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Our Sons Story Our Sons Story
NAV Are these Questions Familiar? NAV
NAV Did Your Child Come Out to You? - Parents are never prepared to accept the news that their children are gay. I will never forget that Friday night in December of 1997. NAV
NAV Is My Child Gay or Confused? - When Adam told us he was gay, we thought, "This can't be true, he's just confused". NAV
  Should I Accept My Child's Orientation? - For Patti and I, our first reaction was absolutely not. He is only 16 years old. What does he know about sexual relations? NAV
  Am I Ashamed of My Child or of Myself? - When Adam came out to us, shame was a big word in our lives. I was afraid that people would overlook Adam's wonderful qualities and focus on just one aspect of him ---- his sexual orientation. NAV
  Did My Parents Make Me Gay? - Yes, absolutely, my parents made me gay. They had sex, my mom got pregnant, and bam!...I popped out of the womb - brown hair, brown eyes, and gay! NAV
  Is Homosexuality a Sin? - When it comes to the subject of homosexuality, our religious institutions remind me of the Civil Rights Movement of the 60's. NAV
  Who Can I Talk to About This? - Take comfort, you are only lost for a little while. There is a light at the end of this long, lonely path. NAV
  What is God's Plan? - How does being gay fit in God's plan? This is the hardest question to discuss. The answer will depend on whom you are talking to. NAV
  Why Would My Child Choose to be Gay? - You have just asked an important question. Ironically, once you have exhausted all of the obvious possibilities, you will probably come to understand the absurdity of the question itself. NAV
 
Other Points of Interest
 
   
  Hope... How Our Family has Progressed - After learning that Adam was gay, Patti and I were devastated. Our response was typical. We prayed for a miracle.  

 

(-- "Our Son's Story"... CONTINUED --)

Then came the unsettling part. For some unknown reason, she started telling her friends that Adam was gay. Here is a 12 year old girl, clueless about homosexuality, spreading a rumor. This was years before Adam came to grips with his own sexuality so she was just being malicious. She enlisted all those in her sphere of influence, especially those in her youth group at church, to help make Adam's life a living hell. She was very successful.

By the time Patti and I had any idea of this, the damage had already been done.

From that time on, the kids began calling Adam "gay" and "fag". If the others did not flatly refuse to allow Adam to sit at their lunch table, they would all simply get up and move to another table when he sat down. The bus ride to and from school shortly became infected with the same rhetoric and no one would allow him to sit with them. To stop this pain, Patti became his personal taxi service; dropping him off and picking him up.

This stopped the humiliation on the bus but we couldn't help feeling as though they had won. We were insane with anger at the cruelty those kids showed our son. I wanted to go on that bus and crack some heads.

Through all of this public pain and humiliation, Adam was constantly wounded and battered but he was never broken. I wonder how many of his classmates could go through that endurance test and come through it like Adam did.

Middle school was a living hell for all of us and we couldn't wait for it to be over. Our hope was that high school would provide a clean start with the students becoming more mature and less cruel. We must have been the most naive parents in the world.

High school started out with such promise. Adam came home after the first week of school and said that he was interested in a certain girl. He told us how she was obviously interested him as well. He made his move and they agreed to meet at the Friday night football game. Things were looking up!

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