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October 7, 2018 3:41 pm  #1


Where to go from here

I’m new to the forum but have been reading posts on here for around 6 months.
Around 3 years ago I started dating an old boyfriend who had been my first love when we we 20 and 30 years old. I’m now 38 and he’s 48, we got back together and it was amazing- both felt we had our soul mate back.
18 months ago whilst on holiday and feeling very in love he told me one night that he was 5% bisexual and prior to getting back together with me had been meeting up with a gay man for sex only for 4 years on and off.   All the while he had had girlfriends and told himself it wasn’t cheating as it was not with a female. Also because it was so secretive he could actually live the double life comfortably and did not feel like it was hurting anyone.
He said he had decided to tell me because I’m the love of his life and his one true love and he wanted to be open and honest about his past without this secret, which he had stopped as soon as he started dating me.
He said he was still in touch with the man but only to say hello occasionally by text and swore there had not been any meetings, which I believed due to his telling me in the first place.
After the initial shock I became angry and demanded we went and got tested for STIs as soon as we got home from our holiday. He begged and swore to me that he had never put me at risk and had always been 100% safe, used condoms, and that I was  over reacting. I had to drag him to the clinic with him trailing paces behind me due to his fear of seeing someone he knew!
Anyway all came back clear, but in my mind a few things he had said didn’t add up, and to cut to the chase I went through his phone one night (hate myself for doing so and felt terrible for it) when he was passed out drunk and found messages from a second man around the time we got back together with the man asking to meet him for a good ‘f****’ and my boyfriend had replied saying ‘sorry I’ve stopped all that now as I’m with a girl I really care about’. 
So I confronted him with this after a few weeks of hell thinking I was going insane, and after denying it he finally confessed it was actually 3 men over 5 years...but always safe with no risks...in his words ‘And it’s all in the past, why can’t you accept it, I’ve buried it, why can’t you? Etc, etc...
Then during a really drunken episode he admitted he had not always used condoms but had lied because he knew these men had regular tests and were all clean!!
We came very close to splitting up but as other posters point out here it’s so hard when they tell you it is in the past and the fact that they told you means they are wanting to be honest and open.
So now it’s been a year...I am not allowed to mention it or he flies off the handle and gets extremely angry that I am bringing up his past before me and him. Says he has buried it. And confusingly we have always had a great and varied sex life and he does seem to be genuinely aroused by women.
But I’m so scared of wasting my years to find out down the line that he is still harbouring these ‘urges’ as he puts it. Especially now I’m not allowed to ask any questions about it...
I should also say that when drunk a couple of times he has said he’d love us to find a man to join us in the bedroom but he could only do it with me there, and would never go behind my back...
Also just to say he has told me he is bisexual and has know since a teenager, but I’m the only person he has ever told..
Any advice from those of you with similar experience where he hasn’t actually cheated during your time together would be appreciated.

 

October 7, 2018 4:04 pm  #2


Re: Where to go from here

WasItADream

Hi there I am sorry you find yourself here like the rest of us.   I am 38 and left my boyfriend 8 months ago and am still very much struggling.  He was cheating with pre-op transvestite hookers behind my back and gave me herpes.  That is one of the STDs that condoms dont protect against and they dont test for it usually unless you specifically ask.  They only test if you have a break out and its very high std in the gay community as well as hiv and hpv too.  He also gave me hpv.  Please get tested for herpes 1 and 2 and hpv if they didnt specifically test you for that.  I hate to also say I dont believe his gay urges will EVER go away they will only get stronger and stronger.  He has done it the last five years behind his other girlfriends back and told himself the whole time it wasnt cheating ! BS !  He will eventually cheat on you with men and think its no big deal even though he promised you he would never do that to you I would believe that for a second! As Kel says in her threads Run Like your hair is on fire before he smashes your heart in a million pieces! And before he brings home STDs to your bed because oops the condom broke.  You will always now have a sense and worry that one day he will cheat because he was craving a penis and thats something you dont have.  It might be months before he cheats but as if he just quit cold turkey and thinks the urges wont be back.  You should force him to get checked for herpes one and two as soon as possible.  I am sorry to be so blunt.  But your story made me so angry reminding me of my own story.
Be strong
IgnoranceWasBliss

 

October 7, 2018 4:10 pm  #3


Re: Where to go from here

IgnoranceWasBliss:  Your forum name indicates that you now have more information than you did, previously.  For sure, you know he was lying to you.  You also know that he becomes angry and defensive, if ever you bring up this issue.  Sounds like your instincts are telling you that you have reason to be concerned.  He's had relationships with 3 men, over the past 5 years...that you know of.  He reminds me of my ex:  He wishes he were straight, but he's not.

To be very clear, as always:  Being gay is not the problem:  Lying (to self and others) and cheating...that's another story, entirely.  GID people do not love themselves.  That's why they get involved with straight people, trying to be someone they are not.  We are all sorry that they thought they had to deny themselves.  We are also angry and sorry that they involved us (spouses and children), in their lies.

Better alone, than with the wrong company.

Last edited by jkpeace (October 7, 2018 4:12 pm)

 

October 7, 2018 4:32 pm  #4


Re: Where to go from here

He's gay, honey.

He likes you a lot but he is not in love with you.

So much for the honesty, he didn't tell you when you were dating earlier on in your lives and he is playing with the truth of what he tells you now.

but at least he is telling you some of it - he is telling you he wants a man in the bedroom.  Do you?  I would be surprised if you wanted to be married to a man who wants to have another man in the bedroom.  Even worse when you realise it's all just an excuse so he can have a man in the bedroom and you are just wallpaper.

see my concern is this - he starts by saying he's 5% bisexual and had a little bit of sex with only one man.  That's known as minimising.  It is often a precursor to grooming - i.e. softening you up incrementally to accept doing stuff you don't want to do but become conditioned into accepting by degrees.

By admitting upfront to 5% bisexual he is making it hard for you to turn round at a later date, once you are further down the road, and say this isn't what I signed up for.

Trust - someone you can trust and you really can trust them - that's what I want for sure.

wishing you all the best, Lily

 

October 7, 2018 4:38 pm  #5


Re: Where to go from here

My advice, If you’re looking for a heterosexual man to love you, be honesty with you and build a wonderful life with then run for the hills and NEVER look back.  Because you will never have it with him.

 

October 7, 2018 5:01 pm  #6


Re: Where to go from here

Thank you all for the replies and I do not mind the bluntness. It’s what I need right now after going round and round in circles in my head, and with time passing since it was talked about it does seem like a dream.   There were some warning signs before he told me like he wanted me to use dildos on him but I put it down to him being adventurous in bed and never gave it a second thought.
Lily - no I don’t want another man in the bedroom and he knows that now based on my reaction to the drunken suggestions. I do think he was testing the water as I am an open minded and laid back person so I think he imagined I would be ok with it...still he blames the suggestion down to being drunk.
I think the bigggest thing that worries me is him saying now he will never ever talk to me about it again because I went crazy and made his life a misery over him just being ‘honest’ with me. I have tried to ask him if he still has the urges and he says not and that it’s buried. I just worry that him living a secret life for years is not going to be an easy habit to keep repressed.

     Thread Starter
 

October 7, 2018 8:01 pm  #7


Re: Where to go from here

Was it,
   In telling you that you are the one at fault (he won't talk to you because you made his life a misery), he is engaging in the classic tactic, DARVO, which refers to a reaction perpetrators of wrong doing, particularly sexual offenders, may display in response to being held accountable for their behavior.  DARVO stands for "Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender."  The perpetrator or offender may Deny the behavior, Attack the individual doing the confronting, and Reverse the roles of Victim and Offender such that the perpetrator assumes the victim role and turns the true victim... into an alleged offender.In a 2017 peer-reviewed open-access research study, Perpetrator Responses to Victim Confrontation: DARVO and Victim Self-Blame, Harsey, Zurbriggen, & Freyd reported that: "(1) DARVO was commonly used by individuals who were confronted; (2) women were more likely to be exposed to DARVO than men during confrontations; (3) the three components of DARVO were positively correlated, supporting the theoretical construction of DARVO; and (4) higher levels of exposure to DARVO during a confrontation were associated with increased perceptions of self-blame among the confronters. These results provide evidence for the existence of DARVO as a perpetrator strategy and establish a relationship between DARVO exposure and feelings of self-blame. Exploring DARVO aids in understanding how perpetrators are able to enforce victims’ silence through the mechanism of self-blame.source: https://dynamic.uoregon.edu/jjf/defineDARVO.html
 

 

October 8, 2018 12:31 am  #8


Re: Where to go from here

Was it a dream? wrote:

I’m new to the forum ..... he told me one night that he was 5% bisexual

My partner has NEVER said "I'm 95% straight". Just that his bisexuality is ONLY 5% of who he is. 
Which shows me where his focus is


KIA KAHA                       
 

October 8, 2018 8:43 am  #9


Re: Where to go from here

Was it a dream? wrote:

I think the bigggest thing that worries me is him saying now he will never ever talk to me about it again because I went crazy and made his life a misery over him just being ‘honest’ with me. I have tried to ask him if he still has the urges and he says not and that it’s buried. I just worry that him living a secret life for years is not going to be an easy habit to keep repressed.

And quite frankly, Was It, I think that should be a big worry. This obviously bothers you (and rightly so), but instead of putting you first and trying to protect your heart and calm your worries and fears, he is more concerned with how this makes him feel. He is more concerned with how your reaction to what HE told you makes HIM feel and not about how what he told you makes you feel.

You are not his priority. He is his priority.

Marriage is hard and cyclical. Even the best of marriages have low points. I would be willing to bet good money that  those urges he says are now buried will resurface during those hard times. See, he can't deny them. They are part of who he is, and that is okay. What is not okay though, is to tell you that they are buried and promise you that they will never become an issue in the future.

 

October 8, 2018 12:53 pm  #10


Re: Where to go from here

3 years is not long in the scheme of a Straightspouse World. You have time on your side. 

If a man can tell one lie about using condoms to a woman who thinks he's telling the truth....he's a man who can keep other secrets. And secrets kill relationships


KIA KAHA                       
 

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