My husband and I were in the Family for almost 20 years. We have been out since 1990. Most of our kids are grown and on their own. Our youngest was born in the Family but we left when she was a year old so she didn't have the same upbringing, and we were able to do more things for her than the other kids. She is 16 now.
My husband has never talked with anyone regarding our experiences in the Family. We have been married for 32 years now. I have really come to terms with things and have talked with a number of people (pastors, etc) about our past which has really helped the healing. But my husband has not and has always had problems with forming friendships, etc, because he did not want to get close enough to people for them to ask questions about our past. To him, it is something we just don't talk about. He is very hurt and disappointed and embarrassed by it.
About 2 years ago, he told me he wanted a separation. He said he had issues that he needed to resolve. He said he believes he is gay and has been all these years. He said that he did fall in love with me while he was in the Family, but he also did have relationships with men many times over the years, which I was unaware of. While he was in the Family, he felt purpose in his life and with raising his children, and the feelings of being gay were not as strong (although he did find ways to still meet men and have sex with them), so he was happily married. He says. But once we left and he felt his life had no purpose anymore, and the children were older and he did not feel needed, these feelings became overwhelming to him, and he said he could no longer go on pretending to be "a family man" when he believes he is gay and always has been. He thought about suicide and he thought about just leaving and never contacting us again, but his dad did that, and he did not want to do that to his children. So I agreed to a separation, because he told me that he wanted to go for counseling and perhaps find a church to go to, etc, and find out exactly what he wanted to do with his life.
That was 2 years ago. Six months after he left, he told me that being gay was his choice, and he had never been able to make his own decisions regarding his life, so he was making this one and was choosing to be gay. He has refused to discuss anything personal with me ever since that point. We discuss bills, kids, house repairs, jobs, etc, but nothing personal. I don't think he has one serious person in his life, but again, he won't talk about it. I do know that he does have friends now, and he has met them all through going to gay bars or online gay sites. I do see he subscribes to a dating website (it comes out of our mutual checking account), and of course, that always makes me feel bad. Anyhow, all that to say that I don't think we will probably ever be together as husband and wife again, except by a miracle of God, but we are also not divorced, and he is not asking for a divorce as of yet. If I knew that he was absolutely going to change and that I could trust him to not be unfaithful behind my back, I would certainly take him back because after 32 years, I still do love him. We speak every day on the phone and see each other every week, even if only for an hour or two. But the reality is that we will probably end up divorced. The only reason I have not done so is that he has not been well and I am the one with the health insurance, and even though everyone says "so what", I can not bring myself to be that mean.
Back to my 16 year old. All of my children are angry towards their dad for leaving. But as one of my daughter's says, "Mom, he really left years ago. After we left the Family, even though dad was at home, he didn't have any input into our lives anymore, and he was never there for us. He just let us do whatever we wanted, and he wasn't a father to us anymore." And I know that is true except for the youngest. She is having a very hard time even two years later. Every once in a while, she just comes in my room in the middle of the night and gets in bed and is sobbing and crying because her dad left. It happened again last week, and the next day she emailed me all the results of research done on kids whose fathers abandoned them in the 1940s and 1950s. It was heart breaking.
But last week something new happened. She didn't grow up in the Family and really didn't ever ask any questions about it. But last week along with all of this, one night she just was sobbing and left the house. She started text-messaging me and
saying that I had hidden things from her about the Family, and that probably her father wasn't her real father anyhow (which is not true, he is her real father), and how could I lie to her all these years, and she knows what kind of stuff I did in the Family, and she is really disgusted by us, etc, etc. It went on for about 2 hours. It was very devastating. Everything I texted back, she just said, I don't believe anything you say, you lied to me. I have never lied to her, I just have never talked with her about it because she never seemed interested. But it seems that someone has been talking to her or she may have found some of the ex-Family sites.
Anyhow, I just don't know what to do with her. I don't know how to help her stop hurting from her dad's leaving. She will not talk to anyone because she says it's no one's business besides our family. And I know I can never make her understand our past with the Family. At this point, I am very open to any suggestions.
I know this was long, and I apologize. Thank you so much for your time.