How Do You Talk to Your Kids About 'Gay'?

June is the city's first official Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Heritage month. Living in the Echo Park/Silverlake community, we see alternative lifestyles all around us.

For adults, it is just part of everyday life--whether you agree or not.  But for most children, seeing two men or two women holding hands--and possibly kissing like Mommy and Daddy do--raises some questions. 

How do you explain that to your child?

It's hard even for someone like myself who grew up in a home where there are two mom figures, it can be challenging for a child to understand. Further, for me, it was even harder because my father had plenty of disparaging comments to make about my mother and her partner.

I grew to understand it, and since my mom lived in San Francisco there were so many gay people in our lives it didn't faze me at all. But when I was 17 and for a year lived about an hour from Santa Barbara in a town of about 30,000, I had a very hard time reconciling that I suddenly was told to refer to my mom's partner as "my aunt." 

Los Angeles is much larger and much more open minded. But as open as we are here in our little patch of the world, we also have a very large and faithful Christian population. It creates a very ecclectic and diverse group of neighbors.

So again: How do you as a parent explain to your child "gay"? Tell us in comments.

NOTE: Please abide by our Terms of Use in your comments. This is intended to be a genuine and legitimate discussion on a topic relevant to our neighborhood.  Thank you!