Coming Home For The Holidays

"137 million Americans will travel home this holiday season," the video says. "44% of LGBTQ people feel they can't come home as their true selves."

That is the opening scene in an ad for Pantene and it features a unique choir.

CNN wrote an article about the ad…

In Pantene's new video series, transgender people talk about what it's like to go home for the holidays
By Elizabeth Wolfe and Douglas S. Wood
December 8, 2019

For many, the holidays offer a home swelling with cheerful celebration, the warm embrace of family and shared time with loved ones.

But some moments can be tense and uncomfortable, especially for those in the LGBTQ community whose families don't accept them or have yet to become comfortable with their identity.

To celebrate the stories of LGBTQ people journeying home for the holidays, Pantene has partnered with the Trans Chorus of Los Angeles and GLAAD, an LGBTQ advocacy group, to produce a "Going Home for the Holidays" video series.

The videos highlight the stories of four transgender chorus members returning home for the holidays and sharing their experiences, which range from intolerant receptions to moments of joy and love. Overall, the stories ring with resilience and hope.

I’m one of the lucky ones whose family is welcoming but for many, many LGBTQ+ people their families have rejected them and they have nowhere to go.

For many of us even going home for the holiday is stressful, we feel like a a square peg in a round hole, even though our families “are accepting” we still feel out of sorts. It is true that “You can’t go back home again.” even if you are not LGBTQ+ you can’t go home again, home changes once we leave and it is even more so for LGBTQ+ people.

For many of us we go home to our chosen family, I know of many LGBTQ+ who have opened their doors to our community for the holidays. I usually receive two or more invitations for the holidays, I usually go to my brother’s and sister-in-law’s family for the holidays but this Christmas is an off year, my nephews’ will be at their in-laws. But I might go to my niece’s for Christmas with my brother and sister-in-law or I might go to a lesbian’s couple on Christmas and then go to my brother’s and sister-in-law’s family for the holiday celebration on the weekend.

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This morning I am at a meeting of the Long Term Care Ombudsman Program’s Inclusive Community Workgroup Meeting… but as I was writing this my laptop buzz with a new email… the meeting was canceled. Now I only have a conference call this evening on planning for the conference in April.