Gay and married
An Introduction
My client sat in the chair looking down at the floor, glancing up briefly to build eye contact, then darting his eyes back to the carpet. He spoke quietly, as if almost afraid to be heard. He clutched his hands throughout the session, exhibiting all the markers of an anxious man in the throes of shame. He was a modern client to my practice: a married, middle-aged, suburban dad with a high-powered career. A colleague had given him my number months before. It took him a long occasion to muster the courage to call and form an appointment. Towards the end of our first session he looked up at me and said, “I think I’m in love…with another man. I’m scared and I don’t know what to do.”
I have worked with hundreds of gay men in heterosexual marriages struggling with being in the closet or wanting to surface from it. There is so much about these men that is misunderstood and very few studies or little literature to provide insight. I decided to share my thoughts and research about these men and their struggles at a conference a few years ago. That presentation led to other opportunities to tell their story and of my work with them. Those presentations prompted men to write to
I’m a Straight Woman Who Married a Gay Man
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Dear Prudence,
I met my husband 13 years ago, and we’ve been together ever since. We fell deeply, madly in admire with each other and have been married for nine wonderful years now. He’s patient, kind, gentle-hearted. He’s also always been honest about being same-sex attracted and has never veiled it from me. Only one of our joint friends knows this about my husband. Our son also knows, since we thought it would be best to remain unseal with him about it, so he never “found out” by surprise or from our mutual partner. Our son took the news very well and doesn’t care that his father was gay.
I’ve never told my family, or really any of my friends, as I ponder they’d all be judgmental. My siblings don’t favor my husband, but that’s a different letter in itself. So I’ve always kept it bottled up inside. He’s been married before, and divorced, to a s
My Husband’s Not Gay, a show on TLC, has caused an uproar. The negative attention is unfortunate because this could own been a show that highlighted mixed-orientation couples and how these couples can actually make their relationships work.
Why do some people become so outspoken and judgmental about marriages with one straight and one gay spouse? There are several reasons. These marriages raise concerns about infidelity. They bring out people’s judgments about what marriage should or should not be. In particular, they bring out people’s opinions about monogamy.
Finally, these relationships suggest to some people “reparative therapy,” the unethical and impossible claim that a person can be changed from gay to straight. The men in this television program aren’t claiming to be ex-gay nor that they can change their sexual orientation (at least not on the show). They announce they are attracted to men but choose not to live as a gay man and their straight wives accept this.
People seem to get up in arms when a man says he is not gay but rather simply attracted to men. In our culture, we identify ourselves via a sexual-attraction binary: gay or straight. This is severely limiting
The Gay Man in the Straight Marriage
Rob rushed into his first session with me, gym bag on one shoulder, briefcase on the other, 10 minutes late and out of breath. He arrange his bags down, gently put his Blackberry on the table in front of him, and heaved himself onto the couch. He sighed and began: &#;Okay, I&#;m gay, I&#;m married, I have three kids, and I&#;m not getting divorced.&#; He&#;d distributed some of this knowledge with me in our phone conversation, but I was still struck by the sense of hopelessness in his tone. As he paused, awaiting my response, quite honestly, I was awaiting my response as well. I knew this was not Rob&#;s first experience in therapy and that a lot was riding on what I was about to say.
Rob had been referred by a former client of mine he&#;d met in an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. Just out of alcohol rehabilitation treatment, he&#;d begun attending AA meetings, where he&#;d shared parts of his story. He described a long effort with his sexual orientation, growing up in a devoutly Roman Catholic family, where he learned that his sexual attraction to men was cause for eternal damnation. Perhaps to overcome his shame, he excelled academically, med
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