TW: this is a story of me coming out to my mom, her reaction is very homophobic and there are mentions of conversion therapy.

I don’t remember how long it has been since this happened, but I can place it during my eleventh-grade finals, probably not less than a year. I don’t remember it very clearly either, because I try not to.

My parents took my phone because they suspected I’ve been talking to a boy. For some reason they believe that I am a promiscuous teenager, and I cannot talk to a boy without them getting suspicious. They wanted to read my chats with my friends, but I couldn’t let them because I was obviously not out to them. I don’t think I’ll ever be ready for it.

So my dad stormed out of the room angrily, and with a lot of courage, I decided to tell my mom  in confidence. I told her I had a crush on a girl, that I’d told that to my best friend, and that’s why I didn’t want them to look through my phone.

She didn’t say anything for a moment or so, and then she asked me how I could be a lesbian, I’d liked a boy before. I already knew that introducing her to the idea of bisexuality was going to do me no good at the time, so I just said that I don’t know. She started saying stuff like one day I’m going after a boy another day I’m going after a girl, and then she continued to slut-shame me some more.

Finally, she told me that I have a very weak mind. She said that whoever this girl is, I probably just really admire her qualities and that made my weak mind think that I have a crush on her. She said that this is not how it works. It is a mental health problem that some people are born with, but it can be fixed without therapy if one is willing to.

And I’m sort of ashamed of this, but I agreed with her, and I went on agreeing with her and convinced her that she has successfully converted and cured me after about an hour of crap, and promised me this shall stay between us both, it probably did because my dad seems clueless.

I don’t remember how it got resolved. I got my phone back on the condition that I give it to them for inspection whenever they want. (They never asked for it really).

What I remember is for days, weeks after that, I feared that in my sleep I would be sent away to some freaky conversion camp or something. It got better over some time. But after a few months, the news was filled with reports of a bisexual girl in India who committed suicide after she ran away from a conversion camp her family forcibly sent her to after she came out to them. It started giving me nightmares again, but it got better after a week or so of talking to my supportive friends.

What I want to say is, when I say my parents will never accept me, I don’t mean I might get thrown out or abandoned because however messed up my mom’s reaction was, and I know it was messed up, it somehow did come from a place of love and concern for me. What is sad is she won’t accept that this is who I am and that there’s nothing wrong with it, she will try to cure me, and that somehow feels worse to me.

I don’t know why I shared this story. I just felt like it. I have told a few people, but it never feels enough, it is right there in me, haunting me. This may or may not help with it, but I know that right now, typing this out, I feel better.