32 years wedded yet I was gay all along.

gaymen2
2 days ago
7 min read

I was married for 32 years. I have seven grown up children. A further 11 Grandchildren and soon I shall be a Great GrandPa.

My wife died - nearly 20 years ago - at the hands of the NHS ( eventually paying me almost 3/4 of a million £ in compensation for their incompetance and it was a long legal battle they fought but stood no chance at all, as they blatantly dismissed her because they assumed she was making it up and died that same night at home having been discharged from the hospital as NOTHING WRONG - Brain Tumor - ( Long story in itself ) - some years ago now and as I am now an old man, I can feel free to share this with you.

I never wanted to get married and I never really loved my wife beyond that of a good friend. It was an arranged marriage between our families and being from India, is expected that our Parents will find us a good wife / husband and that we will marry and make babies for Grandmas to swoon over.

All with a complete stranger.

While I appreciate there is now a TV programme called ' MARRIED AT FIRST SIGHT ' that was definately us, just with no TV cameras around.

I was 20 and she was 19 and we met with tons of family swooning around saying ' Oh don't they make a handsome couple' - and things like - 'Oh I can see lots of children with these two '- and all the while I was cringing inside as I knew I was attracted to men and was trapped.

I tried talking to my Father about this and got a lecture about adolescent crushes not being like the real love between a man and a woman - as if love between two of the same sex was invalid - and being as I was from a strict family with strong ties to the community, it was expected I would marry and carry on the good famly name. Which my Father kept pointing out as if a command. I damned well resented this but had no voice, no choice, no opinion - as my Fathers word was law.

Tried then talking to my Mother and she was understanding, telling me how she had a 'special friend' at school - but leared to get over it and concentrated on making babies after she was also made to go through an arranged marriage, but went on to say she had been happy with my father and that he catered to her whims and offered a lovely lifestyle, and she was comfortable. When I asked if she had been in love or happy - she made some comment about not being sure what love was and that children are the blessing between a couple and brings them together and that, once I had children of my own, I would understand and that was what brought her happy, to see her children grow.

NOT A LOT OF HELP.

I managed sex on the wedding night and lucky for me, my wife fell pregnant very easily and so gave me a 'get out of jail' card and sex was then limited. All our children came along in the first 7 years, one a year, until my wife had a ' ladies problem' and had a hysterechtomy - and she went right off sex after that.

She was a beautiful and understanding women who told me one day she knew I fancied men as she saw how I looked at men and how I behaved when a certain male cousin I fancied visited and how dithery I got around him... She suspected correctly.

This cousin and I were to get into a serious sexual relationship quite soon after we met and it continued until he died in a bus crash and my wife saw how upset I was and completely was the best partner to have had, as we spoke, I confessed, she understood and she felt the pain I was going through and it - actually - brought us closer. She was a very understanding person and always kept it a secret between us. She even gave hints to family about what a stud I was in bed, to throw them off the scent. She was a wonderful wife.

It has never been easy. For some years I used gay escorts but nothing filled that emotional hole, although my sexual hole was being filled, my heart was empty.

For years after her death I was lost. Surrounded by caring loving family who over did the family thing and the caring thing and just smothered me. I was drowning in care, drowning in family, but not for the right reasons. I mourned the loss of my wife and the 6 year battle with the NHS for compensation for a wrongful death and lack of care, plus the real loss for me was my cousun and all this took its toll.

I had a massive breakdown one day and ended up in a psychiatric hospital . This is where I met Frank, who was to become the love of my life.

He was a nurse at the hospital and while most the care offered surrounded the loss of my wife, he saw through that and saw the truth, I was a gay man who was living the lie and was desperate for some true understanding for what I was going through and not what people assume it was. Even the snotty psychiatrist didn't pick up on that and remained useless to me - and it was truly Frank who helped me recover and return home. He started visiting me at home to check on my progress and it soon became emotional and sexual and I felt as if my life was at last starting, as we fell desperately in love with each other and although I was an older man by then, he was no spring chicken either, and we have been together now for the last 5 years, very happy, and while my kids know he is my ' special friend' nothing is said and the only comments are how pleased they are to see me so happy after so many years living with depression and grief. My children were all born in the UK and have a very different mind set to my family ' back home' and see things very differently, thank goodness.

Would I go through an arranged marriage again ? No I would not, but then, I would also not have my wonderful children and grandchildren and that would sadden me, but life is NOT all about procreation, it is NOT all about 'the children' as many cultures believe, it is about the here and now, not what is to be in the future, but finding the peace and the happiness in the now, this minute, this day, and finding what makes me smile daily and hourly. Life is too short to be trapped and suffocated by well meaning people who you really want to tell to ' fuck off and leave me alone'- as they truly do care - and time passes so quickly that if you don't find the joy in every moment, life is wasted.

It took me a great while to write this to you John and I have to admit, I have cried many times while doing so. I am now mid 70's and although I found true love and sexual fulfilment late in life, at least I found it while I do envy you your ability to ' come out' so young and never having to hide your sexuality and how lucky you were John to have understanding parents from a very different culture to mine, and I do not resent, I appreciate we are all different and I admire you for how you have lived the gay lifestle and bring that knowledge and compassion to so many through your Hamilton Hall and the wonderful newsletter I get each week. You cannot believe John how much your newsletter means to people like myself.

I am known as Roger but is not me real name.

Thanks for the opportunity to share this with you.

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Suffice to say, I was quite emotional the first time I read this e mail and it reminded me of so many people I have met in the past - as being a sex worker, I met people from all walks of life and all cultures and stories like this I have heard many times before and met hundreds of Indian, Pakistani men who lived in arranged marriages but were gay. Same in the Arab world where gayness is often punnishable by death, and I had scores of gay Arab Muslims as clients over the years and the heartbreaking stories I heard, did just that, break my heart and where I could, I offered help, but - there is always a but -

Religion plays a very large and destructive part in many peoples lives and sadly, many do not survive the family, the church, the damnation and the hell fires brought forth by ignorance and religous intollerance and while I have my own beliefs about God and the Universe, when a religion is used to limit, deny, abuse and murder its own, then that religion is not a religion - it is a self defeating cult.

Fuck religion - Fuck it to hell, if that is what religions does to people and how it fucks up peoples lives. Fuck the priests and bishops;- Fuck the imams and rabbi's - and to hell with any religion that claims to know what God meant and especially send those to hell who downgrade another, find fault with because their religion says so, as that is NOT the God I follow and NOT the God of love at all.

John Bellamy

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