walkbymyself wrote:

Sherlock I will say, I think what you'd experienced isn't really representative of what the gay community is all about.  People can be very deeply invested in self-exoneration.  That sounds to me like what your gay friends are doing here.

When you say they "knew", was it a question of their gay-dar being pinged, or was it because he had confided in them?  There's a big difference between the two.  My next door neighbor's husband, for example, is clearly gay (to me), but I don't have the kind of relationship with his wife that I would be able to ask her whether she's aware of it.  
 They were his roommates in college.  His bachelor party (all gay ushers) was an evening of gay-bar hopping.  They knew.  I feel like an idiot that I didn't see it.  But then, I was raised in a progressive environment.  If you were gay, you were out. 

When I discovered my husband's secret double life, my gay friends actually were a lot more supportive than my straight friends.  I think it's because they knew first-hand how exploitive and cruel these men really are.  Other people could just chalk it all up to a gay man's need to live in a homophobic world -- but gay men actually know that there are truly evil men out there, and those men are not in the closet because they are gay.  They're in the closet because they like the cover of having a wife, while they're out there exploiting vulnerable boys.  Gay men will be the first to acknowledge how predatory these older men can be towards teenaged boys, particularly the kind of boys who end up in the sex trade.  

My XH's friends didn't actually know, but quite a few reflexively took his side.  

Exactly OOHC, it's not like there wasn't a choice involved.  My ex was most definitely not in the closet because he didn't feel he had an option to live as a gay man - he loves his closet, it's in his DNA - it is a way of life for him, it's a cloak of deception behind which he can play all his tricky shitty little games.

I met him in England which is where I come from, I came to Australia with him so our friends came from people he knew - husband in closet, his best friend in closet his best friends wife in closet and on it goes.  Nobody said anything to me until after I was divorced then I got to hear how much sex/romance with men my ex was having at art college before he even met me.

The only thing that's changed with the closet in recent times is that with the popularity of the term bisexual has come the push to have same sex attraction accepted as a match for a straight and I feel sorry for the young straights these days,  The closet has just got bigger.  And the simple understanding - a straight needs a straight is no longer recognised.

Being married to a gay man caused me so much heartache and was so painful.  Being a straight I believed I had to take it and stay, for what? 

Then I find this forum and oh god, straight after straight expressing the same pain.  Not something that should be walked over any more.  IMO a lot of the time gay people struggle to admit to the pain their straight parent was in and I don't blame them for it, it's tough.

I was debating answering this question and I am not sure if I can give you a good answer. I can’t answer Sean, but I can tell you that choosing the Bachelor route isn’t as easy as it looks.  Lucky for me the internet was in its early days, and I could connect with the gay community using and find information using it. HIV was still a major concern, but the first treatments were available as well as knowledge about safe sex. 
 
I had never considered having a relationship with a guy or being single were options for me. My plan in life was to find a woman and marry.  For me it was just some unwanted and scarry same sex attractions that I hoped to grow out of. For me it was mostly physical (i.e. wanting to do something vaguely sexual or at least some heavy cuddling) and frustrating (something I could never tell the other guy or act on despite my unwanted wishes). 

They were emotions that happened that I didn’t want to happen and lonely (I couldn’t tell anyone about it). 

Sure, I had had some homoerotic dreams and really liked movies with half naked men (or guys my age) and beside my really liking this one scene in a heterosexual porn movie with a guy was just about nakedness. Who cares if the lesbian scene bored me, or all the women did nothing for me.  Not to mention the men’s underwear pics in the catalogues and sales papers….

To give you how out of touch my logical side was with the more emotional sides\, I can remember starting High School climbing the stairs think about all the girls I would date turning a conner when I first saw the class stud…… Ugh!

Anyway, later in college still attracted almost exclusively to men came the events that forced me to deal with the fact that those same sex attractions didn’t go away, and they were more than just some very strong unwanted thoughts. I had recently ended a relationship with a wonderful girl as she went away to college. I hoped we might get together later but I also figured that it was not fair to both of us to try to hang on when we were so far away. So, I was kind of free. 

Normally whenever I felt attracted to a guy, I simply stayed away from him if I could. Easy.  Except this time due to arranged seating in a class I had to sit next to a guy who I was attracted to all semester long. Even worse, I couldn’t act straight around him and could barely think around him and this time it was more than just physical.  Some part of my brain wanted to get lost in his eyes! Ugh! That was new.

So here I was older, but the attraction had not gone away.  I thought I might be gay when I was a younger, but I hoped it would just go away. It hadn’t. It was still there and as strong as ever. 

I have always wondered If I could have gotten away from him could I have left my sexuality on the back burner longer? Would something else have cause this ticking time bomb called gay to finally blow? Up to this point the repeated same sex attractions, PG porn viewing, hadn’t prompted me to act on it. Granted I would not have been in a position to act on it at the time but suddenly figuring out if I was gay or this was just some weird fantasy suddenly became important. 

That encounter where no clothes were taken off was enough to push me to act on it. Any way I won’t bore you with the details but after several same sex encounters a guy finally kissed me.  That kiss did more to finally answer my question about what gay was and why I shouldn’t marry a woman than anything else. 

I thought being gay was about having sex with men. I was wrong. 

I thought I would just screw with men to release tension till I found a woman to share my life with.  I was foolish. 

It isn’t about having sex with men. Heck it isn’t about what sex act of the week you do with a guy. It is about wanting to have sex with men.

That kiss made me realize what was missing in my relationship with my girlfriend. Wanting.

That kiss made me realize that a wife deserves a man who wants her.  She needs someone who wants her for more than just her mind or sweet personality. She deserves a guy who naturally wants to be close and cuddle with her. Not someone who has to think about it. Who isn’t trying to act straight and isn’t repeatedly tempted with same sex attractions.

Heck the only reason I lasted that long was because the guys I had been attracted to were straight and not in a place to act on it. I think I would have crumbled like a cookie had I been married and another gay guy hit on me and I was in a position where she wouldn't find out. 

Anyway, I have always wondered how long could I have kept my sexuality on the back burner? What if instead of she going to college we had remained dating? Would something else derail the train before it headed to the wedding? What if I were more religious and somehow resisted longer? So many what ifs.

I also mourn the cost of choosing the bachelor route. I wont have kids of my own. I will never have a socially acceptable wedding. My entire life and choices are the subject of political and religious debate. I don’t mourn too much as I think not bringing a woman into this was the best thing and the unexpected is what makes life fun. It also saddens me that some guys for some reason don’t or can’t make this choice.  It isn’t an easy one, but it is the right one I think.

These guys that you married let their sexuality, which was a time bomb.  Blow up and change forever more than just their lives. Neither I nor Sean can’t entirely fix that damage, but we might be able to do something to hopeful help. 

Last edited by Diff I guess (June 16, 2024 12:32 am)

Thank you everyone for writing. Canary2 I've looked back at our first exchanges and, if I remember correctly, you dated a closeted friend/co-worker (described above) who divorced the mother of his child, actively hid his sexuality from you, and appeared to seek out female partners as "beards." Please confirm if this is correct.  

Based on the most recent comments, there appear to be several categories of closeted men, namely: 

Category 1: Young men who identify as straight when they date/marry. They date only women and plan to marry "for life." Pre-marriage most have never done anything sexual with another man...other than secretly watch gay porn perhaps. They generally want to be good husbands and fathers, but deep down feel an attraction to men. But they convince themselves they'd never "act on it." These men most often have sex with other men after years of marital monogamy; normally around mid-life crisis time (age 40). 
Category 2: Young men who have pre-marital gay sex and/or date men, but hide it from themselves or downplay it as a "college thing." Some also claim they were "sexually assaulted" to their future wives because they can't accept they actively sought out sex with men. They marry women hoping this will "cure" them; often because their families or church communities have convinced them marriage to a woman is the solution to their "same-sex attraction." These men have sporadic sex with men before and during their marriages. They essentially "split" their lives: living by day as a straight husband/father but then cheating on frequent business trips. Once caught, many of these men identify as bisexual.  
Category 3: Openly gay men demonstrating personality disorders who actively seek out women as "beards." Many are divorced (from women) or already have long-term boyfriends. When challenged about their sexual orientation, some emotionally abuse future female partners. They actively pursue kind and unsuspecting women. They marry solely with the intent of hiding their homosexuality from themselves and others.   

Let me know your thoughts friends. Be well! 

Last edited by Sean01 (June 17, 2024 2:21 am)

Hi Sean,

I think an aspect that is different is that your MOM was a level playing field - you were both in the closet, neither of you was more vulnerable than the other on an intimate level.

It's very different you are simply not putting your wife through the same hell a straight spouse experiences, it's just not as abusive and you just have never struck me as being cut from the same cloth as my ex.  I remember you feeling guilty for what you put her through, that is so different to my ex, just so different.

Diff, thanks for describing what it was like for you and for saying you concluded you didn't want to bring a woman into the situation because it wasn't fair on her.  That also is so different to my ex - I'm always being shocked at the way that closeted gays/lesbians act like they have a divine right to a straight spouse.  

I think probably the majority of stories I have read here are like mine - the closeted spouse feels no guilt towards the straight spouse, far from it.  They are more interested in protecting their closet than in what's happening to you.