I decided to come out to my mom by sending her a “letter” to make it easier for me but I’m not sure is it good enough. Main things I want her to understand are how I feel, that this didn’t happen overnight and that it’s a big problem for me. This is what I wrote (translated to English):
“Something is bothering me for some time now, I want to explain everything here. It’s hard for me to start conversation about this so to make it easier for me I wrote it. I know this will be hard for you and I want to give you as much time as you need to process it. Only thing I want is support, all of this is already very hard for me so if we made negative atmosphere it would become even worse. So, I’m pretty sure that I’m transgender. I don’t know what you heard about trans people in media so I’ll try to explain how I feel. To put it shortly, it’s awful. I don’t feel good in my own skin. Whenever I’m not distracted by school or hobbies I feel really bad. I don’t like how I look and sound and how others see me. I can’t dress how I want. I feel like I’m wearing a costume because of others. A costume that I want to remove but can’t. I feel envy towards women, sometimes I can’t even look at them because of it. As times goes things become worse and my wish to do something about this is growing stronger but I’m scared. I’m scared of potential reactions of others, especially family members, and that I would be rejected. I wanted to come out to you first because I think you won’t disapprove me immediately and at least try to understand me. Like I said, support is really important to me at the moment. If people reject me things would become worse. I want to go to a therapist as soon as possible, that would be the best solution, but I wanted to tell you everything first. I don’t want to do something like this behind your back. I also want to tell you that this isn’t something recent, I’m just able to better understand my feeling now that I’m older. For years I wondered how it’s like to be a girl, I wanted to experience it for a short period. I had dreams where I became a girl. I thought it’s normal and that everyone experienced it from time to time. Anything that has something to do with changing gender was interesting to me, especially male to female. I thought it’s just a fetish. When I realized there is more to these feelings I tried convince myself I’m just making it up and that I can’t be trans. It was hard for me to accept myself as transgender but after some time I couldn’t find a different explanation. Stubbornness and fear were only reasons why I couldn’t accept myself. I’m sorry for not telling this sooner, I want you to understand that it’s hard to talk about this. I’m scared that others will reject me but I also want to do something about these feelings in order to be happy. And, again, support means me more than anything. I’m sure that you have feelings of loss while reading this. I’ll always be me, things like this won’t change that. If you blame yourself for this, please don’t do it. You and dad, or anyone else, aren’t blameworthy. No matter what you did in the past I would get here at some point. If you read all of this, I want to let you know it means a lot to me. When you are ready to talk about this just tell me, it’s easier now that I shared these feelings with someone. This should remain between the two of us, others shouldn’t know about it at the moment.”
Is this good? This is really important to me so I want to approach it in a right way and feedback would be really helpful with that.
Important note: Verbs and adjectives are gendered in my native language. I used masculine forms because I feel like that would make things a bit easier for her. Should I keep that?
This is quite good. If I were your parent I would appreciate your honesty and candor. The only part that might become burdensome is to not allow her to speak with anyone else (therapist, partner, professional) to help her understand. Although I understand you not wanting to be brigaded by a minister, church or someone not supportive. I remember coming out as gay to my parents when I was 16. We did not talk about it again until I was 26. The silence in a conservative household was so repressive. I am so proud of you being open and brave. Your truth is freedom.
My translation of that sentence isn’t the best, I didn’t know how to translate it properly. What I said there is about people from my personal life (family members, friend etc).
This is pretty good. I do have a few suggestions, but of course, these are only suggestions – it’s your letter, and your mom, after all.
First, I understand that you kept the masculine form of words because you don’t want to overwhelm your mom, right? I definitely understand that, but I think it sends a dubious message as well. You’re saying you’re trans, but you’re still referring to yourself with male terms. That could certainly backfire – at worst, your mom could infer that deep down, you don’t really see yourself as a woman after all. Have you considered switching halfway from masculine to feminine words instead? For example, from the “I’m pretty sure I’m transgender” point onward. That really drives the point home of “you’ve known me as a man up until now, but from now on I want you to treat me as a woman”.
Also, at some point you say “I don’t know what you’ve heard about trans people” which leads me to think she might have some misconceptions and prejudice. Many people associate being trans with “moral degradation”, so at worst, she might think of your coming out as a sign that you’re going to start using drugs and whatnot… It might be a good idea to emphasize that you’re still the same person as always, only your gender isn’t what they thought.
Having said all that, I hope it goes well for you.
Maybe I can explain why I’m using masculine forms.
That works too.
It reads very heartfelt and sincere, and it’s very clear that even with how much you’re hurting you want to make sure not to hurt your mother or father by making them feel disrespected, blindsided, or left behind - I think that goes double because you’re continuing to use masculine pronouns and verbs, to make the reading easier for them. It’s clear how much your parents mean to you and that you want very badly to not have to hide this part of you from them.
Do you want to talk about how you think they’ll react? It’s okay if it wouldn’t be helpful, if you’re really nervous there’s no reason to make it worse haha 😊
I think that that my mom would at least try to understand if I send her something like this. With my dad it’s more complicated. His reaction would probably be negative at first but he may come around it later, that’s why I’m not coming out to him yet.
Well then I think this is about as good as effort as you can make! I’ve got my digits crossed for you. Good luck ❤️
