A Few Course Corrections

This week has been very productive for William and I. Getting all of the anger and pain out in the open last week was actually a good thing. A few other things happened this week that has led to us making a few changes - "course corrections" according to our therapist - in our approach to incorporating William's world into our relationship.

The first correction is in how we are communicating. Up until this week, any discussion involving this subject usually dissolved into one or both of us getting upset and/or defensive. We learned this week that verbally identifying the intent behind a question or request is very helpful in diffusing that toxicity. We were able to have a very intense discussion on Tuesday this week without either one of us getting upset...and it was one of the most productive conversations to date.

William also had an epiphany this week. He learned that he knows nothing about what I like in the bedroom. It's not that I never told him or tried to share it with him; it was "selective memory" on his part. This realization took him a bit aback; it was a very solid piece of evidence showing him that his choices had really affected us. And even worse, I had forgotten what I liked in the bedroom. The truth is that we've had seven years of "quickies", not meaningful sex. William followed up his epiphany with sincere efforts to identify MY needs in the bedroom. And, boy, did he do it right! For the first time, he was able to demonstrate that he was capable of fulfilling my needs. Wow. And just as important to me, he was able to meet my needs and still enjoy himself. His response to this discovery showed me that he truly "got" it. And even more importantly, he gets that the changes that he is making need to be lifelong ones. This has helped immensely to lessen my anxiety. I feel like if he "gets" it, he'll be less likely to fall back into his old habits.

William's efforts made me happy, then, to work to identify what was not working for him in our efforts to satisfy his needs. Our stated goal was to try to fulfill his needs to the maximum degree possible while making sure that I was okay with what was happening. We were able to set aside a few hours this week to experiment a bit. William was very good about making sure that my feelings were taken into consideration during our session. He reported afterward that the changes we made were good ones and he was very satisfied with what we did together. And absolutely just as importantly, I enjoyed myself also.

Our most important realization this week is that the focus of our efforts needs to be on both of us. We both need to work to make sure that both of us are satisfied in whatever we do. We understand that there will have to be some changes and compromises, this can't be about just one of us, but at the same time, the truth is that if either of us has to give up an important part of themselves, this won't work.

And so our journey continues...together.

Hidden Reservoirs

Thursday evening, William and I were discussing our "activities" in the bedroom to date. These are the words that William chose to express his feelings: "while what we have been doing in the bedroom has been fun, it is not as fulfilling or completely satisfying as what [he] had been doing on his own." oh. my. God. As if those words didn't cause enough hurt on their own, William also unknowingly tapped a hidden reservoir of hurt, pain and anger that I didn't even know was there. The bucket turned into a wellspring and all those feelings that had been buried inside came welling up to the surface and completely spilled over. You can imagine our "conversation" from there. It was NOT pretty. My face was swollen the next day from all the crying that I did.

Fortunately, our appointment with the therapist was on Friday morning, so we were able to continue our "discussion" with some assistance. It did help....and I felt better this morning.

Right now, I am choosing not to go into great detail about my hurt and pain, but in a nutshell, my feelings are a result of the choices that William made over the past seven years and the effect that those choices had on our relationship. Prior to my discovery, William believed that the efforts that he made to act on his fantasies in secret affected only him. But that is not the reality. There were then -and still are now - repercussions from his past choices. And we have to deal with them.

I can accept who he is now with little effort. But apparently, based on what happened Thursday and Friday, I am still working to come to terms with who he has been for the past seven years. I fervently hope that we have tapped the last of any hidden reservoirs of negative feelings that I have, but I don't know. There may still be consequences for us to deal with over the upcoming weeks, months and maybe even years.

Love, committment and communication - all are healing, but it still takes time...

One Step Back, Two Steps Forward

The "mass" hanging over my head has shrunk to the point where it fits into a bucket next to me. It's full of all of the negative emotions that are primarily associated with my feelings about the past and the "affair" that I feel William had. Every so often, I learn of something new that he did (or get enough detail about something that it changes my mental picture of what happened and makes it new). When that happens, the "new information" gets dumped into the bucket and is stirred up...along with all the bad feelings that I have about the lying and scheming that went on for so long. Fortunately, most days, the bucket settles quickly enough, it usually only takes a hug and "I love you" from William to make the pain goes away. And those times occur less and less.

Last Thursday was a wonderful day - my best to date. Then Friday also went well, then Saturday, - three whole wonderful days! But then Sunday hit. And my brother came to visit. My brother who is on the verge of divorcing his wife. He feels alone in his marriage; his wife doesn't love him. He told me of his efforts to try to communicate with her about his feelings...and her lack of response...and told me of his pain over that. It really stirred the "bucket". Unfortunately, I didn't get much of a chance to talk to William that evening and the pain got a chance to take hold...and started to cause problems.


So Monday started off not great...and got worse. A little devil sat on my shoulder and whispered into my ear all day "he lied to you for all those years, habits are hard to break. How would you know? He's very practiced at deceiving you. Are you sure you know everything?" And I told him, "William loves me. He had convinced himself that he was harming no one - he didn't do it on purpose. He loves me." Then the little devil whispered "Like an alcoholic, he could convince himself again that this would be a one time thing. And it could happen again. Are you sure that you know everything?" Until that damn devil got the best of me and I decided that I needed to look through William's email. My hope was to find NOTHING to shut that little devil up, but instead, I found...well, something. I found evidence of a secret email address. William had covered his tracks well, but I happened upon a copy of a year-old email that he had forwarded to his secret address and had forgotten to delete. So I found it. And, oh boy, that bucket completely spilled over.


William was out for the evening, but I couldn't wait and called him. To his credit, he gave me his password and told me what he thought I would find there. He was right - except he forgot about the email regarding a profile that he had started on a ts-dating website. Ouch! It was rather ugly when he got home. He tried to walk away once, but I didn't let him. He did have an explanation. He said that that he was looking at photos of men in lingerie, not trying to meet them. I already knew about the photos of shemales that he had downloaded, so his view is that this was not new information. He felt that he didn't lie. But he did admit that he had chosen not to tell me about the email account because he thought it would cause me more pain. I'm not sure what I think about that.



So...where am I today? Well, partly, I'm relieved. I actually do believe William when he said that he had not used the site to meet others (it helped that he never completed his profile and the last log in date was the date that he registered.) And I'm very glad that I didn't find anything else - it reassured me that he is telling me the "big truths" - and that what he is not telling me is not as big as my mind sometimes makes it out to be. So in some ways, my looking was not a bad thing.

But really, it was. A bad thing to do. And I'm mostly very sorry that I ever did it to begin with. I violated William with that action. It was a big mistake on my part and I've been thinking about it all day long. The realization I came to today is, that in order for us to succeed, I must trust William. While I may be rightfully angry over his keeping the secret for all those years, the truth is that he did not choose to tell me his secret, I found it out. And now that I know, I must prove to him that I am trustworthy to keep it. And to do that, I do demand that he reveal himself fully to me, but I must also allow him to do it in his way and his time. I must trust him when he says that he loves me and that he is now actively working to put us first. I must show him the trust that I am asking him to show me. Because the reality is, if I fail to do this, he is fully capable of continuing to live the lie again without me ever knowing. And that is unacceptable to me.

I have a new dream. A dream where William and I create a world where we can both live happily, able to express our needs to one another, knowing that our partner is there to meet those needs, no matter what they are. And I must do my part to create that world. So tonight, I apologized to William for my actions yesterday. I gave him permission to change the password on his email account so that I cannot access it. He deserves to be able to have some privacy - and as difficult as it is for me, I will choose to trust that he will not abuse it. You should have seen William's face...

I am writing this story down so that you all know that there ARE and WILL be bad days. And sadly, sometimes one partner will do something to hurt the other partner. But if you love each other, you must ask forgiveness and then allow yourself to be forgiven. Know that just because we have a bad day now and then, and just because this is not easy for either of us, it doesn't mean that we are going to fail. In fact, quite the opposite. The more we weather, the stronger our foundation becomes. We are both committed to one another. We both love one another. And tonight, we are both more than okay, we are awesome.

Midnight Ramblings...

It's the middle of the night. William is sleeping. We had a wonderful day today, so I don't want to wake him up to talk about this, but I can't sleep. Thoughts are swirling around and around in my mind. I want to make them stop. So, I'm up here in my living room...blogging.



I have known William for 9-1/2 years. We moved in together after 18 months of dating and got married about 9 months after that. Sex was great in the beginning, but even before the marriage, the frequency had dwindled to about once a week. I was barely satisfied with that, but everything else about William was wonderful, so I didn't push the issue. We are both older and wanted a family, so we started trying right away. If we had know that I would get pregnant on our wedding night, we might have waited, but we were still excited to be expecting. Our son was born very prematurely and we spent 4 months in a NICU about 2 hours away. William and I had had sex the night before he was born and to this day, William believes that may be have been a factor in his early birth. Sex post-baby was affected, I thought, by the stress and strain of our situation. It was not very frequent, maybe once a month or so, but with everything else going on, it was not an issue. When our son was 14 months old, we started trying for baby number two. Sex was more frequent during this phase of our marriage due to our efforts. It took six months to get pregnant, but it did happen...and the sex stopped. Due to our first's prematurity, I had a cerclage put in and the doctors forbade me to have sex; I couldn't even have an orgasm! I was not happy, but William was all right...too all-right. It bothered me a little bit, I remember, even at the time. I had offered to help him out in the beginning, but he said that he would take care of his needs - and I was not thrilled about not being able to participate in the act myself, so I let him. Looking back, it was waaay too easy... After our daughter was born, sex was almost non-existant. The stress of a new baby, the medical issues that continued to plague our son, the stress of my husband's job, etc. All were too easy explanations for why my husband didn't want to have sex. He didn't like sex, he said. When the pressure got too much, his libido was the first thing to go, he said. Several times, I hinted, even asked for sex and was turned down. I could always get his body interested, even when he said "no", but somehow, it seemed wrong to do that. "No" to a woman, always means "no". So I didn't...and got more and more frustrated. William was very aware of this. About every six months or so, I would get upset with him over the lack of sex. In the cover of darkness, in our bed, I would broach the subject with him. It always ended up with me in tears, asking "why?" Why don't you want to have sex with me? Am I too fat? Am I too ugly? Are you gay?? What is wrong??? And nothing ever changed. But our life outside the bedroom was great. William is a wonderful husband and father; he was affectionate outside of the bedroom with kisses and hugs for both me and the children, so I decided that I should be happy about everything else and let the sex go. It festered, though...and about every six months or so, I would blow up at him again. I am ashamed to say this, but it had gotten to the point where I consciously considered having an affair. I didn't do it, but I was unhappy enough that I had also decided that our next mid-night conversation would include this "threat." I hated myself for that - I'd like to think that I really wouldn't have done it, but if the situation had gone on for years...who knows. Anyway, it's moot now.



So on Sept 17th, I discover "the reason why." Why my husband didn't want to have sex with me. It was because he was having sex with himself. Two to four times a week! He may have only dressed once a month, but the rest of the time, he masturbated to photos of himself dressed in ladies lingerie with wigs and make-up. He masturbated to videos of himself parading around in clothes, screwing himself with a dildo, giving oral sex to a dildo as he imagined it was his own penis. When he knew that I was unhappy, he still chose to do this instead of making me happy.


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William got up and came upstairs to find me. He was willing to talk, but I had blogged my mind mostly clear, so I went to bed. I'm leaving this blog intact because it really helped me to define WHY I feel that he cheated on me. oh, my mind knows that he didn't...but tell that to my heart...

I Never Saw a Thing...

"Prior to Sept 17th, I was just driving down the highway of my life...happy, driving. Going pretty fast, but clear on where I was and where I was going. When out of nowhere...BAM! - The next thing I knew, I was in the middle of nowhere. And I never saw it coming. I feel like the old cliche "Honestly, officer, I never saw a thing..." And afterwards...nothing looked right, nothing looked familiar. I think that I've been racing around, at about 100 mph, the last two weeks, looking for something familiar, something I recognize, something to lead me back to the road that I was on. But I'm starting to realize that my old life is lost. Lost forever. And I'm out here, in uncharted territory, all alone. Imagine how this would feel to you..."

This analogy came to me yesterday as I was trying make my spouse understand exactly how I was feeling. My entire life has changed. The foundation of my relationship with my spouse has been shaken. I am alone, now, like I have never been before. Those friends that I could always tell everything to, can no longer be the same intimate friends that they once were. I feel alone in my circle because, now, I have a secret to keep...all alone. And the only other person who knows it is the person who caused this pain to begin with.

Yesterday was...not peaceful. But last night, it occurred to me that I could stop racing around trying to find something that is gone. It occurred to me that maybe I could slow down a little. Maybe I should slow down a little. Maybe I should even think about stopping to look at the scenery here...where I am now. Yesterday, this thought was terrifying - because I have no idea where I am, maybe I'm on quicksand? Maybe it's dark out there... It's scary.

But today, I'm feeling that maybe, probably, the sun is shining out there. Maybe there are flowers and grass to look at here - where I am now. And just maybe, because I still know where my destination is, I can find my way to where I want to end up. And yes, my world has shrunk, but I need to focus on the fact that I am not alone. I am still very frightened and I'm still glancing around for my old road, and sometimes, I panic and start racing again. But my spouse is with me. And I am relying on him to help us forge a new road together.

How Far Has He Gone?

Two nights ago, my husband cried. He never cries. We were talking about what to say in our counselling session the next day. William shared that he is terrified over the implications of this. He is humiliated. He is sick. He does not want to explore this side of himself, yet he realizes that in order for us to incorporate this into our lives, he must. I tried to reassure him that I would be with him during this journey, but he stopped me. He said that I didn't know everything.

oh, my God. My ears popped and I could hear the blood pounding in my ears. I asked what more was there? William took my hands and led me downstairs to a box in our closet. He took a small videotape out and handed it to me. I looked at it for a moment and asked what was on it. He said it showed exactly how far he had gone in to satisfy his needs. My head kept pounding and I just looked at the cassette in my hand. He said that he wanted nothing more than to destroy it so I couldn't see how much he had humiliated himself, but in the interest of honesty, he had to show it to me. I can't begin to tell you how scared I was. I asked him to please, just tell me what was on it. He gestured at a dildo in the box and told his secret. He said that he had gotten "oral" with it. (I already knew that he had been anal with it also.)

Can you believe that I was a little bit relieved? Here, my husband was crying and in pain and all I could think was "this is completely consistent with autogynephilia." I have to confess - I had to ask just one more question - "was there anyone else on the tape or was he by himself?" He said it was just him, he thinks that he was pretending that the phallus was his own penis. And then he broke down and just sobbed.

oh, my heart... I don't want to disparage anyone who is happy with who they are, but what an awful thing this is - to be compelled to do something that tears you up inside and causes you so much pain. I grabbed William and held him. There was no doubt in my mind as to what I had to do. I handed him the cassette back and said "Here. This is yours." He said "no, I can't." I asked him what do you want to do with it? He said "I just want it destroyed!" So I destroyed it. I smashed it and pulled the tape out and completely obliterated it.

I absolutely feel it was the right thing to do. I do not want to humiliate William; I think that if I had watched that tape, I might have broken something in our relationship that couldn't have been fixed, so I'm very grateful to have destroyed it. Yet my mind keeps wandering back to that tape and wonders... Why does he do this? If I had watched it, would I have learned something helpful? Something that might have helped us get a little farther down the road a little faster? Would I now be certain that this is all? Would it have helped to rebuild my trust - that he has told me everything? or would seeing it have made it worse?

oh, God. What an awful thing this is... Yet it is who my husband is...and I love him. So onward we go...

The Day the World was Turned Upside-Down

Thursday, September 17, 2009 - the day my world changed. It has only been 4 days, but at the same time, it has also been a lifetime ago. I'm starting this story the same way that this journey was started. With the discovery...



It started off an a non-typical day anyway. I was exhausted from being up most of the night with my son who was suffering from a terrible bout of the stomach flu. I kept him home from kindergarten, but my daughter still went to preschool that morning, giving me a little time to prepare for my work meeting over the lunch hour. Even though I consider myself a stay-at-home mom, I still take the occasional temp job just to bring in some extra money. About 10:00am, I happened to glance over at my son who was snuggled into his blanket on the couch. He was feeling better at this point and looked so sweet...I thought "I need to take his picture". Indulging the impulse, I walked over to the shelf and grabbed the camera. Moving close to my child, I turned it on and a photo came up - the camera had been left on the view setting. It took me a double and then a triple take to understand what I was looking at. It was a close-up photo of a man's crotch in lacy red garters and panties. My ears popped and my head got fuzzy. My next thought was "this isn't our camera" followed by "someone is playing a joke on me". I started flipping the photos backwards. About 6 photos in (all close-ups of various body parts in sexy lingerie), I focused in on a full-body image. My eyes saw the dark mustache on the face under the long blonde wig and everything momentarily went blurry. Do you know the scene in the movie where the main character discovers something? The camera quickly focuses in on him, but the scene all around him goes fuzzy and jumps around? Do you know that that really happens? As I realized that I was looking at photos of my husband in our living room - there was our couch - the same one that my innocent son was laying on - I felt shaky, nauseous, panicked. I quickly flipped through the photos again and again, trying to comprehend what I was looking at. My next thought was of my son -- he couldn't know that mommy was upset. I don't know how I found the strength to say as calmly as I could "Mommy will be right back, sweetie" and nearly ran from the room into my daughter's room where I started to hyperventilate. I remember that I kept saying "Breathe, just breathe, oh God, breathe, oh, God, just breathe..." I was shaking. My brain kept trying to grasp what I had seen My thoughts turned to "Who took the pictures? My husband is gay and having a gay affair - in my house!" Who is it??? Is it Steve? or John? or someone I don't know??? Who took those pictures???
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I started the above post four days into our journey. It's amazing how far one can come in such a short time... My husband is not gay; he is an autogynephiliac. The word fits, according to him. It is now day 6 - my reeling world has slowly come to rest, upright, I believe. We are still together. I feel such love for him and I believe him when he says that he loves me. We have committed to work through this and have an appointment in 2 days to see a counselor both to help William come to terms with who he is and to help us as a couple integrate this into our lives. At times, for me, the pain, rage, anger, betrayal that I felt at the moment of discovery wells up inside. When he holds me, though, I am awed by the level of trust that he is placing in me when he tells me exactly what he is feeling and I feel like our love affair is just beginning.

This blog is not about my husband - it is about me and how I am dealing with the changes that are occurring in my life. At this point, I debated whether or not to change the above, but decided to leave it in as it IS the point where our journey started.