I have a very long, frustrating, still ongoing story so bear with me.

First, I’ll say that I came out to my close friends - almost all straight guys - in 2011 and they genuinely could not have cared less. It was amazing and I’m grateful for every one of them.

Now for the hard part - my parents.

I first came out to my mom in 2009 when I was a junior in college. It happened out of nowhere in the middle of a completely unrelated and probably really dumb argument. In the moment she was fairly supportive but after that day it was like it never happened. I guess she was in deep denial to the point that I questioned if she even remembered the conversation. Three years later I got fed up with the constant questions of why I still didn’t have a girlfriend and I came out again. This time was worse. She outright refused to accept it. She wasn’t angry or mean or anything - just sad and I assume disappointed. Again, over the next few years it was like it never happened.

I’m 2016, I had a really intense breakdown about feeling like I was living a lie, so I sat my mom down for the third time, and this time with my dad in the room too, and opened up about the year-long relationship I had been in with a guy who I had since broken up with but who was still at that time a close friend. This time my mom was more supportive. She listened and tried to understand

My dad, on the other hand - my best friend on Earth and the only person I feel truly gets me in almost every way, was devastated. Absolutely destroyed. See, my dad is a very masculine guy and I am too, for the most part. In his mind the two just didn’t add up at all. Silly, I know, but that’s him. This was the first time I had ever seen him cry, and the only time since. I’m the last person in our family to carry out last name (I only have a married sister), and if I don’t have kids, which I desperately want but let’s be real, being gay makes that a lot harder, I’ll be the end of the line. Our name will die out. That’s a horrible, torturous thought for me and I carry a lot of guilt about it. He told me I could never tell my grandparents, which hurt just as much. Here’s the thing: my dad’s side of the family is from the Caribbean - not one of the places where homosexuality is punishable by death, but still extremely intolerant to the idea.

I fell into a deep, terrible depression, considered ending everything many times over the following weeks, but thankfully didn’t go through with it for the sake of my loved ones. For me, all I ever wanted to hear from my parents was that they just want me to be happy. I didn’t get that and it broke me.

Eventually my dad and I got back on track, he apologized for putting so much pressure on me to keep the line going, and things seemed okay...ish.

Just this past weekend it hit me that still, after all these years of coming out over and over again that there was still a wall between me and my parents and I became depressed about it again. All I’ve wanted all these years is to be fully accepted, not tolerated. This past Tuesday I had them over to my house and sat them down and we did this whole thing again, for the last time. Finally, FINALLY my mom was great - extremely supportive and she told me what I need to hear all this time - “I just want you to be happy.” Sadly, my dad regressed and now I’m a mess again, trying to figure out how to make things okay again. It’s hard. I’m not someone who can just let that relationship with my dad go. It’s the single most important relationship in my life and I’d be lost with it.

So yeah, I’ve been coming out to the same two people for years now. I’ve always been told it gets better but at the moment it doesn’t feel like it. I’ll be 30 in December and still, that weight that I’ve been trying to release from my shoulders crushes me a little more every single day. I’m going to my first therapy appointment this Saturday to try to learn to deal with my issues and stop putting everyone else’s happiness ahead of my own. I hope it helps. I need it to.