here's to friends I never asked "what happened?"
seachange
Registrant
Over the years, so many of my friends & lovers told me they were "messed with." Sometimes it seemed like almost every gay man I knew had been molested as a kid. This was back in the 70's 80's 90's.
I always froze in the face of their revelations.
It was usually said with just a shrug, or an embarrassed smile, an apology, a joke, maybe a grimace, rarely anger. Sometimes it was told during the cigarette after sex on a first night.... more often just friends comparing notes over drinks: "when did you first have sex?" ....or with a boyfriend when real trust had grown.... once in a couples therapist's office when a relationship was ending.... once given as a reason not to become emotionally involved at all.
Often it was just a remark made in passing, tossed off as just an ordinary fact of "gay life," a rite of passage, unremarkable.
Or announced at parties: "Okay everybody, a show of hands, who here had Father So-and-So? Ha ha ha." (Note the inversion of the power relationship: who of us had "had" Father, not who Father had "had.") And me, feeling kind of anxious.
Or revealed in the stories of my fellows in recovery from sexual compulsion: typified by years of re-enacting the abuse and denying the devastating cost of sexual betrayal on their physical, emotional and spiritual well-being; betrayals made long before they came of age. And me, completely avoiding the subject altogether, whistling in the dark.
In fact now I know I too had been "messed with" very early on. I feel a growing sense of empathy, sadness and grief for myself, for the bewildered boy I was. And I'm beginning to understand the devastating costs to me and people around me.
I also feel a sense of guilt, loss and grief for all my friends who I never asked, "So what happened? Who was it? Who knew? How are you now?"
I know now partly why I froze and never asked those questions: I was afraid to ask them of myself. I was protecting myself from something I didn't want to know. But finally I'm now answering them. I feel I owe all those guys something, maybe just being honest and forthright and brave in my own search for my own healing. Here's to them.
And here's to you: thank you, reader. And thanks to everybody here on MS, I continue to get me the strength and sense of purpose to carry on with this journey. Happy New Year.
I always froze in the face of their revelations.
It was usually said with just a shrug, or an embarrassed smile, an apology, a joke, maybe a grimace, rarely anger. Sometimes it was told during the cigarette after sex on a first night.... more often just friends comparing notes over drinks: "when did you first have sex?" ....or with a boyfriend when real trust had grown.... once in a couples therapist's office when a relationship was ending.... once given as a reason not to become emotionally involved at all.
Often it was just a remark made in passing, tossed off as just an ordinary fact of "gay life," a rite of passage, unremarkable.
Or announced at parties: "Okay everybody, a show of hands, who here had Father So-and-So? Ha ha ha." (Note the inversion of the power relationship: who of us had "had" Father, not who Father had "had.") And me, feeling kind of anxious.
Or revealed in the stories of my fellows in recovery from sexual compulsion: typified by years of re-enacting the abuse and denying the devastating cost of sexual betrayal on their physical, emotional and spiritual well-being; betrayals made long before they came of age. And me, completely avoiding the subject altogether, whistling in the dark.
In fact now I know I too had been "messed with" very early on. I feel a growing sense of empathy, sadness and grief for myself, for the bewildered boy I was. And I'm beginning to understand the devastating costs to me and people around me.
I also feel a sense of guilt, loss and grief for all my friends who I never asked, "So what happened? Who was it? Who knew? How are you now?"
I know now partly why I froze and never asked those questions: I was afraid to ask them of myself. I was protecting myself from something I didn't want to know. But finally I'm now answering them. I feel I owe all those guys something, maybe just being honest and forthright and brave in my own search for my own healing. Here's to them.
And here's to you: thank you, reader. And thanks to everybody here on MS, I continue to get me the strength and sense of purpose to carry on with this journey. Happy New Year.
