A father discovered his teenage son was gay after walking in on him and his boyfriend having sex.
The father going by username ThrowRA_Gay on Reddit had no problem with his son's sexuality as it was no surprise to him even though his son had not come out to him yet.
However, he was not prepared for the perpetual awkwardness that followed in the aftermath of the mid-coitus interruption.
How do you talk to your evasive teenager about coming out and having safe sex?
Not knowing how to deal with the situation, the concerned dad turned to Reddit's Relationship Advice thread and asked if his son's behavior was just "natural awkwardness or embarrassment."
He prefaced his story with:
"This is how you dad."
r/relationship_advice - I [45M] Walked in on son [16M] having gay sex and he's become quite awkward and distant. from relationship_advice
"So a week ago my son had one of his really good friends over for a sleepover, and I went up to his room to ask them if they wanted any dessert."
"Normally if it's just my son I knock, because well privacy, but it was him and his friend so I figured I didn't really need to."
"It was an hour or so later than I would normally go up and ask them so that's probably why they let their 'guard down.'"
Their guard was down and then some.
"Anyway I open the door and my son's getting bonked by his friend. I don't know if reacted that well - but not badly either, I just said something like 'oh f**k' and shut the door again."
"I waited downstairs for maybe 20 minutes to see if they would come say anything but they didn't so I went to bed."
"When I woke up the next morning his friend was gone and my son looked so scared and tired, I don't think he slept that much, not that I can blame him."
"It was kind of awkward, but eventually he was like yeah dad I'm gay and [friend] is my boyfriend of 2 years (surprised by that but in a nice way i guess) - him being gay wasn't a surprise as I've always suspected to be honest, but I didn't say that of course and was like okay cool love you no matter what, I don't care who you like."
"Since then he's been very awkward and barely said a word to me or even looked at me. I've tried to talk but it's always ends up a very short and awkward conversation."
"Is it just natural awkwardness and embarrassment? Hell, I'm sure if my dad had saw me having sex I would've faked my death and moved to Mexico or something."
"Today I asked him if he wanted to bring his boyfriend for dinner/sleepover in a more official 'boyfriend' capacity and he seemed to perk up at that a little and said 'sure that'd be cool' - so maybe things are getting a little less awkward."
"Is this awkwardness natural or should I be doing something different?"
"I'm also going to buy him a lock for his door and tell him that I want him to feel comfortable 'doing it' in the house with his boyfriend (I'd rather here than some dark alley with heroin needles and serial killers or anything like that) - but I'm not sure how to word it well, and also make the conversation as least awkward as possible."
The OP's post received 85% upvotes, with readers responding favorably towards how he handled the situation.
"I'd stress this. It's going to be awkward regardless. It's not awkward because he's gay."
"It's awkward because he's a teenager who got walked in on by his dad. On top of not really getting to come out on his own terms."
"My parents walked in on me (M) with my girlfriend when I was younger. That was mortifying."
"He's had a boyfriend for 2 years you didn't know about and found out about him being gay, having a boyfriend, and walking in on them all at once. That's a lot." – cageynay
"Wow, you sound like a really great father. I'd say you're doing everything right so far."
"Just make sure it's very clear to him that you completely accept his sexual orientation, if you haven't done that yet."
"Oh, and make sure to thoroughly educate him about safe sex, because pregnancy isn't the only worry."
"Even if both partners are tested to be clean, a condom should always be used during gay sex to prevent UTIs (which are no fun)."
"You're doing great! I wish there were more people out there like you. You have my admiration sir." – WitheredFlowers
In addition to being lauded for being a good dad, readers educated him about safe sex practices and considered suggesting for his son to take pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP).
"You're an awesome dad!! Just make sure they're using protection."
"I used to work with individuals living with HIV/AIDS, and there's a reason why it's more common with gay men (bc it's easier to spread STI's through anal sex due to more open tears and blood, which is how HIV is spread)" – ohmynipnops
"It might be awkward but lube is also really important. I caught my old foster brother stealing lube for him and his boyfriend and since then I just told him to ask me and I will buy them some."
"Kids are going to have sex and it's an important part of safe anal sex." – not-reusable
Readers also suggested to bypass the awkwardness of offering to buy condoms by providing them instead.
"Don't even bother to offer to buy condoms. Just do it, leave them some place your son and BF can get at them and then tell him they're there for them to use when they need them." – about831
"You sound like a great dad. If he's pretty embarrassed about the whole thing, instead of the agony of offering to buy them, you could just get some condoms and leave them in a bathroom drawer or cabinet."
"Make sure he knows they're available and leave it at that. Replenish as needed." – superherostitch
Yes!! OP, not all gay relationships have defined tops and bottoms. A lot of people switch."
"So offer to buy them condoms and lube. Best just buy a whole heap and say 'they're in the bathroom!'. And fill it up whenever needed. They won't want to be asking all the time." – AffectionatePanic
Actions speak louder than words.
"When I got my first girlfriend, my dad told me 'make sure to be safe' at dinner. When I went to brush my teeth that night I saw a surprise box of condoms in my bathroom."
"I have never spoken to him about he, he has never spoken to me about it. He was, and still is, a good father." – I_no_afraid_of_stuff
Give it some time.
"Yep! Even if you had no reservations whatsoever about your parents accepting your sexuality, it would be mortifying for them to see it in the flesh."
"My dad walked in on my giving myself a bikini wax when I was in Grade 11, and when he tried to talk about it the next morning (to be sure I was okay - he had no idea what I was doing and I think he suspected some kind of masturbation injury) I was so seized by embarrassment that I climbed out the huge window in our kitchen and ran off to school without any of my stuff."
"And that was just hygiene! Time eventually allowed me to make eye contact with him again, hopefully that will also work wonders for OP and his son." – KikiCanuck
Let them know you are here for them.
Redditor QueenMoogle – who identifies as a lesbian – said the supportive conversations she had with her mother was worth all the "awkwardness in the world."
"You need to be a bit morestraightgay forward with him. Sit him down and say, 'Son, it's time to clear the air. I'm not mad. I love you for who you are. If this young man is special to you, I'd like to get to know him, too. If it's fine by you, I'd like to get a lock for your door so you can have more privacy'".
"'I also want to make sure that you are being safe in what you two are doing. I know it's weird because I'm your parent, but you can talk to me about anything. Your happiness and safety are my #1 priorities in life.'"
"You're the father to a teenager. It will be awkward by nature! But you have a heart of gold and it's obvious that you have nothing but love towards your son."
"I can't tell you how many painfully awkward conversations my mom had with me about my sexuality. She even tried giving me the lesbian sex talk, which made me want to crawl in a hole and die."
"But underneath all of that discomfort, I could tell how much she loved and accepted me. Even if the kids at school bullied me, I knew for a fact that she was in my corner each and every time."
"That feeling of security you will give your boy is worth all of the awkwardness in the world. I hope you know just how much that will mean to a young gay man in this world." – QueenMoogle
While having these types of discussions are potentially awkward, showing your teenage kids your support will mean the world to them in the long run.
The book Unconditional: A Guide to Loving and Supporting Your LGBTQ Child is available here.
What could possibly go wrong?
It turns out there are so many variables that can contribute to making the bride and groom's celebration a major matrimonial miss.
Curious to hear examples of weddings gone wrong, Redditor lolf**kno asked:
"Those who have been to a ruined wedding, what happened?"
Dramatic brawls and speeches plagued these weddings.
Catty Attendees And Booze
"Very beautiful wedding in a huge barn at this apple orchard. They must have spent a ton of money on the decorations and catering because it looked like something out of a magazine. The ceremony was great, the flower girl did her thing, the vows got everyone choked up. Everything seemed to be going well. Not even 15 minutes into the reception the mothers of the bride and groom getting into a full out brawl, hair pulling, red wine being thrown. Their sons jump in to defend their honor, chairs start being throw, tables are flipped, parents are grabbing children and running for their lives."
"​The bride and groom are horrified and leave immediately and head back their honeymoon suite. My fiancé and I left after this as well but we heard from some other friends that most people ended up staying and getting wasted at the open bar on the bride and groom's dime. Apparently, the fight started because one of the groom's sister complimented the bride's grandmother's dress. The bride's mom thought she was being sarcastic and called her a b*tch, then the drama ensued. Mind you they had all been pregaming the wedding pretty hard."
– AdmiralWackbar
Playing For The Drunk Uncle
"I played a wedding where as we started playing the set, everyone ran outside and nobody was to be seen for the rest of the night."
"I originally assumed it was because nobody liked us but the bride came in afterwards and said there was a huge fight involving multiple members of both families and everyone basically went home upset, injured or in a police van."
"We couldn't stop playing since we were payed and it was our job, and the only person watching was the drunk uncle dancing on his own asking for requests we didn't know."
– TornApartByLisa
Maid Of Honor Speech Goes Off The Rails
"Was a guest of friend of the bride, did not know anyone attending. Very expensive over the top place, several hundred guests of this very Italian wedding. Maid of honor grabs mic at the cocktail hour begins her speech, rambling, drunk. Quickly devolves to stating the recently deceased mother of the bride was against this wedding and that's basically what killed her. Plus Vinny will never give up sex workers. She is tackled by several people and dragged away."
"The happy couple is separated and divorced within a year."
– Rocky1268
This is what happens when bad luck crashes weddings.
Tumbling Into The Sunset
"I work at a golf course with a lot of history behind it. We do wedding venues inside the clubhouse and the actual ceremony is held outside by the historic water fountain and large pond."
"First problem was the weather. I live in the high desert and it was very warm. A solid 90 degrees that day and it was also pretty windy. So everyone's outside, no umbrellas, no ezups."
"The next problem, and probably the worst, was the golf cart incident. The bride and groom wanted to 'ride into the sunset' on one of our golf carts. Drive around a little bit on the golf course. To be fair, it is beautiful on the course during sunset. However the cart had somehow gotten a nail in the tire, tire went flat, battery on the cart went crazy and the cart ended up freaking out. It came to an complete stop from 15mph to zero. The wheels and mechanisms locked up, almost seizing. Both the bride and groom (fairly overweight mind you) both fell out and rolled over a few times. They were totally okay, just a few bruises and perhaps a bruised ego or two. So retrieving that cart was fun."
"And last but not least, the power inside the clubhouse went out to do the high winds. There was no after party available. Only the cake was cut, hardly any food was given out. Yeah, not a great day to cover for someone on your day off."
– Itsallover_
Foggy Memory
"I was not born yet, but my parents rented the observation deck on the Hancock building in Boston for their reception. Tallest building in the city, beautiful view. My dad pored over historic weather charts to figure out what day was statistically most likely to be nice out. Day of the wedding comes and of course, thick fog unlike anything they'd ever seen before. Couldn't see a thing out the windows of the room they had picked specifically for the view."
"Worked out well though, they were happily married for nearly 30 years before cancer took my dad's life a few years ago."
"There's one other funny anecdote from that wedding: The wedding was held in Kings Chapel, which is an incredibly historic church here in downtown Boston that's somewhat of a major tourist attraction. To close that on a weekend afternoon for a wedding, it turns out, was not very expensive. The tourists waiting outside to see the church didn't know that, though, and someone started the rumor that my parents were incredibly wealthy, maybe even Kennedys. As a result, there were tons of people taking photos of them when they left the ceremony. Not sure if any of them ever figured out that my parents were most certainly not rich or famous."
– mimicthefrench
Morbid Surprise
"I was best man at my sister in laws wedding (stepped in for the brother of the groom, that's another story entirely)."
"For a whole year of planning all the bride (SIL) wanted was a dove release while they said handwritten vows to each other. Very small, non denominational (most of the family are atheist anyway) wedding."
"Day arrives (early summer) and something is off with the bird handlers. They show up a bit late and are sourcing help from the wedding party to get everything in line. When the time comes to say their vows I help the handler carry the chest with the doves in it over to what is to be the altar where the bride and groom are standing."
"Vows are just about wrapping up and the handler gives ME the signal to open the chest. I open it and see 20-30 DEAD DOVES IN THE CRATE!!!! I immediately close it to try and limit who knows what happened. Too late. The look of horror on the bride's was all that was needed. We spent the next few hours trying to cheer everyone up but by the end of the reception the entire wedding party had organized and filed animal cruelty complaints on the handler. It was all anyone could focus on."
Tragic losses unfortunately befell leading up to or at a couple's nuptials.
The Wedding Guest Who Left Too Soon
"When I was 6 or 7 I went to a cousin's wedding. Everything was fabulous for little me, so much sugar everywhere, basically heaven. The reception was in a big community center that was reserved for the occasion. Went to the girls' bathroom, passing by the men's room to see my uncle on the floor. Went back to the main room to tell my dad my uncle was looking weird. Well, uncle had a stroke and had died."
"The bride spent the rest of the afternoon crying, and everyone except close family left."
"Bright side is the mariage is still going strong 20 years later, despite what happened that day."
– DecadentOrange
A Terminal Diagnosis
"Leading up to my friends wedding his father had been battling cancer after a terminal diagnosis. And it was touch and go whether he would be well enough to attend the wedding, in the end he was too unwell to attend despite wishing that he could."
"Just as we got to the wedding reception my friend was informed that his father had just passed away. It was devastating."
– boatson25
Wedding Crashers
"Happened to my classmate. He is successful middle level manager, divorced, about 35yo or so. Found a girl of his dreams but from a provincial poor town. The girl insisted to have the wedding in her town to show off her 'success.' The wedding is crashed by her old friends including male friends who are not that sophisticated and have some tense feelings towards the successful groom from the city. Somebody starts a fight in the middle of wedding, groom is trying to stop it and got stabbed in the back. Died right there. And he was my classmate."
– anarchyinuk
​An Unfortunate Trespassing
"The wedding was at a state park that's famous for its giant gorge/waterfall. I don't know whose idea this was, but someone suggested a photo overlooking this gorge and everybody was game. The wedding party went around a stone security barrier and the maid of honor literally fell off the cliff to her death. It was like 500+ feet."
– SingzJazz
With a lot riding on a wedding to go off without a hitch, the mounting pressure is one where something is surely to buckle.
And because wedding guests are usually inebriated and high on the buzz of celebration, they throw caution to the wind and make some choices they wouldn't make under normal circumstances.
People's ill-advised actions can have regretful consequences, but no one expects death to be an outcome.
Fortunately, the weddings I've attended or heard about from friends were not as catastrophic as the anecdotes mentioned above.
While the Redditors' stories are sorrowful, it gives me a sense of relief these devastating examples are rare occurrences.
Have we met? That is an actual question I asked a gift giver once. (Who shall rename nameless) Football tickets. FOOTBALL TICKETS?! Who? What? I can't.
Looks Familiar
Broad City Wow GIF by Comedy CentralGiphy"My own scarf. Yes, that's right, my mother went into my room took my only scarf, wrapped it and gave it to me like it was a new scarf."
Devastation!
"Thought I was getting a bike for my 15th birthday but my foster parents announced that they were sending me to a group home after living with them for 11 years. Devastation! That place was a wake up call. More independence then at my foster home but those kids had it really really bad, 12 year old heroine addicts, abuse... what the entire hell! I hurried up, graduated from high school at 16 and got the hell out of that place. I turned out ok, work in the legal field, live in Las Vegas. I did forgive my foster parents before they died."
The Forgotten One
"My brother and I worked for a farmer one summer, and he paid us with a used car. At the end of the next year, my brother graduated high school, so my parents paid me out for my half of the car, and that was his graduation gift. I gave them all a big discount compared to what it was worth. So like $500 for my share of a $2500 car."
"2 years later, and I needed $50 for some graduation fees, so I borrowed it from my mom until I could get to the bank. (Before mobile banking and ATMs everywhere.) Later, when my mom is telling me they invited all their friends over for a 'graduation' party, I asked if they had gotten a gift for me. "Well I gave you fifty bucks."
"I paid it back the next day, and she didn't blink. The 'graduation party' was just my parents friends, who said congratulations to me, but it wasn't really for me. A few years later, my little sister graduated, she got a car. They bought a used car for her, and our other little sister got the same when she graduated. My parents are mostly nice, and I never felt like they singled me out at birthdays or anything. Just my graduation seemed like I turned invisible."
Office Party Fail
"HR complaint from two subordinates fighting over how to throw me a surprise birthday party."
- BBoySlim
"I've never worked in an office environment, but the stories I've heard of people being required to buy a cake for the whole office and to celebrate their birthday with their coworkers would be enough to keep me in blue collar work for life, were it not for the fact that I love being active and working with my hands and could never sit at a desk all day anyway."
Basics
law school finals GIFGiphy"My Asian mom's gift was "no extra Kumon homework after school homework" so my birthday gift was that I didn't get extra homework from her."
Regifting is trash behavior. Do better. I'd rather you just say I forgot. Or... I just don't care for that much. But regifting? No.
season 4 lint roller GIF by Veep HBOUnlucky 13
"Stomach flu and my first ever period, at the same time. I think it was my 13th birthday."
- kelpself
"Omg, exact same story for me. It was my 13th birthday and my family took us kids to visit our relatives in Subsaharan Africa for the first time. I was sick, jetlagged, overheated and riding down a bumpy road in a Jeep driven by my dad in the complete darkness. We had just eaten at a restaurant where I found a giant scarab beetle in the bottom of my soup bowl. I have flashbacks to this day."
Lazy Thoughts...
"My grandparents have been gifting me (and my brother) the same set of three vice grips for almost 10 years. Collectively we have 60 vice grips. I don't know if they bought a pallet of them, or where they are coming from. GET A GRIP GRANDMA!"
"I had a friend who's father was famous for doing Christmas shopping at the last minute. One year she complained that she went downstairs on Christmas morning and found, sticking out of her stocking, a spatula. Her birthday was a few days after telling that story, so myself and her friends all decided to get together and get her spatulas for her birthday, as a gag gift."
"Well, when it was our birthdays she retaliated. Which lead to a counter-offensive. And soon a new tradition was formed. And guys, I have so many spatulas now. Everything from dollar store cheap plastic, to hand-carved spatulas, a golden spatula, and even a replica of the famous Malaysian fighting spatula."
"I've got seasonal spatulas. As in, today it's time to pack away the Christmas spatulas and bring out the heart-shaped Valentine's day ones, followed by the bunny-shaped Easter ones. We've also been passing around this clip from the Weird Al Yankovic movie UHF. "Spatula City, we sell spatulas, and that's all!"
Their ultimate whack-a-doo move...
"A pair of homemade custom pajamas. Only problem was that they weren't made yet. It was just the fabric and a promise to make them for me. I had to give the fabric back and I never got the pajamas."
"Holy cow my parents do crap like this. It's so freaking weird. Their ultimate whack-a-doo move was to give my wife and I a few acres of their property."
"Nothing legal just at our wedding they gave us a card that basically said 'have some land.' When the dust settled I asked what they thought we would do with it, they said build a home. I said ok, gonna need legal ownership for like building a house. They said sure we will get right on that. Then they decide to sell out and retire and never mentioned our wedding 'gift' again."
Gross...
Disgusted Steve Carell GIFGiphy"My grandma got me a hairbrush with a plastic horse head handle. The horse head was all chipped up and there was hair in the brush."
Bummer...
"My Godfather sent me a Birthday card each year which said, he paid 100 bucks to a bank account which I was supposed to get, when 16yo. He then got into alcohol, used all the money and died."
Oh for God sake, why even bother giving anything at all? Lint rollers, used brushes, homemade pjs... y'all ever hear of a gift card? Just put five bucks on it and call it a day. You can't hide cheap, so stop trying.
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I definitely wouldn't turn down an excursion to AREA 51. I'd like to poke around and get a sense of the place. I've never personally been up close and face to face with a "non-Earther." Not sure I'd like to be...
TV Truth
x files monkey pee GIF by The X-FilesGiphy"UFOs/Aliens are a cover for all of the secret projects that the government is working on. Actually stole that from the X files."
Birth
"How human birth parallels alien abductions:
- Babies are taken from their home (womb)
- They still developing sight, so they see bright lights and grey figures.
- They hear an "alien" language they don't understand.
- They suddenly feel cold after leaving their womb.
- They are in a surgery room being poked with tons of instruments.
Long story short: some people suggest that abductions are just people who had memories of their birth."
In the Mind
"I just don't think anyone will ever see this. But I think that UFO's are the projection of our unconscious collective mind. Everything that exists in reality, also exists, in our immaterial mind. Is it possible that the insides of our mind are also just one drop in the ocean of consciousness... and together we create the material reality were in, simply by experiencing it in a real way, inside-out through our senses."
Flyover...
"My father was an aircraft mechanic and fabricator for test and spy aircraft for the USAF. He spent 75-85 working with test aircraft. He said that when they were going to do a test, that could possibly be seen by the public, they would make a betting pool on how many UFO reports local authorities and flight towers received."
Under the Sea
sci-fi ufo GIFGiphy"I like the idea that some UFOs aren't machines. Instead they are some sort of Upper-Atmosphere Jellyfish. I found the issue of Fortean Times that had this article. Here's the cover: http://ft.gjovaag.com/q/images/a/ae/FT291.jpg"
- BigD1970
Interesting. There are some ideas we can look into. None of it proof, but possibilities. There are certainly plenty of future film ideas.
Like 2012...
"We are like that un contacted tribe and everyone agrees not to bother us."
"I've heard it explained from a channel (idk if you know what channeling is) kinda like this. First of all, we as a species tend to freak out, shoot first and ask questions later. Most humans would have a literal psychotic break. You have to believe in vibrational energy as it relates to our consciousness."
"The aliens (certain ones) are at such a higher level that it would be jarring for us to come in close contact with. We are slowly getting there but it's a process. Like 2012, end of the Mayan calendar, wasn't the end of the world it was the end of an energy cycle that we as the human race had never made it past before."
"Previous civilizations have been destroyed or destroyed themselves before they got this far. We passed a point where we are very unlike to destroy ourselves anymore. This doesn't mean we won't see some real bad hardships yet but we will keep progressing."
- falecf4
"train your eyes"
Dancing GIFGiphy"I was a firm believer in t em when I was in high school and kept googling theories and info in my spare time and during my study halls. They said their bodies were so lightweight or something that the reason why you can't see the evidence is that they disintegrate before hitting the ground."
"And then LOL it was so funny, some people would swear you could "train your eyes" to see rods... HhhahAHAHAHA. Like there were these experts. Video showed him walking around with a serious face, then pointing. And he's like, "that was one just there." "You can't see them, you have to be used to them... like me."
"I've spent many years immersed into hunting them finding them. That's why I can see them." And then one day China, who loves occult stuff, had like a lab that set up a nighttime camera to capture footage of rods at night... then realized they were normal bugs at overexposure. lol"
Lurking
"The Dark Forest theory. Basically the theory that the reason we haven't made contact is because all the other civilized life in the universe/galaxy knows not to broadcast their location. They've learned that there's something awful or predatory lurking in the dark forest of our galaxy, and that it's better if they keep to themselves."
Unknowns...
"That the universe is so vast that we haven't been discovered yet."
- neoastic
"This makes sense to me because traversing the distance to or from even our our stellar neighbors would require technology that is not known to us now or likely to be known by us anytime soon if it's even possible at all. To assume without evidence that aliens could possess this technology and have visited us does not meet my skeptical standards."
- KZED73
Back and Forth
back to the future great scott GIFGiphy"Time travel exists, and UFO sightings are actually future humans coming back to our time. That is why they are so discreet, and never openly make contact."
I hope time travel exists. Now that I'm onboard for. If aliens do exist... just come on out guys. We could probably use your help.
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