Marrying a woman behind my parents back

[YourLilacCat]

My parents are religious and have made it clear they will never accept a gay marriage/gay partnership or any type of same sex relationship, so would I be unreasonable to get married to my female partner regardless and just not tell them? I live in their home.

I'm also a gay woman and I "came out" to my parents in my 30s. They didn't speak to me for 6 months after that. Once they actually met my partner and realised she was a normal person and we loved each other, it was ok.

I subsequently married my partner. My parents weren't delighted about this, but they came to the wedding.

Being an adult is about owning your actions, not hiding from them. Also, being in a long term committed relationship is hard, and it's difficult to really know how life will be with someone without living with them for at least a year or two first. I would deal with your parents now, move in with your gf, and just give it all a bit of time. You're still so young, you have plenty of time.

I wish you the best. It's very liberating living as your real self, no apologies or regrets.

Just do whatever keeps you safest, honestly. Are there any specialist orgs you can turn to for support, if this is a cultural issue?

Op, I get if you can't say your culture, but if you can, I might be able to recommend some resources. I study history & one of my specialities is lesbian history in different cultures, & I keep up w current events too. I would recommend the LesbianActually, Actuallylesbian, Lesbiangang subreddits. Although US focused, they do have plenty of sensible posters. ActualLesbiansOver25 is good for more mature advice.
A lot of the advice here is good, but I think some advice from LGB women specifically would be good. The subreddit queerwomenofcolour has quite a few people in your situation.

Also be aware that the lesbian divorce rate is way higher than both hetero and gay male marriages. Something like 76%/50%/25% respectively. So factor that in to your decision. Once you and gf are married and living together and "out" to everyone, you'll both have the shackles off and who knows how either of you may feel in that scenario? Give the relationship a chance to become established as a whole relationship before marriage, rather than something hidden.

Its interesting that you frame it as "uprooting your life". I actually think its healthy, as an adult, to move out from your parents house before moving straight in with (and marrying) someone else. Even if its just a flat share, it actually isn't a bad thing to be "on your own" for a bit before then marrying and moving in with your partner. By all means, don't sink money into someone else's house/have children/give up your career without the protection of marriage. But you make it sound like the protection of marriage is needed to replace the protection of your parents and that isn't healthy.

If you were marrying a man, this would make you more vulnerable to being in a coercive/controlling relationship though. It definitely wouldn't guarantee it, but it would raise the risk level. As you are marrying someone your parents would definitely disapprove of (and running the risk of possibly cutting ties and your whole external support network) you will be more isolated and therefore potentially more at risk. Even if you are both lovely, not having a separate life/support network will put more strain on the relationship than it would otherwise (normally if someone argues with their partner they can decompress by moaning to their family. I truly believe this saves many marriages). I would be looking for ways to mitigate that as much as possible.

The best advice on here is to go and live by yourself.

Honestly it will set you up for life and be a valuable experience.
Even a house share.
Don't jump into marriage
Rose tinted glasses and all that.

Difficult 4 u OP but for the long term, I think it would be more damaging not to tell them.

After reading your update, I'm more convinved than ever that you've no idea what's coming your way. I don't know any twenty year old who can afford to buy a house, meet all of the living costs and pay the rent on another flat. I also don't know anyone who went into their marriage thinking they needed a contingency plan like the one you've devised.
It sounds like you don't realise what the legalities of marriage entail either. It isn't just a piece of paper.

live independently first - regardless who you are marrying!

Then move in together and get married

either way, you need to have your own space first. marrying someone and moving straight in with them is insaine

Fortunately we have legal protections now to ensure that people don't have to live like that.

The OP is doing so out of choice, and actually making things worse in the process. Instead of being able to hold her head high and - if the parents react negatively - this be entirely on them and their prejudices, she is giving them an excuse to blame her for any potential relationship breakdown by deceiving them.

Much better now to lower herself to their depths and simply move out, tell the truth, pursue her own life, and be the person who treats both her girlfriend and parents with respect by neither lying to them or denying their existence.

Surely once you tell them , before or after, you won't be welcome to live at home anyway. Buy/rent your place, move then get married. Why can you not buy together?

And yes, for entirely unrelated reasons, I'm well aware of how painful it is to lose your family.

The fact remains though, that what she is doing is wrong, and there is an easy way to fix it: live independently, on her own and be honest about the situation.

Once she has done that she may grow up a little and have a clearer idea of a sensible way forward regarding whether to marry her partner or not. At the moment she is behaving like a teenager.

I'm trying to think of something that would make me disown him. For the sake of argument, we'll say he was in love with a paedophile or a serial killer because that's about all I can think of. It would still be wrong for him to marry this person whilst living in my home and keep it a secret from me. Even if he felt I would disown him, it would still be wrong and dishonest. Two wrongs don't make a right.

The honest thing for my son to do would be to leave my home and start his life with this person. Whether he chose afterwards to tell me the truth about this person or chose to live a lie as far as his family goes would be his decision. OP apparently has the financial means to do get her own place so IMHO that's the honest thing for her to do.

I'm not saying the OP has to announce her lifestyle to her parents, that is another matter. Once she's out of their house she is free to live exactly as she chooses, telling or not telling whomever she wants to tell or not tell.

I guess it comes with the 'my house, my rules' thing. My parents would not allow me to share a room with my now DH until we were married. It was important to them not to 'abet sin'. It was a bit silly because we were living together, but I respected their beliefs (even though I disagreed with them) enough to abide by them when I was in their home.

She wouldn't be "sacrificing her family".

She can move out and tell the truth and behave like with integrity. Then it is entirely on her parents whether they choose to sacrifice their relationship with their daughter because of their homophobia.

Yes, I think it is far preferable to walk away and stand on your own two feet and know that you did nothing wrong, you did not lie or deceive them and pretend to be someone else, and any relationship breakdown that might occur would be entirely due to their unacceptable behaviour.

As it stands OP is proposing to continue to lie to her parents, live a double life, deceive them because it's very "comfortable for her living standards" even though she can afford to leave. To marry someone without inviting them or even telling them. No, I wouldn't do that.

She is trying to live to separate and mutually incompatible lives at the same time and in the process damaging both of those possibilities. Her parents will respect her honesty far more. This pretence can't be kept up forever. The impact will be far worse when they inevitably catch up with reality if she has also lied to them. Reprehensible as their "views" are, our responsibility is to ourselves for living a life with integrity and treating people decently, or deciding to have no more to do with them if they cannot return this.

Disrespecting her parents with lies in return for their disgusting prejudices will result in no good outcome, it will make everything else. As would rushing into a marriage with someone she barely knows really, while very young, so naive she doesn't even understand what the laws around marriage are and its purpose, and has never lived independently.

So, yes, I absolutely would do exactly what I've said all through the thread: move out, live independently, tell her parents the truth, grow up and act like an adult and treat her partner with the respect to at least openly acknowledge her existence and pursue an actual adult relationship with her and then consider marriage if they are both together and happy still in several years' time and both still want this (having educated herself on what a marriage contract is).

@YourLilacCat
How comes that in this relationship you're the one assuming the role that culturally would belong to a man?

You are a young woman barely into adulthood, live with your parents, have no life experience or independence and yet talk about "marrying her" (as opposed to we will get married), providing security, buying houses and keeping flats for your wife, like a hairy bloke tending to his harem...

But you're not a bloke. And there won't be any family gold put towards the upkeep of your wife.
Are you sure you can afford this role play?

You can just do your own thing, you know? Like be a lesbian woman instead of a straight Muslim guy. Or is that where the appeal is? To escape the role & path of a woman set in your culture?
Then drop the marriage = path to freedom notion. It's not.
Go do your own thing!

Yes you are

HTH

So you're picking and choosing which traditions you are following

Right you are then

Sunrise, I agree with a lot of what you said, and I'm sorry you've also experience family estrangement. But in the post you're replying to, I said 'assuming you're not living w parents. I def think the current situation is unworkable, esp as op can move out.

I don't think they have wanted to disown her, have they?
I don't think anger on either side will help.
I assume a 20 year old hasn't got together enough money to want to buy a home unaided. It's only a guess, but if some/all of that is 'family money' her parents I think are owed the courtesy of knowing some of her plans. Also, I gather they are providing a comfortable home right now.
Also, they probably think, as most of us do, know that their daughter is very young, and very obviously naive.
Of course she should be able to live with whom she loves. But if she wants to live happily, she'll do that in a much more mature way than she proposes. Hiding her lover, secret marriages, wouldn't go down well with parents in many more liberal cultures than the OP's. For her own safety and peace of mind, and happiness, and her partner's too, she must set about it with a display of understanding, common sense and responsibility. She can't flounce off, she can't force changing beliefs on her family. All she can do, is act in a way that is so reasonable that in time they will come to see her point of view.
I think it's irresponsible of people to tell her to go and do her own thing. She has clearly lived a very sheltered life and is younger than her age. She needs her family.

Oneday, I agree op is v naive. Any mum, even an accepting one, would worry about her. But disowning could be a real possibility. I've read many of these kinds of stories that end in disowning. It's hard to comprehend people who'll do that, bit many do still exist.

But surely if not living with them it's even easier? Just be honest. It's up to them what they decide to do. Why should OP lie to pander to their prejudices and have to pretend she is someone else and disrespect her partner by pretending they don't exist or are "just a friend@? The parents can decide whether to behave like decent human beings or not, whether their homophobia or their daughter is more important to them. If they choose the former then far better to have them out of her life entirely.

So have I, and because of that OP really should not be encouraged to put herself in a position where it might happen. At present, she sounds like a rich kid who is used to having a comfortable life. If the relationship with her partner falls apart, which would not be unusual at her age, and she has alienated her family, she might lose a lot more than a house deposit. She sounds more like an indignant 16 year old that early 20s in her understanding of the world.

I would buy a house first tbh. I’m asian, I get the whole culture thing (not assuming you are asian here but sounds similar). Honestly I think getting married without telling your parents would be worse to them than you moving out, then telling them you are a lesbian. Lying whilst living in their house is not great, it will be uncomfortable for you and will feel like a betrayal of trust to them which will make the inevitable discussion worse.

Also if you are early 20’s do you really need to get married? I wouldn’t care if Dd was a lesbian but if she told me she was getting married in her early 20’s I’d fret about that a lot.

Yes this, I don’t think anyone would be disowned in my family, we really don’t care. I know in Dh’s family some of them would probably kick up a stink (literally one or two though). But I have had gay muslim friends who literally had to leave their towns and move really far away to not bump into anyone they know as they basically had to hide it, the consequences would be to lose their family and possibly some aggression.