The guests at Lemarc & Michael’s wedding, sitting altogether in a circle of trust.
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Lemarc: I’m this skinny little, very very very very effeminate child, with a very girly voice. So most people would not know whether I’m a boy or a girl. I mean, they would think I’m a boy, but then I would start talking and they’d be like, “Uh, are you a girl or are you a boy? I’m not sure.” And—
Lila: Did the adults ask you that?
Lemarc: Sometimes. But often the kids would. So I think that identity was a little bit challenging I think, as a child, to know, it’s like Wait a minute, am I a girl? I don’t know. I think I’m in the wrong body maybe. So I think for a long time, I actually felt that, that— and my sister was a tomboy, so she loved to play football, and she, you know, would be riding on motorcycles, and anything that was a bit adventurous and dangerous and boyish, she would do— I mean typically boyish, and, anything that was typically girlish, I’m like, okay, cheerleading, and dancing. I gave all of my toys away, because, why would I need toys? (both laugh) So I often felt like I was meant to be her and she was meant to be me. I should have had her body and she should have had mine.
Lila: Did she feel the same way, do you think?
Lemarc: I think sometimes people said that to us but I don’t think she did. I mean she was— when I had these thoughts, then she was— four years older is quite significant, so I think then she accepted her, or probably had accepted her body more, and then when I became a teenager, or maybe from 17+ actually then, I really accepted mine and, and really wanted to be a boy.
Hello my horizontal loyalists, my dearest patrons, my horizontalists.
Welcome to your first exclusive episode of Season 4, my Season of Experiments. As you know by now, I’ll be playing with form in all sorts of ways: with coaching sessions and mash-ups and crossovers, happenings and themes and advice sessions, horizontality in unexpected places, and other intimate surprises. Season 4 will also be interspersed with some of the traditional horizontal conversations that you love. This is one of those.
In the first four episodes of this season, I (virtually) lie down with Lemarc Thomas, global matchmaker, relationship expert, sweetheart, psychology-versed purveyor of kindness, native St. Helenian, marriage equality advocate, husband to Michael, and “the gentle but determined Cupid.”
In our first part, episode 112. broken a few hearts, Lemarc interviewed me as if I were his newest matchmaking client. It is one of the most vulnerable episodes I’ve ever released.
In our second part, episode 113. other people’s love, I interviewed Lemarc about his modern matchmaking process.
In this, our third part (recorded before parts one and two), we talk about:
- growing up as an effeminate boy on a very small island
- being a free-range child
- belonging & feeling felt
- the older women who confided in little Lemarc
- how he treated everyone in London as a friend
- losing oneself in groups
- leaving St. Helena and becoming a full-pledged gay
- what happens when women flirt with him
- the Owning Your Femininity workshop that made Lemarc weep
- & the fact that we don’t have to be perfectly healed to be worthy of a relationship
If you’d like one-on-one guidance from me on your intimate struggles, I now offer Personal Intimacy Roadmap Sessions: sex-positive support for what ails you in the realm of sex, love, & relationships of all kinds. 60-minute sessions with a takeaway plan.
I invite you, my patrons & ardent horizontalists, to take me up on one of these sessions on a sliding scale or half-rate, in gratitude for your loving support of the horizontal arts.
To schedule, email me: lila@horizontalwithlila.com, and I’ll send you my intake form, so I can best prepare for you.
If you desire ongoing support of your intimate growth, join the $100 Patreon tier and receive a 30-minute coaching session every month!
In next week’s exclusive episode, Lemarc tells us the epic tale of his romance with Michael, and how they became the very first same-sex couple to get married on the island of St. Helena.
Thank you for listening, and thank you for being my horizontal lover.
Now come lie down with us again, in Uluwatu, Bali, Indonesia, and Stockholm, Sweden.
Links to Useful Things:
Lemarc Thomas – The Matchmaking Agency’s website
The Lemarc Thomas Matchmaking Instagram
Eve Ensler’s TED talk Embrace your inner girl
Lemarc invites any horizontal lovers who wish to apply for his network / open membership to: Get in touch and say you are horizontal!
Show Notes:
(if you quote from this resource, link to the post or the horizontal Patreon!)
[4:32] Lemarc on his home island of St. Helena
[9:58] The landscape of Lemarc’s household growing up
[11:57] Lemarc on his parents
Lemarc: They’re still together, and they’ve been together for like a million years, and (Lila giggles) yeah. I think it’s a different time though, you know. I think when they got together, marriage really is forever, and you stick it out. There is not the idea that you will divorce, you, you go through everything. It’s, it’s a commitment. And I can really see that in them, that they will be together forever.
Lila: That out is not an option for them.
Lemarc: No! And I think when I was younger, I kind of looked at them and thought like, Maybe they would… What if they were not together? What if they would choose different lives? And then I think, I remember looking at them in like difficult times, and thinking Wow, they are — they love each other so much and they are so tight and, you know, what would they do without each other? So I think that’s kind of, quite sweet as well to see that commitment, when, in today’s world we can… sometimes leave a relationship way too easily, before we’ve put in the work and before we’ve tried to… to make it work.
Lila: And I think part of that is— at least part of it, is that most of us don’t have models like you have of your parents. Most of us don’t see, haven’t seen, couples that stuck it out, haven’t had the opportunity to speak to … dyads, who have chosen to stay in, and not take an out… Not that that’s always a good idea, but just I think there’s, there’s so few models like that, that exist now, that most of us haven’t witnessed one or haven’t come in close contact with one.
Lemarc: Yeah, definitely. But that’s why it’s such a good idea to have lots of different role models around you so that you really see different ways of living, different examples of relationships, different examples of parenthood. I really do believe that— in the cliche that it takes a village to raise a child because, when you’re limited to just these, you know, two people, who are going to be flawed in their own special way, then, that’s the only way your body knows. And how limiting is that for us?
[14:32] Lemarc and his sisters (esque)
[15:03] Growing up as a free-range child, and strangers
Lemarc: I think it was a beautiful childhood in lots of ways because it’s so free. You know, you don’t— no one locks their doors, you can, there’s so many kids around to play with. You have such a connection with nature, and community. It’s not so isolated as I see in city life, and I think even with— when you have animals or, when you have pets — the pets even roam free. You don’t have them stuck in your, in your apartment. I didn’t know it at the time, of course, but when I look back I think it’s such a beautiful way to bring up a, a child, in such a safe environment where… you’re not scared of people! You’re not scared of these strangers— who might hurt you when you go out the door? Who might grab you or whathaveyou. You know everyone. I think it’s quite sad when we look at strangers as people who are scary, when I’ve grown up where everyone around me is someone who I know, or I know their family, someone who is a part of the community. And I remember when I went to the UK, for the— what wasn’t the first time but to live, when I was 17 years old. And, I still had that idea that everybody around me was non-threatening, and, like, a friend! So I would have no problem when I went to a bar and there’s an empty seat at a table full of people, I would say, “Can I sit there? Can I sit with you?”
Lila: (delighted) Ohhhhh! Ohhhh I love it!
Lemarc: And I would! And I mean, this is London; you don’t really do that.
Lila: But you diiid!
Lemarc: Yeah, absolutely. And I didn’t realize that it was, that it was strange. I… whoever was around me, I would talk to them. And then I ended up with a lot of— I probably ended up with too many friends. Because I spoke to everyone, and my friends would, when we were going to a class at university would get so annoyed because I would end up stopping and talking to everyone (laughing) and they’re like, “Right! This is enough! I’m not walking with you anymore!”
Lila: (giggling) You became like the Mayor! Oh that’s, oh it’s so, it’s so charming, it’s so lovely that you were able to have that upbringing. There’s so few free-range children these days!
[18:07] Lila on growing up & loneliness in the suburbs of New York
[19:11] How quickly London shifted Lemarc’s sense of strangers
Lemarc: For me, you know, growing up in such a, as a free-range kid as you (giggles) call it, I had this mentality, but when I went to the UK, I don’t think it took very long before I realized that I was strange, and, before I started to adapt to this way of life where, you don’t talk to people, and you don’t look at people in the eye and you kind of, close off from them and now I, I think I’m almost the opposite, where I would not… approach someone, and you know, probably actively avoid contact with (laughs) random, random strangers. And I wish I could, you know get back to that knowledge, that everybody is a friend.
[20:26] Lila on good company, poor company, and owning her part
[22:30] Loneliness in paradise
Lila: You know? We’re relational creatures, and, paradise is less than paradise without great company to share it with.
[25:34] Lemarc on belonging & feeling felt
Lemarc: In attachment studies, there is the term called “feeling felt.” Not just to be seen, but to feel felt. And I think that when we feel felt by other people around us, it’s like, just sinking into a nest of belonging… and, the soul needs that.
[26:41] Lemarc on moving to Sweden and having (almost) no connections
[28:06] Lila’s working definition of poor company
Lila: Poor company is when you feel you don’t belong.
[29:57] Lila on having an abundance of alone time
[30:22] How difficult it can be to make friends in Sweden
Lemarc: I had this conversation with someone recently, other people who have moved to Sweden and we were talking about how difficult it is to integrate into Swedish culture and to get a friendship group here, because there’s a lot of ice to break before you get, to the hearts of the Swedes. (laughs)
Lila: (laughing) Oh my goodness yes!
Lemarc: And you know, I kind of came to that, it is a small city, and the people that are here, they may have their friends that they’ve had for all of their lives, like they don’t actually need us; they don’t need new people coming into their lives. And I was left with: if, we really want to have a good social circle, to connect with them, then it is really up to us to make that effort and to knock on that door again and again and again until, they, see me! (laughing) And then they, you know, feel me and that connection is made, if I want that, because it’s so easy to, feel that sense of I don’t belong, to feel rejected, to feel like, Okay, I’ve called you two times now, but, when are you going to invite me out? And I think maybe I had the safety of my partner at home so I didn’t— I think I probably would’ve made more effort if, I was here, alone. But I started to feel as if there was a part of me that was just expecting people to invite me in, rather than me having to make the effort to make those connections, if that makes sense.
[32:04] Lila on effort and vulnerability (how much is too much?)
[33:30] Lemarc on belonging in too many groups, merging, and the technique he used in order not to lose his roots
[37:12] The older women who confided in little Lemarc at his family’s convenience store
Egads, little Lemarc is the adorablest
[39:00] On being an effeminate boy with a tomboy sister
Lemarc: I’m this skinny little, very very very very effeminate child, with a very girly voice. So most people would not know whether I’m a boy or a girl. I mean, they would think I’m a boy, but then I would start talking and they’d be like, “Uh, are you a girl or are you a boy? I’m not sure.” And—
Lila: Did the adults ask you that?
Lemarc: Sometimes. But often the kids would. So I think that identity was a little bit challenging I think, as a child, to know, it’s like Wait a minute, am I a girl? I don’t know. I think I’m in the wrong body maybe. So I think for a long time, I actually felt that, that— and my sister was a tomboy, so she loved to play football, and she, you know, would be riding on motorcycles, and anything that was a bit adventurous and dangerous and boyish, she would do— I mean typically boyish, and, anything that was typically girlish, I’m like, okay, cheerleading, and dancing. I gave all of my toys away, because, why would I need toys? (both laugh) So I often felt like I was meant to be her and she was meant to be me. I should have had her body and she should have had mine.
Lila: Did she feel the same way, do you think?
Lemarc: I think sometimes people said that to us but I don’t think she did. I mean she was— when I had these thoughts, then she was— four years older is quite significant, so I think then she accepted her, or probably had accepted her body more, and then when I became a teenager, or maybe from 17+ actually then, I really accepted mine and, and really wanted to be a boy.
[42:09] Lemarc on gay role models
Lemarc: (facetious) There are no gay people on St. Helena; I mean, you know, of course gay doesn’t exist there. (laughing)
Lila: Oh goodness, really?
Lemarc: Yeah I mean when you talk about what you learn about relationships from the people around you, they were all heterosexual, traditional, old school relationships that were around me. Gay was definitely something that was weird and unknown and strange.
Lila: How did you even know that anybody could be gay if you didn’t see it? (underlapping) How did you hear about it?
Lemarc: (overlapping) I always knew I was gay. I mean I didn’t have a label for it of course but I was always wanting to be a girl, I mean that, I think that was my— as a young child, I didn’t know that it was gay, it was that I’m in the wrong body.
Lila: But it also isn’t necessarily, because it very well could have been a gender issue and not a sexuality issue.
[43:09] What it would have done for little Lemarc if he’d been allowed to dress as a girl
Lemarc: Oh, I think it would have done wonderful things. I often feel that one of the things that was missing in my childhood was exploration. The freedom of self-expression. There was a part of me that was not accepted in society. There’s a part of me that’s wrong and defective. And therefore, it will stay inside of me and it’s a secret, and I will not show anyone, even though I know everybody around me can see it, I’m still gonna pretend that it’s not there. […]
[44:33] How Lemarc’s family & St. Helenian community reacted to his sexuality & effeminate nature
[47:20] (Cont’d) What it would have done for little Lemarc if he’d been allowed to dress as a girl
Lemarc: I do think that there are two sides to this, and that one side is that I would have had that freedom to express this part of me that I had kept hidden, and I think within that, then I would have understood my own needs and boundaries a bit more. And instead I think, rather than knowing my own needs and boundaries, I am focused on other people’s, so I can easily sense, if you’re in front of me, I know what you need before I know what I need. The other part that I struggle with is that I don’t want to be a girl. I just thought that I wanted to be a girl because I didn’t know that there was anything between girl and boy. And maybe, being able to explore being a girl, I would have got there, but I think, what I actually needed was to know what was in between boy and girl. And that that was okay. And that was still beautiful. And, that was accepted.
Lila: Or that the things that you were taught that related to girls and boys were not true! Were just imposed! Made-up, really.
Lemarc: Absolutely. Tell me that! Like 20 years ago!
[49:15] When Lemarc does his inner child work, what does his inner child need to hear?
[50:26] Lila paraphrases from Eve Ensler’s TED talk Embrace your inner girl. The direct quote is: “I think the whole world has essentially been brought up not to be a girl. How do we bring up boys? What does it mean to be a boy? To be a boy really means not to be a girl. To be a man means not to be a girl. To be a woman means not to be a girl. To be strong means not to be a girl. To be a leader means not to be a girl. I actually think that being a girl is so powerful that we’ve had to train everyone not to be that.”
[51:40] The Owning Your Femininity Workshop that made Lemarc weep, and how the gay community treats femme gay men
[55:22] Lemarc’s teenage attraction to his heterosexual best friend
[56:24] When Lemarc became a full-pledged gay
[56:52] On no longer being attracted to women
[57:29] Lemarc has a revelation about why he isn’t as comfortable with women, physically, as he used to be
[59:02] Lila on the possibility of sliding along the Kinsey scale throughout our lives
[1:02:09] Lemarc on his attachment style
[1:03:37] Lemarc on the two attachment style tactics
[1:04:53] The exercise (of mirroring, validating, & giving empathy) that Lemarc & Michael did in pre-marital therapy, which showed him how healing relationshipping can be
