Today’s Unconditional Love Goes To Accepting Families

Because research now proves that it literally saves lives.

By Jorge Rivas Dec 09, 2010

The findings are simple: supportive families raise healthy, happy children.

For the first time, researchers have established a clear link between accepting family attitudes towards their lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) children and their well being.

This year we saw a spike in gay teen suicides. In September 2010 alone, at least six gay youth–all of whom were bullied by their classmates–ended their own lives. And while we have to end bullying in schools, we also have to consider that accepting families will help young people come forward and ask for assistance at home and in the classroom before it’s too late.

These findings come from a study conducted by the Family Acceptance Project at San Francisco State University. And best of all, they’ve created a series of accompanying videos to help share these findings with other families. In their first video, we see a Latino dad who’s a Marine and self-described "macho man" talk about his transformation, all for the love of his son. And that’s today’s love, to the parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters that help their kids "make it better" at home everyday. 

Read the study if you’re a data nerd (it appears in the current issue of the Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Nursing) and share the love either way: forward the video to a family that could use the encouragement. 

We’re ending the day as often as possible by celebrating love. We welcome your ideas for posts. Send suggestions to [email protected], and be sure to put Celebrate Love in the subject line. You can send links to videos, graphics, photos, quotes, whatever. Or just chime in to the comments below and we’ll find you. Be sure to let us know you’ve got the rights to share any media you send.

To see other Love posts visit our Celebrate Love page.