Actress Maria Bello has joined the ranks of other Hollywood actors and actresses who've come out as gay. The 46-year old star revealed in a published essay in The Times how she revealed to her son that she had a girlfriend.

Maria Bello said "I had become involved with a woman who was my best friend, and, as it happens, a person who is like a godmother to my son."  She also took into consideration the advice of her therapist to talk to her 12-year old son, Jackson, only if he asks about her personal life.

Bello reveals in the essay that she also had another relationship with a different woman prior to her current relationship with Clare. The actress recalls how concerned she was about her son and career being affected of her choosing to be romantically involved with Clare.

She was looking at a black and white photo of her and Clare on New Year's Eve and saw how both she and her best friend looked really happy. Bello also recounted how they both met two years before at a bar.

When she told her son from her relationship with producer Dan McDermott, she wrote "He looked at me for like an eternity and then broke into a huge, warm smile. 'Mom, love is love, whatever you are,"

Coming out to her 'traditional' Italian family had the Prisoners actress surprised as well at how she was immediately accepted. Her father told her "She's a good girl, good for you" - which seems to have the rest of her family in agreement.

She wrote, "Maybe they weren't so traditional after all".

The Coyote Ugly star's essay came out Friday in the New York Times titled " Coming Out as a Modern Family" .