My son said he is gay. Oh what do I do?

Question

I can't let my church find out that I have someone in my family who's gay! Oh what do I do? What are some things that I can do that can change him back to liking girls? I have never had any one in my family who was gay and neither did my husband? Oh we need help!!!

He is 16 years old.

Answer 1

accept your son sexuality
love him, support him & enjoy his company

Thank God that you are blessed with a healthy child

Answer 2

Don't worry PeekABoo. I would look into it outside of Yahoo answers. The answers here tend to be trendy at best, although there are good answers sometimes and can help in searching. If you want to email me and I could give you an answer privately. Don't worry too much about what other people think as people tend to be openminded at church and otherwise, but you have a right to privacy as well, so I do understand your concern.

Answer 3

Help him paint his room pink. Ask him for some fashion tips. Maybe get him to redecorate the living room.

Seriously....he's your son! The last thing you should worry about is what your church will think. Aren't Christians supposed to be tolerant and non-judgemental? Oh yeah....I forgot. They are mostly hypocrits! Accept him and dont try to change him.

Answer 4

Tell your son, "Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind."
- Dr. Seuss

Tell your church. Tell everybody at your church. Accept him for who he is and be proud of him for having the courage to tell you. Don't treat him as something to be ashamed of. If the people at your church can't handle it, then they're not people worth associating with. It's their problem, not your family's.

I knew a girl whose parents tried to change her back into being straight. Not only did it not work, but the Christian counselor she went to ended up divorcing his wife after coming out.

The only thing you can change is your attitude.

Answer 5

It strikes me that you are of faith, yet unwilling to "accept" ??? Maybe you need to take a good long look at yourself and see what just isn't right about someone who goes to church but doesn't have the ability to just accept that we are all indifferent.

The smartest thing you could do is to stop worrying about what everyone else may think, they aren't living your life. Support your son.

Answer 6

Im glad that most of the answers here have not included any sort of angry response to your question. Many of us (Im gay) have dealth with rejection from our families and can react angrily from seeing others put through the same pain.

I have several things to say in response to your question.

First. As i said above, many of my friends have met with rejection from their families on coming out. I have witnessed second hand through the eyes of my friends how painful that is. I was raised in a catholic family. Im sure i dont have to state the obvious, but the catholic church is not accepting of homosexuality. Because of this I was deathly afraid of coming out to my parents and it caused me great distress. However, my parents were wonderful. They should write the book on how to react when your child comes out to you. The first thing each of them said to me was "We love you no matter what". The second thing they said was that I their children (I have siblings) are the most important thing in their life and they want us to be happy. They told me that if being gay made me happy then they would accept that and be happy for me. (Of course this was a misunderstanding since being gay is not really a choice and what made me happy was accepting that I was gay and not being gay, but i chose to accept the positive intent of the statement rather than to focus on the misunderstanding). To this day, i consider this the greatest gift they could have given me. Acceptance of who i am and unconditional love. I will always love and respect them both for this.

So, let me make a few reccomendations:
1. Make sure your child knows that you love them unconditionally.
2. Focus on your child and yourselves. It concerns me that from the tone of your question you are more concerned about how your church will react than on the well being of your child or your love for him.
3. Try to accept your sons homosexuality. There are many christian faiths that do not consider homosexuality a sin.
4. If you can not find it in your heart to accept your childs homosexuality, please, please do not try to change your son. There is vast and growing research that shows it can not be done and that it is potentially very harmful to the child. Some "ex-gay ministries" claim success at converting homosexuals to heterosexuals, but the best t hey can ever do is teach homosexuals to pretend to be heterosexual. The scientific data is sufficiently definive that both the American Psychiatric Society and the AMA have official opinions that it is not possible to change sexual orientation and that attempting to do so is harmful.
5. If your church can not accept that your son is homosexual, then find a different church. More than any other commandment in the bible, Christs major teaching was that we should love each other, not judge each other, and not cause harm to each other. There are many christian faiths that accept homosexuality as a normal variant without compromising the christian principles of monogamy, love and commitement. I would suggest you start with the United Chruch of Christ.
6. I think getting help is a great idea for you. You probably need family counseling. However, avoid counseling designed to convert your child. The best that this can do is teach your son to pretend he is something he is not which will prevent him from ever having a happy and fufilling life. Is that really what you want for him? I would strongly advise you to contact pflag in your community for help. They can stear you toward scientifically and psychiatrically sound ways to deal with this crisis for you.

Answer 7

Don't make it about you and your church first of all. I don't have experience in it either but if it happends to my son, I'll live with it. I believe it becomes acceptable after the initial shock. So be of good cheer and tell him you love him.

Answer 8

It would be easier to physically change him into a female than to convert his sexuality. You can tell your church that your son died, then introduce them to your newly adopted daughter; Convert to Judaism then throw him/her a batmitsvah. And finally, find him/her a nice jewish-boy to marry.
Problem solved. Does this help?

Answer 9

i dont have much experience in gay ppl but from wht i know, if they're gay, they're gay, u cant change them.

Answer 10

Accept him for who he is, otherwise, he'll end up hating you.