cause i know i do. i just wanna be a regular guy who does regular things, has normal guy thoughts and can just laugh and act normal with other guys...and with girls too, of course. man...i just want to be normal so bad.

no triggers, no weird feelings, no panic attacks, no irrational fears, no hating yourself, no crying, no abnormal behaviors that make it hard to have friends.

Man I wouldn't know "normal" if it ran up to me and kicked me in the ass. I don't think we can be normal. We can only approach it....like the speed of light. Whatever.

Jude

Always and forever but at this point it’s just not possible. I think it’s possible to learn to live with and accept fully who and what I am and everything I’ve experienced but I’ll never know what it’s like to be “normal”. I’ve spent 40 years in denial, I’m whole now, empty inside, but whole, I could nor would I want to ever go back to my old life, the PTSD the way I treated people the lack of caring the total lack of concern for the rest of humanity, I accept this as a challenge not like a fight or even a race just something else that I have to accept and learn about so maybe just maybe I’ll have a chance to do something good in the world.

Cee

I've said it before on these boards, and I'll say it again: the normals are so *BORING*!

Yes, I would rather be normal and have normal feelings and interactions with women; yes, that would be great. But that's never going to happen.

And the conclusion I came to long ago, even before I started my recovery journey, is that normal people have such a limited understanding of the world and how it operates. So much to them is literally unimaginable. Whereas we, the not-normals, we do not have the luxury to be ignorant of mankind's dark side and how people use negative forces to influence their world.

The normals are blind and ignorant and boring. True, they hurt less than us; but that blessing comes with its own price -- a lack of knowledge that we know all too well.

Cant

I just want to be able to sleep without pills. That would be all the normal I could ask for.

there is no normal

why are we trying to find it?

and we cant wish, pray , hope , drink , sex, medicate or otherwise alter our present circumstance without it having been painted by past colours. But we can still make it a beautiful painting cuz our pallette has so much more depth of hues and shading that "regular people " just cant see. that makes us hyper normal.

Last night , At a party put on by a gay friend who like me, has teen kids, the topic turned to happiness and the lightness of the season. One guy talked about how in his forties he is finally able to find that place. Sure enough , like me he is a survivor. We talked about how that sense of whimsy gets buried or was never there in the first place. But it doesnt mean we cant find it, only that it may take longer or may look different from the "normal" gay men (talk about an oxymoron).

So hell no, i dont want to be a regular guy. Wishing or wanting something that's not gonna happen is wasted energy spent on not having fun. At this point i need and deserve all the chuckles and lightness possible.

So for the season , i offer a toast to the happiness to trump past ghosts and find a new normal- warts and all. tho it sure looked like hell and was anything but regular, Charlie Brown's xmas tree was festive and triumphant in the end.

talking with my T about this yesterday - i didn't say "i want to be normal" - but he had asked me what i thought it would look like when i am where i want to be. my talking point yesterday was = not see everything in life through the filter of abuse effects and coping mechanisms. to be able to leave that behind or put it aside as my most constant and conscious frame of reference and only bring it out when i deliberately decide to. he was the one who used the "N" word.

one thing i took away is that there is NO SUCH THING as a one-size-fits-all definition of "NORMAL" !!! it is an illusion that is unattainable because everyone is different - and some of us are more different than others! you'd never believe how screwed up some of those apparently normal people are! but he told me that I AM normal! i just laughed. he said the goals and dreams i have are normal ones - to be happy, to have good relationships, to not be haunted by the past. he said that it is possible to make the choice about how to think and what to think about.

ironically - i was at a party last night and there was a mixer game with "who am i" identities on everyone's backs. i was "the Ghost of Christmas Past."

Lee

*

Hey Kuurt

I read and smile and in the back of my mind a little voice says "what is normal"
Just living without the PTSD would be great, cant stand jumping every time someone farts any more, then the triggers and the self mutilation, well I could do without those, and then there is off course the second guessing myself and thinking what a normal guy would do in this situation, well could do without that too, so yeah, I agree, I WOULD LOVE TO BE NORMAL.

Heal well
Martin

I know exactly how you feel kuurt because I have those same feeling all the time. When I'm at work with "the guys" and they're talking about their wives and children and daily lives I feel so out of place. I wonder what it's like to be able to go home to someone who loves you instead of my empty bed and laptop. What is it like to just have normal thoughts and feels and stuff instead of always wondering what the other people are thinking of me. It is a never ending cycle.

Hey Clockwise, I know exactly what you mean.


Would I like to be normal? Yes, and no. While I do have a lot of issues the thing is that if I were "normal" I would no longer be me. I don't not want to be me. I just want to get a few of the things that the Normals have.

I just want to go two days in a row without triggers. That would be enough for me for now...

Last night , At a party put on by a gay friend who like me, has teen kids, the topic turned to happiness and the lightness of the season. One guy talked about how in his forties he is finally able to find that place. Sure enough , like me he is a survivor. We talked about how that sense of whimsy gets buried or was never there in the first place. But it doesnt mean we cant find it, only that it may take longer or may look different from the "normal" gay men (talk about an oxymoron).

I dont know what normal may be, I have nothing or no one to base a comparison. What I can contribute to this discussion is I have worked very hard to do no harm, and to place everyone else needs before my own. I see the joy and happiness that I have given and for a brief second I think I can feel it as well, I know I'm lying to myself but I pretend anyways. I do not get anything in return other than that. I may never know what it means to be normal but from my point of view normal people are takers, users and abusers without consideration for anyone else but themselves. If this is what it means to be normal then I will gladly choose to stay abnormal. I have often observe the world as a poor orphan child looking through a glass window of a candy store and seeing children with their parents gorging themselves with all sorts of sweets and wishing that he had a penny for a stick of chewing gum.

If something like 1 in 5 men have been sexually assaulted in their lifetime, we're a pretty large minority. That makes us relatively normal, doesn't it? After all, "normal" people who have absolutely nothing that makes them some kind of minity - people who have not been abused, are heterosexual, are able-bodied, are the dominant ethnicity and religion for their country - are pretty rare. Most people are labeled "abnormal" in some way.

The problem is that us, the "abnormal" majority, don't always get along with each other. I know that before I knew about my own childhood I didn't "get" male survivors. I know that before I found out about my own sexual orientation I bullied boys who acted "gay". I might still be bigoted against some minority and not even be aware of it.

But I don't think it's healthy to think of ourselves as abnormal. We are normal. We are normal because we, like nearly everyone else in the world, have not lived ideal lives.