Day 236
In the past, when I've thought about people who were acting out in compulsive sexual ways — strangers and friends — it never crossed my mind that there was anything desperate about it.
At worst, they were just selfish individuals, maybe hyper-hormoned, who had just turned their backs on all that is good. At best, they were well-intentioned and just looking for love in all the wrong places.
So when I found myself in that world, I tried to convince myself that I was somehow well-intentioned, just trying to take care of myself. But I always defaulted to the former likelihood; I had turned my back on everything but my addiction. That was the worst thing I could do, and that's all I could see.
Despondency and despair are insightful words to describe that season, but they barely touch the depths and darkness of those places. When I put the acting-in years in this context, there was so much hopelessness about my chances for satisfaction and happiness in those places where I thought I needed it. That's just the way it had to be because I didn't deserve good things anyway, so why should this part of my life be any different.
Still, I knew at some level that that was wrong, so I kept up the image, thinking that if I faked it long enough that I would eventually find the peace that comes with hope and love. I can't say that this was in any way dominant in my thinking because I believed in the illusion and image I was creating and maintaining; it was worth the effort. So I just hid the sadness and the desperation in my fantasies, and the real world never knew.
–JR
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