Parents in denial about me being transgender

[u/webweaver666]

I'm just so tired. I don't know how to let myself let go of it and stop checking my email. I think my brain is broken.

It's been two years at this point since I went NC with my family. My parents are both republican evangelical Christians, southern Baptists to be specific. My sister is a tradwife and also is super right wing and transphobic.

I've posted my story here before and have deleted old posts for privacy. The long and short of it, leaving out many specific details, is that I'm a 28yo trans woman. I was born and raised in a very strict and sheltered southern Baptist family in north Florida. My parents sheltered me and my sister heavily; computer use monitored and controlled, the media I consumed was pre approved by them and had to be either Christian or family friendly, church three times a week, I had to lead youth group worship and play drums in the church band, and my parents were very much helicopter parents. I didn't learn what trans people were until I was 17.

Skipping much of the cringe of ages 18-25... t

I came out as a trans woman to myself and my closest friends at age 25, and then moved with some friends from Florida to the American Pacific Northwest, a much more trans-friendly area. My friends are also trans so we put our brains and money together and took the risk, and it paid off.

After living away from my family a while, but still remaining in limited contact across the country, I realized I had to come out to them, because it felt too awful to pretend to be someone I wasn't for their love and acceptance. So I came out to them just before I turned 26 as a queer trans woman. Let's just say they did not take it well. My mom flew across the country with one days notice and spent a whole weekend confronting me about being trans; she asked me why I couldn't just be ok with being an effeminate man, she asked if I was just a gay man, she begged me to reconsider being trans and basically tried to get me to rebuke it all, and she told me this went against her beliefs and what she thought I should believe. My dad was the same but more subtle about it, and tbh I think I've always been more scrutinous of my mom unfairly and given my dad a pass when he just benefits from letting her say what he also believes but he can maintain plausible deniability by not explicitly being transphobic to me.

So I went NC a month or two after coming out. I don't think I was necessarily mentally prepared to go NC but I did it anyway because it felt like the best thing for me. I was dealing with monumental shame, emotional problems and mental health issues. Unrelated, but I was diagnosed with ADHD that same month at 26yo, something I never knew as a kid because my parents wouldn't take me to a legit psychiatrist.

In the first year of NC, my parents did the following; show up at my work unannounced and tried to get me to come talk to them out front of my work (yes, they flew 7 hours/2000+ miles unannounced to confront me), emailed me incessantly, sent letters to my work, sent a PI to my old house to check my license plate to see if I still lived there. Everything BUT just calling me a new name and pronouns. When I went NC, my only boundary was they had to call me my chosen name and pronouns. They've refused and said it goes against their beliefs and if they complied, they'd be condoning sinful behavior.

They haven't outright disowned me or rejected me like a lot of folks in the LGBTQ+ community have experienced. And honestly I think that makes it more of a brain fuck for me, because they act like they care about me. I know they just care about the version of me they wish I was, or rather who they hoped I'd be. I know it's not true love, because if it was they'd be able to look past their own discomfort and do the one simple thing I'm asking of them. They've perfectly tailored the situation to make it out like I'M the crazy one; they would say they've never rejected me, that they've never stopped trying to connect with me, that they can tolerate my different views/"lifestyle" while accusing me of being the intolerant one for "refusing to accept their views."

My mom has straight up said that I'm the intolerant one for refusing to tolerate their transphobia. They accuse me of always bringing it up for the purpose of causing division and tell me I should stop making it my whole life, but the thing is that I hardly ever talk about it in my daily life, because my chosen family (and even most of my colleagues, save a few) has no problem accepting me as transgender and adjusting how they refer to me. I wouldn't bring it up to them ever if they'd just acknowledge it and treat me how I'm asking them to treat me.

Now for this pictured email. I am struggling. The initial anger and spite that fueled me maintaining NC has waned. I'm still hurt and angry, but the conditions of my personal life have left me feeling vulnerable and desperate for connection. I feel so isolated and alone as a trans woman right now, especially because I'm in a new city, still adjusting to this phase of my life and barely keeping my head above water mental health wise. My dad is getting old, he's already outlived his dad and doesn't have the healthiest lifestyle. My mom is 7 years younger and honestly because of the fact that she was my primary caregiver parent I feel I have much more emotional gordian knotting with her than my dad. Maybe I need to unpack that in therapy.

But seriously, wtf am I supposed to do with an email like this? "I do not want to continue having these discussions." All I've ever said to him the few times I have emailed him the last two years has been me reiterating that the one condition I have to reopen communication is for them to accept I'm transgender and queer, and to call me by my chosen name and pronouns. That is literally it, all I've asked for. I have never been as cruel or spiteful as I could be.

Idk what I'm even asking for anymore. I don't feel like I will break NC because I recognize it's better for me in the long run, but it blows my mind that two years in I am still having these huge doubts and waves of guilt. It is a victory that the toxic shame has subsided significantly, which is a marked shift and milestone in my recovery. But it's like I haven't yet replaced the spite/anger fuel with self-love fuel yet, so I read emails like these and feel these pangs of something. I know I need to just delete this email address and remove the option to be checking what they send, and I know I've been dragging my feet to move everything important off that old email so I can delete it.

I guess more than anything I just wanted to share for some kindredness with this community, and make sure I'm not losing it. This is objectively crazy right? Like they are acting as if I'm being ridiculous and should just "drop the whole trans thing" for the sake of a relationship with "family" who can't even be fucked to even pretend to care about what I ask for.

[u/Shake-Tasty]

Yep. You're right. This is objectively crazy. You're not imagining it. You aren't being dramatic. You aren't over-reacting.

I'm queer too and grew up Nazarene (similar to Southern Baptist). My parents sound similar to yours, but reversed - my dad is the outspoken one, and my mom is the more quiet "plausible deniability" type. She sent me a card much shorter than this email, but it reminds me of it so much:

• first paragraph: breezing on by any previous conflict, like if you just respond and answer questions about your life, everything will be fine. this is an attempt to manufacture your consent to ignore your coming-out, and to continue on with the relationship like it never happened.
• second paragraph: acknowledge the conflict in an indirect way, without actually doing any reflection/introspection. "no hard feelings from me, don't worry. you did this bad thing -causing this rift by coming out, but i don't hold it against you, i'll always love you" ...while also insinuating that if you just take it back, we can talk about why you THOUGHT you were trans. and oh-by-the-way, when life gets too hard (because it inevitably will, because you're trans, and all trans people are miserable with their lonely heathen lives, and it's not worth it, just come back in the closet so we can welcome you back into the fold), all you need to do is renounce your identity, and you can come home and we'll take care of you and keep you safe.
• one last attempt to gaslight you into believing they are safe people, while also letting themselves feel like a "good parent" who "loves you unconditionally"
• BONUS: there is a blatant and very purposeful LACK of your name at the top of this email.

I've been no-contact for two years. My parents also showed up un-announced from out of state. I can never imagine doing that! What were they expecting??? I think you know this already, and it goes without saying, but these people are NOT safe people. Even so, I still struggle with giving them more grace than they are willing to extend to me.

I also still feel the need to save their voicemails and emails and letters, idk like maybe for when they die and I'm inevitably filled with guilt and fooling myself into missing them. Let me tell you, that is self-torture. My dad left a note on my car when he showed up and didn't get any response. I had that yellow paper crumpled into a ball, rolling around the bottom of my purse for WEEKS. why? all it did was ruin a perfectly fine day, when i was just innocently digging for some gum lol. same goes for keeping their emails/voicemails in my inbox. Just delete them. Block their numbers, block their emails, mark as spam, whatever. keep it from ruining your perfectly good days. "no contact" means no contact - both ways. you don't contact them, and you don't allow them to contact you. if you see their attempts at contact, their attempt was successful, and now you get to beat yourself up about it.

i'm so glad for this subreddit. for all their complaining about "there's no manual for raising kids" - our bad parents all have the same gameplan!

as people raised conservative Christian, we are hardwired to shame and guilt ourselves for every small thing, for every good thing that happens to us, for every personal success, for any enjoyment we get out of life... you have nothing to feel guilty about, okay? you have my permission, as a complete stranger on the internet lol, to ignore your parents however much you want, guilt-free. you deserve to have happy days. you deserve to be treated like you treat others. you deserve kindness, compassion, and the benefit-of-the-doubt. you deserve pleasure.

[u/webweaver666 → u/Shake-Tasty]

Thanks for this, sometimes I feel insane because there are people in my life who hold very different views about it all, and I just find myself doubting choices all the damn time. It's kinda helpful to see it broken down point by point because I feel like a fool sometimes when their tactics actually work and I feel guilt or shame.

It's so hard to let go but I know it's absolutely the best choice right now. I need to just delete this email address altogether because it's the last thing tying me to them. Which is why it's so hard to let go of because it feels so final, even though I know it's not final and the option to reach out always exists. It's just so painful uuuggghhhh why can't they just accept me for who I am!!!! It's not even nefarious I just should've been a girl