another “growth” post
There were two excellent posts that I read last week. The first was here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eve-ensler/over-it_b_1089013.html and when I was scrolling through the comments I found the link to this one: http://emptynestdiary.wordpress.com/2011/11/14/not-rape-but-not-right/. When I saw in the comments section that Kelly was partially driven to write the piece because of her sons, and another comment about sons, I wanted to comment but refrained. I didn’t want to take away from message of the piece at all, and felt that I could shoot my mouth off in my own space. She was talking about a serious, traumatic event and I just wanted to give an anecdotal quasi-warning about the possibility of guilt-tripping sons. Her post wasn’t the appropriate place when I’ve got my own here.
The main caveat to this story is that I’m a sensitive guy. A touchy-feely-nancy boy. My feelings are easily hurt, I”m anxious to please and seek approval. Over the years, I’ve gotten less so, but in my childhood, teens and early adulthood I was pretty bad. During my childhood my mom was trying to do the right thing, she made me read “Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret” as a kid so I’d be sensitive to changes female friends were going through and aware of things like menstral cycles and PMS and what not. I received multiple lectures about how to respect a woman, the responsibilities that I accepted for a date’s safety when I asked her out and she accepted, warnings about unintentionally intimidating a girl with my size (hah!) or pressuring her/taking advantage of her sexually. While good intentioned, all of these lectures weren’t really balanced and left me feeling like I was going to grow up to be some evil, vile person unless on constant guard.
Growing up I had two sisters, one older and one younger. I heard all of the warnings to them about being safe, presenting the wrong image/impression/idea to a boy, the dangers of date rape and the general badness of the male population. As they started dating I got to hear about all the horror stories of this jerk or the other, and generally felt like I should be apologizing on a daily basis to them as a representative of my gender.
My first experience with sex was with a wonderful woman. I wish I could say that I had the clearest, fondest memories of that first time, but it’s a blur, in my frenzied state I didn’t take the time to savor the moment. I do remember it being pleasant, obviously I had a happy ending. I was excited, well on my way to manhood! I was expecting to be like a kid in a candy store, to finally try all the things I’d heard about. Unfortunately it didn’t work out that way. This wonderful woman, this girl of my dreams had unfortunately been raped by an ex boyfriend. I didn’t realize it, but this had happened just a few months before I met her and while our first encounter was great, subsequent ones could be hit or miss. We’d start and something would remind her of what happened and she’d shut down. Demons like that aren’t exorcised in just a few weeks or months. She was awesome, and strong and dealt with it way better than could be expected, but it probably wasn’t the best introduction to sex for my personality type. I never pressured her, and I tried like crazy to keep the disappointment off my face, out of my voice when she’d promise an encounter and then it’d fall through, when we’d start and then she’d push me away. Like all relationships, the current interest pays for the sins of the past.
Now, to be clear, I’m not trying to compare my minor discomfort to the seriously tragic events that occur to women who have been raped, I’m just sharing my experiences, my story, not theirs. Their story is theirs to tell. But where did all of this leave me? A sexually frustrated mess, that’s where. With the aforementioned caveat in mind, I think it was just about equal parts me being scared of being shot down and me being worried about being a jerk to someone that turned me into a nervous wreck at the thought of calling a girl and asking her out. And if she was actually aggressive and chased me a little and we got past the first couple dates to sex? I was just incredibly happy to be in the moment and would really go with the flow, if she was that aggressive, chances were she’d take us where she wanted to go and I followed her lead. Not submissive, just not… something.
It wasn’t until the internet that I started to realize I wasn’t a sexual deviant perv for wanting what I wanted, stuff I’d never, ever admit. That I wasn’t going to hell for what was in actuality some pretty vanilla sex acts. And it was a complete shock to me to realize that some girls actually liked and even craved some of that stuff too! It wasn’t offensive, it wasn’t degrading, it was just good, clean, adult fun. There were MUCH deeper levels of depravity than where I was.
The problem was that the damage was done. The inner voice that might’ve wanted to take charge, wanted to be aggressive, wanted to fulfill some of those urges was silenced for years and even now isn’t too loud. I can take charge on the battlefield, I can take charge in the middle of a severe outtage in a Data Center, but I’m not the take charge man on the relationship front.
And it’s not just sexual in nature, although that’s the direction I originally took it in, because of the posts that sparked this. Because of my need to please, my desire to avoid conflict, and the upbringing that I misconstrued to mean that in order to show love for others, you have to put your wants and needs on a shelf and live a life of service I’m left scratching my head and more than a little confused about what to do next. And I had examples from both sides, my dad gave up tons to provide for and support the family, but I’m sure my mom’s childhood dreams weren’t to be a stay at home mother, to have a meal on the table every night by 6:00, to mop the floor on her hands and knees and to sit in the kitchen at an angle where she would the tv and work her way through ironing a small mountain of clothes every Sunday night.
What’s the moral of this story? I dunno. Probably to exercise caution when having discussions with kids. Like all forms of communications, there’s going to be some interference and the strong possibility that the message that was sent wasn’t the message that was received. I think raising good kids who have a healthy respect for others is probably enough, going too far down specific roads can lead to some counterproductive and undesirable results. For me, the lesson that’s become apparent from re-reading this post while editing it, is that I have to be more accountable for my own happiness in relationships.
