As I write this I am locked in my bedroom awaiting my damsel to set me free… She is trying on her wedding dress and new shoes, in following tradition I am to avoid her at all costs until the dress is back in its cubby and hidden from my prying eyes.
While waiting I thought I would announce my next posting series. This series will be covering Mixed Orientation Marriages and relationships and will be discussing why some are successful and why some are not.
This is the first post in this series, this post is very much about me and parts of my life journey that have led to today’s reality. I felt that it is necessary to show the beginnings of my journey into a Mixed Orientation Marriage (M.O.M.) so that you know who I am and so you can see what Anna and I see, which is something different and honest.
Here is a little bit of my story, how I got involved in the LDS LGBT movement and the very beginnings of Anna’s and my relationship:
My journey down my life’s road was not an easy one. It, as I now refer to it as, was long, both uphill and down, windy, hot and made of gravel. Some people asked me, “Why are you doing this to yourself?” I always answered, “Because of my faith.” My faith is not defined as a religion, instead I define it as knowing that everything has a purpose and a meaning that effects the future. My faith is my story, and is the causality of what I call my life today.
“I became immersed in the opposite of tolerance, intolerance.”
I grew up in the majestic rain forest wonders of Western Oregon and Washington, where the giant fir trees, huge lakes fed by aquifers and runoff from glaciers hidden in mountains that I hope to one day climb and cities neighbored by small towns that mostly respected personal choice and diversity. All of this made me into the reality I am today. It was here that seeing two men kiss in public was part of my normal day. While at church it was common to see gay men sit in sacrament, partaking of sacrament, and passing the sacrament. Then I moved to South West Idaho, where the barren desert landscape mimics that of the conservative insanity which seems to harbor homophobia and racism. I moved from a culture that did not care, but loved, and into a culture where not caring was no longer an option. I became immersed in the opposite of tolerance, intolerance. I soon learned that I was required by my peers to be either a
farm raised gay bashing hick, or an all-loving assumed to be “you-are-obviously-a-sinner” liberal who was socially ostracized and constantly judged by those who make up his very religion and social group. I took the second path, and began a God guided journey that ended after four long hard college years and then renewed itself in messages of action, with an inspired group called Mormons Building Bridges.
Through my experiences as an exploring college student I learned that not caring is one of the most important lessons a person can understand. By not caring about another person’s life I was able to rid the judgmental attitude that I gained from those who made me think it was a requirement of being Mormon. Along with this I was able to be honest with myself about who I am!
As a teenager I was too busy to date, but I kind of knew that I liked guys over girls. In college I learned more about the Gospel and as I progressed through my religious studies program at the wonderful College of Idaho I soon learned that I was a phenomenon in the LDS Church. I was chivalrous, I dressed well, I knew how to make my hair look good, I shaped my eyebrows, and I had a successful and meaningful future planned. As I became more engrossed in the emotionally harmful social group of my singles branch I hid who I was and I started dating LDS women who were more conservative then a straight line. After a year of this social pressure induced trauma I decided to back away and out of this group. I then sent myself into a promise, two years of no dating so I could answer one question. How can I be gay and Mormon? I also found solace in a group of ‘liberal’ Mormons, who could care less if someone was gay.
“I learned that I did not need to “pray away” the gay, I did not need to “fast the gay gone,” these practices are not religious belief in action this is self inflicted torture engrained by social bias and prejudice.”
The next two years were easily the hardest of my life, so far… I read the scriptures more than a bookworm could in its lifetime. Soon my scriptures contained no margins; they were overly filled with notes about personal revelations, questions and thoughts that begged the question, “is being gay ok?” I prayed, I Prayed, I PRAYED. AND I PRAYED. I also fasted, often. These two years made me realize that I am who I am for a specific reason. I have my experiences and gifts so that the future could benefit from them. I learned that I did not need to “pray away” the gay, I did not need to “fast the gay gone,” these practices are not religious belief in action this is self inflicted torture engrained by social bias and prejudice. I also learned that it is ok to like guys over girls, and I also learned that my beliefs, my faith and my eternal purpose were just as needed as honestly acknowledging who I am. Once I did this, once I said I am gay, my life changed and God took over. For the first time in my life I was in balance with both my spiritual and personal selves.
To my surprise, about six months after this self exploration ended, I went on a date with a gal who I am now planning to marry. Somehow the gay man inside of me fell in love with a wonderful woman who is my yin and I her yang.
Some of you who are reading this may be thinking that a gay man gone straightish is a Mormon excuse to fit into the norm, for me this is not the case. I promised myself that I would not marry a girl unless I knew I loved her and that my attraction to men would not harm our relationship. I take this VERY seriously! Not only is this the case, but our relationship is not the “Mormon norm,” Anna is Unitarian. We are very open about my sexuality with each other and for some reason I am more attracted to her then I have ever been to ANY man. Now that you know that I fell head over heels for on our first date, let me share how I got involved with Mormons Building Bridges.
“I am a Mormon gay man who is marrying a beautiful woman”
A year and a half ago I began to gather information from interviews and online sources and was soon SHOCKED at how many people in the LGBT community had been negatively harmed both emotionally and/or physically due to the negative social occurrences that have come from LDS social groups. This was my motivator; this information was what triggered an earthquake in my life. I began doing silent activism and helped those men who I could, I told my leaders about what I was doing and offered my time. I did the Mormon thing and prayed for opportunities, and I received many. Day after day I met LDS LGBT members. I heard story after story about how social pressure(s) had caused depression, feelings of being ostracized, and humiliation. When the word got around that I was doing this research and I was an openly gay member of the LDS Church the backlash began towards me, and I soon experienced the homophobia and hate that is common here in Idaho and Utah LDS social groups. These experiences shocked me and forced me into a meditative deep prayer.
From this prayer I emerged a new being with new motivation. Personal Revelation taught me to be prepared for an opportunity to change the homophobic behavior that had taken over much of the LDS social culture. I prepared myself through reading literature and creating presentations that I could use for action. I also wrote a monthly column called ‘Ask a Mormon’ for the College of Idaho’s newspaper where, along with other religious issues, I discussed Mormonism and homosexuality. It was in these college newspaper articles that I “officially” came out. I also worked within my singles branch in showing that yes, it is possible for someone to be Mormon and gay! I kept myself in this circle of initiatives until Mormons Building Bridges came into the spot light, what I had been waiting to happen finally happened! I took this opportunity to build a Mormons Building Bridges group here in Boise, Idaho, the first group to branch itself off of the main MBB one in Utah. We are still young and in the planning stages, but we will and have been creating opportunities for the LDS social mindset on issues of LGBT to change in Idaho. I am also involved in Mormon Allies.
To end I would like to share a scripture with you all which helped me along the way: 3rd Nephi 27:9 “Ask and Ye Shall Receive, knock and it shall be opened unto you.” I would not have been able to help others as I have if it were not for the advice this scripture gives. This scripture has been the teaching factor to me that without God, nothing can be done.
-thatboyleroy
If you truly love her, you won’t sacrifice either of you at the altar. Love each other enough to walk away.
A few things here.
I don’t know either of you but i can tell you this…. you sound just like i did 20 years ago. So full of hope. That my “faith” was a good enough reason to marry my best friend. A woman whom i convinced myself i was attracted to. For various reasons it worked. I was able to think about things that turned me on, and she was open to that as well. However 15 years later the marriage ended and she remains very damaged and i remorseful for putting her through it all.
God made you Gay because you are Gay. He did not make a straight person to in faith go and find a Gay person to be with. If you are Gay then you are gay. If you are straight then you are straight.
You are both young i presume? Please do this young lady a favor and be honest with her that 20 years down the road this enthusiasm to be together for your religions sake is just not reason to marry. Why not keep her as a best friend? And BE her best friend by letting her go…
Also Leroy… the group Mormons Building Bridges is as much of a farse as Mixed orientation marriages are. They marched in parades last year under a banner of building bridges with the gay community. Yet this very story above reminds us exactly what the truth of that group is. Mormons building bridges is more about Mormons finding bridges and and steps and stairs to hoist up the LDS gay members into mixed orientation marriages and as far away from being WHO they are as possible.
I for one hope to see Mormons building bridges as FAR away from the gay community as possible as soon as possible. The word is leaking out about the damage they have done and continue to do in the community.
Leroy please don’t contribute to this. There are way too many LGBT that have finally come to accept themselves for exactly who their true nature is. They don’t need to be made feel “less then” by people who are so much more “faithful” and willing to marry even when its against their nature as a gay person.
As far as Mormons Building Bridges goes…. awful awful group full of super controlling admins who censor the crap out of the group. If you say ANYTHING for gay marriage it will be deleted and marked as political. HA what a joke! Yet if you suggest a mixed orientation marriage it is hailed and applauded.
Please let your dear Ana live a life as she should. As a straight woman who deserves to find a straight man and not have to constantly feel that she has to try to be something she is not (a man)
And please dearest Leroy. Allow yourself to get to a more open minded city, and get in a gay mens therapy group for accepting yourself. And BE YOU!
And stay away from Mormons building bridges!! They are snakes in the grass!!
Str8wife is right. The statistics for successful mixed orientation marriages are abysmal, and everybody who entered one thought they would be the exception, no doubt just like you are thinking. Having done the same thing myself, thinking I would be the exception, and now being divorced, it makes me sad to see others choose the same thing because I know where they’re likely to end up. When even the LDS church reverses course on this and advises against what you’re doing, after years of recommending it, maybe you should consider that there’s a good reason for that change.
I’m sure you anticipated comments like these and are determined to press ahead anyway. I honestly don’t comprehend your choice. Either you are actually more bisexual than gay or else you are willing to settle for a type of marriage that I don’t understand but can’t imagine wanting if one is actually gay. To cut oneself off from the type of intimacy one was made for, in deference to a discredited religion, makes little sense to me. I hope you can make more of a success of it than experience suggests is probable.
Unless you plan to forgo encounters with men outside of marriage, what is the point of marrying her? I assume you love her as much as a gay man can love a woman but you cannot say you can give her the same kind of love as a str8 man would. You have no basis to know what that would be like. You will deprive her of that experience. In addition, homosexual attraction seems to intensify as people age. In 10 -20 years, you may no longer be willing to ignore those urges, and she will be left alone at an age when it is much harder to find a “forever” mate. Finally, what a sacrifice for her to know that her primary relationship will be with someone who wishes she was something she is not. How very selfish of you.
Even if you plan to forgo encounters with men, it might not be enough. I was married to a bisexual woman for 20 years… We thought love would be enough. We thought you fall in love with the person, not the gender. Well, I’m str8 and she isn’t. i fell in love with a woman and she fell in love with a person. but I’m a man, and the way I had to deny, change, limit the maleness of myself in the face of constant emotional longing for a woman and lack of desire for me as a man eventually became too much. I still love her dearly, but she needs to be with a woman or with a man who doesn’t need a monogamous marriage. And i need to be with a straight woman who wants me as a man, and wants me to be a man, and who doesn’t long for someone else.
Really, think very very hard about this before you get into it.
The above comments may sound cruel and missing empathy, but in fact they are just opposite, trying to save your lives (maybe literally) or at least years of them. I am living a M.O.M…. and from my position of a str8wife I say loud: please, please, please, do not do it. Maybe you think you can. Maybe she thinks she can. Me too, I thought so. I admitted to myself the truth just a decade later, with a bunch of kids who used to ask “why I am always so sad” and literally trapped into my marriage which I can´t leave for maybe a decade more. My husband, AFAIK, has no lover. I do not either. But both of us are unhappy, trying to educate our kids in a family which is everything else but happy. Now I know I CANNOT do it, and I guess He realized too. We made a great, great mistake, which led us to a long, endless (as it seems to me) path of suffering and agony.
Please, I beg you, listen to us who are talking to you from our experience. Don´t do it to yourself. Do not do it to her.
A few things here.
I don’t know either of you but i can tell you this…. you sound just like i did 20 years ago. So full of hope. That my “faith” was a good enough reason to marry my best friend. A woman whom i convinced myself i was attracted to. For various reasons it worked. I was able to think about things that turned me on, and she was open to that as well. However 15 years later the marriage ended and she remains very damaged and i remorseful for putting her through it all.
God made you Gay because you are Gay. He did not make a straight person to in faith go and find a Gay person to be with. If you are Gay then you are gay. If you are straight then you are straight.
You are both young i presume? Please do this young lady a favor and be honest with her that 20 years down the road this enthusiasm to be together for your religions sake is just not reason to marry. Why not keep her as a best friend? And BE her best friend by letting her go…
Also Leroy… the group Mormons Building Bridges is as much of a farse as Mixed orientation marriages are. They marched in parades last year under a banner of building bridges with the gay community. Yet this very story above reminds us exactly what the truth of that group is. Mormons building bridges is more about Mormons finding bridges and and steps and stairs to hoist up the LDS gay members into mixed orientation marriages and as far away from being WHO they are as possible.
I for one hope to see Mormons building bridges as FAR away from the gay community as possible as soon as possible. The word is leaking out about the damage they have done and continue to do in the community.
Leroy please don’t contribute to this. There are way too many LGBT that have finally come to accept themselves for exactly who their true nature is. They don’t need to be made feel “less then” by people who are so much more “faithful” and willing to marry even when its against their nature as a gay person.
As far as Mormons Building Bridges goes…. awful awful group full of super controlling admins who censor the crap out of the group. If you say ANYTHING for gay marriage it will be deleted and marked as political. HA what a joke! Yet if you suggest a mixed orientation marriage it is hailed and applauded.
Please let your dear Ana live a life as she should. As a straight woman who deserves to find a straight man and not have to constantly feel that she has to try to be something she is not (a man)
And please dearest Leroy. Allow yourself to get to a more open minded city, and get in a gay mens therapy group for accepting yourself. And BE YOU!
And stay away from Mormons building bridges!! They are snakes in the grass!!
My soon-to-be ex husband and I thought the same thing. 7.5 years and two children later, we’re divorcing. As do EIGHTY-FIVE PERCENT of all MOMs. Of those 15% who manage to stay together, most are either celibate or have open marriages. Is that really what you want? And if it still is, think about it four or five times before you consider bringing children into your family. Explaining this to kids is horrible.
Go see a therapist together before you say your “I do’s.” You both have the right to know exactly what you’re getting into. I have no regrets about how things have gone down for me. But I WOULD ABSOLUTELY NOT recommend this path for anyone else. It’s hard, lonely, frustrating, and has left all the straight spouses I know needing a lot of therapy for how inadequate we feel when it’s over.