I had counted out my sins time and again; I pictured myself laying them out on my bishop's desk one at a time like three $100 dollar bills. Masturbation, porn, and "I like boys."
I thought I could weave my web of transgressions together in a one-breathed sentence. And now that I had scheduled my confessional I had time to rehearse it a thousand more times.
Saying, "I like boys" (or whatever I really did say that day) was the first time I had mentioned my tendency to look at gay porn to anyone.
And that's what it was to me, a tendency. It wasn't homosexuality, certainly not me "coming out" to my newly-ordained bishop. I knew that with Jesus' help, everything would work out ... I'd be normal in no time.
Soon enough, I met my BYU-Idaho counselor and the support group that I would attend for the next eight months.
Each week I joined ten young men in making a circle of desks, admitting that "I have been masturbating since I was 14." I eagerly joined their monastery of shame. It must have looked like we all prayed to Gods that lived beneath the floor boards. That, of course, is excepting the few who had been "victorious" the previous week in the battle against masturbation and pornography who looked at the tops of our heads.
Each of us would take turns divorcing our eyes from the floor, then wedding them again, to recite our lapse incidents that week.
At the time, I thought and felt like I was doing the right thing. I was overcoming my addiction. And certainly, that was not a bad thing to do (and especially beneficial was how I learned to talk about my deepest secrets), but I learned later that I was going about it all wrong.
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I would have rather swallowed broken glass like Pop Rocks than to sit in the waiting room at the campus counseling center for another minute. Next to me a girl with two ratted braids mumbled to herself while scribbling madly in her sketch book.
When my name was called, I tried to stuff the National Geographic I had been failing to read back into the crowded magazine rack. When I got to Dr. Gregg's office, it was too much like I had imagined. I knew, given the La-Z-Boy, exactly where to sit, even though Brother Gregg said, "Sit wherever you're comfortable."
So I sat in the La-Z-Boy and regurgitated my one-sentence recitation again.
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The end of this story is obvious to anyone who reads my blog. I'm quite comfortable with masturbation, pornography and being gay. I'm not an addict, and I consider my sexuality to be a healthy one.
When I was in group therapy, I never went more than six weeks without lapsing into compulsive behavior. A dirty thought would leave me wrapped up in self hatred which would lead imminently (and compulsively) to a lapse.
One thing was never communicated to us, though; of course it wasn't: Masturbation is a perfectly natural part of life. And pornography? Plenty of good people look at it. And guess what? The shame you're feeling is contributing more to your downfall as a human being than looking at naked bodies.
When I realized that, and truly believed it, that's when my compulsive, unhealthy behavior stopped. And
it stopped. I didn't have to do anything to stop it, except to stop shaming myself.
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During my counseling sessions there was a lot of crying, a lot of pain, and a lot of healing.
Steps for "growing out of my homosexuality" provided by Evergreen, International lent healing to my soul and to my relationships and engendered emotional authenticity. But let's be clear: they DID NOT make me straight. And for that matter, any less gay. What I got from reparative therapy was the same as what I could have gotten through standard, more ethical therapy practices.
The reparative therapy I participated in focused on resolving the issues that had "caused" my homosexuality. Talking out homoerotic adolescent experiences, resolving father/son relationship issues, gaining confidence among male peers, building healthy (non-sexual) relationships with the same sex. All important and good things, certainly. But how can this be billed as "treatment" for something for which the medical and psychological community have not determined a cause.
So besides the fact that it doesn't work, what's wrong with reparative therapy?
I remember Dr. Gregg, on several occasions, asking me to close my eyes and picture a woman's body. "What about women are you attracted to?" he'd ask. "Their personalities, their eyes, their smiles."
"No," he corrected, "their bodies."
He seemed to think that my attraction to men was simply a misunderstanding of my sexuality. He certainly didn't understand that I just wasn't attracted to women. Suppressing sexual thoughts of men was something I could do. Developing an attraction to women? Absolutely not.
Now, I must say that there are some who believe their orientation has been changed. Some who claim to run successful ex-gay ministries. And if someone says their orientation has been changed, who am I to say otherwise? All I can say is that for me, and many others who have undergone therapy (including electro-shock therapy in the not-too-distant past at BYU), efforts to change orientation have been fruitless.
And when therapy doesn't work, people who likely already hate themselves (why else would they be trying to change), consider therapy another personal failure. No wonder many are driven to suicide through this type of therapy. Several people I know personally have had serious suicidal thoughts which have led them (thankfully) to quit this kind of therapy.
Everything I've described thus far was before my mission, which I figured would be a miraculous transforming experience that would render me cured; It would be a rich reward for the hard work I had done in therapy. This is a common hope for young gay Mormons. Even after my mission, I returned briefly to Dr. Gregg. By this point, however, I had accepted that my homosexuality would remain with me forever.
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Cliché as it is, I wish I could tell my brothers in that support group (we did develop quite the camaraderie) how I feel now. I'd say, "You can masturbate and feel good about yourself. This shame that you have? It's totally uncalled for. Masturbation is a normal part of life. Your sex drive is healthy. The guilt you feel? It's what's driving your addiction."
And maybe that wouldn't have been that profound a thing for them to hear. But when I discovered it on my own, it was revolutionary.
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A few years after my mission, I returned to the BYU-Idaho Counseling Center. I was referred not by my bishop, but by my ex boyfriend (of all people). I expressed to Geoff the happiness I had found in acting according to my identity. And like Nathan said he would, he affirmed me. After getting to know me, he told me that I was a good person, that I could contribute to society.
We discussed God, my beliefs, the church, and the importance of gaining a new moral code. We discussed what really made me happy.
So I've taken both paths. I bet you can guess which one I'd take again.
