“I carried you for 9 months, how could I leave you?”
A couple of months ago, I took a boy to Sapa but had to tell my parents that I was going on a team-building trip with my department. When we were on our way home, we were holding each other and sleeping without a care in the world. Then, my Dad called. I came to the sudden realization that he called 36 times. Turns out, my Dad figured out how to log onto my laptop, and saw all of the hotel receipts, along with pictures of me and this boy. Our family got into a huge fight. I realized I was wrong for lying, but Dad was wrong, too, for touching my laptop without my permission, and for taking pictures of my profile to show to the entire house. My Dad was so enraged that he beat me up; fortunately, my Mom intervened.
The following morning, my Mom told me to swing by her workplace after school so we could talk. I finished classes at 4 but stayed back and panicked until 6. I was crying the whole way through, so much so that there were tear stains on my mask. When I got there, my Mom told me to tell her everything, and that was when I burst into tears. I explained to her that I had known I liked boys since middle school, but I didn’t tell her out of fear that she wouldn’t love me anymore, or that I would get kicked out, or worse — I would be sent to conversion camp. She said, verbatim: “Oh, it seems like you don’t understand me. You should know that I always look at issues on both sides. Above all, I always need to understand you well before making a decision. It doesn’t matter who you are, you are my child. I carried you for 9 months, how could I leave you?
She repeated those words to calm me down, putting emphasis on the fact that I was her son no matter how I turned out. She also talked about my going out and lying; I was apologetic and so she didn’t mention it anymore. As for my relationship, she said that she wouldn’t forbid it, since I was already 20. She said: “Of course, we’re not happy, but what matters is that I want you to be happy, I want you to be successful and to be a good person.” I didn’t understand why I was crying even harder as she spoke. To be honest, I’m lucky to have my mom as an ally.
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Rồi Sẽ Ổn Thôi (“Gonna Be Alright”) is a project that collects coming out stories from the LGBTIQ+ community and their loved ones in Việt Nam. To find out more details or to read more stories from the project, please visit our official social media site on Instagram at ComingOutVN.
