Through the Open Door - Part 3

I spent the next few months living with an openly gay man who was obviously a full blown sex addict. Between the two of us, we literally had a revolving door through which multiple sexual partners came and left every week. It was an exciting time for me, but there would be decisions ahead that would need to be made. I would need to decide what to do when my leave of absence was over. I would also need to decide what to do about my marriage.

I was offered a transfer by the publishing company and I turned them down. I wanted to stay in the area. I decided to get my real estate license and embark upon a new career. I moved back in with my wife to give it another try, but I soon met another man with whom I began another love obsession. It would be the beginning of the end of my marriage.

His name was Rick and he was stationed in the Air Force. Because neither of us had a place to go where we could be intimate, we maintained an affair of the heart. We would meet at the gay bar where we would dance and kiss only to have to go back to our respective homes at the end of the evening. During the days, we would talk on the phone. We had both fallen in love.

My wife bravely endured what had become a battered marriage, but that endurance would only be able to be maintained for so long.  As the summer drew to a close, I was absolutely beside myself with my feelings for Rick and the desire to consummate our relationship. I finally proposed a tryst at our apartment while my wife was at work. Rick consented and I was delirious that I would finally be able to take our relationship to the next level after a summer of yearning for Rick.

The pitfall in my plan was that my wife didn't go into work on the day of our scheduled meeting and I couldn't reach Rick by phone to forewarn him. At that point I felt such a sense of desolation and longing. I also realized that I wanted Rick more than I wanted to remain in the marriage. I told my wife of my plans to have Rick over and then I hurriedly left our apartment.

I ran up the entry road to try to signal Rick before he drove into a situation that would cause him embarrassment. He saw me and he pulled into the adjacent Pizza Hut where I explained the awkward circumstances and I expressed my desire to somehow try to meet some other time. I felt such an awful ache when he looked at me with his sad, beautiful brown eyes and told me he couldn't go on like this. He advised me that he would rather not see me again. When I returned to the apartment, my wife had rented a U-Haul trailer and proceeded to move out.

I never did see Rick again. On the other hand, my wife and I still had some sorting out to do. We saw each other several times over the ensuing months during which we nursed the hope that we could make a go of our marriage. I realized this probably would not possible at the same time that other unmanageable events began to take place within my life. I was soon lost in another suicidal depression and had to stop work. I took the only viable option at that time. I moved back home with my parents.

Author Davis Aujourd'hui


Books and Kindles by Author David Aujourd hui (these two below are at a special price on Kindle for $2.99)

"The Misadventures of Sister Mary Olga Fortitude" Book 1
"Babes in Bucksnort" Book 2

"Putting the Pieces Together" Kindle Version only for .99 cents!

Putting the Pieces Together is an anthology of a gay man's journey toward self-acceptance. It is a poignant and intimate book chronicling recovery from mental illness, sexual addiction, and alcohol.

Through the Open Door - Part 2

We had an idyllic wedding following what I would later come to realize had been a bizarre bachelor party. That is part of my story in my article entitled “Reaching for Recovery – Putting down the Drink.” During a blackout, I came out to my sister and several members of the wedding party.

Even so, the next day, I marched down the aisle with my new bride before we departed for a fantasy wedding trip to Bermuda. The sad truth was that, once the honeymoon was over, a tragedy would begin to play out over the coming two years.


Within a short period of time, I found the anxiety of self-doubt quickly creeping into my life. I would awake with that awful sense of dread, having to literally force myself out of bed, followed by torturing myself with thoughts that I was incompetent during my morning commute. I also found myself seeking out new places where I could temporarily act out my homecoming anxiety. I reverted to my sneaky sexual behaviors even though my wife had expressed permission for me to have sex with men. The one caveat was that I couldn't fall in love with them. This only fueled the forest fire of my sexual addiction.


Even though she'd given me that permission, I still had the sense that she hoped I wouldn't need to act upon my desires if she could be the perfect wife. I'd arrive home to find her preparing dinner after juggling her senior year classes and all of their demands. This only served to exacerbate my guilt. What I'd imagined to be an ideal situation for me was turning into a living nightmare.

Within the time span of a few short weeks, I was emotionally bottoming-out once again. My morning anxiety mounted to the point where just leaving the house became sheer torture. I would fitfully delay my exit from bed, hoping I could drift back into the oblivion of sleep, only to discover I was so late that I would have to cancel my scheduled appointments.

When I was able to be on the job I would find that to make each call was an exercise in anxious humiliation. This only served to increase my arsenal of self-abuse. I started replaying the tape in my head that I was an incompetent fraud. I would pace the apartment, thereby wasting more precious time. Sometimes I would not arrive in Boston until afternoon, trying to go through the motions of work while I found myself in a hypnotic trance, filled with self-loathing.

It was impossible to keep up any charade of normality with my wife. It was her first time witnessing these behaviors and they frightened her. Nevertheless, my twenty-one year-old bride, stood by her man, trying to find a way to get help for me. She returned to a therapist we had seen prior to our wedding for advice.

He advised her that he wasn't concerned about me; rather, he was concerned for her well-being. He gave her a therapist referral for me. Following a Thanksgiving trip to my family's home where we acted out the part of a happily married couple as best we could, I started my first true experience in psychotherapy.


I started seeing a psychologist named Barbara, who had a private practice in the attic of her Revolutionary War-era home. She really was an empathic soul. I will never forget how the two of us chain-smoked, while she gazed upon the thoroughly depressed shell of a man I had become. Her face reminded me of a sad hound dog.


After a handful of sessions with Barbara, I decided I needed to take a total timeout. I wasn't even able to fake it enough to make it into work at that point anyhow. I was granted a leave of absence by my sales manager; however, I felt ashamed and incompetent when he told me this was the first time such a leave had been requested.

My wife and I decided on a trial separation with me moving out of our marital apartment. That decision made, I felt a tremendous sense of relief. I excitedly went about searching for a temporary living situation with another gay man.

Author Davis Aujourd'hui

Books and Kindles by Author David Aujourd hui (these two below are at a special price on Kindle for $2.99)

"The Misadventures of Sister Mary Olga Fortitude" Book 1
"Babes in Bucksnort" Book 2

"Putting the Pieces Together" Kindle Version only for .99 cents!

Putting the Pieces Together is an anthology of a gay man's journey toward self-acceptance. It is a poignant and intimate book chronicling recovery from mental illness, sexual addiction, and alcohol.

THROUGH THE OPEN DOOR - Part 1

I met another fellow in that restroom with whom I formed a friendship. He was nineteen and he was openly gay, having put his own demons to rest following a suicide attempt. His name was Marc. Marc would become the friend who would help me see the light that being gay wasn't such a bad thing.

He introduced me to gay bars where I was able to meet fellows before having sex with them. It wasn't much different in a way. Although I would learn their names and have sex in a bedroom, there was usually no further contact. Such seemed to be the way in gay life in the late 1970's and early 1980's.

Life in the bars not only fueled my increasing sexual addiction. It also fueled my increasing dependence upon alcohol. I remained in complete denial about both addictions for a number of years. After all, everyone seemed to be doing it!

I continued to see the fellow with whom I'd been having an affair. Even though I wanted to make something of it, he held back. Apparently he had his own demons with which to contend. He became a love obsession for me, but I still believed in my love for my fiance.


My new career had become very successful. I became a top performer in the college textbook sales industry. Likewise, plans for the upcoming wedding were progressing according to my design. My future wife remained in the dark about my double life. That would soon change.

While she was away during the summer we were to marry, I realized that it would not be fair to her to keep her in the dark any longer. I thought she deserved a chance to call off the wedding if she couldn't accept married life with a gay man. I knew that I wouldn't be able to be faithful to her.

A month before the wedding, we were reunited. I told her that I had something to tell her. She begged me to tell her, asking me, “Are you an alcoholic?”


“Not me,” I protested. Instead I told her the only thing I knew to be true at the time. Amidst a waterfall of tears from the both of us, I told her that I was gay.


We were naïve adult children and we didn't know what to do. What we did know was that we loved one another. We decided to bravely go ahead with our wedding plans. It would begin to close one door at the same time that it opened another one through which we passed. When we would walk through that door, we would enter a world filled with pain.

Author Davis Aujourd'hui

Books and Kindles by Author David Aujourd hui (these two below are at a special price on Kindle for $2.99)

"The Misadventures of Sister Mary Olga Fortitude" Book 1
"Babes in Bucksnort" Book 2

"Putting the Pieces Together" Kindle Version only for .99 cents!

Putting the Pieces Together is an anthology of a gay man's journey toward self-acceptance. It is a poignant and intimate book chronicling recovery from mental illness, sexual addiction, and alcohol.

DETACH WITH LOVE

Life is a matter of attaching and learning to let go. To attach yourself to anything or anyone will keep yourself as a prisoner. Do not allow yourself to be a victim. Let go of the attachment and detach with love.


What are some examples of persons or things you can attach yourself to? You can attach yourself to abusive relationships or to relationships with addicts. You can attach yourself to various addictions: drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling, workaholism, compulsive buying, compulsive religion, or compulsive exercise to name but a few.

Now comes the big question. How do you detach? It will be a challenge. It will involve making a difficult choice. Perhaps it will mean having to leave a relationship. Perhaps it will mean giving up an addiction. It will involve an unfamiliar road and that can lead to fear.

The important thing to remember is that you are the only one who can do it. Do it as an act of love. You are the only one who can take care of yourself and you are worth it.

We are all given free will in this life. Everything we think or do is a matter of choice. We can do no wrong. Whatever path we follow is the right one for ourselves. This is why it is so important to forgive ourselves when we think we have made a mistake.

The point is that we can make choices that will lead us in a positive or negative direction. The question is, what would you prefer? Do you want to keep repeating the same mistakes or do you want to move forward to freedom?

The first key is to practice awareness. Focus upon your emotions. Anything that doesn't feel good will be an indicator that you would prefer to head in a different direction. Likewise, good feelings will indicate that you are moving in the matter of what would be your preference. Follow your joy and leave the rest behind.

Letting go is not an easy thing to do. It's human to attach yourself to anything outside yourself. The point is to follow what is the desire of your spirit. It will never lead you astray.

Practice prayer and/or meditation. Try journaling. Talk over your situation with another. Get professional help, if necessary. Join a support group. Any or all of these things will be helpful. It's up to you to reach out for help. No one has to do it alone, nor should they try. We can easily rationalize, make excuses, or get caught up in delusional thinking.

Take a leap of faith and let go of whatever is bothering you. Make the choice that only you can. Move forward and don't look behind. Just, whatever you do, do it with love.


Author Davis Aujourd'hui