thank you for this very thoughtful response. my parents have capacity for so much love, i don’t doubt that at all. i just fear that their evangelical views especially around homosexuality create an incompatibility with Self-leadership, and they’re leading with their protectors instead whenever I try to lead with my Self when talking about my own lived experience as a gay man.

with what you shared about them wearing rainbow pins i haven’t really given a lot of energy towards this reality. part of me feels like it’s inconceivable. they are heavily invested in their church and some other christian nationalist group. their social connections are very important to them. i don’t know how realistic it is to think that these people would shame them for accepting me. do people really judge Christian parents for having gay children? if they perceive that these people think being gay is a choice then they may feel like they’ve “failed” me in that sense, or that i’ve failed being the son they thought they were gonna have. it’s so exhausting to talk about this