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What's the best response to 'Dad, I think I'm gay'? Here are 20 of the funniest and most heartfelt.

There are some perfectly deplyed dad jokes in here.

coming out, lgbtq, coming out stories
via Anna Svets/Pexels and Andrea Piacquadio/Pexels

A young woman comes out to her father.

In a previous Upworthy article, we shared how dad jokes aren’t just a way for fathers to embarrass their children. But a way to build them up and teach resilience is by showing that it’s ok to embarrass yourself.

When a dad tells a joke that gets more of a groan than a laugh, it demonstrates his ability to handle an uncomfortable situation. According to researchers, dad jokes appear in many cultures and are a way for fathers to teach their kids that it’s okay to put themselves out there without worrying about what other people think.

A recent viral thread on Reddit shows how some fathers have used dad jokes to show how they accept their child’s sexuality in a way that made a tense situation comfortable for everyone.

A Redditor with the username Expert_Recover3061 asked the online forum, “What’s the best response to ‘Dad, I think I'm gay’?” the question received nearly 24,000 responses. Many of the stories were first-hand accounts of people who were afraid to broach such a sensitive topic with their father and were surprised he responded with love and a side of humor.

The responses are a great way to show people the best way to support their LGBTQ children. Here are 20 of the best replies to the question: “Dad, I think I'm gay.”

1.

"Your mother owes me £10." — PotterWhoLock01

2.

"You still have to wear a condom." — Ginchy1971

3.

"It's okay, your mother likes guys too, maybe I am the weird one." — Drendari·

4.

"'I thought you were about to give me bad news! Don’t scare me like that!' My granny when my uncle came out in the ‘70s. She was decades ahead of her time." — LongjumpingCake1924

5.

"One of my friends from high school was gay, and when he came out to his family his dad literally didn’t look up from his newspaper and told him his sister didn’t need to tell him she was straight so why would he need to explain that he was gay? He’s known him his whole life and already knew that. It was cute because he was so worried." — 0Diamond0

​6.

"You still have to take out the garbage." — Most_Original_329

7.

"When I came out to my dad when I was 16, I thought he would disown me. He said: 'Son If anyone ever hurts you for that, I’ll f**king kill them.' In that moment, I realized that I had the best dad in the world." — Winterpegs

8.

"This story does not involve a dad, but it involves a very religious grandma. One of my friends was very nervous about telling his grandma that he was gay, and put it off for a long time. But when he turned 18, he decided that he had to get this done. When he told her she just looked at him calmly and answered, 'Of course you are. I have known that since you were 10.' At the age of 10, he didn't even know it himself yet." — Ashtar-the-Squid

9.

"I was getting ready to go to a sleepover with a girl I was totally crushing on and my mom was like 'You look like you’re getting ready for a date!' And I paused and was like 'Would it be okay if I was….Going on a date with a girl?' My mom just said, 'Of course, just remember to practice safe sex. You can get STDs from girls too!'" — Psychological-Run679

10.

"Lesbian here. When I came out to my dad, he said 'That’s okay honey, I don’t like guys either.'” — wafflemaker9093

11.

"My daughter was looking extremely nervous one night while I was cooking dinner. I could see her talking quietly with her mom but she continued to look uneasy. After a bit of time, she came into the kitchen and I asked her what was wrong. She didn't want to tell me at first but I could tell she was uneasy so I said she could always tell me anything. She finally said that she was pansexual. I just looked at her and said 'That just means twice as many people that can turn you down for dates now' and she busted out laughing as I went back to cooking to finish dinner. She was apparently really nervous about telling me for some reason and was glad I wasn't upset." — tahquitz84

12.

"When my daughter told me she was gay, I just told her I loved her, and that none of that would change my feelings. Then I began giving her the heads up when hot ladies would walk by." — PLoddingClot

13.

"My stepdad, who I consider my dad, was the man that raised me, and he's a big redneck steel worker. I came out at 18 and he sat me down and said 'Son, I've loved you like you were my own for the past 14 years. Why the hell would I stop now?''" — KeyboardRoller

14.

"Take a note from Olivia Coleman in Heartstopper: 'Thank you for telling me. I'm sorry if I ever made you feel like you couldn't tell me that.' Honestly, that would have been the perfect thing to hear." — Amastarism

15.

"My friend's daughter came out to her parents when they were all over at my house. Her dad looked her dead in the eye, took a deep breath, and in his big, booming voice said 'DUUUH!' We all got a good laugh but he just said, 'Sweetheart, I couldn’t care less who you love. All I care about is that they treat you with love and respect and that you’re happy. And maybe your gf will like working on cars with me.'” — ItsMRslash

16.

"Hi gay, I think I’m dad. Seriously though when my son came out I just said he was my son and it changed nothing between us other than I was happy he was discovering himself and growing up. Any man who would abandon or shun his own son for being gay is no man at all." — Open_Action_1796

17.

"Firstly, I love you. Now, did you steal one of my beers?" — February83

18.

"When I came out my dad had the best response ever: 'Wow! Now maybe I'll get a son-in-law that I really like!' and then he hugged me." — Gracie305

19.

"A customer of mine told his gay and trans kids 'I’d still love ya even if you were straight!'" — RoyStokes

20.

"A guy in a Walmart parking lot was on the phone and screamed, 'I don't care if you're gay, as long as you marry someone rich!' And angrily hung up the phone." — Shecallsmeherangel

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'It's not Little Sun': Mom admits she's having trouble pronouncing her newborn's name

It was fine 'til other people tried to say it and now she's confused.

via JustusMoms29/TikTok (used with permission)

Justus Stroup is starting to realize her baby's name isn't that common.

One of the many surprises that come with parenthood is how the world reacts to your child’s name. It’s less of a surprise if your child has a common name like John, Mohammed, or Lisa. But if you give your child a non-traditional name that’s gender-neutral, you’re going to throw a lot of folks off-guard and mispronunciations are going to be an issue.

This exact situation happened with TikTok user Justus Stroup, who recently had her second child, but there’s a twist: she isn’t quite sure how to pronounce her child’s name either.

"I may have named my daughter a name I can't even pronounce," Stroup opens the video. "Now, I think I can pronounce it, but I've told a couple of people her name and there are two people who thought I said the same exact thing. So, I don't know that I know how to [pronounce] her name correctly."


@justusmoms29

Just when you think you name your child something normal! #2under2mom #postpartum #newborn #momsoftiktok #uniquenames #babyname #babygirl #sahm #momhumor

Stroup’s daughter is named Sutton and the big problem is how people around her pronounce the Ts. Stroup tends to gloss over the Ts, so it sounds like Suh-en. However, some people go hard on the Ts and call her “Sut-ton.”

"I'm not gonna enunciate the 'Ts' like that. It drives me absolutely nuts," she noted in her TikTok video. "I told a friend her name one time, and she goes, 'Oh, that's cute.' And then she repeated the name back to me and I was like, 'No, that is not what I said.'"

Stroup also had a problem with her 2-year-old son’s speech therapist, who thought the baby’s name was Sun and that there weren’t any Ts in the name at all. "My speech therapist, when I corrected her and spelled it out, she goes, 'You know, living out in California, I have friends who named their kids River and Ocean, so I didn't think it was that far off.'"

Stroup told People that she got the name from a TV show called “The Lying Game,” which she used to watch in high school. "Truthfully, this was never a name on my list before finding out I was pregnant with a girl, but after finding out the gender, it was a name I mentioned and my husband fell in love with," says Stroup. "I still love the name. I honestly thought I was picking a strong yet still unique name. I still find it to be a pretty name, and I love that it is gender neutral as those are the type of names I love for girls."

The mother could choose the name because her husband named their son Greyson.



The commenters thought Stroup should tell people it’s Sutton, pronounced like a button. “I hear it correctly! Sutton like Button. I would pronounce it like you, too!” Amanda wrote.

“My daughter’s name is Sutton. I say it the same way as you. When people struggle with her name, I say it’s Button but with a S. That normally immediately gets them to pronounce it correctly,” Megan added.

After the video went viral, Stroup heard from people named Hunter and Peyton, who are dealing with a similar situation. “I've also noticed the two most common names who run into the same issue are Hunter (people pronouncing it as Hunner or HUNT-ER) and Payton (pronounced Pey-Ton or Pey-tin, most prefer it as Pey-tin),” she told Upworthy.

“Another person commented saying her name is Susan and people always think it is Season or Steven,” Stroup told Upworthy. After having her second child, she learned that people mix up even the simplest names. “No name is safe at this point,” she joked.

The whole situation has Stroup rethinking how she pronounces her daughter’s name. Hopefully, she got some advance on how to tell people how to pronounce it, or else she’ll have years of correcting people in front of her. "Good lord, I did not think this was going to be my issue with this name," she said.

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Hydrate smarter with electrolytes that support your body's balance and energy

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Science

Florida meteorologist applauded for getting emotional in live coverage of Hurricane Milton

People are finding John Morales' genuine empathy refreshing, and very much needed.

Photo credit: NASA (public domain), NBC 6 South Florida/YouTube

“I apologize — this is just horrific,” said John Morales during live coverage of Hurricane Milton.

Venerated meteorologist John Morales couldn’t help but get choked up during his report on the potentially devastating impact of Hurricane Milton closing in on Florida—a mere two weeks after being pummeled by Hurricane Helene.

“It’s just an incredible, incredible, incredible hurricane,” Morales began, the weather forecast map almost completely in red.

Tears welled up in his eyes as Morales tried to notify viewers that “it has dropped 50 millibars in 10 hours.”

To most of us, those wouldn’t mean anything. But the anguish in Morales’s voice says it all.

Trying to gain composure, Morales quickly said, “I apologize — this is just horrific,” and continued with his broadcast offscreen, showing just the water map. His voice was still noticeably shaken.

We live in a 24-hour new cycle, which has made us aware of so many global catastrophes and also desensitized to them. But when moments like this happen, when even our ever-stoic messengers are so moved that it also touches us on an emotional level, we are reminded that what happens to one of us, happens to all of us.

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

That's probably why so many people commented to commend Morales for showing a bit of humanity—which they found particularly refreshing for a news anchor.

"Please don't apologize. Showing some empathy shows you care and aren't fear mongering. <3 We appreciate it."

"No apology is ever needed for being human and showing what we see so little of these days: genuine empathy. Thank you, sir."

"Your kindness and humanity are not a weakness, but the strength that we all need right now. Thank you."

"No apologies needed sir...for someone to show real emotions for other people...is real concern, real caring."

"He showed a vanishingly rare moment of authenticity and actual empathy, in an incredibly cynical and ugly world - a beautiful thing to see in this scary time. As someone whose family lives in the area that is about to be pummeled by this storm, I am very grateful to him for his decency and humanity in the face of this possible horror that my family are facing. He deserves SO much credit for this beautiful display of transparency and empathy - though he obviously didn't do it for the credit but rather, out of empathy."

"I debated whether to share this. I did apologize on the air," Morales would later post on X.

He also urged folks to read his coverage of the relationships between climate change and extreme weather on The Bulletin, calling these recent hurricanes are “harbingers of the future.”

Global warming has changed me. Frankly, YOU should be shaken too," he wrote.

If a professional of 35 years is saying this…yikes.

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Guy who succeeded in cutting his phone usage by 80% shares his tips and powerful insights

He says cutting down has been "hard, but life changing."

Photo credit: Canva

These are actually really helpful.

Almost all of us at one point have attempted to reduce our screentime in an effort to thwart its addictive tendencies. Whether that’s incorporating some kind of app usage monitoring, keeping the phone away from arms reach in the morning, using one of those fancy phone locking pouches, etc. But boy, is it hard not to fall right back into the same pattern.

That’s why it always feels appropriate to hear from folks who have somehow managed to not only do the impossible, but stay consistent with it. You never know what tips and tricks you might find to make your own screen reduction dream a reality.

Recently someone shared how they were able to rescue their screen time by a whopping 80%. Here’s how they did it.

On the r/productivity subreddit, user u/jjohn6646 (whom we'll just call "John") shared how previously he would spend 4+ hours on social media (including Reddit) and 2+ hours on messaging and work stuff.

The biggest things that helped him go from going from 6 hours of phone usage a day to only 1 measly hour were as follows:

Creating a 30-day weaning off plan.

John shared that rather than going cold turkey, each week he would cut back by one hour (though he ended up doing more than that).

Incorporating a tangible reminder.

Placing a rubber band over his phone reminded John to ask himself, “Is this the best usage of mental energy right now?” each time he reached for his device.

Having a go-to "redirect."

For John, it was a book. For others it could be a journal, a simple craft, stretching, sprucing up around the house…you get the idea.

Using an app blocker with stricter settings than iOS screen time.

Quite simply because “iOS defaults are too easy to skip.” AppBlock comes highly recommended for its strict mode settings.

On that note, John added that it helped to set up "morning" and "evening" downtime blocks with the app to eliminate any distracting app during crucial parts of the day. He also only allotted a specific amount of opens for each individual distracting app.

Embracing the boredom.

This one is perhaps the most important of all. It can be so difficult to withstand the pressures of needing to fill every second of time. Even when we’re trying to let go of bad habits, there’s the inherent obligation to replace it with a “productive” one. Social media (and almost all technology we use on a daily basis, really) only exacerbates this. But in reality, we are not designed to be productive or stimulated 24/7.

But as John reminds us, “Our minds tend to panic when we don't have ‘something to do,’ but if you can push through the initial panic, there is a real sense of calm on the other side.”


What I learned while reducing phone screen time by 80% — 6 hrs per day to 1hr
byu/jjohn6646 inproductivity

Having successfully met his goal, John also took away some valuable insights sure to give anyone a little inspiration for their own screen reduction endeavors:

  • There is more time in the day than you realize
  • It's extremely easy to "slip," as I have many times in the past
  • Being "productive" doesn't always mean reaching for your phone just for the sake of doing something — sometimes doing nothing can set you up for more long term productivity
  • We are meant to be bored sometimes (and being bored can make you enjoy the little things more)

John prompted a number of readers to thank him for his advice and even share their own helpful tidbits as well.

“Once I realized all of these notifications and apps were just fancy fidget spinners, and I was designing my own hamster wheel, my interest in smartphones greatly decreased,” one person wrote.

“Great advice, thanks for sharing! Another tip I find helps is to keep a small notebook to hand. I found myself reaching for my phone all the time to check something or look something up. Write down any questions or things to look up online in the notepad, then spend a short allocated time at some point in the day to look them all up in one hit, rather than constantly reaching for the phone,” added another.

Another gushed, “Wow this is really inspiring and helpful. I went through a phase where I deleted all social media from my phone and my creativity, reading, meditation time skyrocketed. I fell back into the habit after a while and am back to 5-6 hours of screen time a day. I delete Reddit, then redownload it the same day. 😭 But this post just gave me the push I need, broke it down in an easy practical way. Thank you op!”

Sometimes we just need to see that a hard thing can be done in order for us to commit to doing it ourselves. If you're looking to reduce your screen time (which let’s be honest, is all of us) take it from John:

It’s “hard, but life changing.”

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An emotional Céline Dion praises Kelly Clarkson's performance of 'My Heart Will Go On'

Tears all around.

Photo credit: RepliCarter (left), Marc Piscotty (right)

Céline Dion and Kelly Clarkson are two of the best vocalists of our time.

There are lots of great singers out there, but only a small handful can rightfully be listed among the greatest vocalists of all time. Icons like Whitney Houston, Aretha Franklin, Mariah Carey and Céline Dion earned their place on that list long ago, and Kelly Clarkson has made a strong case for herself ever since she came to fame as the first "American Idol" winner in 2002.

Clarkson has serious pipes, there's no question about it. That woman can sing her face off, and she just seems to be getting better and better year by year.

Céline Dion apparently agrees. In a heartfelt video shared on social media, Dion enthusiastically praised Clarkson's performance of "My Heart Will Go On" before sharing the video of it from "The Kelly Clarkson Show."

Watch:

Dion said that she was moved to tears by Kelly Clarkson's own emotional reaction to Dion's performance on the Eiffel Tower at the 2024 Paris Olympics. "It touched me so tremendously," she said. "You were crying, and then you made me start crying. What's up with all this frickin' crying?" Then she said she was crying again seeing Clarkson sing the Titanic theme song, the biggest hit of Dion's career. "You were absolutely incredible, fantastic. I loved it so much," she said.

People praised Clarkson's vocals as well as Dion's strength of spirit, especially considering the formidable health challenges Dion has faced in the past couple of years.

Céline Dion has been fighting a disease that impacts her ability to perform

In December of 2022, Dion announced she had been diagnosed with an incurable disease that was affecting her ability to sing and perform.

"I have been diagnosed with a very rare neurological disorder called stiff person syndrome, which affects something like one in a million people," Dion said in an announcement posted to Instagram. "While we're still learning about this rare condition, we now know this is what's been causing all of the spasms that I've been having. Unfortunately, these spasms affect every aspect of my daily life, sometimes causing difficulties when I walk and not allowing me to use my vocal cords to sing the way I'm used to."

Since then, Dion has shared her health journey with updates through social media and in the film "I Am: Céline Dion," on Prime Video. She worked for months leading up to the Olympics to gain strength to be able to perform “L’Hymne à L’Amour” by Edith Piaf. It was a highlight of the opening ceremonies and Kelly Clarkson's tearful reaction to it was shared by millions around the world who knew what Dion had been dealing with.

Kelly Clarkson took on the notoriously difficult "My Heart Will Go On" and nailed it

People also praised Dion's generosity of spirit in complimenting Clarkson for her "My Heart Will Go On" rendition. That song is incredibly difficult to sing due to its belted high notes, but Clarkson can belt with the best of them. She took an iconic song that's hard to imagine anyone but Dion singing and made it her own while fully honoring the original, an homage that Dion clearly took to heart.

Clarkson has long been a fan of Dion's, often citing her influence on her as a singer and performer. Imagine having one of your idols praising you the way Dion did Clarkson here. It must feel like a dream come true, but Clarkson has earned every bit of those accolades.

- YouTubewww.youtube.com

Seeing these two incredible singers express so much awe and respect for one another is just beautiful. So often, people who rise to the top have a competitive spirit that can get in the way of camaraderie, but there's nothing but love flowing between these two. Icons recognizing icons. Talent praising talent. Women lifting up women. People love to see it.

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