The Fourth Step, part one: SISSY
I am working a 12 step program right now and have been stuck on my 4th step--my fearless moral inventory--for a long time. But I've started to gain some steam lately, and I thought I would do the big 4th step--the one on my wife--on this blog. This being the big truth blog. Some background is required:
The program is Al-Anon, but it's not my wife who got me into it, it's my son, who had big drug problems in mid-adolescence. He's doing great now, a freshman in college, loving it, great relationships, great girlfriend, sober and hard working. A great deal to thank God about there.
Which leaves me, after years of dealing with him, left to have to deal with me. And my relationship with my wife.
A little more back story.
You all knew the sissy in elementary school. That was me. Don't know how I stepped into that role, but I was the sissy right out of central casting. Picked last for all sports. Delicate in mannerism. Effeminate in speech. Even now when I listen to tape recordings of myself from back then (we loved to do tape recorded shows on my dad's big old reel-to-reel Webcor) I get sick at what a sissy I sound like. No wonder the kids wanted to gang up and stone me on the playground: I was The Other! Fairy was the word used at the time. Or just plain Girl. But there was a switch. I wasn't actually homosexual. That crush on Martha Silver that I had the first year at summer camp and that filled me with longing for her all year long--while I was being called fairy by one and all-- was real. When I held hands with Elaine Rosenstein walking out of the woods at the next summer at summer camp--Martha was second fiddle that year--I had to turn kind of sideways so she wouldn't see the lump in my swimtrunks, and that was real too. But back in the real world I was four years behind and there were no girls who would go any where near holding my hand. Or at least I didn't have the courage to reach out and try. There were kids, both boys and girls, who were extremely cruel and said really terrible things to me and I remember their names and sometimes I Google them and not one of them has left the slightest ripple on the cyber sphere and when I compare that with my 30 plus pages of entries (I write for movies and television and that leaves a lot of tracks) I feel really good inside. All of this brought me to adolescence with a concrete mixer truck of insecurities sitting on my head. What girl would ever make out with me? If one wanted to, would I have the guts to make the move? And as I got closer to the age at which virginity started to really be on the line, there was: how do I know I'll be able to, you know, DO it? In high school I got into drama, got leads in plays, got fantastic grades in all my classes, got elected president of my class, went from outcast
to big man on campus, was surrounded by girls ready to kiss and be kissed--but I was still all bound up in sissyhood in my heart and three days of therapy a week every day of the year did nothing to help because I was afraid to open my mouth and express any one of my fears. I think that at that point I would rather have been shot in the head than say the word "masturbate" out loud. Because I was afraid that those cruel kids were right. That I was a fairy, doomed to be a fairy, would never be anything but a fairy. You know what? This is really hard because I'm feeling it all right now, the depression and fear and doubt and shame. Signing off for tonight. More to come.
The program is Al-Anon, but it's not my wife who got me into it, it's my son, who had big drug problems in mid-adolescence. He's doing great now, a freshman in college, loving it, great relationships, great girlfriend, sober and hard working. A great deal to thank God about there.
Which leaves me, after years of dealing with him, left to have to deal with me. And my relationship with my wife.
A little more back story.
You all knew the sissy in elementary school. That was me. Don't know how I stepped into that role, but I was the sissy right out of central casting. Picked last for all sports. Delicate in mannerism. Effeminate in speech. Even now when I listen to tape recordings of myself from back then (we loved to do tape recorded shows on my dad's big old reel-to-reel Webcor) I get sick at what a sissy I sound like. No wonder the kids wanted to gang up and stone me on the playground: I was The Other! Fairy was the word used at the time. Or just plain Girl. But there was a switch. I wasn't actually homosexual. That crush on Martha Silver that I had the first year at summer camp and that filled me with longing for her all year long--while I was being called fairy by one and all-- was real. When I held hands with Elaine Rosenstein walking out of the woods at the next summer at summer camp--Martha was second fiddle that year--I had to turn kind of sideways so she wouldn't see the lump in my swimtrunks, and that was real too. But back in the real world I was four years behind and there were no girls who would go any where near holding my hand. Or at least I didn't have the courage to reach out and try. There were kids, both boys and girls, who were extremely cruel and said really terrible things to me and I remember their names and sometimes I Google them and not one of them has left the slightest ripple on the cyber sphere and when I compare that with my 30 plus pages of entries (I write for movies and television and that leaves a lot of tracks) I feel really good inside. All of this brought me to adolescence with a concrete mixer truck of insecurities sitting on my head. What girl would ever make out with me? If one wanted to, would I have the guts to make the move? And as I got closer to the age at which virginity started to really be on the line, there was: how do I know I'll be able to, you know, DO it? In high school I got into drama, got leads in plays, got fantastic grades in all my classes, got elected president of my class, went from outcast
to big man on campus, was surrounded by girls ready to kiss and be kissed--but I was still all bound up in sissyhood in my heart and three days of therapy a week every day of the year did nothing to help because I was afraid to open my mouth and express any one of my fears. I think that at that point I would rather have been shot in the head than say the word "masturbate" out loud. Because I was afraid that those cruel kids were right. That I was a fairy, doomed to be a fairy, would never be anything but a fairy. You know what? This is really hard because I'm feeling it all right now, the depression and fear and doubt and shame. Signing off for tonight. More to come.
posted by Tom at 12:29 AM
3 Comments:
Thanks, Jim. Good luck in the big city. Let me know how it goes.
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I am looking forward to reading more about your life. I was the sissy too but attracted to guys as well as girls.
I am married to a woman (for 26 years, two great kids). We are still trying to make it work in spite of all outside dire predictions of failure. I'm also in a 12 step program but I'm the drunk and now on Step 8. The depression, anger, fear, shame, etc. etc. continue to wash over me in waves but at least I now have a choice of how to deal with them.
Thanks for sharing and keep up the good work.
Flip
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