Straight Spouses - The Collateral Damage of the "Ex-Gay" and "Change" Myths

A topic that I've addressed before but which needs much more exposure is the damage done to straight spouses who find themselves in marriages to gay/lesbian spouses who have married typically under pressure to conform to societal/family expectations and religious brainwashing that tells them that sexual orientation is changeable and that one can become "straight."   Despite the fact that all legitimate medical and mental health associations now condemn the "change myth" as I call it and hold that sexual orientation is not something that one can change, the leading Christofascist and anti-gay hate groups and many churches continue to push the myth that "gay is wrong" and that "change is possible."  Indeed, just this week Joel Osteen engaged in some of this batshitery even though he conceded that he did not "choose" to be heterosexual.  

A piece by Amity P. Buxton, (pictured above left) founder of the Straight Spouse Network, in Huffington Post looks at the plight of these men and women who find themselves in a whirlwind because their wives or husbands, as the case may be, tried to be straight, married and often had children as they deceived themselves and their spouses until the whole structure simply collapsed.  I'm one such formerly married gay with children and I've seen the collateral damage that the ex-gay charlatans and religious leaders like Pope Benedict XVI cause.   The evil they do to countless thousands of gays/lesbians and their straight spouses needs to be exposed and stopped.  Here are excerpts from the piece in Huffington Post:

Tucked in a corner of the lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender closet is a little-known group: straight women and men in heterosexual marriages whose husbands or wives come out as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender after marrying them as "the right thing to do." Finding the marriages too difficult to maintain due to their hidden sexual orientation or gender identity, they eventually say, "Honey, I'm gay," or, "I need to become the woman or man I am .  .  .  .

Though some couples work out ways to stay together, most divorce, their children now in a broken family. As divorced LGBT partners begin to live their lives with integrity, their straight ex-partners are left in shock, their own identity, integrity, and belief system shattered. The spotlight on the disclosing partners, few outsiders think about their wives or husbands. "They're straight! They're normal. No problem."

Lately, many people -- of all orientations -- say to me, "Oh, this doesn't happen nearly as often now, right?" Wrong.  While conditions are improving for same-sex relationships and transgender persons, these marriages still occur to meet heterosexist expectations, and LGBT spouses in them keep coming out.

More importantly, the larger community remains unaware of this wider range of harm caused by anti-same-sex and pro-heterosexual marriage beliefs. Straight spouses are injured by the very anti-gay or anti-trans/pro-straight factors in our society that caused their mates to marry them -- "collateral damage," some say. 

Once they know the truth, the vast majority divorce and must pick up the pieces of their fractured families to create a semblance of normalcy for their children. In addition, a number keep their ex-partners' "secret," wanting to avoid the latter's rejection by community, workplace, or place of worship, and to protect their children from taunts.  .  .  .  .  Few find the knowledgeable professional help they need.

It's time to pay attention to this invisible group. A new book does just that. Unseen-Unheard: The Journey of Straight Spouses, of which I am a co-author, opens the window onto their emotional, sexual, cognitive, psychological, relational, and spiritual trauma.

We wanted readers to see and hear straight spouses' anger at being in their mates' closet unknowingly, their disbelief that the marriage they knew was a mirage, their fear that they don't have strength to cope, their anxiety that their children will suffer, and their grief from letting go of what they thought they had. 

The good news is that most spouses gradually become triumphantly self-confident. Many gain understanding of why their mates married them, and a number, like me, become LGBT equality activists. The bad news is that the societal factors underlying these painful journeys persist, and, until we change them, painful stories like these will continue to be told.

The next time you hear some pastor, priest, televangelist snake oil merchant, Pope, or self-enriching "professional Christian" railing against gays and the homosexual agenda or claiming that gays can "change" I hope you will picture in your mind the men, women and children who are being condemned to doomed marriages  - all so that liars and hypocrites can either feel superior and good about themselves or so that they can line their pockets with money.  Tawdry whores are more virtuous than these "godly Christians." 

Straight Spouses - The Other Victims of "Ex-Gay" Programs

The preceding post took a second look at Robert Spitzer's recanting of his infamous 2003 study.  Having read the study and better yet a number of the reviews, one has to wonder how and why Spitzer ever believed anything that those in "ex-gay" ministries said.  Especially given the virulent anti-gay positions of these organizations, the fact that some of the study participants made their livelihood by claiming to be "ex-gay", and the - in my opinion -  extreme psychological problems of many who had been brainwashed and traumatized by religious doctrine from their youth.  It is fortunate that Spitzer finally has rendered the study worthless except in the hands of the most dishonest of the Christofascists such as those at PFOX and NARTH.   The victims of "reparative therapy" and "praying away the gay" are many.  But the victims extend beyond the men and women who submitted to the witch doctor like ex-gay therapy.  There is another large pool of victims who the Christofascists and "ex-gays for pay" care nothing about: the straight spouses of gays who in self-denial marry and try to conform to the demands of church and society.  In my own case, I will always feel some level of guilt for deceiving my former wife even though I was deceiving myself as well.  I have three wonderful children that I don't regret, but my former wife deserved better.  All of the straight spouses deserve better.  Yet the charlatans of the ex-gay industry continue to victimize on a large scale.  Two posts here and here on Andres Sullivan's blog brought these other victims to mind.  Here are some highlights:

A reader writes:

Andrew, I've been reading your blog for about three years and feel like you're someone who can understand how I'm feeling right now. My ex-husband and father of my two oldest sons passed away of kidney cancer last November. We had been divorced since 1984 and hadn't spoken for the last ten years.

The gay marriage debate lately has had me thinking about him again and feeling so sad. How he tried so hard to fit into the mold society demanded and how much emotional pain and turmoil caused to all our families when he couldn't.

I always thought gays should be allowed to marry but didn't think it affected me personally. Now I know better. This is why we, as a society, must love and accept everybody the way they are and not the way we demand they be. I can't regret loving him because of the wonderful sons we have. I only regret not being the one he could trust with the truth of his life.

I'm crying now writing this. It's been 38 years since we married, 28 since we divorced and six months since he died, and I am still trying to finally have some closure.

This is the flipside of the social conservative debate. One of the great threats to successful marriage in this country is the way in which fundamentalism and homophobia coax gay people into straight relationships which are, at root, based on a lie. The human pain and wreckage this causes - to both gays and straights, and especially children - is immense. Yet so many on the right seem not to care or even notice. They just want us to disappear. It was so much easier when we didn't so obviously, you know, exist.

A reader provides the flipside experience of this post:

There are so many of these straight spouses of closeted gays out there still and they are the very real, and often ignored, collateral damage of anti-gay rights campaigns.  I was one of them once - a closeted lesbian married to a man. I'm not sure I'll ever completely let go of the shame I have about marrying someone while I knew stuffed way deep down, but could not accept, that I am a lesbian. Did I love him? I did. Passionately, though fleetingly. We too lasted 10 years before neither of us could take the distance my secret knowledge created between us.

Another writes:

I haven't been following the Dish like I'd prefer as I've ended my last semester of seminary, but I caught your post and the commentary at the end: "One of the great threats to successful marriage in this country is the way in which fundamentalism and homophobia coax gay people into straight relationships which are, at root, based on a lie." That struck a chord with me.  When I got to college and started sleeping around with guys, I still saw myself middle-aged and married to a woman with children. I was living and knowing one thing, but my fundamentalism and internalized homophobia made me plan to keep living a lie. Guys I hooked up were planning weddings sometimes. At least one of those has ended in a divorce. My experience of the ex-gay garbage was far more threatening to a potential marriage to a woman than my ability to marry my fiance.

The Christofascists say that homosexuality is a sin.  I would argue that what they cause to happen to countless gays and countless straight spouses is by far and away the bigger sin.   And as Andrew and his readers note, the "godly Christians" don't give a damn about the harm they cause.  In their quest to stamp out anything that demonstrates that their "inerrant Bible" is horrifically flawed they care nothing about others.  It's all about themselves and their intense desire to avoid having to think beyond what they were told as children in soul destroying Sunday school lessons.

Will the Spread of Gay Marriage Reduce "Mixed" Marriages With Straights?

One of the major points of disgust I have with the bogus "ex-gay" agenda pushed by Christianist organizations and so-called reparative therapy "ministries" is that they do not seem to give a tinkers damn about the straight spouses that knowingly or unknowingly find themselves married to a closeted gay or lesbian. The agenda is all about "changing" the gay or lesbian spouse straight and the favorite proof of the "ex-gay" conversion is marriage to an opposite sex spouse. The collateral damage that is almost guaranteed to flow to the straight spouse and any children of the marriage when it ends means nothing to the likes of the folks at Exodus International.
*
Also missing from the mix is any concern that the straight spouse marrying an "ex-gay" has been cheated out of having a marriage to someone who is heterosexual even if the closeted LGBT spouse remains faithful and remains in the marriage. No, sadly, the political agenda of the Christianists to be able to parade "ex-gays" before the public, legislators and judges in their quest to denigrate and marginalize LGBT rights trumps all else. It's disgusting and, to me, demonstrates the utter moral bankruptcy of ex-gay proponents. People like, it appears, Marcus Bachmann, the husband of the seriously untethered Michele Bachmann.. A column in Huffington Post looks at how the spread of gay marriage may reduce these unfortunate marriages. Here are highlights:
*
Whether straight men and women know it or not, New York's new Gay Marriage Act will have an enormous impact on them. The reason? It will eliminate or at least drastically reduce the likelihood of gays attempting to conceal or even change their orientation through heterosexual marriage.
*
In the past, . . . . most lesbians and gay men married opposite-gender spouses and tried as best they could to fit into the heterosexual mould their society expected, not infrequently indulging in clandestine gay liaisons.
*
These are the marriages that the Gay Marriage Act will mostly end. And some of its most fervent supporters have been the heterosexual spouses of closeted homosexuals. These gay husbands and their wives and ex-wives, and lesbian wives and their husbands and ex-husbands number in the millions, and number in the millions -- between 1.7 and 3.4 million -- and are increasingly speaking out about how their experience has affected them personally.
*
The Straight Spouse Network, for instance, use a virtual community "for all the millions of us who find that we are married or in a long term relationship with someone who we find out is gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered, or just not sure about that." Television's Fran Drescher's show Happily Divorced is inspired by her real-life experience as a straight woman whose husband reveals, post-divorce, that he is gay.
*
But the right to gay marriage will reduce but not eliminate these marriages; only eradicating homophobia will do that. There remains a chasm between official policy and the realities of personal and social life: parental rejection, social ostracism or mockery, and physical danger that includes being bashed as a "fag." Coming out can still be perilous, and many young gays prefer the safety of being closeted.
*
For the first time in history, young people are growing up in the presence of legally sanctioned gay marriage (and divorce), an experience that will influence how they shape their lives in a world that is marching away from homophobia and allowing gays and lesbians to unite in marriage, to raise their children, and to expect to receive the same rights and to be subject to the same obligations as heterosexual spouses. As more gay men and women decide to marry, they will shore up the very institution whose decline the wider society mourns.

The Closet and Harm to Straight Spouses

The Advocate has a story authored by Amity P. Buxton, founder of the Straight Spouse Network, that looks at the new documentary, Outrage, but from a different perspective - that of the straight spouses of the closeted gays. It is a subject that touches a nerve with me as someone who was married for over 24 years and tried ever so desperately to make myself straight, sadly buying into - or at least trying to - the bogus myth that sexual orientation is a choice and something that can be changed. Of course, the purveyors of the myth like Focus on the Family and Exodus International care nothing for the lives of the straight spouses they set up to be turned upside down since all they are worried about is the financial benefits flowing from false "ministries" and the usefulness of the choice myth from a political perspective. I truly wished my former wife no harm - not that I can say that she reciprocates that feeling given her efforts to destroy me and/or drive me to suicide - and all I ever did was try to be what society, family and church told me I should be. It was all a lie, but I fell for it and tried to live by it for many years until the whole house of cards collapsed. But, I am digressing. Here are highlights from the Advocate article:

*

The recent documentary Outrage exposes the hypocrisy of politicians who live in the closet while voting antigay -- but it also shines a light on the devastation it causes unsuspecting spouses and children.

*

The betrayal of their own integrity as gay persons in order to gain political power and the subsequent use of that power to cause harm to gay and lesbian citizens is enough to raise our adrenaline. Yet below the layers of the film’s crisscrossing of personal and political events lies a side story of betrayal and pain that also needs to be addressed. I fear it may get lost amid the core message of the film.

*

I’m not referring to the individual snapshots of the private relationships and straight-faced denials of men like Idaho senator Larry Craig and Florida governor Charlie Crist, who engage in double talk when their same-sex activities are revealed. No, the side story that needs to be raised to a higher level of awareness is that of the straight wives who find themselves in the glass closets of politicians who rose in the ranks to take the helm of a state government or to represent their constituencies in the House of Representatives or the Senate by denying who they were. The wives’ stories spotlight the costs paid by everyone in a family and community when a gay person feels obliged to hide who he or she is and pretend to be someone else in order to be accepted and gain power. More important, their story is a cautionary tale that reveals the far-reaching damage done by antigay attitudes and heterosexist expectations that still prevail in America.

*

Yes, many people, gay and straight alike, refuse to believe that "the wife didn’t know.” But based on the 25,000-plus spouses with whom I have been in contact since 1986, most have no clue, and if someone raises the possibility, many dismiss it. “After all, he married me and we have children.”

*

The straight spouses of the politicians in Outrage may be a side story in the film, but their experience is just as devastating on a personal level as the effect of the politicians’ hypocrisy is on their fellow gay men and lesbians and their constituents -- and is just as related to the need for the acceptance and equality of gay people. The struggle of straight wives as they try to rebuild their destroyed self-concept, moral compass, and assumptions about gender, sex, marriage, and their future mirrors that of their partners. However, their confusion and pain is not caused by their own moral and sexual dilemma, but rather by their husband’s hiding of identity and belief system in the face of the women's trust, the core of a marital relationship.

*

Their trauma can be traced back to the prevailing mind-set about traditional marriage and antigay attitudes and stereotypes still found in many parts of our country. That is where we need to direct our outrage and take action to change the status quo. . . . . If we could take action to help more people in more communities to comprehend . . . . their own role in causing these tragic stories by their encouragement of heterosexual marriage and discouragement of anyone’s being gay or lesbian.

*

In the end, increased acceptance and welcoming of gay men and lesbians as equal members of our communities will lead to stronger governmental institutions with leaders of integrity who can implement American ideals. Acceptance will also diminish societal pressures for gay men or lesbians to enter heterosexual marriages as the "right thing to do," only to later reveal their truth, which in the majority of cases triggers divorce -- an act that truly does weaken the institution of marriage. Once accepted universally as individuals or government leaders, gay and lesbian persons can help America as a nation and all Americans to create a society based on truth, one that provides equality and justice for all.

*

Often I feel that I, my wife and my children are all victims of a foul and homophobic society - usually driven by "Godly Christians" - that forces gays to embrace the closet and try to be what they can never be. Yes, I should have had the strength to always be who I really was. But there are thousands and thousands (if not millions) of others who have done exactly what I tried to do. So much pain could be avoided if LGBT Americans could be accepted as normal people and not pushed to be something other than their true selves.

Straight Spouse Network Supports National Coming Out Day

Having been previously married for many years, I know all too well the ordeal involved in coming out to one's spouse and family. I also have observed the sense of being cheated that a straight spouse feels at learning that their marriage, while not a sham, was not and never could be what they had hoped and dreamed for. Often, the straight spouse feels that they have been the victim of the gay spouse. This feeling is understandable even if not accurate. On my part, I never had any intention of hurting my ex-wife or causing her unhappiness. With the benefit of hindsight, I believe both spouses are the victims: victims of a homophobic society and a majority religious tradition that forces people like me to try ever so hard to conform and be what they are not. The so-called "ex-gay" programs increase the likelihood of gays trying to be straight and in the process causing hurt and turmoil to the straigth spouse. Sadly, the "ex-gay" programs care nothing about the innocent straight spouses placed in untenable marriages, the sole focus being to maintain the bogus "choice myth." Thus, it is noteworthy that the Straight Spouse Network has come out SUPPORTING National Coming Out Day. Here are highlights from PR Newswire:

*

The Human Rights Campaign has declared October 11th as National Coming Out Day. On this day, members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) community -- and those who love them -- will celebrate the opportunity for them to live openly. A new voice (from what many might think is an unlikely source) has joined in support of this basic human right: the voice of straight spouses -- men and women who have been or are married to LGBT people.

*

Why are straight spouses supporting National Coming Out Day? "Many concerns of a straight spouse relate to anti-gay and anti-trans attitudes and behaviors in communities across the country," says Kathy Callori, Executive Director of the Straight Spouse Network. "They, and their children too, are often stigmatized or isolated in social or religious groups. They also fear their LGBT partners will lose their jobs or community status if they come out publicly."

*

To end the practice of closeting in marriage, straight spouses have added a heartfelt pitch to Coming Out Day 2008: "Let LGBT persons come out as equals -- a human right." For the same reason, SSN [Straight Spouse Network] as an organization supports same-gender marital unions.

*

It is estimated that up to two million gay, lesbian, or bisexual individuals have married or will marry. In addition, an unknown number of transgender persons marry. When they come out, their spouses feel ignored, betrayed, and sexually rejected. Most family members and friends, even professionals and clergy, do not understand their pain or minimize their concerns. Each straight wife or husband must heal the wounds caused by the unexpected disclosure while undergoing their own identity crisis in isolation.

Homophobia Impacts Not Just Gay Lives

Coincidentally to my recent posts about married gays coming out of the closet after many years, MSNBC has a lengthy story (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23168113/) written by a straight spouse that looks at what forcing gays into the closet and marriage does to the straight spouse – perhaps the main victim of the “ex-gay” nonsense intentionally foisted on the public by Christian Right organizations and numerous churches even though they know damn well that legitimate research confirms that the “cure” programs do not actually work. Rather, their sole goal is making money and more importantly positioning themselves to claim gays are gay by choice and, therefore, in need of no legal protections or rights either in the church or under civil law. That these organizations and churches will use such deliberate, disingenuous lies to harm both gays and their straight spouses proves to me that THEY, not the gays are the ones who are morally bankrupt and the sinful ones. They truly do not care who gets harmed if it furthers their agenda and Pharisee like self-righteousness. I would also add that, as noted in the article, this area is living proof there are many married gays in the military - if you doubt it check the local gay chat rooms - who probably did not know what else to do but marry. Here are some story highlights:

That evening, after we'd watched our three children play on the lawn of our home in the Washington, D.C., suburbs, he curled into a fetal position on a porch chair and admitted more than I ever wanted to know: He had been having anonymous sex with men.

was 30 years old when this happened, and Chris and I had been married for 11 years. We looked like the perfect family in our Christmas card portrait. Both of us grew up in the small-town South, and Chris was in the military. Yet I finally understood that our entire married life, except for our children, whom we both loved completely, was built on a falsehood. At that moment, I felt as if I were standing alone in the world, stripped of all dignity, with a big sign on me that read idiot.

The movie "Brokeback Mountain" turned a spotlight on gay men who lead double lives, having sex with other men while they are married to women. But that film only scratched the surface of their wives' miserable experience. When I saw the movie, I started to cry as I watched Ennis, the young cowboy played by Heath Ledger, wed his sweetheart even though he'd been involved with another man. I wanted to scream: "It is such a lie! Don't do it!" My mind flashed back to my own wedding day, when I was the virgin bride standing before family, friends and a minister. I had no idea what I was getting myself into.

This kind of union happens more often than people may think; research done by University of Chicago sociologist Edward Laumann, Ph.D., estimated that between 1.5 million and 2.9 million American women who have ever been married had a husband who had had sex with another man. That means there are a large number of women who have no idea what their husband does in secret.

I was also pleased that we had a similar religious upbringing. I grew up going to a Methodist church, and I've always had a strong Christian faith. Chris's father was a Southern Baptist minister who preached fire and brimstone, and Chris was taught that being gay was the ultimate sin — an absolute sentence to hell.

You might wonder why Chris couldn't accept his homosexuality, but the sin factor was ingrained in him at an early age. Being gay would not only endanger his job and family life, it could also cost him his relationship with his parents, his church and God. Chris feared that coming out would invalidate him as a human being — and might even send him to hell.

The only thing that saved my sanity was the Straight Spouse Network, an international support group founded by another woman who'd been married to a gay man. During my first SSN meeting, I sat in the corner and cried the entire time. At least I knew I wasn't alone. I soon learned that straight spouses typically blame themselves for not being sexy enough to keep their husband from straying. As bad as it is when another woman manages to steal your husband, at least you believe you can compete. When your husband wants another man, it denies your entire being. I also learned that a surprising number of gays in the military are married because marriage is such a useful front. You can't be gay in the military, and if you're married, then of course you're not gay. I see now that many gay spouses genuinely believe they are doing the right thing by getting married, because they are lying to themselves more than anyone.

I have marched for gay rights and spoken about my experience to groups of gay fathers, because I believe it was intolerance and the fear of homosexuality that put me and my family through complete hell — and I hope none of that was in vain. Everyone has a fundamental right to be who he is, and I pray that Americans as a whole can become more accepting of homosexuals. Perhaps then, gay people won't feel the need to pretend they're straight and get married as a way to "prove" it to everyone else.

TRUTH WINS OUT RELEASES 'EX-GAY = EX-WIFE' VIDEO THAT DETAILS HOW EX-GAY MARRIAGES LEAD TO HEARTBREAK AND DIVORCE

My friend Wayne Besen at Truth Wins Out is releasing a new video to combat the false message put out by the Christianist funded "ex-gay" programs. I am setting out Wayne's press release in full because it not only addresses the failed marriages of ex-gays, but also the failed marriages of other LGBT individuals who try to conform to societal and religious dictates only to meet with ultimate failure. I know of what I speak - I am one of them and my children are collateral damage.

Groups That Encourage Marriage As A Cure For Homosexuality Destroy Families And Treat Spouses and Children As Collateral Damage

NEW YORK - Truth Wins Out released an exclusive National Coming Out Day video today, "Ex-Gay = Ex-Wife," that features the stories of four courageous women whose families fell apart after their closeted husbands came out. This video is the latest in TWO's "Talking Truth" campaign and highlights the harm of ex-gay programs from a unique perspective - that of the spouse who gets left behind when the promised "cure" does not endure.

"Ex-gay programs love to show the wedding photos, but they never show you the divorce papers that result from such ill-conceived marriages," said Truth Wins Out's Executive Director, Wayne Besen. "These programs hold marriage up as the Holy Grail to heterosexuality, but the truth is, these marriages wholly fail, leaving shattered lives and broken families."

Bonnie Kaye, an author and director of the organization www.GayHusbands.com, has dedicated her life to counseling women after the demise of her own marriage. She blames anti-gay activists, such as Alan Chambers of Exodus International and James Dobson of Focus on the Family, for creating such miserable and doomed marriages.

"Alan Chambers and James Dobson are destroying the lives of families, not helping them...It's not a choice, people are who they are. Learn to love them and learn to embrace them and help them love themselves so they don't have to go and get married to be somebody they're not," said Kaye.

In the video, Nancy Davis shares how her former father-in law, a psychologist, recommended that his son meet a woman, get married and lead a straight life. "I feel like I was used, I was like an innocent lamb lead to slaughter," Davis said. The pain of such marriages can linger, long after the divorce is final. "Many of us are severely damaged...the spouses and children end up being the collateral damage," said Carol Silverman of the Straight Spouse Network, who was divorced after being married for nearly three decades.

Ignoring the failure and destruction all around them, ex-gay groups arrogantly and selfishly continue to use such families as pawns in their divisive culture war. "These organizations that try to convince people that they can be cured need to be stopped," asserted Tracy Rosenberg, who divorced her husband after almost 20 years.

"This video is a powerful reality check and a warning for those who would marry thinking that it will help them go from gay to straight," said Besen. "We are now looking to tell the stories of husbands whose marriages ended when their ex-gay wives came out as lesbians."