Hi all,
I'm about 1.5 years into transition, started at age 31. I'm happier and healthier than I've ever been, and absolutely delighted by life now. I'm doing fantastically, I have a spouse who is my biggest fan and supporter, and we have a child together - My second biggest supporter.
I've alhad a really good relationship with my parents for most of my life. Maybe not incredible, but they did their best and it showed. They worked hard to provide for me and my siblings, and have been a safety net for us a few times even after moving out some 12 years ago.
The problem: my parents are conservative and very transphobic. Like, "dad posts stuff about 'men playing sports with girls' and means it" transphobic. "Stood up and walked out of the room, refused to talk to me when I came out" transphobic. They are loving and kind otherwise, and not particularly conservative in general. Just this one sticking point really, which makes it so much harder to comprehend.
When I came out to them, I had already made peace with the reality: My parents were likely to want me gone. I went in, not asking for acceptance but declaring my truth. I told them I wasn't going anywhere; That I was only leaving if they wanted me gone, and then they ... Proceeded to make it rather clear they wanted me gone, by never inviting us to anything besides major holidays, and refusing to just sit down and have a chat with me to try and understand or let me explain anything at all. Every time I've offered.
My dad is also a car guy. Built a garage in his yard with a lift in it, swaps vehicles almost yearly, always has an exciting new toy, car guy.
All my adult life of owning a vehicle, he's been the one to do any major work to it. So, when it started idling really roughly the other day, my heart skipped a beat as I remembered I would usually call him to talk about it.
So I did what made the most sense to me: I tied my hair back, put on my gloves and handy-ma'am hat, and dove in. I diagnosed the problem with some research, and learned I needed to clean the throttle body. Not a hard job, but a bit involved. Then I spent the next 3 hours doing just that - Going to the store, buying the stuff I needed to do it, taking things apart, cleaning them, putting them back together.
I crank it, and it works!... And I was quite suddenly hit by the weight of three emotions:
- Happy: Overjoyed, ecstatic that I did that! I did it all, me!
- Angry: I didn't have to call my dad, I didn't need anyone's help - I DID IT. ME. WHO NEEDS A DAD ANYWAY!?
- Hurt: ... I can't even call him to share my excitement. I didn't need his help to do it, why does it feel like I need his validation on the matter?
... And I realized from there that I'm not sure what to do about it. I've already cried and held my spouse, talked them through it - that's step one: let myself feel the feelings.
But, what do I even do from here? Any ideas to help when this kind of thing happens? How do the rest of y'all with unsupportive parents handle the feeling of a need for validation?
My parents aren't supportive of me being trans (one of my moms has makes similar complaints about sports), but they not to push me away. So I still share such with them. Otoh, the person who birthed us has never really been a major part of our lives and we all have cut off contact with her, but since contact with her was limited even as children, she was never that person whom I'd really want to share stuff with anyways (ironically, the only thing I'm sorta interested in seeing how she'd feel if she found out I was trans). It'd be rough not having my parents to tell things too because they didn't want to be around me. Otoh, they'll probably die before me, so the lack of being able to talk to them is something most people eventually deal with. I have my brother and my friend who would be the closest replacement (being people I already share those wins with).