Family Ties star Meredith Baxter married her girlfriend of seven years, Nancy Locke, during an intimate ceremony on Sunday, December 8 in Los Angeles. The couple exchanged personal, handwritten vows in front of their close friends and family.

Suspicions of their upcoming marriage started after Baxter obtained a marriage license in Beverly Hills on Tuesday, November 12. Marriage is not something new to Baxter considering her marriage to Locke makes her fourth. She was previously married to Robert Lewis Bush, David Birney and Michael Blodgett before she publicly came out as a lesbian in 2009.

During an interview in 2009, Baxter said that she never expected to fall in love with Locke, nor did she expect to have the support that she received from her family and friends. “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.”

Baxter also realized that there are some things that you just can’t hide from your children. When she told her five children that she was, in fact, a lesbian, they told her that they already knew. “I said, ‘I think I’m gay,’ and my oldest boy said, ‘I knew,'” Baxter said. “The support from my family and anyone close to me has been so immediate and unqualified. I’ve really been blessed.”

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