Coming Out & Beyond | Support for Women Questioning Their Sexuality

Anne-Marie Zanzal 1ac1f670-c17c-11f0-806a-ef1502adef07
  • 4.4 (26)
  • Sexuality
  • Updated Weekly

Coming Out & Beyond is a podcast for women questioning their sexuality later in life — no matter where you are or what your life looks like right now. Maybe you're sitting with a question you've never said out loud. Maybe you fell for a woman or something woke up recently, everything shifted and you can't put it back. Maybe you're untangling years of religious conditioning or compulsory heterosexuality and trying to figure out who you actually are underneath all of that. Whatever brought you here — this space is for you. Hosted by Anne-Marie Zanzal — Yale Divinity School graduate, ordained progressive minister, grief counselor, and LGBTQ+ coach who came out in midlife — Coming Out & Beyond offers real conversations, emotional clarity, and grounded support for women coming out after 30, 40, 50, and beyond. We talk openly about late bloomer experiences, being married with kids and questioning, single and not finding someone who is right for us, catalyst relationships, faith deconstruction, divorce, grief, identity shifts in midlife, and learning to trust the voice inside you that’s getting louder. This isn’t about rushing labels or blowing up your life. It’s about integration. Self-trust. And the kind of community that changes everything. Because women navigating later-in-life coming out do better — emotionally and practically — when they’re not doing it alone. New episodes weekly. Join the conversation on YouTube, and when you’re ready, step inside Authentically Us (https://community.annemariezanzal.com/)— Anne-Marie’s private community for women on this journey. This journey is yours and you are coming home to yourself. https://annemariezanzal.com/maybe-im-not-straight-guide/

  1. 6d ago

    Should You Run? Unfiltered Sapphic Dating Advice

    This month on Coming Out and Beyond it is our monthly dating and relationship show, and Anne-Marie is joined by her co-coach Barbara Rowlandson, a psychotherapist and dating coach, and her wife Tonda McKay. Before the questions, the three of them catch up on a summer of kayaking, wineries, and a 2,500 mile road trip through Michigan that somehow ended without a single argument. Anne-Marie and Tonda talk honestly about what ten years together and five years of marriage have actually asked of them, because the falling in love was real and so was the work. Then we open the mailbag. All of this month's questions come from the Late Blooming Lesbian subreddit, and they are the ones so many women ask quietly when they are new to dating women. What is it like to hold your girlfriend's hand in public for the first time, and where is the line between joy and scanning the room for other people's reactions. How do you think about an age gap when you are coming out later in life. What does reciprocity look like when one person keeps paying and the other keeps apologizing for it. And when someone pushes for exclusivity after a single date, is that really the U-Haul, or something else underneath. Barbara brings the therapist's lens, Tonda brings the honest one word answer, and Anne-Marie holds the pastoral middle. If you are somewhere on this road yourself, you do not have to walk it alone. Anne-Marie and Barb are hosting the 3-Day Clarity Experience on September 22, 23, and 24 at 7:00 PM Central. It is our most loved event, with 62 women in the room last time, and it is a warm, honest place to sit with exactly these kinds of questions alongside other women moving through this chapter too. We would love to have you there. Register at annemariezanzal.com and click the banner at the top. If coming out later in life is your story, Authentically Us is a good place to land. Authentically Us is our online community of women who genuinely support each other through this time. We hold a minimum of three online events/week where you can learn, share, and connect with other women who are navigating the coming out later in life process. You can find it at community.annemariezanzal.com.

  2. 6d ago ·  Bonus

    You Might Also Like: The Oprah Podcast

    Introducing The Lindsay Clancy Case, Understanding Postpartum Psychosis from The Oprah Podcast. Follow the show: The Oprah Podcast The Lindsay Clancy case has captured the nation’s attention, causing heated debate in the national conversation. On January 24, 2023 Lindsay Clancy strangled her three children in her basement and then attempted suicide by jumping from a second-story window in her house. The resulting injuries left her paralyzed from the waist down. After 21 days of testimony from more than 80 witnesses, the jury was not able to reach a unanimous decision. Lindsay Clancy’s defense team has argued that she is not guilty by reason of insanity as she was experiencing postpartum psychosis, while the prosecution argued she committed premeditated first degree murder. Oprah is in Massachusetts for a wide-ranging conversation about the case with an audience including an exclusive interview with Meg Hamp, a nurse who worked alongside Lindsay for 7 years and testified at her trial - plus medical experts, legal scholars and women who have personally experienced postpartum psychosis. Their stories give us a rare, first-hand insight into what it is to experience this challenging mental health issue. Oprah will also talk with social critics who will share their opinions and she will hear speculation on many sides of the case. Oprah has hosted conversations on postpartum depression and psychosis for 40 years with the intention of providing a platform for a mature discussion. This podcast episode contains discussions of murder, suicide, and mental illness that may be upsetting to some listeners. Listener discretion is advised. Follow Oprah Winfrey on Social: https://www.instagram.com/oprahpodcast/ https://www.facebook.com/oprahwinfrey/ Listen to the full podcast:  https://open.spotify.com/show/0tEVrfNp92a7lbjDe6GMLI DISCLAIMER: Please note, this is an independent podcast episode not affiliated with, endorsed by, or produced in conjunction with the host podcast feed or any of its media entities. The views and opinions expressed in this episode are solely those of the creators and guests. For any concerns, please reach out to team@podroll.fm.

    You Might Also Like: The Oprah Podcast

  3. Sep 4

    🚩 The Signs We Only See Now: Were We Ever Really Straight?

    This month's episode with Anna Empey is the one we have all earned after a tender chapter of heavier conversations. It is lighter, there is a lot of laughing, and it is about the signs. Not the ones we noticed at the time, but the ones we can only see now, the ones that were quietly flashing the whole time while we went about our lives. Anne-Marie and Anna compare notes on the intense friendships they once organized their whole worlds around, and on the celebrity crushes they were so sure were nothing more than admiration. They get into the jealousy that felt far bigger than friendship, the difference between wanting to be her and wanting to be with her, and the church language of same sex attraction that so many of us were handed like a diagnosis. There is one loving thing to hold onto before any of us starts feeling foolish. We did not miss these signs because we were oblivious. We missed them because nobody had given us the words yet. Growing up in religious and conservative homes decades apart, neither Anne-Marie nor Anna had the language to name what was right in front of them. Wherever you are in your own questioning, you do not have to check every box, or any box at all. The only person who can name your sexuality is you. And if there is one thing this conversation makes clear, it is that you have not missed the boat. Your heart is beating, and the fullest version of your life may be waiting on the other side of what you have not yet let yourself see. 🔥Anne-Marie mentions a do-not-miss Brandi Carlile performance covering the Alanis Morrissette song "Uninvited" in this episode, so if you're curious, here's the link! https://youtu.be/kyvDyZoyGUg?si=rWXmdQGaLf6CG1gU 👉Here's a little teaser of Fortune Feimster's Netflix comedy special, "Sweet & Salty": https://youtu.be/Rdj_fEEH5oU?si=rhaJa92JvoQIuYO7 🗓️Reminder: Anna Empey joins Anne-Marie on the pod on the first Friday of every month! You might want to subscribe so you don't miss it. ;) If this conversation stirs something in you, you do not have to sit with it alone. Authentically Us is our community for women navigating questioning and coming out later in life, with group support gatherings every week and people who understand exactly what this chapter asks of you. We would love to have you with us. Come find your people here: https://bit.ly/Authentically-Us

  4. Aug 28

    Straight Women Don't Lie Awake Wondering if They're Gay

    This is the start of something new. The episodes you have told us you love most are the ones where the three of us sit down together, so we are making them a monthly gathering. Once a month, Tonda, Barbara, and I will open the letters and answer the questions women are actually asking: the real ones, the tender ones, the slightly awkward ones, and the ones you would only ask us at two in the morning with the door shut. If you are new to the show, here is who you are sitting with. I came out in my fifties, and I have kept all the receipts. Barbara is a psychotherapist who will advise you gently, and she means it as the highest compliment. Tonda has been out for more than forty years, so she has quietly seen most of it. We think of ourselves as the slightly older, slightly wiser, occasionally ridiculous friends who happened to get here first. This month we read five letters, and the same quiet question ran underneath every one of them. Woman after woman, wondering whether she is allowed to believe what she feels. Here is what we opened this month: How do I know if what I'm feeling is real, or if I am imagining it? I have never been with a woman. Am I allowed to call myself sapphic or queer at all? Is there such a thing as too late? (from a listener in her late sixties) What is compulsory heterosexuality, and how do I know if I have been living inside it? I know I am not straight, but I do not feel drawn to women the way I expected. Where do I fit? We talk about the comfort zone and the fear that shows up the moment you step out of it, the gatekeepers who think they get to decide who belongs (they do not), why it is never too late, and the grace you deserve when the feelings arrive on their own timeline instead of the one you imagined. Pour something you like, get comfortable, and come sit with us. 🌈Email your questions to support@annemariezanzal.com. You might hear yours answered on a future episode. 🌈Leave your questions in the comments below. 🌈If you are already inside Authentically Us, you can privately message Anne-Marie or Barbara with your question. 🌈This Authentic Life, the community course Barbara and Anne-Marie are hosting together, begins the first week of October. Registration is open now at https://annemariezanzal.com/this-authentic-life-community-course/ 🌈Join Authentically Us, our online community, at https://community.annemariezanzal.com/ If the questions in this episode sound like the ones living quietly in you, you do not have to sit with them alone. Authentically Us is our online community, a growing circle of women who are all somewhere in this process of coming out and coming home to themselves. You can ask your own questions there and hear from us, and from women who understand because they are walking it too. We would love to see you inside. Join us here: https://bit.ly/Authentically-Us

  5. Aug 21

    Coming Out at 39: When the Puzzle Pieces Finally Fit

    Some mornings change everything. Marissa Mitchell was 39, a teacher and army veteran in southern Indiana, married to her junior high sweetheart and quietly certain that the distance she felt in her marriage was a problem she could fix if she only tried harder. Then one ordinary morning, about a week into summer break, she woke up understanding something that reordered her whole life. She was in love with a woman, and she had been moving through the world as someone she was not. In this conversation, one we are revisiting from Season 1, Marissa tells the story of what came next with rare honesty. She talks about the depth of the sadness, about telling her husband first and the grace he met her with, and about the tender moment she came out to her eight year old daughter at a stoplight on the way home from therapy. She is generous about her ex, who remains one of her closest friends, and clear eyed about the particular grief of reframing a life you thought you already understood. What stays with you is where she lands. Marissa found her way to community, first through an online group and then a weekend with women who simply understood her, and she calls it the most life altering weekend of her life. It is a truth we return to again and again on this show. When you first come out, the instinct is to go looking for a partner. What you actually need is community, the company of other women who get it without explanation. She carried that clarity back into her classroom, starting a Gay Straight Alliance that drew 45 students to its very first meeting. Her daughter draws rainbows. And for the first time in her life, Marissa says, she is comfortable in her own skin. Whether you came out at 18 or are sitting with these questions in midlife, there is room for you here. We are so glad you are with us. This episode is really about the thing Marissa needed most, which was community. That is exactly what we have built inside Authentically Us, our online home for women coming out and figuring things out in midlife, with group support gatherings every week. You do not have to walk this one alone. Come and see: https://bit.ly/Authentically-Us

  6. Aug 14

    High Libidos, Straight Girl Crushes & Coming Out Later

    It is the second Friday of the month, which means Anne-Marie is back with the company she loves most: her fellow coach Barbara Rowlandson and her wife Tonda McKay. This is the monthly conversation so many of you tell us is your favorite, where we take the real questions women ask about sapphic dating and answer them with honesty, humor, and a lot of love. This month we open four questions from the Late Bloomer Lesbian forum. What do you do when you are in your late thirties, newly aware of who you are, and embarrassed that you have not even had a first kiss yet? How do you make sense of a libido that roars to life the moment you come out, and how do you have honest conversations about sexual health along the way? Why do so many of us keep falling for straight women, and what is really underneath that pattern? And how do you set down the guilt that rises up when someone you love reacts to your truth with hurt or anger? Tonda brings decades of lived experience. Barb brings her training as a therapist and dating coach. And underneath all the laughter is the reminder we return to again and again. You are not behind. This is your timeline. There is no race to run, and there is a whole community of women who came out later in life ready to welcome you. We also have news. These conversations have grown so popular that we are expanding to twice a month, which means even more room for your questions and your stories. Queer joy is what this looks like, and we are so glad you are here. Barb's viral clap back at a troll who asked what she would do if no one ever married her. She answered by tearing across her land on her ATV, dog running happily alongside, grinning and completely unbothered. Two years later people are still liking it. Watch it here: https://www.tiktok.com/@late_2_the_party_lesbian/video/7369204187428670725 Send us your dating questions. Drop them in the YouTube comments, add them in the comments on Spotify, or reach out directly at support@annemariezanzal.com. Like, comment, and share the episode so more women who need this can find it. Keep listening, because the show is expanding to twice a month. Alongside the monthly Sapphic dating episode, there will be a second episode covering broader Sapphic questions. The episode briefly touches on an OP's suicidal thoughts, and Barb reminded listeners that anyone in North America can call or text 988, available 24/7. If this episode made you feel a little less alone, that is exactly why we built Authentically Us. It is our community for women navigating identity, coming out, and dating later in life, created by someone who knows the isolation of doing this in midlife firsthand. Inside you will find real connection and at least three group gatherings every week, from Speed Friending to our book club, along with courses and a place where you are always met with understanding instead of judgment. Membership is $39 a month or $390 a year. Come find your people. https://bit.ly/Authentically-Us

  7. Aug 7

    How to Stop Letting Fear Run Your Life

    What if fear is not a stop sign but a signal that you are growing? In this month's first Friday conversation, Anne-Marie is joined by regular guest Anna Empey, business development consultant and LGBTQ+ coach, for an honest look at fear. Not how to get rid of it, because we cannot, but how to stop letting it make our decisions for us. Together they explore why the brain works so hard to keep us in our comfort zones, even the miserable ones, and why so many women stay in marriages, jobs, and closets for years because familiar feels safer than free. Anna gets wonderfully nerdy about the amygdala and neuroplasticity, explaining how every small brave step literally teaches the brain that change is survivable. Anne-Marie draws on her years as a hospice chaplain, where she sat with thousands of people at the end of life and heard their real regrets. No one ever told her they wished they had stayed more comfortable. You will also hear why "blowing up your life" is the wrong phrase, how to recognize when practicality is really fear wearing sensible shoes, why the anticipation of coming out is often scarier than the act itself, and Anne-Marie's beloved reframe of coming out as "letting in," where you hold the power to choose who enters your inner circle. We leave you with one question to sit with this week. Where in your life is fear making your decisions for you? No need to act yet. Notice, and consider your first brave step. Fear loses its grip in community. When we sit with other women who understand this road from the inside, the fear, the guilt, and the shame all begin to loosen their hold, because shame cannot survive being met with empathy. Both Anne-Marie and Anna are inside Authentically Us, our ongoing community for women navigating identity, coming out, and everything beyond. If you are tired of carrying this alone, we have saved you a seat. Join us at https://community.annemariezanzal.com

  8. Jul 31

    Compulsory Heterosexuality and Coming Home to Yourself (Originally Aired Season 5)

    This week we return to one of our most beloved conversations from the archives, my talk with Dr. Mallory Hanfling, a fellow later in life queer woman, therapist, and the creator of the term Firefly. Mallory shares her story with such honesty. She married a kind man, built a genuine friendship with him, and still felt that something was quietly wrong. Like so many of us, she searched everywhere for an answer. Individual therapy, couples therapy, sex therapy, endless blood work, and doctors who offered birth control and even exploratory surgery. She was looking for a physiological explanation for a truth her spirit already knew. She is queer. Together we explore why the question "have you ever considered your sexuality" is so rarely asked, how compulsory heterosexuality teaches us to dismiss our own knowing, and why women are socialized to carry discomfort quietly rather than speak up for their own pleasure and peace. We also talk about opening a marriage as a bargaining stage of grief, what actually happens when a third person is brought into a struggling relationship, and the moment Mallory chose to end her marriage with love rather than let it end in heartbreak. And of course, we talk about fireflies. Mallory coined the term as a gender and sexuality expansive alternative to late bloomer language. Fireflies spend most of their lives underground, and when they finally emerge as their most authentic selves, they glow and bring joy to others. You do not need to have all the labels figured out to belong. If you are somewhere in the metamorphosis, this conversation is for you. Dr. Mallory Hanfling is a therapist in Philadelphia, licensed in Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, and Indiana. Her practice, Courage to Grow Counseling, serves the queer community with a focus on identity development, coming out, and connecting with one's most authentic self. Her doctoral research explores how community mitigates the impact of compulsory heterosexuality on the Firefly identity. Mallory's resources 🌈Courage to Grow Counseling: couragetogrowcounseling.org (she provides a superbill for out of network benefits) 🌈The Firefly Circle weekly peer support group, linked on her website 🌈Instagram: @thefireflyjourney 🌈TikTok: Mal's Courage to Grow (home of the original Firefly video) Community changes everything. It is the thread running through this entire conversation, and it is why Authentically Us exists. If you are questioning, coming out, or rebuilding your life in midlife, you do not have to walk this road alone. Inside Authentically Us you will find weekly gatherings, resources, and women who understand from the inside because we have lived it too. 🌈Come find your people: https://community.annemariezanzal.com/ 🌈Visit annemariezanzal.com for resources, articles, videos, and the free downloadable guide for coming out later in life. 🌈Subscribe to Coming Out and Beyond on Apple Podcasts and Spotify so you never miss an episode.

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About

Coming Out & Beyond is a podcast for women questioning their sexuality later in life — no matter where you are or what your life looks like right now. Maybe you're sitting with a question you've never said out loud. Maybe you fell for a woman or something woke up recently, everything shifted and you can't put it back. Maybe you're untangling years of religious conditioning or compulsory heterosexuality and trying to figure out who you actually are underneath all of that. Whatever brought you here — this space is for you. Hosted by Anne-Marie Zanzal — Yale Divinity School graduate, ordained progressive minister, grief counselor, and LGBTQ+ coach who came out in midlife — Coming Out & Beyond offers real conversations, emotional clarity, and grounded support for women coming out after 30, 40, 50, and beyond. We talk openly about late bloomer experiences, being married with kids and questioning, single and not finding someone who is right for us, catalyst relationships, faith deconstruction, divorce, grief, identity shifts in midlife, and learning to trust the voice inside you that’s getting louder. This isn’t about rushing labels or blowing up your life. It’s about integration. Self-trust. And the kind of community that changes everything. Because women navigating later-in-life coming out do better — emotionally and practically — when they’re not doing it alone. New episodes weekly. Join the conversation on YouTube, and when you’re ready, step inside Authentically Us (https://community.annemariezanzal.com/)— Anne-Marie’s private community for women on this journey. This journey is yours and you are coming home to yourself. https://annemariezanzal.com/maybe-im-not-straight-guide/

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