(Screenshot via YouTube.)

Star Jones’ ex-husband Al Reynolds has come out as bisexual.

While co-hosting “The View,” Jones would frequently discuss her wedding and relationship with Reynolds. Jones and Reynolds married in 2004 and had a high-profile divorce in 2008. All of the speculation around their relationship was fueled by rumors that Reynolds was gay.

In an interview with Essence in 2009, Reynolds vehemently denied not being heterosexual.

“When it comes to people discussing my sexuality I’ve always taken the higher road, but I get very emotional about it. I’m tired of the disrespect. It has affected my professional career and life. It’s difficult when people are making up stories about you and lying about your sexuality,” Reynolds said.

Now speaking with Radar Online, Reynolds gets candid about his sexuality for the first time.

“Ever since I have been in the public eye, people have been speculating on my sexuality. And ‘speculating’ is a kind word for how it actually played out. With anger and disdain, people have been calling me out as gay, closeted, a sham and even nastier; much nastier,” Reynolds begins. “I have come to a point in my life where I am ready to discuss my truth. I wasn’t ready to do this then — I wasn’t even ready to think about it, let alone process it. To understand my journey and how I got to this point, you need to understand a little about me,

He explains that the reason he remain closeted was due to his cultural and religious upbringing.

“It was clear and proscribed, black and white, angels or sinners. And people who were intimate with others of their own gender were the worst of all with no chance of redemption, or the glorious afterlife that I was taught awaited us all,” he continues. “As a black man, that message and the hate and homophobia were multiplied to the nth degree.”

He goes on to say that he went through a period of “homelessness, unemployment, dependence on drugs and alcohol, public assistance, and, at the center of it all, a deep, deep shame and a feeling of unworthiness of the love of God. I didn’t believe I deserved to live a good life, and I clearly didn’t.”

Reynolds now has come to terms with his sexuality and is ready to share his truth with the public.

“Today I accept myself as a bisexual man. I have learned that sexual orientation is not binary, at least for me. I am capable of loving both sexes, and I have done both. My relationships, all of them, have been honest and based on my attraction to the other person. When I am in love I don’t equivocate, nor do I waver,” Reynolds says.