What did your parents teach you that you had to unlearn?

My mother lived in Iran until she was 27. She came to America and was a stay-at home mom for a decade and a half to raise my brother and myself before pursuing her own dreams and aspirations. Having closed herself off from western culture the way she has, there were certain perspectives she continued to hold from Iran that had no place in a 1st world country of such a high degree of freedom.

There are many things that I had to unlearn from my mother once I reached an age to make my own sound decisions. The most significant one was that being gay is a disgusting, unforgivable thing.

I myself am gay and have known for almost 10 years now. There are 3 separate times when I attempted suicide because of my perception of homosexuality. I never had a problem with gay people, but accepting that I was gay was somehow different in my head. My parents always told me gays are dirty creatures and would refer to them by derogatory terms. Growing up, without ever consciously realizing it, I associated everything my parents said about gays with myself. My self-confidence sank to new lows, I hated every bit of myself and wished for nothing more than to be "normal."

I've only come out to my close friends as of right now. I'm still unlearning my involuntary discrimination against myself so that I can tell my parents. I know they'll love me no matter what, but being middle eastern and coming to America during the AIDS outbreak of the 80's creates 30 years of bad publicity I have to undo when I tell them.

Long story short, the most important thing I had to unlearn from my mother is that your happiness is less important than your image. And I'm so grateful to have had the chance to learn it the hard way and truly appreciate the value of that lesson.

/r/AskReddit Thread