Music That Speaks To Me - Better Than A Hallelujah by Amy Grant

I was driving in this morning, and this song came to play on the radio.  Lately, I've been struggling a lot with my faith.  I've adopted a somewhat apathetic approach toward the church, partially because I've felt misunderstood in something.  I had made a risk, a misguided attempt to make things 'work' that fell outside of the lines of the gospel.  Many times when I've shared it, I felt like I didn't get a chance to fully explain what had been going on or why I did what  I did.

That aside, I've felt a lot of anger, rebelliousness, and bitterness.  I'm surprised that I still go to church each week sometimes.  I've actually felt a lot less stress about life and my attractions in general.  I don't know if that's related to my general sense of apathy toward the church.  On the other hand, I've felt a better sense of connection toward my ward.  I don't feel as much shame being around the other elder's in the quorum.  I'm really excited about a new calling that I have to teach in the Elder's Quorum.

This morning, I also had a strange dream.  I was at some kind of part or gathering.  A man was speaking.  I remember I found him somewhat attractive and that he was a straight (opposite gender attraction) person.  I remember him stating that he didn't mind touching and holding men.  I remember feeling very drawn to that.  Mostly because it was something that I've felt cravings for in the past.  Some kind of safe, nonsexual connection with another man.  In the dream, I never mustered up the courage to go ask the man if he would be willing to hold me.

This song is about those prayers that come from the bitter, broken, or hurt places of people's lives and hearts.  I think it's a beautiful song, reminding me that Heavenly Father loves to hear about my misery as well as my joy.  He wants to hear about my heartache and what makes my heart whole.  In short, He wants to hear everything I have to say to Him, because He loves me.

Lyrics:

God loves a lullaby 
In a mother's tears in the dead of night 
Better than a Hallelujah sometimes. 
God loves the drunkard's cry, 
The soldiers plea not to let him die 
Better than a Hallelujah sometimes. 


We pour out our miseries 
God just hears a melody 
Beautiful the mess we are 
The honest cries of breaking hearts 
Are better than a Hallelujah. 


The woman holding on for life, 
The dying man giving up the fight 
Are better than a Hallelujah sometimes 
Tears of shame for what's been done, 
The silence when the words won't come 
Are better than a Hallelujah sometimes. 


We pour out our miseries 
God just hears a melody 
Beautiful the mess we are 
The honest cries of breaking hearts 
Are better than a Hallelujah.


Better than a church bell ringing, 
Better than a choir singing out, singing out.


We pour out our miseries 
God just hears a melody 
Beautiful the mess we are 
The honest cries of breaking hearts 
Are better than a Hallelujah.


We pour out our miseries 
God just hears a melody 
Beautiful the mess we are 
The honest cries of breaking hearts 
Are better than a Hallelujah.


Better than a Hallelujah sometimes
Better than a Hallelujah
Better than a Hallelujah sometimes
[From http://www.klove.com/music/artists/amy-grant/songs/better-than-a-hallelujah-lyrics.aspx]

If You Only Knew

Just as a disclaimer, this post is more referring to my thoughts.  It isn't directed toward any one particular person.  In fact, it's more directed toward many different people.  Mostly, it's me just venting things that come on my mind that I feel like giving a voice.

****

If you only knew what went on inside my head.  What if you knew that I was attracted to you?  What if you knew that my eyes tended to wander to you?  What if you knew that I liked how you look?  What would you do?  Would you shun me? Reject me? Be afraid and awkward around me?  How I wish at times that I could just touch you and not feel uncomfortable about it, to reach out and connect and not accuse myself of acting on lust.  You may never know how good it is to see you smile at me.  You may never know how I felt that time you randomly came up and rubbed my shoulder, or patted me on the back.  You may never know how enamored I became with you, or how secretly obsessed I became with you.  If you did know, would you still act the same around me?  What if you knew I wanted to hug you?  Or that I enjoyed the feel of your arms around me?

If you only knew, how I felt with you around.  How afraid I was because of the feelings I had for you.  Or how little I cared for what you were saying, or even for you.  How afraid I feel that you would found out how little I really cared for you.  Or how sad I was that we couldn't connect.  Or sometimes the wild fantasies I have with you in them.  Or how many times I wondered what you looked like without a shirt on.  Or how hesitant I am to spend time with you because of how attracted I feel for you.  Or how many times I questioned if I was trying to be my friend because I liked you or because I "liked" you.

If you only knew how I felt the last time I saw you.  The shock at seeing you, the grief, the fear, the rage.  How I watched you to avoid you.  How I felt the piercing anger of your glare.  How distraught I felt afterward.  How much seeing you remind me of my past and how manipulative I've been in the past and my fear that I continue to live and breathe the same lies that have cloaked from so early in my life.

If you only knew how misunderstood I felt, or the pain I've felt.  Or how many times I've let my unrealistic expectations get dashed.  Or how many times I haven't cared.  Or how many times I've cried over you, or over me wanting to connect with you.  Or how many times I've felt like shaking my fist at the heavens only to find the finger of blame to be pointing at me.

I don't know if I could ever explain in words how much it means when you contact me or talk to me.  The little inside jokes.  The ability to say and act how I feel is right.  Understanding when I feel down.  If you only knew how much more I wish I could spend time with you or talk to you.

If you only knew.

****

Thanks for reading!

A Glimpse Into The Madness 6Apr2012

Recently, I started using a website called 'Moodscope' that helps to track a persons mood each day. Today, I got the lowest score since I've started using it (15%).  Ironically, the site suggested that 'It could be useful to talk it all through with someone close'.  Oddly, I don't feel like there's anyone close.  I've pushed everyone away.  My defensive detachment seems to be set into a sense of overdrive.  I've been feeling a lot of confusion, despair, sadness, grief, fear bordering on paranoia.  I've been struggling with thoughts of acting out, browsing through peoples pictures, even feeling urges to walk by places to see if I can find any shirtless guys to stare out.  In short, I think that I'm a sort of death spiral.

In the core of the death spiral is a fear of vulnerability.  I know that is the root of the problem.  I'm afraid to open up to the people that I once felt close to.  I keep thinking that going to an in person support group really isn't changing anything.  I keep thinking that online support groups are useless.  I keep thinking that spending time with people in person, one on one, is largely a waste of time.  All because I'm afraid to open up.  I even think that putting out this blog post is a huge waste of time.

In person, I've grown tired of feeling verbally dumped on by other people.  I've grown tired of feeling like I have to tell other people to back off.  I've grown tired of hiding behind a mask of humor and hilarity when I'd really prefer just curling up in a ball and crying.  I've grown tired of lying about how I really feel.  I've grown so tired of seeing other people as objects and not people, and feeling the same way about myself.

With support groups, I've definitely become very passive when it comes to reaching out.  In a sense, I've grown so tired of trying to make friends there in the past that I really don't care anymore.  I spend all the time waiting for someone to come to me rather than seeking out friendship.  In the past, I've felt like I haven't been able to establish the sort of friendship I want.  Either the other person seems cool, distant, and intellectual, or something happens that doesn't make me feel safe.  Sometimes I do open up to the other person, and I think that the other person isn't willing to do the same.  It's honestly been driving me mad.

With the online support groups, it either feels like a place for humor or debate.  I hardly feel safe sharing things personal any more.  When I have put up what was basically a cry for help, I feel life I've been ignored or given unwanted advice.  Some people have responded with empathy, but it doesn't ever seem to amount to anything.  I'm too afraid to continue to be open.

In relation to the blog, I think that no one ever reads it.  Sure, I see stat counters go up, every so often I have someone talk to me in person about it.  Every so often, I see a comment on it.  It makes me start to wonder, what is it that I'm looking for?  Why am I not happy with how things are?

The truth is, I've been hurting pretty badly.  I've been feeling the need for connection to the people around me, yet I've sabotaged all my attempts to really connect to people.  Yesterday, I was driving home along my usual route.  There is a turn in the freeway.  I glanced out straight and saw all the open space and wondered how wonderful it would feel to fly away from it all.  It was then that I realized how easy it would be to simply turn my car into the barrier and try to end my life.

This is a cry for help.  I feel pessimistic about it.  Even if it is responded to, will I accept the response or will I continue to deflect those people who do try to be my friend until I am ultimately alone?  I'm pretty sure I'm crazy.  And this post is definitely proof of it.  I've been praying, and I definitely feel like I could use more.

P.S. (added at 1:36 PM):
I am feeling a great deal different now.  I will still keep up this post as an authentic and honest post of the negative thinking trap I was in.  I have so many people who love me, admire me, and appreciate me.  I am loved.

I want you to know that you are loved as well!  There is healing and there is hope.  Reach out and reach up and there will be hands there waiting anxiously to grasp yours.

I love you all.  Thanks.

A Glimpse Into The Madness 27Feb2012

It's 11:30.  Normally, I'd be sound asleep by now.  Ironically, I had all the electronics and I was pleasantly reading a book and texting a friend of mine.  Oddly, our conversation stirred up some very deep, painful issues of mine.  To help me sleep, I'm going to be blogging about it here.

For the past eight months, I feel like I've been slipping slowly into a kind of madness or into a state of numbness where I don't feel anything.  I've found myself in a frenzy, moving from one activity to the other, like I was trying to run away from something.  Other times, I found me trying to bury myself in video games, or books to read, or endless Facebook updates, trying to ignore or numb away something I'd been feeling.  Sometimes I've turned to more potent numbing agents, like masturbation.  All of this to try to avoid feeling one thing.

Pain.

Working backward from right now, where I do feel the pain and the sadness.  I can see that my actions lately have made me feel like I'm slippy closer and closer toward acting out sexually with another man.  I can see that I've been putting myself into increasingly more compromising situations.  The cycle is very slow, generally every few months.  I feel like I've been getting very close to a breaking point of sorts.

The root cause? Last year I was in a very close friendship.  I shared a lot with this other man.  I struggled with having romantic feelings on and off.  I started to become very overdependent on him for getting my emotional needs met.  To make a long, painful story short, the friendship eventually fell apart and I had to distance myself from him.

Since then, I don't think I've ever fully recovered from it.  I've withdrawn and isolated my heart to being hurt further.  I've taken steps to numb myself from the pain, which only seems to make the pain feel even worse.  I've noticed that it's been difficult to feel like I have and friends, even friends that are close.  I've felt like there is no one that I can trust.  I don't even feel like I can trust myself, or my own motives.  I feel like I've been playing more and more with fire, and that eventually I'm going to get burned by it, unless I can find another solution.

Pain has been a reoccurring companion for me in my life.  I remember crying myself to sleep at nights when I was younger because I didn't feel like anyone liked me and that I didn't have any friends.  The feeling has continued with me as I've grown older.  I realize that my perceptions are horrifically tainted and twisted by the beliefs I have about myself: that I am unlovable, and not worth the notice of others.  Sadly, I've turned this belief against others.  Many times, a friendship has taken root in my heart, only to later be blasted by my anger and by my inability to love the other person.  I've often felt like my heart was a lonely, desolate place where no one else was.  Many times, it's been like Tumm has rampaged and destroyed everything, only to ultimately curl up in a ball in the center of the blast radius and go completely numb.  I honestly feel like the cycle of destruction and attempted rebirth has gone on far too long in my life.  It would be nice for a friendship to grow, become strong, and stay alive in my heart.  Sometimes I think my heart just isn't fertile enough for it.  I've always thought that friendships were hard to form.  Now I'm beginning to think I may be the difficult person to be a friend with.

The pain is often frustrating for me.  I have tried to pray many times for it to be removed.  I've even tried to surrender it.  I feel like I need to give up on both.  Neither has made the pain stop.  I find myself praying increasingly more in order to have the strength to bear the pain I've been given to bear.

At the root of the madness are number of competing and fighting ideas and desires.  On one hand, there is a part of me that so desperately wants to be loved.  On another, there is a part that wants to be free from pain and suffering and that doesn't want to hurt any more.  The part that desires freedom from pain says that in order to have love, I will have to open up and risk being hurt.  The same part decides to keep me guarded and isolate from others.  The other part cries out so desperately to feel loved that it often comes out in ways I can't control.  Sometimes that part of me starts to listen to the lie that the only way I will be loved is if I am loved sexually by another.

I can see but one path that may lead me back to sanity.  I have many safe places to embrace vulnerability and let my pain be shown.  Perhaps there, I can finally step into my pain more fully, and allow myself to feel truly loved again.

Music That Speaks To My Resolve - Give A Reason

I've recently finished watching an anime series called Slayers (I watched the original, Try, Next, Revolution, and Revolution-R, basically everything on Hulu).  Each of the episodes has an opening and closing song.  I thoroughly enjoyed the series.  The characters seemed have a life of their own.  Each one kept on fighting (sometimes with some encouragement by their friends) despite the odds or the tragedies that happened to them.  Overall, it was a powerful story on the triumph that can come when someone keeps fighting.

Today's song comes from the opening of the Slayers NEXT series.  The title is 'Give a Reason'.  Alas, it's in Japanese, but I'll shared a link to it here:



I'd love to give the lyrics, but alas, they are in Japanese.  I'll share part of a translation here:
Things are moving so fast
The moments ticking by.
I'm running through this city
To me, a savanna.
Like it's struggling
Trying to break free
I wanna test all this power.

I know that "The Answer"
Is out there someplace.
The answer that everyone looks for
From the day they're born.
When all looks lost and there's no escape
I turn to my dreams!

I'm not afraid of getting hurt
But I'm not strong, either.
It's just that I can't stand
Just doing nothing anymore.

Here we go, go!
I'll just run on
And let nobody stop me know.
I wanna find the me in the future
And give her a reason for life!
(Translation was taken from the close captioning for the series on www.hulu.com).

I love this song.  It has a lot of energy and is very enthusiastic.  It reminds me of a recent realization about myself that I've had: that I'm resilient and much more durable than I used to think I was.  I've been through a lot, and I've yet to lay down and completely stop fighting and struggling.  Even when I fall apart, I somehow find the strength to keep going through.

I had a really discussion with a friend about the fact that I've come out publicly on this blog.  I realize that it was really risky situation.  When I made the decision, I realized that I was tired of hiding behind masks, and that I was tired of doing nothing.  I wasn't so much afraid of being hurt further, as I was of continuing to live in pain and shame.  I decided that I was going to stand up and fight, even if it meant possibly drawing more challenges and grief into my life.  As the song lyrics state, I just couldn't stand by and do nothing anymore.  On a related note, I gave my friend a piece of advice.  He's been struggling and I said that he could take some advice by how video game characters react to struggles.  They take time to feel their emotions, work through things, talk about them, and then they keep on fighting.  They always keep struggling.

On a related note, sometimes the struggle I have is to let go and let Heavenly Father step in to help with my life.  Sometimes the struggle is to stand up for myself, even if it's something I haven't done in the past.  Sometimes the struggle is to step into situations that are risky and unfamiliar.  Sometimes it means battling my own thoughts to have thoughts that are elevated and uplifting.

On a personal note, things have been difficult lately.  The procedure that I was worried about was far more pleasant than I imagined.  I'm a bit sore from that.  Outside of that, I've been fighting off the tail end of a cold.  It also feels like I've been challenged in spiritual ways as well.  But like I said before, I'm going to keep on fighting.

On a Slayers related note, my favorite character from the series is Xellos.  This could be major spoilers.  Technically, he should be a villain but often helps the heroes for his own reasons.  He is very powerful, but likes to act via manipulation.  He is very knowledgeable but he doesn't always share everything he knows with the heroes.  One of his iconic lines is 'That's a secret'.  In the later series, the characters start to say it for him.  Hilarious!

The Woman In Black - Forgiveness

I just barely got back from watching "The Woman In Black".  I really don't plan on reviewing movies in this blog post, but I want to share some brief plot points.  I'll be hiding the next paragraph in a nice 'anti-spoiler' tag.  If you don't mind being spoiled, or have seen the movie, you can highlight the text by using your mouse.  Hitting Ctrl-A also works.  If this is a foreign language, see your nearest computer geek for assistance.

The main plot point for "The Woman In Black" is about a woman, Jannette.  Jannette is deemed to be mentally unstable, and her son is taken away from her by her sister.  Sometime later, the son is travelling with his adopted parents and dies in a tragic accident: their carriage sinks in the mud. Jannette angrily declares that she will never forgive her sister, and that her sister never tried to save her son.  Jannette hangs herself, and comes back as a ghost in black.  Whenever someone visits her house, she kills a child in the local village.  The main character thinks he resolves the issue by finding and returning Janette's son's body to Janette's grave, but ghost has already sworn that she will 'never forgive'.

I found it interesting that forgiveness, or the inability to forgive, played a large part in the movie.  As I drove home, I started to think about two people that I judge I have hurt pretty deeply.  No matter how much time has passed, I always feel like I want to tell them 'I'm sorry'.  I'm sorry that things didn't turn out.  I'm sorry I wasn't in the right place to make our relationship work out.  One of these people is a girl that I dated in college.  The other is a man that I called my best friend for awhile.  With the girl, I kept dating her, expecting some kind of spark to happen in me, and for me to become attracted to her.  I'd rather not go into the other story, far too personal and painful.

Anyways, as I drove home, I felt a great deal of pain.  I realized that I was still struggling to forgive myself for it.  On another note, I also realized I still have a lot of anger due to the incidents directed toward the other people.  That probably extends from the pain of not being able to forgive myself.  Honestly, I feel like a man divided.  Instead of there being two equal pieces, I end up with two shadows.  The scene in my head almost plays out like a scene from a play.

One part of me lie curled in a ball, trying to numb everything out.  He rocks and tries to comfort himself.  He says 'I'm sorry' over and over.  He also says 'I can never forgive myself for what I've done'.  In reality, he is the innocent one.  Standing over him is Tumm.  Tumm is dressed in black, as usual, with blood on his hands.  He is the real one at fault in the situation.  Tumm's duty is to draw boundaries, enforce them, and to understand what is going on with the other part of me, which is lying huddled on the ground.  Tumm is pointing his finger, angrily, at me and at the people around me.  He says 'It's all your fault!'.  He points at me and says 'I can never forgive you.  You're worthless.  It's all your fault.'

As silly as it sounds, writing it out like that helps me to gain insight into what is going on, and how I can figure out how to heal myself.  Tumm needs to accept the fact that he was also responsible for my actions.  The other part needs to know that he didn't know what was going on, and that he was under a delusion of sorts.  It's like I need to realize I'm both guilty and innocent at the same time.  And ultimately, I need to forgive myself to find a sense of closure.

As an interesting irony, tomorrow is Valentine's day.  On Valentine's day, four years ago, that girl sent me a note and asked me to a movie.  That was the beginning of our dating relationship.

On a lighter note, I'm glad I was able to walk out of a horror movie with most of my sanity intact.  The last horror movie I walked out of, I was terrified of the dark all the way home and for a few days afterward.  The only side effects this movie had were: 1) my eyes constantly looking for the woman in black, either in windows, cars, down hallways, etc 2) me being terrified about the children I live with.

Oh, on another note, I don't recommend watching "The Woman In Black" if you have small children, especially if you're already pretty sensitive to horror movies.  That being said, I will close up this blog post and get some sleep.

Paths Laden With Fog

I've been coming to learn, or more accurately re-learn, a few things about myself lately.  Recently, I've been feeling pretty desperate for connection with other men.  Granted, I've been talking and reaching out more than normal.  I've even told a number of my friends about me, just in case they weren't following this blog.  The desperation still wasn't being alleviated.  There's a few simple facts that seem to contribute to this.

First off, my primary love language is touch (If you are unfamiliar with what a 'love language' is, see The 5 Love Languages site, it's also a book).  Because of that, my primary way of feeling and expressing love toward other people is through touch, and this very much focused around men, with very few exceptions for women, most of whom are in my family.  Most of the time, the expression has very little to do with lust or sexual desire.  Sometimes it's a simple expression that I like the person or value them as a friend.  Nothing more and nothing less.

This gets obviously frustrated by some aspects of American culture.  In my perception, we're not a very touchy-feely sort of people, at least out in public.  The same seems to be true when I visit church.  In my home ward (by home I mean parent's ward), the people are very good at shaking hands.  The last singles ward I was in, and this current ward don't seem to be very good at that, and I'm far too shy to even initiate that kind of contact.

Anyways, I was starting to feel desperate for some kind of physical contact with a man.  I can look back now and see how crazy I was, because I have a whole group of friends that are willing to give appropriate, safe, and bonding touch with me.  I told myself all sorts of lies to keep myself from asking them.  It led me to seeking the safe, appropriate sort of touch in a very dangerous environment.

As an interesting aside, I notice a pattern that emerges when I feel like my touch need isn't getting met.  I start to get the crazy notion that people will start spontaneously offering the kind of touch that I need or want.  I start to drop into a childlike state, where I expect the people around me to know what my needs are.  I basically tend to regress.  When my need isn't met (which happens very often because I'm not asking for help to get them met), I start to slip into a state of defensive detachment.  I get angry, and I feel lonely.  In an attempt to escape the pain of not having the need met, I seek out 'numbing agents' of sorts.  I turn to video games generally.  The sort of lull and trance they put me in provides a false sense of peace and comfort, yet always lead me to a sense of emptiness and loneliness.  When that isn't enough, I turn to stronger 'numbing agents': masturbation and pornography.  Like video games, they leave with a more profound feeling of emptiness and numbness.  In this state of numbness, I'm even less likely to ask for what I need.  It's a vicious downward spiral.

At my support group this week, I managed to touch both the pain and the feeling of emptiness and detachment.  It's amazing how familiar both of them feel.  I'm often not even conscious of it.  The detachment feels warm, familiar, old, and oddly peaceful.  Yet it also feels like I'm all alone in a dark room with no one else there.  The room is empty and vast.

As I discussed this at my support group, I realized that detachment and numbness is a choice I make.  It's a choice that leads me down a road that ends up with me curled up in a ball trying to shut everything else out.  It leads me to somewhere dark, lonely, yet safe.  As I talked, I also realized there were other paths.  There are other choices.  There are many different people to ask for help from.  All of the roads were covered in fog.  I couldn't determine their outcome.  The path to numbness, however, was quite clear.  I know where it would lead me.  I've taken it so many times, that the outcome is sure.

That aside, at support group I also recalled the last time I felt like I wanted some touch, specifically, I wanted to be held.  It was when I was having a talk with my dad about this blog post.  Forgive me other blog readers, but I'd like to address my dad personally.  Feel free to read as well!

Dad, I think you may remember the last time we got together and chatted about a blog post I had made, one about some past shameful lies I'd been believing for years.  Wow, this is hard, tears are already in my eyes.  I remember as we talked that I one point, I simply wanted you to reach out your arms and cradle me, and comfort me.  When I realized that, I almost immediately started to belittle/demean/talk down to myself about it.  'Why would an adult want to be held? I should be independent.  I shouldn't need this.  I shouldn't want this.'  Despite what I said, the desire was still there.  The pain was still there.  I wanted to connect.  I wanted to connect like a child would connect with his father.  I wanted to be held by you.  Yet, like a child, I found myself powerless to ask for what I wanted.  I found myself incapable of expressing the words.  Maybe because I was starting to feel, live, and act from a very young state, perhaps before I could even talk.  I've always wondered why I've struggled to connect with you.  I know I've been defensively detached from both you and Mom.  I'm starting to wonder if the problem and solution lie somewhere in the desire to be held by you, dad.  I somehow want to go back to where the defensive detachment started, attach, instead of detaching, and start unraveling years of me detaching myself from you.  Honestly, I feel afraid to ask for what I want.  I honestly don't know how you would take it, or even if you know how to hold me.  I don't even know how long it would take, or even if it would take more than one time of it happening.  There are many, many years of detachment.  Many years of me isolating myself from you.  I still think we can bridge the gap and heal this.  Honestly, the path is laden with fog.  All I know for now is there is a desire for me to be held by you.

Thank you for indulging me readers.  I feel nearly overcome inside with the sadness and the pain.  When I was a child, I didn't know what I needed.  I obviously felt a need to be safe, so I started to withdraw from my parents.  I honestly have no idea where it started.  All I know is that it worked at the time, and now, it isn't working as an adult.  To be withdrawn and detached from the people around me, means I can continue to be safe, but also broken, hurt, lonely, and ultimately, empty.  It also means that I defend myself from others attempts to truly love me.  It also extends to and disrupts my relationship with God.

The future paths are laden with fog.  I could continue to take the one familiar path, that leads me to loneliness.  I think it's time to start taking one of the fog laden ones and push through to see what's on the other side of the fog.

Oh, and a personal request.  If you know me, in person, I would definitely appreciate more hugs!  However that looks for you.

Thank you for reading.

Underneath The Armor - A Status Update 11Jan2012

It's been about four days since I last posted on here.  The last major post that I made was basically claiming this blog as my own and putting my own name on it.  I basically put it out in the public that I experience same gender attraction and often struggle with it.

It's been an interesting and disappointing last few days.  So far, a number of people have commented on the blog post, some friends from college and a former co-worker.  Also, a few people from the SSA community have also talked to me about it.  Honestly, I was hoping for some other people to see and respond.  There are other people with whom I want to be more open and honest.  Yet, I'm still afraid to share myself with those people, especially about the attraction.  Even though it's 'out there' I'm still afraid of owning up to it in public.  The most I've tried is texting someone from the group and asking if they've read my blog.  All I've heard back was 'Yeah, I knew that you had a blog.'  That's about as far as I felt safe pushing on it.  Really, if a person does or doesn't read my blog, it's more of the other person's choice.  I feel like I've tried to make it public, and tried to share it.

On to the main topic of my post.  Lately, the weather here in Utah has taken a turn for the cold again, so I'm layering up.  This morning, after putting on my jacket and my coat, I honestly wished I could put on a mask or a faceguard of some kind.  I've been feeling very ashamed of how I've been feeling/thinking/acting lately.  I know that I'm not in a very good place, yet I'm too afraid to reach out for the help I need.  I find myself waiting for other people to do it first as if I expect everyone else to inherently know that things aren't going well with me.  I can probably count on one hand the number of people who have reached out to support me or at least reached out to contact me.

Lately, some people have been asking me 'Hey, how are you?' or any of it's variants or mutations.  They've asked me in a variety of places.  Honestly, the responses may very with how much I trust the person.  I've honestly put on a great deal of 'armor' or 'masks' lately to cover up what's really been going on.

So how am I doing?

Outer layer:
In the outermost layer, I'll probably smile, give a nod.  I'll say I'm doing 'alright' or 'good' or possibly even 'well' if I'm actually feeling good at the time.  In this layer, I generally hide a great deal of what's really going on.  I feel uncomfortable going in deeper, so I often move away or keep the topics of conversation at very superficial levels.

One layer down:
On this layer, I may actually honestly say if I'm doing well or not.  I may say 'I'm having a rough time' without going into details.  My smile may fade.  My eyes may begin to tell the truth of my story.  Even at this layer, I feel uncomfortable and unsafe with a good majority of people.

Two layers down:
On this layer, I may start to go into the details of what's been going on.  I may say 'I've been feeling sad/angry/lonely/depressed.'  Even my feelings cover up a great deal of what's been going on.

Three layers down:
Things start to get even more personal.  I share more details of what's going on.  I feel like an outsider at church.  I try to smile and be friendly, but it doesn't seem to help.  People don't seem to want to sit by me.  People at work seem to avert their gaze when I go by.  People don't seem to want to interact with me, unless I do so first.  On this layer, I point my finger in blame at the other people.  I start to tap into the pain that I feel most of the time.  I may admit that I feel attracted to other people.

Four layers down:
I realize that all the things I've been blaming other people for, are really my fault.  I say 'No one wants to sit with me at Elder's Quorum, because there's something wrong with me.'  On this layer, I tell myself there are things 'wrong with me'.  I honestly have a hard time expressing this to other people.  I honestly even have a hard time admitting that I tell myself these things.  On this layer, I may realize that the way other people act really has little to do with me and everything to do with them.  I'm more honest at this layer of who I'm attracted to and what attracts me about them.  I'm also honest about how my I am disgusted with myself, or how I put myself down over why I feel attracted to certain people.  I put myself down for the desires related to those attractions.

There are things that I am even afraid of speaking about publicly, in this blog.

How have I been doing? Honestly, I've been doing poorly lately.  I've been struggling with the basics of prayer and reading my scriptures.  I've been trying to pray, but sometimes I feel like I've been left to struggle through things on my own.  My work has changed lately, and I feel bored and even more alone.  I feel frustrated when I'm attracted to a person that I see either at work, in public, or in my support group.  I've been growing more isloated and withdrawn.  I've grown tired of listening to the voices in my head that cry out that other people have hurt me, left me, abandoned me.  I'm tired of asking myself 'Why won't anyone sit next to me?'  'Why don't people talk to me unless I talk to them first?'.  I've grown so tired of hearing my own personal demons hiss from other people's faces.

How have I been coping?  I've been trying to drown my woes in computer games, staying up late, eating chocolate.  I've been struggling against the temptation to look at triggering pictures.  I've been struggling with the habit of masturbation.  I've been struggling with fantasizing what it would be like to be with another man.

What is it I need?




Honestly, I'm not entirely sure.  Love.  I want to feel loved by the people around me.  I want to feel loved by Heavenly Father.  Maybe part of what I need is to stop sabotaging other people's attempts to love me.  I honestly think that I've been hiding from the hurt for so long, that opening up to feel loved is only going to bring up all that hidden hurt.  I'm afraid of it.  I run from it, yet it never leaves me.  It always is with me no matter what I do to try to numb it or drown it out.

This morning, a quote from a General Authority which says something like this 'Assume that the people around you are in distress, and you will often be right'.  It occurred to me on my drive in to work that other people are probably in just as much pain as I am.  People around me are probably struggling with loneliness, with attraction, with anger, with sadness, and with depression.  The people around me are also probably screaming out in pain, screaming out to be loved by the people around them as well.

That makes me think a number of things.  First, part of me wants to think I'm insane for asking to feel loved by the people around me.  If everyone is struggling just as much as I am, how am I supposed to expect them to go out of their way to express any kind of love for me?  Second, I deride myself for not reaching out to help lift other people more.  Third, I feel frustrated that when I have reached out, the other people have been to armored to respond.  I realize this has honestly a lot more to do with the other people than it has to do with me.  I'm not going to try to force a response out of people.  If I were to force another person, it would probably damage my relationship with the person, and wouldn't do them a whole lot of good.  In other words, forcing another person to open up would be more about me than it would be about the other person.  Fifth, I need to show more compassion for the people around me.  Honestly, I need to have more compassion for myself, and more patience.  I need to stop getting stuck in the trap of self-pity.

In summary, all I want is to feel loved and to love the people around me.  What impedes me are the demons, the lies that resound inside my head and the temptations that easily beset me.  I often get stuck so deeply in the trap of self-pity that I don't reach out for help, or I reject the attempts of people to try to reach out to me.  In short, I'm convinced that I've gone totally crazy in the head.  I honestly wonder if I should be locked up in a padded chamber so my craziness won't hurt me or anyone else.

If you're reading this, and you are struggling in some way, please take care of yourself.  Talk to the people that you love and trust.  Also, even if you are struggling or aren't, take time to reach out and show your love to the people around you.  It may look any number of ways.  Maybe it means writing a letter, or an e-mail, or sending a text.  Maybe it looks like putting your arm around someone.  Maybe it means being a shoulder to try on or a listening ear.  Maybe it means giving a person some space to breath.  Maybe it means trying to move in a bit closer and being a bit more honest with that person.  In any case, perhaps the person best to start with would be yourself.

The Demons Come In Sideways

First off, this post is a scary one to write.  I feel like I may be writing about some thoughts and ideas that I've never shared before.  Also, I feel like I may be sharing one of the devils tricks.  Also, I'm afraid of some of the ramifications of what I want to share in this post.

Last night started out normal, and slowly turned into something very painful.  Typically on Thursday nights, I go and play computer games with some friends.  Last night ended with me tweeting some very scary things.  I'll start with those:

"The battlefield of the mind is a dynamic place.  One moment, things are calm.  The next, legions of demons emerge from the shadows."
"At first, the demons smile disarmingly, disabling defenses and setting all at ease."
"Then they slip sideways into thoughts, planing corrupt, poisoned seeds of lies that spread like a virus."
"Finally when the person has started to succumb to the poison, they try to crush the person with darkness and despair."

Last night, I was heading home on what I thought would be a typical night.  Rush home, grab my computer, and rush to hang to with the friends.  It would be an enjoyable evening where we ran around together in the game and laughed and struggled through it together.  At least, that was what I was hoping for.  I wanted to try to get to where we were meeting early to see if I could finish a book that I've been reading for the past month or so.

When I got home, I had a surprised.  There were a lot more people in the front room than I expected.  To explain, I live with a family of four.  Sitting on the couch was the father, as well as another man I knew, as well as some of both of their children sitting in chairs.  I was so shocked, I didn't recognize the other man for a few moments.  He smiled and said 'hi'.  In a daze, I think I said 'hi' to the man and his wife and went into my room to prepare my computer for transport.

By then, the demons had slipped out of the shadows.  Without realizing it, the negative self talk had started in my head:

Why is that family visiting? It seems that the two families are becoming good friends.  I feel kind of left out.  Well, that's my fault.  I'm hardly home and I hardly like to spend time with the family anyways.  The two guys seem to have a really good friendship going on.  I guess I'm not the kind of person that the other man was looking for.  I guess I'm not good enough.

It happened so quickly.  I became pretty withdrawn, and felt like I was a shadow moving through the place I lived.  Although I did want to give both of those men I knew, who are my friends, hugs before I left, I instead left the scene as quickly as I could, listening away to the lies in my head:

Oh, I don't want to do that in front of either of the wives.  What will they think of me?  Will they think I'm trying to hit on them?  Trying to make a pass?

It was when I was driving away when I finally realized I was listening to some of the oldest lies I've told myself for years.  "People don't care about me.  I'm not good enough.  I'm not worth love and affection."  I tried to counter it with truths I knew, but the poison had set in.  I felt sad.  I felt lonely.

I arrived at the game night, and it wasn't anything like I had hoped it to be.  Me and the 3 other guys were all doing different things in different places in the games.  It was incredibly lonely.  I made a few snarky jokes on and off, feeling vaguely angry that we weren't all together in the game, yet I didn't do anything about that fact.

As I was driving home, the sadness and the loneliness had set in.  My mind started to wonder.

There are deer along this part of the road.  What if I hit one of them?  I could die.  Mom would be there at my funeral crying.  Dying wouldn't be so bad.  I'd be free from the pain I have here, this grief and pain.

That's when I shook my head and realized I was fantasizing.  Still, I felt a deep pain in my heart.  I was crying.  I was sad, hurting, overcome by grief, a combination of the pain of loneliness, and the pains of a guilty conscious.  I knew I was guilty of so many different sins.  It felt like my heart was breaking.

As I carried my computer back into where I live, I felt dark, crushing despair.  It was like something was trying to squeeze the hope out of me. It was a struggle to breath, and I managed to unlock the house and get inside.  As I went back for the rest of the computer, I didn't want to go back inside.  I knew the demons were out there.  Finally, I was able to get everything in my house.

I was tempted with various things.  One thought said 'Oh, set up your computer, look at some pornography. You'll feel better.'  Another said 'Why don't you masturbate?  It's the only time you're really loving yourself!  After all, only you love yourself.'  And even, there was a few thoughts about trying to end my life.  I'm very scared to admit, but I did consider it for a moment, and even thought of way to do it.

All through this, I was praying.  I was trying to connect.  I honestly don't know why I didn't feel an answer.  I laid down, texting two friends of mine.  The pain was still there.  Tears were still streaming down my face.  Many times I whimpered because of the pain.  Sometimes, I just wanted to implode on the spot and stop being because it felt like too much.  I don't ever remember falling asleep.

This morning, I can still feel that pain in my heart.  I still do feel a sense of guilt over things I've done.  The one sin I was guilty of last night was perpetuating those lies I've told myself all the years and for listening to those demons.  Honestly, I am afraid.  I feel afraid whenever thoughts of suicide come up.  I honestly feel like I'm too much of a coward to actually do anything like that.  I also realize it would cause a great deal of pain to many people that I love.  At what point though, does the pain get to be too much?  I honestly feel like I am getting near some kind of breaking point.  Something has to give.  There's something in me that needs to break before I can move on from whatever it is I've been going through the last day, week, month...time period.

For now, I'm going to keep moving and try to feel my way through this pain.

Toxic Shame, Deep-set Lies

This will be a difficult post to write for me.  Not difficult because I'm afraid to share it.  Difficult because of the pain I know that it's going to touch on.  Once more, into the breach.

In my support group this week, I did something where I looked into events where I had felt shamed.  Sometime soon, I'll have to start up a series of posts called 'From the Memory Vault' where I share things from my past that I'm able to remember.  I actually have a draft for one, but I'm too afraid to share it.  I'm frankly worried about how I could explain it without the event becoming too pornographic.  Here's a list of some of the shameful memories that I was able to remember this week:

• In kindergarten, I colored a hand purple.  The teacher had me re-color it because it was the 'wrong color'.
• In kindergarten, my teacher found my lunch, raised it up, asked who's it was.  I raised my hand and she didn't see me, and it caused trouble later.
• I was forced to recount in front of the whole primary a time when I didn't come when my mother called
• At 8, I was told 'He shouldn't have gone in there!' by a man at the front desk of a military locker room, after I had gone in with my dad
• My dad telling me, at 8-9 years old, "If you were older, you would have needed to talk to a bishop"
• Various events with yelling and throwing of toys
• Me getting caught playing the Legend of Zelda early in the morning...Sunday morning
• Me getting in trouble for spitting on a girl

That was the list of memories of shame that I had from this group.  As a kid, these were some of the messages that I got:

• I don't belong here
• I'm not valued
• I don't belong with men
• I don't matter
• I do everything wrong
• I'm always in trouble
• You don't care.

At some point early in my life, I decided that people didn't care about me.  I must have started ignoring any attempts by people around me to love and care about me.  Even if I was able to perceive it, I would eventually rationalize it away.  In short, I was detached from the people around me.  I figured, if they don't care about me, why should I care about them?  I decided to go off and live in a fantasy world.  At the same time, I became a 'people pleaser'.  I did whatever it took to make people leave me alone.  I would satisfy people and try not to draw attention to myself.  I did my best in school for fear of 'doing things wrong'.  I remember being mortified the first time I was late to a class in my life.


I delved a bit deeper into that first memory I shared.  At one point, I came to the realization that my teacher didn't care about me.  No one seemed to care about me growing up.  I was just another warm body.  I was an object in the room.  And deep down, all I wanted as a kid was to feel special, loved, noticed, cared for, delighted in.

I also got some good insight into one of my 'flavors' of attraction.  I generally feel attracted to men bigger than me, to men that I judge are stronger than me.  I also feel afraid around them, intimidated by them.  It's an interesting internal conflict.  I think it goes back to feeling shamed by various adults in my life.  I wanted to feel loved by them, and instead I felt shamed by them.  To this day, I find myself seeking that love and approval from the 'big men', from the 'adults'.  I still want and crave that acceptance, affection, affirmation, ...love from them.  That flavor of attraction is one of the hardest to 'shake off'.  It's one of the hardest to resolve for me, probably because it's very deeply set.

Last night, I went to hang out with some friends.  As soon as I showed up, they said 'hi', but then went back to talking with each other.  I felt that same story come up. 'They don't care.  They've never cared.  You're just another person to them'.  I tried to compensate by smiling and making jokes.  On the way home, I felt lonely.  As I was driving, I was looking at the world around me, admiring Heavenly Father's handiwork.  A thought came to me: yes, this is a manifestation of His love.  But, it's a manifestation of His love to everyone.  It's a blanket statement.  It's sent out generally to everyone.  I do acknowledge there have been a few times when I have seen tender mercies in my life, when I have felt that I was specifically cared for.  Somehow...I'm just not feeling it right now.

This morning, it finally hit me.  The same idea 'You don't care' shows up in my relationship with my Heavenly Father.  When I pray, I tell myself that I'm just another warm body to Him.  No wonder the heaven's have felt so closed.  No wonder I feel like I've slipped through the cracks and have fallen of His radar.  I keep telling myself the same lie.

The same lie that has been lodged deep in my psyche.

I've even tried telling myself positive stories.  Sure, they help for awhile, but the same old lie creeps up and slowly strangles my attempts at changing how I think.  The poison is set deep.

Now I sit here, feeling empty, with the beginnings of tears in my eyes.  I don't even know if I can see the depth of this wound that was dealt to me.  I feel angry that I've continued to tell myself the same lie.  I'm angry that I made the choice to feel ashamed and to detach while I was young.  I feel like I've screwed up my life by making the choices I did.  "It's all my fault".  I chose to react the way I did.  I chose to detach.  It's my choice, I have to live with the consequences.

Perhaps I'm not heeding the saying that I came up with while talking with a friend a few weeks ago.  The saying is 'You're supposed to carry your cross, not nail yourself to it!'  I need to find a way to carry the burden this lie has created without it paralyzing me.  And ultimately, I need to find out how to heal it and how to surrender it.  There is a way.  I believe that there is healing through Christ's Atonement.  There is strength there, and there is grace.  There is forgiveness and love.  My heart feels too afraid to trust.  It's been hurt so many times before. I keep hurting it by feeding it the same lie, and yet I keep sheltering it from any outside attempt to heal it.

Sounds like madness to me.

Music That Speaks To Me - Everybody's Fool

Perfection.  Perfection is such a lovely, perfect word.  Perfect people are happy.  Perfect people have no flaws.  Perfect people are always smiling.  There's nothing wrong with them.

If I've learned anything in my time here on this earth, there's no such thing as a perfect person.  If I think someone's perfect, I'm obviously closing my eyes to the flaws they may have.  Many times, I've felt like other people see me as a 'perfect' person.  I feel put up on a pedestal.  Sometimes I've put myself on that pedestal.  I've put on that perfect veneer.  I've tried to pretend to be a 'normal', happy, 'perfect' person.

Today's song speaks just to that.  Disclaimer: there is some language in the song.

Lyrics:

perfect by nature
icons of self-indulgence
just what we all need
more lies about a world that

never was and never will be
have you no shame? Don't you see me?
you know you've got everybody fooled

look here she comes now
bow down and stare in wonder
oh how we love you
no flaws when you're pretending
but now i know she

never was and never will be
you don't know how you've betrayed me
and somehow you've got everybody fooled

without the mask where will you hide?
can't find yourself lost in your lie

i know the truth now
i know who you are
and i don't love you anymore

it never was and never will be
you don't know how you've betrayed me
and somehow you've got everybody fooled

it never was and never will be
you're not real and you can't save me
somehow now you're everybody's fool
[Taken from http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/evanescence/everybodysfool.html]

The video takes a big stab at advertisement.  I've always seen advertisements as trying to present some kind of 'perfect' image to consumers.  If you drink this product, you'll be perfect, beatiful, wonderful, loved, etc etc etc.

What a pack of lies.  I've found great amusement when I manage to shake off the spell that advertisements put on me, and really see through the veneer that they've put on things.  There's something enjoyable at ignoring the perfect image that they try to put up.

As for myself, I've been the person who's tried to be 'perfect'.  I've put on many masks in my life.  The most destructive mask I've worn was the 'I'm a perfect person!' mask.  As part of this mask, I have to smile and be happy all the time.  Nothing is ever wrong in my life.  I don't have same gender attraction.  I feel the spirit all the time.  I don't do anything wrong.  I've got 'no flaws when [I'm] pretending'.  Really, I hide my shortcomings.  I hide my struggles.  I'm living a life.  In many ways, I betray myself when I put on this mask.  When I try to live a life that 'never was or never will be', at least in this mortal life.  When I wear the mask of perfection, I'm not loving myself.  After all, how could I be loving a lie?  How could someone else love me, when all they're loving is the mask?

About two and half years ago, reality started to sink in.  I started to realize that I really needed help.  I got a therapist that would actually help me get through my issues.  I went to my first support group.  I started to destroy that mask, although it is a difficult one to destroy.  After all, I've lived for 26 years.  I could probably say that a good majority of that time was spent hiding behind the mask, evading the truth about the world and about myself.  I've spent a long time hiding the truth.

What are some things that hide behind the mask?  Fear.  Pain.  Deep wounding.  Endless cycles of lies that I've told myself.  Sadness.  Anger.  The real me hides behind the mask.  One of my deep fears is that I will not overcome same gender attraction in this life.  I fear that I will have to deal with it until the day that I die.  Even though I've done work, and tried to move past and heal issues, it still lingers.  Many days I see it as a curse.  I hide that fact from everyone around me, even myself.  Some days, I've really got 'everybody fooled' even myself, and thus I am 'everybody's fool'.

The best way to combat any lie is with truth.  To borrow from Jesus, who stated "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth will set you free" John 8:32.  As I've come to know and accept the truth about me, the world, the people around me, Heavenly Father, his gospel, the Atonement, I've found freedom.  Sometimes accepting that truth has been a painful process.  Ultimately, it's healed me and made me free from the lies, free from being everybody's fool.  Or perhaps more accurately, free from being a puppet of the adversary of all that is true, good, and holy.

This had been a difficult post for me.  I hope that I, as well as all of you, can learn to cast of the masks that we wear.  I hope that we together can learn to be more authentic.  I hope we can embrace the truth.  I believe that the truth is the only thing that can heal us and the world around us.

Truth: I am a valued son of Heavenly Father.  Truth: He gave His only perfect Son's life so that I could become perfect as well.  Truth: I am not perfect.  Truth: I have many challenges in life, and they're all meant to lead me toward perfection, and back into the loving embrace of Heavenly Father.

Those are some of the truths that I am learning to embrace.

For more reading, you can read Dan's post from Single Dad Laughing on perfection.  Click here: The disease called perfection.  Enjoy!

Depression - 16Dec2011

Last night and this morning really haven't been good to me.  I've been struggling with the loneliness and depression.  I'm starting to realize that I have more struggles in life than just same gender attraction.  There's the anxiety, the loneliness, the defensive detachment from other people, depression, and an inability to trust others and trust Heavenly Father.

Last night was an OK night.  I went and spent some time with the guys that I knew from the fraternity.  I remember feeling bored most of the night.  As I drove home, I felt kind of empty and numb.  I ate all of the chocolate chip cookies one of the guys had given me.  It made my stomach feel kind of upset.  I remember that I set my computer down and briefly considered setting up my computer and turning it on.  I knew if I did that, that I would start searching for triggering images, and possibly get mixed up in pornography.  Instead, I finished getting ready for bed.

I found myself thinking about how lonely I felt.  I started to go through the people I knew.  I was realizing that not any one person was going to be able to help fulfill my need for friendship.  One person was not going to fit all of the wants I had for friendship.  I starting putting people into categories.  There's one man that I trust for guidance and advice, but we don't really do anything together.  There's another man with whom I share a number of interests, but he is a very busy person.  There's another man like that who I even was close to, but I ended up becoming codependent.  There's other men that I try to reach out too, but I always feel like I'm the one making all the effort in the friendship.  There's other men that try to reach out with me, but I don't feel like I want to reach back.

I basically started to throw a pity party for myself.  I found myself praying, asking, wondering if Jesus and Heavenly Father would be my only friends, the only ones that could really love me, and really help me.  Even after asking and reaching toward Him, I still felt like His love along wouldn't be enough.  I thought that even with Him, I would still be longing for human interaction.  While laying feeling lonely, thoughts of temptation entered my mind.  I eventually succumbed to the idea of 'Oh, I'll feel good for a few moments now'.

This morning, it was a struggle to get out of bed.  I was feeling empty.  I was feeling guilty and ashamed.  I was still feeling lonely.  When I finally got into the shower, I spent a few minutes curled up in a ball under the hot water, not wanting to move and face the day.  I got out of the shower, sat on the floor and draped my towel around my shoulder and curled up in a ball again.  I didn't want to go anywhere, I just wanted to sit there.  Finally, I was able to get up, get dressed, and get in the car.  I was feeling sad.

Driving to work, I was able to feel some emotion: anger, directed at the other drivers.  I got really angry right before I got to work.  I remember sitting in my car, not wanting to get out.  I didn't like the fact I'd gotten so angry at the other driver.  I didn't want the anger.  I sat in the car until the air started to cool.  I briefly considered the idea of sitting there until my body went cold.  I did eventually get out of the car and get into work.  I sat at the computer, and when it was on, I was able to forget about the depression.  When I got up to go to the bathroom, the feeling of sadness and loneliness came back.  I guess the computer is just a distraction for me.

Do I have depression?  I'm scared that I am.  Do I deal with loneliness?  I'm pretty sure I do.  I was remembered a movie we watched in elementary school on the way to work.  It was about a kid that no one seemed to like, no one would interact with.  He would go to school and had no friends there.  He would go home, and his parents wouldn't talk to him.  Eventually, he walked off the school bus one day and just fell down and died.  The title of the movie was 'Cypher'.  Cypher meaning zero.  The person was a zero everyone's eyes.  I realized that I had made some progress.  I do feel like I have some impact on the world. When the loneliness and depression sets in, I start to feel like a Cypher.  I start to feel like a ghost in my life, drifting past that no one can see or if they can see me, they don't care to interact with me.

Depression scares me, especially because that's when the thoughts of wanting to die enter into my life.  I honestly think I'm far too much of a coward to end my own life.  Yet, if the pain and the loneliness get to much, I may be driven to something like that.  The other thing that comes with depression is not wanting to do anything.  The idea of maintaining this blog sometimes feels like it's too much.  I find myself wanting more feedback.  I find myself wanting more people to interact with.  I find myself searching for people that are willing to share of themselves as well.  Sure, I've had many people tell me they've been reading my blog.  Some express that they relate to it.  It seems to end there.  No one wants to further into it and I'm too passive to want to investigate further.

Sometimes I wish some of the people who don't know who I am behind my alias would talk to me about the blog.  They're the people I'm really trying to reach.  I can see it as a form of madness.  I want to connect to those people, but I'm not actively reaching out to them.  I want them to read these words and know that it's me that's writing them, but I hide behind an alias.  I want to find connections and friendships where I can be open and vulnerable with another person, and that other person be the same way back, but I'm too afraid to take the first step to be vulnerable.  I'm just so tired of trying.  I'm so tired of reaching and not feeling like the others are reaching back.

Sometimes I think there's something about me that makes it so other people don't want to interact with me.  Am I too much for them?  Am I too draining?  Do I ask for too much?  Do I expect too much?  I went to a fireside this Sunday.  The first few groups of people I walked up to disbanded a few moments after I got there.  Only in one case did a person stay to talk with me.  Later on that did change, but for awhile I started to wonder if there was something wrong with me.  After my support meeting, it seemed only a small handful of the men really wanted to talk with me.  Most other conversations ran dry relatively quickly.

Perhaps I am crazy.  I do have many friends.  Part of me looks at me with condemnation and says 'Should you be grateful for what you have?  Why isn't it enough?  Why can't the friendships you have be enough?  Why isn't God's love and grace enough for you?'  Another part considers the people I have said I don't want to be friends with and says 'What do you expect?  These men have tried to be your friend, and you haven't let them.  You've turned them down.  You've stopped talking to them.  You haven't tried.  How can you expect anyone to do the same?'  Yet another voice speaks up and says 'If they really knew you, they'd run away in fear.'  Yet another says 'It's not worth it to interact with other people.  You'll either give in to your attractions or be driven mad by them.  You'll always live in jealousy and envy of the friendships you see in other people.  You'll never have it.  You'll always be alone.  You'll always be an island.  Might as well cut your ties with everyone and not expect them to come looking for you.'  I had the idea to stop going to church, to stop going to the support group.  A voice came saying 'Oh, it doesn't really help you.  When you go, you just find yourself longing to connect to the other men there, but it never works when you try.  It will never work when you try.  Nothing you do can change things'.  Then comes up one of the scariest voices 'You should just end it.  It'd be simple.  Then you would really know who cared about you.  They would come and cry for you at your funeral.'  The voice even took a scarier turn this morning 'Heavenly Father is the only one that loves you.  Why don't you just end this life so that you can be with Him?  He's the only one that loves you.'

It is scary.  It really is scary.  I keep praying for the strength to get me through.  Heavenly Father is the one person that can help pull me through it.  It hurts though.  The loneliness and isolation hurt.  I sit here with tears of sadness welling up in my eyes, and pain in my heart.  I'm afraid this pain and sadness will lead me to anger and defensiveness.  That will only drive those trying to get close to me even further away.

Oh well.  It's another day.  It's another chance to try.  I feel pessimistic about it.

The Curse Of Oblivion

I took the title of this blog post from a new Magic the Gathering card.  "The Curse of Oblivion" slowly eats away at a player's discard pile, removing cards from it two at a time unless there aren't any there to remove.  The discard pile represents magics that have been used, or creatures that have been killed.  In some ways, it is a memory of things that have gone before.  Sometimes I wonder if I've inflicted a similar "curse" on me, or if I've somehow have something like that.  I'll have to explain why.

Today in church, I sat a seat away from a man who held his son on his lap.  I typically get pretty envious of little boys who get to sit on their dad's laps.  It tends to get more pronounced if I happen to have an attraction toward the father.  In this case, it wasn't much of a deal.  The dad let him sit on his lap, stand on his lap, or sometimes he just held his son to his chest.  He rubbed his son's back; he played with his son's hands.  In short, he was showing a lot of physical affection toward his son.  I was pretty envious, but I kept a nice, fake smile on my face so that the father wouldn't know what was going on.  I guess I was happy to see that some little boys are getting that from their dads.

Did I get something like that from my dad?  Honestly, I have a real hard time remembering.  I do remember my dad helping me school projects.  I remember my dad hugging me a few times.  I'm sure he did kiss us good night when we were younger.  Other than that, I can't remember.  I honestly have a very hard time remembering things from my childhood.  I have a few memories from early childhood, sometime around 3-5 years old.  Other than that, it's pretty blank.  I'm sure, at least from being a teenager, that I started to suppress a lot of memories.  Being a teenager was a very pleasant time for me.  I wonder if I somehow damaged my memory, because I struggle to remember things that happened on the previous week.

The reason memory came up, is that a man recently shared part of his story with me, about his life growing up, his relationship with his parents, and his struggles with same gender attraction.  When it came time to share my story, I hesitated.  I'm not even sure if I have all the facts straight.  I could speak with some degree of clarity about my time as a teenager.  Before that, I'm not entirely sure.  My reason for hesistation is a lot more than just not being able to remember.  It's a fear that I have my facts wrong.  I'm afraid that I'd cast my parents in a bad light.  I honestly don't remember having a close relationship with either of my parents.  I don't know if that's simply a by product from bad memory, or if it was something that really actually happened.

I wish I could remember.  I wish I could remember so that I could know what actually happened.  Was my father affectionate at all?  Did he hold me on my lap?  I want to remember, so that I know the truth.  The truth is what will ultimately help me heal.

Today, our Sunday school lesson was on the Final Judgment.  It spoke on how our thoughts, words, and actions would come to condemn us.  It also spoke on how I would be a record of my own life.  It got me to thinking that I may have forgotten some very important events in my life.  I may have forgotten something, and that could be influencing my relationship with my parents.

On the other hand, not having early childhood memories makes me sort of un-anchored.  It's disheartening to only have a void where I think memory should be.  Sometimes it makes me feel listless, and like I don't have a purpose.  It almost makes me feel like I'm restarting my life each and every day, with no past to work with.

White Knuckling It 6Dec2011

It's been about 4 months or so since I last had a problem looking at pornography.  By pornography, I mean something that nearly any (sane) person would call pornographic.  I haven't had a problem with masturbation for over two weeks.

I've been tempted many times to give in to both evils.  Sometimes I started to entertain the ideas.  I've found myself looking at pictures that aren't healthy for me in this state.  Just last weekend, I started watching some videos that weren't good for me either.  I was flirting with the line.  I was putting myself into fire.  Thankfully, a friend messaged me on Facebook.  I felt a sense of guilt and shame at having been watching something like that.  I closed the browser tab and talked with him a bit.

This morning, the temptation came again to give in.  I paused for a moment, made sure I was looking at what was going on around me, and tried to tap into what I was feeling.  Sadness, depression and a feeling of warmth inside.  Heavenly Father does know what's going on with me.  He knows what my needs are. When I'm not taking care of my needs or letting Heavenly Father take care of what needs I can't take care of on my own, I'm far more vulnerable to being tempted to 'take care' of my needs with something counterfeit.  In fact, many times when I've been tempted I've thought "Yeah, that will feel good for a moment, but I'll be even worse afterward".

One need that I've been struggling to meet is getting adequate sleep.  I feel tired at night until the moment my head hits the pillow.  I then get a feeling of longing.  I want someone to snuggle up to.  I want to be held by someone until I fall asleep.  I find my mind going into fantasy and the temptation to masturbate grows.  For instance, last night I had to open my eyes many times to get a good dose of reality.  I had to remind myself that I was along in the room.  I had to tap back into my feelings of exhaustion.  After some struggle, I was able to fall asleep.  Lack of sleep really doesn't help with my overall mood.

Another contributing factor is the fact of physical pain.  I've been having some strange and particularly annoying headaches lately, accompanied by pain in my shoulders and neck.  I went and got a massage last Saturday, but that didn't seem to help much.  The whole area either feels tight, or burns.  The feelings of pain come and go.  I'm sure this may be from stress related to my job and trying to figure out life problems.

Another need I feel is lacking is the need to connect with other men.  This need seems to be plastered all over my thoughts and actions.  My primary way of feeling connected to another person is through touch.  I have all sorts of fear, beliefs, and stories around touch that make things difficult.  Sometimes I feel like I'm having to 'sneak in' getting touch.  Sometimes it feels like it's something that can only be done in 'secret'.  On particularly difficult days, I find myself believing that wanting to be touched or wanting to touch another man in any way is 'bad'.

On a related note, yesterday I had to carpool with some men from my work.  Three of us had to squeeze into the back seat.  Both of the other men were bigger than, one by quite a bit.  Needless to say, it was a bit uncomfortable.  The man on my left finally put his arm around the seat behind me.  The man on the right kept moving himself away as far as possible to 'give me space'.  Honestly, I would have been totally happy with him putting his arm around me.  I really wanted him to.  Yet, how could I ask something like that?  I honestly was afraid of what the man would think of me?  Was it 'bad' that I wanted this guys arm around me?  Was it bad that I liked how it did feel to sit right next to him and the other man?

I feel like I'm getting desperate to figure out how to handle this need.  On the way out of a clothing store, I had a strange urge to walk up to one of the male mannequins and starting rubbing its chest.  I thought it was a little amusing at the time.  Now it feels shameful and disgusting.  It's a similar urge that I get toward other men.

I feel like I'm trying to white knuckle my way through this.  There must be a way to get that need for touch met, without it becoming something sexual or romantic.  There must be a way to give and receive affection with another man without violating any sort of gospel principles.  I'm just having a hard time seeing it right now.  I pray that God will help me find the answers soon.  I pray I'll find the answers.

Music That Speaks To My Grief - You Were Meant For Me

Today's song is another of the three songs that helped me process through my feelings after I put my cat Taz down (for the first one click here).

Today's song is "You Were Meant For Me" by Jewel:

Lyrics:
I hear the clock, it's six a.m.
I feel so far from where I've been
I got my eggs I got my pancakes too
I got my maple syrup, everything but you.
I break the yolks, make a smiley face
I kinda like it in my brand new place
I wipe the spots off the mirror
Don't leave the keys in the door
Never put wet towels on the floor anymore' cause

[Chorus:]
Dreams last so long
even after you're gone
I know you love me
And soon you will see
You were meant for me
And I was meant for you.

I called my momma, she was out for a walk
Consoled a cup of coffee but it didn't wanna talk
So I picked up a paper, it was more bad news
More hearts being broken or people being used
Put on my coat in the pouring rain
I saw a movie it just wasn't the same
'Cause it was happy or I was sad
It made me miss you oh so bad 'cause

[Chorus]

I go about my business, I'm doing fine
Besides what would I say if I had you on the line
Same old story, not much to say
Hearts are broken, everyday.
I brush my teeth and put the cap back on
I know you hate it when I leave the light on
I pick a book up. Turn the sheets down.
And then I take a deep breath and a good look around
Put on my pjs and hop into bed
I'm half alive but I feel mostly dead
I try and tell myself it'll be all right
I just shouldn't think anymore tonight 'cause

[Chorus]

Yeah... You were meant for me and I was meant for you.
[From: http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/jewel/youweremeantforme.html]

Listening to this song still brings tears to my eyes.  It reminds me of all the hopes, dreams, and expectations I've had in life that just haven't happened.  It speaks to me on the pain of loss, and also of the pain of holding on to things that are lost.

Honestly, I never expected our cat Taz to go the way he did.  I also thought that he would live another few years at least.  Honestly, I dreamed that he would never go away, that he would always be there.  Finally, he started to have bladder problems more and more frequently, and ultimately we decided that he should be put down.  To speak more accurate, I feel like I was the one that decided that we should put him down.  Sometimes when I think about it, I wonder if it was the right choice.  Sometimes I feel like I chose to kill him, a thought that feels me with grief and shame.

The time after Taz was put down was difficult.  I kept expecting him to be in one of his usual places, or for him to show up meowing, demanding that he be given more food.  This song reminds me of that time.  I would go about my regular life, smiling, and "doing fine" while really inside I was grieving the loss of a beloved pet.  Things just didn't feel the same for a long time afterward.  Dreams and memories really do last a long time.

On a related note, I've found that I often have dreams or fantasies about what friendships will be like in the future.  Sometimes I set up some really high expectations.  Many times those hopes, dreams, and expectations aren't met.  When I'm reminded of those dreams and hopes.  I get filled with feelings of loss, loneliness, and grief.

One example of this is with a guy I grew up with.  He befriended me when we first moved to Utah.  He was my best friend for many years.  It felt like we did so much together.  Time passes.  We both went on missions and to college in other states.  It felt like we saw each other less and less.  I felt like we had grown apart.

I decided that I needed to tell him about the fact I experienced same gender attraction.  I honestly hoped that he would understand and be loving and supportive.  I hoped our friendship would become something much closer.  Instead, all I remember from that conversation is him saying that he knew I wouldn't "do something like that with him".  It was disappointing to say the least.

Recently, I've done some work around it, grieving and surrendering the way things used to be.  Perhaps our friendship won't turn out how I wanted.  The dream I had may not come true.  By surrendering the dream, I can make space in my life for other men.  By letting go of the old friendship, I make space for the new ones.  I still hold on to the golden memories of the time that we spent together and the jokes that we shared.

Time can heal many wounds.  Time will ease the pain of loss.

Dreams last so long.

Dissonance Or Why Going To Church Is Hard 30Oct2011

Today was Stake Conference.  I found myself feeling like I didn't want to go to church.  I felt hesistation, anger, resistance inside of me.  Sometimes I feel that going to church doesn't help my problems.  Instead, I feel like it makes things more intense.

I entered the church, and saw a picture of the Savior when he was young, teaching in the temple.  Instead of feeling the warmth of the Spirit, instead I felt aloof, callous, hardened against it.  I felt anger and bitterness inside of me.  I felt anger that I felt so much bitterness instead of peace.

I got into the main meeting room and sat down in the back.  I was feeling many different negative emotions.  Some days at church are hard.  Today felt like one of the harder ones.  My head was full of ideas about acting out, how it would feel, or the desire to look at pornography.  Feeling quite disgusted with myself, I pulled out my phone and started to text a friend of mine.  Something to try to sort out what was going on.

Finally, the thoughts of acting out left, but I still wasn't feeling very peaceful.  The speaker was talking about how, as members of the church, we need to reach out to other members of the church.  We need to befriend them.  All I could think about is how lonely I feel, especially at church.  The times I have felt to reach out, I generally don't feel like I get much of a response.  With few exceptions, I judge that the other person isn't interested in really getting to know me.  When I'm not reaching out to try to make friends, I'm often feeling intimated or afraid of the other people around me.  I feel dissonant, out of sync with them and with the church in general.  I let the fear of "If you really knew me, you wouldn't love me" rule my mind and my heart.  The fear of rejection is one thing that gets in the way of me trying to connect with the members of the church.  The other is pain from perceived rejection.

As the person continued to speak, I continued to feel the pangs of loneliness, and a deep feeling grief.  It was strong enough, that I started to feel physical pain.  I felt that pain in my chest, and even felt it in my hands.  I looked around, and could see so many signs of love.  There were many families in attendance.  I watched them, and seeing them show their love for one another made me feel even sadder and more hurt.

Part of that pain comes from not feeling very connected with my family.  Growing up, I grew more and more withdrawn emotionally from my parents and to some extent, my siblings.  When I see a parent showing love for their child, taking interest in them, it reminds me of that hole I have inside of me.  I've tried working around the issues that I have with my parents, but oddly, I still feel disconnected from them whenever I'm with them.  I know they love me, but for whatever reason, I just can't make that emotional connection with them.

Anyways, I sat there, watching families show their love for each other.  I found myself watching the father's the most.  I realize that's because it was the connection with my dad that I've probably missed the most.  I saw a father picking up his two girls and sitting them on his lap.  I saw another father leaning down to listen to his little girl.  I saw that same father holder her in his lap.  I could see another father rubbing and scratching his sons back.  I saw another father chase down his little boy and pick him up.  I saw a husband rubbing his wife's shoulders.  All of these things were beuatiful, but they were also painful to watch.  Tears escaped my eyes many times.  I found myself hoping deep inside that someone who was listening to that talk would see me, notice my sadness, and come to befriend me.  After all, I just want to be loved and accepted.  All I seemed to feel was loneliness.  I wanted to go, run away, go sob in the bathroom by myself, go play a video game to take my mind off the pain, go numb myself with something else; I wanted to do anything but sit there in the pain and acknowledge it was there.

Finally, that talk was over.  The feelings of loneliness gradually faded and were replaced with emptiness.  Eventually, stake conference was over.  I helped put away changes and picked up programs.  I took time to talk to another man, smile at others.  The one man I talked to briefly asked me one of my 'dreaded questions': "How's your family doing?"  I said something like "I think they're alright, I haven't seen them in awhile."  He actually waved goodbye to me.  I don't know why that touched me so much.  It struck me as unusual when other men I knew from my ward smiled at me.  One even waved to me as I drove past him on my way home.

Inside, I feel a hope that maybe I can make some friends in the ward.  There is also the fear inside that some of what happened today was a "special" thing, and that it won't happen again.  Although, what I really want is for it to be a constant.  I want to be connected to my elder's quorum.  I want to feel like I have friends among the men in my ward.  I really just want to be loved and accepted.  After all, isn't that what every person craves?

Music That Speaks To My Grief - Who Knew?

This is my first "Music That Speaks" post. I'm not entirely sure of the format I want to pursue for this. I believe I'll share a link to a YouTube video of the music, if possible, as well as place a copy of the lyrics somewhere in the post.

Today's music is "Who Knew" by P!nk. I like this song. It speaks to the grief that is inside of me. It is one of the three songs that helped me grieve when our last cat, Taz, died. Honestly, I was quite attached to the little guy. He had pretty orange and white fur that smelled of maple syrup. He walked on three legs part of the time, and four at other times. He had a limp. We don't know exactly when he got it, but our theory is that is from a time that my dad threw him out the front door. We loved him, limp and all.

Here's the song:

And here are the lyrics:

You took my hand, you showed me how
You promised me you'd be around
Uh huh, that's right

I took your words and I believed
In everything you said to me
Yeah huh, that's right

If someone said three years from now
You'd be long gone
I'd stand up and punch them out
Cause they're all wrong

I know better
Cause you said forever
And ever, who knew?

Remember when we were such fools
And so convinced and just too cool
Oh no, no no

I wish I could touch you again
I wish I could still call you a friend
I'd give anything

When someone said count your blessings now
For they're long gone
I guess I just didn't know how
I was all wrong

But they knew better
Still you said forever and ever
Who knew? Yeah yeah

I'll keep you locked in my head
Until we meet again
Until we, until we meet again
And I won't forget you my friend
What happened?

If someone said three years from now
You'd be long gone
I'd stand up and punch them out
Cause they're all wrong

And that last kiss I'll cherish
Until we meet again
And time makes it harder
I wish I could remember

But I keep your memory
You visit me in my sleep
My darling, who knew?

My darling
My darling, who knew?
My darling I miss you
My darling, who knew?

Who knew?
[From: http://www.elyrics.net/read/p/pink-lyrics/who-knew-lyrics.html]

I acknowledge the fact that the song is romantic. It speaks to my grief at missing someone. It speaks to the holes that people (or cats) leave behind when they leave. It helps me realize that is is OK to miss someone. It is OK for me to miss seeing Taz, and miss the way he felt/smelt/walked/etc. It's OK for me to miss and grieve over friendships that, in my judgement, 'didn't work out'.

The song applies also to my grief that I have around friends that I once knew. There are many men who have entered my life, and blessed me with their presence. Sometimes I was too afraid to be myself with them. Sometimes I was too afraid to share who I really was or how I felt. Sometimes I simply enjoyed being around them. Generally, I felt attracted to these men.

Then, for whatever reason, they left. Maybe it took months, maybe it was years, in one case, it was only a matter of hours before I felt like the person had left me. Sometimes it was for a girlfriend or marriage; sometimes he or I moved out of state; sometimes we just drifted apart.

The reason or situation ultimately doesn't matter. At one point, I was with them, and I felt fulfilled and happy. And then they left. In some cases, I felt like the person would never leave. Secretly, I hoped in my heart that Taz would never die, or that it would be the next year that he would die. Secretly, I hoped that my friendship with whomever it was would stay forever the same. If someone would have told me things would change, I probably would get angry. I may even want to punch them out.

Yet things change. Friendships fade. People move away. People move on to other things. Cats die. Who knew?