CHRONICLE OF AN ANNOUNCED GAY DISASTER

at least I think they understood it, no one has ever talked about it, neither us nor them, but they should have understood it, I think. Among the friends there are some very outgoing, both guys and girls, and some a little more reserved. I and my "companion" we are radically secular, I mean that we are not believers, the Church seems to us something completely foreign and even hostile. With this Pope, perhaps a little less, but it is still a world very far from our way of seeing things. In the group of friends there are also Catholics, let's say so "normal" that is without too much enthusiasm but who still recognize themselves in those environments, but there is also a guy, whom I will call Paul here (because he always mentions St. Paul!) With whom the speech, both on my part and on the part of my "partner" has always been very difficult. He had had a girlfriend for years, always known in a Catholic environment. I would like to make a premise: my "companion" and I don’t feel Catholics but we don’t hate anyone and don’t have radically secular and priest-eating presuppositions. We also met priests worthy of the utmost respect, I mean worthy of the utmost respect even from non-believers like us, because in the end what matters is not what you say but what you do. I say this to clarify that we don’t have a spirit of repulsion towards all Catholic circles, because saying Catholic can mean everything and the opposite of everything, as on the other hand also saying gay can mean everything and the opposite of everything.

I go back to Paul. Ever since I met him, Paul has shown me a kind of detachment, let's say of splendid isolation. There was also talk, every now and then, but only about trivial issues, he, in the group, had his friends, the most radically Catholic ones, and since he had heard me say my opinion and didn’t like what I said, he kept me at a distance, but it was only he who behaved like that, with his "Catholic" friends I had an excellent relationship, we joked and talked about everything, with him no, the dialogue was minimal and limited to obvious things, he did not mix with those whose thoughts were more or less different from his opinions. Then my partner joined the group and Paul had a minimum relationship with him, because my partner is much more prudent than me, and having understood immediately who Paul was, he was careful not to say what he thought. My partner considered Paul a somehow closed guy, a little fixated on religion, but all in all a "pretty nice" guy. With our group of friends we didn't say we were a gay couple, I think most of the friends didn't care about it, so we didn't talk about it, but we had with each other a behavior a bit too loose to be just a couple of friends. Paul always came with his girlfriend but he did things that I didn't understand and that bothered me, he scolded his girl in public for things that seemed completely meaningless to me, he silenced her by making her look stupid,

I asked myself why the girl tolerated all this, if I had done with my partner the tenth part of what Paul did with his girl, my partner would have made me fly out of the window. One day we begin to talk about life as a couple, "normal" Catholic friends said things that were all in all acceptable or almost even for me and my partner, but those things at a certain point triggered Paul who left in a hurry against a girl who dared to argue that premarital experiences are fundamental and can avoid "bad marriages". Paul jumped at the very expression “wrong marriages” and began to quote Saint Paul. At which my partner and I exchanged a look of understanding, as if to say: "But this really comes from the Moon!" Then the girl told him that one must not passively suffer the attitudes of parents and at this point Paul got really warm saying that "honor your father and mother" is a commandment and that we must never forget it, etc. etc.. A girl said to him: "if my mother wants to meddle with my business and wants to tell me what guy I have to put up with, I can't sit and listen to her ruining my life, she has had her life, mine is mine!" Then Paul slipped on the gay topic and said really absurd things, that straight couples must be "serious" because they have to collaborate in God's plan by putting children into the world and they cannot do "like gays" who only think about "having fun". This expression really got on my nerves, I exchanged a knowing look with my partner and then I said to Paul: “Do you realize what a nonsense you are saying? But do you have gay friends? " He looked at me and said, "I've never had gay friends!" and I said to him: “No! It's not true! You have a gay friend and it's me!" My partner intervened and said:" You have two gay friends, the other is me!" Project, you won't believe it, but Paul thought we had agreed to make fun of him and he didn't believe in the slightest that we were gay… for him, gays are just another zoological species. Then, carried away by his incredulity, the others also considered our declaring ourselves as a way of making fun of Paul. All this happened about two years ago. For a few months now, things have changed a bit, Paul considers my partner and me to be two jokers friends, but 100% straight, otherwise he would never have accepted our friendship, but we had the opportunity to talk to him even a little more seriously. Project, my partner and I are really thinking that Paul may be gay. He always goes around with the girl behind him, or rather in tow, but I see our straight friends what behavior they have with their girls, well Paul's behavior is totally different: never a caress, a cuddle, but never even a nice word for the girl, who evidently doesn't count for anything in Paul's world, or rather counts as something that brings him back to a heterosexual model, with whom, however, it is evident that he has nothing to do. My straight friends, both guys and girls also talk about sex, they don't talk too much about it but it happens and they talk about it as the most obvious thing in the world, Paul never talks about it, he avoids the topic in a systematic way. The others talk about homosexuality as well. In Paul's speeches the words: gay or homosexual never appear, not even by mistake and the call to religion is only seen in terms of restraint and limitation, never in terms of liberation or enthusiasm. I talked about it with my "partner" and we came to the conclusion that we could "maybe" tell him about us, assuming something that wasn't granted at all, that is that he was able to understand that our statement was not a joke. We also tried, but every time he noticed that something like this was about to happen he disappeared immediately. My partner and I don’t go to church, but a couple of our friends who go to the parish instead told us about a sermon given by one of the priests who said that “marriage is the remedy for concupiscence” but did not refer the speech to straight people, as usually, but he generalized it by saying that “marriage is also the remedy for homosexuality”, an expression that manifests the most radical ignorance in matters of sexuality. The couple of our friends who were present had the impression that the speech was not generic but that it was meant for Paul who was there in the front row and didn’t move an inch until the end. My two straight friends probably thought what my partner and I had suspected, but in a similar situation what do you do? Do you face Paul directly? Or do you tell the girl to be careful and figure out whether or not it’s worth going further? My partner and I talked about Paul with this couple of friends and they told us that the priest who had said those things was considered a "somewhat strange" and problematic character even by the parish priest who had tried to limit his sphere of action. Everyone in the parish avoided him, except Paul, who was enthusiastic about him. What evidence did we have? Virtually no hard evidence, but the four of us had the same feeling. We concluded that taking Paul head on was not feasible and that we could only bring the discussion to these topics to see Paul's reactions, and we did, but there was no reaction at all. The straight couple of friends started from the need for absolute honesty in marriage, saying that each of the spouses must know everything about the other and that deceiving the spouse means using him/her and ruining his/her life, but Paul was a rubber wall, he didn’t even listen. We noticed another thing, for quite some time, every now and then Paul made some shots at gays even in our presence because at the beginning he thought that we were actually straight, then the phrases about gays disappeared completely and the topic was 100% censored. The straight couple tells me that Paul says the same things that the somewhat strange priest says and that the idea of marriage as an "ideal of chastity" is starting to become one of Paul's workhorses. One day my partner and I talked seriously about it and decided to take action, but before putting our project into practice, the straight couple of our friends told us that "during mass" the priest a little strange announced the date of the marriage of Paul with his girlfriend. At which, after having meditated for a long time, thinking that by now Paul was no longer recoverable, we decided to desist, and we said to ourselves: “Can we prevent an announced disaster? … Unfortunately not! Everyone is free, even to make mistakes and do damage.“ We also told ourselves that basically we didn't have any proof or admission from Paul, but seeing his face after the marriage banns, the answer was more than obvious. A guy who's about to get married should be beaming but he wasn't like that at all. Paul somehow knew he was going to trap himself and was going to throw the girl too into the same trap. Paul told us that he intended to limit the ceremony only to close family members, evidently he knew well that for his friends, and in particular for four of his friends, going to the wedding would be embarrassing and therefore he avoided any embarrassing situation a priori. The wedding was officiated outside the parish by the somewhat strange priest. Of course, our assessments can be completely wrong ... we will simply never know, because " What God has joined together, no person is to separate!" Although sometimes this phrase is a real blasphemy. After the wedding we didn't get any news about more about Paul and his wife. They have disappeared into thin air.

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This email (some contents of which have been deliberately omitted for privacy reasons) would not in itself require any comment. I will therefore limit myself to a very few lines. As I read the story, I was reminded of the romantic relationship between the poets Fitz-Greene Halleck and Joseph Rodman Drake. Fitz-Greene Halleck (July 8th, 1790 – November 19th,1867) was five years older than his friend Joseph Rodman Drake (August 7th, 1795 – September 21 th, 1820).Drake in 1816, still very young, married Sarah (daughter of Henry Eckford, a naval architect) with whom he had a daughter. He died of consumption at the age of 25. Halleck never married, he fell in love at the age of 19 with a young Cuban, Carlos Menie, to whom he had dedicated some of his first poems. Hallock, 1) Halleck’s biographer, hypothesizes according to the common sense and a lot of evidences, that Halleck was in love with his friend Drake. James Grant Wilson underlined the way in which Halleck, who was present at the wedding as the best friend of the groom (a formal role at the time), described the wedding: 

«[Drake] has married, and, as his wife’s father is rich, I imagine he will write no more. He was poor, as poets, of course, always are, and offered himself a sacrifice at the shrine of Hymen to shun the ’pains and penalties’ of poverty. I officiated as groomsman, though much against my will. His wife was good natured, and loves him to distraction. He is perhaps the handsomest man in New York, — a face like an angel, a form like an Apollo; and, as I well knew that his person was the true index of his mind, I felt myself during the ceremony as committing a crime in aiding and assisting such a sacrifice.» 2) 

Here we are dealing in all likelihood with a homosexual who has chosen the path of marriage for essentially economic reasons, in the case of Paul’s story the marriage “seems” to be due to religious reasons, but it is really obscene in the first place that a priest encourages a homosexual guy to marry a woman with the idea that marriage is even the remedy for homosexuality! But perhaps it is even more obscene that attempts are made to consecrate such a union, with the words “What God has joined together, no person is to separate.” A phrase that has a very important meaning that has been distorted and abused to justify an abuse of the marriage piloted by a priest. If it is true that the parish priest had noticed that something was wrong, it is also true that he didn’t do anything to avoid such an obscenity. “He who has ears, let him hear.” 1) Hallock, John Wesley Matthew. “The First Statue: Fitz-Greene Halleck and Homotextual Representation in Nineteenth-Century America.” Ph.D. Dissertation, Temple University; DAI, Vol. 58-06A (1997): 2209, Temple University. And also Hallock, John Wesley Matthew, “American Byron: Homosexuality & The Fall Of Fitz-Greene Halleck” (Madison, Wisconsin: U. of Wisconsin Press, 2000).2) James Grant Wilson, “The Life and Letters of Fitz-Greene Halleck”. New York: Appleton and Company, 1869: 184.

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MARRIED GAY GUYS

This post is dedicated to married gays. I will leave aside all the considerations linked to sexual orientation related to guys who have a straight sex life at the couple level and have a typically gay sex life at the masturbation level, because these considerations have an important meaning only before getting married. I will start here from the situation of married gays, as it showed itself to me through the chats with people living this condition.

The totality (or almost totality) of married gays arrives at the wedding with the full awareness of being gay. These are guys who have been masturbating for years exclusively with gay fantasies, that is, thinking about guys, who often have lived sexual experiences with other guys even after 15/16 years of age and even in adulthood, after 20 years of age, and have considered these experiences as “something that everyone does” (including hetero guys) and therefore not indicative of a gay orientation, even if in reality the involvement of a gay guy in a group masturbation session is very different from that of a straight guy. All this, ignoring seemingly minor episodes, such as experiencing erection in the presence of certain guys or the desire to see them naked in the locker rooms of gyms or swimming pools.

The pressure towards heterosexuality (conscious or unconscious) exerted by the environment on these guys has been so strong as to bring them to stop their gay instincts at the level of masturbation and to orient themselves at the same time towards a couple heterosexual sex.

Generally when a guy who suffered a strong social pressure towards heterosexuality, despite his being gay, that is even though oriented in his free sexuality (which manifests itself in masturbation) towards other guys, experiences for the first time a sexual intercourse with a girl his reaction is not necessarily bad at all and, whatever the level of sexual involvement in the contact with the girl (even minimal) is, that sexual intercourse becomes the typical sign that “the gay problem is overcome”. A gay man is a gay man, not an impotent and, especially when he has lived for years in a situation of substantial sexual deprivation, if he is close to a girl in love with him, in a situation that pushes him to a heterosexual intercourse that has at least some features of intimacy and non-superficial warmth, can very well get to have a heterosexual intercourse somehow satisfying. It is clear that such a intercourse has nothing to do with the expression of the free sexuality of that guy who, even feeling terribly guilty, will continue “episodically” to masturbate thinking about guys, or will eventually completely repress his free sexuality forcing himself to put aside masturbation altogether in the belief that masturbation is the cause of the homosexuality.

The first straight intercourses of a gay guy lead him to the idea of having finally overcome the “gay phase” and to have found a “mature sexuality”. Often, for these guys, the fear that gay impulses will forcefully return to be felt is a push to intensify heterosexual intercourses and to go to marriage quickly. It’s the typical idea: “You saved me from homosexuality”, or: “If I get married and can have sex with her every day I will not think about masturbation and my gay impulses will disappear”. Often, therefore, gay guys who go to the marriage, experience periods of intense heterosexual activity, which however are characterized by a deep sense of ambiguity because in almost all cases, these guys, even making love every day with their girls (or with their young wives, if they have already married them) never talk with their mates about their sexual orientation problems. With wives, in principle, at least for some years after marriage, gay husbands do not even mention the problem of homosexuality, there is therefore no real interpersonal communication between husband and wife, who have daily sexual contacts but without an adequate level of trust and mutual communication.

In a percentage of cases around 10%, the guys talk to the girls openly about their doubts of being homosexuals, doubts that are automatically underestimated by girls, who having a straight sexuality are led to think that their boyfriends, by the simple fact that they have sex with them, can only be straight. Generally, a girl is more afraid of her boyfriend’s infidelity with another girl than of the fact that her boyfriend is gay. In some cases the girl thinks she can sexually reorient her boyfriend towards an exclusive heterosexuality by “sexually cuddling” her boyfriend exasperatedly, what results usually in a very quick and clear reaction of rejection. These attitudes as “Red Cross nurse of love” are lived by the guys as aggressive and not respectful towards them.

In the situations described above, the girl still remains convinced of the substantial heterosexuality of the guy but, in some cases at least (rare but not sporadic) the girl has instead full awareness of the fact that her partner is gay and she accepts him as such, that is, the girl, who is really in love with her boyfriend, consciously agrees to stay close to him without any sexual contact or with a sexual contact limited only to the purpose of conception of children, children who may also be explicitly desired by the guy. These attitudes that have something heroic (in a sense at least) are linked to the fact that the solitude of each of the two spouses with respect to the outside is so strong that they must bind each other with a kind of very close symbiosis in order to survive.

It should be emphasized that when a hug is too tight and too long-lasting it risks taking your breath away. In situations like the one described, mutual dependence is very strong and is felt as a bond that sooner or later ends up becoming constrictive. There are couples, and I have known some, who consciously married only to have children, and there are cases (and I have seen some examples) in which a heterosexual wife helps her gay husband to live like a gay man, an attitude in which the boundaries between pleasure and suffering are very fragile. In all these cases, however (about 15-20% of the total married gays) between husband and wife there is still a frank dialog and at least a relationship of friendship and mutual respect. When a gay guy marries a straight girl and they have no children the problems connected to the possible separation are above all of social and patrimonial nature.

Often a gay guy agrees to be with a girl by excluding in his mind the hypothesis of having children and when he realizes that this hypothesis for his wife is essential, the marriage becomes a kind of imposition for him. When there are children the problem of the relationship of a gay married with his homosexuality is extremely more delicate. The emergence of a homosexual tendency is experienced by a gay man who has children as something that can jeopardize the relationship with the children and the feelings of guilt can be very profound. I met a 49-year-old gentleman a few months ago, who had never had a conscious perception of his homosexuality (an exception in the field of married gays), he had a son more than 20 years old but nevertheless he realized that he had a sexual interest for a work colleague. When this gentleman contacted me in his words I felt a deep anguish, due to the fact that he had never suspected he could be gay and was scared of such idea, because his knowledge of gays derived only from reading newspapers and from attitudes typical of the mass media. This gentleman, whom I had the opportunity to hear several times, sincerely loved his wife and son and came to speak openly with both his wife and his son who accepted it and, paradoxically, this form of sincerity has strengthened family ties. That gentleman agreed to live his sexuality as a very private thing exclusively in terms of masturbation and fantasy, totally giving up the idea of looking for a mate and as people say in such situations of “making a new life”.

The solution may seem like a compromise solution to gays who have not been married and who have never had a heterosexual satisfactory family life, but for that gentleman radical choices would have involved a violent cut with the previous life and would have had very little prospect of leading to realization of a new life with another man.

In most cases, however, the family situations of married gays are quite different and much heavier. The lack of sincerity on the problem of homosexuality involves the establishment of a series of formal relationships and under them a series of conflicts, affective life becomes over time a sort of recitation or due act. With his wife, if she requires a frequent sexual intimacy, a married gay ends up pretending, which usually involves many problems, such as the lack of erection that can worry the wife but doesn’t worry her husband who knows that during masturbation with gay fantasies erection is all right. These problems touch the sphere of sexual intimacy of the couple and can be disruptive. Generally, at first a married gay guy tries to repress his homosexuality but over time this attempt is useless and the illusion of heterosexuality turns into a fiction of heterosexuality. The gay impulses are strengthened as the relationship with the wife deteriorates.

It is only right that I explicitly break a spear in favor of the wives who are often completely unaware of the true motivation of the deterioration of the relationship with their husbands and who live, also themselves, really difficult moments. Basically, even if their husbands acted in good faith or did not really realize what they would do with marriage, these women were misled about the true sexual identity of their husbands, who, moreover, were also confused about the matter. The fact remains that at a certain point, a woman who has married a gay man without being aware of it, understands that relations with her husband are substantially frozen, sexual intercourses are completely absent, dialogue is completely lacking, at least on important issues, and marriage is in crisis. When there are children the problem becomes difficult to manage, because in case of separation there is the problem of the entrustment that creates further conflicts between husband and wife which are often resolved in court.

How does he live his sexuality a gay married who has passed the phase (which in many cases doesn’t even exist) of the illusion of being heterosexual? Here the answers are the most varied:

1) The husband accustomed to sexual repression up to play the part of the heterosexual, limits himself to live a gay sexuality in terms of masturbation and porn sites found on the Internet. Such situations are, at most, compatible with the preservation of marriage, at least on a formal level, where there are children, because the external aspect of the family doesn’t change. Often this is the state of affairs to which things stop. The husbands can get to forums like Gay Project or other serious gay sites and simply look for friendships with other gays, often married too, in chat and at a distance. This solution allows a married gay to find a safety valve that puts him in a position to talk openly about his problems and also to find serious answers. It is obviously a compromise solution, but in situations such as those in which a gay married and with children lives it is a situation that is in many respects acceptable, since in most cases we are speaking about men who are no longer young and are totally lacking knowledge about the true life of gays. It should be borne in mind that for a non-young man the chances of finding a “serious” companion (that is, not the one-night experience [risk of aids!]) are not very high and moreover few gay men would be available to build an affective, stable and serious relationship with a man who has a family, has children and therefore has a number of other very strong emotional bonds.

2) If the husband thinks he has to regain lost time looking for a companion with whom to live his affectivity and his sexuality, and the husband is still thirty or so, he can experience situations similar to those of the so-called “frenetic phase” of sexuality of those who discover themselves gay or finally release their gay sexuality at a fully adult age. These guys are not content to masturbate looking at a porn site but sign up for erotic chats and dating sites, giving credit to the idea that the problem of finding a partner is actually a problem that can be solved easily “with a little effort”. Through the chat they get to sexual encounters, often even at risk of AIDS, because a user of dating sites can also have over 100 different partners in a year! Apart from the risk of AIDS, occasional sexual encounters generate feelings of disgust and frustration after the first times. However, it does not follow a rationalization of the behaviors but only the repetition of other attempts with other partners. I emphasize that in these situations the emotional dimension, which is essential in a gay’s emotional and sexual life, is practically completely absent. After a little practice of erotic chats and dating sites, a depressive phase takes place that depending on age can be more or less heavy.

3) There is however a third path followed by married gays towards their gay identity, and it is a path that can only be done in two. I state that the concrete realization of this third way, which is that of “loving friendship”, is not the result of an individual initiative, but is connected to the idea of being already really in two, that there is an “original affective couple reciprocity” and that a real relationship of affectionate friendship already exists, on which an explicit sexual dimension can also be inserted. Given that married gays who end up in a marriage crisis are not very young and are not only undeclared as gay but are declared as hetero, for them the idea of living their sexuality and their affectivity in a strictly private dimension is fundamental. In dating sites and erotic chats there are often people who don’t have too many problems to declare themselves gay, to go to gay clubs and to be seen around with mates clearly gay. Such things are very embarrassing for a married gay, for whom therefore the option of the amorous friendship remains substantially the most desirable. If that friendship is lived with great discretion, it allows the marriage to be maintained at least on a formal level and in some cases even the wives are not in principle opposed to such solutions that allow a stable relationship between the gay father and the children, avoiding putting their emotional growth at risk. I saw, in about 30% of cases, the development of a loving friendship between a married gay and a friend of his, also gay and undeclared. These relationships, even if they occur between fully adult men, have the freshness and genuineness of the first affective contacts between adolescents, allow the two partners to live a deep affective dimension and to integrate sexuality with moments of non-sexual intimacy, linked to totally sincere dialogue and openness and to mutual trust without restrictions, all things that have an enormous value and help not to trivialize sexual intercourse.

For the moment I stop here. I await further input from readers to be able to broaden and deepen the discussion. I would like to point out that the statistical sites show the constant presence of readers who use on the Google search engine keys to Gay Project as “married gays”. The problem exists and it is not statistically irrelevant as usually believed.

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If you want, you can participate in the discussion of this post open on the Gay Project Forum: http://gayprojectforum.altervista.org/T-married-gay-guys

FROM PERPLEXED HETERO TO HAPPY GAY

Hello Project,
From some months now I follow Gay Project that is practically unique throughout the network and allowed me to understand many things and gave a serious answer to many questions.

My name is Max, I am 29 years old, luckily for me I have a good job, which is a rarity these days, and I live on my own in a small town in the northern Italy. To accept my being gay it took me so long, I had two girlfriends, the first story was a thing of little weight, but the second was important. I needed a rest, I felt alone, I was 26 years old when it started.

I was used to let myself go with this girl, at least a little, then I realized the reason but I didn’t realize at that time. I had sex with her, but in a very strange way, I never took the initiative, such things didn’t event come into my mind, she had to do everything, I abandoned myself just passively and she brought me to orgasm as well. The first few times, that’s what I understood later, it seemed important to me to have an erection with a girl because this drove away the fear of being gay. When I reached orgasm I fell a sense of disappointment, as if it were something completely stupid and in fact for me it was just a physical reaction. She was used to give great importance to the fact that I had reached orgasm, she felt really proud of that.

Only a very few times I’ve been to stimulate her, but she had to basically teach me everything because I had no idea of how a woman could get excited. I think that in general a 26 year old guy knows very well what to do to a woman but I did not know. She wanted me to try penetration but I never did, a little out of fear that she became pregnant and a bit because for me it was not a spontaneous thing. So, according to her, things were going very well and I was just a little clumsy but I knew that it was not the case and that I was forced, as you say, I was “doing an experiment” on myself to see if I could eventually adapt to living with a woman.

The fact of having sex with her, however, gave me the feeling of not being gay and things went on like this, and here comes my discovery of your blog, in fact I had then also another sex life, I masturbated but always just watching gay videos or making fantasies about guys I met at the gym. Frankly these things, then, hadn’t any great significance for me, I said to myself that it was to make comparisons just like, I think, all the straight guys do and then, after all, it didn’t even happen so often.

I never made fantasies about girls but then it seemed to me obvious and almost meritorious because I had a girlfriend who had sex with me. With my girlfriend I had a very special relationship because her parents didn’t even know that we were somehow in love, or at least I had not ever wanted them to know because, I think, subconsciously I was afraid of getting bound, instead friends knew, both her and mine and, after all, that my friends knew it, for me, was an important thing. I had told her about a lot of strange things, about why I didn’t want to marry her and didn’t even want to have children, all these things seemed absurd to her and she was quite sure that she could change my mind.

Sometimes I thought that she considered me as a person of very little importance and that she was only interested in me to involve me into her life in order to complete her project of life, however, I can say that sex between us had become a habit, we were together also to have sex and I liked it, or at least tolerated it, but then when it was over I forgot the whole thing and did not think about until the next time and basically I didn’t want it really. I remember that when we were together she was totally focused on sex on the contrary I was thinking about something else and I was wondering why I was having sex with her.

We weren’t used to talk about us, but always and only about her projects that in fact did not concern us as couple but our being a couple in the eyes of other people, we were talking about going here or there, doing this or that, nothing more. I was surprised that nevertheless she felt in love with me but I think she really felt.

A couple of years ago I happened by chance on Gay Project and I began to read. The more I read, the more I opened my eyes. At one point I said: but then I’m really gay! I was used to think that the fact that I had never done those things that are said to be typical of gay guys was a clear evidence that I was not gay, and in addition I had sex with a girl. Then by reading more and more your blog, this reasoning was beginning to seem absurd, I began to think to the fact that sexual fantasies are a serious matter and slowly, I can say, I started living that things with more awareness, but at most I could consider myself bisexual, that was the idea I had formed of me, but then that idea has been shattered, but I didn’t like the idea of being gay.

The forum helped me a lot, but now sex with my girlfriend had become a habit and frankly I thought it would be still better to have sex with a guy whom I fantasized about but I thought it was absolutely impossible for me as a concrete experience. Let’s say that I had reached a balance, a compromise, certainly unstable but reassuring.

Then three months ago things have changed, I met by accident a guy 21 y. o.. He came where I work and had some work problems to be solved, things were rather complicated and he asked me if I could help him. The way he asked me and his appearance made me come to a heart attack. I was enchanted. I had other work to do but I invited him to sit down and I closed the door. He began to tell me about various problems and I tried to find the best solution concentrating at most. Not all problems could be solved immediately, for some things we needed our attention and time.

We met again in the following days. We were experiencing more and more a wonderful climate. I went to work just to see that guy. I asked myself a lot of questions and he did the same thing. Slowly the atmosphere became very pleasant, he called at home to get information and always we ended up chatting about things that with the work had nothing to do. Both were trying to prolong the conversation as much as possible. It took a little to start a conversation less formal and more friendly, then came the first pizza together and the first evening spent talking in the car, then he asked me how I figured out and accepted it, I told him that everything happened without any problem, all came very natural, and he told me about himself and even that he had spent long nights to read blog posts of Project.

The day when we told each other everything was beautiful, I think it was something absolutely unique and I felt very happy. When I looked into his eyes and I saw his smile I was the happiest man in the world, I wanted to hug him but I did not have the courage neither had he, I was afraid that even the slightest physical contact could break the spell. We met for almost three months, and then he told me that it was his first time and he wanted to make love with me, I told him all my fears, insisting that I had a girlfriend although frankly I wanted to be with him only. With him, I could also talk about my sexual fantasies.

Sometimes it seemed impossible that a guy like him could be in love with me, but things were just so. I felt a sexual attraction to him but also a strong total tenderness, I loved him just as a person, he made me feel loved, made me feel that he loved me, trusted me completely, we were happy together and we are still. Project, what you write about gay affectivity is absolutely true. Recently, I spent two days with him and I do not think I could do without it.

It is two weeks that I no longer see my girlfriend, I could not tell her anything and in the end I’m sorry but I do not think she would understand. When we had the opportunity to talk about gay people she replied as one who takes no offense but with “them” just doesn’t want to have anything to do.

I believe that I have never been so happy as today. It is not a matter of sex, it’s that I feel just totally in love with this guy. In everything he does and says there never was a discordant note and such a guy is in love with me! Guys, before meeting him, I was convinced that my life would have been to have sex with a woman without any real involvement and act like I was in love with her, I thought I’d never have a boyfriend, I took it for granted, and then at age 29 the possibilities decrease, but no! As you say, Project, when you meet the right guy, life changes. And I love my boyfriend totally, I like him in every way, just as a person because he’s truly a good person, a honest guy who wants to love and be loved. I want to tell everyone, do not put in your head that love does not exist and you will not find it because when you least are waiting for him, a guy looks into your eyes and your life changes! A hug to everyone! And one very special to Project (now I really understand the deep meaning of what you said!)

Max

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http://gayprojectforum.altervista.org/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=104

MARRIED GAY GUYS AND SUBLIMATION

Hello Project,

I am writing you this email because I had a look at your google site and also at your forum and it seems a serious thing, neither ideological nor to make money. I am in a rather difficult situation and I need to understand what is happening to me.

I’m 31 years old, I could tell you that I’ve always been straight, because the outside was always so, and I could say that for a long time, I also thought that I was really so, but if I go to look far back in memory, when I was 11 – 12 y. o., I find in practice many things that make me doubt.

As a kid, I was obsessed by the idea of seeing other kids naked, at the beach I tried to spy on them, the boys not the girls, and I still remember very well when a 19 y. o. guy who was playing with us on the shore took off his swimming suit in front of me with the most natural. I would not have forgotten it, at that time I was more or less 14 y. o.. I discovered masturbation this way and alone of course. I tried to do everything to be with that guy who treated me well, but he had a girlfriend and his parents had given him a canoe for two people, and since then he had started to sit always with the girl, when they came back to earth he was playing football with us and it was very nice, then the girl called him and they left. I’ve hated that girl. From 14 years onwards my fantasies have been about guys older than me, I was already no longer interested in my peers.

The following summer, I was 16, and I met at the beach a 17 year old guy, a guy with a nice body. After a few days we got into the habit of bathing in the sea together, he had an inflatable raft, we went where the water is a bit deeper, but not too much because we still were able to touch the ground with our feet, he would stand in the raft and I was trying to drop him in the sea and in the end I could drop him in the water but deliberately I waited a few minutes before deciding to drop him.

The thing that mattered to me was the fact that he wore a swimsuit very wide and when he put up in the raft while I was shaking it trying to get him down, I could see everything (his sex). Clearly he was not excited at all but I liked a lot to see his penis that way.

When I was aged 17, attending penultimate year of school, my life has changed. A priest who was more or less 50 y. o. came to teach us Catholic religion, this priest had his charm because he presented religion in a smart way. This priest was leading an oratory for guys and I started to attend it, at the beginning just because there were guys. There was also a Sunday Mass together.

My teacher introduced me to religion, he never confessed the school boys and I appreciated it very much, in short, with a lot of resistance, at least at the beginning, I started going to church and there came the first problems with sexuality. I think that all the guys who attend the church have had to deal with sexual problems but nothing serious.

In the group managed by the priest girls were rare but it was possible to meet also girls. One of them was called L. was pretty and also a lot smart. I’ll spare you the details, at age 17 and a half I had my first sexual relationship with L. and I liked it well. In practice since then I have no more had gay fantasies of any kind. I was an athlete, I was naked with my teammates every day but I never got excited.

Two years ago I married L., in practice, according to the canons, I become a normal man. L. didn’t know anything of my sexual fantasies when I was young because I never had had told her such things and at that time I honestly thought that I had completely overcome that things.

But for six months now things have changed, but have changed very slowly, I met at work a 24 y. o. guy, frankly I do not even care whether he is gay or straight, even if I think he’s straight. He knows that I’m married and I love my wife very much which in a way is true because I live with her my sexuality and sexually I’m completely happy and also when I rarely masturbate I think about my wife, but the trouble is that I tend to see my wife especially or rather only under sexual profile. When something is not right between us we put it on the sexual and overcome all the problems, at least in appearance.

With my colleague I don’t feel sexual physical implications of any kind, but I think I’m nevertheless in love with him, I do not know how to explain, I got to lie to my wife to spend an evening with him, I feel an extreme tenderness towards him and between us grew a very strong relationship that appears to me that he lives the same way. We’re good together, when I quarrel with my wife (it happens rarely) I call him and his voice has the power to calm me down, when I see him in the office I’m just fine, I miss him badly when he is away, it’s a little what should happen with my wife but with her things never go this way, on the contrary with my colleague it always happens.

I have read on the forum of the dissociation between affectivity and sexuality, however, it refers only to men who are sexually attracted to other men and fall in love only with women, the opposite is happening to me. I do not think I could conceive the idea of having sex with my colleague, I tried to see him also from the sexual point of view but the sense of our relationship is not that I do not know what to think, perhaps I can have it removed. However, what makes me think more and in a way encourages me is the fact that it is a shared thing, I do not know if he realizes it or lives it simply as a beautiful friendship between straight guys but it is certainly something special also for him.

In recent times this story has increasingly become inside me. I do not know if you can call it falling in love, certainly there isn’t visible sex but just seeing him makes me feel good, it’s a bit as if he were my model of man, the best I’ve known, physically but also emotionally, I respect him really, I love him, I think he is better than me and that gives me great pleasure. I came to think something paradoxical and that maybe I could come to prefer to live with my colleague without sex than with my wife with sex. I know I may sound hypocritical but that’s what happens to me.

What should do a married 31 y. o. guy who is in this situation? I do not have any intention of losing my friend. My wife could be happy also this way, in practice what am I depriving het of? A little affection, it is true, but this is a betrayal? And how it will end?

Project, no problem if you want to publish the mail, but please answer me in private. Thanks for your patience. I’m waiting for your answer (and possibly your msn contact).

Robert (not my real name)

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GAY-HETERO RELATIONSHIP AND SEXUAL EMBARRASSMENT

Hello Project,

my name is Jake, it’s not a pseudonym, I am the son of an American father and an Italian mother, my mother was from Milan (unfortunately she died three years ago), my father is from Baltimore. I studied in a Catholic boarding school in Baltimore until I was 13 years old, living practically always there. My father is even now a manager and he never had time to spend with me. My parents never went over well then, when I was 13 years they divorced and I have been entrusted to my mother and I went to live in Milan. I went also to high school in Milan and graduated there. Now I am 34 years old. I recovered a little my relationship with my father when I was 30 years old when my mother became ill. He did everything to help my her, he took her to the U.S. and made the best specialists visit her. He has been close to her until the end even though they were divorced. Not only he had a dignity, but he behaved with me unexpectedly, he was then 62 years old and I think he realized what it means to have a child. I told him openly that I was gay and he was going to cry, he was glad that I trusted him to the point of saying such a thing. Now he is 66 years old and is going to retire, he will leave his job in July. He has no one in U.S. and I think he will come to live in Milan because my mother has bequeathed to him her apartment in Milan (the divorce of my parents was really a bit strange!).

I understood I was gay in my last year in Baltimore, between 13 and 14 y. o., when I fell in love with another guy who was in college with me, but then I came to Italy. The first months I was in Italy were terrible, my Italian was terrible and at school my friends were saying things I was not able to understand exactly and I did not dare to ask in order to get more explications. Physically I was not like others. I am kind of very English, not a Californian guy, I’m very tall and very thin and not at all muscular. At school I was very marginal and did not do well. My mother tried to do everything but it was not easy. I was good in English and bad in Italian. Then slowly, reading a lot and being with my teammates I began to understand the language better and my problems became more and more easier to overcame.

I was about 16 y. o. old and was attending the third year of high school when I took my first strong crush for a guy who had arrived that year and was clearly straight, but nevertheless I was in love with him. From then until the end of high school and over, I thought that that guy would become gay due to the fact that I loved him. He was very friendly with me and treated me very well, but for him girls were too much important. We studied together often. Spending an afternoon beside him, shoulder to shoulder and do the math together, for me, was both a torture and the thing I wanted most. I longed to see him naked but it never happened, not because it was impossible, but because I was convinced that such things would have soiled the love I felt for him. Maybe I was too idealistic, but at that time I reasoned that way. After high school I saw him only a couple of times, then he got married at the age of 24 and I went to his wedding, with a bit strange feelings but I went there.

Then there was the Polytechnic. I am now a civil engineer but I’ve never been too good at science. The engineering degree was certainly not my biggest dream, but my mother worked in that area and I would find an excellent accommodation. The problem was to get a degree. At first I sat down to cry of despair on the exercises of analysis and geometry. I learned things mechanically but understanding very little. Then, coincidentally, just before Christmas, a guy asked me to take the place also for him in the morning for classes, which were very crowded, I did so and from there was born a story, the most important story of my life and at the same time the most conditioning. His name was Henry, an average guy, not beautiful, but at 20 also an average guy looks beautiful! We started studying together. He was a monster of brain! He was able to understand things that I could never understand. So in the morning we attended classes together until 14.00, then lunch together and then study together until ten o’clock in the night and beyond. He pulled like a tractor, he would not let me lose a second, I struggled a lot at the beginning, but I knew that if I had not worked hard to be at his height I would have lost him, because he could not waste time without exams. Well, I got 24/30 in analysis, my first exam, he got 30/30, but, I confess, I was not jealous, then, after the first exam came the second. I was recuperating. My grades were always lower than his, but the difference decreased. Then, after a long time, an examination of topography, I got more than him and I loved his reaction: he was happy for me, he was not envious.

To realize that I was in love with him it took me two years and a half. At first I was too stressed out by the university and the hamletic doubt “Is he gay or he’s not?” always came back to my mind. I’ll make it short. We graduated in the same session, for two years we went on holiday together, we continued seeing each other even after we had found a job, often spending Sundays together. He never, never, talked about girls! I do not tell you about ruminations I did on these signals. The relationship between us was excellent, just like two brothers, but even more. I went back and forth a thousand times between the idea of telling him explicitly that I was in love with him and the idea of leaving it all up.

One day he came to me with an air of mystery and sentimental confession and told me that he was going to tell me a very important thing that I absolutely had to know. I thought it would finally come to the point, instead he told me he was about to get married because his girlfriend was pregnant. I passed from riches to rags, but I had to prove my enthusiasm and hugged him so tight that rose him from the ground, he was beaming really, I was pretending to be happy, but world works this way. I have been also the best man at his wedding.

Inside of me I thought I was doomed to fall in love just with straight guys. That’s enough! No more hetero guys! So I decided at about 26 or 27 y. o. to throw myself completely into the gay world: gay chats, gay dating sites, communities and so on, I filled out all my ads. I was determined to try. I thought, but hey, guys my age have a love life (and even a sex life) and what do I do? It’s not fair! I’m wasting the best years of your life! I began to get responses to my ads, Project, what a squalor! People who put fake photos, boys who only know how to say ass and cock, men aged 50 who think they are 20 y. o., people broken out which are quite crazy. I’ve met some fifty of these people in couple of years, I found only one of them quite normal but I think he was a minor pretending to be an adult, I asked him to show me the identity card but he did not want to let me see it. I said: but you’re a young boy, but what are you doing on these sites? And he answered me one thing that put me in crisis, he said: and you then, what are you doing? Then I invited him to dinner. He thought that we would go to bed, but I told him that maybe I was not on those sites for the reason that he had thought, and I took him back to his house, when he got out he gave me a very strong handshake. Now, after so long, occasionally he sends a message. Let’s say it was the most beautiful story I have experienced in recent years. So we arrived between my 28 and 29. I was a virgin, and so I’m now and I’m not afraid of that because having sex with shabby people just to see what it is, it’s not really something I want. In practice, until this year I have continued to live the sex as I lived it when I was 16 y. o., then that is not too bad and at least you certainly don’t get in trouble catching diseases.

And now I come to the last part of the story. In my project group of Civil Engineering, three months ago, arrives Mark (let’s call him this way) a young 31 y. o. engineer beautiful as the sun, I can just say so, and I start to go back into the flask. In practice Mark, for me, at the official level, is just a work colleague, our relationship is strange halfway between formal (shy) behavior and subliminal messages. Mark has invaded my brain and dominates even the smallest spaces. I think of him at all the day, I feel very strong feelings for him as I have never felt for anyone else. I have to wear always very wide clothes because just thinking of him makes me to get a hard-on, I don’t tell you when I’m close to him. Project, now I’m really in trouble. Mark will be the third straight guy I fall in love with? I would not for no reason that it was so, because I think that for me this is the last train. Or Mark or no one at all! He has nothing to do with guys of gay sites, he’s very careful about what he does and what he says to never pass the border but has some hesitation, some breaks certain ways of sighing just a little while talking, some small facial movements and in some very special moments that can only be gay.

Apart from the trivial. No rings, no familiarity with the office girls, no private problems at work, but he flashes you (accidentally?) certain looks that make you dry, and steal your soul. Project, it’s about three months that I’m back in anguish. I do not know what to do, have I invite him to my house, alone or with other people? I’d invite him to come to the pool with me, I’d certainly do, but then I do not do so at all and when I’m in front of him I feel totally embarrassed and treat him in a formal way and I would not absolutely.

Then there’s just a very private question I’d like to talk with you about me and this guy because something sexual happed between us and I felt a terrible embarrassment for what he may have felt, I really wanted to disappear. Now he behaves as if nothing had happened and this worries me even more, but for that I would like to talk in private. My contact is [omitted]. Just add me and I’ll call you.

A hug. Jake

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UNDECIDED GAY GUYS

According to the experience, both personal one and that of many gay guys I know, I’m inclined to think that for a gay guy meeting other gay guys of different ages and even gay mature age is a key thing. Why do I say this? The answer comes also from experience itself: the lives of gay men maintained over time, generation after generation, something constant arising from being gay itself and if the common contacts of everyday life can lead gay guys the “ordinary” adult life, the contacts with gay adults or older gay guys may facilitate the transmission of a wealth of experience typically gay. A gay guy can only learn from other gays what are the specific problems of being gay.

That said, what is the Forum of Gay Project? I can answer that it’s useful to promote dialogue and discussion, but what does that mean “in practice”? The answer is simple, It’s useful to pool the heritage of experience and knowledge developed by other gay guys in the past. The transmission of this heritage is the real purpose of Gay Project that aims to be a collection of first-hand material on the true life experiences of gay guys. Browsing through the various threads, but particularly those in the section “Gay orientation” you may have noticed that I have tried to outline in a summary the most typical problems that a gay man can face, those related to accepting their being gay, those about coming out, those about relationships with parents, to that more specifically sexual. Knowing these arguments can be a remarkable help when there is the real need to address them because we can rely on each other and we can avoid losing years to develop responses which are in fact always the same, generation after generation.

One of the most typical problems that a gay guy is certainly to live is that of his sexual orientation. For many it is not a problem if not social, for many it is a psychological problem significant in terms of recognition of their own orientation or acceptance of it, or both, for some uncertainties remain for many years and even for life. It is this last case that I intend to discuss here.

The experience made me notice that the discomfort associated sexual orientation is inversely proportional to freedom in which the individual lives. In a “free world” the problems of sexual orientation are absent because sexual orientation is not seen as a problem. In societies where homosexuality is forced to an underground life and is subject to radical censorship homosexual orientation has a strong negative connotation that ends up being internalized even by gay guys. In these environments, the indecision about sexual orientation is common for the simple fact that being gay is experienced as something evil by the gays themselves.

Here are some examples (while recognizing that the real situations may be very different). The problems related to sexual orientation emerge in particular:

1) in closed environments in which the community is small and the private is public domain and often becomes the subject of gossip (small countries closed-minded)

2) in communities linked to the religious culture that condemns homosexuality (for example: the tragedy of a priest or seminarian who recognize themselves as gay)

3) under conditions of economic dependence on the family home beyond the physiological limit of 25/26 years

4) when there is an educational dimension intolerant of homosexuality or homophobic attitudes are shown off in the family.

In such situations, the contact with serious gay people and the exchange of experiences is useful to raise awareness and to reduce the fear of homosexuality. It is not uncommon that I happen to talk to guys who experienced uncertainty about their sexual orientation. In these cases, in general, I perceive anxiety basically linked to the idea of ​​clarity. I often say: “If you are straight, no problem, if you’re gay is no problem, if you do not know what you are you don’t have any obligation to past a label on yourself, you do not have to answer to anyone and in any case there is no problem “. Most of the problems of orientation are false problems that will be resolved over time if the anxiety related to the fact of not being straight decreases. It seems incredible how false problems may affect the lives of guys, but the emphasis is constantly placed on sexuality. Family expectations and environmental homophobia contribute to dramatize a situation which in itself has nothing dramatic.

In general, the anxiety associated with doubts about sexual orientation leads guys to non-spontaneous behavior. A guy who does not feel fully nor gay nor straight tries to define his sexual orientation through sexual behaviors that are straight or gay in order to get proofs of his sexual orientation. It so happens that several guys embark on real challenging sexual gay or straight experiences, without any basic conviction, with the unique (wrong) idea  that if a guy has sex with a girl he’s straight and if has sex with another guy he’s gay. The relationships  that are created on this basis often have a specific feature: i. e. they are essentially sexual and emotional values ​​properly fade into the background. When an undecided guy enters a relationship only to accredit the idea of ​​being straight or gay, in general, usually driven by anxiety of clarity, he’s not even aware that on the other side there is a real girl or a real guy who, unaware of the true motivations of the guy who in their eyes behaves like a lover, can invest in that relationship the whole of their affection.

I had the chance to talk to girls who have contacted me because they had come to realize that their boyfriends were gay even though they clearly stated the opposite. It is not at all certain that a girl refuse a priori a relationship with a gay guy and more than once I have known women deeply in love with gay men, in the full knowledge that they were gay, these relationships can stand very well and can be extremely solid if, even in the absence sex, between the two persons there is a deep emotional relationship. There are women in love with gay men that help them to be what they really are, that is gay. A woman feels perfectly when the man, with whom she also has sex, doesn’t really love her. In such situations a woman often feels used and cannot be able to understand the suffering of his companion. In these cases, in the absence of a genuine dialogue, relationships are going on wearily for years with mutual recriminations but generally the man will not admit being  gay not even at the level of hypothesis.

When an undecided guy enters a relationship with another man, he does with the mental reservation of being able to leave at will, that relationship is clearly for him just an experiment. Sometimes and not only in situations of couple crisis, that will inevitably occur, emerges the idea of ​​wanting to “try it with a woman”. Such a speech, that the undecided guy is unconsciously using as a weapon of psychological blackmail motivated by a greater demand for affection, warns his partner, creates insecurity and further destabilizes the couple. If the hypothesis of “try with a woman” comes only after years of cohabitation and without apparent justification, and especially if that hypotesis really occurs, it is to believe that we are facing a true swinging bisexuality (a form of bisexuality that alternates gay and hetero periods). In some cases, however rare, can also occur situations of intermediate bisexuality (not swinging). When this happens, generally, the undecided guy speaks openly to his partner searching for his understanding that he often really finds at least at theoretical level or as simple human understanding. Even in this case, however, the other guy experiences great difficulty.

The situations of indecision are never clarified through experiments to confirm an uncertain sexual orientation but only through dialogue and with the comparison in a climate of freedom and respect.

I should add that when an undecided guy sees the collapse of a relationship lasting years, at a personal level he experiences situations of extreme insecurity. Expect a final decision by an undecided guy, even after years of living together, is unrealistic and, on the other hand, save the coexistence despite its inherent instability not necessarily is the best solution.

I would warn many guys on one point: when a guy shows himself available to a sexual contact with you, but has some mental reservations, tells you not to feel gay or not to fell totally gay or not love you but just want to have sex with you, do not consider his sexual availability as a clear sign of his being gay, often, in fact, the opposite is true. Often undecided guys take the sexual initiative and involve their partners in order to make them enter the relationship, but these same undecided guys, when instead of having sex, you try to talk to them, show clearly their strong indecision. Before having sexual contacts with a guy you have to talk to him a lot, try to figure out whom you have in front of you and if you have the feeling that this guy is undecided, and you really love him, forget the sex and try seriously to build a friendship. Keep in mind that sexual involvements are often deeply wanted by an undecided guy but are  lived in a negative form, as if his partner took advantage of him.

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GAY FANTASIES OF A MARRIED MAN

Hello Project,
I’m almost 50 years, and have been married for 25, I have two grown children 21 and 23 years, my wife is a very talented woman and I love her. My life, after all, runs happily as the lives of many fathers who hope to see their children fulfill themselves in work and love life. My children are both engaged and their girls are now part of my family, they are often at home without any formalities, we have lunch together and it seems to me that things are going along well in this direction, but I carry within me for many years a thought that haunts me and I can’t talk about to anyone. I think I am and always have been bisexual or even homosexual. I’ve never had problems having sex with my wife, on the other hand, she was the only woman in my life, but from the beginning I felt that a sexual relationship with her was not exactly what I wanted. I’ve never had sex with men but I think it did not happen because of my sense of duty towards my family, a little at moral level and a bit not to put at risk the health of myself and my wife and not for lack of sexual interest on my part. And then, objectively, have a relationship with a man would have been socially unsustainable. There have been periods in the past 25 years, when I felt less homosexual urge. The first four or five years I thought I had overcame the whole problem in the sense that I could contain it because the intercourses with my wife were frequent, but after the birth of our second child the couple sexuality weakened, the children have begun to fill our lives and homosexual impulses have reappeared, which, however, more or less controllable, have never disappeared entirely. In practice, next to my sexuality with my wife, I have a second life in homosexual masturbation, yes, even now at nearly 50 years, and it’s real homosexuality. When I got engaged I was 24 and I had never been in love with a girl before. I met my wife through some friends and she fell in love with me. I was not really in love, I did not feel anything comparable to what I had felt for some guys, but I liked his company, I felt loved and desired. A bit because of the pressures of my family and a little to see how it would end up, I started to do the sweetheart, as it was then: little gifts, romantic walks etc.. etc.., but always without sex, then she tried to go ahead and I had some sexual responses: when we kissed I was erect. Frankly, I never thought about having sex with a girl and I must confess that this not only wasn’t the object of my desires, but somehow it seemed to me like a strange thing. I thought it would not work and instead it worked. She was happy, I was basically indifferent and a bit confused, I could not think of me having sex with a woman, but yet it happened. I told myself then that I could not be gay, but then I thought that I was not really sexually involved. I was in doubt whether to speak with my girlfriend and try to explain everything but she was in love, and I thought that an explicit discourse would upset her totally so I said nothing and went on for a few months. We didn’t use to take contraceptive precautions, we said that if she got pregnant we would be married soon and we had no fear of diseases because neither she nor I had had sex with other people. Then she has been actually pregnant. I remember when she told me, she still had some concerns that I did not want to marry me but I told her that we would try to get to the wedding as soon as possible and I saw her really happy. Of course in such a situation homosexuality was the least of my worries. If I had said to her or anyone else that I wasn’t heterosexual would not have believed. We got married in the church, I would not have wanted to but my wife was and still is very religious and so we got married in the church. Now the idea of being able to talk to her explicitly of my homosexual fantasies had become impracticable and on the other hand I was living with her a form of heterosexuality that made her happy.
At the age of 36, for the first time, I was madly in love with a guy who was 29, of course everything was and remained only in my head but he was the true center of my sexual interest. We were colleagues and stay close to him embarrassed me terribly, I spied his every move, trying to know everything about him but I did not do anything concrete to even exchange a few words with him, I idolized him, I considered him a model in every sense, a model of morality, or so he seemed to me. Then I came to discover that he had been trying to get an important job putting around gossiping about a colleague of ours that I knew very well. This fact has destroyed the myth of that guy and I began to think that a nice guy can also be a go-getter, can also do things morally incorrect and that maybe I was in love with the wrong guy. If he was straight I would not be disappointed the same way. I could fall in love with a straight guy but never with an evil trickster! Meanwhile my children were growing up and with my wife things were going on well and all in all I thought I would forget this guy and the idea of being gay would end, but it was not so, in spite of everything I continued to think about the guys and my parallel sexuality continued to stay there. At 40 years comes the second love that, this time, makes me really in crisis. A guy 24 years old comes to work with me, he’s handsome, a bit my ideal guy. I notice that he tries to be close to me and not to miss every possible occasion to come in my room I do not do anything to keep him at a distance, we become friends easily and he tells me clearly that he is gay and then asks about me, I say that I have nothing against gays but I am married and have two children, he tries to compose himself but is obviously disappointed. I feel safe, because that guy would have really upset me. In the following days he comes rarely in my room, I don’t initially seek him, then, slowly our friendship begins again and sometimes, once every 15 days, we begin to meet also out of the office. He tells me about his life and I stay really fascinated because he is a clever guy, a little neurotic, but authentic, spontaneous, actually a nice guy outside but also inside. Many times I was tempted to tell him that even though I was married and had two children at the end I was gay too. The temptation was very strong but the fear has always held me back, and so our friendship has been going on while remaining only a friendship. Then he found a guy and I became his confidant, of course, our contacts became sporadic. He was really in love with his boyfriend and I kept telling him that the guy was really lucky to find a guy like him but he could not understand that behind those words there was also a healthy dose of envy. During all this time my family life proceeded normally. By now I was living in two parallel worlds that would never have met. I have asked myself many times what my wife would say if she knew exactly how things are, I basically have never betrayed her, I cannot even tell whether for love or for a quiet life. And then, now my children are grown and I wonder what they would think if they knew more about their father from this point of view. They are heterosexual and I have no doubts about, but unfortunately sometimes I see a hint of homophobia in the younger, a few jokes that I do not like, some smile out of place, and in front of these things I do not know what to do. The older has a gay friend and the younger, in front of such a thing, distorts the nose a little. I think these are things that still can be found in all families. My wife is not homophobic, for her, simply, homosexuality does not even exist and if it exists it’s something that doesn’t even concern her at all, sometimes she has an attitude of compassion for gays, which I cannot stand, but in this I can see the legacy of religious education. I think I will take my secrets and my family will always be out of these things. I thought about it a lot, but hear from me what I really am would just be a shocking thing for my wife and my children, something that they still could not understand. Reading stories on your forum I found the anguish of parents who have homosexual children but not (with perhaps one exception) the distress of children who have homosexual parents. I could give my life a different direction? Maybe so, but in fact it makes no sense asking similar questions. At this point, now at almost 50, the game is over, I made my choices and, all in all, I do not regret. When my children call me daddy I feel proud. But I think they would not even accept the idea that I had an homosexual friend as the guy that I was in love, and that, however, continues to be part of my life even if in the parallel reality that now will continue to characterize my life. If you want to publish my e-mail certainly you can. I’d like to know what you think about. A hug.
James

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