The Longest Advent Ever

Yesterday, the predictions were made and you could just feel it in the air that the snow was coming. And it did - ten and a half inches! - most of it overnight - and 35 mph winds and drifting. We made it to church and back and holed up for the day . . .cozy: Eddy's special Irish coffee (Bailey's + a shot of Dewar's); eight episodes of 30 Rock Season One (Eddy slept through 4 and 5); knitting - maybe I will finally finish this prayer shawl (don't know who I'm giving it to); our new little tree is up and pretty; should be doing Christmas cards.

Since "the revelation" (see my first post), the holidays have been melancholy. I can't help but wonder if this is our last Christmas as a family living under the same roof. I am finding the family Christmas letter impossible to write. This year we couldn't even bring ourselves to get out the tree and the rest of the Christmas decorations (at least that is what it was for me). We bought a pretty 4 ft. pre-lit white feather tree instead (not the pink or blue one - $20.00 1/2 price at Michael's).

This is our fourth post-disclosure Christmas, and I don't feel any closer to knowing what I want. My head and my heart are on completely different wave-lengths. I feel pathetically and hopelessly stuck.

I keep thinking about something that Closeted Pastor blogged a couple of weeks ago:
". . .My ex had the courage to know that marriage to a woman who kept falling in love with other women was not what he wanted."

I keep telling myself that I need to not focus on figuring this out but need to know myself better, and then I will know what I want. . . what is right, and the courage will come.

I hate waiting.

nerves

I am about to go to a therapy session, followed by the dentist (two crowns which may turn into root canals). I am really not looking forward to leaving the house. Add that it is 8 degrees outside and I just want to crawl back under the covers. But alas, the bed is made, so I guess that won't be happening.

Is it crazy that I dread therapy more than the dentist? Talk about hitting nerves and digging around. It is so hard to be honest in there but I am really trying, especially since my insurance has run out and I am paying out of pocket for this. (But thank God for good dental insurance!)

A couple of weeks ago, my therapist mentioned that my husband is gay and that's not going to change. It hit me like a ton of bricks that I was not accepting this as reality. I mean if you asked me, "Is your husband gay?" I would say, "yes, I've known this for 3.5 years." And, "Do you think he is always going to be gay." I would say, "Yes - I truly accept this about him." But on a deeper emotional level I'm not sure that I believe it. Ouch.

Heidi

Affair With Self

2007-11-18-014_1 London Stormy sunrise Shepherds Bush
Originally uploaded by Martin-James

I attended a different (not Eddy's) church yesterday and it felt like cheating.

If I put myself first, I feel like I am cheating. It kind of feels like I am having an affair with MYSELF. How is this possible?

I need to snap out of this (the guilt). An affair with myself would probable be a good thing.

Heidi

eddy is out . . . sort of

well, i guess there's a difference between going out and coming out . . . he is out with some friends (gay friends), so actually he is out to them . . . .

but enough about him . . . how am i taking this?

what's there to take? he's gay. he's out with gay friends. this is reality. what could be more normal?

so he is somewhere over the rainbow . . . why do i feel like i'm the one in oz?

Bea

dizzy

. . . and just as the merry-go-round was rounding the corner to "everything's relatively okay - our marriage isn't perfect, but i really love you - let's hang on" eddy read my last post - and got really really angry

it was the 2-and-a-half-year reference - which he interpreted as "she's not okay that i am gay - what else is she not telling me" or something like that

i can see how it read it that way - but that is not what i meant - everything has been soooo uber-emotional since he cracked that closet door open

and

he's tired of me and his therapist telling him to accept himself.

okay . . . truce

we are both on edge

i had a complete melt-down last night as he told me that no one has ever accepted him . . . what about ME? my fantasy has been to be so nice as to make up for all of the hurts from his past - and logically . . . he has been with me longer than his family, so what is the problem? (i know that it doesn't work that way) until i said something, i was so angry that i was dizzy - it was kind of freaking me out

we are both crazy on edge

but we are both not used to being open about our emotions with each other - we went for actual years without fighting for the first few years of our marriage - i'm not exaggerating - i don't like to fight - what is the point? maybe i should just go back to that - or not.

anyway

Bea

blogger's block

i think that it has been four times now that i have told eddy that i can't live this way any more and that we need to plan a way to live separately

this morning was one of those times

i am afraid that i will backpeddle - again

about a month ago i told him that i felt more optimistic about us than i had since he came out to me - he reminded me of this this morning - i didn't tell him, but i had completely forgotten - what is up with that? i remember it now. it was predicated by my deciding to not obsess on making a decision, and by my having pulled away from him the month before.

i'm tired of being sad. i'm tired of watching us die.

i'm ready for the end to end and the beginning to begin.

mostly i'm tired. the thought of dividing a household, moving . . . is exhausting, but so is the thought of being on the same merry-go-round 2 and a half years from now.

bea

hey, we could have a thing on the side

yesterday, i made a huge mistake

in the library (where i work) during a very slow afternoon (because the computers were down) i was joking around with a regular library patron . . . the subject got around to our spouses, and i confided that eddy and i were considering separation. he was not comprehending this because he knows that eddy is a pastor, so i whispered, "he is gay." then he was more shocked and said that he didn't believe that people are born that way (he is baptist and 50ish).

then he says, "hey, we could have a thing on the side." i laughed it off, but he was serious. he said that he could get us a nice hotel room. he wasn't getting what he needed, so he got it where he could (eew! - like does he pay for this?)

i don't even begin to think so.

the feminist in me wanted to bitch slap him. maybe i should have. i never got completely angry. but i made it clear (i hope) that it wasn't going to happen.

so it is not okay to be gay, but it is okay to cheat on his wife? he is a reasonably intelligent person. are people this disconnected? or am i just naive?

on accepting a gay husband who doesn't accept himself

Not too long ago, a kind, but anonymous commenter responded to "Honey He's Gay" with: "do yourself a favour & simply accept what you cannot change about your husband & start divorce proceedings as quickly & painlessly as possible"

When I read this, I felt defensive. I remember thinking, I DO accept him the way that he is. Heck, I am far more accepting of him than he is of himself.

But then I am angry and upset at his lack of sexual desire and attraction to me. What am I expecting?

Does accepting what I cannot change = starting divorce proceedings?

If I truly accepted him . . . would I divorce him even if that is not what he wants?

the gay thing

Thank you everyone for your email and comments even though I haven't been posting. I got suckered into teaching a college course along with my full-time job which has a 70 mile/day commute, so I was pretty stressed for a while there. I am so glad that is over. I hate teaching. Why do I do these things?

Actually, the above is kind of bull-shit. I mean, it is true about being busy, but I think that I would have still posted if I had wanted to. I needed some time off from thinking about tgt (the gay thing).

It has been almost 2 1/2 years now since Eddy came out to me. Not much has changed. We don't even talk about it as much as we did during the first year or two. I am afraid that our situation is "fossilizing". I don't want to wake up another 2 1/2 years from now to everything being the same.

But how much should I push him into talking about it?

B

the advantages of being married to a gay man

i don't have to hear "touch-down" screamed from the other room
i don't have to look at him in tightie-whities
he cleans the bathrooms
he irons
he can tell me if my outfit looks stupid
he likes to shop as much as i do
he has great penmanship
we are emotionally connected
i haven't needed birth control for the past ten years
he doesn't ever look at other women

but i would trade all of this in a new york minute to catch him looking at me

The Big O

A producer from The Oprah Show contacted me about participating in an upcoming show about gay husbands. (She said she read my blog). Although, I'm not about to participate, I had to imagine it, not so much airing out my experiences on national television, but what would it be like if Eddy did come out.

My first reaction was what a relief it would be for all of us. Then, there was a numbing fear of our finances taking a dive because we assume that Eddy would lose his job over this. Then, there was the fear of losing Eddy to a man. Then I realized that in some ways I have already lost Eddy, or a part of Eddy, to the world of other men. In some ways Eddy's sexual orientation isn't "real" to me yet, not that it doesn't exist, but that the reality of it hasn't quite sunk in.

Imagining the coming out, the possibility of it, made it sink in a little more. Ouch.

re: I wish that Eddy would just decide if he wants to be gay or not.

In my last post one of my secrets was: "I wish that Eddy would just decide if he wants to be gay or not."

I knowwww that it is not a decision. I really, really get that.

But right now while he definitely is gay, he is not acting gay in the truest sense of the word. And while he has pledged to remain committed to our marriage, is that fair to ask of him? Is it even fair to ask him to stay married?

I really don't believe that people should sacrifice any part of themselves for another person.

Let me change secret #18 to this: "I wish that Eddy would embrace himself as a gay person, whatever that means, love himself, and experience what life is supposed to be for him." or the short version "I wish that Eddy would be happy."

But it is not that so easy.

The terribly boring secrets of a pastor's wife.

In honor of turning 40 this summer, here are 40 secrets about me:

1. I am afraid of losing weight because I think that it will turn me into a slut.
2. At least once a year, I buy a pack of cigarettes, smoke a couple, and throw the rest of the pack away.
3. I can't stand not being the boss at work because I think that I could do everything better.
4. I am afraid that if I enforce the rules at work (the library) that people (that I don't even care about) won't like me.
5. I wish that I could just stop going to church altogether.
6. I am afraid of not believing in God.
7. I don't believe in God.
8. I don't believe in anything supernatural.
9. I feel like I can't help but believe in God.
10. I love it when I am sick.
11. I wish that we would have more children, but I am afraid that they would be psychotic .
12. Sometimes when Eddy is snoring and I can't fall asleep, I fantasize about smothering him with his pillow.
13. I feel like a loser because I don't make as much money as I used to and have been unable to break back into my former profession.
14. I wish that I didn't have to work for a living.
15. I wish that our cat would run away . . . or something.
16. I can't stop buying new notebooks.
17. I keep starting new blogs.
18. I wish that Eddy would just decide if he wants to be gay or not.
19. I love my hair.
20. I really hate baby boomers.
21. I am terrified of what will happen once the "Greatest Generation" is extinct.
22. I wish that I had gone to seminary for an M.Div. and ordination when Eddy did.
23. I am afraid that I will die a penniless homeless person.
24. I keep dreaming that I am trying to go somewhere.
25. I love Eddy just as much as I did before he told me that he is gay, maybe more.
26. I wish that I had my own bedroom.
27. I think that my parents are FUBAR.
28. I am always afraid that I am about to be fired.
29. I love to throw up. I think about it all of the time. (I haven't done it in years).
30. Sometimes, I am attracted to women.
31. I just can't believe that I am really going to die some day.
32. Sometimes during church, I fantasize about streaking during the sermon.
33. I absolutely hate doing altar guild (setting out and cleaning up communion).
34. Sometimes I wish that the world would just blow up already.
35. I have never had sex with a straight man.
36. I often have the urge to shoplift (I have only done it twice).
37. Spending money makes me feel safe.
38. I don't trust men, especially straight men.
39. I drive wayyyy over the speed limit on the freeway.
40. ?????????????????

To Bella

(Bella left a comment to the linked blog [click on title above], but not her email address).

Hi Bella,

I sort of know how you feel. Sometimes, you feel like you are the butt of a 14 year practical joke . . . you know, like when someone tapes a "kick me" sign to your back. Everyone (or at least a pretty important someone) knew something and didn't let you in on the big secret. In some strange way it is humiliating. It is hard to explain, but I think that you know what I mean.

The best advice that I can give you is to check out the wivesofbigayhusbands website on yahoo. It is extremely active (over 300 new messages this week). It seems like there is at least one new person every week. It is extremely supportive. You could probably find someone near you on it. I think there is a phone list as well.

There is also straight spouse network. They post information on local groups.

Take care,

B

Eyes Wide Shut

Ran across this quote and picture:

El sueño de la razón produce monstruos.
~Francisco de Goya, Los Caprichos, 1799

"The sleep of reason produces monsters."

reminds me of my longtime favorite quote:

"Reality is that which, when you stop believing it,
doesn't go away."

~Philip K. Dick

You know how little kids will cover their eyes and think you can't see them? Is this where I am? Covering my eyes to hide from something - to try to make it go away? Or am I having faith that love will conquer all?

Cate writes:
"I still don't really believe that he isn't gay, but I do believe that his love for me might be stronger than any gay tendencies he has."

(sigh)

Bea

Flipped Out

First of all,

Wow, guys! Thank you for your honest answers. So much of it resonates with our story: the climate of the 80s, the religion, the desire to create a family, falling in love. What you all wrote helps me better understand Eddy.

Flip threw a question back at me:

If, before you married, your husband had told you about his attraction to other men, would you still have married him? Why or why not?

Here is how I responded:

The short answer: I don't know.

The longer answer: Maybe not. He broke up with me three times (including one engagement)before we married. The combination would have made me pretty wary of how long it would be until he broke up with me again.

Or maybe I wouldn't have married him because I would have wanted to set him free.

More likely, I would have married him, thinking that he was "cured" which is what he was desperately hoping/believing at the time (also the 80s). And after our last break up (the engagement) I thought about him and missed him every day (for a year and a half in which we didn't communicate once). I loved him. I still do. And actually, I feel lucky to have been married to him at all. His inability to come to terms with it all, embrace his gay-self, come out . . . was my gain.

Bea

gay husbands tell all

Survey question of the day for all of you gay husbands in straight marriages.

For one reason or another, despite your sexual attraction to men, you married a woman. Why?

(Just looking for honest, direct answers. I want to get a clearer picture of this phenemonen. I am not trying to point fingers. Please feel free to remain anonymous.)

buddha, the divorce fairy, and bounce out

I would like to think that I live in the present. Buddhism calls it mindfulness: being completely engrossed in the present, neither bemoaning the past, wishing away the present, nor borrowing from the future. You are eating an orange. Slow down. Notice the minute droplets of spray when you peel the orange or peel away sections. Notice the colors, the smell, the juice on your tongue. . . yadda, yadda, yadda.

But the present is so entirely bittersweet. Here we are, living together, like we have for sixteen years. Soon, we will go to bed. For once the TV is off. We are both sitting in the dark, both online. The room is dark except for our computer screens and the green and red lights on our 21st century gadgets, our own personal stars (or are they planets because they are not twinkling?). Eddy complains that the cat won't eat mosquitos, so what good is it? (Did our last cat eat mosquitos?) Playing "bounce-out" (for the last two hours), now he is rather quiet except for an occasional cough or hum. An hour or two ago (until tonight he was a "bounce-out" virgin), he frequently muttered mild expletives, as if this game were of utmost importance. (He is passionate about everything.) The steady tick-tock of our cuckoo clock contrasts with the random squeaking and bouncing and honking of his game. I realize that usually, Eddy is the one to pull the chain to make the pinecone weights rise to the top to give us a few more hours of ticking. I realize that I like that he does this. I think that he must have something on his mind to be distracting himself with his mindless game. The air-conditioning kicks on. I feel the air on my neck and shoulders. My eyelids are heavy. I should really go to bed. Unexciting, I know, but peaceful, comfortable. I love him.

When I am mindful, notice these things, notice him, notice us, at times I am unbearably wistful because the truth is that the more gay that he feels he is allowed to be, the happier he seems to be. He says this is my imagination, but it is not.

Living with Eddy reminds me of the movie Ghost. Demi Moore's husband, (Patrick Swayze, I think) is dead. He comes back as a ghost. She sees him and struggles to feel him. The sexy pottery scene. She feels him, his arms around her, her hands on hers holding the clay. She knows that she has to let go, but desperately wants not to.

But Eddy is here, so maybe a better description is that I know that our marriage is terminally ill. The odds are not good. Right now we are living in remission, hoping, fantasizing, that we are the lucky ones who will beat the odds. We have some things in our favor. But like the grim reaper, the divorce fairy (no pun intended), will eventually come to collect. Our very own terms of endearment.

I think of another Buddhist teaching -- that the the cause of all suffering is desire and attachment. But what is life without desire? I can't imagine life without feelings. I would take the package containing both suffering and joy over detachment any day.

Bea

what they said when i told them my husband is gay

Over the last two years, I have gone to people for support. Some of their responses have surprised me. Here they are (abbreviated) in roughly chronological order as accurately as I can remember them. I list the most helpful response last, though.

• my friend, D: No! He can't be. It's just a phase.
• my therapist (after I asked her, "What am I supposed to do with this information?): Just breathe.
• my friend, S: I had a friend who went through that. It was really a beautiful story . . . blah, blah, blah (after divorcing, both the husband and wife end up in same sex relationships, they all get along, the husband dies, the funeral is beautiful)
• my sister: I can see that. Are you going to leave? (or maybe it was, when will you leave?)
• a local pastor (outside of our circle) who didn't know either of us: God wants us all to be whole people.
• my friend, J: Oh, Bea! I am so sorry. He's such a great guy. We love Eddy. Do you think that you can stay together?
• my professor (after I explained why I left class crying): Does he want out? (No, I replied) Well, you can't play for both teams!?
• my friend, H: Oh, Bea! I am so sorry. But how could he have done anything else (but stay in the closet) with all of the bad religion you both were raised in?
• my friend, S, a year later: Bea, I think that you just need to find someone else.
• my friend, D, a year later: I still think that this is a phase.

But the best advice was given to me about a month after "the revelation". It was by a PFLAG (Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays) volunteer, who seven (now nine) years ago went through all of this. She said, #1 the rollercoaster will stop. #2 don't listen to what anyone else says; you and Eddy have to do what is right for you, and it might not look like anything anyone else has ever done.

Peace

B

GOING to heaven! or not?

One of my favorite poems - by Emily Dickinson -- read to the end for the "twist"

GOING to heaven!
I don’t know when,
Pray do not ask me how,—
Indeed, I ’m too astonished
To think of answering you!
Going to heaven!—
How dim it sounds!
And yet it will be done
As sure as flocks go home at night
Unto the shepherd’s arm!

Perhaps you ’re going too!
Who knows?
If you should get there first,
Save just a little place for me
Close to the two I lost!
The smallest “robe” will fit me,
And just a bit of “crown”;
For you know we do not mind our dress
When we are going home.

I ’m glad I don’t believe it,
For it would stop my breath,
And I ’d like to look a little more
At such a curious earth!
I am glad they did believe it
Whom I have never found
Since the mighty autumn afternoon
I left them in the ground.

I absolutely love this poem. For so long, I believed that the after-life was more important than life itself. How sad! Right now, I'm not sure what I believe. If God is real, I don't believe that he would give us life just so we could wish it away. The idea of God is becoming more and more absurd to me. At the same time, though, I can't imagine how I would feel if my parents stopped believing.

And I can't imagine "coming out" to them about my current state of agnosticism. I guess that I have a closet of my own.

Not too long ago, one of Chris' (hurricane's) friends accused him of conveniently changing his theology so he could be gay:
It seems to me that this is very convenient. If, as you say, all church’s are “the creation of men”, then all of us can simply invent our own religion, each of us recreating God in our own image, to suit our needs.

I have thought a lot about this. The truth is - two things collided: long held religious beliefs (gay is bad) and inner feelings . . . life experience (God made me gay). These two ideas are diametrically opposed. They both can't be true.

When Eddy came out to our parents, his Mom's reaction was "God made you this way; it can't be wrong." My Mom's initial reaction was "God doesn't go against his word; he couldn't have made him gay." (She seems to be coming around on this).

So which is it? Which is true? Which idea lives? The one you know is true because you have experienced it, struggled with it, and it won't go away. One of my favorite quotes is "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." ~Philip K. Dick

Chris and Eddy and __________ and Bea aren't trying to change God so we can sleep at night and have lascivious fun. Rather, the two ideas simply couldn't co-exist, so we believe in what rings most true.

B