I lOVE your website! My heart goes out to the women who are struggling with families and their attractions to women, and to the one who found out she had cancer. I hope everyone finds health and happiness, and for sure it is an amazing journey of growth. My coming out age was 51. Just a few months after my 51st birthday, to be precise. So when I read these compelling and heartfelt stories by women in their 30s I ask myself, "old? these gals are still young, vibrant, let's say pre-menopausal, like my daughters! I will write the crone's story here. :-)" 1. In the 50s when I grew up, I had the impression that gay people were miserable folks who just went through life with their heads down, wishing they had been born straight. "Gay" and "Lesbian" were not words that were spoken, only innuendo was allowed.... as in "she is like that!"..... sort of like the word cancer was rarely spoken, only whispered. I had talent as an artist and loved just looking at things. All through junior high and high school, I thought I was examining the beauty of the other girls around me for two reasons, 1) because I was an artist and 2) because I was jealous and yearned to be so beautiful that the boys would l ask me out too. I had crushes on girls and copied their mannerisms and dress. Once at the pool a friend pretended she was drowning and I held her up, and noticed what that felt like. 2. I did well in college, messed around with boys, was anxious to have sex as I had a strong libido, but didn't like it when I did. In fact, I felt I had "trangressed the lord" and would never be allowed in heaven. This was a sorrow that stayed by my side, a discomfort with life that led to suicidal thoughts; I put my passion into my art. 3. Guess where I spent the 60s ! In the Haight Ashbury! Married to a good friend, I became discouraged ' as there was little emotional connection. I thought, for about 2 weeks, that maybe women would be better. But where to find them? (duh!) So I gave up. If you don't know you are gay by the time you are eight, I told myself, you aren't. 4.We moved to NY, though I told him I would be glad to go alone. Our first child was born nine months after I left him; I let myself be talked into moving back with him. The second child came soon after. I was 34 with my first, 36 with my second. Here comes my first strong experience -- when several of us young mothers took a CPR class and I had to drag my partner to safety, my whole body heated up! Her softness and delicacy overcame me. All I could think of was, "Wow! Her husband gets to experience THAT!" Life seemed so unfair! And once, at a workshop, I saw two women holding hands and practically walked into a tree just gazing at them, trying to comprehend. 5. After 25 years of marriage, when that first daughter had her driver's permit, I convinced my husband to move back west where he would be happy. I had two jobs and my parents loved helping their only grandchildren. I took a chemistry class in order to upgrade my skills -- I had gone into physical therapy with a two year degree -- and I studied with a young girl, a year older than my daughter. Hopeless. I hadn't the math skills. I dropped the class. I invited her to join us in some holiday events, it was 1990 -- and to meet my girls. Nope. After I quit c hemistry, she kept calling ME. We were on the phone for two hours at a time. I was neglecting my homemaking duties and my ears ached. I felt sorry for her, maybe her mother was mean or something and she needed a nice older friend. 6. One day on a walk I lay down in the grass and felt something missing. I realized I wanted her to lie down beside me. I was so shocked I couldn't speak to her, only very formally. What to do? This was horrible! I got books on sexuality out of the library. My daughters were enthusiastic about them! I read that many older women, after their marriages have ended, find love with other women. But one so young? At the time I was not able to imagine myself exploring the lesbian community, I only knew that this person was opening doors for me that I had no idea existed. 7. So she moved in 18 years ago this month. It has been kind of a circus. She has been unusually mature, or I would not have been happy with her. We had many great times. However, the age difference has taken its toll, and the monogamy also. I felt I had missed a lot in the past. We grew apart. She got heavy. She had a temper. I shut down. She had an affair, and insisted that I go online to find a friend also. This ended up in my having an affair. Well! A woman in my generation, who knew how to please a woman, that was all I needed to break out of my shell. My therapist says I have finally come out. She, a lesbian herself, says there are stages to it, and I didn't get it those years ago. Who knew? 8. It has been almost 2 years now that I have been out in the lesbian world meeting women for friendship and enjoying growing, finally, into my own lesbian power. I am much more in favor with women than I ever was with men. I have not found a lover ... I had to deal with breast cancer last year ... and I am just recently over the woman I had the wonderful affair with. So, as many of you said in your essays, I am looking with great delight and a nod to the Universe and the Law of Attraction, along with Buddhist Meditation and Byron Katie, at a fun future to add to my enjoyable present. My ex and I have stayed together as friends (we say we are in a committed non-monogamous platonic relationship), and I am looking for a lover who has her own place, likes her solitude and would LOVE to travel and sleep and hike and do concerts and poetry readings, etc. with me! I am planning to go to the Womyns' Michigan Music Festival in August, and a rafting trip with women in September. Now that I am 70, at last, I am out!