Well it’s happened again. I shouldn’t be surprised. I told Jenny Poyer Ackerman that I was done hiding anyway and certainly took no pains to camouflage Miss Miller’s school.
A month ago, an anonymous lurker sent an email to the high school theater group, specifically directed toward Miss Miller—to her preferred name—to tell her of this blog. From there, everyone found out.
It turns out I wasn’t imagining it when the theater kids began to ignore and snub me after performances, then at my house when they gathered one afternoon (as they gobbled the snacks I bought for them, the nerve) and again at graduation.
But who can blame them. I would have done the same. Regardless of the queer agenda, what angsty American teen doesn’t wish to rebel against authority?
But Miss Miller already knew about the blog—since March—when she went to order takeout using my laptop, which stores the handy DoorDash password. I’d left my Substack tab wide open in the midst of editing, nary a shit given about discretion.
One can only conclude that there’s a part of me that wanted her to find out, maybe because A) I don’t enjoy hiding this project from my daughter, and B) I had a hunch this time would be different—would be better.
And it was.
Three months ago she read the tab I’d left open—the Tranny Pack. And she never mentioned a thing.
“Did you read the one called Happy Birthday Baby?” I asked, now in June, having finally become aware that I’d blown the gaff.
She had not, and likely won’t. She admitted she is not comfortable reading what I have to say on the matter.
Which is totally fair.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
How it unfolded is, I’d sent a text to Mr Miller venting about a trusted family member and Substack subscriber. This individual had always shown what I thought was an instinctual understanding and deep sympathy for my position as the blasphemous mother of a gender-indoctrinated teen. Only after a fateful phone conversation did it become apparent that she really thought I was homophobic, and that I should accept my daughter’s choice, no matter what.
Now ironically, the word “choice” in this context is immediately indicative of gender “wrongthink,” as well as a dull-witted understanding of the entire rainbow umbrella. Sexual attraction is not a choice, and via conflation, “trans” is not a “choice.” Unless you pay attention and think critically about the differences, you’ll be fooled too. But here at Mrs Miller we pay attention, so we view modern adolescent trans identities explicitly as choices, because “trans” in 2024 is not an immutable, inborn physiological phenomenon like being gay, but a belief that is very much chosen (or pushed like so many drugs), no matter how many kids plead with their parents to believe that they would never choose a trans identity because trans people have it so hard.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc15cffcb-f776-43fa-8d23-8d3cff880042_1466x998.png)
Yeah, so.
Trusted Family Member and I spoke on the phone at her urging after she expressed concern regarding my last post. I assured her I was okay—just sometimes posts come out sad and longing, bloated with maritime metaphors. I am but a vessel for the muse.
🤪
But she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She kept repeating, “I just hate to see you so distraught.”
I crossed my eyes at the ceiling and shot the phone with my finger gun.
Pew pew!
Compulsive, confusing platitudes spewed through the holes in her logic, about how times are different now, and we have gay people in our own family but we love them nonetheless, and it’s okay for people to be gay and bi- and trans, as if the three are interchangeable categories, as if she was in any position to educate me, as if she never read a word I’d written.
“This is starting to sound like an intervention,” I finally said.
I explained that Miss Miller actually has a girlfriend now (YES, Reader) and I couldn’t be happier for her. Admittedly I’m skeptical, given the current cultural clime, but that is beside the point. And trendiness aside, I’m fine with romantic experimentation.
This news flash stunned Trusted Family Member to silence. I went on to parse the difference between LGB and TQIA+++ but doubt I made a dent. And ultimately that’s okay, because it’s not her job to “get it.” Unless she clicks the links I’ve presented here. Hint hint.
When we finally hung up, instead of texting my rant to Mr Miller, which included the phrase, “she subscribes to my blog,” I accidentally texted our family group—Mister, Junior and Miss.
🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
Mr Miller approached me a few minutes later to let me know what I’d done. I swallowed hard. My heart raced. My fingers went cold. Miller Jr had alerted my husband since he hadn’t noticed, and that’s when we found out about the theatre group email.
We hadn’t yet heard from Miss Miller. I deleted my texts as per Mr Miller’s suggestion, but it would prove to be too late.
In the meantime I wrestled with my new knowledge, my thoughts spinning like salad, tossing and turning between terror and courage, guilt and grace, self-loathing and righteousness, crumbling blue cheese and solid ground.
A little after six, the verdict was in. Miss Miller asked Mr Miller with zero drama or fanfare, “What are we going to do about Mom’s blog.”
Mr Miller offered to liaise, but also suggested that Miss Miller approach me herself. More importantly he told her, “That blog is Mom’s therapy.” He presented my side, because after all that’s come between us, he is on my side.
🤍
Miss Miller understood.
“How about you find out if Mom wants to talk to me,” she suggested.
And that is how I came to find myself planted on Miss Miller’s bed with my laptop waiting for her to finish up in the bathroom. When she entered I skipped the prologue and asked if she wanted to go through the posts with me. I was happy to revise content per her comfort level, without deleting the entire thing. I explained to her what her father had—that this Substack is my creative outlet, my community, my prayer—and she was cool with me continuing to write.
In all, she was most unhappy about the pictures I’d posted of her friends, even though I’d hidden their faces and identities. And she didn’t like that I’d mentioned the name of the school.
“I already started fixing both,” I said. And it was true. I’d started methodically combing posts, editing as I went.
She stood there statuesque, calm and measured, light years from how I was at her age—how I am sometimes still.
“You know I think it’s great that you’re dating Devin*.”
“I know,” she said.
“And I have NO problem with same-sex attraction—at all—it’s the identity stuff that I have an issue with.”
“I know,” she said again, and it sounded remarkably mature.
What did I do to deserve such a reasonable kid? Unless she’s lying her ass off right now and counting the minutes till she’s free.
My voice cracking a little, I said, “You know how much you mean to me, right?”
She said, “You mean a lot to me too.”
There’s no way she was this good at lying. She wouldn’t have asked for her dad and I to take her to the Miller cabin in the mountains for almost a week if she couldn’t stand the sight of me. We’d only returned home a few days earlier. Everyone got along swimmingly.
“Will you help me do my hair for the party tomorrow night?” she asked. A friend of hers and Junior’s was throwing a ‘do.
“Really?” I asked, like Sally Field in 1985.
After our calmversation (H/T Ben Boyce, couldn’t resist) I wept on our back stoop for the enormous blessing of this daughter of mine. We’d peacefully bridged the gap between what she’d willingly ignored for months, what I’d hidden ridiculously unsuccessfully, and what was now brought to light.
I texted her through my tears:
I cannot get over how amazing you are. So thankful for you.
A little while later she responded:
love you :) 🫶🏻🫶🏻
💝
Well, we knew this day would come! It sounds like it’s working out (Sally Field LOL) so that’s good! I think it is important to note this: anyone who reads this blog loves Miss Miller. We’re not laughing at her or scorning her. She sounds like such a cool, smart kid—compassionate, talented, and definitely more poised than we were at her age, as you note. We read because we’re concerned about her being caught up in this awful trend and are rooting for her (and the entire Miller family) to get out of it. To mention another great Depeche Mode song, this blog is The Meaning of Love. ❤️
I was nervous as I started reading that one, but overcome with relief and emotion by the end. Now I’m all vuhklempt, yet somehow lucid enough to quote from an early post of mine: “I become more and more convinced that sunlight, whether or not it can fully or quickly disinfect anything, is the only way forward for us,” because this is the monster you created by name checking me in— was it the first sentence? —I must go back and verify!🧐
Mrs, you have achieved the Fuck-You Life (Meghan Daum’s excellent phrase: works like fuck-you money except in commercial settings) that you deserve. All that’s left is to bask in the sunlight you’ve made!😎🥂