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- Salamander
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Re: Was your partner out as bi before coming out as gay?
lily wrote:
Hi Salamander,
Not sure why you don't think her being bi is a problem - would you do it again?
My ex was in same sex relationships before marrying me, but he didn't tell me about them, just about the girlfriends.
Your ex was in the closet, which is kind of the opposite. He was gay or bi and hiding it or trying to deny it, and that's just the person who is likely to marry someone of the opposite sex and eventually come out anyway.
My wife was fully out to family and friends, etc. When a person who is actually gay gets to the point where they can openly have relationships with the people they are attracted to, even if they initially identified as bi, they just stop being with people of the opposite sex and eventually start using gay instead of bi. They don't go in the other direction and seek out relationships with people of the opposite sex that they aren't actually attracted to. Why would they? So with my wife, I don't think the problem was actually her sexual orientation. If she had married a woman and then left them for a man she would be telling people that she discovered she's straight. She might actually believe it herself, but I think she really has been bi all her life and narrowing her sexual orientation, for now at least, is just a way for her to leave her boring marriage for some young hottie without looking like the cliché bad guy. Her LGBTQ allies will rally around her and she can make herself look like the victim. For context, I've since found out that she was lying about money too. When I confronted her, she just doubled down with more lies. She just manipulates the narrative in whatever ways serves her, and since she's always been bi, it serves her to exploit that now. It's not a sexual orientation problem, it's an honesty problem.
- Salamander
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Re: Was your partner out as bi before coming out as gay?
Gloria, I don't really get being bi either. But I don't get being attracted to men! I think human sexuality is kind of all over the place. Of course there are people who change it to their advantage, and there are people who change it to protect themselves prejudice and stigma. So it's influenced by outside forces too. And then there is the fact that people will sometimes lie about it to other people, and even lie about it to themselves. It's just really complicated. What's not complicated is making a life commitment to someone. When a person goes into a monogamous marriage I don't think their sexual orientation is actually all that relevant anymore. For all intents and purposes they are committing to their partner as their sexual orientation. It's not all women or all men or both, it's your spouse, period.
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Thread Starter- lily
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Re: Was your partner out as bi before coming out as gay?
Hi Salamander,
My ex is still in the closet - the sight of him as I saw through the smoke and mirrors was like seeing a Dalek come out of it's shell. ( don't know if you remember them but as a child watching Dr Who on the telly they struck fear and horror into me) a small ugly crab-like creature scuttling out of the base of a big metal casing on wheels, it was totally dependent on it's shell.
I don't think any of us can walk over the recognition that naturally speaking, babies come from sex between a man and a woman. I personally can't walk over the recognition that that means a lot of gay people have been having sex with the oppositie sex.
So to me, the way I see it, the closet has nothing to do with homophobic social pressures and everything to do with that.
Moving away from my ex and climbing to the top end of the people who identify as bisexual I think these are people with all the mating traits of a monogamous straight person except for being attracted to the same sex. And sometimes you can see them suffering, caught between their love for a girlfriend and guilt due to their commitment to their husband.
But moving back to my ex, he wasn't even committed to being bisexual, when I kept saying it wasn't the same as straight he brazenly flipped back to declaring himself 100% straight and absolutely he expected to get away with it. In other words, there never was any sort of commitment from him to me, I was fodder for him. And hiding his identity is a way of life. Being in the closet is an integral part of who he is.
I completely agree with what you say about monogamy. Your spouse is your sexual orientation. It's just that you need that equal pull of attraction coming from both sides and calling herself bisexual doesn't mean she is being any more honest with you about the truth of herself than if she were saying she's straight.
As Rob puts it, your love for her was fierce and strong and it looks to me like you have gone to the floor for her and now you must face the truth of her before you can walk away. I heartily applaud the strength of your stance to simply say the marriage is over, she has failed to hold to me, her spouse.
Last edited by lily (March 9, 2023 7:30 pm)
- thefuture
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Re: Was your partner out as bi before coming out as gay?
My gay husband gave ZERO signs. We had great sex. Married for 18 years. He comes from a very open family, where his brother is bi and in a polyamorous marriage...
I decided, after 4 months of struggling, that I was in this marriage and I truly loved him, cared for him, and I would be there to support him.... But....through therapy, a lot of talking, a lot of pain....we seemed to gain an equilibrium again. I sat him down and told him that my greatest fear was that he would one day sit down beside me, tell me he's gay, and that he's leaving me. I told him that I am not able to handle this. I cannot do this. That it would destroy me as a human being.
It was my one request. I said, if he had any doubts, if he needed time to figure it out, whatever...take it now. Tell me now. He promised that he would never do that. He learned his lesson about keeping secrets. He was 100% committed to the marriage, wanted this to work and was in it for the long haul...
Then, I was sitting watching tv Saturday morning and drinking my coffee. I was happy. Ironically, through all the self discovery I did....I decided that I was the one making it hard because I still struggled with trusting him. So, I apologized to him for my short comings and said that I was also 100% invested and for this to work I saw that I had to trust him.
In my blissfully unaware and half asleep state....he sat down beside me and said "I'm gay, I am divorcing you". And that was the day he atom bombed my life. That was it. That's all I got. No discussion. No forewarning. He was not even open to a conversation about it. He said I am getting a divorce and your thoughts, feelings and opinions mean nothing to me...
And here we are. I am guessing I just got stuck with a sociopathic narcissist psychopath or something. I really don't know. But I have no idea who that person is. After being together for 20 years, married for the majority of it, and considering I'm in my mid 30's.....he is a stranger to me.
Anon2222 your story really resonated with me. I am only a few months out from learning that my wife thinks she is gay. For the first few months she swore up and down that she was "generally gay but completely attracted" to me. We were trying to figure out a way forward where we could be monogamous and comfortable with that. She projected 100% confidence that this did not threaten our marriage and I had to seek therapy and try to accept it. Then one random Tuesday she said she needed to experience intimacy with a woman one day. She was happy with me, loved me, I didn't do anything wrong, but she had a diminishing attraction to me. She hated the idea of dating but knew that she eventually would need to experience a woman because it's a part of who she was. This was 2 weeks ago. We have 2 kids and she asked for a divorce like she was getting a haircut. 17 years down the drain.
- thefuture
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Re: Was your partner out as bi before coming out as gay?
So with my wife, I don't think the problem was actually her sexual orientation. If she had married a woman and then left them for a man she would be telling people that she discovered she's straight. She might actually believe it herself, but I think she really has been bi all her life and narrowing her sexual orientation, for now at least, is just a way for her to leave her boring marriage for some young hottie without looking like the cliché bad guy. Her LGBTQ allies will rally around her and she can make herself look like the victim. For context, I've since found out that she was lying about money too. When I confronted her, she just doubled down with more lies. She just manipulates the narrative in whatever ways serves her, and since she's always been bi, it serves her to exploit that now. It's not a sexual orientation problem, it's an honesty problem.
Amen, Salamander. I hope you are doing okay. I am dealing with very similar problems and am in the thick of it. It's a mindfuck! My wife identified as bi her whole life and although we have never had any intimacy problems now suddenly identifies as gay. I don't accept the truth of that.
- Blue Bear
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Re: Was your partner out as bi before coming out as gay?
"Bi now, gay later." Admitting that they are gay requires admitting that their marriages to a straight partner have been a total sham, and most of them don't want to go there (see, "closet").
My ex-wife still insists that she's straight even though (a) she had a covert affair with the mother of one of our daughter's friends, (b) admitted that she had same-sex attraction and knew about it before we had even met, and (c) married her female partner. This experience, along with that of many other straight partners, has taught me that the label that they place upon themselves is the least important. The only label that matters is the one that I can unquestionably put on her, which is "not straight", and that's all that matters because I did not sign up for that.