A Note to My Sep-Husband

He's not my ex, he's not my husband. We're separated and we're unrecognizable to each other. I have no idea what to call this man I called my best friend for 11 years. So, sep-husband, as in separated husband, it is.

What a fine mess we have made here haven't we? I have no idea who you are and there are times where I am unrecognizable to myself as well. The things we have said to each other that have either intentionally or unintentionally hurt each other are shocking to me. The number of times I have told you I hate you, or hit you because I have so much rage caused by the demise of this marriage is like an outer body experience. You were once my peace. You brought me such calm and patience and understanding. You made my life make sense, all my past struggles worth it. You were my prize. You were the reason I went through every bad relationship.

And now, I have no idea who I am with you and no idea who you are with me. I feel your recognition of your same sex attraction has made you into a different person, one who does not see a future with me, and that feels so foreign to me. It makes me say things to you I don't mean, act towards you how I would never have thought I would act and think about you in ways that hurt me for even thinking them. A life without you as my partner is never one I wanted to imagine.

But, here we are. Broken. Separately and together, we are broken. We have lost track of each other and what we once knew to be so real...a love that ran deep. You turn left, I turn right. I go straight, you do a u-turn. You see a thorough fair, I see a closed road. Will our navigation systems ever be on the same page again? Only time will tell.

All I do know is that first of all, I have no regrets. How could I regret my two REAL prizes, who are 5 and 18 months? How could I regret all the laughs, the memories, the trips, the amazing family times and all the times we spent thinking about how lucky we were to have found each other. Whether or not you had same sex feelings in the back of your head, I do know that you meant what you said all the times you said you loved me. There was just a little * there that I didn't know about and you didn't know what it meant.

So here is my wish for you...I wish to you that you never feel the pain I am feeling right now. I hope you never have someone leave you feeling as broken as I feel right now. I hope you never put all your faith, love, plans and dreams in the hands of someone else and then have them tell you they can't follow through with them. It's a hurt no one should ever feel and I find myself sitting here thinking, "Why me? What did I do to deserve this? I had several heart breaks before, several times where I thought I would never find love again. I've been through this all before. Why am I going through it again?" And again, only time will tell as to why. There is no answer right now. Will it be because you and I find a way to share a deep love for each other and to make this marriage work? Or will I take what I have learned from this marriage and share it with someone else? Someone lucky enough to be the recipient of my love. 

The right words to end this letter are not coming to me. Thank you seems too nice. Fuck off seems to mean. Warm regards feels to formal. So for now, I will say...

With love,

me

I Don't Like Mess, Grey Area or the Unknown

So, why oh why am I in a MOM? I have no idea. Funny how just a few days can change things.

The last post was written right after we decided to stay together. That our love was true and rare and not something you throw away. Well, today, I feel a little different. Maybe our love is true. And sure, maybe it is rare. But what is love if there is not happiness? I'm not sure "love is all you need".

When talking about having an open marriage, I totally get it. I get the concept. It makes sense to me. I do believe you can love more than one person at a time. I do believe that you can love someone for one thing they give you and love another person for something else they give you. Where I start to question MY MOM is when I think about whether gay husband loves me the same way I love him. I am sure the answer is no, simply because, for me, he is it. There is no one else I need in my life. So, my love for him is completely different. For him, he needs someone else in his life to make him feel complete, to give him the kind of love that I can't give him (both literally and figuratively). This should be ok right? This should not impact negatively upon me should it? He's not saying I love you less because I need someone else in my life, right? But that's sure how it feels. Especially when I tell him that days where we have set aside for him to spend with his boyfriend don't work for me and it causes a fight. I don't feel like I am getting the respect I deserve, desire and demand from a marriage. I have agreed to be in an open marriage, but I guess my definition of an open marriage is different than his. Maybe I don't want a true open marriage. Maybe I want him to be able to satisfy his need and desire to be with a man when it is convenient for me and our life. Problem is, with his job that has him traveling 50% of the month, two small kids, a house with endless projects, and family and friends here who we want to spend time with, I am having trouble finding the convenient moment for him to add someone else into his life. To the extent he wants them. Which is more than a couple days a month. So, we're stuck. We love each other. We know we WANT to stay together, we just don't know how to come to terms with what is going to work for both of us. Is anything going to work for both of us? Isn't one of us always going to feel like they are giving in more (me)? Isn't one of us always going to feel like they aren't getting everything they want (him)? Is that happiness? Is that love?

Too many questions causing messiness. I don't like messiness.

Facing My Fears Head On, Going 90MPH, Without a Helmet

Well, the good news is gay husband and I have decided to stay together. No divorcing, no more separation. For right now. The flip side, I wont say bad news, is that in order to stay together, we need to acknowledge, accept, and incorporate his gayness into our marriage and every day lives. Which means, I am the new lucky owner of an open marriage.

SCARY!!!!!!!

Pre-separation, I would have thought the scariest thing about having an open marriage would be not knowing whether or not my husband loves me, and that's why he wanted to open the marriage. I used to be so scared that he was staying with me out of some sort of fear, mask or guilt. I now know that is not true. He had his chance to walk away from this. We both did. And we both decided to stay. See, the way he explained it is like this...he is a gay man. For all practical purposes, he was never supposed to fall in love with me. But he did. We fell in love with each other. And you don't walk away from a love that defies odds. He boldly stated in our last therapy session that he loves me, he wants to stay married to be, but there are things about our marriage that need to change.

Pre-separation, I think that we thought we were living in an open marriage. The problem was that he was not open. The secret was not out...not to everyone at least, not to his family and closest friends. Only to my family and closest friends. So, how could we really be who we are and be proud of who we are if we weren't telling people who we are? It was like we were ashamed and scared to be totally open about his gay side and what we are doing to try to stay married. Open marriages are sure not common around these parts...or really any where, right? Society says taboo!!!! But, now that mostly everyone knows who he is and how our marriage is going to proceed, the scariest part is actually taking the first step. For me, that's letting go....letting go of my old marriage and welcoming with open arms the new one. I would say my arms are half open right now, and I need to stop resisting them from opening the rest of the way, or I will remain hurt, scared, confused, anxious and worried.

For me, that hardest part now is going to like I said above, just letting go. How do I "let" him leave our house and our kids for 1, 2, 5, 10 days, or however long he decides to spend with his new friend in another city? How do I be okay with the fact that for however many days a month he gets to see this person, he gets to live a different life? See, with his new friend, he has no bills, no debt, no kids, no mortgage, no past, maybe even no future, no home improvement projects to finish, no family obligations, no school plays. It's like a fantasy life. And who wouldn't want a fantasy life? Where's my fantasy life? Do I need to open my side of the marriage too so that I feel like we are equals? Why do I always feel like everything needs to be tit for tat?? What's this all called? Jealousy. I'm jealous. I said it. I admit it. I am totally jealous. I am jealous that he gets to do fun things (i.e. be away from our kids and the monotony of THIS life) for many days out of the month because of his job and also now to spend time with his boyfriend. And his boyfriend gets to experience the husband I fell in love with. The husband I met 12 years ago, pre-kids, pre-house, pre-debt, etc. The husband that is foot loose and fancy free. I get reality. The boyfriend gets fantasy.

So maybe my perspective needs to change. Maybe my husband needs to work a little harder at keeping the "fantasy" going for me and him, not just his boyfriend and him. Maybe it's both. Maybe I need to realize that his boyfriend would maybe one day like all the things I have with my husband and he's frustrated because he knows he is not going to get them. Not with my husband God willing. Maybe I need to value the time we spend together more and not think about the time we don't spend together. Maybe we both need to be better at reminding each other how much we mean to each other instead of just getting bogged down with the every day life stuff that bogs you down after 8 years of marriage, two kids, and life in general. This open marriage thing could be the best thing that has ever happened to us. I have heard others say that. Or it could be what ultimately tears us apart. Time will tell. But for now, I will try to remind myself on a continual basis that the bottom line is, there is love there. There is love for each other, respect for each other, and an apparently strong enough desire to stay together despite the odds!

The Worst Part About Being Married to a Gay Man

The insecurities. And there are many.

When your husband first tells you he's gay, like I said in my previous post, it brings on a whole slew of emotions. From fear, to anger, to hurt, to sadness, to disbelief, to depression, and back again. In the reverse order. Over and over and over again. For awhile. A long while. For some, those feelings never go away. For others, it gets better. And what determines the difference? Well, as non-feminist as it sounds, the husband does.

Alfred Kinsey developed a scale, the Kinsey Scale, in "an attempt to describe a person's sexual experience or response at any given time". The scale runs from 0-6....0 being exclusively heterosexual, 6 being exclusively homosexual. And if you fall into the 3 category, then congratulations, you're bisexual. I believe that where the men fall on this scale plays a part in whether or not a MOM can work. A part. Not the whole thing, just a part. There is so much more to a MOM than sex, as there is any relationship, hence I do not think this is the ONLY determining factor.

In my case, I'd say my husband is a 5 - "predominantly homosexual, only incidentally heterosexual". Meaning, if it weren't for me, he would most likely be in a committed relationship with a man and would not seek out a relationship with a woman again. But there in lies the problem...he was not seeking me out when we first met. He knew he had feelings for men most of his life. And then I came along and totally rocked his world (I don't mean that in a toot my own horn kinda way). I shook his image of who he thought he was....a gay man. How could a gay man be sexually, emotionally, mentally attracted to a woman? Well, according to Kinsey, it's not that uncommon.

It's that level of attraction that I believe plays a role in whether a MOM works or not. Again, speaking only from my perspective and experience, I know my husband is still attracted to me (Full disclosure time....we are currently separated but prior to that, there were no problems in the bedroom if you catch my drift). I know he still loves me, if he didn't, I would not be in a MOM, I would be divorced. I know he still wants a future with me as my husband and partner in life, again, if not, we would be divorced. That's what makes this all so complicated. Now, what he has to do, is figure out where on that non-existent scale his feelings lie for me. Where's Kinsey when you need him???? Are his feelings for me strong enough to get us through the hard times that surely lie ahead of us? Are his feelings for men more than his feelings for me and if so, are they strong enough to risk losing me as his wife? Thanks to our kids, he'll never actually be able to get rid of me, but to what level will his feelings for men allow a spot for me in his life? And to what level will his feelings for me allow a spot for a man in his life? Only he can decide that. Do you feel the insecurities rushing in like I do?

It's very scary to think about the one person you thought loved you more than anyone in the world not loving you anymore. Not like you love them. And there's nothing you can do about it. You didn't do anything wrong. Even if you had troubles in your marriage pre-disclosure, there is nothing you really did wrong. You can promise to be a better listener, you can promise to give him the space he needs, you can promise to try to be understanding even though there is no way in this world you will EVER understand what he is going through (nor will he ever understand what you're going through). You can promise, promise, promise until you're blue in the face. But there is nothing you can do to make him love you more if he just doesn't naturally love you as a woman. 

For some, and here comes the feminist side in me, they decide they don't want to wait around to find out how their gay husbands feel about them. And that's not wrong. I think that's what most sane people would do. People who choose to stay in a MOM might need to get their heads examined because there is nothing about this way of life that is easy:). I have had many moments in the last four years where I have thought, "I'm done. This is not worth it. He's not worth it. I can do better. I deserve better". I've had many of those moments as of late, since the separation. But unfortunately, or fortunately, for me, what it comes down to, is that I really don't mean that. And there in lies the problem for me. This would be a lot easier for me if I didn't really like my gay husband. If I thought he was a jerk (which at times he can be) or treated me badly. But he's not a jerk, most of the time, and he treats me anything BUT badly. Despite the issues we've had in our marriage either because of the MOM issue or just regular marital issues, he has never treated me badly. He's been selfish, he's been stubborn, he's been unemotional, but he's never treated me badly. I truly believe that everything he has done in our marriage thus far, whether it has hurt me or not, it was never his intention to hurt me. I think he always thinks he is doing what is best for me, and sometimes he's right and sometimes he's not. 

But in the end, it does take TWO to tango right? So, while I believe so much of whether a MOM works or not depends on the guys, it also depends on how hard you're BOTH willing to work. How secure are you in your love for each other? How much do you both want to work to show each other on a regular basis how important you are to each other? In any marriage, we definitely settle into our comfort zones and once there, it's hard to get out. Being in a MOM takes work, you have to get our of your comfort zone and do something for the other person that makes them happy, even though it might make you a little uncomfortable. And that, I learned tonight from my therapist, is the definition of love. 

The Best Part About Being Married to a Gay Man

Learning the True Meaning of the Word “Love”

All too often, we hear the word love thrown around. As in “Oh my god, I love these shoes. I need to have them”. Or, “Don’t you just love my new jeans?’ It’s become associated with material things, something you can touch, something you can see, something you can make your friends jealous with. But in reality, love is nothing you can see, touch, feel, taste, smell or really even define. Until the night your husband tells you he’s gay.

It was Friday March 13, 2009. Friday the 13^th, I shoulda known. Sitting on the couch, he poured me another glass of wine. I foolishly thought he was trying to get me drunk to take advantage of me. And then the words I will never forget came flying out of his mouth… “I like men”. After I picked my jaw up off the floor, and put my stomach back down where it belonged, I started to cry. As any one in my situation would do. My marriage, my perfect marriage, was over. Or so I thought. Straight people marry straight people and gay people marry gay people. Right? No mixing! You can’t get a marriage “swirl”.

After a LONG night of talking, crying, yelling, probably some hitting on my part, and no sleep, the next day I did what any other person in this day and age would do, I turned to the internet. Surely there had to be an answer. Surely there had to be a book, or a pamphlet, or a thesis, or a song, or a poem, or anything written by anyone who could breathe who we could turn to to help us through this time. We had no desire to separate or divorce. We wanted to make this kind of marriage work. But what was this kind of marriage even called.

It took no time at all for us to find loads of information on what this kind of marriage was called. It’s what people in the “know” called a MOM, a mixed orientation marriage. It’s just what it sounds like…a marriage where one person is of one orientation and the other person is of another (gay/straight, gay/bi, straight/bi, etc). OK. Now that we had the label, then we KNEW it was going to be ok. I mean, if there was a group for us to fit into, then it will work, right? There are national conferences attended by people in MOMs, there are on-line and face to face support groups for people in MOMs, so surely we were going to make it. Surely.

Well, we quickly found out that it wasn’t as easy as we thought. It wasn’t as easy as finding an on-line support group or even face to face support group. There was no book that could guide us through this, there was no therapist we could turn to to tell us what to do. There is no written rule book for marriage and there surely is no written rule book for a mixed orientation marriage. It’s a “figure it out as you go” kinda marriage. What works for one does not work for another. And we never knew how true those words were until we actually tried starting to live as a mixed orientation couple.

I started to realize that “in theory” and “in reality” are two totally different things. Very different. As we started to test the waters of my husband opening up his side of the marriage, conflict set in. In theory, I was fine with the idea. I whole heartedly believe that there is not just one person for everybody. People can have many loves of their lives. And maybe, just maybe, it’s possible that someone finds more than one love of their life at the same time. The problem with this theory is that that is not how we have been conditioned to think, right? We’re a “one person at a time” kind of society. Anything more is being greedy and selfish. So, in reality, when he did finally find someone to start exploring his same sex feelings with, I could not handle it. The thought of him being with someone else, and it did not even matter that it was a man, it just wasn’t me, killed me. Absolutely killed me. How could he do that to me? How could he be with someone else and not think of me? How could he snuggle, and kiss and pillow talk with someone else that was not me? And didn’t being married mean that I was the only one who got to experience those things with him?

But, I have come to realize several things. First of all, nothing about him being with a man is about me. Nothing. There is nothing that I am doing wrong. There is nothing that I could do better, or more, or less or anything. I am not a man. I am a woman. Simple as that. So, as much happiness as I give him and as much pleasure he gets from being with me, I am not enough. It’s not personal.

Second of all, when you are married to a man who also likes men, and is dating someone, then no, you are NOT the only person who is going to experience those “married” type things that couples experience (kisses, snuggles, dates, pillow talk and yes, even sex). As harsh as it was, I realized that I am not the only person in his life that gets to experience those things with him. And that brought out a whole mess of insecurities on my part. Am I strong enough to stay with him? Is it right that I stay with him? Is it fair to me? Is it fair to him? Is it fair to the other man? Is it fair to our kids? (Yes, we have two kids, one even conceived after disclosure and no, he was not a “let’s try to save our marriage” baby. We always knew we wanted two).

And this is where the love part comes in.

Never, in more than a million years, would I have thought that this is where my life was going to end up. And never, in more than a billion years, would I have thought that after knowing what I know about my husband, that I would want to stay with him. Pre-disclosure, I think it’s safe to say that you could have described me as one of the more judgmental people I knew. I never shied away from expressing my opinion, to your face or behind your face. Post-disclosure, I can honestly say that “to each is own” has taken on a whole new meaning to me. Because literally, to each is own. I never knew what I could handle, or what I would be willing to put up with, or what I would want to put up with, until faced with this situation. And why do I do it? Because of love.

This man is more than gay. Being gay does not define him any more than his brown hair, blue eyes or the fact that he’s white describes him. It’s not something he chose (believe me it’s not something he chose. Who would purposely choose to be gay but fall in love with a woman?) It’s a part of who he is and if it helps make him the man that he is, then how can I do anything other than love it? I love the fact that he is patient, I love the fact that he is caring, I love the fact that he can fix and build anything, I love the fact that he is the most amazing father I have ever seen even though he had never changed a diaper before our daughter was born and I thought I was going to SMOKE him in the parenting department. And I love the fact that he is gay. I love the pain that it has caused me because it has helped me become the person I am today and helps me continue to become a better, more patient, less judgmental, more open minded, less restricted person. I love that he has been able to finally experience all the things with men that he was so scared to experience for 34 years of his life. I love the fact that he does not back down to the pressures I have put on him and the pressures society puts on him to “just be normal”. I love the fact that it is with him, that I feel like we can be pioneers in changing the stigma that comes along with this type of marriage. I would do it for no one else. I would do it with no one else. And I will continue to do it with him for as long as I can.