I carry the trauma of a thousand women

“I carry the trauma of a thousand women”

That phrase appeared in my head this morning as I was doing a yin yoga class. The instructor, a wise and talented friend and therapy colleague, was talking about protection and vulnerability. As I breathed into the pose, shoulder blades “sliding down my back,” those words emerged as if watching them being typed onto a screen:


 I carry…the trauma…of…a thousand...women.


As a therapist, I’ve been a container for trauma for over thirty years. And as a straight spouse whose focus is helping other straight spouses, the trauma of my former husband – a man I loved dearly – coming out as a gay man gets mixed in the emotional soup. 


There are times when I am so triggered that I want to scream. Not triggered by my clients and fellow straight spouses so much, but rather on their behalf, particularly when talking to people who don’t/won’t/can’t understand the straight spouse experience. “NO!” I say, “It is NOT just like other divorces!” The invalidation is a dull knife to the heart; not a clean incision, but rather a painful jab jab jab


**Note: Before I continue, let me make clear my compassion for the LGBT spouse’s experience, which, although differently painful, is just as real. In this moment, though, I need to write about me. And Us. The “left-behind spouses,” as one divorce attorney very indelicately put it.

Even though I’m thirty years out and happily remarried, I can return to my own despair in an instant. That exact moment that I knew…which was decades beyond when he knew. The smirking faces of people out in public, like old girlfriends and other gay men. Crying quietly in bed beside him as the minutes to our inevitable separation ticked away. The nights of waking up to find myself wandering around my apartment, looking for him, then remembering he was gone.  


But every day, I carry the trauma of a thousand women. And men. The broken-hearted spouses in my office. The thousands of straight spouses on Facebook with our many secret groups and private rooms. The people who email me, usually starting with “I just discovered…”


I carry the trauma of a thousand women, just as they carry each other’s. 

And mine. 

Happy Mother's Day, Mrs. Bechdel

Days and days and days

That's how it happens 

Days and days and days

Made of lunches

And car rides 

And shirts and socks

And grades 

And piano 

And no one clocks 

the day you disappear

Days and days and days 

That's how it happens
Days and days and days
Made of posing, and bragging, and fits of rage
And boys – my God, some of them underage!
And, oh, how did it all happen here?

That's how it happens
Days
Made of bargains I made because I thought
As a wife I was meant to,
And now my life is shattered and made bare.
Days and days and days and days
And days and days and days.

Welcome to our house on Maple Avenue. See how we polish and we shine.
We rearrange and realign.
Everything is balanced and serene.
Like chaos never happens if it's never seen.
               - "Days and Days" from Fun Home: The Musical (sung by Helen)

Fun Home is a musical based on Alison Bechdel's graphic memoir of the same name. The musical tells the tale of Alison's sexual awakening as a lesbian woman and her conflicted relationship with her closeted gay father, Bruce, who took his own life four months after she came out. Fun Home was nominated for twelve Tony Awards in 2015 and won five, including Best Musical.

When Amie Shea of the Gay Dad Project asked me to contribute a Mother's Day blog post, I wanted to speak about the "straight spouse" experience from a different perspective, with a fresh voice. As a psychotherapist, I've seen any number of mothers whose husbands either came out as -- or were discovered to be -- gay. And as a member/facilitator of multiple private online groups, I've read hundreds of stories, and have shared my own. All different...and all the same. And too often only heard by other straight spouses. Heartbreak in an echo chamber.

But then, as I was contemplating writing this blog post, I saw Fun Home twice in the same week. (Yes, it's that good!)  Alison Bechdel's book came to life on stage, giving voice to not only Alison and her gay father, but also her mother Helen. It's one of the few times that the straight spouse has been an important part of the narrative.

Jesse Green, the theater critic for New York magazine, described Helen's song "Days and Days" (partial lyrics above) as "murmurously devastating." 

Helen, like most straight spouses, quietly implodes behind the scenes. The closeted gay husband/father and the lesbian daughter are the main characters, and therefore their struggles are front and center. This particular story is, after all, written from the daughter's perspective about her own sexuality and her father's turmoil about his.

Oh, but Helen. My eyes were on Helen throughout the show. At one point in the song she appears physically broken, as if she finally gives in to the weight of the secret and the betrayal and the deceit. Gives in to the devastating realization that all the years spent over-functioning and holding the family together were for naught. Gives in to the agonizing possibility that her best years are gone, offered up to someone who may or may not have ever truly loved her. 

I want to know what's true
Dig deep into who
And what and why and when
Until now gives way to then...
               - "Helen's Etude" from Fun Home: The Musical (sung by Alison)

Alison Bechdel says of her mother, "Like Odysseus' faithful Penelope, my mother kept the household going for twenty years with a more or less absent husband." Helen was a devout Catholic who not only worked and pursued a Master's degree, but also raised three children while coping with a husband who had sexual affairs with multiple men, both before and during their marriage. He was given to fits of unprovoked rage. He also brought young men around to the house and was arrested for plying an underage male with alcohol. On one occasion he brought home body lice. (None of these are uncommon events in the straight spouse experience, by the way. The trauma is about so much more than just a husband coming out.)

In her memoir, Alison describes a photograph of her mother as of a woman whose "luminous face has gone dull." In another photograph, her mother is curled up in a chair, "literally holding herself together." Murmurous devastation.

Another straight spouse story. All different. All the same.

Except for this unexpected twist.

While doing research for this blog, I came across the real Helen Bechdel's obituary from 2013. I was struck by the photo of this beautiful woman, with compassionate dark eyes and a Mona Lisa smile. Here are a few lines from her obituary:

"Helen was a devoted mother, a gracious hostess, a superb cook, and a consummate housekeeper. And she managed all these things with apparent effortlessness while working full time and pursuing her creative interests with both passion and discipline."

While living in New York City, Helen "attended as many plays, operas, poetry readings, concerts, and jazz performances as was humanly possible."

She was "a gifted pianist" and had "a passion for opera."

"For many summers, Helen was involved with the Millbrook Playhouse in Mill Hall, either performing or working on costumes— often both."

"She delighted in her grandchildren."

In other words, Helen was so much more than a woman bowed by her husband's closeted homosexuality, infidelity, and suicide. She both survived and thrived. She was actively engaged with the world. She didn't curl up and die, as much as she may have wanted to.

This is the part of the straight spouse story that doesn't get told nearly enough. Stories like Helen Bechdel's. Straight spouses are brave, out of necessity if nothing else. We are resilient. We keep functioning when NOT functioning would be so much easier. We come through the fire that much stronger. Murmurous devastation gives way to intrepid determination. 

So Happy Mother's Day, Mrs. Bechdel. And to all the rest of you incredible women who are not defined simply by being a straight spouse. You know who you are...and what you're made of.  

I know you.
I know you. 
I know you.
               - "Ring of Keys" from Fun Home: The Musical (sung by Alison)

Related links

https://youtu.be/wMJvLTZOhpE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcAqCMCohto&t=25s

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/31/theater/in-fun-home-a-wifes-late-desperate-outcry.html?_r=0

http://wetzlerfuneralhome.com/book-of-memories/1585010/bechdel-helen/obituary.php

                                                                                   

To schedule a face-to-face or FaceTime session with Kimberly Brooks Mazella, LPC, please go to my website at www.kimberlybrooksmazella.com.

My Most Sincere Condolences for the Loss of Your Marriage

Yesterday, the New York Times published a story called "The Art of Condolence," about how difficult condolences can be to express. How it can be challenging to find just the right words. How awkward it can feel to comfort others in times of loss. 

*From NYTimes.com October 1, 2016 

Straight spouses are often on the receiving end of awkward condolences...if they receive condolences at all. "How did you not know?" "At least s/he didn't leave you for another wo/man!" "You're so lucky you didn't have children!" "So does that mean you're a 'fag hag?'" (I was personally on the receiving end of that one.)

Insensitive comments and intrusive questions are part and parcel of the straight spouse experience. 

As Jean Schaar Gochros wrote in her 1989 book, "When Husbands Come Out of the Closet," straight spouses experience a profound sense of "unique isolation." One aspect of this isolation is what we call "disenfranchised grief." That is, grief that others -- society, our families, our ex-spouses, the LGBT community, the church -- don't feel we're entitled to. Because perhaps we're somehow complicit in the deceit. Because we stayed. Because we didn't know. Or because we loved and married a closeted LGBT spouse, we deserve ridicule, not compassion. But just as our exes deserve compassion for their struggle, so do the unsuspecting spouses who are left devastated by the lie. 

You can simply say, "I'm so sorry. I can't imagine what this must be like, but I'm here for you. And I care that you're hurting."

To schedule a face-to-face or FaceTime session with Kimberly Brooks Mazella, LPC, please go to my website at www.kimberlybrooksmazella.com.

Modern Family: Married...and Trans

Friday night's interview with Bruce Jenner by Diane Sawyer was a turning point in our collective understanding of the struggle of transgendered people. To know that this All-American hero, the perfect specimen of handsome masculinity and fitness, has been tormented by gender identity confusion since childhood, was painful to hear. Reading Twitter and Facebook posts during and after the interview revealed expressions of compassion and encouragement. His first two wives and the majority of his children offered their unconditional love and support, with sincere wishes for his happiness. 

He's out. The burden of the secret has been lifted. He can finally move forward with his transition into Her. Pictures taken of him yesterday morning revealed the smile of a man who was free at last. And the morning after, we celebrated his courage and feel empathy for the years of pain. I, for one, am genuinely happy for him. Everyone deserves to live an authentic life.

But Jenner's somewhat tidy ending misses a huge chunk of the story, because his life overlaps so many others'. Although life can't really be neatly depicted in a drawing, I think my Venn diagram (below) pretty clearly lays out important relationships that are now being or have been affected by Jenner's gender identity struggle. And it's not just in his case, of course, but is true for every LGBT person who comes out during a marriage. Every circle has an equally important story to tell. 

First, let's look at the kids. It's not unusual for a child to sense that something is "off" in the family. They may find evidence that Mom or Dad is LGBT; it might be a photo, a text accidentally read, or maybe one parent has a new same-sex friend that they're spending more time with. Or in Jenner's case, being "caught" wearing women's clothing. And for the child(ren), the internal dialogue might sound like this: "Who do I tell? Can I ask my parent(s) about it? I have this secret and it's too much for me. I'm so mad at my mom for marrying him! I'm so mad at my dad for being gay! I'm so embarrassed! What are my friends going to think? Does this mean I'm gay, too?"

The second circle represents the "straight spouse." Or, as one attorney I worked with so indelicately put it, the "left-behind spouse." That spouse just had his/her world turned upside down. Sometimes it happens abruptly, and sometimes there is a growing suspicion that reveals itself over time. There are often years of a sexless marriage. We wonder, "Am I not attractive enough? Sexy enough? Manly enough?" We buy satin sheets, sexy lingerie, her favorite flowers. We make his favorite meal. Sometimes we even directly ask, and get a defensive denial in response. It is crazy-making and self-esteem shattering. 

The strongest punch to the gut for the straight spouse is finding evidence of infidelity. The genitalia close-ups on Craigslist's M4M page. The sex toys discovered in a suitcase after a business trip. Love letters left out in the open. For your LGBT spouse, it's a new life. For you, it's the death of everything you thought you knew or thought you had. 

As you can see, there is a lot of overlap between the kids' and the spouses' internal experience. The description I hear most frequently is feeling like Alice in Wonderland after falling down the Rabbit Hole. Things you thought were real aren't, and beliefs you had about life are blown to smithereens in an instant. And if no one is talking about it, it's all that much more discombobulating.

The final circle is the person who is coming out as LGBT. Bruce Jenner's description of his years of internal conflict was heartbreaking. Although times are changing, the truth is that historically being gay or transgender has been more than just "not OK"; people are rejected by their families, kicked out of churches, denied jobs. Even killed. I know one person whose mother threatened to kill herself if he was gay. So he's married instead. And miserable. As Bruce Jenner has shown us, it can take decades to come to terms with one's gender identity and/or sexual orientation, and the process for some is agonizing. And lots people get hurt in the process, even if that was never the intent. Some LGBT folks truly believe that if they can just find that right person, they can create a "traditional" life and tamp down those authentic-but-unacceptable feelings. Too many of us know, of course, that it simply doesn't work that way.

Every person in that Venn diagram has a story to tell. Some experiences and feelings are the same. Some are different. And all of the stories are valid and true.

Let me say that again: All of the stories are equally valid and true. My truth doesn't negate yours. And the LGBT person's truth doesn't negate the straight spouse's.

Which brings us to the heart in the middle of the circles, that place where all of the lives overlap. It's the place of communicating and understanding one another's experience, one another's feelings. Understanding does not mean forgiving; it may not even mean you're less hurt. Less angry. But seeking to dwell in that heart space MUST be the goal if we're ever going to heal as family members, as individuals, as a society. That heart is the place where four things must happen:

•  Allow your partner/child to tell his/her story
  
•  Listen and hear without interruption. (It should be no surprise that this is the hardest one.)
•  Validate their experience. Or, to borrow from Harville Hendrix, say something like, "It makes sense   that you feel that way." And mean it! (Note: Validating is different from agreeing. Remember,          every story is valid and true)
•  Express genuine remorse. "Dad, I'm sorry I ignored your calls and texts. I just didn't know what to say to you."   "Honey, I'm so sorry I didn't tell you before we got married. You deserved to have known."   "Dave, I'm sorry I called you those terrible names."
  

What does your Venn diagram look like? Are you firmly planted in your circle, certain that yours is the only story that counts?

Or are you moving towards your heart?

To schedule a face-to-face or FaceTime session with Kimberly Brooks Mazella, LPC, please go to my website at www.straightforwardcounseling.com. Or contact me at kbmazella@gmail.com.

A picture is worth a thousand hurts

We have a little members-only virtual clubhouse where fellow str8s meet to swap stories; vent frustrations; share the devastating pain of an unwanted, unplanned divorce; tell the occasional off-color joke; give and receive virtual hugs; commiserate about learning to date again; and generally just hang out and talk about the shared experience of having unknowingly married a closeted LGBT person. With a membership of over 450 people, it's certain that most of us will never meet face to face. But the bond isn't any less strong simply because of the electronic venue; in fact, our common str8 experience makes for an immediate sense of "knowing", like running into another American in Greece and suddenly that person is your new best friend. No backstory needed; I know you.

Today people posted pictures of themselves and their spouses, pre-divorce. I'm not sure who started it, but by the end of the evening there were over fifty pictures posted, including one of my favorite photos from my own wedding day. Lots of happy, smiling faces. Wedding photos, recommitment ceremonies, vacations, new babies, father-daughter dances...they could be pictures of any family, anywhere. Except for the accompanying captions:

"This was taken one week before she left me for another woman."

"At a friend's wedding. Found out later he hooked up with one of the waiters at the reception."                       

"He liked to take pictures with everyone; I was just another casual person to take a picture with."

"This was on our honeymoon. I thought I was the luckiest guy in the world."

"With our daughter before a dance. He had been dating his boyfriend for three months at that point, unbeknownst to me."

"Holding our baby. I found out right before I gave birth that he had been soliciting sex from men online."

"This was during a short-lived happy period. He lost a damn good woman."

"This was on my graduation day. He came out less than a month later."

"This is the picture he used to meet men online."

"I took this picture on a romantic lunch date. He used it on a gay dating site less than three weeks later."

And my own description of that favorite photo: "It's interesting...I'm kissing HIM, while his hands are not touching me at all."

I couldn't quite put my finger on what it was exactly about the photo-sharing that got to me. It's not about TGT (that's "the gay thing" in str8 shorthand). I understand the closet, I feel deep compassion for the struggle, I appreciate the desire to live the "acceptable" life and have the husband/wife, the 2.3 kids and the golden retriever. I really do get that, and work hard in both my personal and professional lives to promote equality. No one should have to pretend to be someone or something that they aren't.

That said, I found myself feeling emotionally triggered as I scrolled through the pictures again and again. As I sat here struggling to find just the right words to describe what I was feeling, another club member beat me to it with her very honest and to-the-point post:

"It is really interesting to see all the photos, but it is also sad because not one of you in those pics thought that the person you fell in love with would one day end up gay. Right now I am angry at him and all of them for the hurt and the pain that they have put us through. I am angry that so many of us are struggling financially because of their [behavior]. I am angry because so many of us are on meds because of the sh*t we have gone through. I am angry because many of us were made to feel sexually inadequate because of their inability to be honest with themselves. Lastly, I am angry because so many children have been hurt by this. We also deserve happiness and peace in our lives."

And that, for far too many members of our not-so-little club, is a pretty clear snapshot of the other side of this unhappy closet.

To schedule a face-to-face or FaceTime session with Kimberly Brooks Mazella, LPC, please go to my website at www.kimberlybrooksmazella.com.

Piece by peace

by guest blogger Ken Rinehart

Last weekend I bought a mandolin. For about two months I have been coveting this beautiful work of art. Saturday the guy in the combo department at the local music store decided he wanted to deal.

The significance it represents in my life is daunting. This August it will be two years since my wife walked out of my life and started her new life with another woman. At one point I had $15 to my name, so I sold my prized possession    my mandolin    for $75.

Since August of 2011 I have experienced the death of my father and the death of my sheepdog. I lost faith in my church and beliefs I held strongly about my purpose on this earth. I lost some of my dear friends, lost close contact with much of my extended family. The world and my understanding of it was squarely upside-down. I sold most of my possessions, or at least the ones I could get some quick cash for.

I had no choice but to just look up. Looking down took me to an even more crippling place. In some strange way it was learning to totally reconstruct my life in ways I had never imagined or even knew existed or knew how to start.

Ironic as it may seem, I am grateful for that experience. Truly grateful.

The trial of forgiveness is something that has never been challenged in my life. No one has ever taken everything I have given and piled it up in my room and said "no thanks" so briskly and rapidly as they exited my life without explanation or seeming concern about my well-being. I would like to say I understand. I would like to say "all is forgiven."

Phrases have come with this journey:

   Everything happens for a reason.

   You got a lot on your plate.

   God doesn't give us anything we can't handle.

Those are from people that don't know or understand what this felt like. Just as I will never know the grief of losing a child. What it's like to suffer some traumatic loss. To truly know you have to experience it, heart and mind.

I asked someone early on how is it possible to be a victim in this without adopting a victim mentality. She said, "Being a victim is a state of mind you put yourself in." "Being a victim of circumstance is just a fact in this scenario."

Many things have happened. Numerous things have unfolded. Unconditional love from strangers that I never had experienced before nor thought was possible. Development of inner strength that to this day is surprising and disarming. Falling in love again, only this time feeling more like an adolescent with higher stakes.

All of these things and more only started to unfold when I lost the story of "someone did something to me." Life changed. I am not entitled to know the story that someone doesn't want to honestly and openly tell me. It's silly to expect someone to act the same toward you who is preoccupied with their new truths unfolding, truths that go deep into the recesses of denying their sexuality. I have found it is true of only a few of extraordinary people. The honesty, the openness of moving through and out of a marriage with kindness and compassion toward one another. It's hard enough with two people without the twist of same sex attraction.

Weeks ago my new love was having a heart procedure. Side by side her gay husband and I stood  in the hospital waiting room, waiting to get an update. Our mutual love for her and our deep friendship is something that is hard to not share with those that don't understand anything outside of a "traditional family." What was and is true is that we don’t need to. We know what this is.

I bought the mandolin. I walked out of the hospital with my new family. I am surrounded by so much love from friends I can hug daily, and those I have never met.

For this, too, I am grateful. Truly grateful. 

To those that reflected back to me who I really am. To those who have graced the path with their stories, their experiences, guidance, and wisdom. To those who allowed me into their lives when they were at their weakest points. To my true love who appeared and blindsided me when I wasn't looking, and embraced me in that parking lot in Chicago where life changed on its axis. To the god within and without that never abandoned me even when I thought I lost faith in the ever-present light and goodness.

Although I never thought I would say or write these words, I am grateful to my ex-wife for loving me the best way she knew how, and starting me on this journey as she started hers. I hope and pray that one day we will be able to talk about both of our journeys with each other, in peace.

To schedule a face-to-face or FaceTime session with Kimberly Brooks Mazella, LPC, please go to my website at www.kimberlybrooksmazella.com.

A letter to my gay husband

Recently, I was inspired to include voices of other straight spouses on my blog. I became aware that sharing our stories with each other, while helpful, just isn't enough. We already know all too well the pain and devastation of a spouse coming out. My hope is that you, the reader, will share this with others. Believe me, whether you know it or not, you have a straight spouse in your life. 

                                                                   Letter to my Gay Husband

The moment is both crystal clear and a haze of emotions. That moment. That moment at 8 am on an August morning when you hesitated and took a breath for a millisecond after telling me what bills you had paid and how D’s college tuition was being covered. The moment that is the bridge between the safe and comfortable world that I knew and the one that I live in now.  The moment that preceded the 9 words that shattered my dreams for the future and my memories of the past.  “And, I need to tell you that I’m gay.” 

Those words were the gateway to the many months I spent walking through fog in an upside down world, holding all known emotions side by side in my heart - anger, compassion, sadness, love, devastation, strength, resolve, darkness, self-love, self-loathing, fury, and peace. At the time, of course, I believed that had you been more thoughtful in your disclosure, or had you better anticipated what I might need and want, it would have “felt” better. In hindsight, I know that nothing could have diminished the pain and disorientation I have come to embrace as my own as a result of your truth.

We have talked more intimately in the past 6 months than we had during our 28 years of marriage; hundreds of hours by my estimation.  Almost certainly it is because of my need to know the watershed of thoughts, feelings and experiences that you kept hidden for all of these years. I wanted to know that part of you too. I have heard all of the things you have shared. Some of them have helped me believe that you truly love me, in your way. Some of them have helped me understand the myriad of forces that enable men like you to live a life-time trying to suppress or manage their same-sex attractions for the sake of normalcy. But when all is said and done, while you transition to living your life authentically, I still have a broken heart.  You focus on happy years we had together. I focus on this less; I didn't want a marriage that was going to end. I am trying to forgive you. I am trying to let go of the anger.   I am trying to give primacy to the love we still share. It is hard.

In Senegal’s Maison des Esclaves (The House of Slaves) the door to the quarters of captured slaves is known as “Goree”, The Door of No Return.  That is our door. Every possible path to the relationship we knew is blocked. Although we have tried and tried to navigate around this, to see what we can work out, in reality there’s no way back.  

I can’t imagine having survived the past 6 months without the support of other str8 spouses that are ahead of me in this journey. Sadly, there are hundreds of us.  We, collectively, can validate the feelings of pain, betrayal, deceit, loss that each of us experience as we let go of the person we loved so deeply but could not keep.

I know that you are sorry. I thank you for having been so present for me as I process where we are.  You have stayed with me and with our 4 boys.  But in the end, none of it matters.  I love you. I always will.  I only wish that you had loved me enough to have been more careful with my heart.   ~ Anonymous

To schedule a face-to-face or FaceTime session with Kimberly Brooks Mazella, LPC, please go to my website at www.straightforwardcounseling.com.