Ellen And Wife Talk Gay Marriage

Ellen DeGeneres and her wife Portia De Rossi opened up to Oprah yesterday about their marriage, and dealing with their relationship while De Rossi was still closeted.

They were on the show to show off Ellen’s cover on ‘O’ magazine’s holiday edition.

De Rossi indicated that throughout her stint on ‘Ally McBeal,’ where she played Nell Porter, she was still hiding the fact that she was gay because of fear. It took her meeting and falling in love with Ellen DeGeneres to come out of the closet.

She told Oprah that she had fallen in love with Ellen “when I first laid eyes on her,” but it took her three years to tell her how she felt. “I was not living as an openly gay person…I was very very afraid if I talked about being gay it would be the end of my career. So, I wasn’t about to then date the most famous lesbian in the world.”

DeGeneres also spoke about being closeted and coming out herself. “Having that secret - they’re gonna laugh at me they’re not gonna like me - that’s a lot to carry around…I think I found who I was and I try to be a better person every day.”

What made De Rossi take the leap? “I faced one of my fears to do it and [Ellen] did this for me because I felt this overwhelming connection with her and I didn’t wanna miss out. The love overcame the fear for me.”

Portia and De Rossi married in 2008, before the right for gays to marry was revoked by Proposition 8 in California.

Check out Ellen and Oprah’s special edition

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