OurVoices with Kristin Kalbli

Methodist pastor Carter Cortelyou and his ex-wife Peggy Garrigues, who works at a Unitarian Universalist church, talk about their marriage, divorce, and Peggy's sexuality. Peggy came out as lesbian two decades into their marriage. Carter and Peggy share how they navigated disclosure and remaining quiet about Peggy's orientation because of her ministry in the Methodist Church. They discuss the impa...

Writer and performer Julie Feinstein Adams shares her experience navigating both her husband's sexuality and their gender transition from male to female. She shares how, in a spirit of acceptance and goodwill, she tried to roll with the news that her spouse was bisexual (and wanted to open their marriage), and transgender, until she could no longer stay married. She did her best to be supportive d...

The first episode of a three-part series featuring non-trans spouses of trans women. Today, Lauren Rowello discusses her experience of her husband's transition to her wife, working through her initial sense of betrayal, how she navigated the uncertainty around staying versus leaving the marriage in an environment that offers little support for the partners of trans people. She also shares frankly...

Today, the author of The Gaslight Effect , Dr. Robin Stern, discusses gaslighting, what it is, how it works, why it's used as an emotional manipulation tactic, and what its effects are on the target. She illuminates what happens when your sense of reality and sanity are undermined. When an LGBT partner is grappling with their sexuality or gender identity, they may gaslight their straight or non-tr...

In 2014, Gwyneth Paltrow took a lot of heat when she referred to her divorce from Chris Martin as a "Conscious Uncoupling." Today on the show, therapist and straight spouse Janet Jones walks us through the steps of how to consciously uncouple ourselves, energetically, emotionally and psychologically, from an ex-spouse, even years after a divorce is final. Today is an invitation to complete the wor...

Dr. Joseph Ibrahim was the Trauma Director at an Orlando hospital during the Pulse Nightclub shooting when 49 LGBT people were murdered, and over 50 injured. After 40 hours straight in the OR, he came home and told his wife, "I don't know why anyone would want to harm these people, they aren't hurting anyone." A month later, he learned his wife was having an affair with a woman. He shares what it...

Today, guest Shelly Johnson shares her story of coming out as a lesbian at age 43. Growing up in a deeply Mormon family, Shelly believed her role as a woman was to get married, have lots of kids, and take care of her family. When that guaranteed formula for happiness failed her, she began to question what she was taught. After she realized that "God doesn't hate gay people," which is what she had...

Today on the show, psychology and gender studies professor Dr. Lisa Diamond shares her research into sexual fluidity and same sex attraction. She has studied how same sex attraction, primarily in women, ebbs and flows over the course of women's lives, and how that attraction influences sexual identity. We learn what sexual fluidity is, what it isn't, and why sexual identity (and the sexual attract...

Today on the show, SSN's own Tiffany Butler discusses how the friends and family of straight spouses can support them post discovery and disclosure. She discusses what to say, what not to say, and how to hold space for a loved one who has discovered their partner is LGBT. She clears up myths and assumptions people make about straight spouses (no, they do not always know), and she gives us explanat...

Have you ever been told to just "get over it already?" Today on the show, grief counselor and thanatologist Claudia Coenen talks to us about complex grief (grief that is clouded by ambiguous circumstances and takes longer to resolve) and disenfranchised grief (when our grief is publicly minimized or de-legitimized). Straight spouses often experience disenfranchised grief when there is pressure to...

Today on the show, marriage and sex therapist Dr. Joe Kort discusses whether or not straight men can want gay sex, a controversial position among straight spouses. When a wife discovers her husband's gay porn, explicit chats with other men, of evidence of infidelity, she rightfully asks if her husband is actually straight. We dive into the nuances of straight men who, for myriad reasons, might see...

Today on the show, expert and researcher Dr. Amy Baker discusses parental alienation, what it is, what it isn't, who it affects, and how it affects them. She lists some of the 17 behaviors that taken together constitute parental alienation so we can identify it early. She gives us tips and strategies for parenting children who show signs of alienation, and for handling the emotional fallout from t...

In today's episode, guest Jeannie Burnett talks about realizing her husband of 25 years is asexual. For years Jeannie tried to find answers to her sexless marriage. Sex was "mechanical and cold," she says. "I tried to fix myself all those years, and nothing worked." After an emotional breakdown and the reckoning that it had been 10 years since she and her husband had last been intimate, Jeannie re...

Guest Emma Bryn's childhood was overshadowed by her father's gender transition. By age 12, she had developed a severe eating disorder to cope. "For me, it was like my father had died," she says. To acknowledge that loss would cast a negative shadow over her father's transition, so her grief wasn't permitted. "What was expected of me was absolute, 100% compliance. I couldn't show any negative emoti...

Today on the show, Executive Director of the Straight Spouse Network Kelly Holliman walks us through strategies and tips for getting through the upcoming holidays post discovery or disclosure that a spouse is LGBT. We talk about creating space for yourself when you need it, establishing new traditions with the kids, and yes, canceling Christmas. Because sometimes, you just can't even!   Kelly also...

In today's episode, Kristin Levine shares her own story of becoming a straight spouse, and how that experience inspired the events in her YA novel, The Jigsaw Jungle, in which a twelve year old girl named Claudia is left clues by her father in a series of jigsaw puzzles as to why he abruptly left the family. Claudia slowly discovers that her father is gay in an intriguing and sometimes maddening p...

In today's episode, Kelly talks about the rise and fall of her marriage to a closeted gay man, being used as what she calls his "ambulatory homophobia meat-shield," and sitting in her office on their first anniversary crying because her husband would not have sex with her. "I remember thinking, this isn't how this is supposed to be." She lays out, in stark detail, the psychological warfare, gaslig...

Michelle shares her story of growing up with two closeted parents, how the family secrets impacted her sense of reality growing up, how she learned manipulation from watching her parents lie and hide to coverup, and how she grew up attracted to closeted men and men who were unable to connect with her emotionally. Learning the truth at age 51 finally gave her access to her own agency and enabled he...

Dan Cartlidge tells the story of his two marriages, both to gay women. As his first wife pursued sexual relationships with women, he shares the toll her lack of desire for him took on his psyche, to the point that he was willing to sacrifice anything, including his sex life, in order to save his marriage. "You just get beaten down slowly, slowly, slowly. Your psyche just gets chipped away. I was h...

Today on the show, author William Dameron discusses his book, The Lie , in which he gives an unflinching and self-aware account of the impact his closet had on his wife and family. He shares how his lying to hide his sexuality affected his wife: "I could see what my gaslighting was doing to her, it was making her question her value and her beauty. That's why it was so important when I realized the...

In today's special episode, Josh and Lolly Weed talk about how they entered into a Mixed Orientation Marriage thinking their eyes were wide open, thinking they were living in accordance with their faith. They share what happened when they decided to reveal to their community that Josh is a gay man, how their story went viral and was used by religious communities to shame other lesbian and gay peop...

Today's episode is the first in a two-part series on mixed orientation marriage and same sex attraction in the LDS church. Guest Sarah Nicholson shares how her husband's disclosure that he was a gay man may have led to the end of their marriage, but it was actions taken by the LDS church leaders that rocked her faith and led to the end of Sarah's participation in the church. Here's what Sarah real...

SSN contact and group leader Candice Fleszar Smith talks to us about what happens when people call SSN for support. She supports straight spouses in finding their own way through the post-disclosure/discovery maze, whether they choose separation, divorce, or to stay in a mixed orientation marriage. Candice also supports LGBT people seeking to come out to their spouses. She emphasizes that how the...

What's the "right" way to respond when your spouse comes out as transgender? Cis-Spouses often hear plenty of opinions on the matter, especially from people who have not experienced the gender transition of a partner. Family members may pressure the cis-spouse to divorce their transgender spouse and cut ties, even if the cis-spouse wants to maintain the relationship. Conversely, the cis-spouse may...

On today's episode, Dr. David Malebranche returns to discuss the differences between identifying as gay and identifying as MSM, or "men who have sex with men," and what those identities mean from a research and medical perspective. Is it just a semantics? Is there more to it? We talk about when behavior and identity does not seem to align, the straight spouse is often left confused and desperate f...