Just Venting
*Please don’t read this and think that my wife is horrible. I’m including the bad in this post because I have nowhere else to place the bad. I felt like I needed to vent. I love my wife and love so much about her. That’s why I’m still married to her, that’s why I’m still trying do what is right and admirable. But everyday I feel more and more like she’s out to make me suffer for “choosing” to be gay.My struggle persists. My wife and I are continuing to discuss, to argue, to apologize, to blame, to avoid, to cry, to insult, to comfort, to beg, to hurt, to ask, and all the other verbs that seem like they would fit in that list. She cried herself to sleep a couple of nights ago, and I couldn't allow myself to let it go. I stayed up thinking about it, about what to do, and how to handle this incredibly awkward and devastating life change.
My wife doesn’t believe in the term “gay,” she doesn’t think that being gay and married to a woman is any different from being straight and married to a woman. Her solution is that I need to love her more. And she keeps telling me that if I’m gay then it’s impossible for me to love her, and that I’m a liar. No matter how much I contest her thoughts, she is focused on getting me to suffer what she is suffering.
She confessed that she looked at me today when I was getting out of the shower and judged me up and down. She started to point out all of the things that are wrong with my body and asked how I felt? She doesn’t get it. She acts as though I’m critiquing her and her woman features. I love vaginas, I think the female body is beautiful and amazing, but I can’t help it if my penis doesn’t feel an erotic connection to it.
She keeps telling me that it’s not a big deal that I’m gay, that I’m dwelling on it too much, and that I should just let it go. She says that she’s attracted to guys, but that she doesn’t have to think about it and feel bad about it because she just lets it go and she has me. How can I make her understand that it’s completely different? My homosexuality is something that she wants to push aside and not deal with because she believes it’s inconsequential. What she thinks is the central issue is my selfishness.
She comments that I have hurt her so deeply by what I have said. I told her that I just wanted to be honest with her. She tells me that she feels like she has no self esteem because of me. And my initial reaction is empathic and concern, but on second thought, self esteem that comes from an external source is not really true self esteem to begin with.
She feels the need to keep reinforcing thoughts like these: “I’m not good enough because I don’t have a penis. You care about some guy’s dick more than you care about me...”
I feel like I’m sticking around so that I can end this marriage as friends. But she doesn’t get it. I try to explain what it means to be gay, and she tells me that I’m wrong and that I’m making a bigger deal out of it than it really is. I'm lost. I don't know what to say to make her understand. She just doesn't want to understand, and if she doesn't want to I can't make her.
posted by elbow at 9:00 AM
4 Comments:
You say:
"I think the female body is beautiful and amazing, but I can’t help it if my penis doesn’t feel an erotic connection to it."
I've heard you say something to that effect a couple times. Is that the explanation you give your wife as to why you are gay?
Then you go on to say:
"But she doesn’t get it. I try to explain what it means to be gay..."
So I ask, what does it mean to be gay? What does it mean to be gay to you? Is it merely the attraction to male genitalia or is it something more than that?
On one had I hear you simplify it to "Same-Sex attraction" which would sound completely physical, yet there must be something deeper inside. Otherwise it would be easier for you to agree with your wife when she says:
“I’m not good enough because I don’t have a penis. You care about some guy’s dick more than you care about me...”
Which obviously isn't a true statement.
Anyway, Just listening to you. Best of luck! I'll keep praying for you!
-Caspian
The comments she's made are very normal... they're almost verbatim what my wife told me... especially the "if you just love me more everything will be fine again" and the "you'll get over it" and the "this is just selfish" and the "you don't like my body?"
All very normal reactions from a woman who has no clue about things she hasn't really had to think about. But, now you can help her to understand (and you're right - she has to want to understand) by explaining it is so much more than male genitalia!
Keep 'er going!
Many of your wifes reactions are similar to those of my wife when I told her that I'm gay. So, I can relate to a lot of the frustrations you are venting. In other words, I feel your pain.
In an earlier post, you mentioned that you agreed to go to counseling. Have you started that yet? I'm generally not a big supporter of counseling, but in your case, it really sounds like the two of you need a 3rd party to mediate this crisis in your relationship. You are frustrated because you feel your wife doesn't understand - and doesn't want to. But, I suspect that your wife feels much the same about you.
I'm not smart enough to know what the answer is. Perhaps ending the marriage is the right thing to do. Perhaps there is a way to preserve your marriage - I just don't know. But, whatever the outcome, I do feel strongly that it is a decision that the two of you should make together.
BTW, I don't mean to come across as 'preachy'. I really feel a lot of empathy for you and your situation. In fact, I think about you a lot these days. More than anything else. I want the two of you to be happy - whatever it takes.
more than anything else, appreciate that you are having these discussions now, not after a bunch of kids and a mortgage and a fishing trip with her best friend's husband.
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