Mario Lavandeira aka Perez Hilton forces Meredith Baxter into admitting she is a lesbian. video

Meredith Baxter said, “To come out and disclose stuff is very antithetical to who I am.” I sure hope you’re proud of yourself Mario.

Every gay person believes it is their own choice and decision about coming out.

Every gay person except Mario Lavandeira aka Perez Hilton who claims he is gay, and yet he lacks compassion for other gays who he publicly bashes into coming out.

Meredith Baxter, who starred on the successful television series “Family Ties” became Mario’s target on Tuesday of this week when he posted photos of Meredith with her girlfriend Nancy.

This is nothing new for Mario, he forced Neil Patrick Harris and Lance Bass to out themselves as well.

And now Meredith was forced to publicly announced her sexuality because the rag-gossip media cannot be controlled, yet.

“I am a lesbian and it was a later-in-life recognition,” she told Matt Lauer on TODAY.  “Some people would say, well, you’re living a lie and, you know, the truth is – not at all.  This has only been for the past seven years.”

Meredith who is 62, was not ready to do this, and yet was forced because of the public tabloid chatter.   “I’ve always lived a very private life,” said the actress, who’s never even had a publicist.

“I did not want some tabloid to take the story and make it up — I wanted it to be in my own words,” she told Lauer.

Meredith has now had to explain her relationship with men, which says was complicated and took her decades to understand why.

In 1966 she married her first husband, Robert Lewis Bush, and they divorced five years later; she married her second husband David Birney in 1974, and they divorced in 1989; she married her third husband, Michael Blodgett, in 1995, and they divorced in 2000.

She explained that she deliberately chose to be with men with whom she clashed, so that she could blame them for the end of the relationship. “It never occurred to me to think, oh, [the problem is] me,” she said.

Then, seven years ago, she had a relationship with a woman and concluded that she was homosexual.  Suddenly, things seemed to make sense.

“I got involved with someone I never expected to get involved with, and it was that kind of awakening,” she said. “I never fought it because it was like, oh, I understand why I had the issues I had early in life. I had a great deal of difficulty connecting with men in relationships.”

Meredith has been with her girlfriend, Nancy, a contractor who she met through mutual friends, for the past four years.  Because Nancy is openly lesbian, their relationship has not been kept a closely guarded secret.

“I had to reach a level of comfort because it wasn’t fair to push her back into secrecy,” she said. “We live very out lives in Los Angeles.”

When “Family Ties” ended, Meredith went on to direct and star in several TV movies, winning a daytime Emmy award in 1993 for portraying a lesbian mom in the CBS School Break Special, “Other Mothers.”

These days, she’s taken on a few roles, including promoting her skin care line, Meredith Baxter Simple Works.

She is also a public speaker and advocate, traveling the country discussing her personal battles with breast cancer and alcoholism.

Now that she is coming out, she also sees herself as an advocate for gay rights.

“This is a political act, even though that’s not what it feels like to me,” she said. “If anyone knows someone who’s gay or lesbian … they’re less likely to vote against them to take away their rights. I can be that lesbian you know now…”