Working through some things

Hi friends, I haven;t logged in for a while, there's a lot going on and so little time. Last time I updated, I was just starting to resolve some dark feelings and i have continued to feel better and better about that. But right now I'm working through some things and I wonder if you all can help me think it through.

If you don't know my background I'll give that really briefly:

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I was in the closet all my life until age 36, came out as gay (that was 2 1/2 years ago), was married with a little girl. Decided to separate year later but stayed in the family home for another full year for practical reasons. In the meantime, about 6 months after separating I met a woman who i have now been with for a year, and we just moved in together about 6 months ago. She was in a similar position to me coming out late in life and separating from her husband. She and I are really happy together, very much in love, and committed to building a future. She's got 2 sons as well. Just a few months after moving in together, so that would be 4 months ago, her ex husband committed suicide, life has been very difficult since then, more for her than me, but that put me into a really dark period for some time. She is grieving, but very strong, and her boys are managing really well.

That's the end of background -------------------

So here's where things stand. My partner and I are back to a stage where we can find moments of very wonderful joy, although for her this is not easy and she's struggling trough grief, but we know she will get through it. Myself, I am finding other private moments of joy and embracing who i am and my journey. I've got the most amazing group of friends here in my city, including a big group of queer friends, of all the letters in the big rainbow family , whom I've made mostly to find support after coming out. I'm so lucky to have them, i need them now as much as i did when first coming out. We share our difficulties, our fears, our steps forward, our crushes, our celebrations. We go out dancing once a month to the wee hours, and meet for drinks outside of that, and text and message and so on. Wonderful people. I feel like my life as a gay woman is really full and i'm very happy about that.

Ok so the issue is this. There's this set of feelings, it may come off as sounding like regrets, but that's not quite what it is. I'm struggling to find a way to really feel clear and harmonious and present in my current life. It's hard to explain, but i'll try to keep it short not to bore you all. One thing is my life in my current relationship which fulfills almost every single aspect of my needs, except a portion which i think i cannot fulfill, and i think i need to find peace with. Well as you probably can understand, she fulfills my emotional, intimate and romantic needs, sex with her is the most natural, incredible powerful thing, even through grief and pain, we make love and cry sometimes through the painful days. She is comforting, supportive, wonderful in every way. And I'm finally me, on my own, and with her. I feel me as I walk down the street, totally comfortable in my own skin, proud of being butch, proud of being visible in being gay (I am open about who I am, including coming out late), my partner is amazing, she makes me feel like the me that I am is sexy and desirable and I finally understand alot of things about my needs I never would have understood without the kind of love i share with her. I also love the family we're creating. But. And here's where the disconnect is. Guys, I still love my old family. like heartbreakingly love my old family. I still love my ex husband, exactly as much as i always have. The thing is, I cannot get from him what I can from my partner, because I'm gay, simple. And that's why we've separated, that cannot be fixed, and that created a gulf between us that i finally solved by separating from him. But m ex and I get along so well, he's an amazing dad, an amazing co-parent. We used to have loads of marital struggles with communication and working together, but that has all dissolved as we work together for our daughter.

I think I already know the answer is that i still have that family, and i can still love it and embrace that, because we get to spend time together weekly, he is really kind and welcoming to my partner and her boys (who have benefited by having him in their lives especially after what happened with their dad). But i have this bit of difficulty i think in resolving how much i love that old home and my old family, and my ex, but i also really love the life i've chosen.

I think the biggest reason I'm having trouble here is that some things have made it difficult for me to overcome the guilt feeling i've had from the moment i started coming out. First, is just what i think all of us have gone through in coming out later in life - I went through all the regrets and guilt, regrets about not having been myself from the beginning, having embroiled my ex husband into this mess of a life, hurting him, having not nurtured myself the way i should have and been me, guilt for considering and then deciding to separate... I thought alot about do i deserve this? I thought alot about why can't i just make the marriage work, sacrifice these feelings, and what about a compromise of an open marriage. I was starting to grapple with these feelings shortly after my partner and i moved in together, because even though i'd decided to make the changes, I still hadn't fully come to peace with them But then life just went quickly south and i paused my thinking about those things. But now, i'm in a better place again and back to grappling with those feelings again.

The fact that my ex and I get along so well makes me think well, couldn't we have made it work with the open marriage? I didn't realise how damn durable our love and friendship was. And it just makes me think we could have done it... why did i have to shake up my daughter's life and hurt my ex? My daughter was thriving for a while but she was struggling again lately... and of course that adds to the guilt. I think we've figured out what she needs and we're addressing it (it's very much related to practical things we had to do after the boys' dad died, and it impacted my alone time with my daughter, but we're fixing that).

And of course, it's not hard to guess, the loss of the boys' dad put that question back into my mind, made me think why did i have to take this path, which ultimately led to man's death? I know on a rational level that i am not to blame for what he did, but i still have that seed of guilt and blame somewhere in me, his struggle with the separation was the thing that brought his tendency to do this up to the surface, but of curse he was struggling in his mental health overall. It's just hard to not think in that way.

So I think my brain and heart divide themselves into 3 places... the alternative past that i never built, the one where i was always me and i never hurt anyone, and i was just a damn out, proud lesbian from the start; the reality which i left behind, where i was married and built a family, a life which i loved in all the ways, except the one massive hole where i was not being me; and in this present life which i love because it's exactly what i need, but yet one where my heart aches a lot because of all the pain to others that comes with it.

My stomach is in knots today over this one. Can you help me guys, to think this through.

Oh and before anyone mentions, i am on the list for counselling, it's coming soon...

thank you to anyone who had the patience to get through all of that.

 

Thanks SF for these insights,and all of them resonate with me.. I think I have these two side in my thinking, the one that is fighting for me, and it's rational and clear, and the other that is still impacted by internalised messages about who or how I should be.

I keep reminding myself that it is because of the separation that my ex and I have such an understanding relationship, that this was the solution to becoming better parents together. And I think I really do see that but that thought is competing with my feelings of guilt.

And that bit of me that still feels guilty, I think I've identified on some level all the messages I've taken in over the years about my sexuality... that my sexuality is frivolous, that's it's not worthy in some way, that it's value is less than the value of being the kind of mum/wife/woman I was expected to be. I feel almost like I did when I was still quite young, that thought that silenced my feelings, I knew I had this desire, ...something indescribable at the time, that I had a need/set of needs that I was not addressing but to address them and consider them I'd have to discard all the things I'd been sort of steered towards as the person I was expected to be... I'm having trouble articulating this because as I'm writing this I feel like I'm tapping into something I've never really articulated before. I think what I've done with my life at this point, jumping off the expected course, taking the wheel in the direction of my instinct but away from all of the normative scripts laid out before me, I think this is what I've always been afraid to do, my whole life, to discard the script I'd been given because doing that would create tension and discomfort for everyone in my life, who would have to deal with the fact that their daughter/sister/etc had these feelings that were not healthy ( this is all teenage and young 20s me coming out right now).
No matter how much I'vechipped away at that shame in my sexuality I suppose buts and pieces of it remain. I've not come to a full sense of seeing my sexuality, my needs as worth the fight that I've had to put up to live out my truth and my needs.

I don't know if this is quite clear, because I'm unraveling some thoughts as I write.

 

I think you're right, so much of this is about time, this is a big journey, I'm not done, i mean the journey's never really done, right? I'm lucky I have such s good relationship with my ex. And another thing to feel guilt about, I'm lucky to have that, but my partner can't have that... I really wanted us both to have this.

 

I think what you're saying and SF too, is true, that splitting is what allowed us to have a strong relationship, but you understand, having a daughter yourself, what a big responsibility you feel to keep the family intact. It's hard to get past that feeling. But I know as well, and I think it's probably true for your daughter too, that having us as happier parents is necessary for her to be a happier kid.

 

I feel those same things too, and the guilt about thinking about the first path, so much guilt to go around! It seems like a common theme for us late in lifers, all this guilt....

I'm taking your advice to heart about not suppressing my emotions, I know there's a big cost to it, like you said, after suppressing them for so long.

 

I think I'm having trouble keeping this in mind that it's ok to have all of these different feelings, all of these things, this path, this journey, are so complex.

Your thoughts about loving authentically, it's a simple phrase but it carries a lot of weight, being authentic, I need to remember that o have a right to be myself, nurture my needs, I'm just having trouble fully getting there emotionally, even though I've made so many changes to get there practically.

 

Part of the tragedy of it all was that he really did have the desire to make it work, I think if he could have gotten healthier he may have been ok, just 3 weeks before he did it, he invited me (just me and my daughter) along for the day all together with him and the boys to a country park, we all went without my partner and had a lovely day, a few weeks before we all spent the day touring the bus depot and had a wonderful day (all of us including my partner), we'd all spend time together at his house... it's so tragic that he didn't win over the other side of his brain.

 

You're incredibly strong sarah, I really admire your strength. I don't know what the right formula of things would have made it possible for him to pull himself out of his struggle/turmoil.

 

Does anybody relate to these ^^^ feelings?
I think this is the point that I'm at just now and sorting through it day by day.

 

Hi himo, thanks for responding. I was at the stage you're going through right now a while ago. I'm not sure when this shame/guilt ends... I have made all the most massive decisions, taken a lot of steps, I suppose I'm just not quite at peace with my choices. I know that this is what I need, I need to be with a woman (I am), I need to be out and open about being gay (I am), and I need to be able to present my gender in a way that fits who I am (I do), but I think there's still a part of me that doesn't feel like I'm entitled to have made these choices, as if my sexuality isn't important enough, like I'm being greedy or selfish in indulging my needs.

This will sound a bit silly but I think every time I express being gay, like ...having sex with my girlfriend, dancing at a gay club, mentioning a crush, being involved in lgbtq meetings, etc etc, it's like therapy, it releases some of this shame.

 

Yes, totally, I think this really rings true for me as well, I'm pretty butch, I shop in the men's section, I wear my hair with a very masculine cut. I've always been more boyish, i used to embrace that in a lot of ways but only just really started to feel more complete in the way I present myself. On some days, expressing this makes me feel more confident, more strong. But on some days it feels quite vulnerable. I'm aware all the time that I'm the stereotypical dyke. I can't help it, these really are the things that make me feel more myself. And I'm gay. And again sometimes I have fun with these stereotypes. But this was one of those things I struggled with much of my life, that my gender presentation made me read as gay, or that I had all these feelings for women and it was obvious by the way I dress, sit, walk, etc. Something about that association was really difficult for me. I'm trying to break free of caring one ounce about how other people feel about it. I'm getting there...