I need totally honesty here because I’m struggling harder on this than anything in my entire 39 years of life. Be brutal, be real, and don’t hold back.

My girlfriend (I guess now ex girlfriend) and I started dating in October of 2023. We both pretty quickly realized that the connection we had was unlike anything either of us had experienced before. I was head over heels in a matter of weeks and so was Sammy but we promised no lease breaking or Uhauling, we wanted to start out with healthy boundaries so that this could go the distance. Sammy has two youngish kids and I pretty quickly was introduced to them and by the beginning of 2024 I began meeting the rest of her extended family. We live in the south and both of our families are quite religious but her family is affirming of her sexuality and has no problem with our relationship. Unfortunately, mine is not the same. My family has never been accepting of my “gay lifestyle” and use their religious beliefs and convictions as the reason. I’ve been out for about 13 years and have had two other serious relationships and in both of those my family was kind to my partners. They were invited to family holidays and gatherings and included the same way my siblings partners are. However, about three years ago my mom called to tell me that she and my dad were no longer going to be involved in that aspect of my life. They want nothing to do with it or any woman I am in a relationship with.

I’m sure some of you are asking why I would have anything to do with my family if that is the way they see me but I’m not someone who can just sever contact. I had cancer as a teen and my family quickly became the most important thing in my life. The bonds we had became the rock and foundation of what kept me going. I’ve had so many other health issues as a result over the last 20 years of my life and my family has always been there to support me. When I caught my exwife having an affair they were the ones who helped put me back together. When Covid hit and I lost my job and went through another horrible breakup they were what kept me here on this Earth. I also have nieces and nephews that mean the world to me.

When Sammy and I started dating I was open with her about my family. She said she understood and that she would never ask me to choose. I told her I knew how selfish that was of me but that with time I hoped that we could mend things together with them to the point where we could all be together for big life events and maybe even more. About eight months into our relationship it became clear that Sammy wasn’t actually okay with it. I don’t see my family often, usually major holidays and maybe 2-3 weekends interspersed throughout the year. I did everything I could to be present for both. Thanksgiving lunch with my family and supper with Sammy’s. Christmas Eve with my family and Christmas Day with Sammy’s. But it wore on her. Over the first year of our relationship I did everything I could to make our relationship known to my family. To the point where my parents started asking about Sammy, how she and the kids were, taking an interest in that part of my life. By this past Thanksgiving my sister was ready to meet up and introduce the kids to each other. I was so very hopeful that we were moving in the right direction. The kids were with their dad for Thanksgiving and Christmas this last year and Sammy was still not welcome with my family for the holidays so I didn’t go. I told my parents I wasn’t leaving her alone and so Sammy and I did Thanksgiving and Christmas with her side of the family only. Then in January we broke up.

Right after Thanksgiving I found out that my cancer may have come back. I didn’t feel like Sammy was in a place with everything she had going on in life to deal with that, I didn’t want to take away from her kids and I knew if I was sick she would have drained herself trying to juggle them and me so I kept it to myself and then ultimately broke up with her on January 11th. On February 4th I found out I had not relapsed but would need major surgery to replace my femur. I immediately reached out to Sammy but she had blocked me, everywhere. I did everything I could think of to try and communicate with her, to apologize, to tell her it was never about me not loving her or wanting her. On March 7th I found out that at the end of January, two weeks after our breakup, she moved to Georgia and in with some woman she’d met online. I still kept trying though because I was about to have major surgery and I truly feel like she is my person. She finally answered me back about a week before my surgery and we began to text a little.

The morning of my surgery I sent her a long text telling her I’d left her a key to my apartment because there were some things I wanted her to have if anything happened to me and that if she needed a safe place to stay when she came in town for the weekend to see her kids she could stay there. I also sent her about a dozen poems I’d written since our breakup. When I woke up in PACU the first thing my parents told me was that she’d called my dad. She got worried because my procedure lasted several hours longer than anticipated so she payed for one of those websites to find his number. Once I was fully awake and into my room for the night I called her. She had gotten up that morning and driven from Georgia to NC to my apartment and was there. I was alone at night in the hospital and she stayed on FaceTime with me every night. By the time I was discharged a week later we were back together. She was moving her things into my apartment and looking for a job back in NC.

I’ve spent the last two weeks at my parents house recovering. I can’t walk so it’s been rough, Sammy has been at my apartment turning it into our home and finding a job. I was set to go home to her tonight, but Monday night all that changed. She asked about Easter plans and I swear on my life we’d spoken about this while I was in the hospital but I was also in a medication fog the entire time so I could be wrong. I mentioned that we’d have most of the day together before I had to leave for my dad’s retirement supper. I’d even planned an Easter Egg hunt with scavenger hunt clues like Sammy’s grandma used to do and at the end was going to ask her to be my girlfriend again, followed by a nice brunch at home in order to make the day memorable and special since she doesn’t have the kids. The retirement party/supper is happening on Easter night because it’s the only day my brother and his family will be in town. Sammy immediately shut down. She said she couldn’t believe I was doing this, leaving her for them on a holiday. If it was anything else I wouldn’t go but this dinner is something I’ve been planning with my mom for almost two months, it happens to be on Easter night but it’s a once in a lifetime celebration for my dad that I can’t miss. So now we finally get to the AITAH part. Sammy has given me an ultimatum. Go to the retirement supper and lose her forever, or refuse to go anywhere or be involved with my family until she is welcome. I want so badly to draw that line, I know that I deserve better than the way I am treated because of my sexuality and Sammy surely doesn’t deserve to be judged solely because she is gay. But I also very much still love my family, I see my nephews maybe five times a year, we haven’t all been together like this in over a year. I asked her to give me grace for this event and then help me figure out how to draw that line with them and work through the ramifications and feelings of that together but she said I have to choose. I love her so much, despite the way she sometimes treats me and the issues we’ve had, but I can’t just shut out my family forever either. Does that make me a horrible person? Does that mean I don’t love her enough? I just don’t know what to do. There’s so much more going on than just this but this seems to be the sticking point for her. I’ve lost her for a second time before I ever got to kiss her lips again. AITAH?

PS: if you read all this, thank you, I know it was a lot.