ExDH came out as gay

You really don’t know what you’re talking about and clearly haven’t read many of the posts on here about people who have discovered their sexuality later in life. If it was all a lie why stay as long as he did?

Who’s having an affair? Have you posted on the right thread?

He WAS. Said woman is now sadly deceased. Hence the reference to being widowed. Hope that helps.

I misread that

Who's having an affair???
OP's ExH is divorced and the man he is with is widowed...

You said the man he’s dating is married to a woman?

If I misread that please ignore my post. I’d be much more upset about him dating someone who is married than the gender of who he is dating.

@Riva5784 because there is something wrong with marrying a woman if you know you're gay

I didn’t read this post before writing my own. Very very similar experience. I completely agree with you when you say sexuality is a spectrum.

I was just about to say the same thing!

Who is having an affair with a married man?? His new partner is a widower.

There is nothing wrong with being gay, but better not to mention it. Really?

OP, I have a tiny amount of experience of this from the other point of view.

I have a gay friend who was once married to a woman (c1980). He said he battened down his gay feelings out of shame, assumed that they were something he'd grow out of ('it's just a phase' was a common term at the time) and in any case he didn't fit a single gay stereotype. Do I think he deliberately lied to her? No, because he was unconsciously lying to himself. Did he feel shame and embarrassment about the whole situation? I didn't ask but from his tone and demeanour, yes he did.

As PP have said, this is going to be tricky for you to navigate, perhaps tricker for you than for your DC. I can 100% see why you'd feel lied to, even though I think he wasn't lying - at least, not on purpose.

It sounds as though he is handling this well, by telling you as kindly as he could and trying to work out the best way of letting the DC know. It sounds as though you and he have a remarkably good relationship for a pair of exes and maintaining that will be helpful to both of you and to your DC.

@Pamcakey great post and hopefully will help OP. I do also know people who are happily “straight” and then meet someone of the same sex and fall in love having truly never felt same sex attraction before. However I think it’s a lot more likely that OP’s ex did know or at least suspect he was gay a lot earlier and made the decision to be with her or stay with her while knowing this.

I understand why you feel betrayed but this isn’t something personal against you. It sounds like he still respects you very much.

If I explain my situation. I was with a man for 8 years. We broke up and I realised I was gay. I loved him and we had lovely times together. In no way did my sexuality detract from our relationship, I was never pretending. I loved him. However, I have since realised that it isn’t the same for me with men because I hadn’t explored that side properly before.

I still have great memories of my previous relationship and respect him very much. I never lied to him. Sexuality is complicated, it isn’t just a case of being gay or straight. It can be fluid and sometimes it actually does depend on who you meet in life.

You have every right to feel the way you do. In time hopefully you can see he wasn’t lying or being deceitful but has been able to discover himself after the marriage ended. Try and be happy for him. It is very hard coming to terms with your sexuality for lots of people.

Appalling post. “Do they need to know”? Don’t you think enough trouble has been caused already?

It's also a really horrible feeling when an ex moves on and finds happiness with a new partner when we haven't yet ourselves

I also think that he should focus less on identifying as gay when speaking to the kids and more on being in love with a man. Not because there is anything wrong with being gay, but because the general discourse now is that we are born with our sexuality, and they might feel (like you do) like he was deceiving them.

I’m not sure I’d put someone who is having an affair with a married person in the “decent man” category.

I agree with this

Agree with this. Not sure why so many people are brushing aside the ops feelings. There is no way that this man never once thought he might be gay when they were together so he is a liar.

I'm bisexual and it's so badly misunderstood. The comments on this thread are why a lot of people don't come to terms with big parts of their sexual orientation. There is still a lot of shaming in society for anything not heterosexual.

It's perfectly possible that he hasn't lied and that he didn't know. There is a big difference between gay men who knew as teenagers and have lived their lives surrounded by other gay men and men who haven't had the opportunity for that part of themself to be awakened. Your feelings are valid but they might not be fully based in reality.

You married quite young.

He very likely realised later in life that in fact he was really attracted to men. That does not mean he lied to you or was not committed to you and then your family before that. People coming out later in life, maybe after meeting someone and finally realising and accepting the truth about their sexuality, is not uncommon.

He sounds like a decent guy in the way he is approaching joint parenting and the situation.

Ultimately, you have been divorced for 4 years and you are both free to have relationships with other people.

I am sure you accept that him finding a new partner would happen sooner or later?

In this case his new partner happens to be a man.

You also need to teach your kids that not being straight is nothing to be ashamed about rather than making a big deal of it.

Obviously very different circumstances as we didn’t have children and were younger but I’ve had a partner tell me post break up that he was gay, it was just very hard to deal with at the time.

Not because I’m homophobic but because I’m a woman, and I had to come to terms with the idea that he could never have truly felt about me the way I’d felt about him, and yes as a PP said the fact that the relationship had been “doomed” from the start without me having that insider info (which he had had, even if not willing to admit it outwardly).

It’s noticeable to me how many of the replies are about the children coping and the ex’s experience etc but very few about the OP’s feelings except to say she’ll feel “shocked”. I’m not the OP obviously but I think she’s likely to have a LOT of feelings to work through after spending nearly her entire adult life in a marriage which wasn’t what she thought it was. And the added complication I think is that she’ll want to support her ex in what may be a tricky period (coming out to friends and family and growing to be more at ease with his sexuality) and even more so the kids, the pressure will be on to put her feelings on the back burner. There are so many films and TV programmes that feature men coming out as gay and the female ex/partner being super supportive and kind (which is great but it’s definitely a thing) and I can think of none where a woman comes out as gay and her partner or husband or ex jumps to being completely fine with it instantly and is her biggest cheerleader. I sometimes wonder whether that’s because women are supposed to just put any uncomfortable feelings to one side if someone else needs their support.

This has turned into a long post but I just want to say to the OP it’s great that you are so supportive of him and the kids but you’ll probably need to take some time to just be at home with your own feelings, perhaps think of questions you have about the past and your marriage and you and your ex sit down and chat them through when the kids aren’t there. He does owe you some time and I think you may feel a lot better if you get this chance. Just gliding on through because “good for him finally coming out!” might mean you’re burying unhappiness or resentment or loss of confidence for yourself later.

If she didn't feel the need to get a STD test when they first split then there surely isn't a need to now? Does every heterosexual couple go off and get STD tests when they split having fallen out of love, each saying they didn't cheat? Really?