brutal honesty
Bigg says: I am a bit confused. I understand your wish for your husband to love you and to remain married to you. But the very fact that you're in the current situation should underline the fact that he can't "choose" to be straight at the expense of himself -- it just won't work.
So, my question is this: would you be willing to stay with him if he did "pick" you, but also "picked" himself? Could you deal with his need to explore who and what he is? Or would it mean giving up himself all over again?Truly, this is not a judgment. I am in a similar situation, and I would really like to know.All my best to you.
Dear Bigg:
I understand what you are saying. In fact, I really hesitated to post "pick Me" at all, and I am very glad that you commented because I was wanting to clarify it and wasn't sure where to start.
I understand that my "pick ME" wish is illogical (an either or fallacy?), mentally unhealthy (for both Eddy and me), and perhaps it was hurtful and unfair to express it. It is not a fair thing to ask someone to sacrifice themselves.
In all reality . . . logically . . . I wouldn't want him to pick ME over being himself. He has been miserable for forever. If things had kept going on the same as always -- with him in the closet to me and how miserable he was and how miserable he was to live with, we probably would have already filed for divorce.
BUT "pick ME" is how I feel when I look past the logic of it all. And his being gay, does not lessen the rejection factor - does not get him out of having rejected me on some level. I guess that is what I was feeling and trying to express. I think that most wives of gay men can't help feeling this way.
But back to your question: would you be willing to stay with him if he did "pick" you, but also "picked" himself? Could you deal with his need to explore who and what he is? Or would it mean giving up himself all over again?
Am I willing to stay with him? So far, I have stayed. When I was making plans to move out, it was because the pain of living with someone I loved who I was so certain that I was going to lose was becoming unbearable - not because I didn't love him. What does it mean for him to "explore"? Gay support groups? okay. Gay friends? fine. Sleeping with someone else? An open marriage? I can't go that far. Neither one of us has ever been with anyone else, ever. If he feels compelled to sleep with a man to find out if he can't live without having sex with a man, then I think that he already has his answer. And he would tell you the same. At that point we would, together, begin ending our marriage.
I guess that might mean I do expect him to "give himself up" a bit to stay married. Marriage is full of comprimises, and I have made my share of them as well.
However, the last thing that I want is for him to go backward deeper into the closet. I have told him many times that the best thing that he can do for me is to be brutally honest, and I am hoping that is what will happen.
B
So, my question is this: would you be willing to stay with him if he did "pick" you, but also "picked" himself? Could you deal with his need to explore who and what he is? Or would it mean giving up himself all over again?Truly, this is not a judgment. I am in a similar situation, and I would really like to know.All my best to you.
Dear Bigg:
I understand what you are saying. In fact, I really hesitated to post "pick Me" at all, and I am very glad that you commented because I was wanting to clarify it and wasn't sure where to start.
I understand that my "pick ME" wish is illogical (an either or fallacy?), mentally unhealthy (for both Eddy and me), and perhaps it was hurtful and unfair to express it. It is not a fair thing to ask someone to sacrifice themselves.
In all reality . . . logically . . . I wouldn't want him to pick ME over being himself. He has been miserable for forever. If things had kept going on the same as always -- with him in the closet to me and how miserable he was and how miserable he was to live with, we probably would have already filed for divorce.
BUT "pick ME" is how I feel when I look past the logic of it all. And his being gay, does not lessen the rejection factor - does not get him out of having rejected me on some level. I guess that is what I was feeling and trying to express. I think that most wives of gay men can't help feeling this way.
But back to your question: would you be willing to stay with him if he did "pick" you, but also "picked" himself? Could you deal with his need to explore who and what he is? Or would it mean giving up himself all over again?
Am I willing to stay with him? So far, I have stayed. When I was making plans to move out, it was because the pain of living with someone I loved who I was so certain that I was going to lose was becoming unbearable - not because I didn't love him. What does it mean for him to "explore"? Gay support groups? okay. Gay friends? fine. Sleeping with someone else? An open marriage? I can't go that far. Neither one of us has ever been with anyone else, ever. If he feels compelled to sleep with a man to find out if he can't live without having sex with a man, then I think that he already has his answer. And he would tell you the same. At that point we would, together, begin ending our marriage.
I guess that might mean I do expect him to "give himself up" a bit to stay married. Marriage is full of comprimises, and I have made my share of them as well.
However, the last thing that I want is for him to go backward deeper into the closet. I have told him many times that the best thing that he can do for me is to be brutally honest, and I am hoping that is what will happen.
B
Labels: the gay thing
posted by Heidi at
1:21 PM
4 Comments:
Thank you so much for your response. This not only clarified your feelings, but also some of the things that my wife has recently said to me.
I don't know that we (your husband, myself, anyone else in our shoes) necessarily need to have a sexual relationship outside of our marriages to really "find" ourselves. On the other hand, sometimes I think that to come out and meet people and establish a truer identity without exploring the actual fact of our sexuality is stopping short of the whole truth. Sometimes, I feel just the opposite: I took a vow, I should stand by it, and in the end, being faithful to my wife is no different really from being faithful to a partner.
Mind you, I'm not really trying to speak for him, or for anyone else. I'm just trying to find my way in all of this, and decide what I can live with and what I can't live without.
Thank you for your honesty, and for your writing here.
I wish you all my best, and that they future holds only good things for both of you.
I kept feeling that throughout my experience.
You just put clearly into words in both your posts what I felt but couldn't express at my lowest point when I fell into doubt and questioned my faith.
Good luck and best wishes to you and your husband. Your posts inspire and touch deeply.
Thanks for your last 2 posts, B. In this surreal situation we find ourselves in, it seems natural for both partners -- gay and straight -- to have wishes and feelings that defy logic. I think it's important for both to be able to express them -- for neither to be "in the closet".
Hey Bea
Good stuff - I don't know where to start but will pick out one thread that KA and I were discussing last night. Given a choice between my going to a bi/gay support group or having a lunch time hook-up, on many levels she would go with the latter as would I.
The perverse logic in this is that a lunch time quickie is not a threat in terms of falling in love - no competition if you would.
The other path - the support group - feels much healthier of course but also much riskier. A community - non-cyber - of real men with the same struggle. What happens if one truly connects with someone under those circumstances?
I do appreciate the twisted aspects to this logic, but such is our world.
And in maybe the most perverse piece of it all, knowing that I can (the lunchtime quickie) has made it much easier for me to keep things zippered, which is my goal.
As always thanks for the wife's point of view. It is necessary for this to be a real community.
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