Coming out isn't always a happy ending—it's a new beginning

My girlfriend says that when you came out in the 80s, the most common response was, "At least you don't have cancer." We've come a long way since then. Now, the most common response, in my experience, is, "As long as you're happy."

Every time I hear this, I want to argue. Not because it's a horrible thing to say, but the choice for me to come out had nothing to do with happiness. The time of my life when I heard those words the most was the hardest.

Looking back, my life with my husband was like a boat. We pieced it together when we were teenagers in high school, tied the knot after college, and sailed into the proverbial seas after settling down to start a family. Four years into my marriage, our happy boat sprang a leak.

I had my first crush on a woman.

It was easy to plug the small hole for a long time. Eleven years later, when I had my second crush, two holes in our boat required more attention to keep afloat. The third crush was a major rupture, and suddenly, I was spending a significant amount of energy bailing water out of the boat. If my attention lapsed for a second, we'd begin to sink.

By the time I told my husband of my struggles with my sexuality, I was near exhaustion. I yearned to lie back and sink below the surface.

The night I told my husband I wanted to separate, he told me that all he could think of were suicidal thoughts. Neither of us slept that night. He tossed and turned, alternating between moaning and hyperventilating, and I lay beside him on suicide watch.

In the weeks and months that followed my coming out, I was generally unhappy.

I was falling in love and developing a new relationship, which was exciting and fun. But I still lived with my husband, as I couldn't imagine being elsewhere. I worked from home and felt trapped in conversations with my husband that lasted hours - and always ended badly. As a result, I was hopeful and in love but also anxious, sad, uncertain, scared, tired, angry, and overwhelmed.

But my coming out wasn't about happiness. It was about integrity and truth.

The truth was that my husband and I had not been healthy for a long time. We had been strained and careful with each other for so many years that it was hard to remember the friendship we shared before we settled into the grind of adult life. The truth was that our two kids, who both walked on eggshells, felt our tension and unhappiness. The truth was that I knew I was not straight and was afraid I would lose my mother, siblings, and in-laws. The truth was that my loneliness came from fitting in instead of belonging because you can't belong anywhere when you can't be yourself.

When I look back on the two terrible years, from straight and married to gay and partnered, I am sometimes amazed that I didn't cave into the pressure of being good instead of being honest.

What gave me strength was the feeling of being put "back together into something real."

Being straight felt like frantically picking up puzzle pieces and trying to figure out how they fit, but being a lesbian felt like standing still and letting the pieces fall into place. I had integrity in the sense of being whole and undivided, and suddenly, I couldn't live any other way.

I've thought a lot about what people should say when someone comes out to them, and one friend's response always rises to the top. She teared up and said, "I'm so excited for you that you've found a whole new part of yourself to explore." In many ways, I found a new self, not just part of one.

Now that I've had time to settle into her, I am happy, but it took a while to get here.

Frances Frey is an avid student of human behavior. With an educational background in social psychology, she is passionate about women's studies, especially the challenges women face in navigating the pressures of religious and societal expectations.

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