On the journey from being a little kid to a fully grown mature person, whenever we find ourselves in big trouble or in some sort of an emotional turmoil, the people we always rely on is our family. They being our side, give us the feeling that we can conquer the whole world, and win any battle which life throws towards us. But when those family members start treating us like a complete stranger, when the sayings of the society becomes more important than the feeling of their own children, that’s when life starts looking like a burning hell. And at the end it, it leaves us with only one choice, to end everything completely.
Something like this happened to my classmate. He paid a big price for introducing his parents to the biggest truth of his life. That was, he is gay. For various reasons I can’t mention his name or much about his family since it could make matters worse, so I am going to refer him as my classmate only. As I got to know from various sources, it was maybe a month back when my classmate decided to confront his parents about him being gay, having a strong belief that they would understand.
The impact of his truth was quite shocking for his parents to digest.
Though his mother tried her best to abide by the fact, and is still doing her best but his dad reacted furiously. As I was told, they had a big quarrel, his dad kept blabbing about what the society would say, what will happen to his reputation if this leaks out, their family would become a laughing stock to everybody, etc..
Matters didn’t end there, instead his dad took it to a new level. He began neglecting him on a daily basis, suddenly his own son became like a complete stranger to him, as if my classmate was not part of the family anymore. At various family gatherings he was told to stay away from everyone as much as possible. He was not allowed to talk to anyone much and specifically told not to speak a word about him being gay to anyone. This continued for many days.
Being completely broken from inside, he reached a state where he couldn’t stand it anymore. In the end he did what he thought was the right thing to do. He ate a full coil of mosquito killing chemical which resulted in heavy vomiting and at the end fell unconscious. May be he would have been dead if his mom had not arrived in time. He is under treatment now in Apollo hospital. You may think I am making this all up and I don’t blame you, but let me tell you one thing, in everyday life many things happened but all things don’t make its way to the internet or newspaper.
While I was listening to all this I recollected the day when I first visited his house for an assignment, I clearly remember meeting his dad and him talking about how he couldn’t be any more proud of his son for scoring more than 80% in his previous assignment and how the other children of their various relatives enjoyed watching his short animated movies which he had made. But now the situation is completely different, it’s just hard for me to digest how the society or reputation in the family circle becomes more important to any parent when it comes to their children’s feelings.
What is a society? How does their opinion matter more than our own family? Does this mean we can’t say anything which we feel just to keep a good profile in front of them? Does this mean someone has to live a big lie for the rest of their life?
I never see them coming to give a helping hand when we face harsh times in life, they don’t pay our bills, instead even if we are in good conditions they always tend to spread false remarks about us and portray a poker face and never tend to miss out any opportunity of mocking and giving their shitty opinions as if they know everything. Society has never acted as if they care, no matter what, then why does their opinion matters to a family more than their children.
My classmate is a good boy. He was one of the brightest students of our class. He never scored less than 80% no matter what assignment he was given. All I have to say is, it takes great courage to come out of the closet and finally admit the truth. For this spirit of his, he should be given respect. He doesn’t deserve this life of an untouchable. I hope my article would shed some light on this matter. Being gay is not a sin, they have a life too. And they have equal rights to be treated with respect like everyone of us does. Get well soon my friend.
