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August 8, 2018 6:40 pm  #1


Gay and Now Divorcing

Hello everyone.  I am new to this forum.  My road has been a long and painful one.  My husband and I of almost 14 years are getting ready to go through the divorce process.  We have struggled in our marriage for several years now.  Our marriage has never been a very happy one.  We always supported each other and loved each other, but we never connected and became "one" physically, emotionally, or spiritually.  So much of this was because of me and my failures.  From the beginning of our marriage, I began to have one health problem unfold after another, after another... On top of this, I was struggling to adjust to living in a different part of the country.  I have always been very attached to my family-parents, siblings.  So, this move was very hard for me considering I had always lived near them.  Anyway, intimacy was always a struggle for us, and almost non-existent.  This was because of my health issues, and consequently, it caused me to have anxiety problems and depression.  It was like a snowball effect.  He knew having sex was almost always very painful for me, even with medical interventions.  He was trying to be kind, so he never initiated much.  When we did try, it was stressful, painful, and awkward.  This continued, with there being a few times we had success.  In addition, I don't think we bonded emotionally, as a husband and wife should do.  

Eventually, he just exploded and told me that he was extremely unhappy with his life.  He said our lack of intimacy and connection and communication was killing him, making him severely depressed.  He said something had to change in our marriage, or it would be over.  This went on for a long time, with him telling me that everything that has been failing in our marriage was my fault.  I tried so many things to make it better.  I did have a very stressful job that also was making me physically sick, but I kept going because we needed the income.  We tried counseling, and even a weekend marriage retreat.  After this retreat, we seemed to be connecting better and he seemed enthusiastic about us moving forward.  Well, he got his dream job offer across the country.  We planned to move.  I had to stay behind to finish teaching.  

About 2 weeks before he left, he confessed to me that he has been attracted to the same sex since he was very young.  He told me he had hid it from everyone.  He had never told anyone;, because of his shame.  He said he prayed and prayed that it would go away, but never did.  He said because he was fighting this and trying to suppress it, that it was causing him to be severely depressed and he didn't want to live life anymore.  He said he had come to a place where he was finally comfortable with who he was.  He asked if I could accept this fact.  I told him that I could if he was still committed to our marriage.  He replied that he didn't know what the future would hold.  Hello!  Red flag for me!!!  He said he was telling me so that I could decide if I wanted to move with him.  I did debate it for awhile.  But, I finally decided to join him, because he said he thought we needed each other and he hadn't said he wanted a divorce.

Fast forward...We did okay for a few months.  Then, the "s##! hit the fan."  He began becoming extremely unhappy with our marriage.  We have spent every holiday apart since.  We discussed and talked and fought.  He once again, for months, told me that the failure of our marriage was my fault.  I tried to make things better.  I asked if we could go to counseling.  He said he didn't see what good it would do, because of who he is.  Finally, he admitted that it probably wouldn't have mattered if I had done everything right and good, that we still wouldn't be able to stay together, because we are incompatible, because I am a woman.  

Anyway, now we are planning on divorcing.  I am absolutely heart broken.  There are some days that I am so depressed, that I don't even want to drink water.  Of course I know that I have dealing with all the emotions one has when you get divorced and lose your spouse.  But, I am dealing with daily guilt over the ways in which I know I failed at being a loving, supportive wife.  I have told him several times how sorry I am for all the ways I have hurt him throughout our marriage  He has told me that he forgives me and that it's water under the bridge and that I don't need to apologize anymore.  I still can't let it go.  I know God has forgiven me.  But, to think that if I had been the loving, supportive spouse that I should have been, maybe he would have been happy and wanted to stay.  But as it is, he is not happy, and has never been.  

I apologize for this being so wordy and long.  I really need to talk with people that have experienced something similar.  If you are willing to share your story and give your insight, I would be so grateful!

 

August 8, 2018 7:39 pm  #2


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

Deleted.

Last edited by Lynne (October 3, 2020 6:09 pm)

 

August 8, 2018 7:49 pm  #3


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

Hi Dog_lover, it sounds like you have gone through a lot, physically, emotionally, medically but please stop placing all the blame on yourself. Your spouse has admitted to a same sex attraction since he was young and did not disclose this to you for many years. Just like you can't pray the gay away, you also can't influence someone into being gay. You tried hard, at great cost, but you cannot stop the tide from rising. If you were 'perfect', which none of us are, I expect you'd still be in this situation. At best, it might have been delayed a few years longer, but would that make it any easier?

Please, please, please be kind to yourself. If anything he should be apologizing to you for not revealing this and constantly suggesting you were the problem. This was never about your health or anything you did or didn't do.  It was always HIM. He deceived, he shifted blame, he let you think that just maybe you could work harder and fix this. You were unknowingly in a hamster wheel. As far as I'm concerned, this is abusive behaviour on his part.

Be well and, if possible, I think you should investigate some counseling options to help you over the next little while. This is a storm but all storms do come to an end.


“The future is unwritten.”
― Joe Strummer
 

August 8, 2018 8:01 pm  #4


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

To Daryl and Lynne-
Thank you so much for replying!  I feel so alone right now, that I am crying as I write this!  It's so hard because I live in a place without a good support system.  I am hoping to move closer to family, once the divorce is final and I God-willing get funds from the settlement.  

Thank you again!

     Thread Starter
 

August 9, 2018 5:19 am  #5


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

Dog Lover,
 Take a look at Lynne's signature line.  It says it all: those who willfully deceives their partners about their sexuality are committing a form of domestic abuse.  Your spouse exhibits all the behaviors of such domestic abuse: blame-shifting, controlling, etc.  That he also put onto you the burden of ending the marriage, asking you whether you could adjust, while also telling you that he could not commit to ending it "some day,"  is revealing of the cowardly manner in which he operates.  You were very right to see his failure to indicate that he would be willing to restrict his behavior as a red flag.  You will be better off once you are away.  Please do not trust God to negotiate a fair settlement for you--get a lawyer NOW and protect yourself.  You are entitled to marital assets, and perhaps to maintenance until you can find a teaching job again.  I know it's hard to pick yourself up off the floor in order to go out and find a lawyer, but you are now fighting for your mental and financial health. Please tell your friends and family what's up, and ask them to help you--with a reference for a lawyer, housing, and moral support.  You are lovable and have worth, and you need some counseling to be able to remember this fact.  

 

August 9, 2018 5:49 am  #6


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

OutofHisCloset,

That quote is very piercing.  I did not really notice it much until you mentioned it in your post.  Thank you.  I have not thought about his denial and deception as abusive.  It’s interesting because I did ask him this last weekend if it ever crossed his mind to tell me about his struggles at anytime before we married.  He said no because he was denying himself and deceiving himself so he wouldn’t have thought to tell me.  I was asking to see if he would admit this.  All he said was that if there is anyone to blame it would be the teachings of the Christian church (Christianity in general) and the religious right.  J may be wrong in feeling this way, but I think that is an excuse.  I agree that the only person he told, who was a Catholic priest, did not handle it well in telling him that liking boys would “ make God angry” and send him to hell.  This was such a wrong way to handle a small boy’s confession!  To be fair, my soon to be ex did really try to work on our marriage for a number of years.  He was always very kind and supportive of me, he read marriage books, and even went to a marriage group study, even without me.  I selfishly didn’t want to g because I thought I was too busy, because t I should have seen that he was trying.  Anyway, I just feel it’s important to say such.  But I totally agree with his hiding as being abusive.  Ironically, he had told me for three years that I abused him by emotionally abusing him.

     Thread Starter
 

August 9, 2018 9:04 am  #7


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

Dog Lover,
  Those who have suppressed their sexuality for many years and have lived in a closet are warped by that experience in ways that are very difficult for those of us who have always lived an honest life to understand.  You will likely not get an honest response from him, and he will continue to engage in blame shifting, onto you and others, as he has done by saying that he's not responsible for his marrying you under false pretenses, the Church is.  The Church, however, did not propose to you or slip a ring on your finger.  You are very willing to take the burden of the "failure" of your marriage onto your own shoulders, but you might want to ask yourself if you think that a marriage between two people who have opposing sexualities and desires--a heterosexual and a homosexual--will be able to achieve the intimacy you perceive to have been missing in your marriage since the beginning, and blame yourself for not being able to achieve.  (I know there are a number of people in the MOM thread who are convinced that mismatched sexualities do not preclude a happy marriage--I happen to disagree--but even they would, I think, agree that when one party either hides or fails to communicate honestly, and blame shifts, it's not going to work.)  Likewise, when your husband read marriage books and went to group study, he was as likely to have been focused on himself--on convincing himself he could fake his way to straight--as he was on you.

I've excerpted a few of your comments that I think demonstrate the degree to which you have been convinced to take upon yourself the burden of something that could never have worked, and I'm going to reframe them.

"We always supported each other and loved each other, but we never connected and became "one" physically, emotionally, or spiritually.  So much of this was because of me and my failures.  From the beginning of our marriage, I began to have one health problem unfold after another, after another.."

--Your health problems did not cause him to turn gay, which is at the root of your failure to "connect," and if you hadn't had those health problems, he would have still been a gay man in denial and hiding in a marriage.  


"Anyway, intimacy was always a struggle for us, and almost non-existent.  This was because of my health issues, and consequently, it caused me to have anxiety problems and depression.  It was like a snowball effect. ...He was trying to be kind, so he never initiated much.  When we did try, it was stressful, painful, and awkward."

--Do you think intimacy might have been a struggle because he was struggling to desire you?  Do you think you might at some level have perceived this?  Your anxiety and depression might also be explained by your feeling that you were being judged and found wanting, and by your feeling as if you needed to try harder.  Your husband may have also been trying, and you may have felt that his having to "try" was a comment on you and your desirability.  His failure to "initiate" is as likely to be out of the relief of not having to force himself to manufacture a desire he didn't feel as out of kindness to you.

 "...he just exploded and told me that he was extremely unhappy with his life.  He said our lack of intimacy and connection and communication was killing him, making him severely depressed.  He said something had to change in our marriage, or it would be over.  This went on for a long time, with him telling me that everything that has been failing in our marriage was my fault.  I tried so many things to make it better." 

--Dog Lover, I want you to ask yourself, "how could you have made it better?"  How could you have surmounted the barrier between the two of you, when it was not of your making?   A kind and loving and caring spouse does not address issues by blaming the other spouse for all the problems and the depression.  This kind of blame shifting on the part of spouses in denial and struggling to accept themselves is very common.  As is our willingness to believe that yes, we are to blame, and yes, if only we could try harder and find the right way to fix things, we could fix things!  Why, I wonder, do both we and our spouses believe the burden is on us?  You can have faith that his gayness was not something that could ever be fixed--especially not by you.  I heard the same "things have to change around here" from my stbx, and it had me on pins and needles for months, casting about in my mind for what I needed to do to make the marriage work.  My stbx refused to specify what these things were; it was as if he thought I had to guess what he wanted and if I couldn't then that was chalked up as another of my failures as a wife.  For the months that this went on, my stbx was engaged in "figuring out" whether he was trans, engaging in all sorts of activities behiind my back, and not telling me one word about it.  

?Finally, he admitted that it probably wouldn't have mattered if I had done everything right and good, that we still wouldn't be able to stay together, because we are incompatible, because I am a woman."

--This is not only the truth, but the closest thing to to an apology you will ever likely hear.  Repeat it to yourself: It's not my fault.  It was something completely out of my control.  We are incompatible at a basic level, because he is oriented to desire and bond with men.  (It's not "because" you're a woman...that still makes it your fault, as if, if only you could be a man the problem you caused by being a woman would be fixed!)

"But, to think that if I had been the loving, supportive spouse that I should have been, maybe he would have been happy and wanted to stay.  But as it is, he is not happy, and has never been." 

--It is always a temptation for us at first, when we don't want to believe the truth (and haven't yet accepted it) and we still wish we could turn things around, to continue to blame ourselves and our actions.  But we don't have that kind of power and control--nothing you could have done differently would have changed the fact that he's gay.  Even now that I've been living apart from my stbx for six months, a whole year after I knew I was going to tell him we had to divorce, I still find myself engaged in the "maybe if I'd..." game, so I know how this works.  "Maybe if I'd not been sick we would have been able to forge more intimacy...maybe if I'd gone to marriage counseling we could have surmounted our problems..."  You have to forgive yourself, and realize that there was absolutely nothing that you could have done to change the fact that your husband is not wired to love you in the way you desire.  What I discovered, over time, is that my regret about what I could have done or didn't do was a way of granting myself control and power: I could have fixed this!  I'm that powerful!  Well, I'm not.  You're not.  No one is.  It's just part of the way we were socialized and conditioned, to believe that our caring, our willingness to give over ourselves to their needs, would magically heal them.  And it's part of the way they condition us, too, to displace onto us the responsibility for their happiness, because that allows them to avoid confronting their sexuality and their inability to be honest about it, with us and with themselves.  
 

Last edited by OutofHisCloset (August 9, 2018 9:12 am)

 

August 9, 2018 12:48 pm  #8


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

Dear OutofHisCloset,

A huge THANK YOU to you for being so sincere, so real, and taking the time to analyze my words and help me think through things.  I have talked to a counselor here and there, but I will have to continue.  Unfortunately as you may know, cash is tight when you are preparing for divorce.  I do plan to join Divorce Care for general support and guidance. 

As far as feeling desired by him, it never crossed my mind that he didn’t desire me.  He always told me how nice I looked and would compliment me.  He would always go out of his way to give me thoughtful gifts for occasions.  He always tried to make me feel special.  In general, he is a very kind-hearted and giving person.  But yes, I seem to have a similarity with you about him expecting you to know what was wrong.   My spouse did the same thing.  When I said that I didn’t know how unhappy he was, he would say that if I had been paying attention, then I would have seen signs.  This is true to a certain ex tent.  I was on cruise control for many years, assuming he would always be supportive and strong.  It was usually about me and my problems.  This I hope to change about myself for the future.  Just dying to pay more attention to other’s needs and being available.  But I always told him that he should have explained to me what he was struggling with. 

Thank you for helping me remember that this is a fundamental problem with him and our marriage!

     Thread Starter
 

August 9, 2018 2:48 pm  #9


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

When we think it's our fault, we think it's our responsibility.  When we think it's our responsibility, we think it's our fault.
Even if you'd been a mind reader and sussed out your husband's problems, you couldn't have solved the fundamental problem.  And if you didn't have the information that he was gay, you wouldn't have had the frame of reference to interpret the reason for his unhappiness.  And don't forget that although he wants to blame you, he had just as much responsibility to communicate to you that he wasn't happy, and why.  Only when we have honest communication together can we together solve our joint problems.  

 

August 9, 2018 3:00 pm  #10


Re: Gay and Now Divorcing

Hi Dog lover, 

Welcome to our forum.  I'm sorry you are going through this, but you've found us and I'm so glad to see you are getting some great advice.  

Please continue to share your feelings and situation so that the great people of this forum can continue to offer you our help and compassion.   All my best!


-Formerly "Lostdad" - I now embrace the username "phoenix" because my former life ended in flames, but my new life will be spectacular. 

 
 

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