Comedian Ellen DeGeneres

Love, Ellen: A Mother/Daughter Journey

Review of book by actress Ellen DeGeneres’ mother

Ellen DeGeneres’ “coming out’ as a lesbian has been presented to the public as a simple case of “she finally admitted her lesbianism and came out of the closet.” But Ellen’s “coming out” turns out to be as mysterious and ambiguous as that of Ellen’s former girlfriend, Anne Heche.

Ellen’s mother, Betty DeGeneres, was interviewed by the lesbian magazine, Curve, and she was asked about Ellen’s process of growing up:

“Did you have any idea Ellen was gay before she came out to you? No: Her announcement to me was completely unexpected. Looking back, were there clues you might have picked on, had you been looking? The only clue was that she was a tomboy, but that’s not really a clue. Lots of little girls go through tomboy stages. In high school Ellen dated and had boyfriends. I don’t think there were clues.” (Curve, May 1999, pg. 19)

Let us look at Ellen’s life and see how Ellen became a “lesbian.” Betty’s book on Ellen’s life is now a best seller among lesbian books. (Curve, July 1999, pg. 34)

Childhood—As a child, Ellen displayed strong signs of heterosexuality:

“Ellen was a placid, happy baby from the start—and a pretty, chubby, blond little toddler whose piercing blue eyes always seemed older than her years. They could twinkle mischievously one moment and fill with sensitive tears the next. As a little girl, she adored two things above all else: her baby dolls and her big brother, Vance.” (Love, Ellen: A Mother/Daughter Journey, by Betty DeGeneres; New York: Rob Weisbach Books, 1999, pg. 70)

In the picture section in the middle of her book, Betty DeGeneres shows Ellen hugging a doll. The caption reads, “Still-life with Ellen, her ever-present baby doll, and loving dad.” (Ibid., second page of the picture section between pages 148 and 149)

In another picture on the same page, Ellen is shown in a dress and with her pretty blond hair in curls—very much a typical little girl. The caption says,

“Like mother, like daughter, I liked my doll a lot, too.” (Ibid.)

Ellen is clearly shown to be a typical little girl in her childhood, displaying typical, heterosexual female interests.

Adolescence—As Ellen became an adolescent, all the signs of Ellen’s heterosexuality were abundantly clear, as Betty DeGeneres relates. Boys were Ellen’s focus, just like other teenage girls: “So El and I often spent our leisure hours as a twosome, enjoying each other’s company. As she blossomed into her girl-next-door good looks, she was well-liked by boys, and she would tell me about her crushes—mainly on famous rock stars.” (Ibid., pg.106)

Ellen was obviously attracted to boys as an adolescent. However, Ellen felt turmoil in her adolescent life: “She would later tell the interviewer Judd Rose on his PrimeTime Live profile of her that the divorce and our constant moves were very hard on her—she was always having to adjust to a new group of kids, always feeling a little different.” (Ibid., pg. 107)

Ellen seemed “normal” in high school, dating boys and playing on the tennis team, but feeling “different” because of family situations: “In high school, El had the usual dates and boyfriends. Yes, one beau did put her name in iridescent letters on the back of his pickup, ‘right above the gun rack’ as Ellen would later quip. In her senior year, there was even a promise ring with a tiny diamond chip from a nice-looking boy. They went steady for several months.” (Ibid., pg. 117)

Tragedy for Two—What, then, could have pushed Ellen into homosexuality? There are two awful incidents in Ellen’s life which may give us the answer. When Betty expressed to Ellen that she was think of divorcing Ellen’s stepfather, (called “B.” in the book), Ellen makes a startling revelation of previous molestation:

“Unbeknownst to me until 1981, Ellen had been keeping another secret, about two ordeals she had suffered with B. when she was in high school. Had I been in a happy, healthy marriage, she may have chosen never to tell me. As it was, on one visit I told her that B. and I weren’t getting along well, but the last thing I wanted was another marital failure. I confided in Ellen that I just didn’t have the resolve to leave and live on my own.

Ellen’s face showed her disappointment. ‘You deserve better, Mother,’ she said. ‘El,’ I said, “he has his good qualities. And we love our home.’ And besides, I added, ‘Whatever his faults, I know he loves me a lot.’

That’s when Ellen shook her head, sighed, and told me what had happened one day not long after my mastectomy, when she was seventeen years old. The words didn’t come easily. She began, ‘He asked to feel my breast. You were taking a shower.”

She stopped. I looked at her incredulously. What was she saying? Ellen went on. ‘He said you were worried about your other breast and he wanted to feel mine to see if yours was like mine.’

I felt sick to my stomach. What a horrible experience for her! How could she say no? She was only seventeen at that time, and she was used to confiding in me about everything. But for five years she had said nothing.

Now I spoke with effort, asking, ‘Why didn’t you tell me this before?’ (Ibid., pg. 164)

Ellen started to cry, ‘After what you’d been through, I couldn’t hurt you like that…and then…’ Her voice trailed off. ‘Something else?’ I asked. El looked around helplessly, as if wishing she didn’t have to tell me. Then she nodded. There was something else, she said, a lot worse, that hap- pened about a year later. One weekend when I had to fly down to New Orleans because Mother was ill, B. gave Ellen a ride home from the movies and made a pass at her. Still crying, El said, ‘I pushed him away. He let it go but when we got home, inside the house, he tried again.’ She paused, composing herself.

I was furious, confused, and bewildered. ‘And then what happened?’ I asked with dread. ‘I ran into my room and locked the door. I was terrified. When he tried to force it open, I climbed out the window.’ She spent that night at a friend’s house. ‘Oh, Ellen, I’m so sorry,’ I said, hugging her. ‘I’m so sorry.’

The pain of what she had gone through tore me up. I hurt even more to know that she had carried the burden of her secret, unable to tell anyone, and it touched me beyond words that she had done so because her concern for me and my well-being was so great.

It is as painful for me to write about this today as it was to hear about it almost two decades ago. Of course, I was angry and disgusted with B. But more that anything, I blamed myself. Most of all I blamed myself for being so oblivious. ‘I should have known,’ I kept saying. ‘I should have known.’ (Ibid., pg. 165)

I thought back to El’s senior year when she suddenly wanted to drop out of school and return to New Orleans. Absolutely not, I had said, putting my foot down and insisting that she graduate. It made no sense to me at the time. Now I understood why she was so anxious to get away.” (Ibid., pg. 166)

Betty reveals her weakness for denial in dealing with problems in her life, especially about Ellen. Betty is right. Ellen did have a “horrible experience,” she did go through great pain. She did carry the “burden of her awful secret,” so much so that Ellen wanted to drop out of high school and leave home. It was only after these incidents that Ellen also decided that she would no longer seek affection from boyfriends. She now turned to women for affection, for the first time.

Betty explains her past denial:

“In all honesty, I would rather not have included these events in my story of myself as Everymom. That probably comes from my old tendency for denial, for a pretense of normality in which such things just do not happen. Well, they did and they do. And, after some deliberation, I chose to talk about them in this context in the hope that some other mother—or any reader—who might be in denial will pay attention to instinct and act on it…” (Ibid.)

Denial— But Betty still has her “old tendency for denial.” She is still trying to make “a pretense of normality” for Ellen’s lesbianism. In spite of all the evidence that Ellen was clearly heterosexual until the incidents of molestation, Betty has desperately swallowed the gay propaganda myth of “born gay” (to make Ellen and herself seem normal). Betty has been drawn down into co-dependent relationships with her daughter and with gay activists and has become an active part of their desperate denial.

Betty also is aware of the sexual fluidity of Anne Heche—Ellen’s celebrated girlfriend. Anne had been heterosexual, but she felt her first same-sex attractions when she met Ellen. Anne had a confusing childhood; her father turned out to be “gay” and died of AIDS. (The Advocate, 6-24-97, pg. 43) Then, one dysfunctional life intersected with another: Anne met Ellen:

“After all, up until that night, Anne was known as heterosexual.

But Anne’s position was, and is, that love and attraction aren’t about these distinctions.” (Ibid., pg. 247)

Betty and Ellen have found a new closet to hide in—the closet of denial and co-dependency—trying to excuse and justify the condition of homosexuality and its dysfunctional causes. Now, they are trying to drag the media and the public down into the same closet of denial and co-dependency. But people are not born gay, and Ellen and Anne are proof of that.