I have the necessary skills to recognise the actions I must take to protect my soul and yet, I have struggled for months to guard and protect it.

I am in free-fall, which is a feeling of being anything but free, on the contrary it is destructive and damaging and ultimately I believe, it has the capacity to overwhelm me.

So what can I do to manage the constant anguish of my soul?

I am incapable of making a choice which would in theoretical terms, give it freedom, and yet I believe imprison it further still.

So, making a choice is not my preferred option for liberating the anguish of my soul.

I have taken steps today to write this blog. This is no doubt for me a step in the right direction.

I have tried to enforce a regime of lower working hours and establish some time to sit in the comfort of my home and garden in warm and daylight hours.

I have made time to have sex. I have neglected this aspect of crucial importance and in so doing I have neglected the needs of my wife.

I have been deeply unsettled, my mind incapable of being calm, my system on full alert for too long.

I have been unwell, not just mentally and emotionally but spiritually and physically too.

I have tried to recover my physical strength by running, only to suffer a racing heart which made me pull over earlier this week and then to cap it all, feeling stronger on Friday, I took a fall and hurt my ribs.

Are all the gods aligned against me?

Of course not, now my skills kick in – William you are beginning to speak and sound like a victim.

You are not a victim, you are an incredible being (as are we all) with an enormous capacity to think and be.

William Defoe

On Friday last week, I spent the day walking alone in the countryside.

I had an overwhelming sense of the weight of things, and these precious hours alone, helped me to recognise all the different elements of my life which I am trying to juggle at the current time.

I was able to focus on how I might find news ways to carry the load.

When my children were young, and either needed or wanted me to carry them, I became adept at finding ways to distribute their weight, and this same logic of alleviating weight by distribution and continuous adjustment seemed to me to be a good metaphor for managing my current challenges.

I noticed that my work pressures have been out of balance with the wider aspects of my life, and that my capacity to cope by reading, writing, painting and running have been subjugated so that my reasoning has been undermined.

This means that the weight I carry is not distributed evenly and so all that I carry seems to be a burden, when in fact it is not so much a burden, but the reality of life.

My thoughts in the countryside strayed into how I could lighten the load by leaving my job or leaving my marriage or running away.

These thoughts were fanciful, it seemed to me, but they had some validity because they were present in that quiet, beautiful place in which I walked and sat.

My rational self came back to a more sensible train of thought, which spoke softly to my soul of being kind to self, of finding the compassionate and caring self which protects me from within by prioritising the needs of the soul.

I resolved in that place of beauty, to re-distribute the load I carry by shifting my focus to a broader spectrum and a wider canvas so that my burdens are somehow made small by the broadening of the landscape on which my thoughts and feelings take their shape.

In that place of beauty and of solitude, I became aware once again that I am not alone in struggling to manage the demands we place on ourselves to fulfill our ambitions and responsibilities to those whom we love.

However, being in the countryside in absolute solitude and silence gave me the space I craved to work out how to carry the deepening complexities of my life.

William Defoe

The pain I nurture lies within me on the surface of my heart.

I know this pain and it knows me.

This pain is me – this pain is my experience – this pain is my deepest expression of self.

I have worked out ways to rid myself of this pain, and all of these methods hold for me a  validity and a truth.

I have decided to carry my pain, and to endure its seething hold on me, because at this time in my life, all of the alternatives speak to me of the potential for an even heavier load to bear.

I am grateful for my pain, because it is borne and lives within me as result of my experience for things which I now deny myself.

I know that overtime my pain will ebb and flow, and I know too, that my choices around it have the capacity to change too.

My pain resides within my heart, but it does not own my soul – no – I own my pain,

it lives because I give it life;

it speaks because I give it a voice;

it is heard because I listen to it, and

I feel it, because I give it space in my thinking mind.

The pain I nurture is within, I care for it, because it cares for me.

I have made a friend of my pain, because I know that deep within the longings of my soul, this pain occupies the space which reminds me of

what it is to live;

what it is to love, and

what it is to hope.

William Defoe

Throughout the long, dark winter evenings, my wife and I have been sat side by side placing pieces in numerous jigsaw puzzles.

It has felt at times, quite frustrating and tiresome when periods of time seem to lapse without any visible progress to the emerging picture.

The jigsaw evenings, side by side, have been an important step in reconnecting with each other after a very difficult few months.

It seems to me that the act of building something together, into something beautiful and fulfilling is not really in the jigsaw, but rather it is in our relationship, which has been wounded and in desperate need of healing.

The very act of sitting side by side, bumping into each other as we stretch to place a piece of the puzzle, and the occasional kiss or holding of hands has been the greater achievement in rebuilding the broken pieces of our hearts.

Unlike the jigsaw puzzles, which will ultimately broken down and placed back in shattered pieces into their boxes, I hope with all my heart, that what we have been able to re-build between us, will be a visible sign of beauty and sustained for our time together which is still to come.

William Defoe

On  a visit to Spain last month I noticed how, despite not understanding the language of its people, I understood its laughter.

I became increasingly fascinated with observing the laughter of others, and although I myself have a great capacity to create and enjoy laughter, I reflected inwardly, in my quiet moments, how laughter has been absent from my life in recent months, particularly at home.

On this winter holiday in the pleasant sunshine, I was able to re-connect myself to humour and I seemed to effortlessly make my wife laugh to the point on one evening, as we walked back to our apartment, she begged me to stop or she said she would have an accident.

Laughter is the tonic which dispels the need for drugs.

It is the vehicle in which truth is carried to the other openly and honestly, but it is only effective if the recipient is not defensive and is receptive to its message.

It seems to me that these months at home without laughter have been a time of defensiveness and of barriers, which the February Spanish sunshine was able to melt and once again open our hearts to honesty and truth.

William Defoe 

Earlier today a woman named Kane Tanaka, aged 116 years and 66 days was officially recognised as the oldest living person in the world.

She seemed to be very excited and genuinely surprised and honoured by the recognition given to her by the Guinness World Record.

Asked what part of her life she’d enjoyed most, she replied “This right now”

Her response surprised me and connected me to something I seem to have lost a sense of within me recently, which is to enjoy the moment.

The celebratory moments in life can be sparse and fleeting, and although Kane Tanaka-san was enjoying a celebratory moment, her response did not seem to me to be about the event marking her distinguished age, but rather a philosophy which had contributed to her longevity.

I have experienced deep periods of unhappiness and frustration during my life and although in recent years I have experienced a greater understanding and openness with self, I still seem to live significant periods of my life waiting for tomorrow.

I know that this attitude to my life is destructive and in a sense it is wasteful. It is an approach to life which is denying it’s craving need to just be, to just be who I am in the moment, no matter how good or how bad I feel.

My way of being, my way of not being present, is fueling within me a sense of guilt and hopelessness because I know deep down to my core that I am capable of being so much more.

Kane Tanaka-san spoke to me today in her brief response in Japan and I heard her, I heard her loud and clearly in my heart, here in England – domo arigatou gozaimasu.

William Defoe

In preparation for Christmas, and as a practising and believing catholic, I attended confession.

It is a space in which I can bring the issues which have bothered my conscience before a listening priest.

A word people don’t like to use anymore is “sin” – to acknowledge that our actions or words or absence have hurt ourselves or someone else.

This sacrament, is for me, a place in which I can try to draw a line under the past or acknowledge failings which perhaps are ongoing, but which are somehow lightened by a sense that I have been forgiven and that it is ok to fail and to try again.

At my last confession, I told my own priest that I was gay.

This felt right. I was not sorry for being gay (I am not sorry for being gay!), but I was sorry for the impact my recent actions have had on my wife, and I am resolved in that moment and beyond to bring these activities to an end.

I was surprised when my priest asked me to stand up, and as I did so he gave me a hug and said to me “know that you are loved”

It was the most perfect of actions because it summed up for me the reason why I hurt myself and others.

I am at my most destructive when I do not feel loved.

In the intervening weeks, my resolve has strengthened to maintain my marriage, and my wife and I have been making significant efforts to make each other feel loved.

When I feel loved, I feel safe.

When I feel safe, I feel calm.

When I feel calm, I don’t feel the inner pain so intensely.

When I feel less pain, I am less destructive.

When I am less destructive, it is because I  know that I am loved.

My next blog will be: Remain vs Leave

William Defoe

A few years ago, I recall overhearing my brother, who thought he was unobserved saying “no, that’s not the answer” over and over as he grappled with an issue unresolved in his heart.

I have experienced similar struggles during this tumultuous year, when I have tried to socialise my gay sexuality whilst hoping to remain married.

There has come a point now, where I feel compelled to make a choice about the kind of future I want to live, and as I have struggled to make that choice, I too have cried out in lamentation, “no, that’s not the answer”

Ultimately, I have now firmly resolved to stay married, and with this choice comes responsibilities to love and protect my wife whom I love very dearly.

This means that I have to experience a period of withdrawal and pain as I re calibrate my life to my chosen path.

I have also a sense, that my future path is not completely in my hands. My wife has her choice to make too, and she too has to overcome a period of pain and vulnerability which my actions in recent months have brought upon her.

With hope, for both of us, for a happier future, based on a settled desire to accompany each other through the remaining years of our lives, I pray that each of us will be able to feel in our hearts, as the pain subsides, that we have found the right answer at last.

My next blog will be: Know That You are Loved

William Defoe

A few weeks ago, I received a hand written letter from my wife.

In her written words, she tried to convey to me the feelings of her heart, and how my recent actions in absenting myself to visit gay bars was affecting her mental state.

Her appeal, read to me like an accusation and a command, and so I responded by writing a letter of my own to her.

In my response, I articulated that my behaviour in recent weeks in seeking to connect with the gay community was in response to my need to be seen as a gay man and secondly, in response to the poor communication in our marriage which had lead me to take drastic measures to cope with the inner pain and fear, from which I suffer constantly.

It seems to me that the exchange of letters between us was a desperate attempt to connect with each other, because our conversational capacity had become fraught with fierce rhetoric and deafening silence.

After the exchange of letters, nothing outwardly changed, I continued on my chosen path to connect with self, and my wife continued to fear the worse for our marriage.

After a while, I noticed small pockets of change, as if my written words had provoked a response from my wife which indicated in her manner towards me, a willingness to see my need.

A touch here, and a kindness there, unexpected, surprising, made me question my own response to her needs.

Further dialogue and an intense situation, lead me to commit to the marriage once again and to stop my visits to the gay community.

This has given us some much needed space to see if we have what it takes to love and support each other in these truly difficult circumstances.

I suffer badly from the withdrawal effects from curtailing my opportunity to be in the company of men like me, but I have put the marriage first, perhaps for the last time because for both of us, there can be no going back to the recent past, only forward to a better and more sustainable way of living.

My next blog will be: “No, That’s Not the Answer!”

William Defoe

To say that 2018 has been a difficult year for me and my wife would not be understating the intense drama which has played out between us over the last few months.

My determination to socialise my gay sexuality by visiting places where gay men and women meet has had a devastating effect on my wife whom I love.

Whilst on holiday at the end of August, I tried to use poetry and writing to broaden my wife’s understanding of the  methods I was using to explore and experience my truth whilst being faithful sexually to the vows I had made to her over thirty years ago.

My efforts to explain in aesthetic terms resulted in a deep confusion and frustration in my wife, who wanted direct answers to direct questions which I was not prepared to give her at that time.

It might seem strange, but despite feeling that my place in the marriage was untenable, I was fighting my own wave of counter-intuition by resolving within me that it would be foolish to leave my marriage.

One evening, I followed my wife to our room where she had gone to change for the evening and I discovered her almost slumped on the balcony in much distress. I sat in the apartment on the bed listening to her cry, and I resolved the it was my time to speak.

I went out to her and put my arm around her and words started to come out of my mouth with such clarity and honesty that I was surprised myself at my capacity to find the words I spoke to her.

For ten minutes I articulated my feelings for my own sex, their origins in my life as a boy of no more than twelve years old, and how I had lived my life, unacknowledged, hidden from my truth, hidden from meaningful acknowledgement of who I am from those whom I need to love me.

This life, suppressed has devastated my emotional life and frustrated my physical and sexual life to a point now which is untenable.

Despite these feelings, I want to remain in the marriage, but for that to happen I told her I need her to love me, to hold me, to understand and acknowledge my deep inner conflict and pain.

I was able to tell her in those few minutes that I had indeed being visiting gay bars in recent months and that in the main, I had stood at the bar alone, but importantly I had been seen by direct eye contact with other gay men and I felt seen and true in those places in a way that had alluded me all my life.

After speaking, we washed and dressed and left our apartment hand in hand to enjoy our evening meal and a few drinks and the busy bustling atmosphere of the Greek resort.

I had spoken at last, and my wife had heard me.

My next blog will be: An Exchange of Letters

William Defoe