Feeling Gay All Day...What Happens When You Finally Mirror Yourself

Samantha Fox: Hi, Trish. Hi. I was wondering how gay you were feeling today. ⁓

Trish: Hello!

Samantha Fox: Thank you for spending this time with me on Unbox Yourself with Samantha Fox. this episode resonated with you, share it with someone who needs to hear it. Don't to like, subscribe, and leave a review. It helps more folks find these conversations. If you're ready to unbox from something that's keeping you stuck, I would love to support you. You can find the application to the show at unboxyoursexuality.com. ⁓ Let's connected. ⁓ Find on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube at lesbiancuriositycoach.

Trish: I am feeling so gay today. interesting part is I'm feeling gay pretty much every day now. And that is such a huge change for me. And wanted share that with you and ask you a few questions about it and also ⁓ share it others for what it's what I've learned.

Samantha Fox: From day one, we are told who we should be, how to live, and what's acceptable. Before we even have a chance to discover ourselves, our society has already drawn those lines for us. But what happens when those lines are keeping us from knowing and embracing who we truly are? Welcome to Unbox Yourself with Samantha Fox, a podcast about unpacking and unlearning everything that's kept you from living as your true self. honest conversations about your internal emotional landscape, Give me a follow and join the conversation. Remember, we only have this one time through. Why not unbox yourself and let your true self shine in all its beautiful glory?

Trish: because it's something that I know when I was working through with the cohort that I was in, it was echoed as a sentiment that often, we would feel not gay we would want to get together. So we could feel gay. And I really noticed for me that feeling gay was connected to being with other.

Samantha Fox: sexuality, coming out later in life, relationships, and the journey to self-acceptance, we break free from the boxes we never chose.

Trish: lesbians being my girlfriend really gay. I felt gay day when I was with my girlfriend, but my family is long distance from where my girlfriend lived. so when I would be staying with her, I feel gay all day in association with her. But then I would go home for 10 days to my children, my parents, and I would just be put right back in that world ⁓ of. heteronormative Trish, you know, and I would not feel gay. And so then I couldn't wait to get back to my girlfriend so I could feel the alignment with being gay again. And this also happened like with friends from your cohort that I met, where I could feel really gay when I on the call with them. And if

Samantha Fox: Mm-hmm.

Trish: two weeks would kind of go by without a call, I would just be wanting so badly for that call to come so that I could feel the gayness in me again. Because again, I only was feeling it in relation to other queer people or when I was in the company of other queer people. so I remember other friends in the group echoing that comment and

Samantha Fox: Yeah.

Trish: For a long time I wondered when will I finally feel gay all day? And I'm here to say that four and a half years later, I feel gay all day. And when I told you that, you said to me, you feel gay all day, even in your sleep. So I still have, you know, another level to attain before I feel gay in my sleep, I think, but I can I can really feel it coming. And so it made me think about what the changes that have happened in the last four and a half years? And especially I feel like it's the last two years or or even last six to eight months where ⁓ I am feeling gay all day. So I have been single for two and a half years now. you know, pretty much without local community. And what's changed is I went on my big gay adventure. claimed my gayness on that adventure. I practiced telling people I'm gay right away. And I also met so many queer that I was so proud to know. thought were amazing. And I think through having actual experience that I didn't have for 50 years, because I did not have any real queer people in my circle of relationships I knew to have as a role or for representation. again, I was bringing this model that I had in my brain about what it is to be a gay person that I got as a kid that was handed to me from patriarchy and heteronormativity and didn't have good connotations with it. And had internalized this. another, know, aside the big gay adventure, aside from just sitting with myself and learning to find ways to integrate ⁓ my without being in partnership with another woman. and doing the unbox your queer phobic conditioning course that you offer. Those things really, helped me to let go of ⁓ my internalized homophobia. once I did I that I loved myself more, I accepted myself more. I feel like that's a key piece for me in my experience to feeling gay all day. It isn't ⁓ need to be with a girlfriend or in partnership to be a lesbian. It's that I need to integrate within myself. ⁓ And like,

Samantha Fox: Yes. Yeah.

Trish: it as the sacred piece that ⁓ is so that I can go wow this is Super meaningful and important of myself that I cherish rather than ⁓ old way thinking you know for 40 years that this is a part of myself that I don't want to to incorporate I don't want people to see and, and if they do see it, they won't like me, you know? So yeah. it, and it's, it's also speaks that. There was a podcast you did a while back ⁓ that coming is not about being with a woman. It's about being with and knowing ourselves. And you could have never told me that.

Samantha Fox: Yes.

Trish: when I first came to work with you because I totally felt like I was working with you so I could be with a woman. And I really missed the piece about I'm working with you so I can know myself better. And finally, four and a half years later, I'm getting that now. So just wanting to put that out there for any people listening who

Samantha Fox: Yes.

Trish: are really focusing on that piece wanting to, like, I'm coming out because I want to be with a woman, I think doesn't do yourself justice. I really welcome people to think I'm coming out so that I can be fully myself. And once I'm myself, if a woman shows up, great. But... As far as doing the internal work, can't skip over the part of knowing and learning about yourself, or you'll just end up always searching for people to fill that void and relationships that you're not filling for yourself by incorporating it within yourself. ⁓

Samantha Fox: Yeah, yeah, I love everything you're saying. And four and a half years is really quite, I think, expeditious in terms of coming to this place. everybody's ideas in the beginning, they have this later in life, awakening, it's like, I have this desire for a woman, or for women general. And because it's later in life, kind of like, I want to make this happen. You know, like, this is part of my growth. And my journey is being able be in relationship with a woman. a lot of women like, what if I'm wrong, right? Like I attracted. I even feel attracted to this woman, but I haven't had sex with her. What if I'm wrong? I really think this is all part of the journey. And we all have different ways of, you know, waking up to this ⁓ realization and then different people through it in different ways. And you know, some people are like, I don't want a relationship. I don't want to be in a relationship with a woman. I just want to really spend time with myself and figure this out. I mean, I have heard that from some people too. They're tired of being in a relationship. They've been in a relationship for three decades. That's the last thing they want is to be in a relationship. But in terms of it making you ⁓ I think that's about is this kind of like mirroring piece, which like, I've lived a heteronormative life. you know, that is the norm, that is what most of society is doing. And I know I am attracted to women and I know I'm coming into my identity, but I'm living this heteronormative life that I've been living for such a long time. But if I'm around other people who are also coming into this identity, in those moments, we're not doing heteronormativity. We're all mirroring our gayness to one another. And that feels so good. And now I feel really gay. and this feels so fantastic. And now I have to go off of the zoom call and go back to my heteronormative life. And everyone around me is mirroring heteronormativity to me. And also I have some shame in hiding because of my sexuality, and I haven't integrated it fully into myself. And so

Trish: Yeah. you

Samantha Fox: I don't feel gay. And I agree with you that it really is that that work where you become your own mirror. Right. So. Yeah, like like you don't need all people because you now just mirror your own gayness without those people, you know, but that but it's but if you think about.

Trish: ⁓ yes!

Samantha Fox: how we develop as younger people, this is parallel to that, right? Like when we grew up in these families, we look outside for people to mirror back to us who we are, right? That's how we learned who we are is by other people. So it makes sense as a baby gay, as somebody just coming into themselves, we're looking to the outside world to see What are they mirroring back to us? And of course, straight people are gonna be mirroring gayness back to us. They might be mirroring fear or they don't really wanna bring it up or they don't know how to talk about it. But then when we're with our gay people, they mirror that back. And then just like in life, ⁓ eventually, hopefully have done enough work where we are able to be there to mirror ourselves I mean, it's nice to be seen. That's a very human desire is being seen by friends, by loved ones, but not in this way of your identity. Like you do get to this point where you're like, yup, I'm gay 24 hours a day. Like my bones are gay, my cells are gay, you know? yeah, I love that. I love that that's where are.

Trish: Okay. Yeah, I think it really hit the nail on the head. with me that you mirror to your... How did you say that? You mirror yourself or you a mirror. Yeah. ⁓ Yes, what's happened. And I can pick certain things that have happened in the last six months where I'm so proud of what I did to

Samantha Fox: your own mirror. You are your own mirror.

Trish: be my own mirror a hetero environment. you know, getting brave enough to talk about gay queer things with my parents and my kids. Like in the beginning, first couple of years, I didn't want to bring up gay stuff with them that I was thinking about or learning. or seeing in the news because it felt like it would be disruptive because, you know, I done this thing that had, you know, shocked them in the case of my parents and caused them to question how they raised me. Like, where did they go wrong and how did they not see this? And with my kids, it was, you know, they had to grieve future that they thought they had in our family. with my husband and I and then make space for a new future that was uncertain. And that was really hard for them. I felt like I didn't ever wanna bring up that stuff early on because it was just a reminder that their whole world had changed in a way, or part their world had changed. But in the last, year or more I've experimented with dropping parts of things that I'm thinking, friends that I'm meeting, experiences that I'm having, and they are being really receptive about it, even to the point where we start joking about it. like, even daughter-in-law the other day, she was making a joke about my son being a boob guy, and she to tell a story about that, and she goes, I think I want tell this story because maybe you're a boop girl. know, I you guys might have something in common here. And, my God, my heart just like expanded 10 sizes when, you know, it was just a joke like she had ⁓ made would be equivalent to any other joke we laughed at, a joke without weight, you know, a joke without heaviness. It felt light and right, and I just was beaming inside. And another thing that was,

Samantha Fox: Yeah.

Trish: In 2024, I had a high school reunion that I chose not to go to. It was, I think, yeah, our 40th reunion. And even though there's a number of friends who, like, I don't know well now, but I was good friends with in high school who I wanted to catch up with. I chose not to go because I just did not want, like, I knew that liked women in high school, but I also thought it was terrible, so I shoved that down, right? And so in 2024, it felt really hard for me to think about going to that reunion and saying who I was. Like I was still carrying the shame that I didn't come out then, that I couldn't feel like, I never felt I could be who I needed to be in high school. And now as an adult, I would feel shame that I didn't.

Samantha Fox: Yes.

Trish: didn't claim that. And also, you know, yeah, it's just, it like a hard story to tell. And the last thing I wanted to do was meet a whole bunch of people and say over and over, yeah, by the way, I'm divorced. And then, you know, tell why I was divorced, because I want to say why I'm divorced, because it's ⁓ part of story. And I want to know me and If I just say I'm divorced and don't say more, they just assume that I'm still hetero and I don't want to be assumed still hetero anymore. So I just chose to avoid it completely and I felt a little... felt like I wasn't being brave in a way. However, it was the right choice for me and I'm happy that I didn't do that. Fast forward, just this summer, of the people from my high school class started a website for a this summer when we all turned 60. And I at time to say to ⁓ that I would like come and he is building this website and everybody was supposed to make their profiles and put them on the website to kind of generate excitement. I decided in my profile to actually just say at the very end, you know, this is what I've been doing for the last 40 years. ⁓ And the last few years, I've come into myself and ⁓ ⁓ happy. think I just I forget what the exact line was, but I put a little pride flag at the end and said that that was one of my big accomplishments of the last 40 years. finally come into myself wow, I pressed post and I have to tell 50 people that I'm gay divorced ⁓ because I put out there. But the Trish of the last four years wouldn't have been able to do that. It just feels amazing to be able to be comfortable claiming it in that way. And I think it's because I finally ⁓ mirroring myself, proud of myself, and I really do believe that who I'm being is special important, opposed to the old way of thinking it was bad and terrible.

Samantha Fox: you've ⁓ done a job of really unpacking. I I want remind you, last year, I want to say it was in August we recorded Trisha's Big Gay Adventure, part one and part two. Because the travel was in July, right? Yeah, so I think we might have recorded in August and that you had come back, I believe,

Trish: Yep.

Samantha Fox: You had come back from that trip with a gift for your grandsons this book that had some gay theme to it, but you were really nervous about bringing that subject up to your daughter. That's less than a year ago. And you were struggling. You were really struggling with that. And today like in a completely space.

Trish: Yeah. Yep. Yes, so true. it's because like in that podcast, you encouraged me to have that conversation with her because again, Trish wasn't wanting to disrupt things. Trish wasn't wanting to bring more pain you know, difficult But when I did it, she was about it and said, yes, I want you to bring that part of you in. I want the kids to experience that. Wow, that's really true. That was a piece I was hanging on to for sure. And my kids and my family life, I feel like I've really opened up there too. And now they can mirror it back to me too, right? Like with what my daughter in law did, she was mirroring my gay self back to me when she talked to me about whether I'm so food woman. yeah, I'm so excited about it and I'm also

Samantha Fox: Yeah, and it's not long ago.

Trish: really interested about the piece if you have any comments on like Why do you think? We get stuck in thinking it's just about being with a woman. Is that because? We are stuck kind of in those adolescent times of the first time we sort of maybe felt awakening We our eye was at that age of being an adolescent and then you just make it all about that thing at that age where you were stuck rather than continuing to grow with it.

Samantha Fox: Yeah, I think it's on a lot of different levels. mean, I think first of all, there ⁓ a lot of around being single and so and divorce. So, whether you were married or and then suddenly you're not. there's already stigma around that. For people who go through life as single people, there's stigma around being single. So I think we have this way thinking about ourselves as and worthy in society if we're in a partnership. And then we even get more stickers and points and bells ringing when we get married, even if it's same-sex marriage. we still fit into that, we're still fitting into heteronormativity we do those things and we're getting those privileges. So I think there are so many layers to why we feel like we need to, we want to, we should, ⁓ have to be in relationship with somebody, in this case with a woman. Then I think there's also just the, you know, the... the actual desire, which it's certainly possible that a lot of women have never ever even felt. They've never felt desire, but they have been desired that was all they knew. that, so they thought that that was what, okay, this is what it is, but suddenly their desire is unleashed. And so, ⁓ you I mean, going to say most women that I talk to are demisexual. which means that they want to have some kind of connection with somebody. They just don't want to go out and start having sex with random people all over the place. So then you think, okay, well, I need to start dating somebody and I need to find a relationship so I can my desire, ⁓ you know, that I'm really feeling. So they up in a relationship. You know, also a lot of women come into their sexuality later because

Trish: Thank you.

Samantha Fox: because they've met somebody that's awakened. So there's already somebody there, that's what happened to me. So there was no question of or not I was gonna be in the relationship with this person, it just happened. And that's what blew up my whole life. In hindsight, I wish I had had the foresight to ⁓ not have that. I wish that it woke me up and that I would have said, Hey, I have a lot happening here. I have a lot of work to do. Thank you so much for being my catalyst. This has been amazing. But I think you should keep going on your path and find somebody for you and let me sift through the ruins here. I wish I could see that in hindsight. But I just think, you know, it's like this woman loving woman energy. this igniting fire that happens between women. Like they just end up in relationship very quickly. It moves very fast. They're moving in together quickly. They're getting married quickly before they know each other. So anyway, I just think there's so many reasons. There's so much energy push, just like compulsory heterosexuality is like pushing us to be straight. I think there's so much energy pushing us. to be in relationship. mean, even here where I am now, I've got a new community of lesbian friends. A lot of them are partnered or married. Very few are single, but they're always asking me, so are you dating? you, right? It's like, this is the thing. This is what people want. This is what people talk about. So I just think it's, you know, part of it is just societal norms.

Trish: I just want to reflect back like that, like I for me that if I would have met a woman in that frame of between like 30 and 50 when I came out, there was so much energy there. There's no way I would have been able to stop that train. So I am sitting with the power knowing what that energy is and how compulsive it is or how it's magnetic and really, hard to deny while also offering that I feel I had a much gentler experience as much as I wish is sometimes my dreams that I could have had an experience sooner. you know, I'm really honoring that I was given a gift of not meeting somebody that was a catalyst in that way so that I could do it in a cleaner, more step by step rather than having a whole bunch of things come together at once and really complicate the part of you saying who you are, right? Because then it's not just saying, I think I'm gay. It's saying, I think I'm gay and I you know, have feelings for another woman and this might mean we need to get divorced and, and, and, you know, like, I really advocate if it's at all possible for people in my experience that keeping it clean and, and trusting, if you have this feeling that you are attracted to women, it's Like you said in one of your other posts too, we feel hungry, we don't say, I'm not sure, is that true? ⁓ we feel mad. I'm not sure if I should feel mad. When we feel sexual attraction, it's and it's true. yeah, that's something that I'm really in hindsight for the way it played out for me.

Samantha Fox: Mm-hmm.

Trish: we know just as we kind of wrap up, it's understanding you are as a person aside from that really tantalizing physical connection part with another person is as or even in my more valuable long-term for your health, wellness and

Samantha Fox: Yes.

Trish: general relationships with everybody else that you're in relationship with right now like a husband and a kid and parents and stuff like that.

Samantha Fox: Yeah, agreed. mean, I, you know, I do these discovery calls. So I have, you know, 15 minutes, 20 minutes with new women every week that have, going through some aspect of this. And sometimes I meet women who are really deep in the throes of an affair a woman, or just a total obsession with a woman. So you have somebody at work and they're married and It's so hard for them because I always say the same thing is as much as you're having these feelings and they're so real that all these feelings you're having, they're about you. This is about you. This isn't about this other person. We don't know that you don't even know this person. You know, this is, this person is like a stranger. mean, yes, you're picking up, there's chemistry, there's energy, but don't know a lot about this person. So, This, that you're feeling, it's all about you. And don't want to hear that. It's really interesting. Women just don't, they don't believe it. They can't go. And of course it's all of those unbelievable feelings that come up and all the hormones that are being released and all of the awakening energy. But yeah, this journey is about you. And if you you know, a wonderful woman along the way to spend time with, however long that time ends up being amazing, you know, but it's about you. It's about you having sex with another woman. It's not about being in relationship with a woman. It's about being a woman loving woman, you know, ⁓ about in a place where men are decentered. You are not focusing your life on men and pleasing men.

Trish: Thank you. Yes.

Samantha Fox: and taking care of men, it is woman centered. So yeah.

Trish: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's about who you feel most emotionally safe and connected with energized by. Yeah. And that's from what we've been told our whole life ⁓ about who you feel most emotionally safe with and energized by. Yeah. ⁓

Samantha Fox: Yes, right. The you need a man, a woman needs a man. A woman needs a man. mean, what what older does not send that message to her younger kids, you know, at least for us, like at our age, our mothers said things like that my mom did, ⁓ dad certainly did, you know. So

Trish: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I am middle of my journey and really excited to recognize that I've come to one destination ⁓ and is gay all day. And I'm really excited to see what takes me feeling gay even in my sleep. You know, I recognize I still have a lot more to go. But I I'm grateful to be able to come to you and celebrate with everybody this landmark that it has come beyond the messy middle for me. This is one of the joys that when you're going through those really hard roller coaster times of the messy middle, I feel like it's there on the other side to help show you how worth it it all was.

Samantha Fox: I so appreciate you coming here to that so that the listeners that are listening in can hear what on the other side when you really do that work, right? Which is an investment yourself and time and energy and resources used because in less than a year you have rinsed system

Trish: ⁓ Yes.

Samantha Fox: of any remnants of your internalized homophobia. And that is amazing. That is really amazing. And I so appreciate you coming here to share that you feel ⁓ gay all day. And I am celebrating with you. And I would not be surprised if it was less than a year until you felt gay while you were sleeping too. So thank so much, Trish. I appreciate you.

Trish: Mm-hmm. I'm Okay, bye for now. Thank you.

Samantha Fox: Bye.