For some reason I have never really been very good with relationships… when I was much younger I was led to believe that what happens when you grow up is you meet someone, get married and live happily ever after, having 2 or 3 children and living in a two up two down house. This ideal has never materialized for me! Before I realised I was gay I did attempt to be with girls, I had my first real tongues kiss with a girl at the tender age of 9 in a classroom at St. Albans school, back then I just thought she was being disgusting shoving her tongue in my mouth little did I know that this is what kissing was all about. I had numerous girlfriends over the years but the first serious one that meant something to me was when I was at college. I thought I was in love with a girl called Helen from my computer science class. She seemed my ideal woman, she was gentle, nice, attractive – and more importantly we had a love of computers in common! I spent a good few months trying to show Helen that I wasn’t a jerk as I realised I had made a bit of a name for myself at college. After lots of pressure from her friends and me doing lots of chasing Helen finally agreed to go out on a date with me. We went out at dinner time just to get to know each other better and I really liked her. After a few weeks she came to my house for tea to meet my mum and dad. It was a great experience and I showed her the view of my world from the the top of the crags… the sodium lamps from Denaby to Sheffield could be seen it was a spectacular view. We talked, cuddled on the cold damp November grass and eventually moved to kissing; it was a wonderful night and Helen was a wonderful girl.
It all ended with Helen a few weeks after I started university, me being very green and wet behind the ears was led to believe that university was the land of opportunity and I would be spending most of my evening shagging different girls, as such the telephone calls between me and Helen became shorter as I was dedicating more time to drinking with my new friends and partying. We had arranged to meet up one Saturday and I had been out the night before and got pretty merry (as I did most weekends during my first year of university), I woke up to my state of the art Nokia brick telling me Helen was calling…. I couldn’t believe it, I had forgotten she was coming! I answered the phone whilst still lying in bed trying to piece together memories from the night before and remember what day it was. Helen was at the train station in Cottingham, not only that she had decided to bring a friend along to meet me! Quickly gathering my thoughts and pulling on some clothes I dashed down the road to the train station – stopping every few yards to stop my head from spinning and keep my stomach from emptying itself. Upon arrival Helen was as joyous as ever to see me and introduced me to her friend… not being myself at this point I lost my temper somewhat and told Helen I was unhappy that she had brought her friend along to see me. The walk back to my halls of residence was cordial to say the least, I was hardly with it. The argument started when we got into Needler Halls grounds, I knew I had to dump Helen as my thought process was telling me that I cannot go sleeping with random uni girls if I am in a relationship, as such Helen must go! We started arguing about how she had brought her friend over and not told me and I was displeased about this. She was very sorry and started crying, pulling no punches I then started having a go about how every time she wants her own way she would get upset so I would cave in and I wasn’t having it, whilst really using it as an excuse to end the relationship. She then proceeded to tell me that I was mean and that she had found it very difficult at university in Huddersfield and without the support of her neighbor Craig she wouldn’t have survived…. this was it… the excuse I needed! I started shouting and throwing things in the middle of the halls of residence waking every one up, I was not happy that she was telling Craig all about our relationship. The final parting words were when I emptied the change from my pockets, threw some money on the floor and told her to f**k off back on the train she came on and never to bother me again.
Thats the last I heard of Helen… the girl I thought I really loved, and my first real girlfriend. My own need to fit in had driven me to push away the girl I had fought hard to get. To this day I wonder what Helen is doing, who she married, whether she still lives in Worksop? I hope she can one day forgive me for being such a bastard to her…. I certainly created a name for myself in the halls of residence the news of what I had done to this poor girl traveled quickly round the halls, and the shadow of this stayed with me till I left Needler Hall.
My next real girlfriend was also a Helen – there looked like a pattern was forming? This Helen I had known a few years as it was one of my best friends girl friends. He was a bit of a bully when he was going out with her, not that he used to hit her or anything just use her and shout abuse at her when he didn’t get his way. I recall one night of the Needler Ball when my best friend Mike got pretty drunk (yes I have the pictures!), I was doing my usual trick of not really participating but trying to make a bit of an effort whilst not making myself look a pratt. Paul, John, me and Mike were all doing the “I will walk 1000 miles song” in a circle as we usually did and pilling on top of each other when “summer of 69” came on. Mike then did his usual trick and began telling Helen what to do and what not to do and how he wanted it doing, arguments started as Mike became more unreasonable in his demands. It ended up where me and Paul took Mike back to his room and I went and comforted Helen. It was then I realised that she deserved better. The next morning all was forgiven as usual and Mike and Helen carried on in their merry way.
The year after Mike was in London doing his year out working in parliament, it was here that he discovered he was gay, but didn’t tell me till some years later! We used to have long conversations on the phone and Mike would tell me that he wanted to dump Helen but didn’t know how to do it. A few weeks later Helen was heart broken as Mike had dumped her, I met up with Helen and ensured she was alright and not too unhappy. We became really good friends and stayed in touch. It wasn’t till a drunken night out at the end of the year that in a fit of jealousy I told Helen how I felt about her. In LA’s nightclub in a drunken fit a jealousy I told Helen how I felt towards her and that I thought she could do better and I would like to try and treat her how she should be treated. We never did anything more than kiss, as I never did anything more than kiss with my girlfriends, but we did stay together for almost two years. I had a great deal of respect for Helen, she put up with a lot from Mike. That Christmas I traveled to Preston to visit Helen’s mum, dad and brother Michael. It was nice but by that point I had already realised the mistake I had made, whilst I loved Helen to bits I loved her in the same way Michael her brother loved her, it was a protection kind of sibling love. But I had already woven the web of deceit and it was difficult to back track without hurting her. The rest of that year at university I spent some time with Helen but as it was my final year I kept my head down and worked hard to get through my degree, Helen was very understanding. The year after it was easy having Helen as a girlfriend, as she was over on her year out in Spain and I was busy doing my PhD. We spent time on the phone regularly and stayed in touch via letters and emails. Again I was in the position where I knew that this could not last, by this point I had started meeting guys and was discovering my own sexuality. I had organised to go on holiday with Helen to try and make or break the relationship. When I arrived in Madrid I knew almost instantly that there was no attraction to Helen and I needed to try and break up with her in the best way possible without hurting her, I loved her too much to hurt her but I wasn’t about to come out and tell her I thought I may be gay! We had fun on holiday but I started sowing the seeds of the relationships demise. It made life easier as I didn’t get on with her house mates and thought that they didn’t treat Helen well so I told her this, obviously this didn’t go down well… I slept on the floor while in Madrid, it was a wonderful place and I had a great time with Helen. I had organised a romantic few days to Palma de Mallorca so that it was a bit of a break for Helen. We flew into Palma and me not being very good with planes was already extremely stressed so naturally I took some of this stress out on the person nearest me, which was Helen. I upset he a little bit then felt immensely guilty as I had become the person that I was trying to protect her from, I had turned into my best friend Mike!
The Palma holiday was nice, I ended up getting third degree burns on the first day when I fell asleep on the beach without any sun screen on, then Helen trying to be romantic decided that we should get more intimate, well I wasn’t having any of this, not only was I not attracted physically to her because she was a girl, but I had third degree burns! Arguments ensued and we spent another night not talking to each other. The little things that annoyed me about Helen became the excuse for us to end the relationship. For instance I had organised the Palma trip so set Helen the task of finding us somewhere to eat one evening, this turned into a twenty mile walk as we walked the entire length of Palma first on the sea front then the main street, eventually I lost my temped and made the decision… again a night of not talking! Even Helen’s evening where she tried to do something romantic ended in tears when she had not planned the event well enough and we ended up stranded miles away from Madrid in the back of beyond, obviously I blamed Helen.
When we got back to the UK we both agreed that the holiday had shown us that there were severe differences between each other and it was probably best that we end it. Its really weird but I still have pictures of Helen on top of my TV and think about her every so often… I still love her, but only in the same way her brother Michael does, and probably in the same way my best mate Mike did. I would love to tell her I am gay as I think she would be OK about it, but I wouldn’t want to damage her self confidence by letting her know that the man she loved didn’t really love her in the same way, I love her too much to do that to her.
Well I started this tale with the intention of telling you about my issues of finding love with guys and my experiences with men… you being my mechanism of getting things off my chest… but alas we havent got that far yet… as you can tell I am a complex beast with a refined self protection mechanism. I over analyse and I have deep seated self image issues and lack confidence. Is there any wonder I am gay?