Being in the closet is messy. It's hard to keep track of things and to know where you have placed things. Important things too, like love, feelings, friendship and honesty. Again, it is just what Barney Frank said "the effort required to live a clandestine emotional/sexual life involves an all-consuming strangulation of one’s fundamental identity....It leads to cracked judgments—particularly those involving people—since one’s ability to see others clearly is spavined by emotional chaos in order to successfully live the lie."I personally know 5 married women in real life who are lesbians and are still in the closet in varying degrees. Still married to their husbands, usually because kids are involved. One is childless but prefers her social standing within the straight world. Each is holding out as long as they can, but even with those whose husbands know it is still messy. I am in love with just such a woman. Some husbands know and accept it because of the children, some know and don't accept it and are making their wives and themselves miserable until she finally decides to leave. The children in the end aren't happy either. The parents are not giving a very good example of love to them. The tensions are still felt by the kids no matter how hard you try not to let them.
She will leave eventually, oh yes, she will. Just how much damage is done by that leaving is up to the husband and even the wife. Maybe you can think of it this way: The Soviet Union manged to keep their unarmed populace under control by fear and intimidation for 60 years. Then the people simply said "we've had enough". The Soviet Union had guns and laws and nuclear weapons. The people did not. The unarmed people who decided they had enough brought the Soviet Union down. The nuclear arsenal of the United States did not. Fear gets tiresome after a while, you can get so tired of being afraid that even nuclear weapons wont keep you where you don't want to be. Again, there are some husbands who do not know, nor should they ever. They are abusive enough already. And then there are some women who know they are lesbians but haven't acted on it and are waiting until the children are grown, or until they meet the right woman. Some women have lovers and get together with their girlfriends when they can but don't plan on leaving their husbands, ever.
I know probably 30 more through this blog who have emailed me or left comments, they are all lesbians but each is in a different stage in dealing with it. Some are out, some are out and divorced, some still married and some are still married but haven't acted on their feelings. I know of one who has simply fallen in love with a woman. But does not identify as lesbian. Love comes in many forms. But it is no less love than what I feel for Lorrie, no less valid.
There are hundreds of blogs by women like us that I have visited at one time or another. The numbers are probably in the thousands though. I know of a few more who have joined the Late in Life Lesbians network. I have met 3 more on Twitter, on twitter I have also met a woman whose mother came out when she was still a child. I personally know two men who are gay, who are married to women and are still in the closet. I know of one more with an interesting arrangement, the straight wife gets one million dollars if she stays with him until their child is grown so he can remain in his closet. All closets are emotionally expensive to be in. That one just happens to also be financially expensive, hopefully he keeps his bargain with her. Right now she is sticking to it, but the emotional cost, again, this is my opinion only, is hardly worth it. Most men don't want to date married women contrary to popular belief. Most men who will date married women are either married themselves or are just looking for a no strings attached arrangement. I have often thought how lonely that life is for the straight partner. How lonely it can be for the gay spouse as well.
From what I have read at the Straight Spouses Network, more women that are married to gay men know their husbands are gay than men know their wives are gay. It is my opinion though, that the only reason it is true is because we women can hide our emotions better and fake it much more easily than men. It is easy for us to have sex when we are not aroused, it is much, much harder for a man. I know a lot of us also worry that our husbands reactions will be very negative and possibly hurtful when they find out. Their desire to hurt as much as they have been hurt can often overrule their feelings to protect the children from harm by speaking out against their wives. One of the first things that the Straight Spouses Network tries to get across to the straight spouse is that speaking negatively about your gay spouse to your children, only hurts the children, and it will hurt their relationship with the child when they discover for themselves that all those those things they said about you are lies.
In the United States it is estimated that there are an equal number of gay men and women closeted as out. That is a number in the millions. Millions, not thousands. The percent of the population that is out, open and free, is approximately 4%. Approximately 12,000,000 people are out, approximately 12,000,000 are living "under cover" or "in the closet." The term for a woman married to a gay man is a beard. I don't know what the term for a man married to a lesbian is, chastity belt? mask? beardette? Does anyone know? A gay and lesbian married to each other to provide cover for both is called a lavender marriage. You know if there is a term for it, then it is much more common than anyone wants to admit.
I can't really speak for the gay men in these situations, nor can I truly speak for the other women. I can only speak from my own experience and heart. I knew I was attracted to women from about age 6 or 7. I grew up in the 60's. I was indoctrinated to believe that a girl grew up, married a man and had children. You lived happily ever after and your husband was your prince charming and your children were wonderful and that life fulfilled every desire. Sex with your husband was to be amazing, or something you bared, depending on who was telling you about it. But either way, we were led to believe it was a man whom you would fall in love with. At least today with this subject openly talked about there will hopefully be fewer people living in messy closets in the near future.
Meredith Baxter Birney just came out, she pretty much said the same thing a lot of us have said. We don't always know because we didn't know that there could be another way. I knew, I knew there was another way, I was always an inquiring kid, I saw movies, I read books. I just didn't have the guts to live my life authentically. I misunderstood what God was trying to show me because my religion was all about the laws of an ancient theocracy and nothing about simply worshiping an amazing, creative, multi-faceted God.
I am reminded of when my mother-in-law was dying. She had been raised staunch Southern Baptist. After two years of painful cancer, on her death bed, she wrote a letter to her children. In it, she said something about that she had learned that God was not at all like we had been taught. To love God with all your heart is all that is necessary, and to love God means to love others, to treat others, as you wish to be treated, no matter how they treat you, this is all that is required. I wrote a multi-part piece about the process of my reconciling my religion with my gayness, but I really just needed to write this one thing: you have to come to reject religion as man defines what is true in order to understand your own self, I think this is true of all humans, not just the gay ones, the non gay ones just have an easier time of living with the man made rules. You have to listen to God for yourself. He shows us everyday the truth, we just need to pay attention.
Messy closets. That is all living in one brings. No room to breath, no room to grow. Staying in it you and those around you just end up stunted. The husband paying his wife one million dollars so he can remain in the closet is really fooling himself. He isn't able to enjoy his life anymore that the wife who has agreed to stay with him. Fear keeps him in, fear keeps us all in. Fear of society's expectations, fear of what others will think, fear of being attacked for who you are, fear of our own feelings, fear of hurting the kids, fear. Fear. Fear. People, it is time to get sick and tired of fear.
What is it going to take to empty all the closets? People who know they know someone who is gay are about 80% in favor of our receiving full and equal treatment under the law. (We already are guaranteed those rights by the Constitution, we just aren't treated equally by those in power who are supposed to carry out those laws.) Everyone on earth knows someone who is gay, problem is, most of the people don't know they know because there are so many in the closet. It is just this simple. Until the closets are emptied and cleaned out, we are and always will be emotional cripples, liars and damaged as humans. We will continue to hurt those closest to us and we will never know all that life really has to offer.
Update: just ran across this article with insight from straight spouses and why they support our rights, from the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/06/AR2009110602953.html
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