Misery Seeks Isolation & Pornography

The past three weeks had been good. Good until today.

For the first time in a week, I thought about looking at porn.

(Thought about. Isn't that incredible? I had not desired porn for a single instant in a whole week!)

But it's here. The desire is back and can be fanned into flame.

The wife. Still going through trauma counseling for her past. Can't seem to get a grip on herself, and so she clings reactively. When she is sad about herself, I can handle it. When she gets anxious and controlling of me, it's like cat claws ripping into my skin. I growl! Show my teeth. She backs off. For a bit.

Home is supposed to be a safe place. So why does it feel like I've left weeks in paradise to come back to hell? At first, it was pure relational bliss; now, it's a field of anxious, controlling energy.

The best thing to do is to go and comfort her. Be gentle. Be loving. Be patient.

But I am so damn tired. And empty. I can't keep giving out of an empty well.

I don't even want Brother right now. In my state of misery, I feel like I just can't rely on anyone. Isolation into pornography feels like the safest option.

I'm going to sleep. In the basement. By myself. Maybe things might get better tomorrow. Maybe.

A Deficit of Male Love

It seems that I am not alone.

Scouring through the blogosphere, I found some other men (1, 2) writing about their attachments to straight male friends in uncannily similar ways to what I am experiencing with my straight male friend Brother.

In the past, I would have shrugged off such writings and even avoided such people. "Too gay."

I was in denial. I thought I was different, more straight. But what I did was replace real male intimacy with sexual fantasies and male pornography. Which explains why I could never really kick the porn habit for very long. Like these SSA strugglers, I desperately need love from other men. As one of the authors wrote in the above link, I too, have a deficit of male love in my life.

Sex with my wife was absolutely amazing this week. No pretense, no fantasies. We were passionate, intimate, and experienced a deep vulnerable oneness with each other as we climaxed.

But I still miss Brother.

In some ways, the feeling I have for Brother is not very different from the feeling of deep intimacy I had for my wife that night. I told her about it, and added that there is a slight difference: this longing for a male attachment is something that she could never fulfill for me. Only men can do this.

When I looked at pornography, I would feel coldly distant from my wife. Makes sense. After all, I was "unfaithful" to her by having mental sex with a fantasized image. However, my love and longing for Brother doesn't change my deep love for my wife.

Strange, isn't it?

It is as if a guy can love his guy friend and his wife just as deeply, and there is no conflict. The two loves are mutually independent of one another. (Unless the guy has sex with his guy friend.)

Brother says he loves me a lot. I believe him (I want to). So far, he's always been there for me when he can. And he has always been genuine when he shows up. But he doesn't love me "as much" as I love him. He can't. His attachment to me, while deep, has no bridge to his sexual feelings. Mine does. But healing can only come if I accept his love, not reject it out of fear of my own sexual feelings.

So I cast aside the sexual impulse, careful not to throw the baby out with the bath water, as I allow myself to be engulfed in the warm love of his acceptance.

Come, come with me

Strip down, it's easy

See? All around you

Everyone--the same

Come, wash with me

No one looks

Let's get clean

And join the others

Come, let us soak

And man-talk

Fathers, sons, brothers, friends

Together, all men

Yes, together, all men

Them, me, and you

I miss my Brother so much. I have never felt this whole in all of my life until I allowed myself to become vulnerable to his love. He is, truly, God's love in the real for me. And I am, simply, addicted to that right now.

Allow me to relish. It's good for me.

Being Vulnerable with Men

It is interesting how I have had no desire for pornography over the last 5 days. The desire has instead been replaced by a desire for male companionship; for my brother, certainly, but seeing how he has his own life to live, I'm allowing other men to come in as well.

Today, I let two men in. The first was older. I noticed his softness, kindness, and a desire to connect. He reached out to compliment me on something. Instead of putting up my usual tough analytical veneer, I remained vulnerable. Something must have worked because the more we talked, the more physical he got. I did not touch him once, but I counted him touching me with increasing frequency, probably close to 15 times in the 10 minutes of conversation.

I imagined him propositioning me. I imagined what it might be like if he were gay and made a move. Flashing thoughts. I let them pass through. Then, I focused on feeling the acceptance he was trying to give me in a non-sexual man-to-man way. It was nice. Like soft, warm sunshine on baby skin. In the past, I would have scared off someone so touchy-feely with my angry analytical look, and I would have missed receiving the affirmation.

The second man was my age. He was philosophical and abstract. Yet, clearly open to connecting. I made the move this time, asking questions, offering encouragements. I gave him love and acceptance in my usual helper style. He was touched (because he was open to be touched). And I felt good to have been the giver, though no where as nice as being the receiver. There were flashes of sexual thoughts, but again I let them pass through. Focused on the conversation, on just connecting on an intimate emotional level, man-to-man, and non-sexually.

As I lie to sleep, I feel a little less anxious and lonely than I did last night. My brother is not around, and I have no heard from him. Haven't heard from him in almost 24 hours! Can you believe that??!! What is he thinking, treating me as if I am a normal well-adjusted man???Doesn't he know that I'm a needy freakazoid right now and desperately need his affirmation 24/7??!! But I feel okay.

This is a new realization to me: I have been shutting myself off from receiving affirmation from men. I will try to be more open and vulnerable emotionally with other men and see what happens. I know that it means that I will become more vulnerable sexually, but I will trust that the Lord will not allow me to be tempted beyond what I can bear. I trust this is the Lord's leading.

To An Unknown Brother

Your song has ministered to me in ways that you will never know or understand. At least not here on earth. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Thank you for pointing me to the Lord.

I will be strong, and I will take courage in Jesus.

What I Need Is Relational

I have this pattern: when I feel weak and unsure of myself, I go to porn. When my self-esteem is low or I feel nervous about my work, I get a fix by searching out just the right porn clip to masturbate to.

More recently, in moments of weakness and vulnerability, I have found myself missing my straight-male friend brother instead. I no longer want pornography. I want my brother. To talk to him. To enjoy his company. To feel his love for me. To hear him tell me that I am okay in his eyes.

I have become attached to my brother.

This shift tells me that my problem, overwhelmingly, is not sexual but relational. What I need is some deep, intense loving from a male-figure in the real to make up for the years of deficit in male attachments.

That's my grown-up brain talking; offering a cognitive solution to my condition.

My boy-heart?

It just cries. Cries for a father who will love me, hold me, and tell me that he is proud I am his son, over and over and over... until I feel okay.

I can't expect my brother to do this for me. He has his own family, his own busyness. I must find myself more brothers like him. There must be more like him. There must be...

Lord, please bring them to me.

*weep*

The Smell of Brothers

Brothers smell. They stink. Just like me.

Brothers can look good, but they never appeal to me in a sexual way. Even when they splash on the best of colognes, they still stink when you get close.

Brothers have erections in bathtubs together. They laugh about it. Compare sizes. Then they argue and fight--someone took someone's soap. Erections go down. Up and down, their penises, like their crooked teeth and bandaged elbows, are mere physical extensions of their stinky bodies.

I have never fantasized about my brothers. The very idea of having sex with my brothers would make me throw up.

My straight friend whom I love so much is my brother. It should be that if and when I thought of him sexually, I would feel like throwing up.

Man-to-man love may spark feelings of warmth, and even be sensual--like kids in a bathtub. But it should also foster manliness. Talk of sex with women. Connecting at the level of sexual attraction towards women, not each other.

After talking with my friend, and being affirmed again of his love for me in a most nonsexual way, I feel my sexual attraction to him dwindling down and in its place a manly-brotherly love rising up.

I feel stronger. Like an essence of maleness is taking over me.

And it stinks, that male essence.

The kind of stink that women don't have. The kind of stink that women seem not to mind--in fact, long for and lean on. The kind of stink that make men prefer to seek out the natural perfumes that permeate through the soft skin of women...

(...their breasts... their nipples... lovely to the touch... to the tongue...)

I love my straight male friend brother.

And he stinks.

Just like me.

Just the way God meant it to be.

Radical Man-to-Man Love

As a boy, I used to stroke the belly of my puppy. He would lie on his back and enjoy every caress. I also noticed that when I stroked him, he would sometimes sprout an erection.

I am thinking today about how much I love my friend. My straight, male friend who shares with me his very heart and soul, who knows me in all of my vulnerabilities, and yet still accepts me, fully. My friend, who upon hearing how I struggle with same-sex attraction, comes close to me, his body touching mine, looks lovingly into my eyes and tells me that he would like to embrace me in a long, warm bear hug. My friend, who is not afraid to admit that when he feels loving feelings towards others, gets a tingling sensation in his loins. Not a sexual thing, he says. Not a desire to actually have sex; just a physiological reaction of love.

Dare I tell him that I too get the same sensations in the loins when I feel the love I have for him? Dare I tell him that I long for him to stroke me on the belly to the point where I would sprout an erection like an innocent puppy, all giddy and vulnerable?

Alas, I am not an innocent puppy, and I am not straight like him. I have crossed one too many boundaries and I am conditioned to associate male-love with orgasm. Unlike my friend, male-love for me has been sexualized.

How much can one man love another man before it becomes homosexual?

I think my friend lives at the extremes of man-to-man loving, right up to the edge of homosexuality but not crossing over. He has brought me this very edge, and I am teetering, doing everything I can not to fall over the boundary; to embrace his love for me without falling sexually in love with him.

I remember one time, in my adolescence, when I was stroking another dog, and it sprouted an erection. Out of curiosity, I reached out and touched its protruding red penis. I don't remember exactly all that happened after that, but I do remember that its face changed and its happy posture turned into a confused and possibly aggressive one. I also remember feeling as though I had crossed a boundary, and I stopped.

I believe that my straight friend loves me deeply. And I have come to love him back just as deeply, if not more. But it is uncomfortable for me to love a man so deeply and not have it turn sexual. I have only loved one other male figure so deeply and not have it be sexual: Father God.

Such intense man-to-man loving is radical. For me to receive such loving is like having someone open up a huge gaping wound in my heart, pour antiseptic into it, and having me lie there quietly, accepting it all without reacting.

It is killing me.

And yet it may be the only thing that will restore my manhood to me. To experience being fully loved by another man without having it be sexualized. To physically internalize God's masculine, fatherly love for me through the love of a straight man, in the real.

If it be Your will, my Lord, then let me die, that I may find myself resurrected pure and whole in You.