Secrets and lies
Belinda Oaten has suffered the very public outing of her husband's gay affair. But she is not alone. Diane Taylor talks to the women whose spouses hid their homosexuality
Friday January 27, 2006
The Guardian
The political fallout from revelations that Mark Oaten spent time with a male prostitute was swift and brutal. Even before the News of the World, which exposed him, had hit the streets last Sunday, he resigned as the Liberal Democrats' home affairs spokesman. But the extent of the damage to his 13-year marriage is less clear.
Holed up somewhere snowy in Europe, Oaten's wife, Belinda, 37, is saying little apart from the fact that she is "incredibly angry" and views her husband's behaviour as "the ultimate betrayal". One newspaper report yesterday quoted "a friend of the couple" saying that the marriage is at an end as far as Belinda is concerned.
But what of couples who do not find themselves in the public eye when disclosures about extramarital gay dalliances surface? For a wife who has had no inkling that her spouse was anything other than heterosexual, is it better or worse than finding out that he has been unfaithful with a woman? And is it possible to sustain a marriage after her husband's proclivities are revealed, or is parting inevitable?
There are no statistics on the fate of such marriages in the UK, but according to the Straight Spouse Network, which has its headquarters in the US, where, it estimates, about two million gay men and lesbian women are married to straight partners, roughly a third of couples break up immediately, a third remain together for a year and then split, while the remaining third try to stay together. After three years, half this latter group are still together.
Women who have found themselves in Belinda Oaten's situation say that there can be fleeting relief when they discover that another man is involved if they had suspected their husband was having an affair with a woman, which they would have found more threatening. In the longer term, however, the feeling of being doubly deceived can be overwhelming. Not only have they been fooled about a relationship they thought was monogamous, but they have also been fooled about their partner's sexuality.
Helen, 58, discovered that her husband, Tom, was gay eight years ago. They had been married for 24 years before she found out where his sexual preferences lay. But the problems in her marriage predated that discovery by some time. "The gay partner may blame the straight partner if things aren't going right in the marriage," she says. "The straight partner can be made to feel deficient or unattractive.
"I tried to fix things but floundered because I didn't know what I was supposed to be fixing. It's like asking a doctor to cure a headache when what you've got is a broken leg."
Helen found an amorous email he had written. She assumed it had been written to another woman and, when she confronted him, he allowed her to carry on thinking that. Then she discovered links on the computer to gay chatrooms. Even then, she didn't realise her husband was gay. But during a subsequent row, she shouted: "And you visit gay chatrooms too!"
"At that moment I knew," says Helen. "The colour drained out of his face. 'What do you think?' he said. 'Are you telling me you're gay?' I asked. He nodded and I felt strangely relieved."
In fact, Helen felt they were able to communicate honestly for the first time in years: "He told me that he had known from the age of nine that he was gay but didn't want to be gay."
At the time of Helen's discovery, Tom had never had a relationship with a man. They have since parted amicably and Tom has had a couple of short-lived relationships with men. After some initial distress, their two adult children have accepted the situation.
"Tom said that when he met me, he didn't feel the need to be gay, but he was always very distant. Our sex life was more a celebration of the male body than an expression of emotional closeness between us," says Helen. "I think women who are secretly lesbian in a straight marriage have a harder time having sex with their husbands than gay men in a straight marriage. Men are more able to separate the emotional from the physical and are turned on by the idea of sex even if they're not turned on by the woman's body."
Max, a 30-year-old male prostitute, says that the vast majority of his clients are, like Tom, married with children. "Occasionally, I'll get a call from an openly gay man who wants to meet up for sex, but most of my clients are married with children.
"I had one client who told his mother that he was gay. She was so upset that he got married to keep his mother happy. I think that some of the married men who come to me are not only responding to pressure from society to conform to a straight lifestyle, but are also in denial about their sexuality. With men like me, they can express themselves openly."
Interestingly, Max's secretly gay clients don't only seek him out for sexual release, he says, but also for emotional succour. "I have lost count of the number of married men who have cried when they visit me. I've done a basic skills course in counselling so that I can offer them support," he says. "People are saying that men like Mark Oaten are bastards, but in fact they're victims. They're pressurised by society into conforming to a sexuality they don't want to be a part of. I feel sorry for Mark and his wife, and I condemn the man who went to the News of the World with the story. I would never spill the beans on a client."
Amity Pierce Buxton, who heads the Straight Spouse Network (which has a UK branch), is happily remarried after her first husband came out after 25 years. They remained friends until he died three years ago. "The important thing is to go slowly when these situations arise," she says. "Couples need to communicate with each other honestly so that, even if they separate, they can have a relationship based on truth."
Like Helen and Amity, Pat had no idea that her husband, Mike, was having affairs with both men and women, which began within a year of marriage. Both in their late 50s, they recently separated after 27 years. She began picking up clues six years ago when she caught him downloading gay porn. "He told me he was downloading gay rather than straight porn because it was less likely to have viruses in it. His behaviour is similar to that of an alcoholic who will say and do anything - and then believe it," she says.
The legacy of the revelations about her husband's behaviour, when she accepted the truth after an initial period of denial, has been very difficult. "Apart from the emotional cost, the ramifications are pretty unbelievable," she says. "If a man is unfaithful to his wife with another man, it doesn't count in law as adultery. I had always thought that we would have a certain amount of money for our retirement. But now he's moved out, there are two separate households to run so there's less disposable income."
Worst of all, says Pat, is the awareness of what has gone: "When your husband dies, you lose your future with him. But when something like this comes out, you lose your past because it was all based on lies."
Moving on is often far from straightforward for the woman. While her husband can begin a new life in the gay community, she is faced with whether or not to explain the the real reason for the marital break-up. "As our partners come out of the closet," says Helen, "they slam the door on a new closet inside which we straight spouses find ourselves trapped".
ยท Some names have been changed. Information from straightspouse.org or contact ever@str8s.org for UK branch details.
Friday January 27, 2006
The Guardian
The political fallout from revelations that Mark Oaten spent time with a male prostitute was swift and brutal. Even before the News of the World, which exposed him, had hit the streets last Sunday, he resigned as the Liberal Democrats' home affairs spokesman. But the extent of the damage to his 13-year marriage is less clear.
Holed up somewhere snowy in Europe, Oaten's wife, Belinda, 37, is saying little apart from the fact that she is "incredibly angry" and views her husband's behaviour as "the ultimate betrayal". One newspaper report yesterday quoted "a friend of the couple" saying that the marriage is at an end as far as Belinda is concerned.
But what of couples who do not find themselves in the public eye when disclosures about extramarital gay dalliances surface? For a wife who has had no inkling that her spouse was anything other than heterosexual, is it better or worse than finding out that he has been unfaithful with a woman? And is it possible to sustain a marriage after her husband's proclivities are revealed, or is parting inevitable?
There are no statistics on the fate of such marriages in the UK, but according to the Straight Spouse Network, which has its headquarters in the US, where, it estimates, about two million gay men and lesbian women are married to straight partners, roughly a third of couples break up immediately, a third remain together for a year and then split, while the remaining third try to stay together. After three years, half this latter group are still together.
Women who have found themselves in Belinda Oaten's situation say that there can be fleeting relief when they discover that another man is involved if they had suspected their husband was having an affair with a woman, which they would have found more threatening. In the longer term, however, the feeling of being doubly deceived can be overwhelming. Not only have they been fooled about a relationship they thought was monogamous, but they have also been fooled about their partner's sexuality.
Helen, 58, discovered that her husband, Tom, was gay eight years ago. They had been married for 24 years before she found out where his sexual preferences lay. But the problems in her marriage predated that discovery by some time. "The gay partner may blame the straight partner if things aren't going right in the marriage," she says. "The straight partner can be made to feel deficient or unattractive.
"I tried to fix things but floundered because I didn't know what I was supposed to be fixing. It's like asking a doctor to cure a headache when what you've got is a broken leg."
Helen found an amorous email he had written. She assumed it had been written to another woman and, when she confronted him, he allowed her to carry on thinking that. Then she discovered links on the computer to gay chatrooms. Even then, she didn't realise her husband was gay. But during a subsequent row, she shouted: "And you visit gay chatrooms too!"
"At that moment I knew," says Helen. "The colour drained out of his face. 'What do you think?' he said. 'Are you telling me you're gay?' I asked. He nodded and I felt strangely relieved."
In fact, Helen felt they were able to communicate honestly for the first time in years: "He told me that he had known from the age of nine that he was gay but didn't want to be gay."
At the time of Helen's discovery, Tom had never had a relationship with a man. They have since parted amicably and Tom has had a couple of short-lived relationships with men. After some initial distress, their two adult children have accepted the situation.
"Tom said that when he met me, he didn't feel the need to be gay, but he was always very distant. Our sex life was more a celebration of the male body than an expression of emotional closeness between us," says Helen. "I think women who are secretly lesbian in a straight marriage have a harder time having sex with their husbands than gay men in a straight marriage. Men are more able to separate the emotional from the physical and are turned on by the idea of sex even if they're not turned on by the woman's body."
Max, a 30-year-old male prostitute, says that the vast majority of his clients are, like Tom, married with children. "Occasionally, I'll get a call from an openly gay man who wants to meet up for sex, but most of my clients are married with children.
"I had one client who told his mother that he was gay. She was so upset that he got married to keep his mother happy. I think that some of the married men who come to me are not only responding to pressure from society to conform to a straight lifestyle, but are also in denial about their sexuality. With men like me, they can express themselves openly."
Interestingly, Max's secretly gay clients don't only seek him out for sexual release, he says, but also for emotional succour. "I have lost count of the number of married men who have cried when they visit me. I've done a basic skills course in counselling so that I can offer them support," he says. "People are saying that men like Mark Oaten are bastards, but in fact they're victims. They're pressurised by society into conforming to a sexuality they don't want to be a part of. I feel sorry for Mark and his wife, and I condemn the man who went to the News of the World with the story. I would never spill the beans on a client."
Amity Pierce Buxton, who heads the Straight Spouse Network (which has a UK branch), is happily remarried after her first husband came out after 25 years. They remained friends until he died three years ago. "The important thing is to go slowly when these situations arise," she says. "Couples need to communicate with each other honestly so that, even if they separate, they can have a relationship based on truth."
Like Helen and Amity, Pat had no idea that her husband, Mike, was having affairs with both men and women, which began within a year of marriage. Both in their late 50s, they recently separated after 27 years. She began picking up clues six years ago when she caught him downloading gay porn. "He told me he was downloading gay rather than straight porn because it was less likely to have viruses in it. His behaviour is similar to that of an alcoholic who will say and do anything - and then believe it," she says.
The legacy of the revelations about her husband's behaviour, when she accepted the truth after an initial period of denial, has been very difficult. "Apart from the emotional cost, the ramifications are pretty unbelievable," she says. "If a man is unfaithful to his wife with another man, it doesn't count in law as adultery. I had always thought that we would have a certain amount of money for our retirement. But now he's moved out, there are two separate households to run so there's less disposable income."
Worst of all, says Pat, is the awareness of what has gone: "When your husband dies, you lose your future with him. But when something like this comes out, you lose your past because it was all based on lies."
Moving on is often far from straightforward for the woman. While her husband can begin a new life in the gay community, she is faced with whether or not to explain the the real reason for the marital break-up. "As our partners come out of the closet," says Helen, "they slam the door on a new closet inside which we straight spouses find ourselves trapped".
ยท Some names have been changed. Information from straightspouse.org or contact ever@str8s.org for UK branch details.
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