Profiles in LGBTQ+ Courage: Real Stories of Identity & Acceptance

At the age of 23, Felice Cohen was, like many other college graduates, hesitant about entering the real world, and at the same time, uncertain about her sexuality.

Focused on landing her first job as a writer, falling in love was the last thing on Felice's mind. But fall in love she did -- with her boss, Sarah, a woman 34 years older than she.

It was a relationship that lasted 9 years. And for Felice, it was the first taste of true love and deep intimacy. But the affair took place in secrecy and ultimately ended in heartbreak.

Now, Felice has written a book about her experience called Half In: A Coming of Age Memoir of Forbidden Love.

When it was released in late September 2022 Felice's book raced to the top of Amazon's best seller lists in six categories.

As Felice tells PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce in this moving interview, writing this memoir proved a therapeutic experience that helped Felice to mend her hurting heart, and bring her deep love for Sarah out of the closet for the first time.

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For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

Jere Mahaffey is a 35-year-old former Evangelical Christian. He's also an out, married gay/bisexual man who has retained many of the tenets of his early Christian faith, while leaving other elements of evangelical doctrine behind him.

As an adolescent, Jere was drawn initially to girls, and even had girlfriends while he was in junior high school. But eventually he discovered he found boys attractive as well.

Today, he and his partner, Jesse, have been together for nine years and married for four.

In this fascinating interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Jere talks about growing up in an Evangelical Christian household, about his love of God, his journey toward embracing his bisexual identity, and about being both Queer and Christian.

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For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

Connor Ryan is an 18-year-old transgender male and 2022 graduate of Bourne High School in Bourne, MA.

He's also one of three recipients of the 2022 Anne Toran scholarship, an award given annually by PFLAG Cape Cod to high school seniors from the Cape in recognition of their courage and work on behalf of LGBTQ+ rights.

In this insightful interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Connor talks about the time during his high school career when he boldly confronted a school committee member at a school board meeting about her transphobic remarks on social media.

He also talks about his gender identity "journey of discovery" that has taken him, in his words, from "one end of the LGBTQ+ spectrum to the other."

Assigned female at birth, Connor thought, at one point in his life, that he was a "demi-girl" – somewhat like a girl, but not entirely. He later determined he felt more like a "demi-boy" who identifies mostly with things masculine.

As he prepares in the fall of 2022 to go off to college at the University of New Hampshire, Connor describes himself as a Transman and says he's focused these days on keeping a sense of humor about his gender identity and learning to be his own best friend in the process!

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For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

Lilith Rose is a twenty-something individual who identifies as transgender and non-binary. At the time of this interview, they had also just been named executive director of PFLAG San Francisco.

Lilith grew up in what she describes as a toxic home environment. Born anatomically male, they first came out as gay before eventually discovering they are transgender.

Today, Lilith is committed to educating others about the LGBTQ+ world. A professional speaker and blogger, they speak frequently on topics of social justice and teenage mental illness before audiences of educators, students, faith leaders, and others.

In this wide-ranging interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Lilith talks about their own struggles with mental illness, with anxiety, ADHD, and depression. And all that came before confronting their challenges with sexual orientation and gender identity.

Lilith also talks about the challenges of coming out to friends and family as a transgender person, developing healthy self-esteem and self-acceptance, and living and dating as a transgender person in what is still largely a sexually binary world, even in San Francisco.

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For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

In October 1998, Matthew Shepard, a 21-year-old student at the University of Wyoming, was brutally attacked and tied to a fence outside of Laramie, Wyoming. Five days later he died of deep wounds inflicted in one of the most vicious anti-gay attacks in American history.

In this wide-ranging interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Jeff Mack, a personal friend of Matt's and today the Executive Vice President of the Matthew Shepard Foundation, talks movingly about Matt, his life, and the Foundation started by his parents, Judy and Dennis Shepard, just months after Matt's gruesome death.

Jeff talks about the foundation's ongoing work to combat hate and prejudice. He talks, too, about the Laramie Project, a now famous play by Moises Kaufman about the city and its residents that was produced after Matthew's murder. And finally, Jeff talks about the day, in 2018, 20 years after his death, when Matthew was finally laid to rest in the safe sanctuary of Washington DC's National Cathedral.

Please click the button to subscribe so you don't miss any episodes and leave a review if your favorite podcast app has that ability. Thank you!

For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

Alex Hagler is a Latin and history teacher at a prestigious private school outside Boston. They're also the recent co-founder of their school's first Gay Straight Alliance.

GSA's (also known as Genders & Sexualities Alliances) operate in many school systems across the country today. As clubs, they're intended to serve as safe spaces for LGBTQ+ youth in middle schools and high schools. Increasingly, however, they're also serving as catalysts for social, racial, and gender justice.

In this interview, conducted just after they founded their school's GSA Chapter, Alex talks with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce about the valuable role GSAs can play in schools today. Not just as safe places for young people to be affirmed in their sexual orientation and gender identity, but also as resources for educating entire communities about human sexuality, sexual orientation, and gender diversity.

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For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

Imagine being in a traditional heterosexual marriage for many years and then discovering that your husband or wife is gay or lesbian.

What would you think? How would you react? What would you do? And where would you go to get help and find understanding in dealing with your situation?

In the late 1980s, Kimberly Brooks Mazella found herself in this very situation, after being married to her husband Rob for less than three years.

Today, she is a McLean, VA-based counselor and therapist who specializes in working with individuals and couples who find themselves in "mixed sexual orientation" marriages.

In this fascinating interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Kimberly describes the complicated psychological dynamics at play within mixed sexual orientation marriages. She explains the challenges for both the gay partner and the straight spouse in navigating these situations. And, she talks about why it's so important that the pain and perspectives of both parties in such relationships be respected, acknowledged, and seen as valid in their own respective ways.

Please click the button to subscribe so you don't miss any episodes and leave a review if your favorite podcast app has that ability. Thank you!

For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

"Vernon Diannah Porter" is probably not a name you readily recognize. But that's because he's much better known by his stage name and alter ego, "Lady Di", host of the popular Friday evening radio show, Leggs Up and Dancing, on WOMR-FM in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

Lady Di has been a popular fixture at WOMR for the last 22 years. Each week, she hosts her show from her home in Sandwich, MA, playing music -- mostly from the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s, -- all the while presiding over a one-person house party that she enthusiastically invites all her listeners to attend.

And her fans? They're both numerous and diverse. Young and old, they include lots of members of Provincetown's LGBTQ+ community but also legions of loyal straight listeners, as well as veterans, active-duty military, and fans who live as far away as Spain and Guam.

During her show, Lady Di makes her audience feel very much at home, calling listeners "Honey" and "Darling."

And more often than not, when on air, she can be heard singing along – often off key – with the likes of Connie Francis and Anne Murray, the latter of whom was a childhood friend back in their hometown of Spring Hill, Nova Scotia.

But Lady Di is much more than her on-air persona might imply.

Besides being one of P'town's most recognizable public figures, she's also a life coach, a prodigious fundraiser for local causes, and a minister who's officiated at over 900 straight and same-sex weddings.

In this wide-ranging interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Lady Di talks not only about the public personality all of her listeners know, but also about more private matters …

How she was bullied and made fun of as a kid. Why she's been described by others as "gender-gifted." Why she finds such a strong sense of purpose in helping members of the LGBTQ+ community embrace their true identity. And finally about her battle with cancer.

Please click the button to subscribe so you don't miss any episodes and leave a review if your favorite podcast app has that ability. Thank you!

For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

Some life partners first spot each other from across a crowded room. But not Helen Malone. With a piece of birthday cake in hand, she literally bumped into her future wife, Jane Martin from behind, at a birthday party for a mutual friend back in 2002.

From the moment they met, the lives of both women changed rapidly.

And while their lives today on Cape Cod -- with three dogs – seems like the picture of domestic bliss, their back stories include marriages by both women to former husbands... three kids of Helen's – one by artificial insemination... Jane's journey to becoming a parent, and even a child custody battle that, at one point in their relationship, tested Helen and Jane's collective mettle.

In this interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Jane and Helen, together now for over 19 years, describe what they say are the secrets to creating and sustaining a loving, long-term lesbian marriage.

What matters most, they say, are good communication, patience, compromise, and the courage and confidence to be yourself.

Please click the button to subscribe so you don't miss any episodes and leave a review if your favorite podcast app has that ability. Thank you!

For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod

Dr. Joan Beilstein is a Lesbian Episcopal Priest, and Rector of the Church of the Ascension in Silver Spring MD. Today, though a senior, well-respected pastor in the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, DC, there was a time when Joan was rejected by her own priest for being gay. And even after being ordained a priest herself in 1994, Joan struggled to find employment, because no one wanted to hire an openly lesbian priest. In this revealing interview with PFLAG Cape Cod's Rick Koonce, Joan looks back on a storied career that has spanned nearly 30 years. And she talks movingly about how, for her, human sexuality, sexual orientation, gender identity, and spirituality are all beautifully and inextricably intertwined.

Please click the button to subscribe so you don't miss any episodes and leave a review if your favorite podcast app has that ability. Thank you!

For more information, visit the PFLAG Cape Cod website: https://www.pflagcapecod.org/podcasts.html

© 2022 PFLAG Cape Cod