In Shape

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process. These include religious beliefs, fear of rejection from family, and fear of homophobia from friends and cowoorkers. p. 2
Research is indicating that women who come out as lesbians in their middle adulthood go through a ‘second childhood’. These women go through Erickson’s ‘identity consolidation vs. identity confusion’ and ‘intimacy vs. isolation’ stages all aver again (Jordan, Deluty, 1998). They experience confusion and questions about their family life, chosen job, and their future career trajectory. They wonder if they will still be loved and respected by their families, what will happen to the children, and how their employers will look them upon. Literature being written on women who come out as lesbians in their middle adulthood state that it is because they are faced with the fear of discrimination and rejection from the heterosexual culture.
Paula J. Rust states that ...

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don’t usually have same sex experiences until they are twenty- three or twenty- four and women are pushed to marry by the time they are twenty or twenty-one. If a woman marries at that age it decreases the chance of completion of identifying sexually as a lesbian (Swan, 1997).
It is ingrained in our heads that men marry women and that homosexuality is bad.
Having this patriarchal paradigm constantly fed to women suppresses any urges towards homosexuality they may have, and in doing so lengthens the time in which a woman is able to come to terms with her feelings.
In Sheri Hite’s ‘The Hite Report: Women and Love’, women who came out in later life expressed a fear of being without a ...

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