Another word of caution—if you are not connecting to a therapist, end it early and keep seeking someone that you find to be helpful and encouraging. Just because someone is practicing doesn’t mean that he/she is competent for helping you. Keep seeking help until you find someone that you feel comfortable with. I remember when I was 22 years old, MANY YEARS AGO, I was having some personal problems and decided to seek professional help to guide me through this period. I had no understanding of counseling or therapy. I went to a local hospital and they assigned a therapist to me. I went to him for six sessions, and after each session, found myself more and more depressed. He was practicing a form of therapy that was totally ineffective for my problems, but I was too inexperienced to understand this. Rather than switch to a different therapist, I stopped going thinking there was something wrong with me because I wasn’t benefiting from the treatment. It took me many years and lots of schooling to understand what this man was doing. He was a new therapist and practicing his style of therapy that was not suitable for the type of problem that I had. I wasn’t smart or savvy enough to understand that I could have asked for someone else who could have been more effective for me.
Many times when we seek out help because we are in vulnerable positions, we put all our faith in professionals who may not have the expertise we need to resolve our problems. This doesn’t just happen in counseling, but many other situations such as legal or medical problems. That’s why it is so important to recognize when something is not working for you and to keep pursuing the professional help that will work best for your needs.
RECURRING ANGER
I’ve had several requests to address the issue of returning anger. Just when you thought you were past that stage in your recovery minus your gay husband, it’s back. Women have written to me asking me what’s wrong with them when this happens. They are afraid they are backsliding because they feel so angry all over again.
There are different kinds of anger when a marriage ends. The anger that you have when you find out that your husband is gay is different than the anger you will face in future years when you are raising children as a single parent. Then we face the anger that all women face when they are left with raising the family as the primary caretaker. Sometimes we confuse this anger with our gay husband issues, and in all fairness, this is not a gay issues, but rather a universal one of irresponsible men. You don’t have to be gay to be irresponsible.
My own father abandoned my mother and left her with five children. He went on to have a happy, prosperous life 3,000 miles away, taking everything we owned. We ended up virtually homeless. My mother became the primary caretaker and supporter of us, and at the time, my younger sisters were only 1, 3, and 5. My mother had never worked before, and with virtually no workforce skills, went out and started building a career for herself. She never had an easy life after that point, but continued to be there for all of us emotionally and financially until her death a year and a half ago. Ironically, my father, who moved to California 34 years ago, is a millionaire. He has chosen to abandon his children, claiming that we should be able to make it on our own like he did.
My father is not gay. He went on to remarry and had a different family. He was very willing to take care of them financially, but not us. My story is not unique. I know many men who move on after marriage to new families and have new children and never look back. I don’t understand it and I never will. It would be inconceivable for me to think of a mother doing that to a child, but it seems more common in men. All men, just not gay men.
I share this information with you because we do have our own issues to heal from as wives of gay men. But we also have other issues to deal with that are universal to all women. It’s important to understand the difference in the problems because if not, we will always be angry and bitter about the gay issues. It is important for our own state of mental health to distinguish between the two. It is also important for our healing process to understand the difference so that we are able to move ahead in life and not be held back by our own insecurities.
As I’ve stated in earlier newsletters, wives of gay men go through an additional set of recovery issues than women who have straight husbands. We need to rebuild our shattered sense of self-belief and self-esteem. If we are continually pulled back into the gay spectrum, we will never be able to find happiness and fulfillment with a future mate. We will start confusing issues, which will start the self-doubt process all over again.
Anger needs to be channeled into positive responses, or else it turns into bitterness. I have seen this happen too many times. Bitterness affects our own sense of happiness and the happiness of our children. It stagnates us from moving ahead in our own lives, so who ends up losing here? You have lost so much already, why continue to keep being on the losing end?
When you are angry due to circumstances that seem totally out of your control or because of your ex-husband’s actions, learn to confront the anger by taking positive action. If you feel that talking to your ex-husband will only result in a yelling match with no resolve, sit down and write him a letter explaining to him why you are hurting. Sometimes when he sees it in writing, it makes him actually think and act rather than just react. It helps you feel better too because too often in the course of a conversation or argument, you lose sight of the issues that you want to discuss because your anger takes you to other places that don’t need to be revisited. A letter gives you a chance to express your anger and make sure that the important points are covered. If you have forgotten any, you can always add a P.S. or write the letter over—or even rip it up if you don’t feel like sending it. Sometimes just writing the letter is enough of an outlet.
Understand that after a marriage is over, there are lots of “normal” hardship issues that we face as single parents. Raising children is exhausting, and not having a back up for some relief can be overwhelming. It hurts when we are tired at the end of the day and feel so trapped while our husbands are out with their new gay mates or gay friends. But if our husbands were straight, chances are they’d be doing the same thing. It’s not a gay thing, just a male thing. The fact that he’s out with a man may make it more emotionally uncomfortable, but we have to be able to once again separate those feelings from the feelings that most single mothers experience of abandonment and lack of financial security.
So, if you feel anger creeping up in your life again, know that it’s okay. You probably have a lot to be angry about. Just don’t let it take over your life. Work through it so it doesn’t turn to bitterness. Find support or call a friend and talk it out. Don’t let it fester in you, because unresolved anger turns into bitterness, and the only one who really hurts is you.
Remember, you are never alone. There is a great amount of support for anyone who needs it. Write to me or join our Thursday evening support chat sessions for group comfort and help. Have a pleasant Thanksgiving holiday and realize that life can always get better as long as there is hope.
THERE’S NO PLACE LIKE HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS
Let me first wish all of my readers a happy holiday season. Well, how about a peaceful holiday season? I think that expecting a “happy holiday” may make you start to think that you are supposed to be happy, when in fact, many of you reading this are going through your own heavy-duty pain.
When I was married to my gay husband, I usually found holidays to be very depressing. People appeared so happy wherever I went, all wrapped up in a mystical holiday spirit. Inwardly, I felt like a knife was cutting me because I so desperately wanted what I thought everyone else had—namely, a loving spouse and happy family. I went through the holidays very mechanically doing all the right things, but somehow, I always felt disappointed when they were over. My husband made sure to surround us with lots of people in order to take the focus off of “us” as a