Drew Payne

Marty, I am so humbled by how much this story of mine has touched you. As a writer, I always want my writing to touch and move people but when it happens I always feel so moved and small. I originally wrote this story to say "look at the effect that the ex-gay has on people" and as I reply to the people who said that everything was better once you'd left them behind and come out. I also wrote it to help me put my experiences in perspective. I never thought that this story would resonate with so many people. I was two years old when homosexuality was partially decriminalised in England and Wales, but I grow up in the seventies and eighties, with all the homophobia and open hatred of LGBT people. I still shudder when I think back to then. In the last few, I have read a lot about life pre the 1967 act, and God it was awful. The repression and homophobia was breath-taking. I admire anyone would lived through all that and came out of it half-sane. As for what happens to Chris, Spoilers! Spoilers! I have a policy of no spoilers in my comments, and God that is hard, it really is. But please keep reading, at the end is a brief piece about what lead me to write this story.

Back in 2015, there was a big ex-gay conference in London and they were trying to paint themselves as a caring-and-sharing organisation. I wrote an opinion piece for a British nursing magazine about my experiences in an ex-group group. I was so surprised at all the support I received from that piece, all those straight women and men denouncing the ex-gays. I have learnt the power of words and stories, and it's wonderful.

This was the first part of the story I actually wrote (With some of the text in it from the next part), as a single short story, until someone else read it and suggested I expand it into a longer story. I have re-written it so much since then, but it was based on an original encounter. Many years ago (decades actually), at London Pride, I saw a group of men handing out ex-gay leaflets. Some people were laughing at them, others getting angry at them. I didn't approach them but I felt really uncomfortable that they were there, they'd invaded my enjoyment of Pride. The Release Trust is a made-up name, to stop me from getting sued, but it is very much based on a real organisation, and I've used it in several pieces of fiction. In 2014 I got involved in a Private Members Bill in the British Parliament to make Gay Conversion Therapy illegal here too. It was sponsored by a straight MP, but he had a gay assistant. Unfortunately, it didn't get anywhere because of the 2015 election and because neither of our two main parties supported. We now have a government throwing our country away on Brexit, and only being able to focus on that, and a Prime Minister, who is also a Christian, wants Christian Values protected and wants to scrap our Human Rights Act. So I don't see Gay Conversion Therapy being banned here any time soon, and as a Healthcare Professional I am disgusted. P.S. I love the picture.

Thank you. I wanted to get over Chris, the narrator's expectation and his attempt at subtle seduction, which he isn't very good at.

Thanks, please do keep reading. This opening part is to set up one part of Chris's personality, his need for a relationship. The following parts explain more about him.

@Parker Owens, please don't hurt for me. I am very fortunate, I have a very happy life. I have a job I enjoy, a home I love and a husband who makes me so happy. I am very fortunate. I went through hell as a teenager and in my twenties, but I found people who helped me. That was what I wanted to write about here, that the damage doesn't stop when you escape the ex-gay movement. But not showing Chris at least beginning to deal with the damage done to him would not have been honest, there is a way out of this mess but it isn't easy. I couldn't give Chris that romantic happy ending because it would not have felt honest. He has PTSD and at the end of this story he's only just learning to manage friends, but I had to give him a hopeful ending, I had to say there is a way out of this mess.

@lomax61, I wanted to show Chris maturing in his relationship with Ryan, as he starts to deal with the damage done to him. Ryan isn't attracted to him but their friendship is something good, and Chris now has the maturity to accept it. This is a far more stable character than he was in the first part of this story. The four main characters fire-bombing The Release Trust's head office is a wonderful idea (Certainly makes me happy) but is out of character for them, and Nina would put her registration at risk. For the sequel, I want to write about the politics of the ex-gay movements, which would be a rather dark look. I've wanted to write about this for quite a while and returning to this story has shown me that Chris, and the other characters here, are the right ones to write it through, with some new characters. Just, God knows when I'll get the chance to do it but I now have a schedule of things I want/need to write and that is firmly on the list.

Any long journey always starts with small steps. But Ryan as a "serendipitous dinner guest"? Kay and Nina set the dinner up for Chris to meet Ryan. Kay saw Chris's reaction to meeting the (Very screwed up) Ex-gay Lenny at Pride. She saw the effect that had on Chris. This was all set up to help Chris, as good friends do.

Thank you. This part is a very important part of the story. I had to give Chris a way out of his mess. Just to leave the story as a list of how screwed up Chris was would be so unsatisfying, and for me, untruthful. I had to give him an escape-ladder, and someone to push him up it.

Thank you so much for that. I was worried people would want a happy ending here, Chris and Ryan getting together, but for me that wasn't an honest ending. Chris is still screwed up, though he is being to put himself back together again with the help of his therapist, but he's just not ready for a relationship here. And Ryan isn't into him in that way. Since publishing this story here, my mind has been working on an idea for a sequel to it. I want to explore the political side of the ex-gay movement.

There are so many people out there who don't get what they deserve, who get a lot better than they deserve. I really want to believe in natural justice but I really don't know.

Wait until you read the next/final part.

As the great Professor River Song said: "Spoilers sweetie, spoilers." As for wants and needs. If everyone knew the difference between them, what would we have to write about?

Thank you. It was thirty(+) years ago and I had a wonderful therapist who helped to put me back together again. Then I met my husband. I wrote this story, and Keeping the Faith, because I wanted people to know how harmful those ex-gay groups are, and stories are my way of doing that. Thank you.

Thanks for your feedback, and wow you got all the things I was aiming for. That endless and often misguided search for love, in all the wrong places. I wanted to get that down/depression of a failed attempt to connect. I don't want to give too much away, I don't give the reader an easy ride with this story, but sometimes the things we need are not always the things we tell ourselves we want.

Ryan was already waiting for me, and he’d picked one of the outside tables. We always met up at the same coffee shop, and if I got there first, I’d choose a table inside, but if Ryan got there first, he’d always pick one of the tables outside on the square of pavement in front of the coffee shop. I went right up to the table and sat down opposite him. “Hello, Chris, I’ve ordered you a coffee and muffin,” Ryan said. “Thanks,” I said. “How did it go today?” “Not bad. It’s still

The journey of a lifetime starts with one train ticket. Owen, nineteen and single, is finally making his journey to coming out, but this is far more difficult and complicated than the train journey he has to take from his small home town to London, the only place where he feels he can come out. What has led him to such an extreme move and what will he find when he arrives?

“Welcome to Hell!” Kay said as she opened her front door to me. “What’s the matter?” I said as I followed her inside the flat. “Nina’s in the kitchen, and she’s turned into Gordon-Fucking-Ramsey all over some stupid pudding. I told her we won’t want pudding with the amount of stuff she’s already cooked, but she has to be Ms-Fucking-Perfectionist-Lesbian,” Kay said. “Is it going to be all right?” “There’s only the four of us—you, me, Nina and Ryan—so it should be okay.” I foll

Please don't apologise, I am amazed you feel so much for a character I've created, and the reaction I was hoping for in readers. I wanted to put this section in to show how damaged people can pass on that damage when they don't take ownership of who they are. Just because you have been damaged doesn't mean you will always be the victim in your screwed up relationships. Chris is a victim of what has happened to him but he is also passing on the harm. (P.S. Chris does find the backbone to finally end this relationship.)

I love the sound of your church, that sounds like real Christianity to me. I have met some wonderful Christians, people who have dedicated their lives to caring for others and it doesn't matter who for, and then I've meant far too many people for whom their Christianity is a power trip, and "I'm better than you because I'm going to heaven!" power trip. The shameful thing is that I've met far more from the second type than the first type.

I agree with you 100% percent but all I want to say is, "Spoilers Sweety, spoilers." There are two more chapters to post. Wait and see.

I'm so glad that you're getting the themes I wanted to write about here.

Thank you, I always worry about my writing. Your feedback is very welcome.

But Chris is staying with Will because he's afraid of being alone, he's afraid of being that stereotype of the sad and lonely homosexual that he had drummed into him as an Evangelical Christian. This is just another example of how screwed up he is. He's pathetically damaged and it's harming so much of his life. Re-writing this story made painful reading for me.

I don't know about being abusive but this is certainly an unhealthy relationship. I wanted to show, in this one, that Chris is a screw-up in a relationship where the other guy wants him, yet the other guy is completely unsuitable for him and Chris can't find the skills to face that.