Are you questioning your sexuality later in life? You’re not the only one. It's common for people to start to explore their sexuality when they’re in their thirties and beyond. 

On women exploring their sexuality later in life

“Am I a Lesbian Married to a Man?” | Lustery POV

“Am I a Lesbian Married to a Man?” Coming Out Late and Mixed Orientation Relationships

Coming out in your 30s and beyond can be confusing. Understanding your sexual orientation doesn’t happen instantly but it can feel disorienting to come to terms with your queerness if you’ve lived decades of your life believing you were mostly straight. Deciding whether to come out and explore your newly discovered sexuality can be even trickier if you have a husband and children. 

Is it normal to question your sexuality when you’re in a relationship? 

If you’re asking yourself, "I love my partner, but I want to explore my sexuality. What do I do?" It's important to remember you're not alone. You're not the only one who's coming out while being married or in a straight-assumed relationship, it's very common. I’ve recently had an uptick of peer support clients who fit this exact description. Of course, everyone is different but there’s a specific pattern to how these stories commonly unfold. Let me lay out the typical scenario and then we can pull out the themes! 

A woman in her late 30s calls me because she’s started to question her sexual orientation. She’s been married for years and has kids so this is all extremely confusing. She presents me with a metaphorical resume of queer-coded experiences from her teens and young adulthood to “prove” the validity of her attraction despite having few if any same-sex experiences. I reassure her that I don’t need proof, I’m not here to judge, only to help her understand herself better. She’s adamant that she loves her husband and is happy in that relationship. He’s one of the good ones and she’s so grateful about how supportive he has been during the initial conversations. She has a lot of internalized homophobia to unpack, she’s accepting of other people’s queerness but not her own. We work slowly together on challenging the deep-rooted narratives she has about who she’s “allowed to love”. At this point, she’s still not fully out but starts to disclose her new sexual orientation to people close to her. But soon she goes from being confident that she’s bisexual to opening up about her chronic sexual and romantic dissatisfaction with her husband. She starts thinking she might be a lesbian but she still can’t imagine herself leaving him. While he was supportive in the beginning her husband grows increasingly resentful and cold. He starts to feel scared about the long-term implications of her being gay. She placates him, hoping to reclaim some of the closeness they used to have but this makes her feel disingenuous and also resentful. Their lives are so entwined that they can’t fathom getting a divorce but staying together feels less and less appealing. They each put up boundaries trying to protect themselves from each other’s periodic coldness and the now unpredictable future. Struggling to connect for months at a time, they start to contemplate more seriously whether to stay together, 

At this point, she’s still not fully out but starts to disclose her new sexual orientation to people close to her. But soon she goes from being confident that she’s bisexual to opening up about her chronic sexual and romantic dissatisfaction with her husband. She starts thinking she might be a lesbian but she still can’t imagine herself leaving him. 

This is where a huge divergence happens from client to client. All of them choose a slightly different future for themselves, proving that 

coming out later in life and being in a mixed-orientation relationship doesn't look one way

Questioning your sexuality: What to know 

It’s pretty common to look back at your teens and young adulthood and see a trail of repressed queer clues. You might notice a pattern of deeply entangled female friendships that honestly felt more like crushes at the time. Or maybe, like me, you had an enormous wall collage in your childhood bedroom of women you thought were hot… in a *totally* heterosexual way (obviously). Many women find it affirming to uncover examples of sapphic yearning from youth, a reassurance that this isn’t all in their heads. But regardless of your past, sexuality can evolve and it’s okay to want to better understand yourself now. 

Coming out in grade school may be more common now, but it certainly wasn’t for most of us born in the previous century. We didn’t have social media to help normalize our un-straight yearnings, the lesbian master doc wasn’t around to help us diagnose our sapphic afflictions, Katy Perry’s ‘I kissed a girl’ successfully trivialized our already confusing queer experiences, “gayyy” was the favorite schoolyard slur hurled casually at everyone and everything, oh and legalized same-sex marriage was still a far fetched fantasy. It’s not surprising if you’re my age or older to have suppressed your queerness while growing up in a homophobic culture. 

The term straight-assumed (or straight-passing) is used when both partners are queer but of different genders and are perceived as heterosexual by others. While mix-orientation relationships describe a queer person in a relationship with a straight person. Many people are happy in relationships that aren’t perceived as queer from the outside, but it’s also common for this lack of visibility to be a point of discomfort. You can use whatever label makes the most sense to describe your relationship or none at all. 

The majority of people in mixed-orientation relationships initially identify as bi or pan. It makes sense that if you’re in a relationship with someone of the opposite gender, you would assume your orientation also encompasses them. Most bisexual people incorporate their queerness into their social lives and remain happy with their partner. Some decide to open their relationship to further explore their sexuality, but that’s not always the case. After all, bi relationships are just as queer and valid whether they’re between people of the same or different genders. 

One of the confusing parts of exploring sexuality is understanding if you’re attracted to many genders or one. I want to make it clear that the answer doesn’t matter in the sense that all queer identities are equally valid - you don’t get extra brownie points for being gay. Plus, attraction usually isn’t that clear cut, you can have an attraction that falls outside of your usual patterns or it can shift over your lifetime. But for those who do realize that they’re gay, rather than bi, the decision to stay or leave can seem harder. 

We all have to navigate compulsory heterosexuality, but the expectation to marry and have children is undeniably more intense for women. Even if you’re a feminist, it’s hard to escape narratives that settling down into a straight marriage is considered “making it.” Not only is it challenging to internally deconstruct normative social expectations but too many people are more than eager to reprimand you for stepping out of the straight line. 

Exploring your sexuality in a committed partnership 

While it’s becoming more popular for women to wait until they’re older to marry (or abstain completely), many women still get married or commit to a long-term partner in their 20s. Exploring your sexuality in a committed partnership can bring up a lot of hard questions. So it’s not surprising that it can take years, often waiting until kids are more independent, for you to have the freedom to explore your sexual desires. 

 Exploring your sexuality in a committed partnership can bring up a lot of hard questions. So it’s not surprising that it can take years, often waiting until kids are more independent, for you to have the freedom to explore your sexual desires.

Talking to your partner about questioning your sexuality 

Being honest about questioning your sexuality can be difficult. While many husbands and boyfriends are incredibly supportive of their partners, it’s not uncommon for insecurity to get in the way. Men have been socially conditioned to be sexually competitive, which doesn’t mean that all of them hold those attitudes as their own, but can cause some feelings of inadequacy when their partners express confusion, dissatisfaction, or disinterest in sex. It’s a good idea to be slow and compassionate, realizing that both of you will need time to process information and work through any baggage you may have around queerness, gender roles, and sex. 

Our identities can become enmeshed with our partners, so discovering things about ourselves individually can feel uneasy at first. Many women want to tie their sexuality to their long-term partner rather than identifying what genuinely turns them on and feels good. Finding other queer people, especially those going through a similar transition, can be super helpful. Queer friends can provide a listening ear as you explore certain topics that may not feel wise to discuss with your partner just yet. While I encourage transparency, it bears noting that some discoveries can be messy or painful, and hurting your partner’s feelings by disclosing information that feels too spicy isn’t always the best way to proceed with these conversations. 

At first, he was supportive… now not so much 

The unfortunate reality is that many partners are very supportive of your explorations as long as they remain theoretical. You might even find that the initial conversations bring you closer or ignite intimacy. However, there can be a noticeable change when your identity begins to disrupt the secure heterosexual future that your partner was banking on. Some husbands externalize their grievances, discouraging further exploration or even becoming bigoted toward the LGBTQ community. But more commonly, boyfriends start to shut down and disengage from further conversations. It can be hurtful to feel like support is conditional, but it’s important not to personalize these reactions as an indicator that your exploration is wrong —it’s not. More likely, your partner is grieving and needs some time to acclimate to the new relationship. 

Questioning reality - were you ever attracted to him? 

One of the big questions that comes up is whether you were ever attracted to your partner. Whether it’s posed internally or by your partner, there’s no easy answer. It can be tempting to say that you never were if your partner has been cold or mean. But it’s important to place the current conditions aside and ask yourself what you or he seeks to understand from that question. Is denouncing that you were ever attracted a way to legitimize your queerness? Is it a way to get back at a partner that is no longer supporting you the way you need? Is it a way to reassure him that your relationship was legitimate? Or are you (hopefully) trying to better understand how your attraction has shifted over time? Remember that being queer enough doesn’t mean you can never have been confused or happy with a straight person, sexuality doesn’t work like that!  

While it’s possible to have a successful unromantic and non-sexual relationship, not everyone wants that. Sometimes realizing you’re gay comes with the discovery that being married to a man no longer works. But again, there’s not a one-size-fits-all answer. Plus, often the future of a marriage goes beyond just emotional considerations. I’ve spoken to women who focused on raising children, and the decision to leave comes with the added difficulty of re-entering the job market after many years, breaking up the family, and perhaps even messy divorces and/or custody battles. It’s far more helpful if you and your partner can jointly make decisions about the future and amicably part ways (if that’s the best choice), rather than getting gridlocked in conflict. 

What will they think?! Dealing with friends and family 

Regardless of whether you stay or leave your existing mixed-orientation relationship, at some point, other people will find out about your queerness. Reactions can range from pleasant nonchalance or excitement for you to uncomfortable skepticism or outright condemnation. You can’t control how others will think about you, nor is that your job. I recommend using the principle of “letting in” rather than “coming out,” giving people as much information as they make safe to do so. It’s okay if you need to be more guarded about your personal life with certain people, especially during difficult transition periods, just know that others will have your back no matter what. 

Lastly, the quintessential queer experience is finding a place within the community. It’s important to remember that when we talk about “the community,” we aren’t describing a monolith even if we are all connected through sexual orientation and/or gender identity. Some pockets of queer folks are unnecessarily biphobic, and if you’re in a mixed-orientation relationship those are not going to be your people. There are tons of open-minded and accepting queers, and there are some real assholes. Find people who make you feel good about yourself and your relationships (no matter who that’s with) and pay no mind to those who don’t. After all, the entire point of exploring your sexuality was to understand yourself better and it’s important to surround yourself with people who will uplift those discoveries after you’ve put in all that work.  