My Story

Larry B (NY)

I come from a large family and I am the youngest of six children. Well for some reason, my
family decided to have a family reunion after 20 years of basically separate lives. The
reunion and my one year AA anniversary were the same weekend. I was scared to death to go,
but somehow knew that I really needed to. Since I couldn’t remember at least 95% of my
childhood. I had always assumed it had been pretty normal. To make a very long and
complicated story short, my three sisters and two brothers and I ended up confronting our
father about the overt sexual abuse he had violated us with. Separated, the memories were
easier to drink, sex, work, spend, shop, gamble or achieve away; but once we all came
together for the first time in twenty years, the memories started to shoot forth like an
oil well. Confronting our father probably wasn’t an item on my sister’s list of
“Things to do together.” I came back to New York devastated, but sober.

When I was first getting sober in AA, I had all these ideas like, I’ll stop having
unprotected anal intercourse with complete strangers. I really thought it wasn’t possible
without drugs and alcohol. By the time of the reunion, I had participated in unsafe sex
numerous times, I was addicted to porno, and I was dating people who worked in the sex
industry. I had decided that “sex” fell under my sixth step and it would be
taken care of by A.A. For six months, I white-knuckled it. No sex with another person.
Then, one night, I had sex with a stranger who was staying next door. We had intrigued
through the living room window. I was devastated. I knew once again that I was powerless
over “something.” All my life I had had a love/hate relationship with sex; I
loved it while doing it but after I felt enormous guilt and shame. I had been raised a
Catholic, so all my life I remember hearing that homosexuals were very bad people who
would go to Hell. My mother was Hispanic and had the belief that sex was a woman’s
obligation and should only be enjoyed by the man, i.e., if she enjoyed sex she was bad and
dirty. I’m quite clear today that both of my parents were themselves sex addicts. My
father had been asking me from the age of eleven if I had gotten “laid” yet. It
felt like he was waiting to throw me a party if I did, or on a darker note, to make sure
“the sins of my father” hadn’t turned me “queer.”

So on New Year’s of 1993 I went to my first SCA meeting at St. Veronica’s Church. I read
the Fourfold and said to myself, “I belong here.” I got my sponsor at that
meeting and he is my sponsor today. We’ve been through a lot together and I love him in a
very special way, as I’m sure he loves me. My favorite slogan from him is “lighten up
girl!” When I came to SCA, I was working four jobs, going to meetings, dance class
and working out. I refused to go therapy; I was taught that only sick and weak people
“air their dirty laundry.” A month after my first meeting, it all fell apart, my
back gave out and I was an emotionless zombie. I went to a therapist and chiropractor on
the same day for the first time in my life. That day marked the beginning of my
re-parenting and self-nurturing, two extremely foreign concepts to me. That day, I took
myself to McDonald’s and bought myself a really nice gift for being a brave, good boy.

I’ve gone to meetings ever since. I’ve sponsored people, I’ve done service at a meetings,
been on conference committees, conference shows, and been a member of Intergroup. My
therapist specializes in incest and I’ve worked on that issue diligently for 6 years. I
have gone to two retreats for male survivors, facilitated an incest meeting, participated
in two conference workshops on incest, and have participated in the free group therapy
offered by St. Lukes Roosevelt Hospital. I also attend the SCA incest and child sexual
abuse meeting on Saturdays in New York.

I enjoy sex now! I’ve kicked my parents, siblings, society, and the priests out of my
bedroom and invited God in. In the past, I always felt like I was perpetrating or being
perpetrated when I had sex. Now, it’s just having sex with another consenting adult.
Sometimes it’s within dating or a committed relationship and sometimes it’s with someone I
don’t know very well; but most importantly it is my “choice” and I have a
healthier sexual life as a result. I still have times that are difficult. (I will always
be a sex addict.) Now, I have tools that help me get through those difficult times:
meetings, telephone, service, sponsor, sponsees, fellowship, the Steps, and most of all
“God.”

I’ve had complicated plans (I’m a perfectionist) and I’ve had really loose plans (I’m an
addict). Right now it’s just three simple things to abstain from. Simplicity is key! It’s
really working. I’m dating, I’m exploring areas of my sexuality that I had always had too
much shame to look at. It’s fun, scary, hard, but it’s living and it’s my life now. As
long as I am true to mine own self, I can’t go wrong. I’m learning to worry less. I love
the slogan “why worry if you pray, why pray if you worry.” Another favorite is
“The doors of enlightenment are pillared by confusion and paradox.” Wow!! I’ll
say.

I have no contact with my parents. That really works for me. I don’t feel I, in any way,
owe them an amends. What they did to me (I discovered after the reunion in therapy that
the medical, educational and sexually based rituals performed on me by my mother were
“not what mommies do to their little boys”) was wrong and the effects almost
drove me to destroying myself. They stole something from me that can never be replaced,
and even though it may have been taken from them too that is no excuse. If anything, it
should have been the reason to protect me.

I am building relationships with my siblings and their families. I am also working on my
non-sexual and sexual relationships. One of the relationships that I’m most proud of, is
the loving relationship I’m having with me and God, which really are the same. This is all
due to 12-step recovery. I thank God for Bill W., AA, SCA and all the fellowships that are
bringing people back home. My life has never been better and as I stay in program, work
the steps, and help others, my life keeps unfolding like the blossom of a desert cactus. I
love you all and thank you for my sobriety.