can a gay man and a straight woman have a happy marriage correspondent jordan Rowling travels to Salt Lake City Utah to explore how some Mormons with different sexual orientations end up married to each other we have a happy fulfilling sex life but what motivates that sex life is different something different I don't like it's not like I come home and see her and I got to get on that a mixed orientation marriage is one in which two partners have different sexual orientations these kinds of relationships are commonly found in Mormon communities we have given much thought and care to better understanding the experience of same-sex attraction and making sure individuals who feel such attraction and their families feel welcome and part of the great worldwide family it is the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints the Mormon doctrine considers those in same-sex marriages apostates meaning they can no longer be affiliated with the church yet it hasn't taken a clear stance on mixed orientation marriages basically the church gives you three choices if you are LGBT Mormon you can either you know be celibate for the rest of your life you could leave the church and get excommunicated or you can enter into a mixed orientation marriage and marry someone that you're not attracted to I'm on my way to meet Blaine and Lindsey Hickman they are currently in a mixed orientation marriage and they've been married for almost 15 years [Music] hello Jordan flame hi Jordan nice to meet you so Blaine have you ever been with a man and Lindsey have you ever been with another man no no which is funny but no yeah Blaine and Lindsey met in high school where they became best friends they bonded over their love for theater and music after high school when Blaine returned from teaching English in China he finally came out to Lindsey and even though his family would have supported him in a gay relationship he chose to pursue one with Lindsey if I had come out and there wasn't like a specific girl there that I was really wanting things to work out with it would have been a lot different Blaine works as a therapist whose focus is to help people who are trying to reconcile their sexual orientation with their religious beliefs he previously volunteered with Northstar International like dealing with stuff about like with men or whatever Lindsey is really good at like understanding that that doesn't have to do with me but that doesn't have anything to do with like me not being cute enough for not being desirable enough that like that it those are they're different well I always like to say he chose me out of all the boys and the girls I feel pretty great Danny Caldwell was married to a woman for ten years before filing for divorce as a devoted gay Mormon he believed a mixed orientation marriage was his only option God wants me to marry a woman and in the LDS temple for me that was you know what what I needed to do to be happy because that's that's what's taught in the church is that happiness comes from living the gospel and if you're not living the gospel you're not going to be happy I spoke with John Dylan whose research looks specifically at those either currently in or once in a mixed orientation marriage basically our estimates were about 70 percent of those who entered into a mixed orientation marriage either got divorced or would be divorced by the time their lives ended but more stark than the divorce rate was the low quality of life high levels of sexual identity distress low levels of self-esteem and and sort of abysmal quality of life ratings that were associated with entering into a mixed orientation marriage according to the Center for Disease Control suicide rates in Utah have increased by almost 50 percent since 1999 and those who identify as LGBTQ experienced higher rates of mental health disorders and suicides than the national population we were married for 10 years and I realized that about every three years I would have these like total breakdowns where I would just get super depressed and I hooked up with a couple guys that I had met online and it seemed like each time the depression would be worse and this last time it was I was I actually didn't do anything with any guys but I was so depressed and and suicidal I wasn't fulfilled in the relationship but I couldn't leave because I would lose everything was how I saw and started feel like the only way way out was was suicide did you have like a breaking point yeah I so I was I started I found a therapist that I thought was could help me so I started working with him on basically writing a letter telling my wife that I can't do it anymore and I at that time I shared the letter with her and she very upset which is understandable and she left and that was that was probably Milo i okay that night I had a gun at my head I thought I'd made such a mess of everything I've I'm gonna hurt my kids I've hurt my my wife who even though it wasn't working I still cared about her I didn't want to hurt her and I just thought you know I could live with the damage if I could just remove myself from the equation you know I was able to calm myself down in that process I realized you know it's better for my kids to have a gay dad than a dead dad [Music] after hearing Danny's experience I wanted to see what the church had to say about mixed orientation marriages I've been trying to get a statement about their stance on makes orientation marriages and I'm kind of getting the runaround so I'm just gonna show up and see if anyone will talk to me I'd spoken to Carly but I haven't really gotten any responses back so I was trying to see if there's any way I could come and anyone would talk to me or you could call up and ask her or okay well since I wasn't able to talk to anyone by just walking in I'm gonna try to call their media relations senior associate on the phone and see if she'll say anything you've reached Carly Brandt diamond with LDS Church public attorney when I finally got a response from the Mormon Church they didn't address mixed orientation marriages directly rather stating marriage is defined by God as the union between a man and a woman we reach out with love to our LGBT brothers and sisters so it's been kind of challenging to get a direct statement from the church on anything regarding mixed orientation marriage regarding gay people why do you think the church is so telling because they are cuz everybody looks different because there are so many people in the world that have different experiences and and the church really does believe in agency and that people do have a choice and truthfully like that there are times when I feel like don't be so tight-lipped just say some things it's difficult because everybody wants things to be black and white like you just like just say you're supported or say you don't and then shut up about it it's just more complicated than that even with a divorce rate at least 20% higher than the national average some mixed orientation couples are just able to make it work if they follow the average their quality of life is very low now they're always going to be exceptions think of a bell curve that I was going to be people more miserable than you could ever imagine in the bell curve and there's gonna be people who defy all odds and are extremely happy what the data seems to suggest is that if mixed orientation marriage were a product that you could purchase on the shelf there should be a big red huge warning label on the side that says warning entering into a mixed orientation marriage has a seventy percent failure rate and is associated with quality of life ratings worse than having lupus and as long as every gay and lesbian and straight Mormon knows sort of that data before they enter into a mixed orientation marriage then they're entering into it with full information there are some days where they like we hate church and I was like I know but this is what we believe in and so when you believe in this we go to church [Music] the huge reason why our marriage has worked out so well is because we just talk about things right we have like a fulfilling like happy sex life to which a lot of people also assume like oh you must just be friends and not do that or they assume like oh you must have to like pretend she's a boy that would not fly if that was like having sex is a choice that we make that is like motivated by different highlights besides just like we love each other and our relationships important and we you know yeah look you know that that's a part of a relationship right right and it's a it's enjoyable yeah what would you tell someone who is considering entering into a mixed orientation marriage if you give them a piece of advice I would I would say just be careful like realize what what you're doing it's it's not gonna go away if you think that the marriage is gonna make the same-sex attraction go away it's not going to Danny is now engaged with fiancee tie and they're planning to get married next year and he makes delicious scrambled eggs I asked Blaine why he feels his marriage won't end up like Danny's I feel really okay to come to her and say like I like today it was just a really bad gay day like I'm just feeling like like I'm feeling accepted for whatever he says yeah and like just like I'm able to communicate like today it's hard and today that I wish I had something else and but and so that we can talk about that and if the church came out and said mixed orientation marriages are not viable because you have same-sex attraction we don't support that would you choose church or would you choose your marriage my marriage yeah marriage the church is a tool to help me be connected with God but I feel like that's what fuels us is like having an eternal perspective that we aren't just who we are now it's not just about that eternity that we go on forever and that's kind of comforting for me to know that life just doesn't end [Music] so after that piece I have a lot of questions and I'm sure you do too so we have Jordan rolling here in the studio with us who's going to talk to us about her reporting on mixed orientation marriages in Utah Jordan thanks for being here thank you for having me so this was actually a kind of a personal story for you then yeah it was very personal for me I think this has been long overdue for me to be able to explore this topic you know my mom grew up in Utah grew up Mormon and basically hid a very very big part of herself for her entire life and she was married for 20 years had four kids and then finally when she you know was I think like 45 came out and decided to change her life and go a different go different way what was your impression of Blane and Lindsey you know it's funny I told them when I first met them I went into the story thinking that they were gonna be kooky thinking they were gonna be weird they were honestly the sweetest most normal people and they're they have three boys as you can as you could see like they have three boys who are happy and normal and their kids know what's going on Blane and Lindsey speak openly about their situation their dynamic in front of their kids and their kids know and their kids frankly are just like mom and dad like why do people care like who cares like they're so used to having a gay dad and a straight mom and this dynamic that they just they're just like who cares that was actually something that I was really curious as I was watching the piece if they had talked to their children about the fact that he is gay yeah they know and in fact like I think their kids are very open about it too I even asked Elaine and Lindsey like what would you do if one of your sons came out as gay and they were just like we wouldn't care like they would be completely supportive completely happy for them if they wanted to pursue a same-sex marriage they would be completely supportive as well and now you also talked to Danny who left his mixed orientation marriage and obviously talked to Blaine who's still in in that kind of marriage how sustainable do you think Blaine and Lindsey's relationship is I think we have to remember their relation chip is built off of friendship it's a friendship that comes with the romantic and sexual aspects of relationships but it's a friendship first as John de lijn explains in the piece there's the bell curve so some people can make it work others can't make it work and then there's people that just kind of float in the middle Blaine and Lindsey have been making it work for 15 years so we've seen in recent years gay marriage has become more broadly accepted nationwide is there any kind of movement within the church or in the community to push for acceptance of same-sex marriage so you're right Natasha same-sex marriage is legal in all 50 states right actually in Utah we're seeing that Mormons aged 18 to 29 there's a fifty-two percent support rate for same-sex marriage so younger Mormons are in fact supporting you know progress in the LGBT community but we're seeing the older Mormons are still not supportive of it but what's interesting is our couple Blaine and Lindsay they're they're one of those couples that you know don't believe the doctrine will change but it doesn't really support the stats that are showing that you know the Mormons are kind of progressing with our thought toward same-sex marriage Jordan thank you so much for being here thank you for having me and that's it for another episode of Mike dispatch leave us your comments and see you next time [Music]