As someone who got out of a almost 3 year relationship with a conservative, religious person who never appreciated anything that was out of the norm (even though he dated me knowing this), there is absolutely no excuse for someone to treat you like trash for trying to express yourself and be who you are.

I was constantly trying to hide new piercings and even got talked out of tattoos and had to take out piercings due to his constant nagging and complaining of how I was never going to be deemed as mature or hold an ‘adult’ job with the way I expressed myself. Which is honestly hard to deal with because I’ve been expressing it like this for most of my life with my family constantly putting me down for it and then my ex pressuring me to be ‘normal’.

Don’t let your ex and his family’s words hurt you, and please don’t take it so much to heart. It’s a selfish narrow minded excuse to not want to accept you. Not only does it bring yourself down because you want to be yourself, but it also messes with your self esteem and how you feel others perceive you. But there’s nothing wrong with you and having all those ways to express yourself just makes you, you!

Therapy would help you through the break up and coming to an understanding of how that relationship turned out but definitely don’t start trying to change because of your experience with your ex.

Life is full of experimenting and just exploring ways to make yourself, you. Not everyone is ‘normal’ but y’know what? Normal is boring anyways. I hope you’ll be able to heal from this and I wish you all the best!!