Darkness

My mind is dark tonight
I'm angry
Do I have a right?

I'm alone
What else is new
No power

No power to change my past
No power to change my present
No power to change my future

Do I surrender to destiny?
Does suicide prove free will?
Doesn't free will mean that I have a choice?

I have the power to harm myself
I have the power to kill myself
Or at least to try

I have power over me in the immediate
I have limited power over myself
But I don't always have control

My mind is dark tonight
I feel defeated
Is it too late?

Part Eleven - Living a Cursed Life

I was 17 years old when I entered college. I had moved out of state, perhaps subconsciously because I needed to get as far away from the source of my damaging sexual abuse as possible. Then again, perhaps not.

I wanted to go "wherever God was calling me" and certain that calling was into full-time ministry, I wanted a college that would not only educate but also mentor me in my spiritual growth. Living hours from home and out of State was just an added bonus.


Within the first couple of weeks as a Freshman, I met another young man who shared with me that he had been sexually abused as a boy. I opened up to him about my abuse. He was actually the first peer with whom I shared my story. Like me, he had been compromised by an older male and was conflicted about his sexuality and gender identification. We became roommates and over time he developed a crush on me. Actually, he was crushing both on me and on my (very first ever) girlfriend at the same time. Like I said, he was conflicted. When I announced I intended to marry my girlfriend, he threatened suicide, saying that "now he could never 'have' either of us". Shortly thereafter, he took to spending his nights in other male student rooms and bragging the next day about his homosexual activities, whether true or not. Regardless, that whole experience didn't help me in my own gender identification struggles. Was I really gay and that's why he was attracted to me? Was I simply in denial about my sexuality? Add to that the question which haunted me for decades: did my being abused as a boy by another male MAKE me gay??

Anyway, for the first time in my life I had a girlfriend. A REAL girlfriend! And I wanted nearly more than anything else to claim my manhood and confirm my gender identity. I was studying Christian ministry in a denomination in which homosexuals were an abomination at a college which expelled students without mercy who dared come out of the closet. I feared if I was gay I could never be a pastor, never to be able to worship, never receive the sacraments again and would most certainly be damned to a life...temporal and eternal...apart from God. Homosexuality was the unforgivable sin and I feared, through no fault of my own, I might have been stuck with that sin. Damned for all time.

As I've written before: I really do sympathize with LGBTQ women and men over their spiritual, emotional, psychological and sociological struggles. I know how it feels to question "what in God's name am I?" and fear that being true to myself could...would probably...would surely... land me in hell. It's hard enough being "different" in a secular society which won't accept you...even more so when you add the pressure of fitting into a religious environment. But enough about that.

I met my first girlfriend, and I asked her to marry me, and she said "yes"...so I wound up marrying my first and only girlfriend. I'm still married, I still love her; but with hindsight I realize part of my motivation to get find a girlfriend and get married was my need to prove to myself that I was straight as well as get over the abuse and mature into being a real man.

I didn't want to enter the marriage with secrets, so I worked up the nerve to tell my fiance about my brother; but I didn't tell about my sister. It was hard enough telling her about my brother and my fears that I might be gay, etc. I guess I felt I could blame my brother for what he did to me; but I wasn't so sure about what happened between me and my sister and I wanted to preserve the illusion of my virginity (I didn't consider male on male sex to be true coitus). So I told my wife and trusted her to keep one of my biggest, most precious (albeit dark) secrets to herself. I told her, and I trusted her.

Fast forward 2 years and in preparation for our wedding, my fiance and I find ourselves meeting with a pastor for pre-marital counseling; which to large degree is focused on the mechanics of the wedding ceremony. I had chosen to include certain family members in the wedding party; but strongly objected to my big brother from taking part. He could come to the wedding. He just couldn't be a groomsmen or anything like that. The pastor pressed me for my reasons why...and I held onto my secrets, only telling him that my oldest brother was mean to me when I was growing up. The pastor again pressed me, this time telling me I needed to forgive my brother and not bring these hard feelings with me into my new life as a married man. Eventually I gave in, still not giving up my secrets; but I gave in to the pressure, "forgave" my brother and gave him a role in the wedding ceremony.

About 5 or 6 years later, after the pastor had moved on to another congregation, my wife and I happened to be passing through his neck of the woods and stopped in to visit him. In a moment of privacy, just the 2 of us alone, I got up the courage to tell our old pastor the real reason I did not want my brother being part of my wedding. I say I got up the courage; but that doesn't seem to express just how difficult it was to reveal my secrets...to reveal this very damaged, very hurting part of my soul...my psyche. I told him what happened and I told him why I so strongly resented my brother. The pastor replied with "I know. [She] told me that years ago." I was crushed. With only a few words, he dismissed years of psychological, emotional and spiritual pain. It still hurts today, writing about it. Crushed. Devastated. Re-victimized. That son of a gun knew all along. When he told me I needed to forgive my brother and include him in my wedding party, he knew my brother was a rapist...MY rapist. I felt betrayed: both by my wife as well as by that pastor.

A similar event would happen nearly 2 decades later when, after finally gathering the courage to tell my mother-in-law about the loss of my childhood and resulting sexual confusion, she also brushed it away with "I knew that. [your wife] told me that a long time ago."

It wasn't just discovering that my wife had broken my trust; but more so that these 2 people could minimize something which I hated but was so much a part of me...that they dismiss it so easily without even offering any comfort or sympathy. Just a cold "I knew that". It took a lot out of me just to gather the courage to mentally revisit my past and reveal my deepest, darkest secret...and to have that secret trampled and treated as if it meant nothing had a devastating affect on my psyche. The 2nd time, with my mother-in-law, actually played a part in my first weeklong vacation in the Psych Ward.

I realize that people say and do things out of ignorance, and that there was no malicious intent on the part of that pastor or my wife's mother; but it doesn't change the effect their acknowledgement and dismissal of my past had on me. But I'm getting repetitive, aren't I?

I guess the point is that these 2 experiences gave me even more reason to keep my secrets to myself rather than talk about them, especially with people who had no clue just how damaging child sexual abuse has on the survivor even into adulthood. In the future, I won't so readily cast my pearls before swine (Matthew 7:6).

Back to My Story

Sorry for the long break; but I've been struggling a lot with depression, anxiety and my PTSD these past few months and simply haven't had much interest in doing anything other than feeding off of my own personal darkness. Not a  good thing.

Before I pick back up on where I left off, I want to follow up on my last post titled "Intermission"...

About 1 week after I sent that letter to my mom and my abusers telling all that happened to me and how it has affected me, I received a reply from my mother. In her letter, she stated that she missed me and shared how lonely she is in her old age. She sent me some pictures of her dogs and her camping trailer; but not one single mention of what happened to me. And not one single sentence mentioning my abusers by name. Funny thing is that she mentioned my other brother by name and had a few, choice, negative things to say about him...but nothing about my abusers...not a single word about what happened to me and my co-victim in her house, under her roof, during her and my Dad's watch.

On the other hand, she didn't deny any of what I claimed happened to me either. So at least I have that going for me, right?

I have yet to reply to her letter and don't know if I ever shall; but having spilled my guts to my family, I don't feel I will ever be able to return to my home town...not for a wedding, a baptism, family reunion or even a family funeral. I am currently in exile. By my own actions I have placed myself into exile, never again to return "home".

And this makes me sad in ways I cannot put into words. So I'll just stop here.
 

Intermission

I'm temporarily stepping out of my chronological recounting of the abuse to share with you a new milestone in my recovery. Last week, following over 40 years of secrets, I mailed a letter to my mother and cc'd it to my abuser. This was a huge step for me, in that for the first time since I suffered the abuse, I have finally told my mother what happened under her roof, and while it may not be face-to-face, it is also the first time I have confronted my abuser as well.

I penned these words shortly after mailing the letters, summing up my immediate emotional and spiritual impressions upon sealing those envelopes:

"As I come to accept the damage of childhood rape, so much I'd previously seen as my own personal failure, the outworkings of a cruel and demanding God or simply my predetermined God-damned destiny was none of these at all. Crippled by the abuse, I had little chance of ever meeting my unrealistically high expectations. Mysteriously enough, this epiphany frees me to worship, not curse, my Creator - my Saviour - my God."

   

Part X - Damaged Goods

I just got out of the psych ward again, having been there almost a year ago previously to the date...or actually, to the Season.

 

The first time I was put in lockdown, I went home on Palm Sunday. This 2nd time, I came home two days before Palm Sunday. I assume that's a coincidence; but who knows? Either way, the effects of the trauma inflicted upon me as a child continue to wreak havoc with my self-esteem, self-worth, self-image and self-control.

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SUICIDE: I never actually made the attempt; but both times I self-admitted to the ER with suicidal ideations & self harm consisting of me carving words into my own flesh.

• DAMAGED
• FAILURE
• BROKEN
• WORTHLESS
• EPIC FAIL

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I hated myself. Hated what I had become. What the hell had I become?

One of the things I have become is a re-victimized victim, or a victim of my own re-victimization. I both long to be free of my victimhood; yet find a strange sense of comfort in remaining a victim. At least as a victim, I more or less know what to expect. Self-fulfilling prophecy. That's what you can expect if you always anticipate someone is going to victimize you. I'm not talking some crazy paranoia here, although, having been admitted to the psych ward twice, I guess I am a bit crazy...but it's not I believe everybody is out to get me; but rather that I don't have a chance and I am destined to fail.

As I continue my own study on the continuing effects of childhood sexual abuse, I find that my behavior is not all that abnormal...at least not for survivors. The cutting, the suicidal ideation (and often successful suicide attempts), the excessive self-criticism coming from a felt need to say, think, do, live every second of my life as close to perfection as possible, the guilt, the shame and the suppressed anger and rage. All of this has been pushed down inside of me and it is being carried on the shoulders of "little Gary" ...my child-self who is still trapped inside this hulking, overweight adult frame.

I'm on psychiatric medication and currently seeing 2 therapists and a psychiatrist for my PTSD, Depression, Anxiety and Panic disorders. I am awaiting approval of Disability through the Social Security office...not because I don't want to work and certainly not because I can live without an income; but because, right now, I'm too much of a basket case to put in a consistent block of hours every week. Just consider this blog: I started writing this entry within a few days of being released from the hospital and I am just finishing it now...3 weeks later??

I hope to not be so foolish or careless to blame all of my problems as an adult on the abuse; but I continue to learn every single day just how much of my current behavior is somehow linked to my past..is somehow connected in one way or another to the abuse and my continued and failed coping mechanisms for dealing with that abuse.

I want to believe that it can and it does get better; but right now I'm just moving forward in faith, hoping that some day at least some of this will make sense and I will finally be free of the secrets and the sickness of my childhood (or lack thereof).

Part 9 - Gay, Straight or Something Completely "Other"?

For every male survivor of childhood sexual abuse, you will hear a story unique to that individual. Although we all seem to have quite a few side-effects in common, our different cultural, social and economic environments affect how we reacted and acted out in response to the abuse.

One of the side effects very commonly experienced by men, especially when the abuse was perpetrated upon them by another male, is a sense of gender confusion. I wish I had known how "normal" my feelings were back when I was still a kid. It would have saved me a great deal of grief, to say the least, because for me, the question of gender identity tormented me for most of my childhood and continued to haunt me as an adult heterosexual male, even after years of marriage and raising children.

At the time the abuse began, I'd like to think I was just a typical little boy. To the best of my memory, I was average size and weight and looked and acted just like the other boys in my school and neighborhood. I don't remember when the bullying started other than it was before the 5th grade. I know that, because that's when I began to intentionally overeat. It sounds sound both funny and foolish now; but at the time, I was tired of getting picked on and beat up and had the idea that if I was bigger than my tormentors, they would leave me alone. The irony was that, although I stopped being physically beat up at school, I found myself now being ridiculed for being FAT. When I entered Junior High School, it went from being teased about being fat to being teased about having "baby titties". Yeah, that was one of my nicknames: BT, as in Baby Titties.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Growing up in the Midwest during the 70s, it was common for boys to tease one another with words like fag, faggot, femme, queer, girl. I got called those words a lot. It started with Gary the Fairy and proceeded to Gary the Fruit, Gary the Fag or simply Faggot. I was not a homosexual then or now; but those were the words used to taunt me. As I've already written, I was bullied as a kid. I got beat up a lot: in the home by my abuser, in my neighborhood by the kids across the street and on the school playground. Kids who get bullied get a reputation for being weak. Expressions like "fruit", "fairy", "femme" or "faggot" implied that a boy was weak...weak like a girl. Considering that I got beat up by girls as well as boys, I guess I must have been really, really weak.

The teasing continued even after the physical bullying ground to a halt. It actually got worse for awhile, the teasing that is, in 5th and 6th grade when I failed to impress with my lack of athletic abilities. I remember being lined up to be picked for teams and me being one of the last...me being the kid nobody wanted. I was weak and I was a freak. I remember competing for the President's Physical Fitness Award and how badly I failed. My Gym Teacher made a point of telling his other classes they couldn't do worse than Gary. I could only do 3 sit ups at that time. In the eyes of my peers and even my teacher, I was weak and I was a loser.

So at this time, I'm being teased with words like "faggot", "fruit" and "gay", I'm no athlete, I'm shy and a bit nerdy and my biggest brother is anally raping me at home. What conclusion would you reach if you were me? I was about 6 years old when the abuse started, with little understanding of gender roles other than boys became Daddies and girls became Mommies; but by the time the abuse came to a halt I was mired in phrases, accusations and the realization that I did not measure up to the ideal of manliness perpetuated in that culture. Was I gay? Did these kids know what was happening to me behind closed doors? Could they see right through me? Was it that obvious to everyone else but me?

As I already shared, upon entering Jr High I got saddled with the nickname BT or Baby Titties. Partly due to my new-found obesity; but also a genetic trait inherited by quite a few of the males in my family regardless of body fat. The official medical term is gynecomastia; but it's more commonly known as man-boobs. I didn't know either of those terms when I was a kid, and I didn't know any other boys with my same problem. All I know is that when I came home crying about my condition, I was told it was spoken of in my Dad's side of the family as a "curse" and there was nothing I could do about it. My mother told me that by the way, not my father. I don't remember him ever speaking about it.

So picture me as a teenager being called a "girl" by the other boys, a failure as an athlete and consequently having little interest in sports, weak and easily beat up, having been sexually abused by an older male for a period of years and then having continued for a brief time by my own choice with my fellow victim. I had baby titties. My parents had told me for as long as I could remember that they had wanted me to be a girl since they already had 1 girl and 2 boys. I had all kinds of thoughts, most of them completely non-rational but at the time serious as all get out and deeply troubling to me. I didn't know if I was gay. Looking back, I'm sure I wasn't; but at that time I wasn't sure. I questioned if maybe I was a freak of nature, like a hermaphrodite. No disrespect towards people who truly are born with both sets of sexual organs; but at that time I really didn't understand the term, I just knew it meant half man/half woman. Jr High to High School we're talking the late 70s here and talk shows about sex change operations with people saying they were born the wrong gender had become very popular. Was that me? Was I born the wrong gender? Was I half boy and half girl? Did my parents wish that I be born a girl come partially true? Was I a man with breasts? Did I have female hormones inside of me battling the male hormones for dominance?

"I wish my brother George were here"

I feel so stupid writing this now; but these thoughts dogged me for years. I really didn't  know what I was. All I knew was that I was not normal. For a couple of reasons, I made great efforts to at least publicly identify myself as heterosexual; but on the inside I was never 100% certain. Looking back, I realize a lot of my difficulty was due to unreasonable stereotypes. My father joked about homosexuals and hippies. Believe it or not, there's a connection there. Dad was a redneck, and proud of it. He always made fun of hippie guys with their long hair, questioned if they were really men since they looked like ladies from behind and he loved making fun of homosexual men, talking with a high-pitched voice and a lisp. My father impressed upon me the difference between a real man and a faggot. The problem for me was that in my mind, I didn't measure up to the stereotypical real man...so I must have been a faggot or something "other".

But back to those stereotypes and how they messed with my mind for so many years. The stereotypical homosexual, in my mind, was effeminate, spoke with a lisp, tended to be weak (limp wristed), preferred Fine Arts over sports, enjoyed doing things considered woman's work (like cooking), didn't date girls, were always somewhat "queer" (in the sense of being eccentric), tended to be artistic, etc.

When I was in 1st grade, I went to speech therapy to correct a lisp. I was not athletic and sports bored me. I preferred to read a book rather than watch football. I was weak and easily bullied. I leaned towards being artistic without ever actually being an artist: I was a musician, I acted, I wrote plays and poetry. I enjoyed cooking and liked to help my mom in the kitchen. I didn't date girls and I was a bit on the weird side. On top of that, I had experienced gay sex both as a victim as well as by my own choice (with my fellow victim). With all the kids in my neighborhood and school teasing me, saying that I was gay...while I earnestly tried to reject that label, I kept struggling with whether or not it was the truth. I know. I know. I'm beating a dead horse here. I've already pretty much stated the exact same thing 2 or 3 times above. It's just, the reality is that the roots run deep and it has taken a very, very long time to reconcile my self-image with the Truth. Thank God I've got some really terrific GAY friends who have helped me work through this. And I do mean THANK GOD!

Reading about the propensity of men sexually abused as boys who struggle with questions of gender identity helped me a lot. Also, realizing that the "gay sex" I experienced as a young boy wasn't really gay sex at all. It was much more like prison rape than anything else. The older boy who sexually abused me did not then or now self-identify as homosexual. He used heterosexual pornography to inspire himself, even though gay porn  was available (or in the very least, Playgirl magazine which could be bought over the counter). HE WAS NOT GAY...so him imposing himself sexually upon me does not, in itself, make me gay.

A friend of mine explained it to me this way: "When you're at the beach, who's butt are you looking at? Hers or his?" That may be a bit simplistic; but at least as far as my own self-identity goes, I have always and only been sexually attracted to females. Regardless of how one defines homosexuality (born that way, a choice, or something else), I have always been heterosexual in my desires. Always. The struggle over my sexual identity was in my head, not in my loins. But being that it was, indeed, in my head; I have suffered mentally, emotionally and spiritually greatly. Very greatly.

Rock Hudson was QUEER??

Again, I thank God for my good friends who happen to be gay. Having struggled for years...decades!...wondering if I was in denial about my own sexuality/gender identity, I find myself emotionally and spiritually connected to my gay friends. I know the pain of being regarded as "queer" ...of not fitting a worn out, broken stereotype of masculinity. I also recognize that the homosexual stereotype is equally worn out & broken. By now, I suspect most of us realize a lot of gay men don't fit the gay stereotype (Rock Hudson anyone?) I'm still waiting for the rest of the world to recognize that a lot of straight men also don't fit the typical, macho, heterosexual stereotype. The stereotypes have failed have done a lot of damage along the way...as those of us who've been through it know all too well.


So while not every male survivor has had the same experience I had growing up, with myself questioning my manhood all along the way...nevertheless, it is not uncommon for adult men to struggle with questions about their gender identity. I read a professional, psychological article about this a few months ago stating that straight survivors often question if they are gay and survivors who identify and have primarily same-sex attractions struggle with questioning if they are really gay or if they're really straight and the sexual abuse made them gay.

I'm not going to get into the argument of what makes someone gay or straight. Right now, I feel there are far more important issues at hand, and as a Christ-follower (i.e. Christian), I have no interest in condemning to hell men and woman whose struggle is eerily to similar to mine. I thought I was gay, and finally concluded that I was not. I've got friends who have concluded that they are gay, and have struggled with that for their whole lives. It's a very painful struggle. At one time I would have written this as "I feared that I was gay"...but now, I realize that "I feared that I would never know what I was". As such, I don't write this as a treatise on homosexuality; but to spell out some of the psychological damage suffered by male survivors of childhood sexual abuse. Survivors of abuse, straight or gay, feel like freaks, outcasts, unacceptable, aliens, untouchable, unforgivable, marked, branded and hopelessly out of place in a world of black and grays which foolishly argues about shades of white.

Part Eight - Re-Victimizing Myself

It's hard to believe my original abuse began over 40 years ago and that I am just now beginning to understand my role as innocent, non-consensual victim as well as how that abuse has affected me all of these years.

I told others over the years about my abuse, usually in vague terms; but it wasn't until I opened up to my therapist in November of 2010 that all the garbage long buried inside of me rose to the surface. As I began to confront my past, I researched for myself the lasting effects of childhood sexual abuse especially with regards to boys abused by men. I was shocked...completely blown away...as I read case study after case study and saw myself in these other men's stories. What, where and how it happened wasn't necessarily the same; but how it affected all these different men from different backgrounds, cultures, economic statuses, etc. was eerily similar to my own experiences. And that experience of likeness continues as I have met with other male survivors and discussed our stories together, face-to-face. Whether the abuse happened only one time or over a period of years, the trauma has apparently affected us in very similar ways.

---

An article published in a 1994 issue of the Journal of Traumatic Stress by psychologist David Lisak gives a concise overview of the effects of child sex abuse on adult male survivors. It's the first article I read on the subject and immediately identified with the men interviewed.

A common reaction to sexual assault is an ongoing re-victimization of oneself. Once victimized, the survivor continues living in "victim mode". So having resigned myself to "once a victim, always a victim", "been there, done that, got a closet stuffed with 'I Survived...' t-shirts' "  I assumed "This is who I am, so I might as well (figuratively) drop my pants and bend over for any and every one."

---

As a kid I was bullied: first by my 2 oldest siblings (sister and oldest brother), and then throughout my childhood. The bullying continued into adulthood; but I failed to recognize it as such. I became a pushover and a people pleaser. I became very non-confrontational and rarely stood up for my own rights. As a kid, I got in a lot of fights; fights which I did not start. Bullies knew that I was "pickable"...they could smell my weakness and fear. Was I bullied because I was abused? No. I was bullied because I allowed myself to be bullied. I resigned myself to being a victim. No self esteem, no self confidence, no sense of equal standing with my peers. I was a piece of crap waiting to be stepped in and scraped off the shoes of everyone around me. I got beat up by boys and I got beat up by girls. And for whatever reason, at least in elementary school, it seemed every visit to the Principal's office found me getting in trouble for getting beat up, and not the kid who did the beating. The loser of the fight getting in trouble for being in a fight he didn't start. That was me.

I was a victim because I let myself be a victim. No, I'm not entirely blaming myself for all the bad things which have happened to me; but I'm beginning to understand how being sexually abused as a young boy unconsciously (subconsciously?) affected the way I viewed myself as a person. As one who submitted to the whim of his abuser, I became a submissive person. As one who did not fight back, I continued in my passivity. As a boy who had been raped by another boy, I relinquished my manhood. And I have spent my entire life living in the shadow of the abuse, that little boy inside of me still cowering in fear, still feeling awkward, alone and ashamed.

Living my life as a victim, I learned to not expect any better for myself, and in retrospect I see how I actually avoided opportunities that could have freed me from that sense of hopeless and failure because why? why??? maybe because I knew and was comfortable with a life of victimhood and feared this great unknown life of success and happiness. Fear of success and fear of failure add up to failed living. It's not that my entire life has been a failure; but that I have trouble seeing beyond my failures.

Part Seven - Keeping it in the Family

Some people like to joke: "Incest is best, just keep it in the family"; but writing as a survivor, I've got to say that incest is not funny. Not funny at all.

As a little boy I had incestuous sex with both of my brothers, one of them being the abuser. After my abusive brother moved away, I continued the incest with my other brother. That part of our familial relationship ended when both of us became fed up with our own self-disgust and shame, and the two of us never spoke about it again for over 30 years. As a matter of fact, we've only just recently begun talking about everything we did alone together as well as with our abuser. These have been awkward conversations as we sort through blame and shame in search of vindication and healing. Part of that process is acknowledging and repenting of those deeds for which we are responsible; but more importantly, with that repentance needs to come self-forgiveness along with letting go the guilt and shame which was never ours to begin with.

If that's where my story of sex with my siblings ended, it would have been enough guilt, shame and familial dysfunction to mess up my life for the rest of my life; but unfortunately, there was one more experience before I finally packed up all my belongings and moved myself away from that house of shame.

My final incestuous episode is also my most difficult to share, not because it was more horrible than what happened to me as a little boy but because of my age at the time, my culpability in the act and with whom the inappropriate sex took place. I can't remember if I was 15 or 16 at the time; but I'm leaning towards 15 going on 16, which would have made the other person 23 years old at the time.

My final act of incest was with my sister. I have beat myself up over this one for decades, and greatly feared what happened between the two of us might some day come to light and expose me for the disgusting, sexually twisted pervert I really am. The actual activity was brief and took place over a few hours on a Saturday evening and Sunday morning, never to be repeated (or discussed) again. I'm beginning to understand this as another situation where I was sexually victimized; but it's much more difficult to shake my complicity in this act of incest than I can do with what happened with my abusive brother.

My memory of this final, disgusting and shameful experience of my childhood began one Saturday night with my sister and I discussing sex and sharing with one another our individual stashes of pornography. I had Hustler, Penthouse Letters and a few other magazines and my sister had a few Playgirl magazines along with an extremely descriptive and sexually extremist erotic novel titled Rx for Sex. Without getting too explicit on details, the plot of the book involved a young married couple seeing a sex therapist and primarily what the therapist and his staff did with the wife to open her mind (and other body parts) to things she (and I) had previously never imagined.

Reading to one another from our respective stash of filth served as a form of mutual seduction...or at least that's the way I interpreted it for the past 30+ years. We read to each other until we became so aroused that we could look past the horror of a little brother and big sister having sex with one another and just get on with the act. Like I wrote above, it was short-lived. We did a few things that Saturday night and a few more things the next Sunday morning and that was that. While I probably felt more shame at the time and continuing on through my life about this than she did, I never interpreted those few hours as abuse on either of our parts; but rather as an episode of mutual moral weakness. We were both complicit, the act was consensual...or was it?

While I cannot disown my own lust and lack of self control in the experience, not to mention my continued reliance upon pornography, I'm beginning to see the bigger picture behind those hours of shame. Yes, I was in the wrong. Yes, I still feel guilt over this. Yes, I wish it had never happened. And yes, I can never dis-invest myself of at least some of the blame; but just as my abusive brother groomed me in preparation for our incestuous activity, so did my big sister (whether consciously or not).

What happened that weekend didn't begin Saturday at dusk, as I had always recounted it in my mind; but much earlier, as my sister began sharing sexual materials with me. Just as she supplied porn to my abusiver; she provided me with porn, erotica and catheter condoms from the nursing home and excitedly told stories about sexually touching some of the residents. She also gave vivid descriptions of XXX magazines which she didn't bring home featuring bestiality, and as she described the images in those magazines, her sense of sexual arousal over the idea of sex with farm animals was very evident. In other words, my sister was a bit twisted herself in her sexuality as well.

And there was one other thing: some time before the events of that shameful weekend, my sister told me she had shaved her pubic area and lifted her nightgown to show me. Again, just to explain it now, I felt inside myself a mixture of sexual arousal and disgust at seeing my sister's private parts...but in the end, carnal desire won out over personal morals and cultural ethics.

So was I abused by my sister? Yes. Yes and no; but yes, I was abused. Looking back now and remembering the weeks and months building up to that weekend, I can see how she prepared me (consciously or not) to do something which normally, even for a sick, twisted, sexually corrupted adolescent boy like myself, would have found difficult to pursue. Yes, I was abused. While I will continue to take some responsibility as a sexually mature boy with raging sexual desires, I was still a kid (emotionally and psychologically immature) and she was the adult in the situation. Yes, I was wrong; but I think I can say with all things considered, she was more wrong.

I've tried to comprehend what happened that weekend within the light of myself having already been sexually corrupted as a young boy, my way-too-early introduction to pornography and my continued use of even harder pornography upon entering adolescence. I believe there is some truth to my previous theory. I was corrupt. I was damaged goods. I had a skewed understanding of sex and sexuality which certainly affected my continued behavior with my brother and most likely influenced my lack of restraint with my sister. Yes, this is true; but I also was victimized by a sibling who was quite a bit older than me, a sibling with sexual desires begging the opportunity for exploitation of the nearest, easiest-to-access subject: ME.

Lately I've been reading a lot about survivors of childhood sexual abuse and one thing which comes up repeatedly is that, having been victimized as a child, the survivor continues to place him or herself in a position to be re-victimized both sexually as well as in other ways, including being bullied through childhood and even adult relationships. I'll address that when I write about my relationships over the years with friends, co-workers and authority figures was affected by my past; but this final story was my final sexually dysfunctional experience within my own family. It was the end of what began with my oldest brother, and the beginning of a huge, internal, twisted mess I'm still untangling.

Part 6 - Continued

Did you see what I did in my previous post? I settled for a few vague references to my later sexual acting out rather than spell out any details. I can't do that. I do myself a disservice if I don't spend time remembering and writing out what actually happened, so here we go.

 After our abuser moved away, my other brother and I would still, at times, look at pornography together. Our abuser had left behind his personal stash, and we found a new supplier in one of our neighbor's steady supply of Hustler magazines he got from his big brother who worked for a local binding company.

 As I wrote in my last entry, my abuser moved out of my life right around the same time I was sexually coming into my own. Now, when I look back on all of this, I don't remember experiencing any sexual pleasure with my abuser. I might be blocking the pleasure out of my memory if it ever, in fact, existed...but I just can't recall ever really understanding what was so great about my oldest brother peeing sticky white cream. I'm sorry about the childish terms; but that's how I remember it. I was a kid. The only thing that came out of my penis was urine. The stuff that came out of my abuser's penis was gross.

---

That changed when I entered puberty, like it does for every little boy. This is really difficult to write. Just being candid right now. Phew. Okay, I'm ready to continue.

 I have a clear separation in my mind of

• sex with my abusive brother
• me personally stopping the abuse (saying "NO! No more!")
• my abuser leaving home to join the military
• and then indulging myself in the very things which fueled my abuse

Viewing pornography and mastubating felt both good and horrible at the same time. Once I experienced the pleasure of reaching orgasm, it was difficult (no...impossible) to stop; but those few minutes of pleasure were always followed by hours, days and even weeks of shame. I know part of that ties in with my Christian faith. I was fairly certain that looking at pictures of naked ladies and ESPECIALLY masturbating about those ladies was sin. Not just a sin; but it was sinful - full of sin.

On top of that, even at that age there was in my mind a continuous thread between the earlier abuse and my current behavior. To a certain extent, I was mimicking what had already been going on for the past 6 to 7 years of my life; but now I couldn't blame my abuser because I myself was the one doing these things to myself. Too much guilt and shame. I've got to say that right now. Too much guilt and shame.

I began to masturbate to porn, followed by orgasm, followed by incredible guilt which most often resulted in me destroying my cache of magazines, only for me to call on my neighbor for another fix the next time I was jonesing.

I suppose, to most men, this part of my story doesn't sound unusual or unnatural because it's typical, raging hormone, teenage behavior; but what made it different for me was when my closest brother and I would look at the porn together, wind up getting naked and give in to our sexual desires by doing the same stuff our biggest brother did to us. I even remember both of us wearing pantyhose, which is pretty disturbing considering I didn't like that when our abuser did that. And all the while we were acting out like this, on the inside, I experienced both revulsion and compulsion to do it over again and again and again.

Can I say that this was all my abuser's fault? After all, he introduced me to this stuff long before a child is supposed to see and experience such things. He showed me pornography, and he showed me what to do with it. Should my brother and I blame ourselves for repeating what our abuser did to us?  This continues to be one of the most difficult areas to reconcile myself with my. I feel guilt because I feel complicit. I feel self-disgust because I chose to do things I hated having done to me of my own free will. I think it was free will...but how much can a child consent to? Can a child consent at all?

 As I write this, I'm realizing the main difference between the abuse we suffered and our acting out together was that our abuser never, ever expressed any guilt, shame or regret about anything that he did to us...not even to this day.  BUT, whenever my closest brother and I acted out sexually together, it was always followed by guilt on both of our parts. We would both promise to one another and to ourselves that we would never do this again. Sadly, we broke that promise repeatedly; but it's important to acknowledge that we DID feel shame and that we DID feel regret and that those feelings were mutual.

That's a pretty important difference, and right now I'm glad that I'm writing this out. Our abusive brother never expressed shame or regret. Instead, he came home from the military boasting about his sexual escapades with hookers and locals and showed off his shiny new Betamax player with a stash of hardcore movies. He didn't change. He was still the same. Everything for him was about getting his rocks off.

 My other brother and I felt shame and we still feel shame. He's not dealing with this openly yet...not like I am; but we've recently talked about it (first time in over 30 years) and I hear the same grief, shame, regret, and desire that this had never happened, either with our abuser or what the 2 of us did together. So if there is any benefit to detailing this part of my story, it's in realizing the difference between our shameless predator and his victims.

 We eventually kept our promise to stop masturbating with each other. That's how I see this now: Just as our abuser used the 2 of us as a masturbation tool, we did the same with each other. To be specific, we serviced each other the same as our abuser had done to us: oral and anal penetration, dressing up in pantyhose, lotions, oils, lots of rubbing against one another; but we weren't having sexual intercourse in any way which I understand that term. We were just getting off on one another. It was wrong. It is disgusting. I mean, man... I hate spell this out; but it was and is disgusting. It's sick. I guess I was sick. I guess we all were sick...all 3 of us.

But in the end, this was not at all about making love. It was simply mutual masturbation. It was the equivalent of prison sex. I'll be getting more into that in a future post about my struggles with gender identity; but that was a huge breakthrough for me: realizing what happened between me and my abuser was the equivalent of prison rape and what happened between me and my other brother was the equivalent of prison sex.

 I still feel guilty about what I did, of my own volition, after the formal abuse had stopped; but I can also more clearly see a distinct separation between the us victims and the one who victimized us.

Part Six - Caught in the Undertow

Scientists say a baby's brain is a fascinating bundle of neurons just waiting to be hard-wired into the intricate circuitry we call the mind. The wiring of the brain begins at birth and continues until age 10 or 12 when it is wired for life, according to these findings. - www.aagc.org

---

Between the ages of 6 and 12 years old I was exposed to stimuli, both normal and abnormal, all laying down the psychological, emotional, biological and spiritual foundation upon which the rest of my life has been constructed. Thus, the title of this blog: Deconstructing Gary.


In deconstructing my life, I hope to sort out 

• the good from the bad
• truth from misbelief
• facts from myths
• personal responsibility/accountability from unwarranted shame

that I might reconstruct myself with the right pieces in the right places, so that which hath crippled me in my past would no longer limit me in my todays and tomorrows.

In connecting the dots from my present to my past, I am not looking to excuse my own mistakes, sins, poor decisions or the outright foolishness behind some my behaviors; but rather hope to better navigate my life from this day forward without stumbling down the same old, miserable paths I seem to inadvertently traipse into again and again and again.

Before my abuser was bodily removed from my life by his leaving home to join the military, I had already taken a stand in telling him "I don't want to do this anymore!" And for whatever reason, he stopped. I don't remember feeling especially empowered or anything at that time. I think I was just conflicted inside to the point that I cried out "STOP!!"

I asked him to stop, and stop, he did; before moving far away and out of my life for the rest of my now, adolescent years. However, "stop", I did not. Whether merely repeating an established pattern or that now, having entered puberty, I discovered for myself the pleasure which comes with sexual orgasm; I did not stop. My other brother, the "good brother", and I infrequently continued to act out sexually with one another for a few years before both deciding we could not and would not continue this behavior. I also began to masturbate to porn frequently. Yes, I know...I was a teenager - WHAT ELSE IS NEW?

What else WAS new? I was new, or at least part of me was new. Beginning in the 6th grade, I had a gradual spiritual awakening leading to a very personal faith in a very real Jesus Christ. My family of birth was nominally Christian: we went to church, we celebrated the standard Christian holidays, we paid lip service to a Supreme Being. It was all structure without any substance. But, like waking from a dream, all the vague concepts of my religion came to life for me in a way that forever changed my life. Or maybe I should say that it changed some what of my life.

I don't want to dig too deep into my spiritual conversion, as that is not my intended purpose for writing this blog. I only bring up my faith in Christ because my personal beliefs and the religion (read: dogma, doctrine and culture) related to those beliefs played a role in both my healing as well as my compulsion to hide all of those dark and shameful secrets which did and still threaten to undo me.

So back on point, about the same time I was experiencing this spiritual awakening I was also having a sexual awakening (which most of us call PUBERTY). As I've said, when I was a child I was scared of what would happen if my parents found out about me and my brothers. I feared punishment from my parents and my abuser. As an adolescent with a new found spiritual awakening, my anxiety shifted to fear of a righteous God, as well as fear of what others in and outside of the church would think if they ever stumbled upon my dirty laundry. And thus began a spiritual, emotional and psychological roller coaster ride of pleasure, guilt, shame, remorse, desire, self-indulgence, self disgust, repentance, erotic lust, pleasure, remorse, guilt, guilt, guilt, shame, etcetera ad infinitum.

I imagine some of you nodding your heads right now, as that pattern of giving into desire and reaping shame, entertaining pleasure and reaping guilt is the norm for anyone with any sort of religious upbringing.

So part of this blog entry is about the shame over sexual habits which originated before I could really even understand or enjoy the experience; but which continued in one form or another once I was able to choose for myself to continue what I believed was wrong and sinful and yet felt so incredibly awesome.

The other reason I've documented this part of my life is because it's a segue to later issues with my sexual, social, spiritual and gender identity. My need to keep things buried and secret. My fears which were kept bottled up inside of me, torturing me with no hope for relief. My misbeliefs based on false conclusions grounded upon an unhealthy, unnatural and damaged childhood.


As I stated above, I take full responsibility for my own stupidity; but have also begun to more fully understand how much of the behaviors for which I've borne such shame are connected to corrupted patterns laid down in my childhood. In many ways, I was riding a wave towards the beach before being pulled back out into the ocean of personal struggle.

Pulled back out to the sea where a series of patterns, habits and addictions join together as coping mechanisms...as a ineffective means of treading  water too deep to swim and too far from shore to prevent my own self-destruction.

Part Five - Dredging Up the Details

*** WARNING! This entry is the most explicit I've posted so far. What follows is not sexy. It is not pretty. It is not inspiring. It is sick, plain and simple. But it is truth. It is my truth. PLEASE READ WITH CAUTION! ***

In Part Five, I am going to attempt to recount some very specific details about what happened to me as a child. I am doing this primarily so I can get it all out on the surface, kind of like lancing an infected wound or better yet, major intrusive surgery to remove all the YUCK inside of me. This is supposed to be cathartic, so here goes.

It's going to be ugly and I don't even know if I'll be able to get through this today.

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First Physical Contact:
I remember being in the basement with my 2 brothers.
I remember the wooden box, smelling of tobacco and newsprint.
I remember pornography spread over the couch.
I remember my abuser wearing nothing other than my mother's pantyhose, and encouraging me and my other brother to do the same.
I remember him lying on top of me and rubbing against me.
I remember him reaching orgasm, and his jelly-like semen.

This basic scenario went on for some time, before progressing to the next stage:

I remember being in the basement again.

Same wooden box, same heavy, musky smell.
Porn spread out across the couch.
I remember looking at the magazines
and having everything explained in detail.

I remember my abuser suggesting we try some of the things in the magazines.


I remember him performing oral sex on me, and having me do the same to him.
To the best of my memory, he never ejaculated in my mouth or made me taste his semen; but I remember the texture, the smell and how much I wanted to wash it off myself.

Eventually it reached the point where he attempted to penetrate me:
I remember lying face down on the couch in the basement.
I remember my abuser climbing on top of me.
I remember him using a jar of Vaseline to lubricate his penis.
I remember him rubbing his penis in my butt crack.
I remember him pressing his penis into my rectum,
and I remember the pain.

I remember all of these things:
I remember nearly every other Saturday night from Fall through Spring.
I remember waiting for my parents to leave for their church bowling league.
I remember having to clean up and have everything back in place before they came home.

My story is true, and I have never forgotten these things I've written above. This is the first time I've ever spelled it out like this. This is the first time I've ever put it in writing like this; but this story has haunted me my entire life, from the first day the abuse started up to today. The memories don't go away, the effects remain.

There is more to the story than what I've written above; but this ends the first chapter of the abuse. My next entries will begin with the effect the abuse had upon me after my abuser left home, both in my own acting out and my self isolation.

Part 4 - What Happens in Private

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Part Three - Sexual and Emotional Conflict

Victims of rape often give conflicting testimony of their assault, especially when the abuse happened at the hands of someone they knew and in whom they trusted.

e.g. an adult victim of date rape may find herself questioning her own complicity in the assault.

• On the one hand: "That son of a bitch forced himself on me. He took away my right to choose, to consent, to give myself to him when I was ready. He raped me."
• But on the other hand: "I must have done something wrong. I let myself get drunk. I didn't fight back as hard as I could have. I can't totally blame him. And besides that, I love him."

Children who have been sexually compromised have it even worse.

Think back to when you were 5 or 7 or 10 or even a young adolescent and compare the child you were to the adult you are now. As children, we did not have the capacity to reasonably consent to adult activities (be it getting drunk, having sex or committing a crime). That's one of the reasons minors are held to a different accountability in our justice system. Call it childhood innocence, inexperience, lack of understanding, incapability of abstract thought or plain and simple ignorance: a child cannot be expected to view things as an adult would.

So it was with me. I was conflicted about my role in the abuse  and still am to some degree. Since I participated, was I not also to blame? Since I accepted the bribes of candy and food, did I not also carry some blame? And what about family loyalty with its unspoken code of honor? I didn't want to be a snitch. I was afraid to be a snitch. But since I didn't speak out when I could have, doesn't that mean that it's my own fault this happened to me?

As far as the whole love thing goes, I don't know that I ever really, truly loved my abusive brother. As I've written previously, when we weren't being sexually inappropriate together, he was usually kicking kicking the tar out of me. Not a lot of love; but still some measure of family loyalty, code of brotherhood. (Yeah, he abused me but he's still my brother, still family, still my flesh and blood)

In light of my own personal conflict, it's not difficult for me to understand why more victims don't speak out about their abuse. There are consequences to opening your mouth. On top of that, even now in year 2012, we've still got a whole lot of people who don't want to believe that childhood sexual abuse happens - who would rather believe that the child is exaggerating or is confused. DAMN RIGHT we're confused! And the imposed silence continues to shove us back into our own darkness.

I knew something was wrong when I was a kid. I was pretty sure this didn't happen in other boy's homes, especially after mentioning it to my fellow cub scouts. In being inducted into the secret club of childhood sex, I was automatically disconnected from childhood normalcy. In my mind, in my soul, I was an outsider to the rest of the kids in my neighborhood, in my school, in my extended family. And there was no way back in once you've been initiated into a life of the unspeakable. It wasn't my fault. I couldn't have knowingly chosen to lose my innocence, to quite frankly give up my virginity.

I didn't understand that back then; but I'm beginning to understand it now. I was compromised. I was betrayed. I was exploited. I was taken advantage of. I was used and abused. I wasn't treated like a brother; but as a sex toy. We didn't have consensual sex. I was a living sex doll - no emotions, no feelings, no strings attached, no regrets. Just another tool for his masturbation.

And for all these years I've carried the shame for something I did not choose to do; but was done to me. Over 40 years of shame, of grief, of internal conflict, confusion, corruption. Feeling broken,soiled, defective, dirty, always coming up short. And over 40 years of feeling alone in all of this. SIGH.

Thank God for groups like One Sixth Columbus, SIA and MaleSurvivor.org. I'm grateful for online support from RAINN, ASCA, 1in6.org and The Joyful Heart Foundation (thank you Mariska!) I'm getting closer to 50 years old and finally, now, I'm able to share my story with others who understand and support me.

Part Two - The Naked Truth

It's funny how images and smells from long ago can be so vivid today, especially when related to trauma. Sometimes connected to good memories as well; but so often and so vivid when connected to trauma.

I remember the smell of my brother's padlocked wooden box in which he stashed his porn and cigarettes. It had the fragrance of colored newsprint and tobacco.

The porn smelled of tobacco and the box smelled of both the cigarettes and the porn. I have memories of my brother unlocking his treasure chest to display its contents to me, my closest brother and my sister. Sister was the oldest of the kids, and she was also the provider of porn to my brother and probably the cigarettes, too. She used to be a candy striper at the Nursing Home down the road and would frequently lift porn mags and other goodies from the residents. She also stole porn from the people for whom she used to babysit. I can remember her smoking with all of us; but I do not recollect her ever being present for the abuse or for naked hide n' go seek. She obviously knew about the porn...and was also aware of some my biggest brother's other habits: like the women's undergarments he kept in that box.

Regarding those undergarments: This was in the 70s, and streaking was a popular fad. You know, completely naked people would run across an athletic field, interrupt a parade or expose themselves at some other public event; usually running off before they were caught. That was the fun of it, right? There was even a popular song on the radio about it. "Oh yes they call it the streak, look at that, look at that. The fastest thing on two feet, look at that, look at that. He's just as proud as can be of his anatomy. He's goin' to give us a peek."

I guess every generation has its own weird fads and streaking was one of them, along with Pet Rocks.

So what does streaking have to do with bras and panties? Well, around that same time my father had purchased a little camping trailer that we used, as a family, every warm weekend and the occasional week or two when Dad was on vacation. When we weren't camping the trailer sat out on the driveway; and during the Summer with no school, Dad let us kids sleep outside in the camper. My sister had a job, so she didn't typically sleep out there with us. She stayed inside the house with Mom and Dad.

So three boys alone and you probably imagine. But here's where it gets weird.

My brother got into this habit of leaving the trailer around 2am, when the neighbors would likely be sleeping, completely nude. He convinced me and my other brother to join once or twice; but we were scared to go any further than a few steps away from the camper door. Big brother, on the other hand, would go walking around the neighborhood, bare feet, bare buttocks and all. He didn't run, so I guess technically it wasn't streaking; but he would walk around the neighborhood, occasionally ducking behind trees or bushes when the occasional car drove by. And when he came back he would wake us up and tell us of his adventures. He talked about climbing fences, looking in people's windows and skinny dipping in the neighbor's pools. And as if we needed proof of his adventures, he would bring back bras, panties, nylons and pantyhose he had nicked from the neighbor's clotheslines. The more interesting prizes were the crotchless panties and the bras with crude holes cut to allow someone's nipples to protrude. This is the truth. This really happened. One of our neighbors saw him stealing clothes from her clothesline late at night. Either she didn't know or didn't want to believe it was my brother; but she told the whole neighborhood about the naked man in her backyard, causing no small amount of concern that a pervert was wandering our streets at night.

Big Sis knew about the undergarments, and she had a pretty good clue about the identity of the naked lingerie thief. To the best of my memory, she laughed at the thought; but I'm pretty sure she had no clue about the other things her brothers were doing in the dark.

One more memory and then I'm going to stop for today. I believe it was while I was in 3rd grade that I started walking with fellow students to our weekly cub scout meeting. One of the boy's mom was our den mother. These boys, fellow cub scouts, they had this weird habit of sticking their hands down the backs of each other's pants on the way to the meeting. Strictly down the backside, never down the front. I can't say for sure if it was or wasn't sexual in nature, because it never really went further than someone sticking his hand down another boy's pants and then pulling it out. I remember them accusing one of the boys of having pooped his pants and how that kid cried and said they were lying.

Yeah. So my final memory for today is when I asked these guys if any of them ever put their "thing" in one of the other guy's butts. Their reply was a pretty solid "NO".

To this day, I don't know if they ever put 2 + 2 together and figured out what was going on at my house; but I do remember telling big brother about the conversation and how angry he got at me. I was never, ever, ever to tell anybody about what happened in my house when Mom and Dad were away. NEVER! There would be consequences if I ever opened my mouth again. Mandated silence. A silence that screamed then,  screams now and continues to scream forevermore.

Part One - Earliest Memories

One of my earliest memories connected to my abuse began with some innocent role-playing between myself and my closest brother. Back in those days, the easiest costume a boy could wear was to run around in nothing but our Fruit of the Looms.

That's all we needed to play Tarzan. Add a loosely tied blanket around your neck and presto-change-o! now you're Superman! This vision of childhood innocence is, unfortunately, probably one of the last memories I have of being truly innocent.


The tie-in to my eventual sexual abuse was when my oldest sibling found me and my brother hiding under the sheets, completely naked after one of our silly underwear games. I was 6 years old, my brother was 8. The sibling who found us was nearly 6 years older than me, meaning he was just entering puberty. What we were doing under the sheets was completely and entirely non-sexual. We were little kids. There was nothing perverse about our nudity. But my oldest sibling saw it otherwise. He said we were being naughty and threatened to tell Mom and Dad. He said we would be in BIG TROUBLE if they found out.

Only recently have I begun to connect the dots and see how this was the beginning of our grooming. FEAR is a powerful means of control, and though it seems almost silly to me now; once the abuse commenced, I continued to fear getting in trouble with Mom or Dad for years. I was worried I would be punished if they found out what I was doing...or rather (in retrospect), what was being done to me.

Let me repeat that: I never thought my abuser would get in trouble; but that I would be the one who would be punished! Fear is a powerful weapon, and my abuser continued to use it as a means of keeping us quiet the entire time he was actively abusing us as well as into adulthood.

Some time after that incident, our abuser exposed us to sexual materials buried in my father's night stand. The stuff in that drawer was tame by today's standards; but it was my first experience looking at a naked adult female as a sex object. I remember a coin with heads printed on one side and tails on the other along with the appropriate female body parts, a little telescope with a pin-up model inside, some condoms in what I remember as little metal containers - sort of like mini-film rolls. There may have been more stash in there; but that's all that I can remember.

My brother tried to make this a fun event, laughing about finding my Dad's secret stash and inflating one of the condoms like a balloon. I can't say I exactly understood what I was seeing; but instinctively knew we were doing something bad. After all, this my Dad's private property which he had made efforts to keep hidden from us. We had no business digging around in his nightstand and looking at his stuff while he and Mom were out shopping or bowling or whatever they were doing that night.

This was another means of our abuser grooming us. He impressed upon us the fear of our parent's wrath, should they ever find out what we had done, and also led us to believe that he possessed a magic key to secret knowledge: information that would make us wiser and more advanced than our peers. Not unlike a certain snake so very long ago in the Garden.

The grooming progressed along the same lines whenever my parents left him to babysit us. Having had a taste of adult sexuality, we were introduced to a new game: Naked Hide 'n Go Seek. It was just like the regular kids game; but this was supposed to me more fun because it had the added thrill factor of playing in the nude (something we now understood was naughty) and our Mom and Dad didn't know anything about it. That's cool, right? At this same time, big brother babysitter started playing upon our natural physical desires and allegiance to him by purchasing a ton of goodies while Mom & Dad were away.

Basically, bribing us to keep quiet with bags of potato chips, candy bars, soda, cheese puffs, you name it. All stuff which we normally received in measured rations now available to us in Bachanallian fashion. Eat, drink and be merry, for later tonight Mom and Dad will be home! That's also when we started smoking cigarettes together, which further bonded us together in our secrets.

But I remember there was always a balance between fear of physical abuse and my indebtedness to him for all that good stuff he bought when Mom and Dad were away. Usually when the parents were home, I cowered in fear of being punched in the chest or having one of my favorite toys crushed in a vise; but when they were out for the evening, I revelled in the attention, the treats and a couple of hours of peace.

At some point in the midst of this new sibling tradition of feasting and being naughty, I got to see my first Playboy magazine. This was back in the 70s when Playboy was a bit classier than their competition. No full-frontal nudity and obviously no genitalia; but regardless, the idea of women as sex objects to be used and tossed aside was pretty clear. Playboy was followed by Penthouse with it's descriptive and rather imaginative Letters section as well as whatever else my abuser could get her hands on.

And as a result I was schooled in the mystery of where, how and why a man sticks his penis in a woman's orifices; most often with graphic R. Crumb style comix than with the much gentler Playboy mags. We were schooled and we were groomed and eventually, as a result, experienced firsthand the discomfort of a large penis in our little mouths and the pain of having it forced into our little boy rectums...but I'm jumping ahead. It didn't exactly happen that fast. We went from naked Hide 'n Go Seek to naked browsing of girlie magazines to dressing in our mother's undergarments to being rubbed against in slippery, slippery pantyhose followed by sticky semen from our abuser's penis pumping out upon our backs and legs. This non-penatrative sexual contact went on for some time before the creep went all the way; but all the way he did eventually go.

I'm going to stop for right now. Writing about this stuff is not easy. I'll get into the impact of the abuse in another post. Just suffice it to say that mentally and emotionally I am a mess whenever I re-visit the darkest days of my childhood and I would never wish this sort of thing on any young boy (or young girl, for that matter).