I had not seen my Mom for six months. Yesterday she came to me, and it was the best present for my birthday! I’ve been thinking: lots of LGBT and straight people do not have this joy of feeling love from their close ones. And I realize how lucky I am to have such a great Mom. After all, I have been down that road before, when my close ones did not accept me.

For you to understand, my Mom is very religious. But she has been able to accept me and, at the same time, stay very faithful to the church. She is an elderly woman from a village and without higher education. In her life, Bible and the words of church are above all, but because I am openly gay she was not allowed to attend the church for a long time. And she found the strength to argue with the priest when the church community collected signatures to forbid me to come to my home village. She said: «He is my son, I love him, and I will not leave him!» Having heard that they wanted to forbid me to come home, I really laughed and said to my Mom: «Now when I come to the village they will probably burn me at the stake just like Joan of Arc.» Mom was not happy about those words but replied that she would never let them offend me.

I remember the moment when I got to know that a support group for parents of LGBT people was going to be organized in Chisinau. I asked her to go to a meeting with other parents. I remember how trainings for parents of LGBT people were organized by GenderDoc-M in Moldova – for the first time in a former Soviet state. And how after that my Mom for the first time went to Ukraine to participate in the first joint Summer School for parents of LGBT people organized by the LGBT Association LIGA. A lot of time has passed since then, and I am happy that such meetings are now held every year. Both these organizations have played a very important role in my life. They began their work back in the 90s and stood at the origin of the LGBT movement in the former Soviet states. At that time it was hard to imagine that our parents would be involved in the life of these organizations and help other parents to accept, understand and love their children again. Years had passed before I began to realize that without the help of the Information Center GenderDoc-M and the NGO «LGBT Association LIGA» it would have been much harder for me to resume the relationship with my Mom and get her love back.

Nowadays there are a lot of LGBT organizations. I’d like to address all guys and girls: don’t be afraid to turn to the organizations in case of problems with your parents because of your lifestyles. You will get help and support like I did sometime.

Thank all the people, real professionals who know how to organize the LGBT work. And even though you are not very energetically promoting yourselves on the Internet, those who need you know about you. Believe me, they will find you.

Love your close ones and each other, and believe in love.

Thank you all.

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16 June 2016