SEVEN DAYS
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OSET AN
UPCOMING
C O N F E R E N C E
. HOMOSEXUAL
TEENS TALKS
SAFE &
By
Pamela
Polston
W
hen Jane and Ronald Gardner learned their son, Paul, was gay, their first reaction was denial. "It's not true, it's a phase," Jane recalls thinking. "We nearly disowned him." Then they began to wonder what went wrong Was it something they did? Was it the influence of other people? Something or someone at school? "We tried to explain it," Jane says. "Then we tried to 'fix' it — we sent Paul to a psychiatrist, which didn't work and didn't help our relationship with him." In fact, Paul became depressed and suicidal. Finally, the Gardners realized they could neither deny nor alter the reality of their son's sexual preference. So they did what most loving parents of gay children do: They changed their own attitudes. Today, nearly a decade after their son "came out" to them, Jane and Ronald Gardner are more than passively tolerant; they're pro-active members of a national organization called Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (P-FLAG). But, though they' re dedicated to helping other parents through the trauma of a child's coming out, they're still not ready to see their names in print. Jane, Ronald and Paul Gardner are pseudonyms, at their request. Not all parents make a successful transition from avoidance to advocacy — even with the "Gardners" the process took years. It may take more years still for relatives of gays, lesbians or bisexuals (GLB) to come "out of the closet" — the term is also applied to people going public about the homosexuality of a family member. Overcoming fear, misunderstanding, confusion, ostracism and a host of other emotions and learned biases is not easy.
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