YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

My dream:

I'm sitting with my boyfriend of 2+ years. Everything is pretty normal, boring, bland. As usual. Suddenly a thought occurs to me: What was on that pizza we ate last night?

It wasn't one of my usual toppings, that's for sure. It was chewy... Really chewy. My usual veggie toppings were on it. Was it mushrooms? I hate mushrooms. No... It wasn't... bad, exactly. Just not right.

Wait.

I turn to my boyfriend. "Why did you put my ovaries on the pizza we ate last night?"

He shrugs and just says something dismissive like, "why not?"

And then the full memory comes to me, chewing happily on my ovaries, bits of Fallopian tube scattered like pepperoni on this decadent pie.

I woke up in a sweat, horrified.



I knew immediately what the dream was about. I'd been doing a lot of thinking about my sexuality and my relationship, and really all my relationships. Am I gay? I hate sex with men. But I can do it, sometimes even get off. I'm not attracted to them physically, but bond emotionally with them. Is that enough? Am I okay with mundane sex, shame about my identity, and the fact that he knows I'm not attracted to men, him included? I feel like I'm living a lie and everyone knows it. I feel shame around all my family and friends. I'm also not in a good place financially to leave as I've invested so much in the lie while not putting any thought into this. I have a dog I'm very attached to and won't be able to take with me. It is really torture.

Thus, eating my ovaries.

Arrrgh, shoot! I just wrote you a long reply and then my bastard internet cut out when I tried to post. I need coffee and foods, so I can't write again, but I really feel for your situation and wondered if your boyfriend knew about your maybe-attraction to women, or if he just thinks it is because of something he is doing wrong or you thinking he has a funny shaped head or something. If he doesn't know, I might consider telling him...then it is out in the open and you can try to figure out what to do. Even if that decision involves breaking up. Or maybe there is a more dog-friendly middle ground. I say all this assuming there's a good level of trust and hopefully love at the base of this relationship... If not, maybe disregard this advice. Even if yes, you can still disregard this advice!

Also... Your description of ovary texture was so damn vivid. Haha! I will carry with me... as I try to eat breakfast.

Thank you for that reply! I know the pain of a Long response gone forever due to bad internets/accidental key press.

The dream was pretty vivid so I had a good base for the descriptions and how disturbing it was.

I moved in with my boyfriend with him fully aware of my mostly-lesbian identity. My car still had rainbow bumper stickers when I pulled into the driveway for the long haul. He had initially seen my facebook and was well aware of it. He knew at the time I started seeing him I was torn between him and a very close female friend. Ultimately guilt, shame and desperation led me to him, leaving my family and friends behind me. He knows I have no male celebrity crushes and generally am not at all attracted to men. But he has made comments referring to something physically about him that he assumes I like and it's really awkward and makes me feel bad.

So it's not like I'm completely lying to him.

There is a really awkward past between us though. I met him online when I was 16. I only had online friends then. We mostly talked about books and politics, but after a year I asked him to meet me in person and he did. I feel really conflicted about this because I was, at the time, pretty messed up from an abusive relationship and it was exciting for me to be assertive and for the first time in my life to voluntarily be with someone. However, I was still a junior in high school and he was ten years older than me. I didn't know myself at all at that point. I was still trying to be straight.

I moved in with him very quickly (it has been 10 years since our initial meeting but we had lost contact for many years and I moved in shortly after we started talking again). I feel pretty trapped here. Sometimes I am happy with him, but I don't have a lot of leverage so when he does do or say something to hurt or control me I feel so helpless. He is extremely OCD about everything. I have looked into getting an apartment but with my student loans and other bills it would be really tight, and with my mental/emotional issues I don't think I could tolerate living alone. I'm not convinced that 90% of my issues with him aren't based largely off my mental issues.