{"podcast":{"title":"Coming Out & Beyond | Support for Women Questioning Their Sexuality","slug":"coming-out-beyond-support-for-women-questioning-their-sexuality-3916256","podcast_index_feed_id":3916256,"rss_url":"https://rss.pdrl.fm/61288f/feeds.captivate.fm/comingoutandbeyond/","website_url":"https://annemariezanzal.com/coming-out-stories-beyond-podcast/","image_url":"https://artwork.captivate.fm/baa17cb3-0a45-417c-abd2-7bef950f96a4/Z7j4qj8k47aF8JnsB9FSHKaU.png","author":"Anne-Marie Zanzal 1ac1f670-c17c-11f0-806a-ef1502adef07","episode_count":189,"summary":"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-…","last_synced_at":"2026-07-24T12:21:24.406773+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/coming-out-beyond-support-for-women-questioning-their-sexuality-3916256"},"episode":{"title":"Clarity Is a Thousand Small Permissions","slug":"clarity-is-a-thousand-small-permissions","published_at":"2026-05-01T04:00:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/coming-out-beyond-support-for-women-questioning-their-sexuality-3916256/clarity-is-a-thousand-small-permissions","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/coming-out-beyond-support-for-women-questioning-their-sexuality-3916256","url":"https://youtu.be/g2AGyBj8JXU","audio_url":"https://episodes.captivate.fm/episode/f80aae2c-d14c-4bb5-bf7e-9b5af8673243.mp3","summary":"Join the 3-Day Clarity Experience , May 5–7. A live space for women in the long middle who are ready to stop doing it alone — not to get a fix, but to sit with the questions alongside a community of women in exactly the same place. Standard admission is $47, or $87 for VIP, which includes a private 45-minute call with Anne-Marie. https://annemariezanzal.com/3-day-clarity-experience/ The fantasy is that one day you wake up and everything snaps into place — the marriage, the friendships, the way you dress, the way you pray. What nobody tells us is that for most of us, becoming happens at the speed of a glacier, not a lightning bolt. In this month's conversation, Anne-Marie Zanzal sits down with returning guest Anna Empey to explore the long middle — the space between knowing and acting, between the question and the certainty. They talk about why coming out is the end of the beginning, not the end of the story; why \"I don't know yet\" is a complete and honest answer; and why the grand reinvention is really a thousand small permissions stacked on top of each other. The conversation moves into the nervous system response that comes with this kind of change — the sleep that won't come, the body that won't settle — and the practices that help women stay with themselves while everything is moving. Anne-Marie and Anna also get into shame versus guilt, the cultural script that says coming out is only for the young, and why no one has to blow up her life to live an honest one. Whether a listener is four months into claiming a new identity or has been sitting with the question for years, this conversation is a reminder that she is not behind. She is already becoming. Coming Out & Beyond is available on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, with full video episodes on YouTube: https://you…","meta_description":"Join the 3-Day Clarity Experience , May 5–7. A live space for women in the long middle who are ready to stop doing it alone — not to get a fix, but to sit…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":2523,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/coming-out-beyond-support-for-women-questioning-their-sexuality-3916256/episodes/clarity-is-a-thousand-small-permissions/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/coming-out-beyond-support-for-women-questioning-their-sexuality-3916256/clarity-is-a-thousand-small-permissions.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}