When Gay Men (Mis)Marry Straight Women: Bonnie Kaye's Story | Psychology Today

Contents:

• HOW TO COPE WHEN YOUR SPOE COM OUT AS GAY
• STRAIGHT WOMEN AND THEIR GAY HBANDS
• HELP! I THK MY HBAND IS GAY
• WHEN GAY MEN (MIS)MARRY STRAIGHT WOMEN: BONNIE KAYE'S STORY
• WHY I STAYED MARRIED TO MY GAY HBAND: I WAS MTED AS MUCH TO THE LIFTYLE AS TO THE MAN HIMSELF
• MY HBAND IS GAY BUT WE’RE MARRIED WH TWO KIDS AND HAVE GREAT SEX
• IS YOUR HBAND GAY? 6 SIGNS THAT COULD BE A CSE FOR CONCERN
• MY GAY HBAND
• FDG OUT YOUR SPOE IS GAY
• IS MY HBAND GAY? 10 SIGNS THAT CAN HELP YOU FIGURE OUT
• ASK A QUEER CHICK: SHOULD I STAY MARRIED TO MY HBAND EVEN THOUGH I’M GAY?
• IS MY HBAND GAY? SIGNS OF A GAY HBAND
• IS YOUR MAN GAY, STRAIGHT, OR BISEXUAL?
• THE FEMALE SPOE: A PROCS OF SEPARATN WHEN A HBAND ' OUT' AS GAY

HOW TO COPE WHEN YOUR SPOE COM OUT AS GAY

Among the upl, when the gay, lbian, or bisexual partner out, a third of the upl break up immediately; another third stay together for one to two years and then spl; the remag third try to make their marriag work. There's no qutn that learng your partner is gay when you believed them to be straight n be extremely difficult. People do not choose who they are attracted to, so make sure to not direct homophobic backlash towards your partner.

Fally, the relatnships suggt to some people “reparative therapy, ” the uhil and impossible claim that a person n be changed om gay to straight.

STRAIGHT WOMEN AND THEIR GAY HBANDS

The men this televisn program aren’t claimg to be ex-gay nor that they n change their sexual orientatn (at least not on the show). They report they are attracted to men but choose not to live as a gay man and their straight wiv accept this. There are plenty of wiv who choose to stay married even after fdg out later the marriage that their hband is gay and attracted to men.

HELP! I THK MY HBAND IS GAY

They make this choice wh open discsns, which are very paful and emotnal for both the gay man and the straight wife.

WHEN GAY MEN (MIS)MARRY STRAIGHT WOMEN: BONNIE KAYE'S STORY

You might be able to claim your inty by meetg ocsnally wh gay men, stayg touch on Facebook, and lettg your gay iends know that you want to rema sexually fahful to your wife.

WHY I STAYED MARRIED TO MY GAY HBAND: I WAS MTED AS MUCH TO THE LIFTYLE AS TO THE MAN HIMSELF

I warn mixed-orientatn upl that he may feel differently later life and his gayns may surface more strongly and bee more of an inty for him and th bee an issue their marriage. Both straight and gay muni put enormo prsure on the man and woman a mixed-orientatn marriage, and few marriag n stand up unr this social, fay, and relig prsure.

Some upl try to “live straight” and image that they will be able to not acknowledge the hband’s gayns any way.

Generally, a gay man will feel a lot of emotnal distrs, grief, and prsn if he is livg so eply the closet. Most of my male clients who are gay and married to women didn’t know that their inty was gay when they married. He most likely terpreted his gay terts as sexual “kks, ” and he nvced himself they would fa away after he married.

MY HBAND IS GAY BUT WE’RE MARRIED WH TWO KIDS AND HAVE GREAT SEX

A gay man n tly love a woman, have satisfyg and regular sex wh her, and want to stay married to her while beg unterted other women sexually. The big qutn is: How n a gay man affirm his inty wh other gay men and at the same time rema te to his wife? Matag a mixed-orientatn marriage requir endurg the strs of keepg the secrets that one of them is gay and beg discreet how they live their liv.

I recently spoke wh Bonnie Kaye, thor of Straight Wiv, Shattered Liv: Stori of Women wh Gay Hbands, among other books, and host of Bonnie Kaye’s Straight Wiv Talk Show on BlogTalkRad. Bonnie has spent much of her adult life first livg wh and attemptg to love a gay hband and then helpg other women the same mis-marriage suatn. Bee I know untls gay men who were once married to straight women, wh varyg gre of short and longer-term happs and misery, I wanted to discs this topic, and I wanted to do so om the straight wiv’ perspective.

Our discsn was wi-rangg, begng wh her own marriage to a gay man and progrsg to how she was able to move on post-marriage, eventually beg a rock for other women siar suatns.

IS YOUR HBAND GAY? 6 SIGNS THAT COULD BE A CSE FOR CONCERN

So if somebody told me they’d tried somethg but they didn’t like , there would be no reason for me to thk that the person was gay.

He was a karate teacher, martial arts, a strong guy, looked like Sylvter Stallone, and gay was not one of the issu I thought about wh him. Then somebody who was part of my social work rmed me, a uple of weeks before we were supposed to get married, that he had spicns that Robert was gay. Then, wh the AIDS epimic, a lot of men who were gay felt as if they uld be straight, was a good time to be straight.

And at the end of the day, wasn’t the fact that he was gay that was so vastatg to me, was the way that he treated me. I fd tertg that a lot of men this suatn ratnalize their behavr, sayg ’s not cheatg and don’t mean they’re gay.

MY GAY HBAND

He had also been tellg me thgs like, “If you ever tell anybody the silly stori about me beg gay, then that’s , we’re done. The mom-of-two scrib herself as straight while her hband Matthew intifi as gay or pansexual, admtg he is “more attracted to men than women”. Matthew had known he was attracted to men sce he was a teenager, but he belonged to the Church which do not enurage homosexual relatnships.

“I’ve heard gay men say that they n’t even image tryg to be sexual wh a woman, and I have never felt that way. The mom-of-two scrib herself as straight while her hband Matthew intifi as gay or pansexual, admtg he is “more attracted to men than women. While Brynn is a straight woman, Matthew’s sexualy isn’t lear and he has intified as gay, pansexual and bisexual.

FDG OUT YOUR SPOE IS GAY

If you have had any notn at all that this is a possibily, might help you to know the 6 signs that may suggt that your hband is gay.

Issu ncerng sexual sire alone are not a sure-fire sign your hband is gay, but women who report that their hbands turned out to be gay often say this was somethg they noticed first.

IS MY HBAND GAY? 10 SIGNS THAT CAN HELP YOU FIGURE OUT

But remember, there n be many reasons why sex a marriage is ls than satisfyg, other than the fact that your hband may be gay.

His social media ntacts are unual and full of people, or new iends that you don’t know how he knows them and many of which are gay. It’s highly unlikely that, if your partner is straight, he would want to put his picture and rmatn on a gay datg se.

In most s, if your hband has been hidg gay tennci om you, ’s probably bee he is the closet and don’t know how to e out to you or anybody else his life. And, if you do fd out signs your hband is gay, then the first thg that you’ll need to do is to s down and talk to him. It is entirely possible that he might ny that he’s gay om the offset, whout givg you any satisfactory answers to your qutns.

ASK A QUEER CHICK: SHOULD I STAY MARRIED TO MY HBAND EVEN THOUGH I’M GAY?

If you n live a marriage where you are sure that your hband might be gay, some personal unselg might help you work through this so that you n fd the right way forward for you. If your hband do adm that he is gay, ’s important to remember that he didn’t choose this life to hurt you. So, next time if you have siar doubts md, jt study your partner, check out his browsg histori and fd rmatn about his iends and you will e across signs your hband is gay.

Wh more than 25 years of experience treatg sex and timacy issu, I n tell you that ’s not unmon for betrayed female partners to exprs ncern about their male partner viewg gay pornography or engagg sex wh other men – all the while sistg they’re heterosexual and love their wiv. ) He also sists that he’s not gay or even bisexual, and that his same-sex porn e is related to childhood sexual abe.

IS MY HBAND GAY? SIGNS OF A GAY HBAND

He suggted that maybe he uld look at gay porn on a limed basis, or they uld have an open relatnship that would allow him to be sexual outsi their relatnship once or twice a month, or, well, the list of optns was endls. Here’s the twist: Even if I had proof he was gay—and even if that proof were sexual fily wh men—I’d happily stay married to him. We are long past time when homosexualy was “the love that dare not speak s name, ” but not darg to speak to your hband about his probable gayns leav you physilly and emotnally vulnerable.

You are both still young, and if your marriage requir silence and nial, then you n the risk of beg alone middle age bee your hband fally acknowledg his need to live as a gay man. But when the marriage is over bee your spoe turns out to be gay, there is a whole different layer of thoughts and emotns to ntend wh. Bonnie Kaye,, me to specialize helpg women face this unanticipated reason for the mise of their marriage after her own marriage llapsed by virtue of her hband beg gay.

Kaye reports that when a woman learns the reason for the problems her marriage-namely homosexualy, she go through a wi range of emotns om vastatn, shame, guilt, rponsibily, and perhaps even to repulsn. Acrdg to, there are over 4 ln women this untry who are married to, or have been married to gay men, and there are lns more throughout the world.

IS YOUR MAN GAY, STRAIGHT, OR BISEXUAL?

"In almost all s, " Kaye stat, "women wh gay hbands are unaware of their hbands' homosexualy at the time of the marriage. The answers to the qutns pend on if the gay or lbian spoe knew and tried to reprs the homosexual attractns, whether he or she didn't know they were gay, or if they are bisexual (attracted to both genrs) or pansexual (attracted more to a person's spir or personaly rather than a person's anatomy) so the attractn to their spoe was real was real but not limed to one person or genr.

THE FEMALE SPOE: A PROCS OF SEPARATN WHEN A HBAND ' OUT' AS GAY

The seems to be no shortage of support out there on this subject matter and I also me across several books on the topic that may be of help to both the gay and straight spoe.

If you're a woman, you may have noticed thgs about your Hband that lead you to believe he's gay or terted men. It might be surprisg to know that if your spoe isn't straight, he might actually display extreme homophobic behavur. He will show signs of disapproval towards gay men and gay upl, as well as be particularly vol about how wrong homosexualy is.