Hi Sean,

I appreciate the effort you put in to the writing all you did. You give a honest view on yourself and I think it's potentially very helpful to many.
But my question to you has a different background and intention:
Reading through a large part of it (some time ago), I thought it was a pity you weren't posting anymore (ie. that stopped some time before I came across this forum late last year).
I often wondered how you relate to my/our story, and whether this interaction could reveal more insight in this complex and diverse matter.

Probably you don't know my situation because I entered this forum after you left/paused. In a nutshell: I'm a straight spouse in a succesful monogamous MOM with a lesbian wife. Married 35 years, 4 children, after 20 years of marriage my wife discovered to be lesbian. With "succesful MOM" meaning: no negative aspects whatsoever, rather leading to a very possitive outcome (though it certainly took time, struggle and effort, stumbling through unchatered territory, to find the door).

I'm aware of the differences in our situation, not the least of all the gender of the MOM-mix, a (lesbian) woman is different than a (gay) man. But nevertheless I think there is a overlapping space.

I suspect a major aspect is the closet/denial part. This is not something that is in our story. (My wife didn't know her sexual orientation when we married).
So I'm curious how you reflect on this for yourself. What if you'd been honest and open to yourself, and to your wife, about your sexual orientation from the start?
Maybe this is too hypothetical for you to consider, so if you don't like to go into it, that's okay also. It's just that I try to get more understanding about the effect of "the closet", which may have substantial importance that is underestimated.

Thank you for writing Dutchman and Jackie H. Dutchman I'm afraid I don't understand your question. Sorry my friend! If you could please send me a list of specific questions you'd like answered, I'd be happy to reply. Before answering Jackie H's post, I'd urge you to please read the following previous posts about gay husbands claiming childhood sexual abuse. I think it's very important to read the posts (see last link) of the straight spouse who lives with a husband and victim of sexual abuse. She strongly disagreed with me. Again, I want to disclose that I'm not a mental health professional, nor have I ever been sexually abused. As such, I'm only expressing my personal opinions. Here are the links: 

1. Gay in denial husband cries "I was abused": http://straightspouse.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?pid=11686#p11686  
2. Determining whether or not it's true: http://straightspouse.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?pid=11695#p11695 
3. Exchange with a Straight Spouse who disagreed with me: http://straightspouse.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?pid=13221#p13221

Now in response to your post: 

1. I’m going to preface this with what’s probably the most important piece of information. My husband of 31 years was sexually abused by the older boy across the street where he lived from the age of 8 until 8th grade. He disclosed this to me when I discovered gay porn on the computer.   We have been to therapy and talked about this with the therapist as well as between ourselves. He has talked about how confusing it was because it felt good. He said that therapy helped him to get everything in the open and that he felt no need to look at gay porn anymore.

Before responding I want to make my opinion clear: sexual abuse is barbaric, totally unacceptable, and rightfully illegal. With regards to gay husbands claiming sexual abuse, I believe there are two possibilities: 

1. He's telling the truth. 
2. He's lying. 

Let's assume he's lying because given what you've shared below, your husband is clearly a pathalogical liar when it comes to discussing his sexuality. You shared: "He disclosed this to me when I discovered gay porn on the computer. We have been to therapy..." For me, these are red flags. I've learned through countless exchanges here that it's actually quite common for gay husbands to claim they were sexually abused when their backs are up against the wall. And by "against the wall" I mean straight wives who are just days away from separation/divorce and present him with irrefutable proof of watching gay porn, sexting, and/or hooking up with men on the down low. You also shared "we have been..." rather than "he has been..." to therapy. To me this means that after he claimed the sexual abuse, you two started couples' therapy. While I am not a mental health expert, I do believe that gay/straight marriages resemble narcissist/co-dependent relationships. When a gay-in-denial husband claims childhood sexual abuse, it rather neatly shifts the narrative in his favour. He is instantly absolved of any bad behaviour ("the abuse made me gay"), his wife now feels sympathy rather than anger (wife: "the poor thing has been struggling with this his entire life"), and this activates her co-dependent tendencies to save him ("We started couples therapy"). He can now neatly claim that any discussion of him f*cking other men is off the table. Check mate. So what's my point? I think your husband is lying because he clearly can't tell the truth about his sexuality. What he has characterized as sexual abuse was likely (consensual) sexual exploration that he's seeing through his "I can't be gay!" lens. Another common version of this story is, "I was attacked by two gay men in college" when in truth it turns out the "attack" took place in the backroom of an adult bookstore the husband haunted back in his university days.      

2. As I said above, we have been married for 31 years, we have 5 great kids and 5 wonderful granddaughters. As a group we do quite a few things together Sunday dinners, helping each other with any home improvements or projects, we trick or treat together, holiday dinners, watch whoever in whatever sport they’re playing, birthday parties and any other things we can think of to celebrate. We are very close and besides the fact that we all love each other, we all like each other and chose to hang out. In that way it’s all great and I realize that and honestly it’s why I’m still married. I know many people don’t agree with that and it’s probably not something I would recommend to anyone, yet I feel a very strongly that I don’t want to create a “before and after” for my kids.

Understood.

3. From the very night of our wedding sex became an issue. Prior to that there was not an issue. By issue I mean lack of desire for sex on my husband’s part and anger when it was brought up. For 26 years I couldn’t figure out what the problem was besides the fact that it was my fault for being to pushy, bossy etc.  The argument from him was never that we should have sex but why sex shouldn’t expected. We do have 5 children, so obviously it happen but very seldom was it spontaneous.

I want to share that NONE of this is your fault. Fact: gay men simply aren't interested in sex with women. And gay-in-denial narcissists are very good at shifting the blame on their wives..."pushy, bossy, etc." He's the problem Jackie, not you.  

4. On January 1, 2016 my husband had a question about the cell phone bill. While I looked for the answer I noticed that there were hundreds and hundreds of texts to one number beginning very early in the morning each day and lasting until last midnight. I looked up the number on the computer and found the name of a woman. I called him into the kitchen to question him and he looked at me and shrugged. He “met” her through Ashley Madison. I was devastated. We had always had a marriage where we argued but I always thought that everything was between us with no outsiders. I had to keep everything in since our daughter’s birthday and birthday party were the next day and if I began to confront him I was afraid that he would do something to upset her day. Needless to say I was in shock what the party and I noticed him watching me to gauge my mood the whole time.

What an *sshole. I'm sorry you had to go through this. I'd read up on narcissism and co-dependency. 

5. After the party I confronted him and of course he apologized and said he would never do it again. For the next month there was a lot of arguing, he said he would go to therapy. He disclosed that there were more women that he said he only texted with. Countless women he said because he went link to link through different hook up type websites as well as Craigslist and Ashley Madison. One woman in particular ( the original one I caught with the phone bill) seemed to have the most intimate relationship with him. They each drank the same coffee flavor each day and reported back, they each watched Christmas shows like Rudolph together, they watched hockey, they talked about me, my children, she sent naked pictures, he shows her our Christmas tree, so it was A very intense emotional relationship that he said was all a game and meant nothing.

Minimization along the lines of "one time" and "it meant nothing" is common with cheating husbands. I don't have a lot of information here but it sounds more like he was her gay bestie, rather than a lover. I reckon if he never had a sexual interest in you and responded to her nude pics with photos of his fabulous Xmas tree, she sounds like more of a "fag hag" (pardon the expression) than a lover. 

6. About a month later we were talking about the situation in the car and I kept asking him to lay everything out on the table so that I could deal with it all at once. I found an email address but he deleted everything except for some spam. As we were talking he became very upset and said that he had been going to a “bookstore” to meet up with men in the booths for our whole marriage. He also texted men. He watched tons of gay porn. He apologized again. "We went to therapy." The therapist told me that what I’m dealing with is a “10 out of 10” and nobody would blame me if I got divorced. At this point i figured it’s all out of the table. Nope. I finally got my husband to give me the password to the email address., he thought it was safe since he had erased everything.

Finally the (partial) truth! Clearly he's gay as a rainbow. What bothers me is this: "We went to therapy." Question: has he ever been to therapy alone? You wrote: "he said he would go to therapy" which suggests he never has. Please clarify. 

7. I tried logging in to craigslist with the email address and password and found out that he had placed at least 100 ads on the men with men section and every variety of that theme. He offered to be a bottom, to service groups, to wear panties and let people use his “pussy” and more.

Wow. 

8. Again I called him into the kitchen to show him and he left in a panic. At that time we had no tracking so I didn’t know where he was.  After about a half hour I texted him that if he wasn’t home in 10 minutes I was going to call the police. It turns out he saw the text through the car window as he was going to drown himself in a large body of water near us.

I call bullsh*t on the suicide story. He's again trying to maniuplate you into feeling sympathy. 

9. He came home, told me that and I felt compassion for him and hugged him.

You should have hit him with a frying pan my friend.

10. Again more therapy.

I'm going to assume couples therapy but please confirm. 

11. The next wave of information came in the form of a letter with the added layer that he had been meeting 2 men at their homes for sex in our area. He claimed there were only two men that he met up with outside of the bookstore and in the letter he described the encounters as “they sucked me and I fucked them." 

Given his 100+ salacious Craigslists ads (see above), I think it's safe to assume there have been a lot more men.  

12. With all of these disclosures you would think maybe he would be consistently nice and give me some space to process everything and be willing to answer questions and generally deal with the consequences. But very often he was cruel, one example of the cruelty was when he said “ how does it feel to know your husband turned to men instead of you” and he said very often that I should be over this by now beginning at around a 2 weeks.

What a d*ck. This is the definition of narcissim.

13. I have to say it’s hard to “get over” something that keeps coming at you in waves. The final wave during this time came 6 months after the initial disclosures in the form of another letter telling me about more men that he met up with and details of those meetings ( I asked for details because I wanted as much information as I could gather). So more therapy together and separately. I was willing to stay married ( for the kids) but also to explore if we could finally have a good marriage since everything that had been creating problems was out in the open and being worked on in therapy.

Got it. I reckon "everything that had been creating problems was out in the open..." is a bit of an understatement my friend. Given what you've shared here, your gay-in-denial (GID) husband is the cause of everything wrong with your relationship, not you. Question: has he ever genuinely apologized to you? Probably not. Unfortunately, most GID husbands use couples' therapy to shift the blame on everything (childhood abuse) and everyone (his wife) to explain away why they are gay. They are also masters at manipulating therapists. Every gay man I know believes he was born gay. Only closet cases and deeply religious men still maintain the long-debunked myth that we somehow become or choose to be gay. End of rant! 

14. For the past almost 5 years we have been trying to have a normal marriage including sex. However he has had erectile issues that he refuses to see a doctor about. It takes some work to get things going and it’s much quicker since he’s afraid of losing his erection. We have watched porn...

Gay porn? He can't get an erection because he's gay as a rainbow. 

15. ...to try and help things along and I notice that every time there’s an erection on the screen he becomes very hard.

Gay. 

16. So things had been going along with the new normal when suddenly in June the latest wave hit when he decided, without informing me, that he wasn’t going to have sex with me anymore even though nothing had changed or happened to cause this cut off. He started fighting even more and of course I don’t want to put up with any nonsense because even years later this whole thing is difficult to say the least. The fighting was the excuse for no sex.

What a complete *sshole. Well at least he's now showing his true self. Now that you know everything and still chose to remain in the marriage, I reckon he no longer has to "pretend" to be nice...or even straight. He's not interested in sex with you because he's gay and isn't interested in sex with women. Again, it's not your fault. He's the problem and always has been my friend. 

17. He also says that he doesn’t want to deal with the anxiety that comes with performance issues. It’s a cycle. I have wondered if the reason he won’t go to a doctor is because the erection problem is only with me (I should mention that we are both 55 and I’m in pretty ok shape so I don’t think I would be found really repulsive and he is now overweight but used to be in very good shape).

You are sexy, beautiful, and desireable. Don't let him shift the blame on to you. He's not sexually interested in you because gay men aren't sexually interested in women. Period. 

18. I asked him if he’s gay and  I said I would not get divorced  or tell anyone but that I just want to know and want closure. He said absolutely not. He doesn’t care what I think and that he knows he’s not gay and that’s all that matters. Says he’s not attracted to guys he’s attracted to women. Says he had sex w men bc it was “easy.”

Bullsh*t. Let's review this chronology: he started (consensual) gay play at a young age; has gone to gay backrooms in adult bookstores for decades; ran 100s of Craigslist "gay hook up" ads; has had a a long-term relationship with a gay couple; refuses to have sex with his wife; and has never cheated with other women. He's not just gay, he's a living Pride float my friend.   

19. ...and he felt that having sex with [women] was a worse form of cheating and that’s why he didn’t do that. 

How thoughtful. 

20. I should also mention that he is very masculine so there has never been any mannerisms that made me wonder.

Lots of gay men are "masculine" or "straight acting." 

21. So that’s where we are now. Everything is normal family wise, people think he’s a great guy, which, if you’re not his wife is probably true haha. Thanks for any insight or comments you can give me.

I'm going to push back on the word "normal" my friend. You're now trapped in sexless and emotionally abusive relationship with a closeted gay narcissist. There is nothing "normal" about that. 

I want to apologize if any of my responses appear glib or flippant. I think you've made an excellent start by joining the SSN and sharing so openly/honestly. Here are my suggestions: 

1. Read the SSN First Aid Kit: https://straightspouse.boardhost.com/viewtopic.php?id=1217

2. Go to individual therapy (not couples' therapy) with a therapist who has experience with narcissism and narcissistic personality disorder. Don't let your husband have any contact with your therapist as he'll just start brainwashing this person to believe his bullsh*t stories. 

3. Read up on narcissism. I'd suggest the book "Co-Dependent No More." 

4. Share your story with at least 1 other person...a close friend or relative who has little to no contact with your husband. 

5. Get tested for STIs, stop attempting sex with your husband, and if you are still having sex, practice safe sex. 

6. Prepare yourself for a "honeymoon" phase of short-term good behaviour and perhaps even attempts at sex. Closeted husbands are highly attuned to wives who are seriously considering separation/divorce. So I'd be ready for him to try to trap you in the relationship again. 

7. Continue posting and sharing here. 

I hope that helps my friend. Be well! 

Last edited by Sean (October 29, 2020 5:41 am)

Thanks so much for answering Sean. When I woke up at 4 am and read your response I felt a lot of weight roll off of my shoulders. I chuckled at a few of your responses haha.  I like how you pulled out parts of my post and answered that way, I’m going to try and do the same thing. I will put an ** by my responses in case they get buried.

*** I do want to try to be very fair in my answers and use only facts, not to defend my husband but more not to sound like a victim. There have been plenty of good and nice times and I don’t want to sound like “poor me”. The cloud that hangs over us does cast a huge shadow though. It’s hard to want to believe he cares about me despite some evidence to the contrary. I should probably mention a few “not so nice things” just to fill out the picture a bit. In 2014 our oldest son, who is a great person, honor student, star athlete, and befriended many kids with disabilities went to college at a very prestigious school full of wealthy students to play football on a full scholarship.  As he said “these are not my people” as we are middle class people. He was invited to pledge a fraternity and during the hazing the brothers publicly demeaned a very heavy kid. My son stood up for the kid in front of everyone and that was a big mistake. They tried to break him physically with endless wall-sits and other physical tasks but it didn’t work. So they ostracized him. He had no one to sit with to eat-and  he was honestly ( not just me as his mother saying this) the most popular kid in his HS and he would sit with the people who had nobody to sit with them. One day they served crayfish and he had to google how to eat it because nobody would speak to him. So one day it got to be too much and this great kid went out on the 4th floor ledge of a window in his dorm and contemplated killing himself. Luckily he went back inside and called me, completely terrified and apologetic. Well, when my husband came home I was on the phone with my son and when I told my husband what was going on, my husband started yelling “you had everything you fucking pussy” “Jump you mother fucker” “you fucking loser throwing everything away” and more things along this line. All my son could do was apologize over and over. My husband refused to come with me that night to go and pick him up so my son-In-law drove with me. When we got home my husband refused to acknowledge our son. Wouldn’t look at him or speak to him at all. My husband had just retired as a police officer-someone who had talked numerous people “off the ledge” and helped so many people but refused to help his own son. The stress that I felt over this was something I had never felt before. And it caught up with me because 10 days later I quite literally blew a gasket and had a stroke ( luckily I have few residual issues besides a little weakness). Even then he kept the grudge going and tried to refuse to let my son come to the emergency room. And I found out when everything was being divulged that he used the week that I was in the hospital to cheat me with men rather than come visit daily. A few months later I needed surgery and when my daughter brought me home I asked what there was for dinner and he told me to “make my own hamburger. “

But to be fair he could also be a very nice person to me but I never know which person will show up. This is compounded by the fact that he chews chewing tobacco which is his personality in a can, so there are very sharp highs and lows depending on whether or not it’s in his system.

With regards to gay husbands claiming sexual abuse, I believe there are two possibilities:

1. He's telling the truth.
2. He's lying.

**I have to say the possibility that he is lying never entered my mind. If he is lying I would say that it would be only partly. I believe that the older kid across the street ( who is gay according to his Facebook) probably raped my husband when he was 8. He was the smallest in the group of neighborhood kids and probably easy prey. I could believe that it evolved into consensual with a lot of guilt and shame involved because, as he has said, “it felt good”. My husband has said that the housekeeper at the boy’s home walked in on them when he was 10 and didn’t say anything to any adults or to the two boys.

Let's assume he's lying because given what you've shared below, your husband is clearly a pathalogical liar when it comes to discussing his sexuality. You shared: "He disclosed this to me when I discovered gay porn on the computer Wehave been to therapy..." For me, these are red flags. I've learned through countless exchanges here that it's actually quite common for gay husbands to claim they were sexually abused when their backs are up against the wall. And by "against the wall" I mean straight wives who are just days away from separation/divorce and present him with irrefutable proof of watching gay porn, sexting, and/or hooking up with men on the down low. You also shared "we have been..." rather than "he has been..." to therapy.

** He went to therapy alone 3x a week and then eventually asked  me to come with him once a week. I went for a while then I attended less and less

When a gay-in-denial husband claims childhood sexual abuse, it rather neatly shifts the narrative in his favour. He is instantly absolved of any bad behaviour ("the abuse made me gay"), his wife now feels sympathy rather than anger (wife: "the poor thing has been struggling with this his entire life"), and this activates her co-dependent tendencies to save him (

** very accurate



I want to share that NONE of this is your fault. Fact: gay men simply aren't interested in sex with women. And gay-in-denial narcissists are very good at shifting the blame on their wives..."pushy, bossy, etc." He's the problem Jackie, not you. 

** thank you. It’s a relief to hear this.

4. On January 1, 2016 my husband had a question about the cell phone bill. While I looked for the answer I noticed that there were hundreds and hundreds of texts to one number beginning very early in the morning each day and lasting until last midnight. I looked up the number on the computer and found the name of a woman. I called him into the kitchen to question him and he looked at me and shrugged. He “met” her through Ashley Madison. I was devastated. We had always had a marriage where we argued but I always thought that everything was between us with no outsiders. I had to keep everything in since our daughter’s birthday and birthday party were the next day and if I began to confront him I was afraid that he would do something to upset her day. Needless to say I was in shock what the party and I noticed him watching me to gauge my mood the whole time.

What an *sshole. I'm sorry you had to go through this. I'd read up on narcissism and co-dependency.

** I’ve been reading. And then I’ll bring it up to him. And of course he denies it all. For some reason I feel that it can’t be true unless he says it is.

5. After the party I confronted him and of course he apologized and said he would never do it again. For the next month there was a lot of arguing, he said he would go to therapy. He disclosed that there were more women that he said he only texted with. Countless women he said because he went link to link through different hook up type websites as well as Craigslist and Ashley Madison. One woman in particular ( the original one I caught with the phone bill) seemed to have the most intimate relationship with him. They each drank the same coffee flavor each day and reported back, they each watched Christmas shows like Rudolph together, they watched hockey, they talked about me, my children, she sent naked pictures, he shows her our Christmas tree, so it was A very intense emotional relationship that he said was all a game and meant nothing.

Minimization along the lines of "one time" and "it meant nothing" is common with cheating husbands. I don't have a lot of information here but it sounds more like he was her gay bestie, rather than a lover. I reckon if he never had a sexual interest in you and responded to her nude pics with photos of his fabulous Xmas tree, she sounds like more of a "fag hag" (pardon the expression) than a lover.

** they never met up for sex but I should have mentioned that they constantly talked about it in great detail by text.

6. About a month later we were talking about the situation in the car and I kept asking him to lay everything out on the table so that I could deal with it all at once. I found an email address but he deleted everything except for some spam. As we were talking he became very upset and said that he had been going to a “bookstore” to meet up with men in the booths for our whole marriage. He also texted men. He watched tons of gay porn. He apologized again. "We went to therapy." The therapist told me that what I’m dealing with is a “10 out of 10” and nobody would blame me if I got divorced. At this point i figured it’s all out of the table. Nope. I finally got my husband to give me the password to the email address., he thought it was safe since he had erased everything.

Finally the (partial) truth! Clearly he's gay as a rainbow.

** why do I need him to admit it to me in order for me to really believe it? Even with all of the evidence. And it’s not that I want to believe he isn’t gay so badly that I’m in denial. I just want the facts and the truth so I can have that closure and not wonder anymore


7. I tried logging in to craigslist with the email address and password and found out that he had placed at least 100 ads on the men with men section and every variety of that theme. He offered to be a bottom, to service groups, to wear panties and let people use his “pussy” and more.

Wow.

*** Yup. I was shaking very badly when all of this popped up. I also felt a certain amount of relief.

8. Again I called him into the kitchen

* I’ve said “I called himInto the kitchen “ as if I’m summoning him haha. It’s where the computer was And he was in the other room.

to show him and he left in a panic. At that time we had no tracking so I didn’t know where he was.  After about a half hour I texted him that if he wasn’t home in 10 minutes I was going to call the police. It turns out he saw the text through the car window as he was going to drown himself in a large body of water near us.

I call bullsh*t on the suicide story. He's again trying to maniuplate you into feeling sympathy.

** he often does use a sudden crisis to deflect the attention from an uncomfortable subject.

9. He came home, told me that and I felt compassion for him and hugged him.

You should have hit him with a frying pan my friend.

** that got a chuckle, and you’re right about that lol

10. Again more therapy.

* he went. I didn’t at that time

11. The next wave of information came in the form of a letter with the added layer that he had been meeting 2 men at their homes for sex in our area. He claimed there were only two men that he met up with outside of the bookstore and in the letter he described the encounters as “they sucked me and I fucked them."

Given his 100+ salacious Craigslists ads (see above), I think it's safe to assume there have been a lot more men.

* correct! 

12. With all of these disclosures you would think maybe he would be consistently nice and give me some space to process everything and be willing to answer questions and generally deal with the consequences. But very often he was cruel, one example of the cruelty was when he said “ how does it feel to know your husband turned to men instead of you” and he said very often that I should be over this by now beginning at around a 2 weeks.

What a d*ck.
** agreed

This is the definition of narcissim.


13. I have to say it’s hard to “get over” something that keeps coming at you in waves.The final wave during this time came 6 months after the initial disclosures in the form of another letter telling me about more men that he met up with and details of those meetings ( I asked for details because I wanted as much information as I could gather). So more therapy together and separately. I was willing to stay married ( for the kids) but also to explore if we could finally have a good marriage since everything that had been creating problems was out in the open and being worked on in therapy.

Got it. I reckon "everything that had been creating problems was out in the open..." is a bit of an understatement my friend. Given what you've shared here, your gay-in-denial (GID) husband is the cause of everything wrong with your relationship, not you. Question: has he ever genuinely apologized to you? Probably not. Unfortunately, most GID husbands use couples' therapy to shift the blame on everything (childhood abuse) and everyone (his wife) to explain away why they are gay. They are also masters at manipulating therapists. Every gay man I know believes he was born gay. Only closet cases and deeply religious men still maintain the long-debunked myth that we somehow become or choose to be gay. End of rant!

* I have to say that yes he has been humbled at times and given what seemed like a few genuine apologies. I would just prefer that he doesn’t do the things he has to apologize for.

** he did sometimes use couples therapy to shift blame or make light of it. And it did seem like he liked the attention. But he never did admit to being gay. The therapist said that due to the timing of the abuse he was psych- sexually stuck at about 12 years old.  Maybe he manipulated the therapist too but I’m not sure. The therapist had many years under his belt and didn’t seem like the type to he tricked. However, the therapist did say he doesn’t think my husband is gay and the. Explained the psycho-sexual implications of the abuse.

14. For the past almost 5 years we have been trying to have a normal marriage including sex. However he has had erectile issues that he refuses to see a doctor about. It takes some work to get things going and it’s much quicker since he’s afraid of losing his erection. We have watched porn...

Gay porn?
**usualy bi
He can't get an erection because he's gay as a rainbow.

15. ...to try and help things along and I notice that every time there’s an erection on the screen he becomes very hard.

Gay.
**chuckle

16. So things had been going along with the new normal when suddenly in June the latest wave hit when he decided, without informing me, that he wasn’t going to have sex with me anymore even though nothing had changed or happened to cause this cut off. He started fighting even more and of course I don’t want to put up with any nonsense because even years later this whole thing is difficult to say the least. The fighting was the excuse for no sex.

What a complete *sshole. Well at least he's now showing his true self. Now that you know everything and still chose to remain in the marriage, I reckon he no longer has to "pretend" to be nice...or even straight. He's not interested in sex with you because he's gay and isn't interested in sex with women. Again, it's not your fault. He's the problem and always has been my friend.

** thank you

17. He also says that he doesn’t want to deal with the anxiety that comes with performance issues. It’s a cycle. I have wondered if the reason he won’t go to a doctor is because the erection problem is only with me (I should mention that we are both 55 and I’m in pretty ok shape so I don’t think I would be found really repulsive and he is now overweight but used to be in very good shape).

You are sexy, beautiful, and desireable. Don't let him shift the blame on to you. He's not sexually interested in you because gay men aren't sexually interested in women. Period.

** that makes me feel better

18. I asked him if he’s gay and  I said I would not get divorced  or tell anyone but that I just want to know and want closure. He said absolutely not. He doesn’t care what I think and that he knows he’s not gay and that’s all that matters. Says he’s not attracted to guys he’s attracted to women. Says he had sex w men bc it was “easy.”

Bullsh*t. Let's review this chronology: he started (consensual) gay play at a young age; has gone to gay backrooms in adult bookstores for decades; ran 100s of Craigslist "gay hook up" ads; has had a a long-term relationship with a gay couple; refuses to have sex with his wife; and has never cheated with other women. He's not just gay, he's a living Pride float my friend.   

** for some reason I won’t be able to relax and believe until I hear it from him which I probably never will. I will always wonder if I’m wrong despite the evidence.

19. ...and he felt that having sex with [women] was a worse form of cheating and that’s why he didn’t do that.

How thoughtful.
** what a great guy lol

20. I should also mention that he is very masculine so there has never been any mannerisms that made me wonder.[/b]

Lots of gay men are "masculine" or "straight acting."


So that’s where we are now. Everything is normal family wise, people think he’s a great guy, which, if you’re not his wife is probably true haha. Thanks for any insight or comments you can give me.

I'm going to push back on the word "normal" my friend. You're now trapped in sexless and emotionally abusive relationship with a closeted gay narcissist. There is nothing "normal" about that.

** Fair point

I want to apologize if any of my responses appear glib or flippant.

** no apology necessary You made me laugh. I appreciate  all of your input

I think you've made an excellent start by joining the SSN and sharing so openly/honestly. Here are my suggestions:

1. Read the SSN First Aid Kit

2. Go to individual therapy (not couples' therapy) with a therapist who has experience with narcissism and narcissistic personality disorder. Don't let your husband have any contact with your therapist as he'll just start brainwashing this person to believe his bullsh*t stories.

** I began looking tonight

3. Read up on narcissism. I'd suggest the book "Co-Dependent No More."

* done

4. Share your story with at least 1 other person...a close friend or relative who has little to no contact with your husband.

**theres nobody I can think of that can 1) handle the info or 2) that I can trust enough to not say anything to him or someone else.

5. Get tested for STIs, stop attempting sex with your husband, and if you are still having sex, practice safe sex.

6. Prepare yourself for a "honeymoon" phase of short-term good behaviour and perhaps even attempts at sex. Closeted husbands are highly attuned to wives who are seriously considering separation/divorce. So I'd be ready for him to try to trap you in the relationship again.

** he’s being nice lately and I’m able to see it for what it really is. However, does help when I need something heavy lifted haha

7. Continue posting and sharing here.

I hope that helps my friend. Be well!
** thank you for everything. What a difference you’ve made in the way I feel already.

An anonymous member sent this via private message and I said I would answer here. So here goes: 

1. For some back story, my husband says he is bi, really likes porn, self stimulation (alone) with anal toys, he also likes fantasy and uses poppers when using those toys. (I know what you will say but the poppers and toys are here in my house and he’s using them while I’m in the house so I’m certain he is alone.) -

Gay porn I assume? Please confirm. My opinion: Porn, fine. Masturbation, fine. Gay porn, red flag. Anal toys, red flag. Poppers, (huge) red flag. With regards to you somehow supervising and/or controlling his sexual play, I'd be ready to learn he's doing much more than just supervised play at home. It's like this...you can only resist that beautiful chocolate cake in the bakery window for so long before you find yourself face deep in it. I reckon toys, poppers, and gay porn are just the window dressing to real-world sex with another man in my opinion.    

2. Among his play things he also has black tape, a few wrestling unitard type things, crotchless leggings, and a full leather harness with underwear attachment. He LOVES “sexy” men’s underwear...

Wow. Black tape...for bondage? That's next level my friend. Question: you need another person to apply the black tape and I've never seen a man wrestle himself, so who is he playing with?  

3. I know he has done some sexting and I suspect he has done some video sex but he swears (and I mostly believe him) that he has never done anything with another man. And I have been VERY specific with my questions...

He's lying.

4. So, my question is, explain the outfits... the wrestling outfits and the leggings mostly... and the tape maybe. He has worn the harness for me and says it is more of a fantasy and he has only ever worn it for himself.

Again lying. 

5. He says the other things can all go under clothes so he wears it that way... I can’t make the outfits add up.

What he wears is the least of your problems my friend. You should be more worried about what he's doing, and with whom, when you're not supervising him. While I don't have a lot of information, he certainly sounds like a submissive gay bottom with a very high sex drive.  

6. I do know he is very fantasy driven... and he is addicted to solo sex so I guess maybe it’s just for him... anyway, I’d love another gay man’s take. While husband says he is bi, I’m pretty sure he’s full on gay. 

I'd go with your intuition on this one my friend, namely "he's full on gay." While your questions are exclusively about him, I'd like to know more about your sex life and relationship, namely: 

a. Are you still having sex? 
b. Is the sex you're having limited to you playing the role of a gay top (pegging him for example)? 
c. Are you happy with your relationship/sex life? 
d. If he is bisexual, this would suggest he has a sexual interest in both women and men. Does he? 

While I'm no expert, these are some common signs your husband is having (gay) sex outside your marriage: 

1. He's chosen a job where he often travels for work. 
2. And while traveling, he takes all of his toys/paraphenalia with him. 
3. He shaves his body or meticulously manscapes.  
4. A sudden interest in physical fitness (to be more attractive to gay men). 
5. A sudden lack of interest in sex, or no longer having sex with, his wife.
6. Very secretive about his phone, likely because of gay hook up apps/messages, or he has a second (secret) phone.  

If you are still having sex, please get tested for STIs and only practice safe sex. There is a simple way to find out if he's cheating on you (with men). Check his phone, look for gay hook up apps (Grindr/Scruff/Hornet), and check to see if he has explicit selfies. These days most of us leave a considerable online trail. Racy/naked photos are normally exchanged with potential sex partners before a hook up. I hope to hear back from you via private message. Be well! 

Last edited by Sean (October 30, 2020 3:12 am)

Thank you for writing Karis. In reply: 

1. Thanks for coming back and helping us try to make sense of our lives.

Glad to be of service my friend but I'm no hero. I'm just a gay ex-husband posting on a forum. 

2. I have a quick question for you. For those GID men who can still perform sexually with their wives, do you find that they often (almost always) want to “make love” to their wives and hardly ever (or rarely)!give their wives a firm fucking?

I'm happy to share my experience but please keep in mind that I'm not a sex therapist. So here goes nothing: based on my former marriage, I could perform sexually (and rather mechanically) right up until I'd had sex with another man. Once I'd had gay sex, I could no longer perform with my (then) wife. Even when I performed, we rarely "made love" because it mostly consisted of my former wife straddling me until I climaxed. I didn't enjoy kissing, oral sex, nor a lot of foreplay. We never had that romance-novel experience of me ravishing her like some 18th century farmhand because I'm gay and had zero attraction to women and women's bodies. Every sexual experience with my ex-wife felt rather like I was reluctantly forced to have sex with a female cousin.  

3. I feel like this is why I became disinterested in sex.

Understandable. Gay-in-denial (GID) husbands can swear up and down that they're straight or bisexual, but there is no lying in the bedroom. In my experience, a lack of sex/intimacy is often what spurns straight wives to start investigating.  

4. He enjoys sex but it’s often robotic or lacking in passion.

This was my experience. In order to perform, I'd have to shut my eyes and fantasize about men. 

5. It’s at time so awfully slow, that all I want is for him to hurry up and finish. It’s terrible.

Ironically, this is exactly how I felt as a gay man. 

6. But then he accuses me of never wanting to have sex. Which I don’t. But I’m not sexually broken just sexually unfulfilled. What are your thoughts?

Based on my many exchanges here, I believe that blame shifting is common in gay/straight marriages. GID husbands often project their own problems on their innocent straight wives. As you've shared, gay husbands may accuse their wives of a lack of interest in sex and they may even accuse innocent wives of cheating, watching porn, lying etc. when it's in fact the husband who's guilty.

I hope that I've answered your questions. If not, please feel free to post again. Be well!