Dear fmH: I don’t know if my husband is gay and I don’t know what to do.

By Call me Sarah

A few days ago, I grabbed the family laptop to check my email, but, when the screen came to life, I found that the browser was on a gay (male-male) pornography site. It was an “anonymous” browser—one that doesn’t keep a history, I guess? I didn’t even know we had a browser like that.

When my husband— (let’s call him Jay) —got home later that night, I brought it up. “Could it be a virus?” I asked. (I have never heard of a “porn-spraying” virus, but I didn’t want to sound like I was on a witch hunt and, honestly, I think I wanted an out—a reason to just dismiss it.)

“Maybe it was a pop-up thing?” I continued when he didn’t answer. “Maybe [our 9yo, who we’ll call… Junior?] accidentally clicked something?”

“It wasn’t Junior,” was all Jay said at first. He was looking at his feet, trying to avoid looking at me as much as I had tried to avoid looking at him. I recognized something immediately in his stance: shame. It hit me with that strange feeling you get when you’re in a car crash—how time slows down, how you see everything in slow-motion, frame-by-frame and somehow notice tiny nuances you didn’t know where there. Like, his shoes were scuffed at the toes. His tie hung loose and crooked. There was stray thread hanging from one of his buttons, a small stain of something red he ate for lunch. And he leaned against the doorway, as if suddenly unable to support his own weight.

The silence started to go on so long that it said something itself.

On my end: it wasn’t that I didn’t want to say something. It just wouldn’t… come out. I was surprised, in fact, at how hard it had just become to talk to my husband. We’ve been married 15 years and have three children together. I wouldn’t call us “wordy” people, but we’ve always been able to talk. Words should come more easily, shouldn’t they?

But they didn’t.

Finally Jay said, “Were you hoping it was a virus?”

I shrugged.

After another very long, very telling, silence, I asked, “Do you want to talk about this later?”

“I’d like to talk about this never,” he said…

(Click here to read the entire post.)

One night, my Gay ex-husband posted a beautiful response on his blog. It made me cry. I wanted to share it here:

Dear Sarah

[NOTE: No, this isn't to my ex-wife Sarah. Rather, it's my reply to "Call Me Sarah", who wrote a post on Feminist Mormon Housewives after catching her husband viewing gay pornography. I'm posting it here as well because that's kind of what this blog is for—to collect my random musings from Facebook, blogs, etc. I've made very minor corrections to grammar and spelling, but not to content.]

I’ve only skimmed the comments. It’s possible that anything I might have to say will already have been said. But I wanted to respond anyway, even if it’s just to provide another perspective to add to the flood you’ve already received.

I came out to my wife (named Sarah, coincidentally) about four and a half years ago. I told her I was gay a mere two or three weeks after figuring it out myself, and only about six months after I even began to consider the possibility that I might be anything other than straight.

I was thirty-four; we had been married fifteen years and had four kids. For thirty-three years and change I believed, completely and entirely, that I was straight, and in a relatively short period of time I came to understand—and to accept, completely and entirely—that I was gay.

So much of what you write about Jay is so familiar to me… The lack of interest in sex; the guilt and shame; the fear of losing my wife and children; even the denial (“I don’t think I’m gay”)—I specifically and directly told my Sarah that I was not gay at least twice (and I wasn’t lying when I said it—or I was lying to myself as much as to her).

My take, for what it’s worth: Jay is gay.

Some people will reassure you that he’s probably bisexual, and this is a comforting thought to hold on to because it gives some hope that you can fulfill him and complete him; that he can sublimate the gay part and focus on the straight and be happy… But he’s been doing that for fifteen years now, hasn’t he? Is he happy?

Jay is gay, and the sooner he acknowledges that and accepts it the better it will be for all of you. The conflict and struggle inherent in denying such an integral part of one’s self can’t not affect his ability to be a kind and loving father and husband. You’ve seen evidence of that when “R.J.” takes over. R.J. isn’t his gay side—it’s his conflicted, self-denying side; it’s a symptom of the emotional scarring that such conflict and self-denial causes.

Let me continue my story…

I came out to my Sarah. She cried for a week over the uncertainty and the loss of something she thought she had. But she also understood, and loved, and accepted, and I honored her for that by doing everything within my power to find a way to make our marriage work.

For two years we tried to find a way, and for most of those two years I never so much as held hands with another man. Eventually I came to understand that while I could continue in my marriage, repress my attractions, ignore any need for intimacy (both emotional and physical) and live a basically straight life, it wasn’t fair to me or my family for me to do so. My own “R.J.” revealed himself more and more frequently. My patience with the kids grew thinner. My relationship with Sarah grew more strained.

I finally told her, two years after coming out, that I couldn’t do it anymore. I could not sacrifice my own happiness for the sake of a marriage, and attempting to do so would ultimately destroy the very thing I was trying to save.

We separated. I moved into the basement for a year, and then got my own apartment.

A few years ago I would have thought that to be a tragic ending. But you know what? I’m happy, in a way that I never dreamed I could be. I’m at peace. I’m complete. And not only that, our “family” is stronger than it’s ever been. Sarah and I are better friends than ever. We talk daily. We share parenting responsibilities. We love the kids. We still love each other in almost all the ways we ever did. Life is good.

Sure, there have been struggles and challenges, and it’s possible that, if I was allowed to write the stories of our lives, I might write a few things a little differently. But then again I might not.

Your story won’t necessarily mirror mine. But from all I’ve read in your post and in your responses to some of the comments I’m absolutely and entirely convinced that your story will be a happy one. Your family structure might change. You’ll have ups and downs. But you love Jay, and he loves you, and that doesn’t need to change no matter what else does.

My advice? Encourage Jay to find a therapist who is gay-affirming. Someone who can help him work through his attractions and discover what they mean. Someone who isn’t beholden to current LDS policies on homosexuality—who won’t in any way suggest that Jay is broken and needs fixed.

Consider finding a therapist yourself. Maybe someone you and Jay can see together now and then, who can help you lay out your choices and make the best ones.

If and when Jay decides that he is indeed gay or bisexual, please tell the kids. They deserve to know, so that they aren’t confused by the subtle hints of confusion that they will pick up on. We told our kids just a couple of weeks after I came out to Sarah, and they’ve been incredibly accepting and supportive.

In addition to therapy, encourage Jay to find a support system. When I came out there was a thriving gay Mormon blogging community that played a vital part in my journey. These days much of that support has moved to Facebook.

Find support for yourself, too. Holly provided a link to “Supportive Straight Spouses” (straightspouses.org), which is an excellent group (started by my Sarah, coincidentally) that is more about building and growing and healing than about blame and victimhood.

You said you’d leave the church if you had a gay child. That may not be necessary, but please, at the very least, turn your back on the church’s views of homosexuality. They are, quite frankly, wrong, and they cause far too much unnecessary struggle and suffering.

I’ve gone on far longer than I attended. Thank you for writing this post. Thank you for approaching the question from a perspective of love and understanding and acceptance. No matter where things go from here, Jay is lucky to have you.

[[HUGS]]
–Scott

Today it was presented for the first time at the Mormon Stories conference in San Francisco.

Here is the link to YouTube. Please share it with as many people as you can. We want to get our message out to the world.

Videos of individual stories can be found at http://straightspouses.org/advocacy/videos/

1. Don’t keep everything inside.  Find trustworthy, open-minded, non-judgmental people to confide in.  Find other straight spouses who understand completely and intimately the complex situation you are in.  Bounce off ideas and thoughts with people in your same situation.  Vent your frustrations and sadness through writing (blogs, journals, etc.).

2. Own your feelings.  Allow yourself time to process your negative feelings.  Don’t try to hide from them or bury them.

3. Once you have processed the initial emotions of disclosure, focus on the good things in your life rather than dwell on the negative.  Find joy in everyday living and laugh at the things you can find to laugh about.  Allow yourself a set amount of time to feel the negative emotions and when time is up, move on to the good.  If it’s a really bad day, make it a short day and go to bed early.

4. Don’t dwell on the “what-if” or hypothetical situations.  They are unproductive.

5. Be open-minded.

6. Don’t hurry the process.  Take time to gather strength and understanding.

7. Take good care of your health.  Give yourself a “self-care” day when you put away your responsibilities and focus on yourself.  Exercise, take long walks, take long, relaxing hot baths, take time to dress up and allow yourself to feel pretty.  Make sure to get plenty of sleep because being well-rested is essential.  If you can’t sleep, talk to your doctor about possible medications that may be helpful.  Put yourself first because you cannot help anyone if you are out of commission yourself.   8. Find a good therapist.

9. If the gay thing gets in the way of your ability to function in your everyday life, consider medication.

10. Manage your expectations in a way that is realistic for your situation.

11. Keep open communication with your gay spouse.  Be honest with yourself and your spouse.

12. Snuggle with a child.

13. Keep yourself busy.  Throw yourself into a project that gives you a purpose and makes you feel worthwhile.  Enjoy time with your kids—take them out somewhere fun or interesting.  When you don’t have your kids, read books, listen to books on CD, nurture your hobbies and talents, watch silly tv shows and movies.

14. Learn about gay issues and homosexuality in general to see things from the gay spouse’s perspective and to put yourself in their shoes.  Watch gay-themed movies or read gay-themed books.

15. Rediscover and reestablish your own identity.  Establish your own social life.  Just be you and not someone you think you’re supposed to be.  Learn something new and explore new hobbies and activities.  Have fun on your own.  Watch movies and read books that focus on strong, confident characters.  Become more self-reliant and less dependant on the gay spouse financially, emotionally, spiritually, etc.

16. Give yourself time to be with God in whatever way works best for you (prayer, meditation, being in nature, etc.).

17. Let the past go and allow yourself to forgive.  Release the burden of holding on.

The next 7 strategies are specific to working through a divorce.

18.  Don’t avoid the pain.  Find a way to resolve and work through it.

19. Stay away from angry, bitter, toxic people during the first few years after the divorce.

20. Seek wise counsel.

21. Do not rush into a new relationship to distract you from the pain of the loss.  Give yourself some time to heal before entering a serious relationship.

22. Create a support system that will be there to support you.

23. Have fun in spending time connecting with your children.

24. Be patient with yourself.  Divorce is a developmental trauma that may take a year or two to resolve.

UGFA-Release-Nightline

(Video on YouTube)

Back to Before

 

There was a time

Our happiness seemed never-ending
I was so sure
That where we were heading was right
Life was a road
So certain and straight and unbending
Our little road
With never a cross road in sight
Back in the days
When we spoke in civilized voices
Women in white
And sturdy young men at the oar
Back in the days
When I let you make all my choices…
We can never go back to before

There was a time
My feet were so solidly planted
You’d sail away
While I turned my back to the sea
I was content,
A princess asleep and enchanted
If I had dreams
Then I let you dream them for me
Back in the days
When everything seemed so much clearer
Women in white
Who knew what their lives held in store
Where are they now,
Those women who stared from the mirror?
We can never go back to before.

There are people out there
Unafraid of revealing
That they might have a feeling
Or they might have been wrong
There are people out there
Unafraid to feel sorrow,
unafraid of tomorrow,
unafraid to be weak…
unafraid to be strong!

There was a time
When you were the person in motion
I was your wife,
It never occurred to want more
You were my sky
My moon and my stars and my ocean
We can never go back to before
We can never go back to before

Copied from MetroLyrics.com

The First Year, The Hardest One- The Story of Veronica (name changed for anonymity)

As posted in our group, and re-posted on Ashley’s Tiny Crumbs on June 25, 2012

by Karen Armstrong
The Guardian, Friday 20 February 2004 20.38 EST

“Until a few days ago, many of us had never heard of Jacqueline Wilson, but the children of this country certainly know who she is. More of her novels are borrowed from libraries than those of any other writer; she is now more popular than Catherine Cookson or JK Rowling. Yet Wilson chronicles the effects of divorce and marital disharmony, parental inadequacy and betrayal, the dreadful consequences of dad losing his job, the anguish of watching your best friend run over before your eyes and the desolation of children’s homes. Everything turns out reasonably well in the end, but it is always a close-run thing. What is the appeal of this bleak vision?

In fact, the best children’s classics have always evoked the dark side of life. Alice’s Wonderland reveals the arbitrary demands and heartless craziness of the adult world from a child’s perspective. The sinister menace of the Wild Wood is a constant threat in The Wind in the Willows. In the novels of Frances Hodgson Burnett, children are regularly abandoned, bereaved, neglected and ill-treated. Some parents would prefer their children to read books that are more upbeat, but Wilson’s success and the endurance of these classics remind us that children know instinctively what is best for them, and find that their worst fears become more manageable when they are made explicit. It seems that many children have not yet succumbed quite as fully as adults to the “positive thinking” that is fast becoming a social orthodoxy.

Increasingly it is becoming unacceptable to voice legitimate distress. If you lose your job, become chronically ill, or fall prey to loneliness or depression, you are likely to be told – often abrasively – to look on the bright side. With unseemly haste, people rush to put an optimistic gloss on a disaster or to suggest a patently unworkable solution. We seem to be cultivating an intolerance of pain – even our own. An acquaintance once told me that quite the most difficult aspect of her cancer was her friends’ strident insistence that she develop a positive attitude, and her guilt at being unable to do so.

Every evening the television news beams images of anguish from all over the world right into our homes – we live on constant terror alert. We naturally want to keep what distress we can at bay. But while it is important not to succumb to despair, it is also dangerous to deny the suffering to which flesh is heir.

As TS Eliot said, humankind cannot bear very much reality. Some forms of religion encourage us to bury our heads in the sand to block out the suffering that surrounds us on all sides. The rich man in his palace can reconcile himself to the plight of the poor man at his gate by reminding himself that this is part of God’s bright and beautiful plan; those who suffer poverty and oppression in this life will be recompensed in the hereafter. When thousands die in an earthquake, we can tell ourselves that God knew what he was doing.

At a literary festival, where I had been describing the fear that lies at the heart of religious fundamentalism, a man in the audience told me that he found this quite incomprehensible. If you have true faith, he argued, you cannot suffer. I suggested that if he lived in a more troubled part of the world (we were in Cheltenham at the time), he might find it more difficult to maintain his equanimity. But he seemed to regard religion as an anaesthetic that would even numb the pain of a concentration camp.

This is lazy, inadequate religion. If we deny the reality of suffering, we will ignore the distress of others. At its best, religion requires the faithful to see things as they really are. In Buddhism, the First Noble Truth that is essential for enlightenment is that life is dukkha: “unsatisfactory, awry”. The Buddha’s father tried to shield him from sorrow by imprisoning him in a pleasure-palace, walled off from disturbing reality. Guards were posted to drive away any distressing spectacle. For 29 years, the Buddha lived in this fool’s paradise, locked into a delusion and unable to make spiritual progress. Finally the gods intervened and forced the young man to confront mortality, sickness and decay. Only then could he begin his quest for Nirvana.

The Buddha’s palace is a striking image of the mind in denial. As long as we immure ourselves from the pain that surrounds us on all sides, we remain trapped in an undeveloped version of ourselves. Denial is futile: suffering will always breach the cautionary barricades that we erect around our fragile existence. The ideal is to find a still centre within that enables us to face pain with equanimity and use our experience of dukkha to appreciate the sorrow of others.

The failure to confront unpleasant reality can also be politically dangerous. In the Bible, those preachers who told people to look on the bright side, that God would protect Jerusalem and that everything would work out for the best are condemned as “false prophets”. The prophet Jeremiah has become a byword for excessive gloom, but if people had listened to his dire predictions, the Babylonian army might not have destroyed Jerusalem. He was not being “negative”; he was right.

In our global world, we can no longer afford to edit out the uncomfortable spectacle of human misery. In the past, we have sometimes pursued policies that have resulted in great suffering, telling ourselves that all would ultimately be well. We have let conflicts fester until they have become intractable. We have supported such allies as Saddam Hussein, ignoring the atrocities they inflict upon their people. We are now rightly outraged by his massacre of his Kurdish subjects, but at the time we ineffectually turned a blind eye. Today we are reaping the reward of our heedless karma. The pain that we ignored in some parts of the world has hardened into murderous rage.

Perhaps the children who read Jacqueline Wilson’s books are learning about the sorrow of others. The First Noble Truth requires us to acknowledge the ubiquity of pain, even when we are happy and successful. If we get a coveted job, other candidates are disappointed; if our country prospers, it may well be at the expense of other nations that are languishing in poverty and despair. In our privileged first world, we have been living in a bubble of false security that is not unlike the Buddha’s pleasure palace. On September 11, reality broke in. If we turn our backs on the suffering in our troubled world, it will come back to us, in a terrible form.”

· Karen Armstrong is the author of Buddha

karmstronginfo@btopenworld.com

SALT LAKE CITY — Life is a complicated and messy endeavor. In LIFEadvice, Life Coach Kim Giles will help you with simple, principle-based solutions to the challenges you face. Coach Kim will empower you to get along with others and become the best you.

Question:

Can you give me some advice on how to put the past behind me and move forward? I’m haunted by the mistakes I’ve made and how they have hurt my family. Is it possible to let them go and feel good again?

Answer:

Imagine your life as a road trip. On this road trip there are high points and low points. Some of the experiences are fun, some are scary and others are miserable. Each of these experiences is a location on your journey through life.

These experiences do not define who you are. They are just places you’ve been. Just because you spent time traveling through Texas doesn’t make you a Texan. Texas was a location on your journey; it is not who you are.

The thing you must understand about your past is that each experience — each location you visited — has brought you to where you are today. Each experience taught you things.

Some experiences taught you about who you don’t want to be now. Some showed you options in human behavior and the consequences of those options. Each experience served a divine purpose in your life.

You must embrace what each location taught you, and understand that you are not there anymore. You are a different person now. The person you are today wouldn’t make the choices you made then (though that is partly because of what you learned from making those choices the first time).

You cannot change the past, nor should you want to. Your journey taught you perfect lessons. But you can refuse to let your past define you now. You left Texas and you aren’t going back.

Now, in this place, you get to choose who you want to be today. Here are a couple suggestions for putting the past behind you:

Accept that there is nothing you can do to change the past. You did the best you could with what you knew at the time. That was all you could do. Give yourself permission to be a work in progress.

Let go of shame, the belief that you should have already mastered everything. You are here on earth to learn and grow, so you can’t expect to have known everything all along. The important thing is the direction you’re headed now. Shame is a waste of your energy. Instead, focus on who you want to be today.

Live in this moment, all the time. There will never be a moment when it is not this moment. Understand that you cannot fully experience joy today while you’re holding onto angst about the past. Choose joy today. You can do this. You have power over your inner state.
Focus your energy on what’s in your control. Look at your current situation and write down what’s in your control and what’s not. Focus your time and energy only on what is.

Do something to metaphorically let the past go. Write down the experiences you are having trouble letting go of. Then burn it, bury it, tie it to a balloon and let it go, or rip it up and throw it in the trash. As you do this, say out loud, “I’m done wasting energy on the past. I choose to let it go, once and for all.”

Choose to trust life and the Universe. Trust that your journey is the perfect one for you and that everything happens for a reason. Trust that you are on track and right where you are supposed to be now.

Don’t worry. Eckhart Tolle said, “Worry pretends to be necessary but it serves no useful purpose.” Worry, guilt and stress do you no good. They will not prevent bad things from happening and they may, in fact, attract more bad things your way. Choose to trust that good things will happen to you.

Set aside a time to experience regret and guilt. Decide that for 15 minutes today you will set aside time to wallow in self-pity and shame. Dive in and immerse yourself in it. Then when the time is up, you’re done.

Examine your past and embrace the lessons. It may serve you to examine your past, but you must do this in trust that your value is not on the line. You must know that your past experience were lessons, not tests that you failed. You must use the lessons you learn to help you be the person you want to be today.

Soren Kierkegaard said, “Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.”

This is the key to a successful and happy life. Examine the past, understand it and learn from it. Then, leave it in the past and move forward. Put the lessons to work by making better choices today.

Choose to see the past as a location on your road trip; do not let it define who you are. If you see experiences accurately, you will be grateful for the lessons and empowered to be a better you.

Ask Coach Kim
Do you have a question for Coach Kim, or maybe a topic you’d like her to address? Email her at kim@lifea dviceradio.com .

Kimberly Giles is the founder and president of www.ldslifecoaching.com and www.claritypointcoaching.com. She is a sought after life coach and popular speaker who specializes Clarity: seeing yourself, others and situations accurately.

Have any of you watched “Happily Divorced”? It’s a comedy starring Fran Drescher based on her own marriage to a gay man. (Actually, he was the one who wrote and produced “The Nanny.”) They were married very young and it lasted 21 years, into their 40s. Neither of them realized it until they started going to therapy after the trauma of a home invasion. At that point he thought he was bi and they were both struggling with the situation. She felt it wasn’t fair to either of them to stay in the marriage, so she divorced him and he was so hurt that he wouldn’t talk to her for a year. He moved to New York and about a year later she was diagnosed with cancer, wrote a book about it and she ended up in New York on a book tour. At that point he admitted to her that he was fully out as a gay man and they reconciled. They were on Oprah talking about it last spring.

Anyway, the sit-com stars Fran and has her living with her gay ex-husband, Peter, because neither one of them can afford to move out. I think it’s on TV Land. It’s not very many episodes, and the first season was last year. It was funny, but still too soon for me to laugh much. A few weeks ago, the new season started, and I definitely like it more this year. Last week’s episode had two parts that I wanted to share. Fran and Peter go to anger therapy because she is having trouble dating anyone who is emotionally available. She thinks back to when they first met and Peter told her he loved her, but wasn’t in love with her. She’s trying to work out her anger and why that made her want him even more. And why she keeps dating men she can’t have. It comes to a climax and here’s the part that really touched me:

Peter: Why do you think I keep trying to set you up and find you somebody?
Fran: Oh, I don’t know…to relieve your guilt?
Peter: No. It’s because I can’t be happy until I know that you’re happy too.

Has anyone else felt this way? I have been frustrated because ever since DGH came out, he has been talking about me finding someone new and how he wants me to date, etc. Because I was blind-sided and in mourning, I didn’t want to hear it. He moved on to new relationships in the blink of an eye and I just felt abandoned and unwanted. The petty part of me felt like he just wants me to remarry to relieve his guilt and get out of paying alimony. But this silly sit-com really struck a chord with me. I know he loves me so much and he truly struggles to find happiness even though he is now living as his authentic self. I see now that me moving on and finding a new relationship would help us both to heal. I never blame him as the cause of my pain, but he is the unwitting source. I don’t know, just thinking about this in a new way.

The other part of this last episode that I loved, was at the very end. Fran and Peter are talking about how good the anger therapy felt and toasting the closure of old wounds. But before they can call it a night, Fran has to bring up the “love you” vs. “in love with you” from their early days:

Fran: When you said that you loved me but weren’t in love with me, what did you mean?
Peter: I don’t know. I was 19. I was a kid. I wasn’t ready. I mean, you understand that, don’t you?
Fran: Yeah, I guess so. But, were you ever…?
Peter: Madly. And deeply. In love with you. And to be honest, it’s still hard for me to see you with another guy.

For all of you wonderful straight spouses out there, don’t you ever think that your spouse/ex-spouse wasn’t in love you. I believe that they all were truly, madly and deeply in love with us at some point. Don’t diminish what you had. ‘Nough said!

Each time, you come out of it a little stronger, and at some point you realize that there are more flavors of pain than coffee. There’s the little empty pain of leaving something behind—graduating, taking the next step forward, walking out of something familiar and safe into the unknown. There’s the big, whirling pain of life upending all of your plans and expectations. There’s the sharp little pains of failure, and the more obscure aches of successes that didn’t give you what you thought they would. There are the vicious, stabbing pains of hopes being torn up. The sweet little pains of finding others, giving them your love, and taking joy in their life as they grow and learn. There’s the steady pain of empathy that you shrug off so you can stand beside a wounded friend and help them bear their burdens.

And if you’re very, very lucky, there are a very few blazing hot little pains you feel when you realize that you are standing in a moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth which at the same time cannot possibly last—and yet will remain with you for life.

Everyone is down on pain, because they forget something important about it: Pain is for the living. Only the dead don’t feel it.

Pain is a part of life. Sometimes it’s a big part, and sometimes it isn’t, but either way, it’s part of the big puzzle, the deep music, the great game. Pain does two things: It teaches you, tells you that you’re alive. Then it passes away and leaves you changed. It leaves you wiser, sometimes. Sometimes it leaves you stronger. Either way, pain leaves its mark, and everything important that will ever happen to you in life is going to involve it to one degree or another.”

–Jim Butcher, in White Knight