Pressures - HELP

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My parents and older brother expect me to be straight. When my friends start talking about boys, I just leave because I can't relate. My older brother expects me to be a GIRL. He also says things like "gay" and "ret*d" to me, which offend me, but he doesn't seem to understand why. (The "gay" one is obvious. As for "ret*d", he seems to forget I'm autistic. People sometimes call autistics "ret*d" due to ignorance.)

Any way to cope with this? I'm only out to two of my friends - no one else.

Have you considered coming out to your family? I mean, it's only natural for people to expect you to be straight, because 95% of the population is--it's a pretty safe bet most of the time.

I have considered it but thought it may not be beneficial at this time. My brother's pretty judgmental. As for my mom, I feel a settle pressure to be straight. As for my dad, I'm not so sure. I'm mostly worried about my brother's reaction, I don't know why.

Well, you're going to have to tell them sooner or later. Are they homophobic at all?

I'm not sure but I'm getting the feeling that they might be -- particularly my brother.

If coming out to your family is out of the question, then have you considered coming out to more of your friends? Perhaps, if they're open-minded enough, they could act as a support group for you.

I agree to this. Coming out to ones family should be done when you live hundreds of miles from ones family and you can easily cut off contact if they have a bad reaction.

I am not saying run away, but there is a reason why people who are queer go away to college and come out there. And then come out to their family close to graduation.

Lets put it this way, your situation sounds familiar to me, I don't talk to my family anymore based on how they reacted to me being queer. Build up your social support structure outside of your family first. Thankfully LGBTQ folks are very open minded about peoples quirks.

The reverse can also be true. Sometimes a person whose behaviour might be interpreted as homophobic undergoes a signficant change when someone they know is gay. Suddenly it becomes personal.

When it was fashionable to be homophobic (i.e. Britain in the 50's), my father was certainly homophobic, but now that he has a gay son, the world is a very different place.

That being said, coming out is a one way street. Once that genie is out of the bottle, it never goes back. So you certainly need to be sure that you are ready when the time comes to come out. It would likely be valuable to come out to all of them--if your brother takes longer to come to terms with the idea, your parents can be helpful in putting some fences around his judgementalism.

You know your family best, and you know yourself best. When the time is right, you will respond to the pressure that you are feeling right now.