GROWING UP

"Late Teens and Early Twenties"

For the last few days I have been swamped at work and taking some time out to really put my thoughts together. Relating my past has really brought up a few things that were painful and having to write it here has helped to confront them and deal with it. I really used to let fear rule my life, everything in life I would worry about to the point that it affected how I dealt with people and it really affected my health in the form of stress. At one point in my teenage years I wanted to run away from home so I would not have to deal with my family or others around me. I actually packed my bags and was ready to climb out my bedroom window, but fear and wondering where to go put me off. Right after that, depression had reached such levels that I wanted to end it all and have no more confusion or pain. I thought of suicide many times and once I took about 12 paracetamol tablets, but all it did was give me a headache. After that I really felt foolish as no one would really miss me and in a few years no one would remember Daniel. Then a friend of mine tried it and nearly succeeded, her reason being she was too fat and no one took an interest in her. I actually felt for the first time in my life that it was not the way to go, that I needed to prove to the world that I was important and that I could make it.

Ok well I had planned to write tonight but it seems my body is rebelling against me. Hopefuly I can finish what I wanted to say in the morning. (mind you this was on Tuesday 25th April)

Lets see, its Friday night and at last a hard week of work is done. From the age of 17 onwards my way of dealing with things was to hide them and put on an act and to place all my problems into boxes so that "one day" I could deal with the issues. The image people saw of me was very different from the one inside and even though I was not comfortable with it, it did work. It is very funny that up to this day my mother still believes that she knows me so well. In fact the only person who really knows me is God and to a great extent my wife. I tried to surround myself with very religious friends and moral people so that I could keep my feelings in check even as I was exploring my interest in understanding God.

I really only started dating seriously at 17 and my relationships were always good. In fact I treated my girlfriends as queens and was truly with them. My desire for a guy never popped up or was an issue during these periods and I even felt as though those issues were really gone. I always believed in waiting to make love on or after my wedding night and it was another one of my vows I stuck to. I would admit there were times when intimate moments could have gotten out of hand but then the girls I dated had their heads on their shoulders and also wanted to wait. I also believed in making good friendships before dating and getting serious, because for me every potential relationship could lead to marriage. However I did not feel secure enough to tell any of them how I felt when it came to the alternative feelings. In all I probably had around 10 girlfriends between 17 and 23 years of age all of whom I can say are still on good speaking terms.

My most serious relationship was with my second girlfriend, who was my age and had a great personality. D. and I were so into each other that after a a year and a half we were talking about marriage, mind you I was only 18 and was on cloud nine. Then she went away and met some one and we broke up over the phone. My world around me crashed and I could not eat or sleep for weeks, in fact I cried myself to sleep a good few days. My mother said that girls like that are not worth it and that's why you should only date and not get serious. This pissed me off since I was really in love and I wondered if she ever had any emotion. But one thing it did do was to really make me close myself to being loved and experiencing love to the fullest. In fact I decided not to open myself up like that again to anyone. This I did until I meet my future wife S. a woman who melted my heart.

All of the girls I was with were not covers for my alternative feelins in that I never acted them out and as I said I never thought of them when I was with a girl. Yet because I stayed a virgin until I got married people thought something was wrong with me - I was either gay or lying. I know my dad was worried about it and on two occasions he invited me to a "whore house" to have "an experience", mind you I was neither interested nor wanted such an experience. I enjoyed long courtships with lots of dates and presents; it took me long to get up the nerve to kiss a girl or to hold hands but once I did I was really into it. It felt great sharing your life with someone special and yet there was that feeling that there could not be a whole sharing since no one would really understand how I felt.

At the same time I was experiencing my exploration of courtship I was starting to find my place in the world of school and work. I did well in history, geography and biology and these were the areas I excelled in, I finally found my place and decided to dedicate my life to teaching since I knew how much trouble I had in school from horrible, impatient teachers. I knew I could make a difference. I went on to do my Advanced Levels in London Exams and then moved on to University. I loved to do research and studying became a way of escape for me; in fact, I dived into history since it helped escape my thoughts and life around me. Understanding history helped make sense of the world, and I liked the knowledge of knowing dates, people, places and events, something I was good at and which my parents could not touch. At this point in my life I also picked up the hobbies of stamp collecting, book collecting and hiking, hiking because I loved nature and knowing my environment and also because the hard trips were like therapy and penance.

I felt also very disconnected with my family and I had nothing in common with my brother. I had more in common with only one friend, A., who was was born on the same day as I and who I got to know well without dating. We actually sheared our darkest feelings with each other and felt understood, but we drifted apart and by my twenties I was back to being a loner, which I was comfortable with.

When I did have bouts where the alternative feelings were overpowering, I would get very upset and depressed. There were many times in school that good looking guys would arouse me and out of shock and fear of the dreams I would have about being with them I would consciously surpress everything. When one of these guys touched me I would be fearful of being aroused right there and tried my best to be as normal as I could. It was hard but then I always felt it was unnatural. For me the idea of being gay was something that really made me feel dirty, violated you can say, since in all other things I felt straight. I hated myself for feeling that way and also that something was wrong with me. I knew that God created man for woman and to say that he made me that way was saying that he made mistakes and I just don't believe that. So I would sit in my bed at night and cry asking God to show or tell me what was wrong or where I was going wrong. Many thoughts of what it might be went throught my head from entertaining perversion to some problem of socialization process my parents were not aware of. But the cost of it was tearing me apart and it only made me go into myself and become more shy, yet I did do a great job in surpressing it and keeping it under control, but it continually lurked beneath the surface and I was always fearful that it would burst into a flood I could not control. I did have about 3 male friends in my life who never knew how I felt but I did not have those feelings for these guys, they were good liming partners and I could speak to them about life without discussing my alternative feelings. This however did not stop my dad from wondering and expressing his fears about me being gay and being with these guys.

In my second year of University studies I would meet a girl who would change my whole outlook on Life and who I could really say could help me truly bring out that man in me. S. was a sexy girl in one of my tutorals that I did not think I had a chance with, she was so pretty that I thought she must have a boyfriend. So I looked from afar hoping that one day she would be single and interested. S. was someone who I could really see myself sharing things with and I started to share my books with her when no one else got to use my books. Then one day in the middle of the library I blurted out to one of her friends how I felt about her and well let's just say I will write more in a next blog. But note that this was going to be my future wife.

THE OLD ME

"The Way I Was"

I really should have started my second post with a look at where I began, but as thoughts go I wanted to write what I was thinking at that moment. As it is, my selfish nature really played a large part in shaping my history and dealing with it yesterday really helped in developing the real me. So now I can focus on where I was and where I am now. Honestly I feel a bit odd writing this since the succeeding posts are really going to be filled with painful feelings, events and thoughts. Yet all of it has helped in making me stronger and better, and thus I write.

So how do I start? Well a lot of my defining characteristics developed in my early childhood and it is this part of my life I want to focus on in this post. I was the first grandchild and was a favorite with everyone. I know I was a very happy child and had more energy than any car you could name, so much so that people would ask my parents what they were feeding me. I know I stayed up at all hours wearing out and frustrating my parents. I was a very adventurous boy and from the age of 3 I would be out in the yard looking for snakes, climbing and hanging out of windows and destroying everything in my path. My mother did not have patience with me and I usually ended up being beaten. Then my brother came along and I would employ all sorts of mischief on him from throwing him out of his crib to putting my mother's makeup all over him. Up to the age of 8 years I was so energetic that I was always dreaming up my next adventure. I loved animals and they just took to me, I held snakes in my hand and had lizards sitting on my shoulder. Dogs and cats were my best friends and I would spend my time living in the yard playing.

But there were many things that I can remember that were very painful and distressing, my mother always told me that I was spoilt by everyone else, so she had to offset that by favouring my brother and ignoring or chastising me, saying that it was my brother's turn to be treated well. It felt so unfair because the imbalance, especially in the extended family, was not my fault, yet all the trouble my brother and I got into together always led to me being the only one punished.

To add to this, I was not very interested in school -to me it was boring and not very inspiring. I spent all my time dreaming of having wings and flying, saving people and playing with animals. It was felt by teachers and grownups alike that I had a problem and I was even sent to a child psychologist. I really did not like having friends and actually I never felt like I fit in, though this mind you was ok to me until I felt that something was inherently wrong with me for feeling fine with it. I became very frustrated as my mother and teachers tried to force me to learn and since everyone was saying I had a problem, I started to believe them and this lead to me becoming very passive and only wanting to stay in my room. I would read books and dive into the world of fantasy so I could get away from my parents' constant complaining and the pressure of school.

My family was not one to show love or affection, in fact my mother often said that we only showed love by the price of gifts which we received at celebrated times. As part of a Catholic family we stuck religiously to ceremony and rules, church every week and prayers every night. I became very interested in understanding God and wanting to know him, but then my mother would ask why I was becoming so religious and this turned me off since I wanted to please my mom. My dad did not really play a large role in our lives and all socialization and discipline was done by my mother, so much so that she became both matriarch and patriarch. I told my dad once that he really made a big mistake by not taking charge of his household.

By the time I was 10 years old my brother and I were two very different people, strangers one could say, and definitely clearly and oppositely labelled. I was the "boring" dreamer and intellectual and he the hands on, curious, take apart, action guy. We were worlds apart and our differences and separation were strongly encouraged and reinforced, almost mandated, by my mother to the point that we never really had a brotherly relationship because of her influence.

My family considered themselves part of that "French Creole' class who prided themselves on being descendants of French and English settlers. For the most part I never felt like I fit in when it came to socializing with family. Their conversations always revolved around the latest scandal, the last shopping trip and when next they were going to the beach. I liked having constructive and intellectual conversations, which isolated me from the rest of my family, so much so that I was seen as strange and hard to communicate with. For me it felt as though I was an outsider and I forced myself to blend in and accept the status quo.

By the time I was 12 years old I felt very confused about who I was and where I was heading. My parents had sent me to so many schools because in each I was seen as "unable to learn" and this contributed to my demotivation. At this stage I dove in to church and wanting God in my life, I took an interest in First Communion, praying, reading the Bible and going to church. Again my mom felt something was wrong with this. I also enjoyed visiting my great-grandmother who would tell me old stories of her life as a child. This inspired me to take an interest in history, especially when she related stories of times when there were no cars and people had no television. So, by the time I was 14 years old this new pattern in my life had emerged.

There was however a very new feeling taking over me as I reached my teens and it was, of course, because of puberty. Like for most teenagers, puberty was for me a time of changes biologically and emotionally and my interest in girls grew very strong. From what I had learned from my parents and the few friends I had made, this was very natural and normal. I remember my first kiss in primary school, a girl I liked and I went behind the school and kissed - the only thing was we got caught by classmates and they had a good laugh. However, at the same time I was experiencing feelings for girls I was also having physical feelings for guys. This was very confusing for me, since the thought of a guy naked and me touching them aroused me. I became very confused and did not know what to do, I could not talk to my parents since my dad had said if he ever found out that any of his sons were gay he would kill them and my mother saw it as a mortal sin. In Trinidad society the more "macho" a man you are in appearance the more prestige and popularity you gain; the mere mention or rumor that you might be gay could lead to disgrace. It is also against the law to be a homosexual and one can also lose one's job. All of these things made me so fearful that I resolved to surpress these feelings and never to act on them. Added to which, church teachings said that it was such a sin that two cities in the bible were destroyed for it. The result of these pieces of knowledge was to place more pressure on me to supress my feelings and I was always depressed, something I have learned is a normal feeling of others in similar positions.

I could and did have natural relationships with girls and it was during these periods I felt very whole and normal. I always felt that the alternative feelings I had were foreign and needed to be purged. I always felt it was not right and I cried out to God asking him why this was happering to me and praying for him to take it away. I was so paranoid about being found out that to avoid any sign of being feminine I over-compensated by attacking gays and trying to appear macho. I remember once my mom said I was holding my arm up too much like a girl's and it look queer, I got so upset about it and made a conscious effort to stop it. Then again, my dad and brother were always asking my mom whether I was gay or not and again I became scared. There were times the feelings for guys would be so strong that I just kept to myself in my room, I never had guys as friends and only one or two girls I talked to. No one knew my secret except God and I made a vow to Him never to act upon those feelings.

By the time I was 17 years old things started to feel normal again, I had found my niche in school, taking a serious interest in subjects like history, geography and biology and I got involved in my first serious relationship with a girl. I even went to confession and confessed my feelings to the priest. He told me that these feelings were normal, that "...every boy feels that. It fades away once you don't act on it". I began to think that life could be bearable and the feelings under my control; boy, was I wrong!

SELFISH ME

Stunted Selfish Kids Must Go!!!


After reading my first ever post I felt good, in that I actually could say I can open myself up and not hide what really counts inside. Dealing with a problem is very important and going around it, which I used to do, really made things worse. The fact that all my life I have been selfish did not mean that all my selfish ways would go all in one night, even though I was fooling myself into believing this. Take today, for example. I was so impatient with my kids and really shouted at them to behave, when being a kid and acting wild and carefree is so natural. Yet when it came to my wife, who has the patience of more than the population of the world, and who I really upset today, I was asking her to be more patient with me. In fact when you think about of it and after all I have put her through it was really hypocritical and unfair, especially with the example the same day of not having patience with my kids.

After an argument which really upset the whole balance in our household, I recognized a number of things about me which I not only accept as things I do but really as habits and internal thinking which I can call a "Selfish Kid who wants his own way" trait. In fact my wife who knows me well pointed it out to me, which I might add she has done so many times that it's really unfair especially when I don't recognise the problem. How can I expect to be receive patience myself for the things I have done when I won't be patient with others, that selfish child who thinks of me first and not the feelings of others really destroys and causes a distance to widen every time he throws a tantrum..

Another thing which I have noticed in me is when my wife is frustrated and gets really tired and expresses her out of sorts feeling in her tone, I take it to be an attack on me. Again, after about six or seven times of my wife explaining that its not about me or directed to me, I still process it as a problem I created. Now, this is an insecurity about myself, that, once observed, shows another aspect of that "selfish child". I realized that my preconceptions of what a good husband and father should be resulted in strict parameters being set upon myself by me. I have to accomplish it at all costs to the extent that I alienate my wife and children and cause more harm than good. Good intentions, but really a mess in the making.

So sitting and thinking and talking to my major and only source of answers, God, I really understood that an "immature selfish child" still lay within my basic personality, out to sabotage any progression which was made in becoming a man. I allowed that child to develop, as a defense against the world, which clashes with the real man who is developing.

So after recognizing and accepting the situation as it stood, I made a commitment, a promise, a resolution, that I would discard that stunted, little child for the man I am becoming. I know that God brings these things into focus so that they can be dealt with; a true man cannot have lingering selfish traits popping up and causing rifts and insecurity. Worse yet, if, they play out as though the past has come back to impact the present.

God, my life, wife and children deserve more than that. So I say good bye to old little "immature child" and hello to that brand new man.

FIRST START

"Beginnings"

Ok! I am sitting at my computer and its 12:13 am and I am thinking... did I do the right thing by setting up this blog? I am not really one for writing personal, deep feelings on a public system and the only two people in the world I pour all my feelings and thoughts out to are God and my wife. As a child I tried to keep a diary of my thoughts but I always lost interest or was so hyper that my attention was on what next to do. As an adult, I kept my secrets close to my chest putting all my good and bad stuff into compartments, in this way I could come back to them some day.

But after 35 years of my life, a life I must add, filled with so many ups and downs, hurts and pains and failures and victories that I can no longer keep them in my head, heart or mind. I am tired as I write this, but, I feel that before I go to bed, I should get some of the things on my mind off my chest so to speak. So I write, more for me I know and for those I love, God, my wonderful and loving wife and beautiful and loving children than anything else.

My experience may not be new, in that, I have read many blogs of those who have had personal fights and have dealt with their internal demons, are getting rid of them or embracing them. I am not here to condemn or give advice, but to give an account of my struggles and the struggles of those I love, which I might add were as a result of decisions I have made. I know I could not write what will follow if there was not a happy ending since I would certainly be a hypocrite, especially when it comes to life changing events in my life that has impacted on others.

So with that said, well, the next stage is to say a little about me. I am a 35 year old guy, name is Daniel who lives in the West Indian or Caribbean Island of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. I am married to a beautiful wife and we have two beautiful/handsome boys. We are a mixed couple and live very independently from our families. I am very much into reading, cooking, hiking and love a good fantasy and sci-fi movie and book. I also love research and discussions which are intellectual and constructive. So what would you say is wrong so far? Well, from the age of 14 years old I struggled with homosexual thoughts and after suppressing these feelings and thoughts for nearly 18 years I finally let go of control and acted them out while being married. Yes! I committed adultery and yes I betrayed my wife, hurting her very deeply and destroying her security in trusting me.

In the last three years both my wife and I have gone through a journey from hell and back. My wife most of all has had to put up with loving a guy who was selfish and selfcentred, a guy who became a monster for 3 years. The point is that my wife's love and knowing that I love her deeply is just part of a long uphill struggle to becoming a man. Now I am not on this blog to gain sympathy or support for my actions. I know I was wrong and the decisions I made which I have taken responsibility for were really bad ones. What I really want to write is how I have come out of the depths of hell and to be really one with my wife.

At this point I just want to say that I do know in my being that I am not gay, bi or curious. I have always known that it was a foreign element in my sexuality that needed to be expelled so that I could have a stable life. Yes it was a struggle and for many it continues to be. I am finally freed of these feelings and also know that all I want is my wife, all I feel and think about is her. There are many who will continue to say, "Well, you can never get over those feelings" and my answer is, yes I can and I have. The major issue for me was where my focus lay, I was selfish and I talked about only"ME" and "I" and if that were still the case, then yes I would say that I would never have gotten over it. But for me the main change that helped was shifting the centre of my focus to God and what he wanted for my life.

Being fully a man is liberating, in that I can love my life and my wife and know who I truly am without physical and psychological problems stunting my development into manhood. This is a lot, and I thought I would have very little to say. I once use to be a nervous boy who allowed everyone around me to control my every move, then I became a rebellious teenager who just did not want to grow up and did not care who I hurt. But today I understand the right from wrong for all my actions. Now, becoming a man and taking responsibility is important. My wife most of all deserves so much credit for going beyond what any wife would endure from an hurtful and painful situation.

I can say that our marriage has been tested by all that has been thrown at us and I can truly say we are in a new relationship one that is far better than the old. It is scary at times and feels like courtship when you get those butterflies in your stomach but it's wonderful all the same....