IN MEMORY OF MY DAUGHTER JENNIFER
My daughter, Jennifer, age 22, died on April 14, 2002. Her young life was snuffed out due to medical complications from a serious drug addiction that overtook her life starting three-and-a-half years ago. For this reason, the April newsletter that comes out mid-month was delayed.
I would like to thank the dozens of people who were alerted through the various Straight Spouse groups who sent me beautiful messages of warmth and comfort. Your words have been overwhelmingly supportive and kind. The members of my own on-line support group have been extremely generous in their love and support. I would like to take a few moments to share some personal thoughts about the relationship between my daughter and me in hopes that it will shed some insight to those of you who are part of this large network.
As I reflect on the years that I had my daughter, I can say with good feelings that I take comfort knowing that I did everything humanly possible to help her through her troubled years. When I first learned of her addiction two months before the age of 19, I immediately admitted her into a drug recovery program, the first of a dozen or so that she entered and dropped from until her death. It was during this first stint that I learned that Jennifer was a lesbian. She did not reveal this information to me. Rather I found out from some of her friends when she ran away from the program with another young lady during her second month there. When she came to visit me several days later, I asked her why she never told me about her sexuality. I felt hurt that I had to find it out from her friends because she didn’t trust me enough to tell me. When she responded that she was afraid of hurting me, I was very confused and asked her why.
I had raised my daughter to be understanding and tolerant of homosexuality. From the time she was a young child, I was very careful to project positive images of gay people. I developed some wonderful gay friends through my support group in the 1980’s who were part of her life. I was very emphatic in telling her that gay people had no choice in their homosexuality—they were born that way. I felt the need to reinforce that regularly for two reasons. First, I never wanted her to feel that her father “chose” homosexuality over his family. It was difficult enough living in a homophobic world without thinking that a father would prefer that way of life if given a choice. But more importantly, I knew statistically that children with a gay parent had a higher chance of being gay themselves. My years of research had proven that to me. I believe that gay is genetic, and it would only follow that the gene could be passed on to some of the children. I was always able to separate my anger towards my ex-husband’s irresponsibility from homosexuality.
My daughter’s response: “Mom, I didn’t want to hurt you because I know how much dad has put you through.” I was stumped. I asked her if I ever led her to believe that I had a problem with homosexuality. She said, “Absolutely not.” I next asked her if she thought I would be disappointed that she was a lesbian. She replied, “I’m not sure.” No matter how accepting I felt about homosexuality, and no matter how many times I said it would never bother me if my children were gay, she wasn’t sure when it became a reality if I would feel the same way.
Truthfully, I was initially numb when I found out that Jennifer was a lesbian. Was I happy about it? No. But it wasn’t because of homosexuality. I just knew how much harder life would be for her as a gay person. But, after the initial numbness passed in a day or two, I fell into an easy acceptance. Homosexuality was never an issue for me when it came to my daughter. Her drug problem was my only concern. I embraced all of her girlfriends over the next three years hoping she would find one that would give her a greater sense of stability and happiness.
Some people have asked me if I thought my daughter’s drug habit resulted from her homosexuality. After all, drugs and alcohol are a common problem in the gay community. That’s because the pain of being gay is too difficult for many who don’t have accepting mothers. This was not Jennifer’s case. She had no problem being a lesbian. That was one area of her life that she was totally comfortable and happy about. She had a large “PRIDE” tattoo engraved on her arm several years ago with all of the rainbow colors. She became active in the gay recovery movement during the times when she was clean. In fact, last year when she had her longest clean period of six months, she worked at the drug recovery booth at the Philadelphia Gay Pride parade. She laughed at the end of the day when she brought me a bunch of leftover flavored condoms she gave out at the booth saying, “Ma, you need these more than I do.”
When I think back to the day I revealed my daughter’s homosexuality to my ex-husband shortly after I first learned about it, I remember the great irony of that moment. He went on a screaming rampage that shocked even me. He started yelling, “How could she do this?” He then went on to blurt out a number of obscenities. I was really stumped. He was sure that it the drugs were turning her “temporarily” gay. Over the next few years, he came up with numerous theories about Jennifer’s homosexuality and tried to convince her that it was just a “passing phase” that would change if she overcame her addiction. He was embarrassed by Jennifer’s comfort with her sexuality because he was so uncomfortable with his own homosexuality. When she would visit him and he had company, he would ask her to cover the tattoo. He constantly bemoaned the fact that now she wouldn’t have grandchildren, and periodically kept hoping that she would at least meet a man and have a grandchild to carry on his legacy. What can I say?
The funniest thing is he would occasionally try to blame me for Jennifer’s homosexuality stating that I must have been too much of an “overbearing mother,” similar to the one he had. My ex just didn’t buy into the genetic inborn thing when it concerned him. He made sure to tell me on various occasions, “Don’t try to blame me. It has nothing to do with me. After all, I wasn’t born gay.” He always feels better thinking that he was “made” gay and not born that way. I never blamed him, I just stated my feelings that it was a passed on gene. Homosexuality is not a “fault” to be blamed on anyone. People have no control over this anymore than they have control over their eye color.
` When my ex wasn’t blaming the drugs, he would blame her appearance. Jennifer was a heavy-set young woman and he believed her lack of an attractive figure made her believe that she had more options finding women than men. This was his craziness in thinking. In my heart, I believe that he feared people would question his carefully hidden sexuality if they knew she was gay. As usual, it was always about him. And yet, in some of his more vulnerable moments, he would admit that he was glad that she was comfortable with her sexuality, even if he wasn’t comfortable with his.
Last July, my daughter fell in love with a woman. They were both in programs at that point and met through the recovery community. There is a rule in the recovery world that states people should avoid romantic relationships until they are clean for at least a year. This is based on statistics that show people who get romantically involved with other people in recovery during the first year are likely to relapse together under pressure. Go tell that to a young woman whose hormones are raging and need to feel love and security are at their height. Jennifer knew the rule but couldn’t abide by it. She had a string of involvements over the past few years, but none that lasted for any length of time until she met Raina. Raina had been clean for eleven months. It didn’t take long for them to fall down together shortly after they met. I accepted this woman as if she were my own daughter, even though her own family had abandoned her. She took care of Jennifer the best that she could. They were totally intertwined in their love and their addiction. They would try to pull each other up, and then they would knock each other down.
I certainly don’t blame Raina for my daughter’s demise. Jennifer did that all on her own. She developed hepatitis and a bowel instruction brought on by the heroin. This was also complicated by chronic asthma. In the end, her drug-ravaged body just gave out.
There is a point I would like to make in sharing this story with you. Over the past two weeks since this tragedy, I have been processing a lot of emotional feelings, which is natural under the circumstances. When my moments of rationale surpass my emotionalism, I sit down and add to this tribute because my thoughts are clearer. I think one of the best gifts I gave my daughter throughout her life was unconditional love regardless of who she was or what she did. I also feel a great sense of relief that my daughter didn’t have to struggle with one additional problem in her short-lived life, namely her sexuality. I never made her hide her tattoo or gave her any indication that I loved her any less or differently because she was a lesbian. She was very appreciative and stated that to me during numerous conversations between the two of us and with her friends. I embraced her girlfriends and never made them feel like I judged them because I did not. I was proud that my daughter felt comfortable in who she was, at least sexually. Being gay did not turn her into a drug addict. As I said earlier, I was always able to separate my anger of what my ex-husband did to me during and after our marriage from my feelings about homosexuality. Because I could do this, I have hundreds of wonderful memories to carry with me through the empty years ahead.
There is something you can learn from my experience and tragedy. Homosexuality is not a choice. Don’t transfer your personal anger against your gay husband to your children in terms of the sexuality issue. You don’t know how the sexuality of your children will end up. If they sense your hostility towards homosexuality, it may create years of hardship for them to come to terms with themselves, just like it happened to your husband. It can also alienate you from having a loving relationship with your children.
I know I’ve passed this message on before, but now, more than ever, it needs to be said again.
Wednesday, May 1, 2002
Friday, March 1, 2002
"LOW SELF-ESTEEM ISSUE." MARCH, 2002 Volume 2, Issue 13
LOW SELF-ESTEEM ISSUE
I can never talk enough about the issue of self-esteem. When I reflect back now, at the age of 50, I can honestly say that I have spent a lifetime building up my own self-esteem. I can trace this back to my early childhood days when I was always the “chubby” girl. Eventually I transitioned from being a chunky teenager to being an obese adult. I have spent my adult years being fat. There have only been short periods of perhaps several years from time to time when I was heavy instead of obese.
When I met my gay husband, I was physically at the best point of my adult life. I had lost over 100 pounds and I was feeling and looking good. My self-esteem and confidence was at a new height. I was NOT desperate when I met him, so I can’t use that as an excuse of why I married a gay man. Like almost all of us, I honestly did not know that he was gay. It’s that simple. He made sure to let me know that he wasn’t by yelling up a storm when I mentioned a friend of mine suspected that he may be “bisexual.” I remember that feeling of total relief when he stood up in the middle of the restaurant and nearly turned the table over in sheer anger. Ah, the man was protesting—and it couldn’t be nearly enough--forget too much.
Why would I even think he was gay? He was tall, athletic, very handsome and extremely charming. We had sex in those early days. It wasn’t the best sex, but it wasn’t that bad either. I had worse in the previous years, and I believe that all of them weren’t gay.
My ex-husband married me because he loved me and wanted to have all of the things that straight men had. And in his mind, at that time, he was NOT gay. Yes, he had gay sex. Yes, he had a string of sexual encounters with men before we married. But in his mind, he believed that he was straight because there was no emotional commitment to these men. He enjoyed women and dated his fair share of them. And he believed that sexually he could pull it off as long as he loved someone enough. Through the years, I have come to terms with the fact that most of these gay men really don’t believe in their hearts that they are gay when they marry us. They can have gay sex galore, but they are not gay in their minds. They don’t even view themselves as Bisexual, just straight men dabbling with same sex encounters. Go figure.
Getting back on track here, I married a man who was mentally abusive to me. Not all gay husbands take this route, but many of them do. They are frustrated with life because they are living a lie, and the one they lash out at is the one responsible for living this lie in their minds—namely, us. Yes, I know it makes no sense at all, but that’s just the way it is. Even though my self-esteem was quite high when I got married, it didn’t take long for it to get battered back into oblivion within a relatively short amount of time. I was on a temporary high when I met my husband. I was feeling good about myself for the first time in my 28 years of life. I had not even had two solid years of good feelings about myself before this marriage. That means that I had numerous years of personal insecurity, loneliness, poor self-image, and peer-inflicted pain scars from adolescence that carried over into adulthood.
I was the girl who was picked last to be on whatever sports team that gym class played on any given day. I lacked the motor coordination to be an effective sportswoman, and my excess weight slowed down my athletic abilities. It was pretty heartbreaking and humiliating knowing that you would always be the last or almost last person picked. I was the girl who never got asked to dances or proms. I was the girl who didn’t have dates on the weekend because the guys I wanted didn’t want me. They wanted the pretty cheerleaders or the girls who radiated confidence. I was the girl who fell in love so often but always had her heart broken time after time when some girl who was prettier, thinner, or more graceful crossed my path. Ultimately, I was the girl who got left out. There were so many of us when I was growing up, but that didn’t make me feel any better. I wanted so badly to be someone worth loving, but that didn’t seem within my reach.
For that reason, I made poor choices in relationships from early in the game. I just wanted to be wanted to badly, that I was willing to “settle” for guys, later men, who were not worthy of having a relationship with anyone. They were men who had value systems that were different than mine, but yet, my desperation kept me moving in their direction because they seemed more obtainable.
In my mid-twenties, I was nearly 270 pounds and at five feet tall, I wasn’t long for the world. I began to care about living after having extensive chest pains, and started to lose weight. First I lost it in a healthy manner; then I developed an eating disorder when the healthy way just stopped working very well. Within 18 months, I lost approximately 130 pounds so I was feeling quite good about myself. I was never thin, but I was looking good, feeling good, and doing quite well in life. I was very vain at that point, and that was fine too. It was time for me to finally feel good about myself. Professionally, I was where I wanted to be, and personally, I was testing out the waters and looking for the right somebody to love.
Maybe if I had married a wonderful supportive man, my self-esteem building process would have continued on an upward trend. But instead, I found a man who was down right cruel who used to find great pleasure in knocking me down whenever I dared to stand up to question any of his unusual behaviors. This was his way of fighting back. My ex wasn’t really a bad man, he was just a sad man. He was sad because his life was falling apart being married to me. He was lying all over the place to cover his tracks, and every time I would uncover just one little crack, he became so angry. He was trying to tie that web of lies together but I seemed to be untangling them faster than he could tie them.
Rather than accept responsibility for his misactions, my ex would yell and scream about my inadequacies. He would magnify every molehill into a mountain when it came to my imperfections, making me believe that I was the awkward, gawky, overweight teenager all over again. I didn’t have enough “ self-confidence” time accumulated to make me believe differently. After a while, I bought into all of the lies that my husband kept telling me about me as he shredded away the few good years of feeling good and reverted me back to my original form of feeling inadequate.
And so once again, I found my comfort in food and started putting back my weight, one pound at a time. When I became pregnant, I looked at it as a license to eat all I wanted because the weight would come off after the baby was born. That’s what people kept telling me. I did gain 70 pounds during those months feasting on Baskin Robbins ice cream daily by the gallon. When my premature daughter was born and weighed less than five pounds, that’s what came off my body. And although in time I was able to take off half that amount gained, I regained it when I was pregnant with my son. I was once again a fat woman.
When my husband told me that he couldn’t make love to me because I was too fat, well, that seemed reasonable to me. At that point, I didn’t think much of myself so why would I expect a man to think much of me? It sounded so logical and made so much sense.
I say this first of all because I receive letters from so many women who write to me and tell me that they are 20, 40, 60, 80, or 100 pounds overweight. They didn’t start out that way in their marriage for the most part, but ended up that way due to frustration. Some of them had childhoods like mine where weight was a factor, but many of them never had a weight problem until during the marriage. They usually throw into their letters that marriage caused them to overeat because there was nothing else giving them much satisfaction on the home front. And as they gained weight,
I am sure that their husbands secretly cheered on the weight gain because now they had a new reason to retreat in the bedroom—namely, fat. Now fat became the natural enemy and justification for lack of passion, as if there was ever much passion to start with. Like my husband told me shortly before we split up, “Who would ever want to sleep with someone who looked like you? Have you looked at yourself lately in a mirror? If I became gay, who could blame me?” OUCH, with all capital letters. There were lots of tears that flowed from my eyes after that conversation. My ex had a wonderful talent for destroying any residual good feelings I had left from days of old. There was nothing left by the time he was done with me except a sense of survival—to find a way to survive without him in my life.
When I first started my local support group, the first two women who joined were also fat. I will not cover up that word and make it into something that it’s not. I don’t use that word to be insulting, but rather to be honest. I don’t need a bunch of “feel good” words about what I am. I feel good about myself now even if I am fat. It’s amazing what a wonderful straight man can do for your sense of self-worth. My soulmate hasn’t noticed the weight gain I’ve made over the eight plus years we’ve been together. He still thinks I’m beautiful and makes me feel that way about myself.
But, getting back to the point, I thought at first it must be a thing that women of weight encounter because my first two group members were big women. But after that, I was shocked to find how many thin women who were beautiful, attractive, and graceful women by society’s standards were in the same situation. As many of you know from my book, I still have my theories on the prototype of woman that a gay man seeks out when he wants to get married. One of the prototypes is a woman with low self-esteem. There are so many of us and we are all such easy targets. However, what I learned is that self-esteem is often something that women have within themselves from what’s going on inside, not outside.
I recently corresponded with a lovely woman who read my book last year. She thanked me for giving her the key to the problem in her life. She is an airline stewardess who is viewed by men as beautiful. And yet, after nine years with her hands-off husband, she felt as deflated as the rest of us. She has now moved on in her life and feels wonderful about it. I hear from many women just like this-- women who have never had self-esteem issues over their looks. Over this year alone, I have worked with three models, two in New York and one in California who certainly didn’t have a problem with their physical appearance. And yet, all of their external physical beauty didn’t help them feel beautiful inside. Within this same time frame, I have helped women who were doctors, lawyers, nurses, stockbrokers, professors at universities, a CEO in a Fortune 500 company, and a Broadway actress. Certainly they had accomplished enough in their professional lives to be admired by the masses for their intelligence and status. And yet, they felt just as horrible about themselves as I used to feel about myself. It seems as if having a gay husband is the great equalizer among women of all sizes, shapes, colors, professions, economic situations and societal boundaries.
I guess what I’m getting to is simply this. If the beautiful women who had high self-esteem throughout their lives can fall into this dark and lonely hole, what chance do women like me--who by society’s standards have imperfections creating emotional baggage--have? If a woman who held her head high all of her life can have hers chopped off the block, why would I expect mine not to be in the same pile only squashed down a little more?
I talk about this because women write to me constantly looking for excuses of why their gay husbands may have been turned off to them. They write about their torment of how hard they tried to be better wives by dieting which sometimes led to eating disorders, having breast implants, liposuction, plastic surgery, changes in hair color, and so many other things to try to physically change their husbands’ desire for them. It’s almost as if they are still apologizing or looking for reasons why they were at fault. And their pain becomes my pain. I hurt for every woman who has to spend one extra minute not feeling good about herself because she has failed with her gay husband.
In my last newsletter, I wrote about the long awaited conversation that I had with my ex-husband that brought closure to our misunderstandings. I think that these are the feelings that our gay husbands and ex-husbands have to know and understand. It’s not just the superficial damage or the obvious problems that result from these mismarriages. It’s the internal damage and scaring that they just don’t have a clue about.
I can forgive any gay husband for being gay. That is not a conscientious decision, nor is marriage a calculated move of deceit to punish some loving woman. And I acknowledge how difficult it is for gay men to come to terms with their homosexuality during a marriage. However, what I can’t forgive is the cruelty that they display to their wives while going through their own hardships. And even when they are able to be honest and move on in their lives, they somehow lack the understanding of what we are left to deal with. They feel we should just be able to “get over it” as if we can walk away from the damaging years unscathed. Well, we can’t and we don’t. And perhaps when they can recognize this and try to undo some of the damage that they caused, a better understanding will come about between wives and gay husbands or ex-husbands. There is great comfort in knowing that your gay man understands that the hurt goes much deeper than just superficial cutting. And when he can comprehend that and tell you that he is sorry for the internal damage he has done to you, then you will finally be able to start to heal—and even start to forgive.
Share your thoughts by posting your comments ???
I can never talk enough about the issue of self-esteem. When I reflect back now, at the age of 50, I can honestly say that I have spent a lifetime building up my own self-esteem. I can trace this back to my early childhood days when I was always the “chubby” girl. Eventually I transitioned from being a chunky teenager to being an obese adult. I have spent my adult years being fat. There have only been short periods of perhaps several years from time to time when I was heavy instead of obese.
When I met my gay husband, I was physically at the best point of my adult life. I had lost over 100 pounds and I was feeling and looking good. My self-esteem and confidence was at a new height. I was NOT desperate when I met him, so I can’t use that as an excuse of why I married a gay man. Like almost all of us, I honestly did not know that he was gay. It’s that simple. He made sure to let me know that he wasn’t by yelling up a storm when I mentioned a friend of mine suspected that he may be “bisexual.” I remember that feeling of total relief when he stood up in the middle of the restaurant and nearly turned the table over in sheer anger. Ah, the man was protesting—and it couldn’t be nearly enough--forget too much.
Why would I even think he was gay? He was tall, athletic, very handsome and extremely charming. We had sex in those early days. It wasn’t the best sex, but it wasn’t that bad either. I had worse in the previous years, and I believe that all of them weren’t gay.
My ex-husband married me because he loved me and wanted to have all of the things that straight men had. And in his mind, at that time, he was NOT gay. Yes, he had gay sex. Yes, he had a string of sexual encounters with men before we married. But in his mind, he believed that he was straight because there was no emotional commitment to these men. He enjoyed women and dated his fair share of them. And he believed that sexually he could pull it off as long as he loved someone enough. Through the years, I have come to terms with the fact that most of these gay men really don’t believe in their hearts that they are gay when they marry us. They can have gay sex galore, but they are not gay in their minds. They don’t even view themselves as Bisexual, just straight men dabbling with same sex encounters. Go figure.
Getting back on track here, I married a man who was mentally abusive to me. Not all gay husbands take this route, but many of them do. They are frustrated with life because they are living a lie, and the one they lash out at is the one responsible for living this lie in their minds—namely, us. Yes, I know it makes no sense at all, but that’s just the way it is. Even though my self-esteem was quite high when I got married, it didn’t take long for it to get battered back into oblivion within a relatively short amount of time. I was on a temporary high when I met my husband. I was feeling good about myself for the first time in my 28 years of life. I had not even had two solid years of good feelings about myself before this marriage. That means that I had numerous years of personal insecurity, loneliness, poor self-image, and peer-inflicted pain scars from adolescence that carried over into adulthood.
I was the girl who was picked last to be on whatever sports team that gym class played on any given day. I lacked the motor coordination to be an effective sportswoman, and my excess weight slowed down my athletic abilities. It was pretty heartbreaking and humiliating knowing that you would always be the last or almost last person picked. I was the girl who never got asked to dances or proms. I was the girl who didn’t have dates on the weekend because the guys I wanted didn’t want me. They wanted the pretty cheerleaders or the girls who radiated confidence. I was the girl who fell in love so often but always had her heart broken time after time when some girl who was prettier, thinner, or more graceful crossed my path. Ultimately, I was the girl who got left out. There were so many of us when I was growing up, but that didn’t make me feel any better. I wanted so badly to be someone worth loving, but that didn’t seem within my reach.
For that reason, I made poor choices in relationships from early in the game. I just wanted to be wanted to badly, that I was willing to “settle” for guys, later men, who were not worthy of having a relationship with anyone. They were men who had value systems that were different than mine, but yet, my desperation kept me moving in their direction because they seemed more obtainable.
In my mid-twenties, I was nearly 270 pounds and at five feet tall, I wasn’t long for the world. I began to care about living after having extensive chest pains, and started to lose weight. First I lost it in a healthy manner; then I developed an eating disorder when the healthy way just stopped working very well. Within 18 months, I lost approximately 130 pounds so I was feeling quite good about myself. I was never thin, but I was looking good, feeling good, and doing quite well in life. I was very vain at that point, and that was fine too. It was time for me to finally feel good about myself. Professionally, I was where I wanted to be, and personally, I was testing out the waters and looking for the right somebody to love.
Maybe if I had married a wonderful supportive man, my self-esteem building process would have continued on an upward trend. But instead, I found a man who was down right cruel who used to find great pleasure in knocking me down whenever I dared to stand up to question any of his unusual behaviors. This was his way of fighting back. My ex wasn’t really a bad man, he was just a sad man. He was sad because his life was falling apart being married to me. He was lying all over the place to cover his tracks, and every time I would uncover just one little crack, he became so angry. He was trying to tie that web of lies together but I seemed to be untangling them faster than he could tie them.
Rather than accept responsibility for his misactions, my ex would yell and scream about my inadequacies. He would magnify every molehill into a mountain when it came to my imperfections, making me believe that I was the awkward, gawky, overweight teenager all over again. I didn’t have enough “ self-confidence” time accumulated to make me believe differently. After a while, I bought into all of the lies that my husband kept telling me about me as he shredded away the few good years of feeling good and reverted me back to my original form of feeling inadequate.
And so once again, I found my comfort in food and started putting back my weight, one pound at a time. When I became pregnant, I looked at it as a license to eat all I wanted because the weight would come off after the baby was born. That’s what people kept telling me. I did gain 70 pounds during those months feasting on Baskin Robbins ice cream daily by the gallon. When my premature daughter was born and weighed less than five pounds, that’s what came off my body. And although in time I was able to take off half that amount gained, I regained it when I was pregnant with my son. I was once again a fat woman.
When my husband told me that he couldn’t make love to me because I was too fat, well, that seemed reasonable to me. At that point, I didn’t think much of myself so why would I expect a man to think much of me? It sounded so logical and made so much sense.
I say this first of all because I receive letters from so many women who write to me and tell me that they are 20, 40, 60, 80, or 100 pounds overweight. They didn’t start out that way in their marriage for the most part, but ended up that way due to frustration. Some of them had childhoods like mine where weight was a factor, but many of them never had a weight problem until during the marriage. They usually throw into their letters that marriage caused them to overeat because there was nothing else giving them much satisfaction on the home front. And as they gained weight,
I am sure that their husbands secretly cheered on the weight gain because now they had a new reason to retreat in the bedroom—namely, fat. Now fat became the natural enemy and justification for lack of passion, as if there was ever much passion to start with. Like my husband told me shortly before we split up, “Who would ever want to sleep with someone who looked like you? Have you looked at yourself lately in a mirror? If I became gay, who could blame me?” OUCH, with all capital letters. There were lots of tears that flowed from my eyes after that conversation. My ex had a wonderful talent for destroying any residual good feelings I had left from days of old. There was nothing left by the time he was done with me except a sense of survival—to find a way to survive without him in my life.
When I first started my local support group, the first two women who joined were also fat. I will not cover up that word and make it into something that it’s not. I don’t use that word to be insulting, but rather to be honest. I don’t need a bunch of “feel good” words about what I am. I feel good about myself now even if I am fat. It’s amazing what a wonderful straight man can do for your sense of self-worth. My soulmate hasn’t noticed the weight gain I’ve made over the eight plus years we’ve been together. He still thinks I’m beautiful and makes me feel that way about myself.
But, getting back to the point, I thought at first it must be a thing that women of weight encounter because my first two group members were big women. But after that, I was shocked to find how many thin women who were beautiful, attractive, and graceful women by society’s standards were in the same situation. As many of you know from my book, I still have my theories on the prototype of woman that a gay man seeks out when he wants to get married. One of the prototypes is a woman with low self-esteem. There are so many of us and we are all such easy targets. However, what I learned is that self-esteem is often something that women have within themselves from what’s going on inside, not outside.
I recently corresponded with a lovely woman who read my book last year. She thanked me for giving her the key to the problem in her life. She is an airline stewardess who is viewed by men as beautiful. And yet, after nine years with her hands-off husband, she felt as deflated as the rest of us. She has now moved on in her life and feels wonderful about it. I hear from many women just like this-- women who have never had self-esteem issues over their looks. Over this year alone, I have worked with three models, two in New York and one in California who certainly didn’t have a problem with their physical appearance. And yet, all of their external physical beauty didn’t help them feel beautiful inside. Within this same time frame, I have helped women who were doctors, lawyers, nurses, stockbrokers, professors at universities, a CEO in a Fortune 500 company, and a Broadway actress. Certainly they had accomplished enough in their professional lives to be admired by the masses for their intelligence and status. And yet, they felt just as horrible about themselves as I used to feel about myself. It seems as if having a gay husband is the great equalizer among women of all sizes, shapes, colors, professions, economic situations and societal boundaries.
I guess what I’m getting to is simply this. If the beautiful women who had high self-esteem throughout their lives can fall into this dark and lonely hole, what chance do women like me--who by society’s standards have imperfections creating emotional baggage--have? If a woman who held her head high all of her life can have hers chopped off the block, why would I expect mine not to be in the same pile only squashed down a little more?
I talk about this because women write to me constantly looking for excuses of why their gay husbands may have been turned off to them. They write about their torment of how hard they tried to be better wives by dieting which sometimes led to eating disorders, having breast implants, liposuction, plastic surgery, changes in hair color, and so many other things to try to physically change their husbands’ desire for them. It’s almost as if they are still apologizing or looking for reasons why they were at fault. And their pain becomes my pain. I hurt for every woman who has to spend one extra minute not feeling good about herself because she has failed with her gay husband.
In my last newsletter, I wrote about the long awaited conversation that I had with my ex-husband that brought closure to our misunderstandings. I think that these are the feelings that our gay husbands and ex-husbands have to know and understand. It’s not just the superficial damage or the obvious problems that result from these mismarriages. It’s the internal damage and scaring that they just don’t have a clue about.
I can forgive any gay husband for being gay. That is not a conscientious decision, nor is marriage a calculated move of deceit to punish some loving woman. And I acknowledge how difficult it is for gay men to come to terms with their homosexuality during a marriage. However, what I can’t forgive is the cruelty that they display to their wives while going through their own hardships. And even when they are able to be honest and move on in their lives, they somehow lack the understanding of what we are left to deal with. They feel we should just be able to “get over it” as if we can walk away from the damaging years unscathed. Well, we can’t and we don’t. And perhaps when they can recognize this and try to undo some of the damage that they caused, a better understanding will come about between wives and gay husbands or ex-husbands. There is great comfort in knowing that your gay man understands that the hurt goes much deeper than just superficial cutting. And when he can comprehend that and tell you that he is sorry for the internal damage he has done to you, then you will finally be able to start to heal—and even start to forgive.
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