In the first thirty-eight years of my life, I’ve had Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, small pox, hepatitis, a brain tumor, gonorrhea, syphilis, and a recurring case of homosexuality. None were diagnosed by a medical professional, yet more than once I asked my mother for a living will. I brought this up to my shrink once, and she said, “Craig, I have to go to the bathroom.” Upon her return, I completed a series of tests, and just like that, she wrapped up all of my previous diagnoses and even tied a pretty little bow on top.
“Craig, I think you have OCD,” she explained.
“Oh God. Occasional Crabs and Dysentery?”
“No. OCD. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.”
She explained that OCD is an abnormal brain function where a person has intrusive and unwanted thoughts and feelings and/or engages in repetitive behavior in order to halt them. She told me that medication is not necessary since mine is a mild case and assured me that my recurring case of homosexuality obviously decided to stay. It seems that part of my OCD causes me to project symptoms of various illnesses on to myself, but unlike hypochondriacs, I keep these feelings trapped in my brain.
“So, my worries are unfounded?”
“In most instances, yes,” she assured me.
What a relief! Now I could have sex with men without the nagging worry of giving them the Clap.
At the time of diagnosis, I was twenty-eight, living in Alabama and tip-toeing out of the closet. Now with this newfound knowledge, my life began to make sense. The faux illnesses, the angst and sense of dread, the constant praying. Not to mention the typing in air. I always thought I was fucked up. Come to find out I’m just screwed up.
As a pre-teen, I had an abnormal fear of being kidnapped after I saw a special report by Barbara Walters. I also have an abnormal fear of Barbara Walters, but some things even medication can’t help. Her report unleashed unfounded fears in my brain that could be so gripping and immediate, they often paralyzed me. I went through phases where I never played outside after dark, even though we lived in a tiny tranquil burg where the talk of the town for an entire summer was the bank secretary’s affair. My dad spent many a happy hour at our local country club, and I waited by the window every night for him to come home. Without him at home, I was more susceptible to being kidnapped by some deranged fanatic in a windowless van. Each night, like clockwork, I saw his truck lights coming down the street and was relieved whenever they turned into our driveway. Dad would come inside, sometimes sober and other times blitzed. Either way, his presence served a purpose: my physical security. With him at home, I felt safe and could adjourn to my bedroom for the evening to do homework and watch “Dynasty.”
Things really got odd once I hit puberty. It was 1985, Rock Hudson had just died of AIDS, and an older football player at my school, Steve Avery, was giving me hand jobs on a regular basis. I was skinny and unsure, an awkward kid who enjoyed attention from both girl and occasional boy. I enjoyed a modicum of popularity but quickly learned my role was the class clown, the jester with the effeminate gait. I also had braces which paved the way for all sorts of nicknames and catcalls and also irritated my gums. So they bled easily. Our biology teacher added a new unit to our curriculum that year about AIDS, which was quite revolutionary for a small Southern town in the mid-80’s. I’m still not quite sure where she got her facts though.
“One of the first symptoms of AIDS is bleeding of the gums,” she instructed.
Pangs of horror shot through my gut. Goddamn it! I knew I shouldn’t have let Steve touch it! I went home, locked myself in the bathroom, and looked in the mirror. With all the melodrama and nuance of Susan Lucci, I wailed at my reflection.
“Oh GOD! I’ve got AIDS!”
Steve couldn’t understand why I wouldn’t play around with him for six months. I didn’t want to tell him that I possibly had AIDS and that I needed to wait six months for any other symptoms to appear. Again, not sure where my revolutionary science teacher collected her data. I waited and occasionally worried that each new zit was a lesion. Each bleeding gum episode was further AIDS infection from Steve’s hand jobs. Every cough was AIDS-related pneumonia. However, six months passed, my gums healed, and I didn’t die. All clear. Steve was thrilled.
Throughout my teen years, I was getting reborn and baptized as a result of my pastor’s sermon on homosexuality. The word ‘reborn” triggered something in my brain, and I had regular engagements at the baptismal pool. I also prayed. Constantly. At the time, I subscribed to the Southern Baptist Laws of Christianity and Tolerance. “If you don’t believe in God, you go to Hell.” Easy. So to avoid the down under, I prayed the same prayer every night of my life, verbatim. My brain dictated that any deviation in the prayer would cause my world to fall apart, and I would keep the devil company for eternity. But when my Sunday school teacher said that we must vary our prayers and not recite something that we don’t mean, I simply reversed the sentences and prayed with conviction!
“Dear God. Please don’t ever let me or my family get kidnapped, killed, or robbed. Keep us safe from all sin and evil. Please forgive me for my sins. And please let me get a hard-on with my girlfriend without having to think about Steve.”
Looking back, I’ve exhibited classic symptoms of OCD as well: keeping everything in certain order, doing tasks a certain way, not readily accepting change. I’ve always hated cleaning, but my bedroom has always been kept just so. Everything has a place, albeit sometimes a strange place, but a place nonetheless. Condoms always in the same drawer as the Bible. I’m not sure why; it just seems like God intended. But some things even perplexed my shrink. After I learned to type in junior high, I began to simulate typing random words that I would hear in my head. The principal could be lecturing me in the hallway. Before I knew it, my arms would be at my side, and I’d be typing in the air with my fingers:
W-H-A-T A-N A-S-S-H-O-L-E!
Balance has always been very important to me. I’ve gone through phases where if I scratch one arm, the other deserves a scratch too. Smooth the right eyebrow? My brain would be in a state of fury until the left one was smoothed also. In gay bars, I’ve gotten more than a few odd looks from men who would playfully pinch one of my nipples, and I would turn and say, “Wait, you have to do the other one too.”
There are darker compulsions as well. Since coming out ten years ago, I have discovered that all men, straight or gay, are horny pigs. The only difference between the two is that straight men don’t have the luxury of sex in the gym. And never has there been such easy access to compulsive sexual behavior than now in the age of the internet. It’s easy to mask the fears and doubts of self-worth and the disappointment of rejection when you’re sexually compulsive. Instant validation with the aftershocks of regret and depression. Sort of like snorting coke with the added benefit of orgasm. But with time and therapy, I found myself surfing the virtual sexual highway with irregularity and confronting the taunting thoughts and fears head-on. Spontaneity may be gone, but so are the crabs.
OCD, just like homosexuality, is my DNA. Both needed to be hidden for awhile. Both needed to be eventually accepted. And in the end, both were embraced. And every so often, I’ll meet a kindred spirit. A few years ago, I met a guy at New York Nebraska
“This sounds so weird. But can you brush the other side back too?”
I smiled.
“Absolutely.”
