Ron Poindexter
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PlanetOut: Could you tell us a little about your life up to the point at which you got involved in the ex-gay movement?
Ron Poindexter: I grew up in Clarkston, Washington -- a small town in Eastern Washington State. I had one brother.
My dad was a
schoolteacher, and my mom was a bookkeeper. Sort of an all-American family. I was a good student. I was a trumpet player in
the band. I was
in the choir. I played sports from when I was old enough to hold a baseball bat all the way through high school. I actually had a
very good
childhood in many ways. But there was this thing that I couldn't quite figure out -- and it was that I was attracted to men, which I
figured out
when I was 12 years old. So, I was pretty miserable in a lot of ways because of that. The illustration that I use when I talk about
this is if you
watch a duck swimming in a pond from the top, it looks like it's swimming very smoothly. But if you had a camera under water,
you could see that
its feet are paddling like crazy. And that's sort of the way my life was. On the surface, everything looked like it was going very
well. But I had this
secret, and it was causing me all kinds of problems and a lot of angst.
PlanetOut: At what point did you verbalize to yourself that you were gay?
RP: Probably 12 or 13 years old. I was in sixth grade. Well, let me rephrase that. I mean, I didn't have a word for it at
that point. But I knew that
I was attracted to men.
PlanetOut: What happened in adolescence and high school?
RP: Well, I didn't have any real church background. But I prayed that God would do something in my life to make me
not miserable, and I didn't
see that thing happening. So I assumed that there was no God -- because I assumed that if there was a God, he would love
me and help me.
When I was a sophomore in high school, I was asked by a couple teachers active in a local Christian group to go on a retreat
with them. I went
because I still was very much looking for answers about what was going on with me and my life. At that point, I became a
Christian. That
weekend, I saw that I wanted a relationship with God, and I saw for the first time that God really wanted a relationship with me,
too. So I said
yes to that, and got involved with the church and some really amazing people -- and those were the first people I told that I was
attracted to
men. And to a person, they all said, "We don't really understand what's happening with you. We just know that this is not what
God wants for
you." So the stage was really set for me to try to do something about these feelings.
PlanetOut: How did that affect how you felt about your own sexuality?
RP: I don't think I felt more or less ashamed. I felt hopeful that some day I wouldn't be attracted to men anymore. But I
always felt really bad
about being attracted to men, and that translated into feeling really bad about my sexuality in general, really bad about who I
was, and really
bad about anything having to do with my body. I was very afraid of the feelings that I had for men -- not because I was afraid I
was going to
hell, but afraid of where those feelings might lead me.
PlanetOut: Were there any signals from the church that heightened that fear or were explicit about what was wrong
with being gay?
RP: Not explicitly. Nobody had to sit down with me and say, "You know, being a homosexual is wrong." Because I
already believed that. That
didn't come directly from the church. That just came from society in general. What I heard in church reinforced that. It was a
very loving
reinforcement. I didn't have anybody preaching hell and damnation to me. These were people who really loved me and wanted
to help me
figure out what was going on. But nobody could. All the way through college, nobody could tell me what I could do to change
my feelings.
That didn't happen until after I graduated from college, when I applied to go on staff at an organization called Campus
Crusade for Christ. They
asked on the application if I had ever had any sexual relationships with a man, and by that time I had had a couple one-time
experiences. So I
was honest and said yes. They contacted me back and said they'd love to have me on staff, but wanted me to get some
therapy first. About
that time I heard of an ex-gay organization in Seattle. A friend of mine who was familiar with my "struggles" called me and said,
"You've gotta
talk to this guy." So I contacted him and liked what I heard and made arrangements to move to Seattle specifically to get
involved in this
program.
PlanetOut: Between the time you started to get involved in Christianity and the time you joined the ex-gay ministry, a
number of years passed. What
were your feelings like during that time?
RP: A lot of pain, a lot of loneliness. Probably the best word to use is confusion. I just didn't know what was going on
or what to do about it. I
was attracted to all of these wonderful Christian men, but I wanted to take those relationships in directions that they didn't want
to take them.
So it was very lonely.
PlanetOut: What exactly went on in the counseling sessions? What was the method of treatment by which you were
supposed to be able to change
your attraction to men into an attraction to women?
RP: This is probably a simplification, but the main focus of the ex-gay ministries at that time was that I was attracted to
men because I had a
deficient relationship with my father. If I could in therapy get to the point where I could reconcile my relationship with my father,
then I could
developmentally move past being attracted to men. So that was the theory. In therapy, they tried to bring me to a point where I
understood all
this and could make this shift in my mind and see that I really didn't need to be attracted to men -- what I needed was my
relationship with my
father.
PlanetOut: This all sounds very Freudian.
RP: Oh, extremely.
PlanetOut: For how long were you involved with the ministry?
RP: Almost two years in both therapy and the support group.
PlanetOut: Were there moments -- or even long periods of time -- when you thought, "Hey, this is going to work.
Things are changing."
RP: Absolutely. After several months, things had gotten much better for me. I learned coping skills to deal with the
feelings -- what we called
"temptations." And a lot of that was good basic therapy. One of the things that we talked about was just the fact that I'm
attracted to a man
doesn't mean I have to go have sex with him. And that was true. And more than anything else, I wanted hope. I believed the
therapist when he
told me that I had a deficit with my father -- even though, as I look back on it, I had a very good relationship with my father. But
I was so wanting
something to hold on to ...
PlanetOut: An explanation ...
RP: I so wanted something to explain to me why I was attracted to men that I bought it. Now I look back on it and say
that it was a bunch of
garbage. I had a great relationship with my father. But there was enough truth in it for me to grab onto. But the
combination of having
that hope and learning to live practically with my feelings made me feel like I was really making good progress.
PlanetOut: Did your actual, physical attractions change in any way?
RP: They had less power to them. I was not any less attracted to men. It just didn't control me as much. So I saw all
that as very positive. I was
dating a woman during this time. We began to talk about marriage, and things were going extremely well. In fact, I stopped
going to weekly
counseling and was instead just going to the support groups. Then I went on vacation by myself -- this was probably 15 months
into the
program.
PlanetOut: So you're about 24 years old at this time?
RP: Yes. On vacation I had an anonymous sexual experience for the first time in five years. I was absolutely
devastated. I've never been in as
much pain in my life as I was after that, because I just saw all the work that I had done go down the drain -- at least that's the
way I felt. I had to
go back and tell my boss at the youth ministry what had happened. That was sort of the beginning of the end for my
relationship with that youth
ministry. I told my girlfriend what had happened, and she broke up with me. It was really a very devastating experience. So I
went back into
weekly therapy.
PlanetOut: How did the therapist and group respond to your "lapse"?
RP: My "fall," we called it. They were extremely compassionate. This was certainly not something nobody had seen
before. It was fairly common.
My therapist was very disappointed. But he had enough psychological background to know that when you're dealing with these
kinds of things,
there are ups and downs. He tried to help me not be too disappointed about it and to let it be an experience I could learn from.
PlanetOut: So after that, did you continue down the road of "recovery"?
RP: For another six months, I was involved in the Seattle ministry. Then I packed my bags and moved to Pasadena,
California, to go to
seminary. I got linked up with another ex-gay ministry there.
PlanetOut: When did you eventually say, "This is not going to work. I'm not going to change who I am, and I am not
going to try anymore."
RP: You have to skip ahead several years. That would be about 1992, when I was about 31. By this time, I had
finished school and had moved
to the Bay Area. and was on staff at a church. In a lot of ways in my life I was doing very well. I had continued to date the
same woman I was
seeing at the time of my "fall" on and off for several years. I took some time to go home to sit down with her and decide
whether we were going
to get married or not. She sat across the table from me and said, "Ron, dating is supposed to be the fun part and marriage is
supposed to be
the work. I feel like the dating has been nothing but work, and I can't imagine what the marriage would be like." I looked at her
and said, "I
guarantee that if we get married, at least for the next two years, it's going to be really hard." I knew where I was. I knew I was
still very attracted
to men.
PlanetOut: Did she know how strong your attraction to men still was?
RP: Yes, she was aware of everything from the very beginning. She said, "I don't think I can do it." And I said that I
couldn't really blame her. I
was really devastated because I had known her for 7 or 8 years. If I couldn't in that amount of time learn to love her, that
meant I was going to
have to start over. If I was going to have to wait that long -- or longer -- to develop a relationship with a woman I could marry,
that would be
devastating to me. I spent the next year rethinking things, and finally came to the point where I realized that my orientation
hadn't changed.
PlanetOut: And wasn't going to?
RP: Well, that was the second step. At that point, I didn't have it in my mind that I was going to go be gay, and that
that was going to be OK. I
just didn't know what I was supposed to do next. So for the very first time I began to allow myself to get to know gay and
lesbian people. I had
never allowed myself that before because I was so afraid. I also began for the first time to study the Biblical passages that had
been used to
condemn homosexuals. In all my years, even in seminary, I had never really studied those passages. I just assumed it was cut
and dry. But I
began to realize that it's not as clear as I thought. I got to know gay and lesbian Christian people, which was amazing because
I realized that
they were really normal people -- people who loved God just as much as I did, people who wanted to serve God just as much
as I did, but
people who were OK with being gay or lesbian. That had a huge impact on me. And over the next year or so, I finally came to
terms with the
fact that it was okay for me to be gay.
PlanetOut: Did you feel that being gay was going to compromise your relationship with God?
RP: That was the assumption all along. So that's what I had to figure out. The most important thing in my life was --
and still is -- my relationship
with God. So if I ever had a relationship with a man in a romantic sense, I knew that I was going to have to feel OK with that
and was going to
have to believe that God was OK with that.
PlanetOut: How did the church at which you were working receive your reevaluation of your sexuality?
RP: It was mixed. Those people loved me, and some of them were very disappointed. Some of them still are very
disappointed. Most of them
understood why I was making the decision, even though a lot of them disagreed with it. Some of them actually said they
thought it was a good
decision for me. But most were pretty disappointed.
PlanetOut: What are your feelings towards the ex-gay movement now that you've been out for awhile?
RP: I think that the vast majority of people in the ex-gay movement are very caring, loving people who are
well-intentioned. But they've bought
into a false philosophy -- that is, that one can change one's sexual orientation. And the other false philosophy is that God
indeed wants
people to change their orientations. It's a bad psychological model. It's a bad Biblical interpretation. And the combination of
those puts them
where they are. They have an answer that is ultimately the wrong one.
But I should say that I don't believe I ever would have gotten to the place I am now had I not gone through the ex-gay world.
There were a lot
of good things that happened to me during those years, and it's too bad it had to happen as it did. But I value my time in the
ex-gay ministries.
PlanetOut: Do you feel at all cheated or frustrated about the fact that you spent essentially all of your 20s and early
30s not being out?
RP: Absolutely. Not so much not being out, but all the damage that happened when I was trying to change. There's
anger and frustration there,
but it's not directed towards the people themselves. It's directed towards the bad theology and the poor psychological models
that they use.
PlanetOut: So how long has it been since you left the ex-gay movement?
RP: About seven years.
PlanetOut: And how has life been since then?
RP: Great. It hasn't been easy, because life isn't easy. But I have allowed myself to be who I am, and allowed myself
to thrive in ways I never
allowed myself to do before. So personally, I'm in a very good space, and my relationship with God is in many ways better than
it's ever been.
So that feels good. I'm in a relationship. I started dating my current partner about six years ago, and we are together for life.
We love each
other dearly, and we have a very good relationship. We're having a great time. I have wonderful friends, and I'm more
psychologically happy
than I've ever been. The piece of it that's difficult for me is that my vocation was really taken away from me. I was training to be
a Presbyterian
pastor, and in the Presbyterian church you cannot be an ordained pastor and have a partner. You can be gay; you just can't
do anything
about it. So I'm not able to use all of my training and education in the way I'd like to. I'm indirectly using it with Evangelicals
Concerned [a group
that works with people exiting from the ex-gay movement], and I feel good about that. But I feel really cheated that everybody
was telling me I
was going to be a great pastor, but now they say I can't. That's hard.
PlanetOut: Are you still in touch with many of the people from ex-gay ministries?
RP: I continue to meet people from ex-gay ministries who are now both gay and Christian. And they have come out of
the ex-gay world the
same way I have. I can say honestly that I do not know any single person of all of the people I knew in the ex-gay world who
are still living the
ex-gay philosophy with any kind of integrity or joy in their lives. I'm not saying there aren't any. I'm just saying I don't know any
personally. And I
know dozens of people who have now reconciled their faith and their orientation.
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