Happily Ever After

I have pondered before how it can be that I didn't realise I am a lesbian; how I ended up married to a man for seventeen years, and discussed the the social norms about how I ended up there.

Every so often I read things that seem to describe my experience with such clarity that I wonder why it was so hard to describe before.

This piece on the website Brainpickings so perfectly describes the strength of social norming, and even how I managed to end up somehow book ended into a very old fashioned concept of love.

Women’s social inferiority could thus be traded for men’s absolute devotion in love, which in turn served as the very site of display and exercise of their masculinity, prowess, and honor. More: women’s dispossession of economic and political rights was accompanied (and presumably compensated) by the reassurance that in love they were not only protected by men but also superior to them. It is therefore unsurprising that love has been historically so powerfully seductive to women; it promised them the moral status and dignity they were otherwise denied in society and it glorified their social fate: taking care of and loving others, as mothers, wives, and lovers. Thus, historically, love was highly seductive precisely because it concealed as it beautified the deep inequalities at the heart of gender relationship

Articles like this have my yelling at my computer 'This! This! This!' When you look at the historical and social history of love and marriage, it makes perfect sense how strongly socialised we are into the institution. I loved the idea of 'being protected and looked after' and constantly had externally reinforced the virtue in my role as a wife and mother. Interestingly enough, not by my husband himself, who now in his role of angry ex has reverted to completely denying the work I did in that role.

But this wasn't all I read today. There was also an article from Huffington Post about 'late life lesbians,' which tells a similar story about gender roles. 

“Sometimes people don’t understand how I could have been married for ‘so long’ without realizing that I was a lesbian. They often underestimate the power of cultural ‘norming.’ Cultural expectations can’t make someone straight (or gay or anything else) but they have enormous power in directing how people live their lives. I grew up in a fairly traditional (though politically liberal) family with clearly defined gender roles. What I learned from my family and from the larger culture (this was in the ‘60s and ‘70s) was that I was expected to marry a man when I grew up.”

What can be troubling is the idea that your prior life was a lie. This seems to come from people who don't understand that people change, identity evolves, and knowing more about the world broadens your idea about how you might live your life. Fortunately, I have not experienced that by most people who know me, but it does hurt me that my ex husband thinks that everything prior to my departure was an exercise in deception. He has forgotten that while I might not have been able to be truly vulnerable with him, I was always upfront about my actions. I am generally not prone to deception. When I revealed that I had kissed one of my female friends, his only reaction was that he was sorry he'd missed it.

“My past was not a sham. I truly lived my former life as a straight dedicated wife, mother, and friend. All I knew was that at age 40, something was missing. Many of us struggle for years and years and many maintain the relationship with their husband yet still seek a relationship with a woman. I’m sorry for the pain I caused my husband. I thought I could maintain a dual life but it simply wasn’t possible.”

And on sexuality? Its a vexed question. I still struggle with it. I tend to eschew labelling, because there are too many influences on how I lived my life and how I live it now for me to truly know. When I left, the question 'So are you bisexual now?' was spat at me. Which is the only obvious answer, seeing as how I'd had a bob each way, right?

 “Being with someone (sexually) of the opposite sex does not make that person heterosexual. It is all about desire and attraction, not simply the act itself.

Seeing as how I've had a go playing for both teams, you'd think I'd be able to make up my mind. Well, no, not really. Do I have to make up my mind? Its kind of irrelevant isn't it?

I was there then. I'm here now. That's all that matters.