I Never Wanted a Daughter Like Me

“I don’t want a daughter like you!” My mother’s voice ricocheted through the kitchen, brittle and sharp, bouncing off the faded wallpaper and the cracked linoleum floor. She clutched a crumpled piece of paper in her fist, the edges torn from where she’d ripped it out of my backpack. Even now, standing at the threshold, my shoes still muddy from my walk home, my hands trembled as I watched her. My eyes stung from crying, but I tried to keep my voice steady. “Mom, please… can we just talk?”

She slammed the paper down on the counter between us. “Talk? About this?” She jabbed her finger at the words scrawled in purple ink: a letter I’d written to my friend Jenny, but never sent. A letter where, for the first time in my life, I admitted—even if only to myself—that I liked girls. That I was terrified. That I didn’t want to hide anymore.

My mother’s face was twisted with anger and something else—fear, maybe. Shame. “Do you have any idea what people will say?” she hissed. “How am I supposed to look Pastor Mike in the eye at church on Sunday?”

I closed my eyes, wishing I could melt into the floor. I could hear the television droning in the living room, Dad’s footsteps pacing. My little brother, Tyler, was nowhere to be seen—probably hiding in his room, pretending not to listen.

“Mom, I’m still me. Nothing’s changed. I’m still your daughter.” My voice broke on the last word.

She shook her head, her hands shaking now too. “No. You’re not. My daughter wouldn’t do this to us. My daughter wouldn’t choose something so… so disgusting.”

A sob built in my chest. “It’s not a choice.”

She didn’t hear me—or wouldn’t. “You’re sixteen, Emily! You don’t know what you want. You’re confused. Is it that friend of yours, Jenny? She always seemed strange to me. Are you two—”

I cut her off, the words spilling out before I could stop them. “Yes! I like her. I think I love her. And I can’t help it. I’ve tried, Mom. I swear, I’ve tried so hard.”

For a moment, the world went silent. My mother’s eyes filled with tears, but her mouth pressed into a hard, thin line. She turned away, shoulders hunched, as if my words had physically struck her.

Dad appeared in the doorway, his face unreadable. He looked from me to Mom, and back again. “What’s going on?”

Mom whirled on him, voice rising. “Your daughter thinks she’s—she’s gay. She wrote it in this letter. To another girl.”

Dad’s jaw clenched. He looked at me, and I saw something flicker in his eyes—hurt, maybe, or disappointment. Or just confusion. He didn’t say anything. He just turned and walked back into the living room, the sound of his boots heavy on the hardwood.

I stood there, shaking, my whole body cold. “Please,” I whispered. “I just want you to love me.”

Mom wiped her eyes, her anger spent. Now she just looked tired—like someone who’d been handed a burden she didn’t know how to carry. “I do love you, Emily. But I can’t accept this. I can’t. Not in my house.”

I felt the ground tilt beneath me. “Are you kicking me out?”

She didn’t answer. She just walked past me, her perfume trailing behind her, and closed the door to her bedroom. I was alone in the kitchen, my letter still lying on the counter like a piece of evidence.

That night, I sat on the back porch, knees pulled to my chest, listening to the cicadas whine in the humid Ohio air. My phone buzzed, a message from Jenny: “Are you okay?”

I typed back, fingers shaking: “She knows. It’s bad.”

A minute later, Jenny replied: “I’m here. Do you want to come over?”

I wanted to say yes. But I couldn’t. Not yet. Not when my whole world had just crumbled around me.

The next day at school, I felt eyes on me everywhere I went. I didn’t know if Mom had told anyone, but in our small town, secrets had a way of leaking out like oil stains on concrete. At lunch, I sat alone, picking at my food. Jenny slid into the seat across from me, her blue eyes worried.

“Did you sleep at all?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know what to do.”

She reached for my hand, squeezing it under the table. “You don’t have to figure it out right now. I’m with you.”

For a moment, I let myself believe her. That maybe, somehow, things would get better. But when I got home, Mom was waiting for me in the kitchen, her suitcase on the floor.

“I need some time,” she said, her voice flat. “I’m going to your Aunt Linda’s for a while. Your dad will be here.”

“Mom…”

She shook her head. “I just can’t, Emily. Not right now.”

She left without another word. Dad barely spoke to me that night. Tyler wouldn’t meet my eyes.

Days passed. The silence in the house grew thicker, like a fog I couldn’t escape. I started sleeping at Jenny’s more and more, her parents quietly accepting, never asking questions. At school, a few people whispered behind my back, but most just ignored me. I felt invisible, and yet exposed.

One night, Jenny and I sat on her porch, watching the fireflies blink in the dark. She brushed a strand of hair from my face. “You’re brave, you know.”

I laughed, bitter. “I don’t feel brave.”

She squeezed my hand. “You are. You told the truth.”

The truth, I thought, can hurt more than any lie.

Months went by before Mom came home. She looked older, her face drawn. We sat at the kitchen table, the same place where she’d screamed at me, and she reached for my hand. Her grip was tentative, but real.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t understand, Em. But I want to try. Will you help me?”

Tears burned my eyes. I nodded, afraid to hope but unable to stop myself.

Even now, years later, I remember every word, every wound. My relationship with my mom is still complicated. Some days, we slip back into old habits—her silence, my anger. But we’re trying. That has to count for something.

Sometimes I wonder: What would have happened if I’d never written that letter? If I’d stayed silent, played the part everyone expected? Would I have been happier? Or just more alone?

Did you ever have to choose between being yourself and being loved? What would you do if your family couldn’t accept you?