I am married, a father and I am gay. I give you my story

Email sent to us by Bruno in response to the published email from Eros

Dear Eros, I'm writing to you because your email struck me. I have no advice to give you; I want to tell you my story, the (true) story of a journey, like all journeys with its joys and sorrows.
I am almost 60 years old and have been married for 31; I have three children and I'm gay. I have always known that I am homosexual: I have known it at least since I was 5 years old, although obviously in a confused way then, but gradually becoming clearer...

I abhorred this thing, I tried to "cure", I NEVER had homosexual experiences in my youth (although, in hindsight, I had some wonderful and desired opportunities... which I simply... refused to see!).

Around the age of 25 I made a "deal" with God: "You make me work with women too - then I'll take care of keeping me at bay!". He kept his part of the bargain: I met a woman with whom I got along and with whom there was understanding and affection... Marriage and children arrived.
For a long time I tried (I tried seriously!) to keep my part. But I hadn't taken into account my fragility and two very powerful forces: homosexual attraction on the one hand, love on the other.

Like you, I haven't cheated on my wife (apart from pornography which helped me "keep me at bay") but as the years have gone by it has been increasingly difficult for me to resist.
By frequenting religious environments (I am Catholic) I had the opportunity to speak at length with priests whom I respected and I increasingly realized how my fragility was reflected in an almost inevitable distancing from the center of my life and from God himself.
My life was becoming more and more unbearable to me and I was moving away from a God who I thought of as a judge and an oppressor, while he was filling me with gifts I didn't see. Thoughts of death came to me too to resolve a situation that I now felt unbearable...

Until a very smart priest (perhaps not by chance, also a graduate in psychology) opened my eyes during a long and painful confession: I couldn't, I shouldn't have cut such a fundamental part away from me: the "eye to be gouged out and thrown away ” (Mt 18.9) perhaps it wasn't homosexuality, but my pride, my desire to build a false existence different from the one that was consistent with who I was, with who I am...

I was 46 years old, I had been married for 14. I had never cheated on my wife, I didn't want to do it now... With a lot of suffering I opened my heart to her, I explained to her who I was and my path...
It was hard, very hard: sleepless nights, crying, conversations with priests and psychologists... But I felt that there was no alternative: I no longer wanted to pretend... Then... there were the small children, the difficulty of managing a business common….

We decided to try to live like brother and sister, while I would try to get to know this world that I felt was similar to me but which I actually didn't know (at the time the Internet was also much less widespread and rich than it is now).
I don't know if she knew that I also had physical experiences in that period (officially she didn't know, but being very intelligent I think she imagined it).

But above all I fell in love! And then I understood the enormous mistake I had made: I had never been in love with my wife (in this my situation is very different from yours) and I had deprived myself and her of this wealth.

One (another) priest told me “as long as you make it, as long as you make it, stay like this”.

So I accepted the advice: basically it coincided with my wife's requests... even if this meant that at least in part I would have to continue to "pretend" a normality that didn't exist.

But then… what does “as long as you make it” mean? When does one have to give up?

Almost 15 years have passed and… we are still here. Now the children are grown up, I have lived (in clandestine) some stories and even currently I have been living one for two years... But we are still here!

There is still affection between us, we collaborate together and work successfully, but... neither of us has a complete life. And I wonder about the meaning of our choice, if it wouldn't have been better to then separate, find a way of managing our lives that would allow us to try to rebuild a wholeness next to someone capable of giving and receiving love, full love even under the aspect of corporeality.

Of course: no one guaranteed anything, no one guaranteed that things would go as hoped, that the people we fall in love with would fall in love again or that relationships would work... but at least we would have had a basis of truth.

I have no answers, of course, much less advice, for you but not for me either...

I still feel like I'm on the road and I try to find direction step by step... trying to lean on God who I now know is beside me, accepting me just as I am, mistakes and insecurities included.
As I told you at the beginning, it is only my story, which I give to you as it is, and I assure you of my prayers for you, your wife and your splendid children.

A brotherly hug

Bruno