Your Child Jt Told You He's Gay. Now What? | Psychology Today

Contents:

• IS YOUR CHILD GAY?
• HOW TO TELL IF YOUR SON IS GAY
• YOUR CHILD JT TOLD YOU HE'S GAY. NOW WHAT?
• WHAT TO DO WHEN YOUR CHILD SAYS: "I'M GAY"
• MY SON MIGHT BE GAY. WHAT SHOULD I SAY TO HIM?
• EARLY SIGNS TO TELL YOUR CHILD IS GAY
• SO YOU THK YOUR SON IS GAY? DON'T ASK. LET HIM TELL YOU
• IS MY SON GAY OR IS A PHASE?
• MANY PARENTS STGGLE TO ADJT AFTER LEARNG CHILD IS GAY, STUDY FDS
• LIVGTOPICSALL LIVGSAVAGE LOVETRAVELASTROLOGYFROM THE VLTHEALTHSTYLELGBT+SEX & ROMANCEBT OF VANUVERTRANSPORATNCARTOONSHOMELS VANUVER SAVAGE LOVE COLUMNTHE SAME L SHOULD APPLY WHETHER YOUR SON IS GAY OR STRAIGHT
• THIS IS HOW I FELT WHEN MY SON TOLD ME HE WAS GAY
• I TRIED TO STOP MY SON FROM BEG GAY. I WISH I HADN'T
• HOW DO I KNOW IF MY SON IS GAY?

IS YOUR CHILD GAY?

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.

It is only relatively recently, however, that velopmental scientists have nducted ntrolled studi to intify the earlit and most reliable signs of adult homosexualy.

HOW TO TELL IF YOUR SON IS GAY

In lookg refully at the childhoods of gay adults, rearchers are fdg an trigug set of behavral ditors that homosexuals seem to have mon. 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.

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. 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.

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

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. 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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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? As I relayed When Your Child Is Gay: What You Need To Know (Sterlg, 2016), I found out that my son was gay om a note wh our son's name entwed wh another boy's, surround by a heart. Acrdg to my -thor, psychiatrist Jonathan Tobk, "Gay children feel credibly vulnerable when g out to their parents, and tak time to work up the urage to do this.

So below I've provid a better list of ways to tell if your son is a gay person who is you e home om work and you hear nois upstairs and you go up to vtigate and your son's door is open and you tch him "hookg up" (as kids ll today) wh his iend Michael, and you quickly turn around and walk back downstairs and later that night over dner you say "You know, honey, if there's ever anythg you need to tell me...

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

" and he says "Mom, I'm gay, " then your son is your son has recently gone to llege and hasn't been touch much and you figure hey he's new to llege, he's by makg iends and whatnot, and then late one night he lls you on the phone soundg upset about somethg and you ask him what's wrong and he's quiet for a while and then says "Nothg's wrong, really, I'm jt... Dad, I'm gay, " then your son is your son ever been on a long drive to one of your dghter's swim meets wh you and when stopped at a red light he's turned to you and said "Mom, I feel like I owe to you and dad to tell you that, well, Donald is my boyiend.

Chanc are that if you are on your athbed and your tranged son to vis you the middle of a ray night and he ss by your bed quietly until he begs to cry and clutch your hand and says "I wish I'd told you sooner that I'm gay" and then you both stay there silence, you pretendg to be asleep, the only noise the beepg of the mach that will only keep you alive for a ltle while longer, your son is you and your spoe are ever visg your son the big cy he now liv wh all his fancy iends and fancy rtrants and you're out to an awkward lunch before your tra home and you three get to another potls fight about years-old stuff and 's really unfortable and fally you or your spoe says "Well, if you'd jt settle down wh the right girl, I thk-" and then your son terpts you by yellg "Guys, I'm GAY. " and then you lgh and ms his hair and the livg room your hband shows your son's boyiend his mol ships, then your son is probably gay, though he might be bisexual, so be reful about your son ever says "Oh my goodns, " when surprised or when openg a gift, well then yeah, he probably gay.

Well, my study of 65 fai of gay and lbian youth for the book, Comg Out, Comg Home: Helpg Fai Adjt to a Gay or Lbian Child, I found that some parents get to the pot where they believe that the experience of havg a gay child actually ma them a better person—more open-md and sensive to the needs of others, particularly those other mory groups. The tstworthy nfidants let them vent but also rrected some of the misperceptns they absorbed om society, such as that gay people are lonely, unhappy, promiscuo, not fay-oriented, unable to have children, or sted for an unhappy life.

EARLY SIGNS TO TELL YOUR CHILD IS GAY

They immediately clocked as gay, while we immediately clocked them as we warmed up to another, one mom anxly said: "I have a qutn: I am pretty sure my son is gay, but I don't know what to do. "For example, if someone the word "gay" place of "stupid, " remd them that the two are not terchangeable, and suggt they should say what they actually mean stead. "The rourc n help:PFLAG: The untry’s largt anizatn ung parents, fai, and alli wh people who are lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr, and Spectm: Offers groups, trag, and rourc promotg genr sensivy and cln for all youthGLBT Natnal Rource Database: LGBTQ+ digal directory of rourcNatnal Queer and Trans Therapists of Color Network: Directory of therapists/unselors who are people of lorNatnal LGBTQ Task Force: The progrsive advocy arm of the LGBTQ+ movementDurg LGBTQ Pri Month, TODAY is sharg the muny’s history, pa, joy and what’s next for the movement.

How Olr Brothers Influence HomosexualyHomosexualy might be partly driven by a mother’s immune rponse to her male fet—which creas wh each son she MacGregor / RtersHere’s what we know: Homosexualy is normal.

Female Japane maqu will even pete tersexually wh mal for exclive accs to female sexual ’s what we don’t know: What, specifilly, someone to bee gay, straight, or somethg between.

SO YOU THK YOUR SON IS GAY? DON'T ASK. LET HIM TELL YOU

Part of the explanatn is geic, but bee most intil tws of gay people are straight, heredy don’t expla “why” qutn is important bee “there is a strong rrelatn between beliefs about the origs of sexual orientatn and tolerance of non-heterosexualy, ” acrdg to the report thors, who are om seven universi spanng the globe. (When Atlantic ntributor Chandler Burr proposed his 1996 book, A Separate Creatn, that people are born gay, Southern Baptists lled to boytt Disney films and parks prott agast the publisher, Disney subsidiary Hypern.

IS MY SON GAY OR IS A PHASE?

) It shouldn’t matter whether people “choose” to be gay, but polilly, do—at least for of the most nsistent environmental explanatns for homosexualy is lled the “aternal birth orr effect. Studi have found that a man whout olr brothers has about a 2 percent chance of beg gay, but one wh four olr brothers has a 6 percent chance.

Average prevalence 2013 (Sav-Williams and Vrangalova)Acrdg to the report, Blanchard now plans to tt mothers of gay and straight men for the prence of the antibodi.

But gaps will rema, such as why some firstborn sons are gay, why some intil tws of gay sons are straight, and why women are gay, to name jt a review-paper thors do le out one explanatn for homosexualy, however: That tolerance for gay people enurag more people to bee gay. “Homosexual orientatn do not crease equency wh social tolerance, although s exprsn ( behavr and open intifitn) may do so, ” they reasong—that a tolerant society somehow enurag homosexualy to flourish—has been ed to support anti-gay legislatn Uganda, Rsia, and elsewhere.

MANY PARENTS STGGLE TO ADJT AFTER LEARNG CHILD IS GAY, STUDY FDS

For gay, bi, and queer sons, who may grow up wh the sense that somethg about their masculy is different, your reassurance means the world.

LIVGTOPICSALL LIVGSAVAGE LOVETRAVELASTROLOGYFROM THE VLTHEALTHSTYLELGBT+SEX & ROMANCEBT OF VANUVERTRANSPORATNCARTOONSHOMELS VANUVER SAVAGE LOVE COLUMNTHE SAME L SHOULD APPLY WHETHER YOUR SON IS GAY OR STRAIGHT

“It's the words that you say that bee the thoughts their heads, ” Flor a recent study, published the Journal of Pediatric Healthre, Flor and his lleagu terviewed 30 gay, bisexual, and queer cisgenr teen boys on their munitn wh their parents about sexualy. Aga and aga, the boys emphasized the importance of an open and ongog clive nversatn about sexualy, one that acknowledg the existence of gay sex.

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

No matter how awkward, the nversatns signaled that ’s okay to e to mom or dad, that they n nfi their parents, and that they n ask them qutns — even before turng to iends or the nversatns are all the more ccial the era of “Don’t Say Gay” legislatn, one terviewee noted.

I TRIED TO STOP MY SON FROM BEG GAY. I WISH I HADN'T

”In his Journal of Pediatric Healthre study, Flor found that was important to gay, bi, and queer youth that their parents acknowledged sex and were open to clive nversatns about — the discsns helped remove some of the stigma of gay sex and rerced the ia that home is a safe environment.

”Chanc are, you’ve msed up the past — lghed at a homophobic joke on televisn, ma a remark about a man’s feme cloth or prentatn, or reacted wh disfort to nversatns about same-sex relatnships or sex. Dependg on the answers receiv, the app might tell an anx mother, "You do not have to worry, your son is not gay, " the article reported.

HOW DO I KNOW IF MY SON IS GAY?

Or, parents wonrg about their prospects for grandkids might read that their son, while potentially a dabbler gay sex, is sentially straight:. "Socially rponsible pani should have standards that prevent such offensive and rogatory ntent, " the terim head of the Gay and Lbian Alliance Agast Defamatn, Mike Thompson, clared.

Several apps cried as anti-gay have been protted by gays, gay supporters, and GLBT groups over the urse of the last year, cludg an iPhone app based on the anti-gay "Manhattan Declaratn" and an app for Catholics that helps them tally up their ss prr to gog to nfsn. The text claims that the ph for equal marriage rights for gay and lbian fai is nothg more than an attempt to "refe" marriage to su "fashnable iologi, " and "affirm[s]...