Trans parent, gay son: pride across the generations

"There’s a huge difference between being gay and being trans," affirms LGBT activist and parent Marti Abernathey. Many would agree, but Abernathey has a rare perspective: she is transgender, and has a gay son. Despite their differences, though, she feels they share a certain bond: "In the whole coming out process there are a lot of similarities. I think his understanding of that has helped him understand where I’m at. And vice versa." Abernathey has one child from each of two previous marriages.

Eighteen-year-old Nik has lived with her for three years, after his mother kicked him out when he told her he was gay. "He came out in a small middle school in Indiana and did that all on his own," Abernathey says with a parent’s pride. "He is one of the strongest kids I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Where we live in Indiana is not the most liberal place in the world. It’s not Massachusetts. His freshman year in high school, on his own initiative he decided to ask his boyfriend to go with him to homecoming. That’s just not done here. As far as I can tell, he’s always been proud of who he is."

When Abernathey came out as transgender to Nik, about a year and a half before he came out to her, she says, "He had questions more than anything. There wasn’t any anger. I’ve never sensed in him any kind of loss issues or anything like that, because he’s still my son and I’m still his father. For such a young adult, he has totally got that." She advises other parents who need to come out to their kids, "The earlier the better. I think it is more an issue if the parents make it an issue."

"Everyone assumes I’m his mother," she relates. "The only thing I ask him not to do is run up to me and say ’Dad, Dad!’ in public. It’s kind of uncomfortable for both of us. But he just does it because I’m his dad. That is kind of odd, but he really takes it in stride. He thinks it’s funny and so do I."

Her relationship with her daughter is different: "I haven’t seen my daughter since she was not quite six. She’s 11 now. Basically, I’ve been barred from seeing her. It’s complicated, but I’ve been told by a court I have to present as male to have supervised visitations with her. It’s very difficult considering I’ve been on hormones for six years. That’s been probably the hardest part of all this. As an activist, that’s one of the things that I fight for." See Trans parent, gay son: pride across the generations
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