Beginnings

I always  figured my mind , my way of reasoning, as a sort of ladder,  I have to make one step at the time and configure the thought.  I analize one thought,  I  make sense  of it  and then step to the next one, normally the consequence of the step before.  Does is it make sense?                                                                                                                                                                                                                 In my past state of mind,  my thinking  always stopped at the step just before the understanding of the issue I was dealing with.  I have analized, retraced and ultimately lost my footing so many times that by the end nothing was making any sense.  My whole being was  so repressed, and almost depressed, that I was really at breaking point.  I let myself down very badly, I do not know how I could let it happen.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  I always thought of myself as an honest kind of guy, but obviously I was not, or at least not enough to make my life really worth living. I was resigned to live with my "problems", I thought I realised what my life had become and I did not care. But I could not actually look at myself in the mirror of my bathroom. I felt my eyes looking into my soul and  it felt wrong, I was ashamed of myself for whatever reason. Now I know I was lying to myself.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               After the first years here in England, I started to come to terms with the family issues I had, or at least that's what I thought I was doing, in reality I was simply bottling everything   up. I thought of family for a long time, and by the end I laid all my guilt at mother's door. She was neurotic and deeply depressed and I did not know any better as a child, so. Now I could not doing anything about it, so I put it away. All true, but I never managed to really explain to myself  the knows and hows of the story.  I tried so many times, and always got to nowhere. Lost. My mind was not capable of  functioning rationally without emotions getting in the way of it. I lied to myself and accepted  my feeling of sadness and loneliness. I probably felt sorry for myself, but deep down I was never happy with it. Again I was telling myself it was all because of her. But I knew there was more to it.  You see the circle of my thoughts? Depression was the only option for me, as it was for her. And she was suicidal. Now, that get me thinking more than once.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          As early as I can remember, I have always been comfortable in my own company, even the loneliness I feel at time never really bother me, I learned early to cope and survive on my own.    You see, for me family always meant mother and mother equalled fear.  She was the boss, the one  giving orders, the one to make my life a misery . My father and brother never really entered into the equation. One because of his night job, the other as an older brother that never wanted anything to do with me. So right from the start I felt I was on my own, and what is more I had to watch out for mother. At least that is how I  felt as a child.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 In my childhood I made mistakes, I guess every child make them. I had to learn my ways,  and it was mother's job how to teach me  how to behave, how to live. She herself had a difficult upbringing, and I guess she did not know how to cope with a child that was needy, I always looked for cuddles and reassurance.  I think she could not be for me what I needed, for whatever reason. Her way of teach me was with her hands and her feets and that tongue of hers. I try to understand now, but at the time it just shutted me.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   Mother simply used to beat me. One time I remember I was in bed sleeping, and the next thing I can remember  is myself in the bathroom with blood on my face. My brother forgot the keys in the locked door and she could not come in after a night out. It was always me, even if I was not. She  always asked the questions after, and it looked to me she never learned from my answers. I was bad.  I seem to remember I stole a toy at the age five/six, I do not think I knew what I was doing, I do not think I meant to. But I was bad, so she simply felt that I would learn only throwing  me out of the house. I remember walking the streets for a while until father come to look for me, poor man He did not have any saying on any issue in that house. I think he felt he was in no position to argue or to simply have a say in our upbringing. I do not really know why, but I can guess.                                                                                                                                                                               To be fair she threw me out only two times, and the second one I was prepared for it,  I simply did hide in the cellar. I spent the night in there. I felt almost safe in there. This is my first recollection of me having to cope on my own, reallly on my own. From then on I learned  to equip myself emotionally and practically for  the event of  being  left  out again. And the place that felt the safer was that cellar, were I could go and be with me without fear. In there I learned to live without her. Scared but able to be free, to like what I liked, feel what I felt with no fear of making her mad if I made a mistake.  After that I was not a child anymore.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                I can now make that last step and finally look down and see clearly, at last I have the courage to accept my life for what it is. My mistakes took me here. Mother did what she could, I am sure of it. Her life have been worst than mine anytime, that's why I cannot take myself  to blame her. True it could have been different, but hey, that's life.   It is amazing how now I can  have a thought and being able to carry it throw up the ladder without slipping and hurting mysellf or getting lost. The simple notion of being gay have make sense of my life.  I am gay, and finally accepting who I am had taken me back to my childhood. I can finally learn how to live.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       That cellar was the beginning of my journey. I am glad it took me here. Alex                                                                                                                                                                                                              

Amazing

Amazing, everything is falling into place. It is very very rewarding, it all seemed so complicated before. But now I finally start to understand, it is all oh so simple. The reason why I felt for all my adult life so depressed and unable to belong                                                                                                           .                                                                                                                                                                                      The amazing thing is that the answer have always been there. I am gay , I was born gay, but never wanted to even start consider looking into my soul to search for it.  I  did never understood why all my reasoning never took me anywhere. I did put up a wall around me and hided behind it.                                                                                                                                                                                                I used to think that my depression was a result of that blasted familly of mine, a result of all the years  on my own, with heroin as my only way of living. How wrong I misjudged the whole situation. But know finally I am starting to get my feelings and emotions back, I FEEL ALIVE for the first time in a long time, and it is amazing, really amazing.  My body is getting sensations back, my thoughts are clearer as they had never been.                                                                                                                                                                                               Now I can see , every single step I took, consciounsly or unconsciounsly, had been the result of my hiding by myself, and what is more I can see how I lied to myself  without really realising  I was. My addiction had kept me under a thick cloud of nothingness. For twenty years I have been hiding , sure that my life was not really worth anything anymore. And I almost manage to believe my own lies. All the justifications I made to myself, trying to con myself that there was no way out. I thought I was dying. But now I understand.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               And is amazing and wonderful  not having to hide anymore. My feelings are coming back and I feel happy. I can start to love myself for what I am. No more hiding for me, thank you very much. I never thought I would accept myself. My big mistake have been to think that all my problems were a consequence of not having a family around me, or that I was simply a junkie. I never digged into it, for fear of realising that I was a bad person, even when every bone in my body  was telling me I wasn't. And so the confusion and depression.                                                                                                                                                                                                                              But today I stand up , tall and proud that finally everything make sense, everything fit. I know I need help and I have to express myself, this diary is certainly of help. Today I asked my drug counsellor about some kind of therapy to get everything out of mt system.  Alex       

Awakening

My name is Alex and I am 38. Today I cried, for relief and fear. Until recently my mind was clouded by drug use and self destruction, I guess. After 20 years of struggle with my past and the consequences of it suddenly today I dropped the denial that I have maintained all my life. And it felt very good indeed.I do not want to annoy any one but it look like I have to explain myself to myself. Until last summer I tought my life path was set in stone. I was a junkie with very bad addiction, no family, no friends and no real knowledge of myself.. My mother was, and I Think still is, very depressed and very strict. She had her own baggage, now I understand, but at the time I was very scared of her, she used her hands freely, sometime heavily on both me and my brother.  He never really tried to be friendly with me, he is four years older than me and always resented me for being born, or so the story goes. My father was probably a good guy, but completely subdued to my mother, as all of us were. He left when I was nine. By the time I was in my twenties I had a heroin addiction, not many friends and the relationship with my mother was at breaking point. My job as a chef always maintained my addiction and took me places. At 26 I come in the UK on the conscious decision to cut all ties wiyh my family and my life in my homeland. I came here because I wanted to die on drugs, as high as I could go, that was my state of mind, completely hopeless and with no consideration for me or my body. Nothing did mattered any more. Today I am 38 , bearing the phisical and mental scars, paying the price for that mistake. I always led a lonely life, always scared that everything i did was wrong. The only place I found to feel safe was the cellar under the block of flats where I lived. In there I could hear and see if she was coming for me, and it felt safe to know I had that little advantage. In there there were my dad old comics and classic books, so I read and hide.And I started playing with myself, and I liked it and felt guilty about it, specially after I started to play with botttles and brush handles. I felt bad but I did like it. As the years passed I started to think that I was not really normal to have those strange feelings and experiences, but life did go on, I had some not memorable experiences with girls, putting on the back of my mind my cellar days, trying to balance my family life with my teenage years. At about 15 I got a saturday job in a print shop, the owner was a sweet bachelor that today you would probably call a paedophile, thank God he just touched me. He scared me out for sure but it got me thinking again about my feelings and likings, my sexuality. By now I was going at a live in college, away from home and for the first time free. I was having oral sex with my room mate almost straight away, but we never talked about it. The familiar feeling of guilt and anormality make me hate my room mate and I asked to change room. During this early years of travel I had another two or three encounters with peadophiles, the last time I almost had full sex, but I chickened out. They never really hurt me, but it make me wonder why people looked in my eyes and knew that it was OK to approach me, I never said anything. At 20 I did military service. Until now my experiences were only sexual, they were just a different way to off load. And then I met this guy and eveything changed. I think it was my first love, a feeling pretty strange to me thanks to my family, but this was wonderful. We had some beautiful times together,  we touched and cuddled and laughed, but we never get down to it. We were in military barracks, not exatly the best place to let your feelings known to everybody. That was really when I decided I would be a"straight" guy. Less problems and easier life. Probably my biggest mistake, but it was not time. Drugs started to get hold of my life and only last summer I felt that everything was wrong and something have to change. Almost in my fourties with nothing to show for it. I tried to con myself . I had some relationships with girls, but never felt right, never horny or aroused, never able to open myself to anyone. By myself sex toys and videos kept me going , even if they never satisfy me, they always make me feel stupid, after I shot I alwaysfelt dirty and wrong. All these years I almost convinced myself that I was the son of my mother, crazy, neurotic and depressed. And then last summer I finally waked up. I managed to quit heroin, throwed away all the toys, deleted all my contact numbers and started with a clean slate. In the last two months I have not be working, you see as headchef I had a good pay, but it always went on drugs. Now I can do what I want, when I have enough to pay the rent  I am OK. I am trying to understand what happened to me and why.  After weeks of emotional up and downs it downed on me. At first I tought "kick the drugs and everything will be ok", but it didn't work. Something  is still missing, maybe a family, not my mother family  but my family, I tought get out there and find a girl and get going, but again it didn't fell right. And then I understood. All of a sudden I said out loud  "I am gay". Fullstop. And everything felt right, scary but OK. And I started crying, relieved that just maybe from now on I can be Alex, gay, single with a lot of past and scars , but is OK. My biggest regret is that I lost a lot of time. I do not even have a real friend to who to come out to. And my fear is that some how I will not be able to finnd a soulmate that can help me and take by the hand. I am scared that I will die as an old sad man with too many regrets and no one to love me. I just need someone that can love me for what I am.           That's it.        

The day after

So here I am, the day after. I re-read  the post and I am already feeling the tears, I am scared. But I wake up this morning and I smiled at myself. A novelty for me, I can tell you. I read somewhere that talking down my feelings should help ( was is it Tom Cruise blog? ). Aftermy awakening  last summer I did come to understand that I cannot cheat myself any more, at first I thought that gay me was the consequence of my family and drugs history, that's why I did throw away all my toys ( arghhh...), now I just realise that I was again in hiding mode. I always thought that one doesn't become gay, simply you are born gay. "I am gay" is a statement that is true as much as the "I am a man and fellow human being" one. Until yesterday my feelings and emotions were very much confused. Every bit of thought I had about me and my history always led me to sadness and anger and pity for myself. Life have been very bleak indeed. Today I am starting to feel that the pieces will come together, I have hope. But I am scared, simply because it start making sense. The fear is that I am making another mistake, and in Alex style at that. All my life I have dealt my problems on my own, I learned to trust no one, and I took steps that destroyed my chances. I am in this world as a human being, and I always tried to be a good one, and I tought enough. But it is not enough, I need to cry and laugh without restraints, and feel that I am living, not just passing by. My family never helped and the drugs certainly did not help. My family is now long gone, and I know that drugs are another chapter, I regret only the scars on my body. My biggest fear is that no one will accept me as I am, with all my baggage. I know I cannot answer that question, I can be only myself at the moment.  Alex