By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Private Policy and Terms of Use.
Gloria Estefan Denies Blocking Her Daughter From Coming Out To Grandma
Emily Estefan opened up about her coming out experience last year, and now Gloria is telling her side of the story.
Emily Estefan, daughter of Latin pop diva Gloria Estefan, opened up last year about her coming out story while the two were hosting Red Table Talk: The Estefans. Emily recounted a painful story about how, when she came out to her immediate family, she was told she couldn’t tell her grandmother. Gloria warned her daughter that doing so would kill her.
Emily opened up more about the experience during an interview with The Real. She recalled how she had actually been outed to her family before she got to open up to them. “By the time I was ready to say ‘Hey, I’m in love with this girl, this is what happened,’ they were like, ‘Oh, I already knew that,’” she recalled. “And it was painful because you need to get ready for that experience.”
While her family knew, she wasn’t able to share that with her grandmother. “My mom told me, ‘If you tell your grandma and she passes away, that’s going to be your fault,’” she recounted. “And I know that she was just trying to protect me and now we understand it’s just a fierce love and protection for the people that you love, but that in that moment was difficult for me to hear.”
However, Emily feels confident that her grandmother did actually know. “I know she knew because we had a really incredible relationship,” she said. “And that’s the one thing I say: you can’t let anybody take you from your path. You gotta be yourself.”
Over the weekend, Gloria was interviewed by CNN’s Chris Wallace and the topic came up, offering the “Conga” singer the chance to tell her side of the story.
Gloria shared that she didn’t forbid her daughter from telling her grandmother, but rather asked that she do so slowly. “Don’t just sit her down and say, boom. Give her a minute to process,” recalled Gloria.
“In the Latin community, a lot of these subjects aren’t touched, they’re taboo,” she said. “People see, but they don’t want to talk about it, they don’t want to see it. And the whole point of us doing those 20 episodes was, I have all these people that have loved me through the years and supported me. And I want them to realize that we’re all just families trying to get through the difficult moments in life.”
She also shared that she has no regrets about opening up about her family’s story on the show. “Life is complicated. Life is tough,” she said. “And we wanted to share those things with people, so they would realize these are conversations we need to have. And it really was wonderful. The response.”
Yes, they have been in a relationship since 1975.
Gloria is 65, her birthday is September 1, 1957.
Gloria and Emilio Estefan became minority owners of the Miami Dolphins in 2009.
Rachel Shatto, Editor in Chief of PRIDE.com, is an SF Bay Area-based writer, podcaster, and former editor of Curve magazine, where she honed her passion for writing about social justice and sex (and their frequent intersection). Her work has appeared on Dread Central, Elite Daily, Tecca, and Joystiq. She's a GALECA member and she podcasts regularly about horror on the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network. She can’t live without cats, vintage style, video games, drag queens, or the Oxford comma.
Rachel Shatto, Editor in Chief of PRIDE.com, is an SF Bay Area-based writer, podcaster, and former editor of Curve magazine, where she honed her passion for writing about social justice and sex (and their frequent intersection). Her work has appeared on Dread Central, Elite Daily, Tecca, and Joystiq. She's a GALECA member and she podcasts regularly about horror on the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network. She can’t live without cats, vintage style, video games, drag queens, or the Oxford comma.
