Chris Appleton reflects on coming out to his kids: 'I was feeling shame for them'
Appleton opened up about his nearly two-decade coming out journey on the Aug. 6 episode of 'On Purpose with Jay Shetty. ' Appleton explained that by the time he was 26, and after being in therapy and moving to Los Angeles, he couldn't keep his secret inside any longer — but he was still nervous about telling his kids.
'My biggest focus in life is being a great dad to two kids, and any parent out there can connect to that. I will always put them before myself,' he said. 'The difficulty with shame is it's very difficult to heal when I wasn't just feeling my shame. I was feeling shame for them.'
Appleton, now 42, explained he first told his former partner of nine years, Kate Katon.
'That was a process, and I also had to respect that she needed to go through her own grief,' he said.
'I loved her, I really loved her,' he added. 'And I didn't want to be gay, I didn't want to be different.'
After he told Katon, Appleton said he told his family, and then came what he called the 'hardest part': telling his two children, Billy and Kitty-blu.
'My job as a dad, I felt, was to protect my kids. Going through what I went through as a kid, being bullied was horrible,' Appleton said. 'My childhood was a lot of memories are not great ones, so the idea of bringing that to my kids was really painful to feel that they would get bullied because their dad was gay.
'I know the things that kids say, and I know how mean they can be, and I just didn't want them to ever have that shame that was put on me, onto them,' he added of his kids.
Appleton said that when he sat down with his former partner to tell his two children, he couldn't say the words.
'I think maybe a lot of people can relate to this. Initially, saying the words 'I'm gay' is a challenge, because once those words are out, it's done,' he said. 'I actually didn't say it. Kate's mom actually said it.
'And then I just saw these two beautiful kids who were, like, 6 and 8, and they were just they were upset, because they knew I was upset, and they were confused,' he continued. 'And all of a sudden, I just felt like I'd just messed their life up, and I felt like I'd failed as a dad, because my job was to protect them, and if anyone ever hurt them, I would protect them. I was the one hurting them, and I couldn't understand that. I also just couldn't hide I was gay anymore.'
After he told his kids, Appleton said he 'just shut down' and left to go on a drive.
He said he thought, 'It would be better for them to have a dad that was dead than a dad that was gay.'
Appleton said he had painkillers and a bottle of alcohol and checked into a hotel room. He explained he called his former partner and 'apologized for the pain' he had caused and later woke up in a hospital room.
'Something changed then, and it was really powerful, because I realized I couldn't hate myself any more than I had, and I couldn't try and stop being gay anymore,' Appleton said.
'I just remember thinking, 'What about if I just surrender?'' he added. ''What about if I'm just gay and I just be that?' I don't really know where to begin with it, and I don't know where it's going to lead me, but it has to be better than what I've been doing.'
In that moment, Appleton said he 'decided to live.'
'I think that's the moment where I went back to that 8-year-old boy standing in the window and allowed himself to be seen. That was the beginning of it all, really,' he said. 'So although it was one of the darkest nights of my life, I think it was a turning point.'
'I hope other people in watching this can maybe feel heard or seen and find the help they need,' he said. 'Even maybe it's a parent that is struggling understanding their child, to understand how dark it can be when you're left in silence and when you don't get to express who you truly are.'
Appleton said he is in 'a good place' now and added he will share more about his life in his upcoming book, 'Your Roots Don't Define You,' publishing in 2026.
He appeared on TODAY Aug. 7 and said the book is 'about finding your true self' and hopes it helps people who are 'silently struggling,' like he once was.
'I hope people, from this book, look in the mirror and actually finally see themselves,' he said, 'and see the version of themselves they can be.'
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