Wayne Gray

I actually revel in my "Bearness" too. This is one of my tattoos. It's on my thigh, and I got it to make the dudebros in the gym nervous. It worked swimmingly. They don't like knowing a gay dude can bench-press them. 😄

Ohhhhh, crap. That's awful.

I DO qualify as a bear, you know. 200+ lbs of hairy gay man. So ... yeah. lol

Hey! I ... I am ... I may resemble that remark. Anyway, welcome, @Sherye. 🙂

This gave me chills - that's a good thing. Thanks for sharing, molly.

Good morning to most of you folks, and good evening to the rest. I found this. Honestly, it made me think of my story, Camp Refuge. Regardless I think there's a lot of truth in it.

Thank you for taking the time to comment, madinessex. I need everything I write to feel possible within the world I'm writing. That means characters who are flawed, emotional, and as real as I can get them. I want readers to read along, maybe not agreeing with them, but understanding why the character is making the choice they made. That's what I want. I'm glad I hit the mark, in at least some of those for you. Thanks again for commenting. It does mean a lot to authors to get that feedback, and I'd encourage you to continue sharing when something really grabs you. You never know ... you may be the reason someone writes another story. 🙂 There's more to come from me down the line. Stay tuned.

I am long overdue, replying to this one! Thanks for the great comments, Hugsly. I appreciate them. My apologies for taking so long to let you know it! As for adding to the story of Troy and Grant, I don't know. I mean, I'm open to it if they speak to me of a new adventure they'd like to take. If that happens, I'll dive back in.

Thanks, molly. Me too! And I think many people, not just men, don't want to find out there's actually nothing measurably wrong. In this case, if I'd have gone and found out "No, you've moved from a demisexual gay man to asexual." I'd have gone from married to divorced. I never would have forced Kevin to stay with me, or even try. That's where my head was during that time. So proving that there was no reason was the worst thing I could imagine, and it's why I put it off. Maybe it wasn't a reasonable way to think, but ... yeah, that's where my brain was.

This is great advice. I hope everybody out there is having a great day. 🙂

Thanks, Mike. You're right that age and diabetes both can cause problems for men. I like to think watching me flounder around the way I did made for a convincing argument - if there are problems, you'll go to the doctor. I mean, something good needs to come out of my stubbornness! I'm really a case study of why a guy shouldn't wait, and I hope my example of what not to do helps other guys do the right thing, right off the bat. We don't have to be miserable if this happens. That's really it.

It's so ingrained that women will change over time. We accept it early and just "know" it. You're right that with men it's different, so there's no concept of what is normal. There's no concept of what guys should just accept. And helping others act, that's really the idea. No guy should wait as long as I did. Just GO. Stop being stubborn, go get yourself checked. This was such a simple fix. There was a low hormone involved in the problem, replace the hormone, and a few months later, the problem is fixed. I thought about the "private" nature of it. But there's another side effect to testosterone. I am definitely more aggressive. I care less about bullshit. And frankly, societal pressure to act according to "good behavior" decided by puritanically rooted ideals to never talk about sex and sexuality is exactly that - bullshit. I'm not a fan of suffering. I did and it wasn't necessary. My hope here is to gently prompt other men having trouble to just go. Also, if anybody out there wants to message me about this you can. I'll talk to anybody who needs more information. I will also keep your communication private. Waynewrites4u@gmail.com

Thanks, and you're right. Things happened gradually. It wasn't like a huge change one day to the next. But eventually, you look at the situation and you refuse to accept that's how life is going to be forever. Or, at least I did. It took a sort of a wake up call for me. I got it, I acted on it (thanks to a bit of prompting), and things are a lot better now. "Things." That may be a word that makes people giggle in this context, considering the implication involved. Note: I'm covering the next line because I'm going to be direct, and a little crude; like the caveman I am. There are real effects the hormone has on the brain directly, and guys that are low are often depressed. Then there are the effects of simply being more confident in my own body. It has been a slow, steady change. And, other than my impatience, it is one I have enjoyed all along the way.

I really appreciate you and Mike through this. I know I laid some heavy stuff on you when I was in the thick of it. That felt so unfair, even when I was doing it, but I wasn't able to stop myself. And you guys listened. I sincerely appreciate that you pushed me to do what I knew was the right thing. Going to the doctor, finding out my testosterone was so low ... that was a powerful thing in itself. Knowing the reason why, that was huge for me. It's such a sensitive thing for many. It'd be hard not to be since it's the butt of jokes. That's one reason why I wanted to put this out there. Yeah, it's considered private. It was to me for a while, but I realized that other guys are in this position too. Two visits to my doctor got me on the path to better things. It can work for others, and we're worth the effort. We are definitely lucky that we have treatment options available, and if anybody finds themselves in my position they should go get tested. So ... taking Kevin's side, are we? Hrm. 🤨😏

Thanks, chris. I'm glad I did too. I really needed help. I needed to know I had done everything I could do to fix things as well as I could fix them. Kevin and I are both much better now for the effort. And ... now we've got Sam too. 😄

Thanks, Reader. You know, there were times, even during the worst of it that I did laugh at the situation. But in the beginning, things were often not good. I felt as if I should be more than my biology. Like I should be okay, however "nature" intended I end up. But that was a cop-out. It was a way to not act, and in the process I extended the time I needed to suffer. There's absolutely some funny stuff wrapped up in the experience. But man ... it's so much easier to laugh now. And nice PS there. 😄

Caution: Some personal stuff concerning sex and sexuality is in this post. The reason I post it is for my own thought process, and with the idea that it may prompt other guys to go get tested if they're having problems. That said, here we go. I'm not very evolved when it comes to some things, I suppose. I fully accept that there are men out there born genetically female. That's not at issue. I don't define their maleness; my role in knowing and supporting trans folks is to acknowledge their definition, not to superimpose my own. Selfishly, this is all about me. It's about my self-perception, and what I feel I bring to my relationships with my husband and Sam. I am attracted to a very limited set of examples of the human condition; that being Cis men. People who are pansexual or bisexual confound me. Like ... they've found some secret I'll never quite discover. Some within our community call out men who are purely attracted to Cis men as being trans-phobic. But that's just not it. If I could shift my attraction to include someone other than a Cis guy, then I'd have shifted until I were straight. No Kentucky-raised kid in his right mind chooses to be gay. I'd have been just like I was "supposed" to be. So those are my limitations. I talk about this because they're important to know before getting to the rest of this post. Back late last year, I began to have trouble. Lack of desire, depressed a great many days, in a real and true funk. I felt like I was no longer the man my husband needed, and really? Well, that hurt more than anything. That's the whole reason I pushed us to open things up a bit. I wanted my husband to get laid again, even if it wasn't with me. Before anyone says "sex isn't everything," yes ... you're right. But it's very important to us; that connection is deeply critical to us as a couple. Maybe more proof of a lack of evolution. But I've yet to evolve not needing the other biological drives either. Why sex is different is beyond me. Anyway, we met Sam. The newness of him sparked things for me, and for a while I managed to stave off what became inevitable. After a few more months, I got to the point of no desire at all. Nothing. And that was so eerie. It's like knowing how delicious a bite of cake will be, but you no longer care about experiencing anything delicious. Finally, I went to the doctor. I found out I had the testosterone of a ninety-year-old man (I was forty-five at the time). He started me on the lowest dose medically prescribed of injected testosterone. Odd things began to happen shortly after I started the regimen. Within a couple of hours, the first thing I noticed was stuff was ... ah ... tingly. You can laugh. I know I did. I even looked it up, and sure enough, that's a common side effect of treatment. But ... only in guys who are actually low. The body has this resource it needed again, and suddenly it is put to work. Another nearly immediate effect, was this weird fog I had sort of lifted. It was like I had been operating at 95% as my base level for so long, it became "normal." Now things click faster, I spend less effort on complex problems. I'm back at 100%, and it feels so nice. I also began to finally notice strength gains in my workouts. Who knew that having a normal testosterone helped with weight lifting? Well, I did, but still. But what about sex? I mean, that's the big reason for getting tested in the first place. It didn't happen right away. It took a few months of my body figuring things out again. I am not exactly patient either, so my poor Doctor had to endure quite a few messages from me about it, and all the gory details. He kept telling me to "just be patient. Stop trying so hard. It'll happen." He was right. I feel now like I did when I was in my early thirties. My levels are dead center of normal range for a guy my age, and I have way fewer "dark" days. Importantly, I feel like I am, again what Kevin needs. The whole thing taught me a lot. It taught me about my self-perception, and how deeply it's tied to the physicality of my body. It taught me that there will come a time when I will have to evaluate this "What Makes Me a Man" question again, and maybe a different answer will be necessary down the line. It taught me that a relationship isn't defined by monogamy. But there's more too. A few weeks ago, while laying with my husband I asked what we'd do if something happens again, and I can't be "fixed". Kevin lay there for a bit. "We'll figure it out. We already did once, we'll do it again." Just that. Simple. Uncomplicated. Then he ruined it as he turned with a smirk on his face. "Besides, there's no fixing you. You're a wreck!" I guess, ultimately this whole experience taught me that I am indeed a wreck. Yet, my husband loves me anyway.

Thanks for sharing this with us. I particularly like that third stanza. 🙂

You're right. I'm talking immune response, not lethality or infective doses. Which makes it even more hopeful to get news related to immunity. I get wanting to be cautious. But the sample size in this is pretty astounding. Even the abundantly cautious medical providers I work with were optimistic. Cautious, yes but optimistic.

Oh, I get that. The numbers make for hopeful news, but we don't know what seasonal changes this thing is capable of making. THAT ... next year, when we see if it comes back like influenza, that'll be the real test. That and how people who've had it previously or have been vaccinated (that's coming) react to the new versions. It may be like measles, where we get it once and we're done. Or it may be like a cold, where we get them almost every year. Frankly, it's more likely to be similar to a cold or the flu - as the common cold virus is a coronavirus too. There are still unknowns. We've still got to be careful - all of us. Yet, this is a hopeful thing. Once fought, the specific version of SARS-CoV-2 cannot re-infect a person (unless there's an extraordinary event like a complete eradication of the immune system).

FYI - this may end up being similar to the flu: where the virus changes slightly every year, and thus can indeed reinfect folks. But those infections will likely be less severe, as the body had previous exposure to another version of the virus. It's very much a case of the immune system having a quickly developing partial response to such a bug, rather than a delayed one. In other words, it is no reason to stop wearing a mask if you do get and recover from COVID-19 while a pandemic is going on.

I have a meeting every Monday morning. In that meeting, we discuss SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, and specifically news and our response to the virus. Today the following information was released by our medical director, based on a huge sample study of folks who had been previously infected Concerning reinfection: To date, we have proof that five of thirty-eight million people have been reinfected by SARS-CoV-2. This means once someone gets the virus and recovers, then they're functionally immune, and reinfection is anomalous. That's amazing news that I really needed. I wanted to share it, in case it can help someone else out there.

You're welcome. Thanks for reading my work. I always love hearing from folks who give it a try. tim and I are still working bit by bit on our collaborative project. We'll get there. I hope you end up liking that one too. 🙂

I also wanted to thank @Renee Stevens for featuring the story in the blog. I appreciate that. 🙂

tim, the Instant Pot is going to get jealous of your Knitting Obsession.