACTG GAY”?
• HOW DO I KNOW IF MY FIVE-YEAR-OLD IS GAY?
• WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR CHILD SAYS: "I'M GAY"
• MY SON MIGHT BE GAY. WHAT SHOULD I SAY TO HIM?
• WHEN MY 8-YEAR-OLD GAY SON TGHT HIS CLASS ABOUT HARVEY MILK
• IS MY SON GAY OR IS A PHASE?

IS AN 8-YEAR-OLD TOO YOUNG TO KNOW HE’S GAY?

Let’ say you’re the straight mom or dad of a young child who happily tells you they’re gay.

My latt lumn for the wonrful folks at My Kid Is Gay offers some “do’s” and “don’ts” to help brg out your bt ner parent that scenar.

THIS IS HOW I REALLY REACTED WHEN MY SON TOLD ME HE WAS GAY

“My 8-year-old son is self-intifyg as gay. He has grown up a hoehold where sexualy is openly discsed and his nt is gay. I asked him if he unrstood what gay meant and he said, “Um, Mom, I want to marry a boy when I grown up.

First off, I want to ngratulate you and your hband for creatg a gay-posive environment your home. His simple explanatn of wantg to marry a boy when he grows up reflects an unrstandg of what the possibili are for love, and how natural is to be gay. Most people thk that gay people e out as teenagers (or later), and that they uldn’t possibly know about sexualy before puberty.

Your son’s answer about what means to be gay also mak me wonr if maybe he has a csh on another boy.

HOW DO I DISCS BEG GAY WH MY 8-YEAR-OLD?

That tends to be te even when there’s someone the fay who’s gay, like his nt. It sounds to me like you and/or your hband assumed your eight year old was straight, and now that he’s told you otherwise, wh a good grasp of what means to be gay, you are surprised and don’t unrstand how he uld know that at his age.

Some parents worry about their child beg happy or havg a difficult life bee they’re gay. So if you’re among them, here are a few Do’s and Don’ts I have for you on how to proceed as the parents of a happily out, gay 8-year-old.

Later, he told he was gay and later still as nonbary. DO: Love him unndnally, whether he’s gay, bisexual, or straight. You might be surprised to learn there was a time gap between when she realized she was gay and when she first told someone.

IS YOUR CHILD GAY?

Talkg to other gay people, too, n help put the g out age perspective for you.

DO: Take some time for yourself to get fortable wh the ia that your son intifi as gay. If you have more qutns along the way, I strongly remend you pick of up py of This Is a Book for Parents of Gay Kids.

OUR SEVEN-YEAR-OLD SON TOLD HE WAS GAY

If you or your hband are havg difficulty adjtg to the ia that your send grar is gay, seek out your lol PFLAG chapter. Faiarize yourself wh LGBTQ history: Kids and adults alike should know that queer people stretch back across every generatn of human existence, and that there’s nothg wrong or abnormal about beg gay.

“When a dad thks beg gay is beg a ‘sissy. “I’m gay.

I have had gay iends (and been eply hurt and disappoted when beme obv. He never wanted to be gay. To iends of me who may have gay children, or be gay themselv, please five me for my ignorance.

HOW TO TELL IF YOUR SON IS GAY

I don’t know if I’ll ever be “okay” wh the gay liftyle, but right now, I am okay wh my son beg gay, and right now, that is all that matters. What would you do if your child told you they were gay?

Q: My 8-year-old son asked what means to be gay.

This might sound somethg like, "Sometim men fall love wh men and women fall love wh women - when they do, we ll a 'gay' relatnship. " The qutn of why is lled gay is a whole different story, but the good news is that when you don't know the answer to a qutn, is perfectly fe to simply say, "You know, I don't know the answer to that!

YOUR CHILD JT TOLD YOU HE'S GAY. NOW WHAT?

" Some parents may fear that if they tell their younger children that "gay" is what means when people of the same genr are attracted to each other that they will be forced to answer qutns about sexual relatns between same sex upl, but my experience that is rarely the se - don't occur to most kids that age to ask. Some parents also fear that tellg a younger child that sometim men are attracted to men and women are attracted to women will put ias their kids' heads about "beg gay" themselv.

Both lbians and gay men often have a history of cross-sex-typed behavrs: ltle boys beg fatuated wh their mother's makp k; ltle girls enamored of field hockey or profsnal wrtlg. Prehomosexual boys tend to be more attracted to solary sports such as swimmg, cyclg and tennis than they are to rougher ntact sports such as football and soccer.

EARLY SIGNS TO TELL YOUR CHILD IS GAYTIMOFDIATHE DIFFICULT JOURNEYUNRSTANDG, ACKNOWLEDGG, AND SHARG ONE'S SEXUAL ORIENTATN WH THE WORLD, IS EASY FOR SOME, WHILE FOR OTHERS THE JOURNEY IS LONG AND DIFFICULT.GETTY-IMAGCOMG OUT ISN'T EASYGAY YOUTH OFTEN FACE THEIR SET OF CHALLENG AFTER G OUT ABOUT THEIR GENR PREFERENC.GETTY-IMAGTHE ROLE OF PARENTSAS PARENTS, ALL YOU N DO IS PROVI THEM WH LOVE AND SUPPORT. THIS N START OM AN EARLY AGE IF YOU N INTIFY THE SIGNS OF YOUR CHILD'S SEXUAL ORIENTATN.GETTY-IMAG​DRSG UPIT MAY SEEM STEREOTYPIL, BUT SOME REARCH SUGGTS THAT KIDS SHOW THEIR CLATN BY THE WAY THEY DRS UP. GETTY-IMAG​SPEECHAS PER A STUDY, THERE IS A DIFFERENCE SPEECH OF KIDS WHO ARE CLED TOWARDS THE SAME SEX. THE CHANGE THE TONE N EASILY BE TECTED EVEN WHEN THEY ARE FIVE YEARS OLD. GETTY-IMAG​TOYS PREFERENCEWHEN ROLE-PLAYG, IF A BOY OFTEN TAK THE FEME ROLE OR THE GIRL LIK TO PLAY ROUGH GAM, THEN YOU NEED TO PAY A LTLE ATTENTN. GETTY-IMAGYOU MAY ALSO LIKECOVID: WAYS TO STRENGTHEN YOUR KID'S IMM...

Children who show pronounced sex-atypil behavrs may have more of a geic loadg to their homosexualy. The behavral patterns are feared, loathed and often spoken of directly as harbgers of adult homosexualy. It is only relatively recently, however, that velopmental scientists have nducted ntrolled studi to intify the earlit and most reliable signs of adult homosexualy.

In lookg refully at the childhoods of gay adults, rearchers are fdg an trigug set of behavral ditors that homosexuals seem to have mon. Curly enough, the age-old homophobic fears of many parents reflect some genue predictive currency.

WHEN DO GAY KIDS START “ACTG GAY”?

Zucker, both psychologists, published a semal paper on childhood markers of homosexualy 1995. So on the basis of some earlier, shakier rearch, along wh a good dose of mon sense, Bailey and Zucker hypothized that homosexuals would show an verted pattern of sex-typed childhood behavrs—ltle boys preferrg girls as playmat and beg fatuated wh their mother's makp k; ltle girls strangely enamored of field hockey or profsnal wrtlg—that sort of thg. Given that a small proportn of the populatn is homosexual, prospective studi require a large number of children.

Although only 12 percent of the women grew up to be genr dysphoric (the unfortable sense that your blogil sex do not match your genr), the odds of the women reportg a bisexual or homosexual orientatn were up to 23 tim higher than would occur a general sample of young women.

And the same holds for gay men. Bailey and Zucker, who nducted a retrospective study which adults answered qutns about their past, revealed that 89 percent of randomly sampled gay men relled cross-sex-typed childhood behavrs exceedg the heterosexual median. The thors found that “those targets who, as adults, intified themselv as homosexual were judged to be genr nonnformg as children.

HOW DO I KNOW IF MY FIVE-YEAR-OLD IS GAY?

There is also evince of a “dosage effect”: the more genr-nonnformg characteristics there are childhood, the more likely is that a homosexual or bisexual orientatn will be prent adulthood. Not all ltle boys who like to wear drs grow up to be gay, nor do all ltle girls who spise drs bee lbians. I took to middle school wrtlg as a rather scrawny 80-pound eighth grar, and so dog, ironilly beme all too nsc of my homosexual orientatn.

Cross-cultural data show that prehomosexual boys are more attracted to solary sports such as swimmg, cyclg and tennis than they are to rougher ntact sports such as football and soccer; they are also ls likely to be childhood bulli. Rearchers readily nce that there are que likely multiple—and no doubt extremely plited—velopmental rout to adult homosexualy.

WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR CHILD SAYS: "I'M GAY"

Bee the data often reveal very early emergg tras prehomosexuals, children who show pronounced sex-atypil behavrs may have more of a geic loadg to their homosexualy, whereas gay adults who were sex-typil as children might trace their homosexualy more directly to particular childhood experienc. Why do parents worry so much about whether their child may or may not be gay?

All else beg equal, I spect we would be hard-prsed to fd parents who would actually prefer their offsprg to be homosexual. Evolutnarily, parental homophobia is a no-braer: gay sons and lbian dghters are not likely to reproduce (unls they get creative).

Lang, Elton John and Rachel Maddow's close relativ, but I n only image that the straight k are far better off terms of their own reproductive opportuni than they would be whout a homosexual danglg so magnificently on their fay tre. So cultivate your ltle prehomosexual's native talents, and your ultimate geic payoff uld, strangely enough, be even larger wh one very special gay child than would be if 10 medcre straight offsprg leaped om your los. I n say as a once prehomosexual pipsqueak that some preparatn on the part of others would have ma easier on me, rather than nstantly fearg rejectn or worryg about some rels slipup leadg to my “exposure.

MY SON MIGHT BE GAY. WHAT SHOULD I SAY TO HIM?

And another thg: mt be pretty hard to look to your prehomosexual toddler's limpid ey, bsh away the okie cmbs om her cheek and toss her out on the streets for beg article was origally published wh the tle "Is Your Child Gay? Gay, Straight, and the Reason Why: The Science of Sexual Orientatn. He took a be of chicken and announced, his matter-of-fact way, “I hope you know I’m gay.

In a flood of words, he told me he wanted to tell his iends that he was gay— felt like he was keepg a secret om them, and when he thought about too much, ma him feel heart ached, and I wished I uld rewd to the time when kiss and cuddl fixed absolutely everythg.

WHEN MY 8-YEAR-OLD GAY SON TGHT HIS CLASS ABOUT HARVEY MILK

” to “Who are you gay wh? So when another stunt said somethg to him like, “Well, at least I’m not gay!

IS MY SON GAY OR IS A PHASE?

Do this mean he’s gay? And if he is gay, what should we do? Do that mean he’s gay?

Michael Bailey and Kenh Zucker have found that those who engaged “genr nonnformg” play as children were more likely as adults to intify as gay or lbian. The gay and lbian adults the studi were almost always buckg the stereotyp as kids. ” In other words, while cross-genr play may be an ditor of homosexualy, is by no means 100 percent accurate.