coming out and in
by barbara marlowe

I came out as a lesbian when I was twenty-two.

I fell madly, passionately in love with a black haired beauty of Native American and Greek heritage. With a gap-toothed grin and subtle lift of her eyebrow, there was no need to steal my heart. I gave myself away and flew into her arms with grace and surrender.

Once, early on in our relationship, we called in sick for one whole week and stayed at home taking baths and dancing in the kitchen while we baked vegetable casseroles and chocolate chip cookies. We felt sorry for our straight friends who dated clumsy boys who never measured up to impossible standards. For other women, we cried when they married and settled for so much less than they deserved.

Even in my first year of college, I hadn’t let myself be aware of a sexual attraction to girls. I began to get a glimpse when I went to see a counselor for general angst and despair. Among other things on my long list of fears was volunteering at the rape crisis center. I was worried that with all the women around, I’d become a lesbian. I had no idea where such a crazy notion had come from. I had a boyfriend—my high school sweetheart. Everyone knew we would get married. Mostly unconscious, I did get married and when he asked me if I’d ever leave him, I answered truthfully, “not for any other man.”

I kept that vow but broke all others when I fell in love with a woman and left him cold. He couldn’t understand and neither would I tell him why. I gave into mistaken fears that if he knew, in anger he might purposefully ruin my budding professional reputation. So I hid in the proverbial closet and spoke of everything else that was wrong between us. He fell apart while I talked of remaining friends.

All wasn’t joy in ‘coming out’. Suddenly, I was a lesbian and damned by almost all religions. I felt unnerved. Me, the good girl next door. People used to say in disbelief, “But you are so pretty!” while others would spontaneously offer advice that, even though I was in love, I should sleep with a few more men just to make sure.

I have to admit that piece of advice confused me for a while. What if I hadn’t slept with enough men—and how many men were enough? Forget being accused of sleeping around. Now premarital sex was okay. I made peace with the issue after receiving advice that the best way to find out if I was a lesbian was to sleep with other women. Funny that no one ever said, “Congratulations on being in love.”

I used to ponder how being sexually abused as a child by both men and women (equal rights opportunity) affected my sexual preference. I didn’t want to be a lesbian because I was sexually abused. I wanted to be a lesbian for positive reasons—because I loved women. Then I learned that if all women who are sexually abused actually become lesbians, there would be a lot more lesbians in this world. Up to one in four, not just one in ten. The real question was how my abuse affected my ability for intimacy and trust. I healed and moved into my proud beautiful woman’s body.
I embraced my new sexual identity with as much pride as I could muster in a world full of hate. Unless I told, few would guess that I was lesbian because of how I looked. Lots of people thought we were sisters because of that special closeness we demonstrated. I never thought about men. Lesbians are often called man-haters but really for me, it wasn’t about men at all. It was about her—my first woman lover and life partner for twelve years, two houses, four cats and no children. I was woman-identified when we broke up. Badly. She was in love with someone else and this time, it was I who fell apart while she spoke of remaining friends.

I found comfort in women’s arms, breasts, and Ben and Jerry’s New York Super Fudge Peace Pops. I took gay dance lessons and learned how to lead, though a natural follower. I fell in love again with a woman of words, size five shoes, and a gold-tooth smile. Tough little nut with a heart of gold and a passion for dachshunds who loved me fiercely. And I loved her. Seven years, one condo and four cats later, we broke up. It ended well, now a rich and rare friendship.

Dating men still never crossed my mind. This time I truly welcomed space to grow and live alone. I was almost fifty and felt called to a home of my own making. I started to let loose, experiment with brighter colors and let my hair grow long. “Follow Your Bliss”, says the bumper sticker and so I did. I started wearing clothes that accentuated my breasts and began to dance with abandon.

For two years, I didn’t think about dating or sex, although I was aware that I felt nervous around certain men at work. It wasn’t until I went to my 30th high school reunion that it dawned on me. I went out to dinner with a boy—now man—I’d been friendly with growing up. We hit it off and when he came to town for business, he stayed with me. What an odd and wonderful experience to have sex with a man after 26 years of sleeping with women! He seemed so big and such a curious species. And when he held my hand on the subway, the overt display of public affection was disorienting. Who was I? What was I doing? What if I saw someone I knew?

Just as it wasn’t all joy in ‘coming out’, the path of ‘coming in’ was no less straight or narrow. My attraction and love of women was real and such a part of me that I felt shaken to my core by this unexplained attraction in the opposite direction. Plus, by now I was well known both personally and professionally as a lesbian. At first, the question of what people would think haunted me. On the gay side, I didn’t want to be judged as disloyal or the object of sudden mistrust. On the straight side, I didn’t want to be seen as finally coming to my senses or some sort of proof that homosexuality can be cured. I was no longer a lesbian, certainly not straight. I begin to appreciate the term bisexual.

Then there were the men—that is, men who were interested in even dating women fifty and older. Men with baggage, men with issues, and even more suspect, men who had never been married. Men were new to me and oddly enough, as I spoke to straight women about the men I was meeting, I was horrified by the male-bashing; so many women so hurt by men and angry with the gender as a whole and most sadly, so many women who did not enjoy sex or their own bodies.

I became involved with a man from India, to me dark and exotic, who truly loved women’s bodies. I explored new rhythms and rhymes. Got to know what a penis has to do with sexual ecstasy. Became comfortable kissing in public. That relationship wasn’t meant to be forever but it did show me that I could dance in the kitchen, love and be loved by a man. And that I wanted to.

I came into a family and a world where strict notions about right and wrong cast long shadows onto sex, sexual expression and gender that have paved the way to stereotyping and laws that discriminate. Damned as an abomination, I have feared being the victim of a hate crime. I am much more aware of heterosexual privilege now that I live and enjoy it. Everyone should have it. I want a world that is safe and where God is sex-friendly no matter the sex of my beloved.

Could I have found men earlier? Who knows and why care? I’m doing it now with my husband, a sweet man, who like me has been damaged and has grown. We found each other like magic, and trusting due diligence to the energies that guided us, quickly made a deal to fall in love and do it right as if for the first time. With him, I am welcomed as a bisexual, astral traveler, tattooed lover, adolescent girl, desecrated child and sexy, sexy dancer. I love this man.

We decided shortly after we met to get married. Shyly and with chagrin, I realized I wanted a diamond engagement ring. Being a lesbian, I never dreamed of an engagement ring. I am a feminist and understand why diamond engagement rings and marriage are often oppressive to women and other groups. Even with all the gay pride I’d achieved, the depth of my yearning for tradition surprised me. Legality and recognized symbols of commitment are important. Sometimes I feel like a traitor to my gay and lesbian friends as I now embrace what we’d all been forbidden together. I feel like a spectator to starvation while sitting at a feast holding some man’s hand with my diamond. Yet I love its twinkling promise of everlasting loyalty.

I miss belonging to the out crowd. The inside jokes and women’s thighs. Just by loving a man doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten. How could I? Would I go back? Moot question because I want my husband to outlive me. But should he go before me, who knows who I’ll love. I’m open. And when I hear my beautiful straight single women friends bemoan the lack of good men, I want to shout, “Try women!” Women are glorious creatures and offer a love no less than men but stunning in the difference.

Paradigms shift. And I had to catch up with the times. Distilled, this is what I’ve learned as a straight, lesbian, bisexual woman who now is married and loves her man:

Love is love.
Most of the good people in the world believe in Gods who damn me when I love a woman and welcome me when I love a man.
I’m the same person.
Public displays of affection ought to safe.
Freedom and healing from abuse can have everything and nothing to do with sexual preference.
Sex with a beloved is holy.
What we are taught to believe creates our reality.
Love is love.

Barbara Marlowe understands transformation and the reclaimation of joy. She recently announced the opening of InbodyMe: Explorations on the Healing’s Edge.
[ 828-298-6579; bmarlowe@atlascare.net ]