Sometimes when a young adult or adolescent declares that their sexual orientation is “different” than what is considered normal, it can be more difficult for family members than it is for the person involved. Don Foster is in his eighties now. His son “came out” and admitted he was gay over thirty years ago. It was the early 1980s, acceptance wasn’t all that high, and the AIDS scare was just beginning. *That’s* what Foster worried about…
Foster has joined a parents support group just formed by the local chapter of P-FLAG–Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays. Debi Stevenson has a teenage daughter who is transgender. She was born male, but said at the age of 13 that she identifies as a girl. Stevenson was accepting, but even though society is a little more tolerant these days, P-FLAG taught her how to tell others…
Julie Stephens also has a transgender teenager, J-D, who was born a girl but now identifies as a boy. She says she learned how to answer the one question she gets all the time…
The support group just formed last month and had 16 members at its first meeting. They hope to have more tonight, and continue to grow every month. Foster says not enough men are attending …
They meet at 6pm on the fourth Tuesday of the month at the Unitarian Universalist Community of the Mountains on Church Street in Grass Valley.
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