You want to love women like everyone else, but you don’t. You don’t hate them, but you don’t love them. They do not fill your dreams, they do not catch your eye when you go out in the street, like other guys who claim to get an erection from merely strolling ten meters from their house. What’s up?

In one of his emails, Jack wrote to me about his inner turmoils:

“Another part that goes with it is: I’m trying to force attraction to women. I can’t imagine spending my life with a woman because that’s just like living how I did as a child. I just want the boys around, but then, I can’t bear the humiliation of not having a girlfriend by now. And I’m envious and confused at how other boys WANT to be around a woman for the rest of their life. I don’t know how they can stand it. I want that, but then I don’t want that. I am finding that I do not incline to like women at all because of my loss of value in them. I’ll never do gay shit because I’m not interested in that, and find it disgusting. But I’m not really attracted to women, yet I still try to force myself to like them. I’m grumpy, I’m angry, I’m hurt.”

This is a very honest email and a brave one, especially in the current political climate where criticism of any woman can lead to accusations of being misogynist, for hating women for who they are. This new stigma lies in ambush around every corner.

1. I’m hurt

Does Jack hate women? No, he doesn’t. How do we know? He says: “I’m hurt”. The female singer, Timi Yuro, sang a great song in 1962 with this title. Her haunting voice bewailed the loss of a love relationship with a man. Once you have heard it (click youtube), you will never forget it.

Jack means to express the same as Timi, only in his case, the other way around. He mourns the loss of trust in a relationship that was once paramount in his existence: the unconditional love of a mother for her child (son) and his loving her back. His feelings for her have sadly grown stale. He doesn’t hate her for who she is, he hates her for what has happened after childbirth and which wasn’t his doing. After which, his feelings became expanded to her whole tribe.

Let us analyze what Timi sang about, lyrics that have captured the hearts of millions ever since. Imagine this song being about a boy who was hurt in his relationship in his mother:

“I’m so hurt
Much more than you will ever know
Yes, darling, I’m so hurt
Because I still love you so
But, but even though you hurt me
Like nobody else would ever do
I would never, ever part and hurt you”.

This, then, is Jack’s lament to Squaw Camp. Let us look into this sadness.

2. The effects of narcissism on others

Jack’s mother happened to possess a narcissistic personality disorder. This does not mean, however, that one always sees this problem in men who experience same-sex attractions. It could be the case, but then again, quite often, it isn’t. The point is not how the parent behaved, therapy isn’t a forensic examination, but it is crucial how a child has experienced his youth. Quite often, his experiences are distorted, as he often finds out later in life. He may very well have misunderstood cues, signals, and remarks. He may not have understood his parents’ own background and personal history. He needs to figure it out.

When there is overt narcisissim, though, we need to examine its consequences. They can be subtle or they can be quite rash. The child’s own reactions to it are what constitutes a therapeutic approach.

Darlene Lancer, an author of ‘Codependency For Dummies’, writes:

“Narcissists lack empathy and the ability to nurture their children. They don’t see them as individuals, but only as extensions of themselves. Their children’s feelings and needs are neglected and criticized, while their own take precedence. Narcissists feel entitled and insist on getting their way. They achieve compliance through control, manipulation, guilt, and shame.”

The sons of narcissistic mothers can suffer damage to their autonomy, self-worth, and future relationships with women if they don’t come to terms with it. Possibly, they may feel that they are not loved for who they are, but only for what they can do for their parent’s approval. A father with a huge ego can cause the same dismal feelings.

The child may come to feel that appearances are all important for their parents’ sake, and this feeling slowly morphs into the adult look at life. It grows and becomes dis-attached over the years from the original connection. “Appearances-are-all” becomes a comforting mantra of life.

It can even grow way out of hand. “I am who I look like”, said the outrageous young drag-queen while spending 45 minutes in front of the mirror, doing his visage, without realizing the original connection. The feelings stem from inside, so he claims. But therapists know they stem from his youth, his childhood.

The child was small, Mom was big. She was giant-size, much like the Empire State Building. With a father being absent, or emotionally absent and unreachable, or equally terrified into submission, Mom had the stage to herself.

“Lights out, spot on, here comes Mom (or a look-alike)”. Many drag-queens make themselves look giant-size in an effort to dwarf their memories of Mommy. They re-create the once-immense drama, but now, they are at the steering wheel. They even look scary in the streets at night. But they do so, to scare the wits out of the spooks in their minds.

“That’ll fix her!”, so is the feeling as they settle their wigs. “Mom, your days are over. The more you hate me now, the better! The feeling is mutual. No, I am not who you want me to be! And Dad, where were you? Take a hike, mother-fucker. Dig this!” Defiance, all around. And boy, does defiance feel good! Can’t get enough of it!

Darlene Lancer says about these narcissistic mothers:

“It’s their way or the highway, and if you don’t oblige, they (the narcissistic mothers) punish you with attacks, coldness, or withholding”.

3. Living on a volcano

Although a narcissistic mother may appear independent, she has eruptions of emotional dependencies. She is like a volcano that may erupt and then come to peace again, only to start shaking and erupting when you least expect it. Out pour lava streams of emotional neediness.

The son will find himself being tied to her as she fosters mutual dependency through adoring him; only later will he become aware that she is controlling him. It is as if she is everywhere while Dad is nowhere to be seen. Slowly, lava oozes over a once happy youth as he notices his feet becoming immovable in a broth of paradoxes and bewilderment. Her inner turmoil becomes his inner turmoil. Like a depression in the weather forecast making its way, dark clouds of misery gather over the family home.

The Electric Light Orchestra sang:

“I can’t get it out of my head. In dreams the world keeps going round and round. Now my old world is gone for dead. ‘Cause I can’t get it out of my head”.

She might depend on her son to support her emotionally. To soothe the Gentle Giant, the son picks up a coping strategy: to listen to her, to be a companion, to attend to her physical needs, and to take over her responsibilities. When he’s an adult, the drama continues as he tries to break free. She draws him back, exploiting the victim role, a stance that she may even have come to believe as true. She might rely on him to make decisions and manage her affairs and finances. Above all, it is all about her. Guilt feelings haunt his soul as he tries to find a new ‘me’.

A slave is born. Woe is he if he goes into leather. Yep, leather! Many men in the gay leather scene are actually fooling around with old psychic dramas of dependency, trying to tolerate being forced into submission, and practicing the reversal of the power relationships which shaped their lives. With whips and a false toughness that you can buy at the leatherwear store, with the looks of a he-man and a police cap to go with it, they go out on Saturday night with a new “me”, an independent “me”, and one that, he imagines, will scare the wits out of poor victim-mommy. Serves her right, so he feels. “I’m a big boy now”.

When Testosterone sets in and an orgasm is reached, all inner conflicts subside as the miracle drug of the hormones does its job. Pain is relieved, angst is subdued. Often, it is not enough and extra drugs are taken to re-create and enhance the feeling that all is well and wonderful. But when the man leaves the darkroom and goes into the light like a vampire seeing the crack of dawn, the old feelings start nagging again. The volcano is not dead.

4. Drugs make me happy, I’m gay

In the gay leather scene, the use of drugs has become normal because no psychiatric association in the West cares about what the LGBT do to each other ever since 1973, the year when the US shrinks were finally terrorized into taking a hike.

Many professionals are glad, too, that it is no longer their concern. It has become too touchy: you could burn your fingers, not to mention your license. “Leave ‘em to it”, so mainstream psychiatry feels while shrugging their shoulders in the process and heading on to the next, more easy, patient. Only a handful of brave people, like the invincible Laura Haynes, Ph.D., from California, still cry out, putting their head on the chopping block.

Leatherboy sex even has a name: “chemsex”, meaning having sex with the addition of chemicals. Doctors are very worried about these developments due to the inevitable side effects: the tsunami of unsafe sex (loss of control), brain damage, addiction, and the tendency to need ever more powerful drugs to achieve that feel-good state again on your only night-out in the week.

On the Internet, we read (businesstimes.com):

“Gay “chemsex” is fuelling urban HIV epidemics, AIDS experts warn. A surge in “chemsex” parties, where gay people spend days getting high on drugs and having sex with scores of partners, is re-fuelling epidemics of HIV among gay men in European towns and cities, doctors say. Despite much higher risks of contracting the virus that causes AIDS, as well as other sexually transmitted infections (STIs), users search online “hook-up” apps like Grindr for tags such as “high and horny” or “party and play” to find others wanting drug-heightened and often anonymous and unprotected sex.

The result, AIDS experts say, is that in cities across Europe, HIV is spreading rapidly among men who have sex with men – leading to concentrated epidemics in hard-to-reach groups. “Chemsex is very pervasive now – it’s a growing phenomenon,” said Rusi Jaspal, a professor of psychology and sexual health at De Montfort University in the British city of Leicester who has been studying the spread of HIV and the chemsex scene.”

On Towleroad.com, we read:

“Our sexual health clinic in London has thousands of gay men who engage in chemsex every month coming through its doors. Hundreds overdose monthly from chemsex drugs” according to Dr. Ignacio de Inza. “Three in 10 HIV-positive UK men who have sex with men (MSM), for example, engage in chemsex activities. Many who engage in chemsex find it a means to cope with their inner conflicts”.

5. Unsafe sex

With their addiction to the soothing effect of Testosterone on their mental condition, many men don’t care about the consequences. King Louis XIV of France once said: “Apres moi, la deluge” (After me, what do I care?):

“A Spain-based study last year found that of almost 750 HIV-positive men surveyed, 60 per cent reported continuing having unprotected anal sex, and 62 per cent had been diagnosed with an other sexual transmittable disease within 12 months after seeing their HIV-internist”.

Their sexual behavior is compulsive and defies all healthy rationality. Leather drag is a coping mechanism. Rationality has nothing to do with it. Meanwhile, LGBT activists teach doctors to look the other way and to mind their own business, in a frenzy of paranoia. They perpetuate the statistics of morbidity and mortality (disease and death). If you raise an eyebrow to this 21st century development, you are stigmatized as being anti-LGBT.

6. A crazy-making parent

Dereck wrote:

“She drives you nuts. Crazy-making is one of her tools to convince me that what is happening, is not happening, or is not as bad as you think. I was convinced that something was wrong with me personally until I moved away from my mother and got counseling. Even today – 25 years later – I am viewed as the crazy one in the family because I called my mother on her narcissistic behavior while she appeared to people outside the immediate family to be the perfect mother who did her all to raise two boys by herself.

I still doubt myself at times because, of course, I was crazy and didn’t have the correct perception of reality. Recently, I had an uncle explain that all is not right with my mother and that she was always a difficult child when they were young. But I couldn’t talk with him about Mom’s non-diagnosed narcissistic personality disorder. I’d be looked at as crazy all over again.”

The child of the narcissist is doubly abused – once throughout childhood and again when he tells the truth about the narcissistic parent. If the son tells the story and gets emotional, he may be accused of being hysterical. He may even be called a drama queen, increasing his sense that he himself is the problem.

In the gay scene, quite a lot of men are still fully under her spell and even stick up for her, although they have every reason to do the contrary. In the frenzy against therapy offered to men who struggle with same-sex attractions, for instance, you will see activists furious about the fact that therapists want to demonstrate the family interactions.

“How dare you try to tie sexual feelings and romantic indulges with stuff from someone’s youth? What has someone’s past got to do with it? Gay feelings just happen to be there. It is who you are. These therapists are hurting Mommy”.

Then, laypeople that they are, they cherry-pick from the professional literature and make a caricature of psycho-analytic insights by saying: “These guys are accusing my parents of bad parenting. I never suffered, I just happen to be gay. And my folks did a great job.” End of story.

Why do these activists do this? The answer is quite simple: all people are endowed with a full sexual potential. And men who have come to believe that they do not possess the slightest possibility of attraction to the opposite sex, that they are exclusively “gay” now and will be for evermore, demonstrate heterophobia, a deep aversion of even the slightest mention or possibility of the opposite sex into your private life.

Can I say that? Well, if the activist circles are contemplating organizing an International Day Against Homophobia, accusing whoever they feel like accusing, then I can do the same. If other people are full of shit, as these activists proclaim, then we are entitled to say the same to them, especially when we have evidence on our side.

Roger Pebody, Amsterdam, 2014, writes:

“A large, representative study of Dutch adults found that gay men were three times more likely than heterosexual men to report a mood disorder or anxiety disorder, and ten times more likely to report suicidal thoughts. While similar results have been reported in other western countries, the Dutch findings are especially striking given the country’s good record on equality for gay people. The acceptance rate is up to 98%. So, society can’t be the issue.”

7. Are you “gay”?

Being gay does not exist, homosexuality does not exist, at least (read carefully) not as a separate sexuality. There is but one sexuality: THE sexuality. Homosexual feelings and behavior exist, no doubt about that; it is quite obvious and not to be denied. But it is part of a bigger picture. You are not a separate species of the human race, even though it may feel that way. Science has proven since 2019 that it is a software issue, and a software issue only. All other stances are now outdated. When it comes to looking into your life, you will have to face the music: your past. It is not important what you are, it is important who you are.

Will this make someone straight? Well, the notion that therapy will straighten you out is paranoid. Therapy is not about swapping sides but about expanding possibilities. A therapist is not adding and subtracting: he is adding only. And this needs to be said relentlessly.

Why do men keep hanging on, in a one-sided fashion, to images of a sweet and loving mother when, in their case, evidence to the contrary also lies everywhere?

Susan Krauss Whitbourne, Ph.D., writes in her essay on “Bad, mad love”:

“When an infant son of a narcissistic mother is continuously threatened by loss of love for protesting, he fears becoming abandoned. A narcissistic mother’s love is conditional. As a result, he will seek constant reassurance, emotional support, and closeness. He feels forced to deny all complaints and all inner needs that his mother does not recognize or fulfill. He learns to be who she wants him to be. His emptiness will make him emotionally needy in the future.”

His own feeling of self can hardly grow, and even so, it will very well become an identity in anger. Not much to go on, not much to become king of your world and to feel good about it.

8. Conclusion

Back to Jack. He wrote:

“I’m envious and confused at how other boys WANT to be around a woman for the rest of their life. I don’t know how they can stand it. I want that, but then I don’t want that. It’s paradox psychology at work, ambivalence with women.”

Paradoxes cause pain, but they lie at the heart of the predicament of the confusing nature of same-sex attractions. Jack is confused by other boys, then he admires them, and due to the working of Testosterone, his irreconcilable frustration becomes drugged by a feel-good drug, the sex hormone, especially when he sees them in the street, fantasizes about them at home, or sees the pornography of gay male models secretly in his bedroom, men who are hired for appearing to have it all. After which, an orgasm conveys that all is well. Which it is, for the time being. But come the next day, it is sadly back to the drawing board…

The solution for Jack is not to look into same-sex attractions or try to avoid them, but to become aware of the feelings that have grown in him about women.

After all, every man with SSA’s still likes women. When a narcissistic parent is present, it takes nerves to admit to such a thing. The object of self-reflection lies in the disappointments of a smothering mom, betrayal by a weak or distant dad, the feeling of being used for the sake of others, and the knowledge that no one actually realized who you were as a person in his own right. You had hangups.

Other boys didn’t have such a start. That is how they manage to have a woman around them for the rest of their life. No hangups, no hard feelings.

To be continued.

Job Berendsen, MD.

References:

1. Lancer, Darlene, MFT: ‘Codependency for Dummies’, 2015, 2^nd revised edition, ISBN-13: 9781118982082

2. Duwe, Justin David, Bsc: ‘The Truth About Chemsex’, 2017, London, ISBN:9781543926040

3. De Inza, Ignacio Labayen, and Stuart, David: ‘Meth, GHB And Sex: A Chemsex First Aid Kit’, 2017, London.

4. Daughters, Emma, PhD: ‘Narcissistic Mothers: How a Son Can Face the Narcissist Mother’, 2020, London, ISBN-10 1801095620

5. Shahida, Theresa: ‘Narcissistic Mothers’, 2019, New York, ISBN 1088721486

6. Andrews, Vincent: ‘The Complete Leatherboy Handbook’, 2012, New York, ISBN 0985900415.

7. Whitbourne, Susann Kraus, PhD: ‘Why Clingy Partners Clinge’, 2012, www.psychologytoday.com