After 3 years being separated and now divorce is almost final, I am no longer "living in his closet." When people find out I am getting divorced and they say, oh, I am so sorry,I tell them it's ok, he lied to me for thirty years about who he really is and left me to figure it out..he is and has been gay all his life! I am 71 years old now and I will not live his lie one minute longer. This is my truth!

Hi Iris!  Only you know best for your situation.  As for me, when people asked what had happened that would cause me to file for a divorce after almost 30 years, I told them the truth.  Along this journey I have come to see what a crafty manipulator I was married to.  He was a master at trying to keep me stuffed in his closet!  As I began to take back my life, I realized this was MY life and MY story, not just his.  I have every right to do whatever is necessary to heal and live a healthy, thriving, self-empowered life.  If this means I share MY story, then I do so.  He and his feelings are not my priority, not my present and definitely and thankfully not my future!

I tell people that I was married for 16 years to the father of my 3 children, until I found out he liked men as much as I did.  ;)  It usually gets a chuckle.  It lets people know what the issue was while letting them know I'm not sensitive about it and can joke about it.

I'm 6 years post-disclosure though, and re-married.  So no one's asking any more.  There were people who did ask, though - mostly people we went to church with that knew us as a couple.  We'd stopped attending when I decided that I'd wanted a divorce (even before I communicated that to my ex) - mostly because I knew I was going to feel convicted over and over again during hymns and communion that I shouldn't be doing this.  Not that I felt it was wrong so much as I felt that I'd get renewed energy to continue on my path of suffering if I kept going to church.  And I just didn't want that anymore.  So we kind of dropped off the radar, and then years later people would find out we were divorced.  When I bumped into one of them in the local community, they'd sometimes ask what happened.  I'd simply say, "He was gay."  "Oh".  Some said they'd suspected.  Some just stood there with their mouth agape.  No one asked me if he'd cheated, or how I found out.  Even in a mid-western, fundamentalist Bible church, that seemed to be a clincher.  No one told me to just pray on it longer or harder.  No one told me it was my duty to keep on keeping on.  Then again, I wasn't asking for permission to divorce - I was telling them why I'd decided to.  It wasn't open for debate.  If someone ever DID ask me, I'd planned to ask them how they'd feel if they finally found out the reason their spouse had no intimacy with them in over a decade and a half.  People accept what you accept - or they leave.  It's their only choices, really.  If you won't be convinced to do what THEY want you to do with YOUR life, then they either give up and accept it, or walk away because they can't accept it.  That's all their is.

My family didn't want to accept it at ALL.  They were the worst of the bunch - especially my mother, who knew all the issues I had with my ex (outside of the gay thing).  She just wanted what was best for my kids.  I got that.  Until one day when I asked her, "What would YOU do, Mom?  What would YOU do if your husband didn't desire you and you felt like roommates and he never showed you any affection and this was your children's role model for their own marriages?"  You know what she said?  She said, "That DID happen to me (and I knew it had).  I stayed - because I had kids."  And I just said, "And if you knew then that 30 years later, you'd be in the same boat - nothing having changed - would you do it all over again?"  And she said "No."  "Well, that's me right there, Mom.  I know this isn't going to change.  And this isn't a happy home for my kids.  It's not a good example.  And you must be stronger - or weaker - than me - because I just couldn't do that, Mom.  I'm worth love, and acceptance, and passion. And I'm NEVER going to get it here.  So I'm leaving the situation.  Maybe I'll find it if I leave - maybe I won't.  But I SURELY won't if I stay.  So I'm going."  She never asked me again to stay.

For what it's worth - I've heard many people over the years say they got divorced.  I have never, EVER - even ONCE - asked "Why?"  The answer was always going to be that in some fashion, they couldn't work it out.  Period.

Kel

Hi Iris

I have finally reached the stage where we are talking about divorce.  I told my family and close friends the truth and they support me and my decision.  I will tell everyone else things did not work out.  I know that they will blame me for this because he is such a likeable guy and no one will believe the things that he put me through this past six years (he fooled me for a long time, how can I blame others when I helped him strengthen that image for years?).  I am not worried about that;  my only concern is my kids, family and close friends and I have their support.  It is up to him whether he wants to keep up his false identity or not. 

Good luck to you.  For me, this is the scariest time of my life.

Last edited by Mrs Lonely (April 7, 2017 7:14 am)