The current scenario is my marriage. I am a gay Mormon married man. My wife is, for lack of a better term, “normal”. (Opposite-sex-attracted is a weird term.) We married with complete transparency.
I started blogging so that I could tout the blessings of such a marriage. Both of us felt that we had received inspiration in getting married to each other.
Did I go into the marriage thinking that I would be transformed? I will admit that, Yes. I didn’t expect it to be immediate, but I did expect something at sometime. I hoped it would be sooner rather than later.
Did my wife go into the marriage thinking that I would be transformed? I think she did, though she doesn’t say it. I do know that she thought – to a degree – that I would change myself.
Was the implication made by anyone that I would somehow, sometime have the gay taken away? Or did we infer that on our own.
We inferred.
I inferred.
It was always in my mind that if I obeyed, the Lord would take this particular cup from me/us. However, there was no established precedent other than, say, Abraham and his son. My ego is quite large. Huge in fact. But even in all my greatness I couldn’t possibly expect that particular brand of divine intervention.
No one is sending an angel to point a sword at me, whistle a Sondheim tune and change me straight.
Frankly, between us MOHOs and spouses of MOHOs, I will say that say that I do believe Heavenly Father could intervene in such a fashion were He to choose that method. However, I think he expects us to do our share first. My share is going to be the day to day obedience/repentance/forgiveness that happens to those who are doing their best to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ and the word of his prophets.
Bottom line -- will my marriage work? I don’t know. I am doing my best to make sure that it does. But my wife could decide that it is just too hard, or that she would rather be with someone who had a more butch libido. I can be the best husband that I can be, and yet, there will always be the sex issue. I have committed to not have sex outside of my marriage, but sex within ain’t "all that" for her. Can I ask her to be celibate? I can’t answer that.
Am I enough for my wife if I don’t have a sex life to offer? I don’t know that either. Yet I felt strongly that I should marry this woman, and she felt inspired to marry me.
· Perhaps there is something for us both to learn that could not be learned any other way.
· Perhaps I need to learn obedience at any cost.
· Perhaps the next life will offer us something we can’t even imagine that will make today's pain worth it- a time when our eyes will be opened and there will be an ah-ha moment.
· Perhaps there is no big moment of change and I will need to be content with having obeyed.
Regardless of the end result, I know that following through with the prompting of the spirit is always the right thing to do – even with the knowledge that I may not ever in this life know the reason why.
One of the hard parts of getting older is that we slow down -- and it's particularly noticeable in that libido area. I'm a little different from you in that while I'm also married to a "normal" woman, (actually, I think "extraordinary" fits better) I do not particularly want my orientation to change. I prefer my preference for males. I have been working with that attraction for my whole life, and I don't want to have to re-learn how to deal with my attractions. Every married man finds himself attracted to someone other than his spouse -- it's just that for me it's always guys. I will admit that I have thought in the past that it would be nice if the Lord "healed" me. But I've changed my tune a bit.
ReplyDeleteAnd I found this list, written for heterosexual couples that seems really relevant to me. I notice that if many of these problems exist in a so-called mixed orientation marriage, they are usually blamed on the orientation mismatch rather than seen as a normal part of marriage. http://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-14909/10-things-nobody-tells-you-about-being-married.html
It sounds like you both went into this marriage hoping you would change. That was naive but that is done now. I don't think it is fair to find an excuse for your lack of sex life - well, straight people have that same problem (whether they do or do not is not relevant as that is pretty clearly an excuse to enable yourself to feel less guilty about not sexually satisfying your wife). If you love your wife as you say you do, then I would give her the chance to be married to someone that she doesn't have to consider being celibate with. I would also suggest that your libido hasn't slowed down - surely if you were with a man it would be just fine? (after the terror/shame, etc, is dealt with. I realize i am coming across strongly and therefore what I am saying is easy to ignore. Hopefully you can not use that as an excuse to ignore what I am saying - your wife deserves, at the very least, a sexually satisfying relationship. She should not have to consider celibacy or to have to constantly rationalize how sex is not important in a marriage. Or to settle for being with someone who does not want to be with her. You at least have a small outlet in this blog, where is her outlet? Imagine if you did the ultimate sacrificial thing risking your own Celestial Kingdom entry - and set her free? imagine that.
ReplyDeleteHow arrogant of you, or at very least sexist of you, to assume that my wife needs anyone's permission to make changes in her life. She is a big girl. If she wanted an active sex life in exchange for what she has she would have no problem obtaining it.
ReplyDeleteShe obviously does not need permission - I never wrote that. If she believes that her role in life is to get you into the Celestial Kingdom, to put it bluntly, then it would be very very hard for her to leave. It has nothing at all to do with permission from you or anyone. And if she is in love with you, it is harder still. I'm not sure how a woman who believes that it is her role to help get her gay husband into the Celestial Kingdom can leave. That is where you come in - your decision really. So no, not your permission at all. Rather, it would be your kindness and selflessness in this life.
ReplyDeleteThe nature of sacrifice is that one gives up something of value for something of greater value. Both of us have lives that make marriage, for us, the brightest and best choice. You seem to be suffering from an old Mormon school of marriage. Marriage today is strong people making strong decisions to live better lives than they could have lived alone. I stand by that. And so does my wife.
ReplyDeleteEither sex is sacred and so sacred that one waits for marriage or it is not and can be cast aside. Not sure one can have it both ways. I still maintain that if you loved your wife as much as I imagine you do, you would lift the burden from her that she must stay with you because God calls her to get you into the Celestial Kingdom. You get the CK, she gets a lifetime of being with someone who has to force himself to feel sexual toward her and to tell herself that that is enough because if it is not, she is affecting your eternal future. I understand the nature of sacrifice - and I also understand the concept of loving someone enough to let them go. I don't see that here.
ReplyDeleteRespectfully, ...blaa blaa blaa. You head is way to big and you assume far too much. Have you ever tried acting?
ReplyDeleteWell, yeah, you can absolutely dismiss my points that way. I would expect that. And you are right - I am assuming that your wife may want a sexually fulfilling relationship which you write that you can't provide. She may be completely happy in a celibate relationship or in a relationship where her partner finds it difficult to be sexual with her. She might be fine with that. i don't know for sure because you don't say, although you allude to it. And I don't think I am wrong about the Celestial Kingdom - but you did say that sacrificing for now to get something of great value later. Is that not the Celestial Kingdom? Isn't this about fulfilling God's eternal plan for the family? I agree i come across strongly, absolutely. But that doesn't negate what I say or my questions.
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