As far back as I can remember, there seemed to be a cloud of gloom hanging over me. It hung there like poison in the air, which through the lungs works its way into the bloodstream, stifling life and causing reduced activity, hopelessness and premature death.

I was raised in a religious Catholic home in the working-class northern suburbs of Cape Town, the fifth of six children. My father was a hard-working and emotionally distant man who was defeated by lost trust in business and by the disappointment of his dreams and ambitions. My mother, who was relationally and emotionally dissatisfied, selected me as her confidant. My memory of her attitude towards my father is that of criticism and subtle hostility. She would tell me how she thought a man should behave, which was often accompanied by "Don't be like your father." This did no good to my gender identity as I was role modelling after my mother, and not my father.

In my first year of school I was being called a "moffie" (an effeminate man) which came along with shame and with me telling myself "You are bad. You're not like the other boys." Envy grew as I realised that I was lacking the qualities that the other boys seemed to possess. As a child and as a teenager and young adult I was not able to communicate nor process these ideas as there was no healthy intimacy in my home. The only intimacy was in being smothered by mother's needs.

However, I did have a couple of childhood male friends and even found a few girls attractive. The situation worsened at my new Catholic boys high school, which was situated in a rough part of town and contained many boys from dysfunctional families. I lived in fear of being jeered at, abused or molested by other boys, which happened on occasion. However, I was never raped nor sexually molested.

As puberty developed my body and caused my genitals to grow, I developed a compulsive habit of masturbation. I found in orgasm a temporary relief to my stress and anxiety, and even if it lasted only for a few seconds, better than nothing...

Also, I seemed to be stroking myself and reminding myself that at least generally, I was a man. (Remember, I was getting no healthy stroking anywhere else.) I started idolising pictures of male models, my hunger developing into lust and arousal.

During army national service the emotional agony continued and it was here that I met actively homosexual young men who introduced me to gay night life. However, it was not until after a year of working with South African Airways as a flight steward, that I had my first of numerous one-night stands. A year later found me living with an older man, who had tried Christianity but could not change his homosexual inclination, so he embraced it as though it was God's will for him.

My stricken conscience, my desperation and God who was seeking me brought me into conversation with a Christian ex-gay flight steward. I called him when all my possessions were being thrown out of my lover’s during a fight about my promiscuity. That night I accepted Jesus as my Saviour as I heard for the first time about having a personal relationship with God. I believe now that he was seeking me and waiting for me with more desire for me than that with which I hungered for in my lovers. Consequently I have thought it strange that I had no emotional conversion experience, except for an experience of hitherto rare deep, inner peace.

My life changed dramatically as God convicted and corrected me and as my Christian friend discipled me. I consider myself fortunate to have been quickly guided into water baptism and the baptism of receiving the Holy Spirit. I remember the Christians of the first church that I visited assuming from my appearance that I was unconverted. I was twenty-two and it was 1981 and my dress was a mixture of Camp Village and New Romantic Military! At least I got people's attention! It was my way of expressing my need to be affirmed in my masculinity.

I attended a few counselling sessions with women - somehow no men ever seemed to be available to minister to any of us broken people. Yet God himself ministered to me and brought healing. I had by this stage developed an unhealthy attitude towards authority figures. I feared them and expected them to be faultless. This wrong attitude carried over into Christianity where I was shocked to discover my first pastor's weakness. The first church that I went to broke up after a year and a half. Relationally my ability to trust was shaken. My Christian flight steward friend was not available as he had not approved of my membership in this church. I became backslidden, but not into active homosexuality as I was afraid of soul ties with sex partners.

Masturbation continued to be a cause of almost daily frustration, condemnation and depression. The roots of this behaviour go so deep that I believe that only God in his grace, wisdom and patience could fully minister to me and bring transformation. I remember confessing this sin to an older married Christian flight steward. I found some relief in his confession that he on occasion committed the same sin when he was away from his wife. Before becoming backslidden, I would regularly go to church and meetings in whatever city I was in. This was an improvement on my pre-Christian isolationist lifestyle. Yet, inside I was still very dislocated, both socially and relationally, and my international flight steward lifestyle perpetuated this unhealthy situation.

I met and struck up a rather unhealthy (although not sexual) relationship with an older Christian woman who was a talented yet struggling artist. We started carousing in Soweto with a struggling black artist that she had befriended. After about a year I reached a new point of dissatisfaction. I had all the things that money could buy, an enviable job, youth and good looks, yet a hunger inside me wanted more. I grew to realise that only God could fill that space. I knew that I had to break away from the lifestyle and the unedifying relationships that I was pursuing. So I returned to the Lord, to fellowship and away from drugs and alcohol.

The road was hard and lonely, yet exciting. After about four months I met an attractive young woman. I was so excited with this new-found heterosexual relationship and so in need of affirming my weak masculinity that we quickly got into a sexual relationship. She was a young Christian, almost completely undiscipled. Her young life had recently been dramatically altered by her father's untimely death. I gave her my testimony at our first meeting and subsequently shared my sexual struggles, temptations and depressions with her. She was remarkably supportive through this, yet I think that she needed to be needed.

Our wedding day was wonderful and I cried upon seeing my beautiful bride, thinking that God can make dreams come true. I experienced our sexual relationship to be deeply satisfying. Yet the grim reality of not finding healthy male friendships seemed to stand and watch me, waiting like a curse. Sometimes I would find my wife's embrace claustrophobic and in retrospect I realise that her needs were as selfish as mine. At such times, while having sex, I would fantasise about sex with men in order to bring myself to a quick climax. Sometimes I resisted this temptation, but there were no gold stars for discipline. However, there was definitely condemnation for fantasy after which to become silent, ashamed and withdrawn. Sometimes I confessed these struggles to my wife, which I now realise was not such a good idea. It would have been better to have confessed to a counsellor or trusted male friend (but I didn't have one at the time).

I remember how angry I was after a general marriage counselling session with our pastor. I saw that he supported her statements and complaints about me. She was, at that time, far more articulate than me. I was still groping around in the nether world of guilt, condemnation and shame and not knowing how to overcome. This remained so until I somehow discovered a Christian counsellor who counselled men struggling with homosexuality. We were then living in London during which time I had four sessions with him. I hesitatingly started discussing some of my deeper issues. This was short-lived as my wife and I left for the U.S.A. where we lived and worked for the following year.

Our marriage became more and more strained with economic and work pressure from without, and with very little relational support network to strengthen us from within.

The local church which we attended would not see us for counselling unless we first received counselling from a home group leader and were then referred. During this time my wife started losing interest in Christianity and became more interested in the surrounding seductive culture of New Age, drugs and hedonism. I was stressing out badly with two part-time jobs, her night shifts, my night shifts and tensions in our workplaces.

I decided to return to South Africa and expected her to return with me. She was not ready to leave and suggested that I go, after which she would follow. Initially I disagreed vehemently. I recanted after praying and remembering that on her previous visit to the U.S.A. her father had died. Her life was radically changed circumstantially. It seemed a potentially healing experience for her to travel when she was ready.

After my return to South Africa communication from her dwindled, promised return dates passed one after the other and I became more and more desperate. One evening after hearing from a Johannesburg friend that she had assumed that we were a "swinging" couple in our early marriage I reached a crisis point and phoned her, insisting on definite communication from her. I started attending counselling immediately and subsequently discovered that she was living with another man. I was counselled to divorce and I agreed as I knew that I could not deal with the other options. Her written reasons for her unwillingness to return to our marriage were:

My fear of life. This was true as I was anxious and stressed out.

My sexual struggles. My temptations did not lessen. I did not change as fast as (I think) she hoped I would.

A do-it-yourself international divorce followed after which I relocated to Cape Town. Shortly after arriving in Cape Town my sister divorced, my mother died and my father languished for a further one-and-a-half years before he passed away.

I moved, got some really challenging jobs after waitering for years and joined a home group. Then I was delighted to attend a TRAILBlazers Ministry conference. As the church pastor I was seeing seemed unable to counsel me effectively, (he later entered a homosexual lifestyle and left the church) I decided to see a sexologist. At another time I visited a Christian psychologist. Hereafter I became committed to an intercessory prayer group. Subsequently I left that to enable me to focus on my involvement with TRAILBlazers Ministries-Cape.

My change has been gradual. When I look back I am aware of how God has changed me inside. For me it's been a long process. I realise that I have had many circuits in the desert and like Israel, my old attitudes have had to die in the desert before the taking of the promised life. I am aware of how much I have sinned and continue to sin against God, yet He in His grace loves and heals me.

Today I long to be settled and committed to marriage, friendships, church and ministry. Psalm 27 reads "I would have despaired unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Be strong and let your heart take courage, yes, wait for the Lord."

Copyright © 2003, Restoring Wholeness. All rights reserved.