In talking to both of them over the years, they both claim they had no idea my Dad was gay. Then possibly once I was born and the pressure was off, that perhaps somehow my Mom realized something was “wrong” in the marriage and that drove her to leave him. I don’t honestly know if that sense of obligation drove him to marry. Growing up I always thought that he probably felt obligated to marry and have a male heir.Īfter all, he was the son of a Baptist Preacher and there would not have been much tolerance in the 1940’s or 50’s for him to come out as gay. I don’t think anyone knew yet that my Dad was gay.Īnd in fact, it wasn’t he that left my Mom, but the other way around. For the next several years, I would only see my Dad a handful of times a year. Then we moved to Philadelphia a long way from my Dad.
My Mom and I then moved from my hometown of Mineral Wells, TX to Dallas.īy the time I was 2 or so, my Mom had remarried. To hear both of them tell it, my Dad being gay wasn’t a factor in the split. They went through a number of miscarriages and were all but ready to give up when I was born in 1964.īut somehow despite all they’d been through (or perhaps because of it), they divorced shortly after I was born. My Mom and Dad were married over a decade before I came along.
Thus I never had that aha moment of realizing “I have a gay father”!īut my childhood was far from conventional. I don’t recall a time when I didn’t know my Dad was gayįrom my earliest memories of my Dad around age 5, I think I always knew my dad was gay. I look at the challenges we faced, what impact, if any, his sexuality had on his ability to parent, and how we eventually became closer. So in this article, I explore exactly what my relationship was like with my dad. Additionally, as he was focused on exploring his newfound sexuality, it left little time for him to actually focus on parenting.īut we did eventually get close, well into my adulthood. Growing up with a gay father, particularly one who was afraid to come out, presented challenges in our ability to get emotionally close. So this is my story of growing up with a gay father.
But I knew he was gay by the time I was 7 or 8. I never grew up with my father as he and my mom divorced when I was 6 months old.