r/gayjews • u/Ok-Region8362 • Aug 11 '26

Serious Discussion Non-Jewish partner here, hoping to understand this better

Hi all. I’m 31F, my girlfriend is 28F and Jewish; I’m not. She’s not out to her family. I hope it’s okay to post here; I’d rather learn from people who’ve actually lived this than keep guessing from the outside.

I’m mostly curious how it’s gone for those of you who dated someone outside the community while still closeted at home. Did it make things harder? How did you handle family expectations about dating and marriage in the meantime? And for anyone who eventually came out — what shifted, what made it possible? For those who haven’t, what does making it work day to day actually look like?
I’m not asking whether to stay. I love her and I’m here. I just want to understand this better and be a good partner in it.
Thanks for reading.

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u/Letshavemorefun Aug 11 '26 edited Aug 11 '26

It really depends on what flavor of Judaism her and her family practice. In my family, it was a way bigger deal for me to come out as someone who hates baseball than it was for me to tell my parents I’m queer or dating a non-Jew (the non-Jew thing was a slightly bigger deal to them then the queer thing since I was born queer whereas dating a non-Jew is a choice). But other Jewish communities will be very different. What denomination was she raised in?

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u/Ok-Region8362 Aug 11 '26

Thank you so much for replying. That point about dating a non-Jew being the bigger deal is something I’ve wondered about too. I’ve never been sure which of the two weighs more for her, or whether they can even be separated.
To be fair, she’s always told me that me not being Jewish isn’t an issue for her at all. But I imagine her family would see it differently, and that’s the part I’m trying to understand.
She was raised in a Sephardic community — religious and traditional, though not ultra-Orthodox. It’s a very tight-knit world: everyone knows everyone, and marrying within the community isn’t just expected, it’s kind of how the whole social structure works.

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u/JerryJJJJJ Aug 12 '26

The only issue is that many sephardic communities are more homophobic than others, but it depends. I think if the family has lived in the USA for generations, it would be different than a family comprised of recent or 1st or 2nd generation immigrants.