Where Am I Going

23 May 2009

 I think I’m just going to rant. I have been trying to take a nap to no avail and my brain is running a mile a minute. I have been thinking about many things I’d like to say in my blog. I have written the blog several times in my head. But now that I’m sitting here to type, I have no clue how I had it all planned out. It’s weird how I do that, I think about it and I know what I want to say but then when I sit down I can’t say what I wanted.

 Anyway at 48 years old I’ve been going through a lot of different things. Emotions, thoughts, etc. and I have attributed it to my Mid-life Crisis. I read a book about it. It seems I’m at the age, but the problem is, I’ve been suffering with this for a few years now. Some days it’s much worse than others.

 Also, I suffer from severe clinical depression so I think those thoughts and feelings don’t help matters much. I have been giving a lot of thought and feelings into where I’m at in life, what I want, where I’m going, etc. and I thought I’d try to put it in writing maybe to help me make some sense of things.

 I have told my doctor a few weeks ago how I’m feeling and he said we need to work on things. So, we’re supposed to work through some of this stuff but it seems topics always change and I don’t get to the heart of the issue. Like I said, I’ve been dealing with this for a few years now and I really haven’t gotten anywhere.

 I have no purpose for life, no reason to be here. I really do not want to be here. I never have. If you really knew me, you’d know I’ve attempted suicide many times over the years. I’ve never been meant to live on this planet. I don’t belong here and never have and at 48 years old I can say I doubt I ever will be.

 There is a lot of pent up anger in my system and I often try to figure out who I’m angry at. I tend to always end up back at being angry with God. It seems He always gets the brunt of my anger. But today, I’m trying not to be angry at God I don’t think I can blame Him for how I feel. I’ve just never appreciated life, I’ve never seen the appeal and I’ve never really wanted to be a part.

 As most of you know, I’m elusive, aloof, eccentric and quirky in many ways. I guess growing older by oneself and living alone for many years one just builds up a lot of peculiarities that the average person doesn’t get.

 Anyway, I honestly don’t see that I have a purpose in life. I have never really accomplished anything. And what I wanted most out of life never came to pass and it’s way too late for it to happen so I don’t see any reason for life to continue.

 Most of my life has been living a lie, living to hide, living in fear of being found out. I didn’t actually come out about my homosexuality until I was 46 years old to anybody and I still haven’t fully accepted it myself. I try to, I talk about it, I joke about it and I try to make the best of it. But I am so strong in my faith that there just isn’t any room for it and it really just gets in my way. It’s a part of myself I have always hated and I’m quite sure that I will always hate it. I’ve never wanted to be gay and I have lived as straight a life as I could. I really never got involved with too many men and when I did it was only for a few years. My conscience really didn’t allow me to get into it. Plus, I was so afraid of being found out that I just had to keep things quiet and to myself. It’s very hard to live a double life and even harder when you have such strong faith as I do.

 I’m not going to rehash all the ex-gay stuff except to say I spent many years of my life in the ex-gay ministries only to find that it didn’t help and I think it only hurt. And I would tell any young Christian who happens to find himself gay to avoid such a ministry because all it does is make you hate yourself all the more. It makes you feel that you’re just not good enough for God’s love because God never changes you. While you are promised a change, it never happens. I’ve never seen it happen and I know from personal experience it doesn’t happen.

 But here I am at 48 and I keep thinking I have nothing to live for. And truthfully, I don’t. There’s nothing here for me. I don’t do anything exciting, I don’t have any desires to do anything exciting. I never accomplished much with my life and now I am on disability so I spend much of my time home alone.

 The one thing I’ve always wanted was my own family. I wanted a lot of children I wanted a wife and a family. I wanted to prove that I could love them and take care of them as a real man. But I never had that opportunity because I am gay and God never saw fit to make me straight.

 So now, what do I have? I should have grownup children. I should be a grand-father. But, it didn’t happen. I look at the younger generation and I always think to myself, I should have children their age. I think of all the joy that I’ve missed out on. All the love that I’ve missed out on and especially all the love I should be getting now at my age by being a grand-father. I would give anything to have grand-children running around me, sitting on my lap, crawling on me, etc. It hurts, it hurts real badly and I don’t think I can explain to anybody just how I feel about this.

 And even if I went looking for a significant other, a partner, I don’t see that bringing any lasting happiness or real purpose in my life. I’m old, set in my ways and I’d feel too guilty. I’m too set in my religious ways. And it would in no way fill the longing I have for children and a family of my own.

 So, even if there are a few more things I want to do with my life I do not see any of them giving me a reason to want to stick around. I don’t want to stick around. Life just is not nor has ever been worth living. Life has never shown me anything that made me want to stay here.

 But now another dilemma that I have is that I believe in a heaven and hell. And I believe we go to either one place or the other. Hopefully, I am going to go to heaven. I mean, who doesn’t hope that, right. We all want to go to heaven. I know it’s not going to be by my good works but it’s going to be on my faith. One cannot please God without faith and it is only by Grace that one is saved and not by works lest any man should boast. So, I think I have that part pretty well settled and I am pretty sure if I were to die I will go to heaven. I mean, as long as the promises in the Holy Bible are true, then I am headed in the right direction. When I meet St. Peter all I have to say to him is that I get to enter heaven not on my own merits but on the merits of my Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And if the Holy Bible is true, then I’m all set.

 But now here’s yet another problem. I believe that whether a person goes to heaven or hell that it is for eternity. I believe that once the human spirit is born it is eternal. I do not believe in annihilation and the thought of living for eternity just does not appeal to me. Ugh! Can you just imagine having to live forever? I just don’t want it. There is no end, no end to any of this and it really just depresses me all the more. Even if I were to attempt and succeed at suicide, I’d still have to face God and I’d still have to live forever. What’s a man to do? Seriously, what is a man to do? I don’t want any of this. I didn’t ask for any of it. But, I’m stuck with it. I’m trying my best to make the best of things, but I just cannot help it when my brain starts running away with these thoughts and the feelings they bring on are just overpowering sometimes.

 As a side note, this is not a suicide note. I have no plans on attempting suicide at this time. So no worries, ok. Some folks have “one of those days” well I’ve just got “one of those lives”. And I’m not quite sure what to do with it. And as strong as my faith in God is, He doesn’t talk to me so I don’t really get much help there. I just hope and pray that I can endure to the end.

 So for now…

Father’s Day

15 June 2008

First let me wish all of you fathers out there a very happy Father’s Day. I truly do mean it but it is one of the hardest days of the year for me. I hate Father’s Day, I hate going to church on Mother’s Day and Father’s Day. I find them to be very painful days. Today was no different. I almost lost it in church today. I sat there with tears filling my eyes several times, runny nose, the only thing I didn’t do was actually burst out and outright cry.

I find it to be such a painful day and it gets worse every year. Not so much because of my relationship with my father and mother’s day not so much because of my mother. But the fact remains that it has been my hearts desire my entire life to have children. Now that I am 46 years old I know this will never happen and I find that to be very painful.

I have prayed to become straight every single day of my teen and adult life. I have prayed to get married and have a family of my own. I know I would have been a good father. I helped my sister raise her three kids. I feel jealous of my brother-in-law because now after the hard years he is in the picture and I am pushed aside. I devoted my entire life to raising those kids and what is the thanks I get for it. I feel like they should be my kids I took care of them as babies, infants, toddlers and children. I was there for every single thing that those kids needed and wanted. They went without nothing because I was there. If it had been left to my sister alone to bring up those kids God only knows how they would be today. While I don’t take all the credit I feel I wasted my life bringing them up. I wanted my own.

I still want my own family and so I find Father’s Day a very painful day to experience especially in Church because that is what the topic of the sermon always is about. The church I used to go to on Mother’s Day the Pastor’s wife always gave the sermon. It got to the point that I never went to church on Mother’s Day. Why is it so painful? Because I’m gay and I don’t want to be, I want to be normal and have a normal life and have a normal family. I so dearly wanted children that only God knows how deeply this affects me.

I realized while in church this morning that today I am finally beginning to grieve over my midlife crisis. I think that’s good. Maybe it will be over soon. I knew that grief was something I would have to experience before the midlife crisis disappeared and hopefully this is the last and final stage. It is so hard to accept the fact that I will never have children. I so desperately wanted them, I know I would have been a good father. I wanted to prove that to the world and to myself. I wouldn’t have been a father like my father. I would have encouraged my kids, I would have spent time with them, I would have protected them and the list goes on and on.

So, while I wish all you Father’s a very Happy Father’s Day I sure hope that you all realize that it’s days like today that are painful for single folks. Especially older single folks who missed out on the normal’s of life. My life from childhood up until now has been anything but normal and I have a lot to grieve but the biggest is the fact that I don’t have any kids.

I know I’m whining today and having a pity party, but that’s ok, this is my blog I can do that. Besides, I need to get it off my chest and tell somebody how I really feel. I am hurting, some days are harder than others but none are as hard as Father’s Day. It’s something that I will forever miss out on and it’s something that I so desperately wanted.

The other thing is there is no special day of the year for me. There is a special day of the year for everybody but the single adult. Yet single adults account for about 33% of our population. Of course not all those single folks don’t have children a lot of them are one parent families but there is a good number of them that do not have children. So where is the Single’s Day? Or the Aunt’s Day or the Uncle’s Day? There’s a day for mothers, fathers, & grandparents and it makes me feel like I am not important to society. They couldn’t give a hill of beans about me because I am single. Well, it’s my taxes, which are higher than families taxes, that go to pay for their children to go to school. It’s my taxes that pay for all the benefits that families get from the government but even the government doesn’t appreciate us singles.

I guess this will be another bitching blog. I didn’t mean for it to be. I just wanted to share how painful a day today is for me but I guess I got carried away. This is how I feel so this is what I’m going to post. I just don’t understand why? I didn’t want to be gay. I never did, I still don’t. I wish to God He would have answered my prayers and made me straight so I could have had a family of my own. It’s a bitter sweet time in my life and I just as soon go without the bitterness of loneliness.

So, for now…