An Emotional Plea to Parents With LGBTQ+ Kids

This last weekend we attempted to film a Youtube video for our series “The LGBTQ View,” where we discuss LGBT-related news topics. We first got distracted when our merchandise arrived by mail while we were filming. When we were finally able to get back on topic and discuss LGBTQ news, well, we got off topic again, but in a pretty good way.

We first discussed Caitlyn Jenner’s interview on Diane Sawyer. Then we showed a great clip of parents of transgender children giving positive affirmations to their kids like, “I am strong” and “I am beautiful.” And that’s when things got a little emotional for us.

Every day we receive messages from our viewers on Youtube or followers on social media and some of those messages revolve around parents who do not accept their LGBTQ+ children, from teens to grown adults. It breaks our hearts.

As parents ourselves, we know that there is this unwritten contract that parents sign when they choose to become parents and start a family. That contract states that we, as parents, promise to do everything in our power to raise happy and healthy kids and to protect them from those who may harm them. So it’s hard for my wife and I to understand how some parents can deny, disown, or harm their LGBTQ kids through mean statements, disowning their kids, kicking them out of the house, asking them to be who they are not, or making them feel bad for who they are.

After watching the video with the parents of transgender kids, we became so emotional that instead of doing the LGBTQ View, we began pleading to parents with LGBTQ+ kids to accept their kids for who they are — to do everything in their power to love their kids and guide them in a happy life because that is the contract that parents signed when they chose to have kids.

After the video went live, we were happy to receive a wonderful comment from a viewer that showed us that our pleas didn’t fall on deaf ears.

The viewer wrote, “I recently came out to my mum, and it wasn’t that she was unaccepting, but she didn’t really fully understand me and she felt like this was something I was ‘doing to our family.’ We just watched this video together and after weeks of talking and me trying to explain things to her, she was silent until the very end of the video.”

After watching the video, this is what happened:

“She turned around looked at me and said, ‘I will always love you no matter what, I hope you know that.'”

Many parents of LGBTQ+ kids might not stumble across this video, but we hope that maybe for some of our viewers, they can use it as a wonderful tool in communicating with their parents what they are going through, just as this viewer did.

But if our viewers get anything out of this video and any other videos that we do from here on out, it’s that we hope they know that we accept them exactly for who they are. As we said in the video, we’ll virtually adopt those whose parents don’t accept them, because everyone, whether you are young or old, deserves to be accepted and loved for who you are. Join us — we are The Next Family.

Check out the video below: