Coming Out and Relationships with My Sons
When life happens every parent faces the question of how my child will respond to this event/situation. Will it hurt them? Will it make them confused? Will it bring us closer or pull us apart? Will they get angry, sad, or mad? Will this help them grow or will this stall their progress?
These questions can paralyze a parent. I remember with my first child debating back and forth with my ex-wife as we tried to figure out between formula or breastmilk. I remember scrutinizing day cares down to the basics to the point we just decided one of us would always be home with the kid. All the small things aside, parents also make huge life decisions based on the wellbeing of the children.
But what about those things that a parent can’t control? I have come to learn that these are the things that effect our children in the most positive way because it is through these things a parent and a child bond.
The things we can’t control humble us and make us human. When our child see’s us humbled by life their view of superhuman dad disappears momentarily and they become beings on our level. I remember seeing my father cry as a child and it made me feel a longing and a love for him. I reached out and embraced him for his good, which is rarely the case for a young child, but the act shows tremendous growth. These chances for a child to show love are so important for both the child and the parent.
This is what coming out did. It placed me and my 8-year old son on level playing ground. It showed him that I don’t have it all figured out. But this didn’t make him think less of me. Rather, when I came out to him and explained what gay meant to me he replied, “oh wow dad, I understand now why you wrote a book!”
Life as I knew it changed in many ways after coming out and it has been so very fun to explore some of these with my son. I was the type of closet homosexual who displayed hyper and often toxic masculinity to shield my gay from being exposed. I held in emotions, I acted tough, I said stupid things like “boys don’t cry” and “a real man knows how to yield an axe.” All the while there was this little boy screaming inside of me saying, “let me out! I want out to dance, perform theater, I want to laugh, I want to cry, LET ME OUT so I can play with your son!”
Coming out opened up this possibility for our relationship to experience fun and play together, but also authenticity. Children are smart little critters. They spend most of their waking moments observing the actions of the adults in their lives. If these actions aren’t authentic what happens? Research shows that children who’s parents show incongruent display of behaviors often end up with disorganized attachment styles. Disorganized attachment style has been correlated with borderline personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder and conduct disorder (Click here for the research).
Therefore, not only has coming out helped me to be more authentic with my boys, but it has also helped us to begin having more fun together. Play is an essential part of a child’s life. In fact there are therapy clinics where that’s exactly what they do. Play is what they specialize in. They literally teach kids and parents how to play together to repair their relationship.
I guess you can say coming out has been positively therapeutic for my relationships with my children. It has created closer ties and a more authentic relationship. Finding ways to be authentic with children in my mind is just as important as helping them to have a healthy diet. It’s going to pave the way for how they choose relationships in their future. It’s going to predict how they resolve conflict and how they display love to their partner. Ultimately, it’s the framework upon which they build the rest of their life and its up to us to just be ourselves for them.
The memoir is here! From Heroin addict to triathlete and gay father
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