On waking up on the morning after I had told my wife of my same sex attraction, the fear I experienced was terrible.  I hardly dare move, but I sensed that she was awake at the side of me. At the same time, I felt a sense of relief that I had in fact told her. I was fearful that an issue, which I had tried to suppress and control within my own isolation, was now potentially going to be exposed.

I was worried about my reputation and I sensed I would be ruined if my wife spoke out, and my mind quickly ran to how I would protect myself by “running away” never to be seen again. Writing that sentence now sounds pretty barmy but that is what the fear did to me at a time before I accepted my same sex attraction and subsequently rejected the idea that others would not accept me too.

I did not follow my normal rushed routine to get off to work – I fully intended to go, but I needed time to compose myself – looking back I am surprised I was able to function at all considering the emotional turmoil that I was experiencing – this speaks to me now of a profound strength and resilience that I had not recogised previously.

After breakfast we sat together in the living room – a room I never normally enter on a morning – and we both cried. I told her that I hated myself for the attraction to men and that I wanted to get rid of it (yes, I believed it was possible!) – that I would never act on my same sex feelings because they contradict my religious values and the promises I made to her in our wedding vows that are stronger values within me (I think these are valid aspirations and plausible but they have to be actively chosen everyday from a whole range of choices with all options remaining available if they are to be honoured).

I told her that as a young man I was deeply attracted to her and my memories were of wanting to he a husband and father – I wanted to have children – I told her that I had been a failure as a man.

I explained that a traumatic exit from a job that I had loved doing seven years earlier, had triggered within me a deeper awareness of a same sex attraction, which over the years had got gradually worse, until the torment and isolation that I was experiencing and the inner conflict of trying to resolve two competing lifestyles had become exhausting and unsustainable.

I told her I felt angry towards my family (my parents and siblings) whom I blamed (at that time) for neglecting to address the issues that I had experienced as a young man (boy), At this time I linked my homosexuality to having been caused by being bullied at school.

I cried all the way to work – Abba’s song “Chiquitita” came on the radio which includes the words “you’re enchained by your own sorrows” and as each wave of emotion came over me as I listened to this song I did think that now at last for good or ill the secret is out and I felt hopeful that we could resolve this within the marriage.

In the evening we sat and cuddled, we turned off the television and talked all evening and reassured each other of our love fro each other.

As I went to sleep that night I caught a glimpse of a photograph I have on my bedside of St Theresa of Lisieux on the reverse is the following prayer:-

A MORNING PRAYER WRITTEN BY ST. THERESE

O my God! I offer Thee all my actions of this day for the intentions and for the glory of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I desire to sanctify every beat of my heart, my every thought, my simplest works, by uniting them to Its infinite merits; and I wish to make reparation for my sins by casting them into the furnace of Its Merciful Love.

O my God! I ask of Thee for myself and for those whom I hold dear, the grace to fulfill perfectly Thy Holy Will, to accept for love of Thee the joys and sorrows of this passing life, so that we may one day be united together in heaven for all Eternity.

Amen.

I mention this because having explained in my first few blogs the background to my inner conflict and my eventual liberation from it – I want to write in my next blog, about my Roman Catholic heritage and my attempts to seek help from the church in the months leading up to November 2012 and St Theresa of Lisieux inspired me, I believe, to tell my wife.

My next blog: Catholic and Gay – Inner Conflict

William Defoe

In my previous blogs I have related how I came to the point after many years that I could no longer live a life of inner turmoil and anger and isolation.

In November 2012 after what I would describe as a “meltdown” – stressed, worried about work, family relationships and voluntary commitments underpinned about my secret same sex attraction, I drove over to see my brother 60 miles away to tell him I needed his help  – I did what I consider to be the bravest action of my whole life by trusting him with my secret.

I related in my previous blog how he was very supportive and calm and confident that my fear and anxiety could be overcome. His advice to me was that I should work towards telling my wife what I had told him and he offered to help me get ready for that conversation.

What neither of us had appreciated was that the very following day my wife would confront me and demand answers – the subject of today’s blog.

I woke up the day after confiding in my brother and I was extremely emotional. I cried as I told my wife that I needed to make changes in my life and I was going to make an immediate start by giving up some of the voluntary services that I carried in in the community in line with what I regarded as my catholic duty to others. I also told her that I needed to let go of some of the issues that had caused family relationship problems particularly around how I expected my daughters to pursue their futures.

I struggled to concentrate when I got to work – I felt emotional and angry – angry with my family (parents and siblings) for not helping me with this problem and how they had allowed it to blight my life  – a feeling that they were aware of my internal conflict but they had chosen to ignore it’s effect on me.

I did not regret having discussed the issue with my brother last night which was a surprise to me because whenever in the past I had built myself up to risk speaking about it I had always imagined that the moment of relief would be overshadowed by bitter regret – regret because I had lost control over an aspect of my character which I was deeply ashamed of because my sexuality did not fit in with what I perceived to be the values on which I had been conditioned to be in the world.

True to my word at a meeting of the voluntary committee on which I served that evening I did notify the chair that it was my intention to step down after many years of service at the end of the year and that a replacement would have to be found. 

Unbelievably, whilst watching ITV I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here that very evening Brian Conley made a jokey remark that despite being a married man he fancied David Haye – I felt very uncomfortable and embarrassed and my wife sensed it but did not say anything.

On getting into bed that evening, my wife confronted me in the dark and told me in not so many words that she wanted to know what my problem was  – she demanded to know what I had gone to speak to my brother about last night. I begged her to give me more time to prepare myself for the conversation but she simply said that was not good enough and she would not wait.

I said I could not tell her in the dark so we got out of bed and went downstairs into the lounge and whilst sitting on opposite ends of the sofa I took a deep breath and told her that I had an attraction to my own sex  – that I did not define myself as gay – that I had never had any sexual relations with anyone else but her ever in my whole life. 

She said calmly “the marriage is a lie.”

I said that the marriage was not a lie and that our sex was heterosexual – that I was attracted to her – I always have been and that as a young woman at the time we got married I was besotted with her and deeply attracted to her and in love with her and I still am.

She simply said, I feel sick, I am going to bed and off she went. I remained where I was totally shocked that the conversation had taken place – convinced I was about to lose her and preparing myself for being asked to leave perhaps as early as tomorrow – to be honest I felt lucky to be still sat where I was. I went to bed.

My next blog will be – Love through tears 

William Defoe

In my last blog I related how in an effort to end my feelings of isolation over my hidden sexuality I had asked to see my younger brother for his help and advice.

As soon as we were seated in the pub with a pint he said “so what is all this about?”

I did the bravest thing I have ever done in my life – I made no answer except to slide over an extract of the introduction of Joseph Nicolosi’s book “Reparative Therapy of Male Homosexuality – A New Clinical Approach” which I had brought with me which said:-

“There are homosexual men who reject the label “gay” along with all the implications that label would bestow upon them. Although “homosexual” may name an undeniable aspect of their psychology, “gay” describes a life-style and values they do not claim. These men experience conflict between their values and their sexual orientation”

he read the passage in silence and when I sensed that he had finished I turned to him and said – this pretty much sums up the dilemma I have experienced in my life for a very long time and I cannot continue to live like this any longer. I was very emotional but because I was in a pub I had to suppress it.

He was calm, not judgmental – he wanted to know if my wife was aware of this issue – when I said she was not, his immediate advice was that I should begin to work towards telling her.

He was confident from the start, that the outcome that I dreaded of losing my marriage, losing my wife and daughters and being humiliated by gossip about the reasons for the break up, were not necessarily the outcome I would get if I told her the truth.

He asked me if I had ever entered into a relationship with a man and I explained that I had not but that I was tormented daily in my attraction to men that could not be suppressed or denied. 

I asked him whether he had ever suspected the truth about my sexuality and he said he had not. I said that I found that hard to believe and that for many years I had not felt comfortable in conversations with the male members of my family whom I felt sure had made comments about me. I explained that this had made it difficult for me to have meaningful friendships with my brothers, my brothers’in-law and my nephews and this had had a damaging impact on my relationships with them.

He said that on one occasion, and only once, our older brother on witnessing me having an emotional outburst at a family event had turned to him and said “When will our William accept that he is gay?”

This comment was to haunt me and although my brother urged me not to seek to blame others I felt from this moment that I had to explore the origins of my homosexuality  – was I born this way? – or had my emotional development lead to my developing in this way? – where has my Dad been through all this?  – can he be blamed? 

My brother assured me that the family were aware of my pain but they had felt powerless to deal with it as I had a tendency to turn on them with my anger so over the years they had backed away from me but they most certainly did not know that my anguish had been caused by a conflict over my sexuality.

He said that he wanted to help me get the support I needed to confront the issue and in time find the courage to tell my wife about it. He asked me as I prepared to drive home if he could discuss this with his wife – I said to him I am 48 years old and I have carried this secret with me for at least 20 years and you want to unburden yourself in less than two hours by sharing it with your wife – I said no he could not tell his wife.

As I drove home I felt an immense sense of relief that I had actually told him – almost euphoric  – but at the same time very vulnerable to the fact that I could not take back this conversation back – I had trusted him and in doing so I had made myself vulnerable to his care. 

My brother features in my story as it will unfold in future blogs – he has suffered for his trouble as he has been on the receiving end of my anger and frustration but I am where I am today because of his acceptance of me and his willingness to help me financially and emotionally over the last two years.

A key lesson for me has to been to learn to challenge my belief in what I think an outcome will be before it has actually happened, and also, to learn to trust in others. When I write blogs in future in respect of my magnificent coach I will explain these observations in greater detail.

My next blog will be  – My wife confronts me

William Defoe

The lead up to the decision to tell my wife of my same sex attraction came after many years of living with the conflict within myself.

I could not reconcile within me the reality of my deepest feelings about what I was in the world with the everyday reality of my life

I will explain in later blog posts the longer history of my feelings and explain how I came to be married and gay, but in this blog today I will explain the circumstances that were apparent in late 2012 which made me feel that I had no choice but to reveal my secret.

I was stressed, anxious, difficult to live with and over stretched with work and family and voluntary commitments that I had entered into for the service of others. I felt a tendency to suicidal thoughts mainly because I could not accept that I could break away from the way I was living my life and embrace a gay lifestyle.

I felt that If I chose to live a gay life I would simply be putting my life into further conflict because I would be substituting one aspect of my character with that of another and I risked losing everything – my wife and my daughters and possibly my friends.

However, in early November 2012 I was away for a long weekend in Cumbria when a combination of fatigue and trying to help my daughter with her A Level homework tipped me over into anger and resentment. I became verbally aggressive to my wife, went off to sulk, refused to drive home and as part of the exchange between us my wife said to me these words:-

“In your anger you come across as a man who is gay”

I feigned even more anger  – how dare she refer to me in those words – like a school bully  – but at the same time I knew that I could not go on in denial for much longer.

I came home and started to think again how I could seek out help. I was nervous of typing anything gay related into a search engine because I was always concerned that my wife would find my interest in the subject in my online history. I decided to risk it, so I did search for “married and gay” and I came across a book by Joseph Nicolosi PhD called:-

“Reparative Therapy of Male Homosexuality – A new Clinical Approach”

In the introduction to this book are the following words:-

“There are homosexual men who reject the label of “gay” along with all of the implications that label would bestow on them. Although “homosexual” may name an undeniable aspect of their psychology, “gay” describes a life-style and values they do not claim. These men experience conflict between their values and sexual orientation”

At the time of reading these words and not having read the book, which I did read and rejected subsequently, I felt that these words helped to explain my internal conflict and dilemma for which I remain grateful. I picked up the phone and asked my younger brother if I could see him about an urgent and private matter on which I needed his help – he offered to see me the following evening at a local pub near his home which is 60 miles away from where I live.

I also sent an e-mail to a coach from whom I had received intense professional development seven years earlier to ask for her services relating to work related concerns that I was experiencing.

My journey to self acceptance had started  – I was emotionally exhausted and could go no further in isolation – I had put in place the two key people who would lead me to confronting my lovely wife with the truth.

My next blog will be – My Brother’s Support

William Defoe

In November 2012, after 25 years of marriage I told my wife that I had been aware for many years that I had an attraction to my own sex – that I was gay.

I did not want to lose her, but I had come to the point in my life where the private feelings that I agonised over could not be hidden from her or contained in isolation within myself any longer.I fully expected that in revealing this to her my marriage would end – so far, it has not!

This blog is about my journey to that momentous day in November 2012 and how in the months that have followed I have learned with my wife’s love and support and with the guidance of a truly amazing coach I have come to accept within me something that I had for years felt was incompatible with who I was meant to be.

I have undergone a huge process of examining my past, my feelings about the future and most enlightening of all learning how to live not just for today, but in the moment.

I want to share the wonderful integrated coaching practices that have accompanied me on my journey, my  highs and lows and my emerging understanding that I will always have to live in moments of light and shadow and that all these feelings have something to contribute to my journey through life and are valid.

I am on a journey – I have not reached the end of it.

It is my hope that in sharing my story I may be able to support any person who rejects within themselves an aspect of their being  – an aspect of what contributes to their wholeness – and which causes conflict within themselves and impacts on all those around them, particularly those people who love us and yet do not know the source of our hidden pain.

I hope that my story will inspire others to free themselves from a mindset which restricts their ability to be calm, to be happy, to be accepting of themselves and to be surprised by the generosity of others.

My next blog will be – Living in conflict with myself

William Defoe