Originally posted by reverie35

Summary, hiding myself was good for my wife, and good for both children. Was it bad for me, or did it keep me focused on job and family and not self and personal pleasure? Am I a better or worse person today because of the way events went? I don’t know.
You will never know. However, if you want to keep tabs, you made your entire family quite secure and happy. You are happy on the fact you made them happy. You are not happy for missing out on self pleasure. You are a very unselfish person - with the divorce rates as they are, the broken homes, etc - you didn't become an alarming increasing statistic, and maybe those kids will learn from you how to pass down that family.

And what keeps me with my family is I do respect them, and know that sure - I figured this out late in life, but I keep telling myself that maybe if I found out earlier I could end up farther down the road and realize that I had my fun, and done pleasing myself - or maybe it's time I introduce a family into my life....and then it's much harder or too late.

Well, that's what keeps me with them. And I do put them ahead of me. I try to shove my wants to cheat or explore with others under the rug - and tell myself that over all - I'm better off this way...hell, I can always have myself when they leave, and the simple act of TALKING to someone else to relieve that little pressure a little at a time is what keeps me from going insane, and utimately, become a statistic and create yet another broken family.

Thank you for your post - you show me that I can stick it in, and live through it.

The one thing I got going for me though is my wife does know about me, alot about me and my sexuality. However, she knows I still love her and wont leave her and I will not allow this to ruin it. She trust me...and didn't run off like some would. She won't explore it with me - but hell......some of us do ask that people just ACCEPT who we are - and she did just that.