I used to write often in high school to process and share my thoughts.  Years ago, I took a trip down nostalgia lane and read the musings of pubescent Jason.  A cute kid who was struggling with his sexuality and navigating the lack of honest interaction with friends as he kept himself at arm’s length as many kids in the closet do.

Then I shut it down.  I stopped writing as much and kept most thoughts hidden away only to be pulled out by bourbon or whiskey.  I shared more with strangers then I did my friends and family.  I come today to change that.  I write, again, to process and share something that I joke about to mask the permanent damage it has caused. 

Most of my long-term relationships since coming out have ended with them lying and cheating on me.  The bearded romances before that never took off because they wanted their options open (until one very special, now, woman who’s heart I broke and am forever indebted to).  I know that many are rolling their eyes.  I have had people tell me that I need to get over it, it’s their loss not mine and other platitudes that never did dull the pain.  While they mean the best, they never really address the true damage of being lied to and cheated on multiple times by those you trusted.

The lying and manipulation is what gets me.  It literally rips at my heart and has tainted every relationship I have entered into since being wronged.  It has caused me to develop a narrative in response to very minor disturbances in a budding romance.  This narrative always ends in the other person being exposed as a horrible human being, that has no regard for another, who has made me their latest game.

In the past, when I have attempted to talk thought the situation with the other person, I have been called crazy and stupid.  Never have my fears been validated or even attempted to be understood.  As a result, I have slowly come to believe that I am, indeed, crazy.  I placed the blame on me.  I am the common denominator anyway, right?  I have existed in this self-blame for years and accepted it to be truth.  A self-diagnosed, paranoia-crazed man who has no chance of being able to trust again.  To say it wasn’t true sometimes would be wrong of me.  I must acknowledge where my sometimes-obsessive behaviors turned others away and I was the culprit in creating an unhealthy companionship. 

Then I began to run away from any real emotional connection.  My friend Don jokes about my supposed ‘four week’ rule.  He has observed that by the fourth week of dating someone new, like clockwork, I sit them down for ‘the talk’.  Looking back, he’s not wrong.  I can see where I encountered some trigger in our interactions that led to that fear-based thinking and instead of opening myself up to the possibility of being hurt or called crazy, I sat them down and simply said that I wasn’t interested, or I wasn’t over somebody else. 

That has changed though.  I met someone great two months ago who doesn’t make me feel like I am crazy.  He acknowledges that the thoughts may be crazy but tries to understand why I would have them.  He accepts how the situation could have triggered that fear and asks what he could do to help make sure it doesn’t happen again.  When I apologize, he tells me I don’t need to.  It was refreshing.  It was freeing. 

I don’t enjoy being vulnerable.  It’s not a feeling that provides any satisfaction in my life; not even being vulnerable to myself.  I find it useless and risky.  I despise victimizing myself.  To exist in this mental state of “I was wronged, and I’ll never get over what happened to me”.  Although, I feel I have repressed this transgression too far.  I need to acknowledge it to move on.  I was mentally and emotionally abused, but there is hope and a promise of freedom from its damage. 

If you see me after reading this and wish to tell me how sorry you are that I had this experience, don’t.  I would rather you say that you are happy I have found hope.