WEBVTT - The Last Haircut 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:08.080 Family Secrets is a production of I Heart Radio. How 0:00:08.119 --> 0:00:11.680 long have you known you were gay? She asked? Since 0:00:11.720 --> 0:00:14.920 I was a child, then why didn't you come out? 0:00:14.960 --> 0:00:19.000 Then the world was a different place. Being gay wasn't 0:00:19.000 --> 0:00:22.560 an option, I said, But why did you wait so long? 0:00:24.079 --> 0:00:27.160 Why did I wait so long? Why Because I made 0:00:27.200 --> 0:00:30.159 a promise to never be like my father, Because my 0:00:30.240 --> 0:00:32.880 mother sucked me up every single day by saying being 0:00:32.880 --> 0:00:35.720 gay was disgusting and that I would never be happy. 0:00:36.360 --> 0:00:39.360 Because I thought being gay was disgusting, and if I 0:00:39.440 --> 0:00:42.479 was gay, then I was disgusting. Because I thought I 0:00:42.520 --> 0:00:45.599 would go to hell, because religion sucked me over by 0:00:45.640 --> 0:00:49.440 telling me my feelings were sinful. Because I was broken, 0:00:50.400 --> 0:00:53.880 because I couldn't look at your sweet face and say sorry, 0:00:54.320 --> 0:00:56.520 Daddy can't live with you anymore, because he wants to 0:00:56.560 --> 0:00:59.640 have sex with men. Because I thought your mother would 0:00:59.720 --> 0:01:02.520 kill her self. I lied for so long that I 0:01:02.600 --> 0:01:06.240 didn't know how to stop. I created an entire world, 0:01:07.080 --> 0:01:13.720 and how could I stop that from spending? That's William 0:01:13.800 --> 0:01:18.240 Dameron reading from The Lie, a memoir of two marriages, 0:01:18.440 --> 0:01:22.240 cat fishing and coming out. Bill's story is about a 0:01:22.240 --> 0:01:24.800 secret he did his best to keep from himself from 0:01:24.880 --> 0:01:28.280 most of his life. But as we all know, secrets 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:31.919 don't like to sit quietly in corners. They don't appreciate 0:01:32.000 --> 0:01:36.479 being stuffed down in the silence. They grow until they 0:01:36.520 --> 0:01:51.760 can be contained no longer. I'm Danny Shapiro, and this 0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:54.920 is family secrets, the secrets that are kept from us, 0:01:55.280 --> 0:01:58.120 the secrets we keep from others, and the secrets we 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:03.880 keep from ourselves. I like to begin by asking you 0:02:03.960 --> 0:02:07.560 to describe the landscape of your childhood, where you grew up, 0:02:08.240 --> 0:02:10.560 the family you grew up in, what it was like 0:02:10.720 --> 0:02:17.440 for you. I was born in nine in Greensboro, North Carolina. 0:02:18.440 --> 0:02:21.560 It was very a southern town, very provincial. I think 0:02:21.639 --> 0:02:26.360 social Moray's and religion played very big in our family. 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:29.840 My mother was Catholic, and um, she stayed at home. 0:02:30.360 --> 0:02:33.560 My father was an attorney. I had three brothers. I 0:02:33.600 --> 0:02:37.120 was a second born, so it was a family that 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:40.280 was very much a part of the social fabric. My 0:02:40.320 --> 0:02:42.919 mother was a part of the junior league. We were 0:02:42.960 --> 0:02:45.920 all into sports. I was not into basketball, but I 0:02:46.000 --> 0:02:48.639 was a swimmer, so, um, it was all sort of 0:02:48.680 --> 0:02:53.640 about being that good citizen. I think tell me a 0:02:53.639 --> 0:02:56.120 bit about your like, your inner life, as a child, 0:02:56.480 --> 0:03:02.880 this boy growing up in Greensboro. I was the second point, 0:03:02.919 --> 0:03:06.280 as I said, um, three years behind my older brother. Uh. 0:03:06.320 --> 0:03:09.320 And I always looked up to him. And he was 0:03:09.440 --> 0:03:13.320 the basketball star. He was, um, the kid who did 0:03:13.360 --> 0:03:15.880 so well and and and that was sort of my 0:03:16.040 --> 0:03:19.160 childhood is trying to look up to my older brother. 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:23.080 And and I specifically sort of remember him sitting on 0:03:23.320 --> 0:03:27.440 the corner with him and he said, you know, all 0:03:27.480 --> 0:03:30.880 I want in life is two cars a house in 0:03:30.880 --> 0:03:36.240 the suburbs, two point three kids. I knew I was different, Um, 0:03:36.280 --> 0:03:39.360 but I knew the dream or the desires and thoughts 0:03:39.440 --> 0:03:43.080 that I had couldn't be the same. I couldn't give 0:03:43.160 --> 0:03:46.320 voice to what those were. So I sort of adopted 0:03:46.680 --> 0:03:51.000 his dream is my dream. I went to a Catholic school, Um, 0:03:51.080 --> 0:03:55.680 we all did. We attended church every Sunday. Was very important. 0:03:56.160 --> 0:03:59.320 I remember once our car ran out of gas on 0:03:59.360 --> 0:04:02.160 the way to church, and instead of stopping to get gasps, 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:04.240 we walked to the rest of the way to church. 0:04:04.960 --> 0:04:06.760 So that was kind of an important part of our 0:04:06.800 --> 0:04:11.640 lives well. And so interesting. The idea of being quote 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:17.960 unquote normal, being average, being like everybody else, that being um, 0:04:18.000 --> 0:04:20.320 that being a goal, that being something to aspire to. 0:04:21.279 --> 0:04:24.280 It was it was a goal to be like all 0:04:24.320 --> 0:04:27.039 the other kids. And it's funny when you're a kid, 0:04:27.560 --> 0:04:29.640 you know how the other kids are, but also you 0:04:29.680 --> 0:04:33.080 don't really know what their secret thoughts and desires are. 0:04:33.520 --> 0:04:36.680 So as a child, you don't really know that until 0:04:36.960 --> 0:04:39.479 you learn it, or you say something out of character 0:04:40.080 --> 0:04:44.880 and then quickly something said, oh, that's not what I'm 0:04:44.880 --> 0:04:48.400 supposed to say or be like. I remember playing with 0:04:48.440 --> 0:04:51.640 some neighborhood kids. The rest of them were playing football 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:54.440 in the backyard, and there were two other boys that 0:04:54.560 --> 0:04:57.360 had a football, and we were being kind of silly 0:04:57.520 --> 0:05:00.760 and and walking to football down the driveway and sort 0:05:00.760 --> 0:05:03.200 of dancing behind it. And I remember one of the 0:05:03.200 --> 0:05:06.279 mothers saying, y'all are acting like a bunch of girls. 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:10.760 That kind of stuff stays with you, doesn't it. It does. 0:05:12.360 --> 0:05:16.160 It's so interesting to just generally the nature of childhood, 0:05:16.200 --> 0:05:22.039 because no kid wants to be different, and yet every kid, 0:05:22.279 --> 0:05:26.239 every child has an inner life. Um, but the idea 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:30.800 of sharing that inner life is too scary. It doesn't happen, 0:05:30.960 --> 0:05:34.919 and so there's that feeling of um. Nobody else feels 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:37.600 the way I do, which is of course where literature 0:05:37.640 --> 0:05:41.920 comes in, because then when we read, we discover that 0:05:42.520 --> 0:05:44.720 there are these characters who feel just like we do 0:05:44.760 --> 0:05:47.200 and have in our lives that are so similar to ours. 0:05:47.240 --> 0:05:50.040 But there's such an isolating feeling. I think that is 0:05:50.320 --> 0:05:55.039 universal in childhood, but more so when there's something within 0:05:55.120 --> 0:05:59.320 you where you really do feel like you're different from 0:05:59.440 --> 0:06:02.480 the large your group that's trying to be quote unquote 0:06:02.520 --> 0:06:06.479 normal average. Tell me a little bit about your mother. 0:06:09.520 --> 0:06:12.880 I can see looking back now that she really wanted 0:06:12.920 --> 0:06:15.320 the best for all of us. She wanted us to 0:06:15.440 --> 0:06:19.640 excel at everything that we did, whether that was jobs 0:06:19.800 --> 0:06:23.239 or sports um or for me, I played the piano 0:06:23.320 --> 0:06:26.680 as well. So it was really important to her that 0:06:26.760 --> 0:06:31.000 we presented our best image um to our family and 0:06:31.080 --> 0:06:35.039 friends and society, and there was sort of one image 0:06:35.080 --> 0:06:39.400 to portray that that was the best. In the sixties 0:06:39.400 --> 0:06:42.719 and seventies, there was no internet, so there was no 0:06:43.480 --> 0:06:47.080 sort of way of finding different people or connecting to 0:06:47.120 --> 0:06:50.040 other people. You only knew what was happening in the 0:06:50.080 --> 0:06:52.880 town that you were in, in that small radius, and 0:06:52.960 --> 0:06:56.159 my mother was very much that way. Tell me a 0:06:56.160 --> 0:07:00.600 bit about your dad. My father was an attorney UM, 0:07:00.600 --> 0:07:03.480 and he was a litigator, so I think he used 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:06.760 up all his words during the day in court. When 0:07:06.800 --> 0:07:09.559 he came home, he was a man of very few words. Uh. 0:07:09.560 --> 0:07:12.400 He came home, dinner was on the table. We did 0:07:12.440 --> 0:07:14.800 have one sort of fun thing when he came home. 0:07:14.880 --> 0:07:18.040 Sometimes he would have chewing gum in his pocket. We 0:07:18.080 --> 0:07:19.880 would all sort of punch each other and run to 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:21.680 the door to be the first one there to grab 0:07:21.680 --> 0:07:24.160 the chewing gum out of his pocket. But then we 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:26.120 would sit down at the table. My mother would have 0:07:26.200 --> 0:07:31.320 dinner ready. He would drink down scotch very quickly. He 0:07:31.360 --> 0:07:34.560 would eat his food in a minute or two. And 0:07:34.640 --> 0:07:40.080 so there were very few really words spoken between us. 0:07:40.360 --> 0:07:43.400 And when I look back, I sort of see that 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:45.640 he was. He was missing a lot of the time. 0:07:45.760 --> 0:07:49.440 Even before he left us, he was sort of not there. 0:07:50.160 --> 0:07:53.320 Did you feel like you knew him? No, I don't 0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:57.280 think I ever really knew exactly who he was. Looking back, 0:07:57.480 --> 0:08:01.000 I know now who he is. He had a difficult 0:08:01.080 --> 0:08:03.080 childhood as well. He was an only child and his 0:08:03.120 --> 0:08:06.240 mother was an alcoholic um so he was sent to 0:08:06.280 --> 0:08:10.480 live with his grandparents in Fletcher, North Carolina for a 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:13.760 while while his mother recovered. So as an adult, I 0:08:13.840 --> 0:08:17.720 understand that as a kid, I didn't was in this 0:08:17.840 --> 0:08:22.040 image conscious childhood in this traditional Southern family. There was 0:08:22.080 --> 0:08:26.120 also the matter of the body, as in Bill's body. 0:08:27.280 --> 0:08:29.440 I think our bodies are for many of us, a 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:33.560 source of embarrassment or shame. There's just something so messy, 0:08:33.800 --> 0:08:38.400 so exposed, so physical about our bodies. This shame came 0:08:38.400 --> 0:08:41.800 into play in Bill's early life. I was a swimmer 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:45.240 for most of my childhood. My brothers and I were 0:08:45.240 --> 0:08:48.800 all painfully skinny. We just could not seem to gain weight. 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:52.680 And as as a boy, you don't want to be skinny, 0:08:54.679 --> 0:08:58.400 and also too, it's sort of portrayed this weakness on 0:08:58.440 --> 0:09:02.680 the outside that I felt the inside. And I remember 0:09:02.840 --> 0:09:05.960 swimming at the City swim Me getting out, my mother's 0:09:06.000 --> 0:09:09.080 sitting in the stands, and I go up and sit 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:12.400 next to her on the bleachers, and I remember her 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:17.200 comment was, you're so damn skinny. You need to press 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:21.319 weights like those other boys. Um so, so there was 0:09:21.360 --> 0:09:24.840 no there wasn't really a comment about, wow, you did 0:09:24.880 --> 0:09:29.040 a great job, you know, swimming. It cemented that feeling 0:09:29.200 --> 0:09:32.720 that there was something wrong with me, not only inside, 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:36.679 but on the outside. You internalized that I did, and 0:09:36.679 --> 0:09:39.080 then you, and you carried it with you. I did 0:09:39.120 --> 0:09:42.360 carry it with me. I think when you have something 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:45.000 you consider ugly on the inside, that's all you can 0:09:45.040 --> 0:09:47.360 see on the outside. When I looked in the mirror, 0:09:47.400 --> 0:09:51.800 I just saw all of the flaws. What Bill considered 0:09:51.880 --> 0:09:56.680 ugly on the inside was the awareness, not necessarily conscious knowledge, 0:09:57.040 --> 0:10:01.480 but something else, something thrumming deep in his interior that 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:05.679 he wasn't attracted to girls. He felt something for boys, 0:10:05.720 --> 0:10:09.480 something he knew he wasn't supposed to feel. I was 0:10:09.520 --> 0:10:13.360 in college for two years at a piano performance major. 0:10:13.960 --> 0:10:17.000 I had an opportunity to have a summer job with 0:10:17.040 --> 0:10:20.800 my aunt, who lived in Denver, Colorado. She knew a 0:10:20.840 --> 0:10:24.080 couple who owned the Lost gold Mine. It was a 0:10:24.080 --> 0:10:26.880 gold mine where you could take tours through and I 0:10:26.880 --> 0:10:29.640 would live with her. I remember my mother sitting me 0:10:29.720 --> 0:10:32.360 down in the living room. She was a nurse, so 0:10:32.440 --> 0:10:35.000 she was wearing her starched nursing whites, and she sat 0:10:35.040 --> 0:10:37.600 down and said, okay, Bill, I want you to know 0:10:37.679 --> 0:10:40.880 that your aunt is and she lowered her voice a 0:10:40.960 --> 0:10:44.079 lesbian because you couldn't say that out loud. It was 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:47.080 almost like it was a curse word. And she said 0:10:47.120 --> 0:10:48.880 to me, I want you to promise that you won't 0:10:48.960 --> 0:10:53.959 let Sheila change you. I is that okay? And I'm 0:10:53.960 --> 0:10:56.240 still not quite certain why she let me live with her. 0:10:56.320 --> 0:10:58.439 If she was so afraid, she must have had some 0:10:58.559 --> 0:11:02.040 sense of of who her son was. But she still 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:05.720 let me live with her for that summer. So two questions. 0:11:05.720 --> 0:11:07.880 One is you you had a consciousness that you were 0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:11.000 gay at that point? Yeah? Did you have language for it? 0:11:11.559 --> 0:11:14.400 I didn't have language for it. You're exactly right. I 0:11:14.400 --> 0:11:16.679 I could not say in my head that I'm gay, 0:11:16.840 --> 0:11:20.199 and I never did. It just wasn't how I identified 0:11:20.240 --> 0:11:23.240 and it wasn't an option. I knew it wasn't an option, 0:11:23.320 --> 0:11:28.800 but I knew I had these thoughts and desires. So 0:11:28.960 --> 0:11:31.400 I lived with my aunt for the summer. The Lost 0:11:31.440 --> 0:11:34.000 gold Mine was owned by a couple of gay guys, 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:37.800 and it was a great summer. She eventually took me 0:11:37.880 --> 0:11:41.400 to my first gay bar in Central City, of all places, 0:11:41.440 --> 0:11:45.959 which is such a conservative passion. So we went into 0:11:46.040 --> 0:11:49.880 the bar. I met a friend of hers don who 0:11:49.960 --> 0:11:54.120 was twenty three. I was nineteen. I had a few drinks. 0:11:55.120 --> 0:11:59.640 We walked out to the parking lot, and it was 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:03.640 the first time I kissed a man, and it was 0:12:03.720 --> 0:12:08.040 the most amazing feeling. It was right and it was wrong, 0:12:08.640 --> 0:12:13.719 and I knew that could never happen again. So now 0:12:13.760 --> 0:12:16.880 you're twenty and you're back from your summer. Yes, And 0:12:16.960 --> 0:12:19.200 as a matter of fact, that summer too, I remember 0:12:19.240 --> 0:12:22.640 I um got a gym membership in Denver, and I 0:12:22.640 --> 0:12:24.199 went to the gym as well, so I was a 0:12:24.200 --> 0:12:26.800 little more fleshed out too, And so I was actually 0:12:26.840 --> 0:12:31.040 feeling good about myself for sort of the first time. 0:12:31.480 --> 0:12:34.560 And it felt good to have, you know, two or 0:12:34.559 --> 0:12:37.520 three months of just being myself. But I came back 0:12:37.559 --> 0:12:40.120 to North Carolina and I knew I had to tell 0:12:40.160 --> 0:12:42.480 my mother. I knew I had to let her know that, 0:12:43.280 --> 0:12:45.240 you know, the things that she said and the things 0:12:45.280 --> 0:12:48.679 that I heard about gay people were wrong. I still 0:12:49.360 --> 0:12:52.800 was not strong enough to say, Mom, I'm gay. What 0:12:52.960 --> 0:12:56.920 I said was, you know, Mom, the love that Sheila 0:12:57.000 --> 0:12:59.320 has for her girlfriend and the love that these other 0:12:59.360 --> 0:13:05.079 people have, it's the same. And she was immediately incensed 0:13:05.080 --> 0:13:08.439 and said, no, it's not that's disgusting. It's it's not 0:13:09.720 --> 0:13:14.400 were her views informed primarily by her Catholicism, or by 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:17.200 community and culture, or all of the above, all of 0:13:17.240 --> 0:13:20.840 the above. Yeah, I have actually spoke, you know, talked 0:13:20.920 --> 0:13:24.840 to her, interrogated her a bit, since it was taboo, 0:13:25.000 --> 0:13:27.400 That's what she told me. It was taboo, and I 0:13:27.480 --> 0:13:31.040 didn't want you to experience that pain. You know, the 0:13:31.080 --> 0:13:34.520 world would never alter, so I had to. So, now 0:13:34.559 --> 0:13:37.079 you're back from your summer and you're feeling pretty good 0:13:37.080 --> 0:13:39.920 about yourself. You've you've been able to be yourself for 0:13:39.960 --> 0:13:45.880 three home months. What happens next? I was thrown right 0:13:45.880 --> 0:13:50.480 back into this was so, I was thrown right back 0:13:50.520 --> 0:13:56.640 into society in North Carolina. When you escape hundred miles 0:13:56.640 --> 0:13:59.520 away from home, you fill this freedom. But when you 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:05.080 come act, it's sort of like the humidity of southern summer. 0:14:05.120 --> 0:14:08.559 It's oppressive and you start to feel it and there's 0:14:08.679 --> 0:14:11.120 your church again, and there's all the people you know. 0:14:11.800 --> 0:14:16.000 And here was my mother saying this is wrong, this 0:14:16.080 --> 0:14:19.280 is disgusting. You're never going to be happy. And it 0:14:19.360 --> 0:14:22.080 wasn't just a one time thing. It was sort of Okay, 0:14:22.160 --> 0:14:25.240 let's talk about this. As I came home from school 0:14:25.240 --> 0:14:27.880 every day, do you want to talk to the priest 0:14:28.000 --> 0:14:30.800 because the priest can help you. Do you want to 0:14:30.800 --> 0:14:34.720 be a woman to My mother asked me, um, and 0:14:34.840 --> 0:14:38.240 I just it was immediate. It was like, okay, this, 0:14:38.240 --> 0:14:41.960 this is wrong, this is not good. Also, at the 0:14:42.000 --> 0:14:46.840 same time, the AIDS epidemic had become national. It was 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:50.200 hidden for so long. I remember my aunt telling me 0:14:50.280 --> 0:14:53.000 don't do poppers because they thought that's what caused it. 0:14:53.120 --> 0:14:56.040 There was, you know, nobody really knew. But suddenly was 0:14:56.080 --> 0:14:59.080 on the news and men were wasting away and here 0:14:59.240 --> 0:15:03.800 was my body dysmorphia coming again. Okay, this is gay. 0:15:04.200 --> 0:15:08.240 People are getting skinny and wasting away. And and so 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:11.080 it was the combination of all that guilt and shame 0:15:11.760 --> 0:15:14.280 and being back that sort of drove me back into 0:15:14.360 --> 0:15:18.800 the closet. We're going to take a quick break. We'll 0:15:18.840 --> 0:15:34.520 be back in a moment. So Bill returned to the norm, 0:15:34.560 --> 0:15:37.840 you know, wife, two point three kids, white picket fence. 0:15:38.640 --> 0:15:41.800 In the South. In those days, people married young and 0:15:41.920 --> 0:15:45.160 got on with it. His brother, his friends, they were 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:48.800 all getting married. He meets Catherine, the friend of a friend, 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:52.440 and he's drawn to her. She seems like a kindred 0:15:52.480 --> 0:15:56.840 spirit to him. First time I met Catherine, there was 0:15:56.920 --> 0:15:59.560 something I saw in her eyes. It was this this 0:15:59.640 --> 0:16:03.520 look vulnerability. I can remember it so specifically, looking at 0:16:03.560 --> 0:16:07.440 it and seeing something there that I connected with, and 0:16:07.520 --> 0:16:09.320 I think it was the same thing I saw in 0:16:09.440 --> 0:16:13.200 my eyes. She was adopted, and I've heard that adopted 0:16:13.320 --> 0:16:16.960 kids often find each other because there's something about them 0:16:17.000 --> 0:16:19.960 that connects them. I wasn't adopted, but it was feeling 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:22.800 like it didn't have parents, and so I think, you know, 0:16:22.880 --> 0:16:25.840 we really connected on that level. It was our our 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:30.040 shared pain that we we didn't externalize, but you know, 0:16:30.120 --> 0:16:33.880 we had it inside and so we connected. And how 0:16:33.920 --> 0:16:38.560 long after that did you marry and begin a family? 0:16:39.720 --> 0:16:43.240 We dated for a year. We dated for a while. 0:16:44.040 --> 0:16:47.600 Um I remember introducing her to my brother and he 0:16:47.800 --> 0:16:51.880 sort of said, she seems a little immature, And it 0:16:51.960 --> 0:16:55.720 mattered to me so much what my older brother thought. Um, 0:16:55.760 --> 0:16:58.320 So we stopped dating for a while. But then my 0:16:58.400 --> 0:17:01.800 older brother got married and and Catherine, you know, I 0:17:01.800 --> 0:17:03.440 called her up and said would you come with me 0:17:03.520 --> 0:17:06.119 to his wedding and she was like, well, you didn't 0:17:06.160 --> 0:17:08.760 call me, so I thought we were off. And when 0:17:08.760 --> 0:17:11.480 I saw her again, um, well, she dolled up, right, 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:16.000 she was dogged up. You know. It was a nineteen eighties, 0:17:16.040 --> 0:17:18.719 and she had the big hair and the shoulder pads, 0:17:18.920 --> 0:17:22.200 and she had this tiny waist. And I remember all 0:17:22.240 --> 0:17:24.320 the men they are sort of looking at her, like, wow, 0:17:24.400 --> 0:17:28.200 she's beautiful. And I felt proud, like this is great. 0:17:28.480 --> 0:17:31.680 And and she always had an amazing sense of humor, 0:17:31.720 --> 0:17:33.760 and I think I love that about her too. So 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:37.960 I think at weddings, that's what happens, right you you're 0:17:38.040 --> 0:17:41.200 with someone and you see all of this happiness and joy, 0:17:41.320 --> 0:17:44.720 and you want to capture that and have that for yourself. 0:17:45.160 --> 0:17:47.800 And was this the wedding of your older brother who 0:17:48.000 --> 0:17:52.280 was admired and emulated and wanted to be like So 0:17:52.359 --> 0:17:55.880 Bill and Catherine start to plan their wedding. The details 0:17:55.960 --> 0:17:58.520 kind of take over the way wedding details. So often 0:17:58.560 --> 0:18:02.520 do you talk about flower arrangements and place cards and 0:18:02.560 --> 0:18:06.440 whether to serve chicken or duck breast, rather than actually 0:18:06.480 --> 0:18:09.760 talking about what you're doing, which is committing to another 0:18:09.800 --> 0:18:13.800 person for life. Bill had all kinds of doubts, but 0:18:13.880 --> 0:18:17.920 he didn't articulate them, not to Catherine, not even to himself. 0:18:18.680 --> 0:18:20.720 He was going to make the best of it. A 0:18:20.760 --> 0:18:25.440 beautiful wedding would lead to a beautiful future. I remember 0:18:25.480 --> 0:18:29.240 the night before my wedding, we had a rehearsal dinner, 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:34.919 and I remember thinking I should feel something different, I 0:18:34.960 --> 0:18:41.239 should feel this immense joy and wonder and love, and 0:18:41.280 --> 0:18:44.080 I'm not feeling it. But it's too late to change it. 0:18:44.240 --> 0:18:48.000 Everybody's been invited, all the gifts are here, and I 0:18:48.080 --> 0:18:52.280 can't go back. Yeah, you're reminding me of I mean, 0:18:52.320 --> 0:18:55.960 I had a brief, ill fated marriage when I was 0:18:56.000 --> 0:18:59.600 in my twenties, and I remember walking down the aisle 0:19:00.200 --> 0:19:02.920 on the arm of my nineteenth century literature professor who 0:19:02.960 --> 0:19:04.840 was standing in from my dad, who was no longer living, 0:19:05.240 --> 0:19:07.439 and just thinking, this is a mistake. This is a mistake. 0:19:07.480 --> 0:19:10.199 This is a mistake. Um. Yeah, it's not what you're 0:19:10.200 --> 0:19:14.959 supposed to be feeling on your wedding day. Yeah. Katherine 0:19:15.000 --> 0:19:18.200 and Bill begin their lives together, first in Tampa, Florida, 0:19:18.240 --> 0:19:20.439 where he had a job working at a bank, but 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:23.720 Catherine was terribly homesick, so they packs up their stuff 0:19:23.760 --> 0:19:27.000 and moved back to Greensboro, North Carolina. After a year, 0:19:27.920 --> 0:19:31.000 Bill found another job and that's where their children were born. 0:19:32.280 --> 0:19:34.760 Bill throws himself into his life as a family man. 0:19:35.200 --> 0:19:37.960 He stuffs any feelings he has for men even further 0:19:38.040 --> 0:19:41.240 down into the recesses of his psyche, it just isn't 0:19:41.280 --> 0:19:43.720 going to happen. He loves being a dad to his 0:19:43.800 --> 0:19:47.320 young daughters. He's a really hands on father, unlike his 0:19:47.359 --> 0:19:50.600 own father, who not only was distant and absent, but 0:19:50.720 --> 0:19:53.399 was known to be a full landerer. So this is 0:19:53.480 --> 0:19:56.600 yet another reason why Bill is never going to cheat 0:19:56.640 --> 0:20:00.000 on Catherine, not with anyone, so that part of his life, 0:20:00.520 --> 0:20:05.760 the sexual romantic part, just ceases to exist for him. 0:20:05.760 --> 0:20:08.240 The family moves a number of times as his daughters 0:20:08.240 --> 0:20:11.879 go from babies to little kids to teenagers, and he 0:20:11.960 --> 0:20:13.960 works his way up with the corporate ladder in the 0:20:14.000 --> 0:20:18.000 banking business. I had moved from North Carolina to Virginia 0:20:18.040 --> 0:20:22.600 for a job. That company declared bankruptcy and I found 0:20:22.600 --> 0:20:27.440 a job in the northeast. My kids were teenagers. Then 0:20:28.480 --> 0:20:32.160 we made the decision to move for my career. So 0:20:32.160 --> 0:20:36.040 suddenly I was out of the conservative state of North 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:40.920 Carolina and Virginia and in the very liberal bastion of 0:20:40.960 --> 0:20:44.720 New England. Same sex marriage had just been approved the 0:20:44.800 --> 0:20:49.400 year we moved, and there was this cognitive dissonance inside 0:20:49.440 --> 0:20:51.720 of me. So there was the combination of the move. 0:20:52.240 --> 0:20:55.400 The kids were teenagers and not relying on me anymore. 0:20:56.560 --> 0:21:00.040 And I met this guy who sort of affect and 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:05.399 me in a way I had never experienced before. He 0:21:05.560 --> 0:21:09.600 was an ideal, He was funny, he was generous, he 0:21:09.760 --> 0:21:12.840 was kind a lot of men in the South, they're 0:21:12.920 --> 0:21:15.879 kind of guarded, you know, and they don't really express 0:21:16.000 --> 0:21:18.720 their emotions and their feelings. This was the first guy 0:21:18.800 --> 0:21:23.880 that did that, and it really affected me. Bill's feelings 0:21:23.880 --> 0:21:27.560 for this man can't be expressed. It's way too dangerous. 0:21:28.040 --> 0:21:32.439 So instead he finds another outlet for those feelings. The 0:21:32.520 --> 0:21:34.760 skinny kid whose mom told him he really ought a 0:21:34.840 --> 0:21:40.119 lift weights. That kid asserts himself big time. So I 0:21:40.160 --> 0:21:45.080 began to feel those feelings and it became stronger. Because 0:21:45.119 --> 0:21:49.359 of all of that, I was still feeling like that skinny, 0:21:49.720 --> 0:21:54.120 ugly kid, and I wanted to sort of shore up 0:21:54.160 --> 0:21:58.800 the outside to help shore up what was crumbling inside. 0:21:59.440 --> 0:22:02.720 So I began going to the gym working out. It 0:22:02.840 --> 0:22:05.760 was an obsession. It was a way to control something 0:22:05.800 --> 0:22:08.960 in my life when everything else was spinning out of control. 0:22:11.280 --> 0:22:14.600 And I remember the first I'm sort of clicking on 0:22:14.640 --> 0:22:18.320 the by for steroids on the internet and it was 0:22:18.400 --> 0:22:21.480 like all my life, I've been the good boy. I'm 0:22:21.520 --> 0:22:24.160 going to do something now that is just for me. 0:22:24.440 --> 0:22:27.959 I'm going to control this thing. And how did that 0:22:28.000 --> 0:22:31.880 play out? With the steroids and within your I mean, 0:22:31.880 --> 0:22:34.200 you're you're living this family life. You're in this house, 0:22:34.240 --> 0:22:37.119 You've you've got Katherine, You've got your daughters, and you 0:22:37.200 --> 0:22:41.720 have this other life, this secret life. It's sort of 0:22:41.720 --> 0:22:43.840 like a double secret life. It's a secret on top 0:22:43.880 --> 0:22:49.359 of a secret. It is. I remember getting them in 0:22:49.359 --> 0:22:54.639 the mail and Katherine and the girls were sleeping. It 0:22:54.720 --> 0:22:57.760 was a Saturday morning. So I got up and I 0:22:57.800 --> 0:23:00.680 had planned it all out. I had printed out how 0:23:00.800 --> 0:23:04.040 to do a steroid cycle stack. I did all my 0:23:04.119 --> 0:23:08.400 research like the Internet was the greatest teacher. Looking back, 0:23:08.440 --> 0:23:10.919 of course, now that's so foolish, but you know, I 0:23:10.960 --> 0:23:13.440 felt like, oh, I verified it with several different sources 0:23:13.480 --> 0:23:16.760 on the Internet. It was foolish. I got this in 0:23:16.840 --> 0:23:18.840 the mail. I had no idea who the supplier was, 0:23:18.880 --> 0:23:22.399 except it was someone in Eastern Europe. I actually, in 0:23:22.520 --> 0:23:25.680 order to get the steroids, my father had died and 0:23:25.760 --> 0:23:28.840 he left me in I ra a and I needed 0:23:28.840 --> 0:23:31.440 to cash a check every year, and I used that 0:23:31.480 --> 0:23:34.480 money to buy the steroids, and I wired it to 0:23:34.520 --> 0:23:39.000 the supplier. I went down to the bathroom, closed the door, 0:23:40.200 --> 0:23:42.560 and I remember looking in the mirror, thinking, all right, 0:23:42.720 --> 0:23:44.960 am I really going to do this? Is this what 0:23:45.000 --> 0:23:50.520 I'm gonna do? And I filled up the syringe, pulled 0:23:50.520 --> 0:23:53.879 down my pants, stuck it in, pushed the plunger in, 0:23:54.119 --> 0:23:56.960 and then pulled the needle out. And I sat there waiting, 0:23:57.080 --> 0:24:00.159 thinking how fast is this going to work? Is this 0:24:00.280 --> 0:24:02.439 going to make me strong right away? Is it going 0:24:02.480 --> 0:24:06.280 to cause a heart attack? Of course, none of that happened, um, 0:24:07.040 --> 0:24:09.959 But over the weeks it became more of an obsession. 0:24:10.480 --> 0:24:13.520 And then I began to see the scale move from 0:24:13.600 --> 0:24:20.360 one sixty one seventy, and I became really hungry, finishing 0:24:20.359 --> 0:24:27.160 my plate, finishing the girl's plates. It's interesting because I 0:24:27.200 --> 0:24:31.359 was spiraling down, but somehow Catherine was becoming stronger in 0:24:31.400 --> 0:24:34.560 a way. I'm not sure if she saw, Okay, something's 0:24:34.800 --> 0:24:38.560 terribly wrong with her husband, um, but she had struggled 0:24:38.600 --> 0:24:42.520 for a while, you know, in finding her birth family 0:24:42.680 --> 0:24:46.120