Abstract

Before the so-called “gayby boom” in the 1990s the most common pathway to parenthood for gay men was heterosexual marriage. Since the 1990s most research on gay parenting has focused on intentional gay fathers – those parenting after coming out as gay – and the experiences of post-heterosexual divorce gay fathers (PHGF) have largely been overlooked, even though they remain the largest group of gay fathers. Furthermore, most research on this group, and on gay fathers more broadly, has been conducted in the US, with only a small handful of studies examining the experiences of gay fathers elsewhere. The current study aims to begin to address this omission by exploring the experiences of heterosexually divorced and separated UK gay fathers, focusing on their experiential journey from married, ostensibly heterosexual, men to living openly (more or less) as gay fathers. Transcripts of interviews with six white British men were analyzed using interpretative phenomenological analysis. Five themes are reported: (1) The impossibility of being openly gay; (2) “Drowning in normality”; (3) “The point of no return”; (4) The kids are alright; and (5) “It just doesn’t seem to compute for people.” The findings suggest that for some PHGF little has changed since the earliest research on this group of gay fathers was published in the 1970s. The men in this study had mostly experienced a tumultuous (and sometimes incomplete) journey to gay fatherhood and continued to struggle with feelings of shame and stigma.

摘要

在1990年代所谓的“盖比热潮”之前，男同性恋者最普遍的生育途径是异性婚姻。自1990年代以来，有关同性恋育儿的大多数研究都集中于故意同性恋父亲（那些成为同性恋后育儿的人）以及异性恋后离婚的同性恋父亲（PHGF）的经历在很大程度上被忽视了，尽管他们仍然是最大的同性恋父亲群体。此外，对这一群体以及更广泛的同性恋父亲的大多数研究都是在美国进行的，只有一小部分研究检查了其他地方的同性恋父亲的经历。当前的研究旨在通过探讨异性恋离婚和分居的英国同性恋父亲的经历，着重于他们从已婚，表面上是异性恋的男性到公开地（或多或少）作为同性恋父亲的生活的经历，来解决这一遗漏。使用解释现象学分析对六名英国白人男子的采访记录进行了分析。报告了五个主题：（1）不可能公开成为同性恋；（2）“正常情况下溺水”；（3）“无可挽回的地步”；（4）孩子们还好；（5）“它似乎并没有为人们计算。” 这些发现表明，自从1970年代对这组同性恋父亲的最早研究发表以来，对于某些PHGF而言，几乎没有什么改变。这项研究中的男人大多经历了动荡（有时不完全）的同性恋父亲之旅，并继续因羞耻和污名而挣扎。