On a recent episode of Law and Order, Detectives Lupo and Bernard are protecting a witness who has had what she describes as a “down low” lesbian affair with a murder victim. The program shows them hiding in a hotel, passing the time. The witness decides she likes Lupo, and asks Bernard “Does he have a girlfriend?” Detective Bernard’s response is to look at her wide eyed and say “YOU had a girlfriend”. The witness looks surprised, but they cannot continue the conversation because they are interrupted by a knock on the door from the prosecutor.

Some of our gay and lesbian spouses do not acknowledge the label of “gay” or “lesbian”. They may even reject being called bisexual, since this is just about one person. They have affairs with someone of the same sex, but do not believe that makes them “gay”. For the straight spouse, coping with this complex situation can be frustrating, an unending riddle.

When our marriages end because of our husbands and wives have an affair with someone of the same sex, the words “honey I’m gay” can provide a sense of finality, a definite scenario. “Honey I’m bi” doesn’t seem to be said quite so often. Rather, the disclosure to a straight spouse might be “I might be a little gay”, or “I fell in love with just this one person”, or “everyone has these feelings, you’re just repressing yours”. Some men did know their wives had been involved with women – but they had no idea what that would really mean in a marriage. There may be further complications after divorce when the bisexual spouse begins to date other people of the opposite sex. If the couple is still connected through children and step parenting, the dilemma of whether or not to tell the new lover what actually happened and spare them the pain of deception is a painful one. The risk of course, is that no one will believe what they say, and attribute it to maliciousness.

For us, unresolved issues of our spouses sexuality are a part of denial in marriage. We may hear that it isn’t really cheating because they never cheated on us with the opposite sex. We may hear that since they aren’t happy in the marriage they decided to become intimate with someone of the same sex. And of course, we’ll be told in counseling and by well meaning friends and family that the unhappiness in the marriage “takes two”.  We are left to ponder the impossible task of satisfying a spouse who cannot be happy with someone of the opposite sex.

The healthy skepticism that Detective Bernard showed in the Law and Order episode is refreshing to see on television. “Everyone” does not have sex with someone of the same gender, only gay, lesbian, and bisexual people do. A straight person who becomes involved romantically with someone who has had a same sex affair needs to know what it really means – and their friends, family, and counselors should not be afraid to speak openly.

Open that closet door. Put the “down low” on the “up and up”.

By Kevin Stevenson

I am a 45 year old straight guy, a very logical man, with a live and let live attitude and I have never been homophobic, having both gay and lesbian friends and relations (respectively).  Being straight and not in the least bit ‘confused’, I am not troubled by repressed feelings and the gay community doesn’t affect my life.

Until recently.

In March I could have killed someone.

Some two actually. I saw (what I took to be) a lesbian couple, hand in hand crossing the road as I approached at speed. I felt a great anger well up within me.  All it would have taken was a flick of the wrist, to mount the pavement, and to destroy three lives. Theirs and my own.

I was very close.

How did this transformation come about?  What had changed an open minded, non-judgemental character, and all round decent chap into a bigot?

Well, simply this.  My wife had come out.

Now, I’m not going to go into the whole phenomenon of women (and men) finding themselves in mid life. It happens. And thanks to the various LGBT support groups, national and local help lines and pride days etc, they are well served.  However, we, and by we I mean the straight spouses, are not.

I personally found it very hard to be angry with my wife, after all I still loved her, I was devastated, yet understood that this was not so much a choice for her, as fate.

But I was angry.  Angry at the loss of my marriage, our home, our plans, our future. In desperation I started looking at LGBT websites, looking for some clue, some hope, looking for the ‘get out of gay free card’.

Naturally I didn’t find it.  Instead I found endless support for her, celebration of her decision, and on one site, a lecture on how heterosexual propaganda had been suppressing her.  This simply fueled my rage.  My wife had been stolen by lesbians! My LIFE had been stolen by homosexuals!  I was under attack and had been all along!  How blind I had been!

I was doubled up in pain and my head spun. They were laughing at me. Worse!  They were disregarding me!  My marriage didn’t matter, my life didn’t matter, all they cared about was that they had added another to their ranks!!

As I grew more and more enraged, I knew that my attitude was wrong.  Illogical.  Stupid.  Hateful.  Spiteful.  Bigoted.  All the things that I am not.  I was becoming a monster.  I was going INSANE.

In desperation I reached out for help, PFLAG were kind, but couldn’t help.   Stonewall said that ‘there were no facilities for people in my position’, but they did suggest Relate.  Well, ultimately useful, but where was my help line?  Where was my support?  I couldn’t find it, and no one in the LGBT community seemed able to help.

What I really needed was someone, anyone, to tell me that I was going to be OK.  That the homophobia that I was feeling was a natural reaction, and more importantly, one that would pass.  I needed to speak to people who had been through this, even lesbians who had come out in mid life, to try to understand why, how.

I needed help.

But there was no one.  Ultimately, I have found support, through SSN. But my point is that when I reached out for help to the logical place, the gay community, it wasn’t there, the knowledge and the experience that I hoped for wasn’t forthcoming.

I was collateral damage.

If I had seen that lesbian couple on my way TO Relate, rather than on the way FROM Relate, they might have been collateral damage too.

Homophobia is wrong.  But this lack of support for us is a cause of homophobia.  The LGBT community needs to take responsibility for its fall out.  By giving support to straight spouses it would be protecting itself.

I don’t want anyone to suffer what I have gone through.  To suddenly become homophobic when previously you had been tolerant and even supportive, is a frightening and literally mind bending experience.

It has got better.  I can walk by the gay pub without wanting to smash its windows. I can talk to my gay friends as individuals.

I was not a bad man.  I was a man in a bad place.  I have not lost myself to this, as I feared that I would.  I’m not ‘right’ yet, but I’m assured that I will be.

But none of that assurance has come from where I looked for it.

Kevin.

Copyright K Stevenson 2009

The Straight Spouse Network invites the perspectives of various individuals who wish to share their unique experiences. We Thank Kevin for being our Guest Blogger today and permitting us to print his article.

It’s not uncommon in the course of a mixed orientation marriage for an individual with a same sex attraction to deny being gay.  Gay means swishy.  Gay means women with butch haircuts and mannish clothing.  Gay means attitude.  Gay means being “in the life”. 

 So honey, I’m only a little bit gay and you should put up with it or make me stop.  Or you should understand and get educated about just what gay means since you obviously don’t know anything.  Or, I wasn’t interested in the same sex until I met this wonderful person who makes me feel wonderful -  something I never got from you!!! And guess what?  Just because I look at erotic pictures of the same gender as me, just because I have sex with men doesn’t mean I am gay.” 

 The fact is that human sexuality is a varied and subtle spectrum.  Some people certainly do not fit the “labels”.  But when it comes to a relationship going forward, all the straight spouse’s understanding of all the dynamics of same sex attraction will not matter one bit unless the straight person’s needs, perceptions, feelings and desires are given equal time and attention.  

 Honey you KNOW I have sex with my lesbian lover.  So why are you so upset to see she  left her stuff here, or you passed her car on the way home?  Why are you so angry when she calls during our dinner, our family time, our vacation time, and whats the problem with me talking to her.  After all, I go into another room, away from you.  It’s not like you don’t know!  At least I’m honest about it! 

 Imagine a heterosexual wife telling her heterosexual husband these things about her need for the other man.  Imagine a heterosexual man telling his heterosexual wife these things about his need for a mistress.  For the straight spouse, the experience is similar – but also very different.  Because the same sex aspect of the extramarital relationship makes others uncomfortable, the straight spouse or partner cannot express their anger, their frustration, their disgust.  If they set limits, they are sometimes accused of being abusive, intolerant, homophobic, crazy.  If their husband or wife is completely denying any homosexual activity to the rest of the world, they must endure well meaning people “explaining” to them what is “really” going on. 

 Despite the daunting challenge, there are couples who remain in mixed orientation marriages.  This requires a great deal of communication and mutual respect.  Most couples separate, many remain on friendly terms, others do not.  How the straight partner is treated, respected, acknowledged within the relationship and within therapy has great impact on the future of any ongoing relationship. 

 The Straight Spouse Network has a small library of articles for therapists, marriage counselors, and individuals seeking to understand the dynamics of mixed orientation marriages.  If you would like to know more about these resources, please contact us.  We are the pre eminent support source for straight spouses in all sorts of relationships.  Perhaps the most valuable thing about what we offer to heterosexual husbands and wives in mixed orientation marriages is affirmation and a safe place to discuss what is happening to them in their life. 

     By Amity Buxton

It’s time to go back to the beginning, I think, to clarify why straight spouses need to be heard in the current conversations about social justice swirling around us. It is not because they are overlooked, which they are. Rather, straight spouses want desperately to share their wide lens on what happens to their families when their husbands or wives come out. Every family member — they, their gay or lesbian partners, and their children — is hurt by antigay sentiments and action, such as constitutional amendments and laws that limit legal marriage to that of a man and women.

Up to two million gay men and lesbians in the United States have followed the traditional idea that marriage is limited to a man and a woman and have entered a presumably heterosexual marriage usually without the straight spouse’s knowledge of their sexual orientation and often without the gay or lesbian spouse’s acknowledgment or realization. They marry because they truly love their fiancés and want to raise a family and also to meet societal expectations. Their faith communities, families, and society in general expect that marriage will occur in almost everyone’s life and that it would, of course, be with someone of the opposite gender. While many gay men and lesbians now do not feel a need to follow the traditional pattern, a number still do. So, don’t stop reading

Once they marry a straight person, most lesbians and gay men struggle to suppress or deny their same-sex attraction and become totally involved in the marriage and parenthood. However neither prayer nor practice changes their sexual orientation. For most, their internal struggle escalates, often reaching severe depression, until something happens to change the pattern. The children finish school and leave home, or they meet someone socially or at work, or the Internet invites them to explore and — poof! — their same-sex attractions are ignited or they unexpectedly fall in love. When they disclose (or are discovered), that they are really gay or lesbian, their straight wives or husbands are devastated, their children confused. Though some couples manage to stay married, because of their long history, love and close friendship, the good of the family, or the difficulty of separating, most divorce – and their children lose a two-parent home.

I lived that experience, watching my gay husband suffer without knowing why until he came out. As I then met and studied straight spouses across the country, I saw that they, like their gay and lesbian mates, were stigmatized, too, and so were their children. I saw, too, that their issues and those of their families were ignored and not understood, as they tried to protect their gay spouses and children from rejection in their churches or synagogues, jobs, schools or communities. That’s why I founded the Straight Spouse Network in 1991 to provide confidential personal support for straight men and women who faced this unforeseen family crisis for which they were not prepared.

Given these scenarios that repeat themselves across the country, the rationale for legalizing one man-one woman marriage as the only marriage form and a way to bring stability to the community is sabotaged by the reality of the family crises experienced by mixed-orientation couples. Neither spouse entering those marriages has high odds of fulfilling his or her hope of creating a lasting relationship and family. No children born to them can be sure their two parents will stay together.

Revealing the devastating impact on families of couples married under the one-man/one-woman societal imperative is the reason why straight spouses want their voices heard by proponents of laws designed to exclude gay and lesbian couples from marrying. Avoiding the perpetuation of this kind of harm to families is reason enough to pass laws that enable gay men and lesbians, no less than other adults, to marry any person to whom they wish to commit their lives and love, regardless of gender. Only then can the hopes of all spouses and families in the United States have the greatest possible chance of being fulfilled.