After three marriages and five kids, former television star Meredith Baxter has finally figured out she’s a lesbian. She also reveals in new interviews that she is an alcoholic, although she’s been sober for 19 years.
Baxter, 62, was outed, so to speak, not long ago when the National Enquirer reported that she had gone on a lesbian cruise with a gal pal.
But the former star of went public in a new interview with The Advocate, a gay oriented magazine. She also appeared today (Dec. 2) on NBC’s “Today Show” and was interviewed by Matt Lauer.
“I am a lesbian and it was a later-in-life recognition. Some people would say, well, you’re living a lie and, you know, the truth is not at all.
“I’ve always lived a very private life. To come out and disclose stuff is very antithetical to who I am,” she said.
Baxter said she clued in her family about seven years ago, and has been dating Nancy Locke, a 54-year-old contractor, for four years.
She told the Advocate she realized she was gay when she had an affair with a woman 13 years ago.
“It’s probably hard to imagine, but not once did it occur to me that I was a lesbian. Not once. I just thought, OK, I don’t think so, and went off and got married again for a short period of time,” she said.
“And a couple years after that, I entered my next foray into being with a woman, and the penny dropped at that point…” she said.
She said telling her friends and family was “absolute agony,” because she was fearful of being judged.
Her first marriage to Robert Lewis Bush in 1966 ended in divorce after two children in 1971. She then married actor David Birney, whom she met on the set of the sitcom “Bridget Loves Bernie.” They have three children.
In 1995 she married actor and screenwriter Michael Blodgett; they divorced in 2000. By then she already had had a lesbian affair, although she didn’t tell her family for two years after the marriage ended.
Baxter is best known for her television roles as Nancy Lawrence Maitland on the drama “Family” which ran 1976 to 1980. She received two Emmy Award nominations for her work.
In her most popular role she played ex-flower child Elyse Keaton on the sitcom “Family Ties,” which aired from 1982 to 1989. She was only 14 years older than Michael J. Fox, who played her son, Alex.
