A few years ago, at my urging, my Korean boyfriend flew home to Seoul to come out to his family. The whole thing was a disaster. His mom apparently had a small psychotic break-down and she spent the next 48 hours in and out an emergency clinic for mental health. A few months before that, his mom had been diagnosed with cancer and the whole family basically bullied my boyfriend back into the closet out of fear that the stress of having a gay son would exacerbate her disease and kill her.

It’s three years later. Her cancer has gone into remission and my boyfriend has decided to live a totally double life. His family is pretending he’s not gay, and, as it stands now, his plan is to go forward, for us to get and have kids, etc., but never, ever tell his parents about me or, eventually, their grandchildren. Unsurprisingly there are already cracks in this plan. His parents want to fly out to see his (our) new house and he floated the idea that I would go and stay with friends for a few days. It offended me that he asked and told him I wouldn’t do that. Similarly, his American cousin, who knows me well, is getting married. And though I’ll probably be invited, I already know my boyfriend won’t want me at the wedding, lest his secret gets out.

The whole situation causes him so much distress but as we look to our future, it’s all starting to hurt me too. It was easy to hide from people I’ve never met. But as my life with him grows more intertwined, I’m growing weary of being his dirty little secret. The thought of playing these games with our future children also seems particularly cruel. To be sure, I have compassion for the fact that he comes from a deeply conservative culture. But I think it’s appropriate that he take ownership of his life if we’re going to have a future together. I, honestly, would rather he speak his truth and be disowned than for him to try to have it both ways. But that feels like asking him to choose me over them. None of this seems sustainable. What should I do?

Don't Wanna Be His Secret

Disclosures—timely and untimely, trivial (ball licking) and profound (sex work)—seems to be the SLLOTD theme of the week.

Okay, DWBHS, your boyfriend is either committing to you and wants to start a family with you or he isn't and he doesn't. If he's serious about starting a family with you, if he's serious about marriage and kids, then he needs to demonstrate that you're the most important person in his life. And that means your boyfriend is gonna have to come out to his parents. Again. Because you aren't going to play these games. You aren't going to go stay with friends when his parents come to visit. You aren't going to treat your children, once you have them, like dirty secrets that have to be hidden from your bigoted in-laws.

And he shouldn't ask you to play these sorts of games.

Your boyfriend has to come out to his family again and come out to them for good. On the upside, this time around he won't be telling his family anything they don't already know. On the downside, his mother and the rest of his family back in Korea are going to have another meltdown. And why wouldn't they? That tantrum his mother pitched a few years ago? It worked. His family's efforts to weaponize his mother's illness? That also worked. They know he's gay—he was gay then, he's gay now—they just wanted him to crawl back into the closet and close the door behind him. And that's just what he did. So the takeaway for his family was, "If we throw a big enough fit he'll shut up about this 'gay' shit." Which means he can expect an even bigger fit when he comes out to them again... but this time he can't let it work. It's a game of chicken: they can accept him or they can disown him but they can't prevent him from being who he is.

Unless you're forcing him to marry you (shotgun wedding?) and forcing him to have children with you (are shotgun adoptions even a thing?), DWBHS, you aren't "asking' your boyfriend to choose you over his family. He's choosing you to be his family. It's wonderful when we can integrate the families we create with our families of origin. But we set the families we create up for failure when we treat them—when we treat our partners, spouses, and kids—like they're embarrassments. Hurting the people we claim to love most to appease the bigots and drama queens in our families of origin isn't, to borrow your term, sustainable. Which means your boyfriend has a choice to make: he can hide in his closet or he can have you. But he can't ask you—or his kids one day—to hide in the closet with him.

It's ultimatum time: He comes out again and stays out this time or you're out.