Chapter 10: only days before my return

With my last text before my return in a few days, I would like to position myself clearly with an opinion that there is a chance in feminism to change something in the men’s world, which should help everyone in the long term.

I suppose I’m an extreme example of emotions.

I’ve always been very sensitive to external influences, but I know that I’m not the only one.
Therfore It has become all the more important for me to finally publish this text.
The idea came months ago, but my previous versions were full of rage and macho hatred, so in the end I always decided not to release them. I never could explain exactly where the anger came from and how deep it actually sat. It was just there.

An anger at a system where I was taught how to behave towards women. A system which, in my view, profits from the uncertainties of many young people and which ultimately leads to a lack of understanding for each other.
To the suffering of many women, as well as some men.

This is a story that has little to do with art, but it affirms with every word how important this step was for me and by publishing it I would like to thank all the great people, especially the onces that have accompanied me the last months.
Among others aswell for the understanding of those, which I addressed directly on our common past.

A few important words in advance:

I was about 10 or 11 years old when my big sister was in puberty. She shared many of her experiences with me, which gave me an early picture of what it was like to grow up as a young girl in the countryside.

She had a significant impact on the fact that I have never really come to terms with the tricks and gimmicks that were taught to me and therfore it has a great impact on my subsequent, positive development:

Review in my youth

I am between 13 and 18 years old and have been playing soccer in a club in the country for many years.
Girls and alcohol become interesting. My male and largely inexperienced environment begins to explain to me how I have to behave in dealing with women. The sources for the supposed knowledge are commonplace platitude and reviews of older people.

We confuse self-esteem with being an asshole and the credo “Women fall for assholes” manifests in our heads. Whether we find it right or not does not matter.
The world around us sadly confirms this credo and the reasons for it are quite simple in my view – many girls are also insecure and an asshole has less scruples to exploit.
Films like American Pie and talking about length, size, number unconsciously puts me under pressure.
I am a cheerful and open-minded, naïve person and internalize everything that is said to me like a sponge, but quarrel thanks to the many conversations with my big sister very much with the implementation.

At that time, I often find myself „friendzoned“, which was equated with the absolute loser status.
The tension increases as the first person reports his sexual experiences.
A compulsive pressure arises, in which one is pushed into one’s own sexuality.
Without open discussions. Without much passion. Often accompanied by the question “Have you finally scored?”
Sex degenerates into a status symbol. Furthermore, I am accompanied by the never ending flood of tips and tricks on how to get it.
Nobody says that this could be open and honest. Even at work one of my mentors tells me bluntly that women want to be lied to. I listen.
I’m 18 years old and I experience my first sex at this time. A slow one, as you would call it.
I increasingly distrust the people around me.
How could it be otherwise if one of your own friends said that you would like to “slip over” my girlfriend?
It happens every now and then that during this time I am laughingly touched in places where you should not be touched without being asked. It’s the world I grow up in, and when I question it, I get caught in the crossfire.
“You’re just a man and you would do the same …” “Do not be so hypocritical” “That’s evolution …” “That’s the way guys are”.

The extent of my confusion only becomes clear to me much later. I am becoming more restrained and insecure in dealing with women and men and I slip into a rather destructive melancholy phase that will accompany me for several years.

It will be almost impossible for me to fall asleep until I’m about 30 next to someone else. Just the touch of a body part of my own partner often causes me to lie wide awake and cramped in bed.

The exception is when I am drunk. Luckily I do not start drinking excessively.

I am about 18 years old and in the coming years I usually dress up as a woman on carnival. When I take of the Make Up I like it when the Kayal is still a few days to see. He emphasizes my green eyes.
Sometimes I paint my fingernails.
I’m told that I look very feminine and one would not be surprised if I turned out to be gay. My circle of friends continues to be men, with a few exceptions.
I am told that friendships between men and women do not work. The rules remain the same and sex is still a status icon. Nobody really talks about it honestly. At least not with me.

On the football field I am often called “fagot” because I tie my half-length hair into a pigtail. I counter with clean takles, extreme ambition and fair play. Until I tear my cruciate ligament, I’m one of the youngest and best defenders in our area.
I fall for women, but sometimes enjoy the emotional closeness of a man. In the coming years I will hug especially men who carry a “free hugs” sign.
Just because I’m allowed to hug them without judgment.
When I’m drunk, it happens that I have tears in my eyes.

At 21-22, my sexuality is a jumble of uncertainties and fantasies that I feel ashamed of. I refuse to accept that I have the same urge I see in other men. An instinct that does not follow any rules and ignores friendships.
I associate this urge with lies and deceit. Despite the fact that I am moving to the city, where a mixed circle of friends forms, I am sometimes accompanied by the same advice from my old world. Many of the boys have expierienced the same questionable education.

Apart from all the lies and games I enter a swingers club for the first time on my own.
A place where at least people communicate honestly about their desires with one other.
Even here I feel out of place. I continue to see the bad in the sex drive and develop again an internal demarcation to the behavior, which I see especially in single men:
Pushing in the foreground, waiting for the opportunity and always with his cock in his hand. After all, one is there to fuck and everything else would be lost time.
I can not find anyone with whom I can talk openly about my first experiences. About the uncertainties. About the shame that accompanies me.
About whether what I experience and think is normal.

I am now 27 years old and a rather subservient person who gives the world far more control over his life than he would ever trust himself. To avoid confrontation I say yes to a lot more than I should. I am on my first journey to South America and I get in touch with psychedelic substances for the first time.
I participate in indigenous self-discovery ceremonies.
It will be a very liberating experiences. First blockages dissolve.
A seed of my self-worth is planted in me, which begins to germinate slowly after my return.

After the trip, I meet a handful of people who talk more openly about their sexuality. I am fascinated but at the same time intimidated by the much younger group. I make my first experiences in BDSM. It will be a bumpy start, but it will be a start.

During this time, I also take an opportunity in Germany and begin to deal more with my artistic streak, which I have always had in me.
Despite a 38-hour week in the office, I spend a few extra hours in a tattoo parlor, looking over people’s shoulders, cleaning machines, and even tatooing a few people myself.
You notice that slowly but surely all sails set in a new direction.

I am now 29 years old and on the brink of a burnout. The only help I’m offered is antidepressants and my doctor’s statement that if I do not get out of my melancholy soon, I’ll live a lonely life.
I do not trust anyone anymore. My hatred of the sexual behavior of many men becomes unbearable. I have an anger in me that I can not explain.
I withdraw completely and slowly but surely tear down all that keeps me emotionally and materially in Germany. I quit and sell just about everything I have.
… I meet up with a friend I met a few years ago. She hugs me when I ask her to. At one point in my life, when I just want to leave and be on my own, she becomes one of the few people I still like to have around me.
I do not own anything anymore and I move temporarily into a tiny side room into the apartment of a friend, where no more than a bed fits in.

She continues to visit me in my little room in Stuttgart. I visit her in Munich. Feelings arise.

Nevertheless, I travel to Colombia for an indefinite period. I’m on my own a lot and I have time to think. I am in the precious situation to learn a lot about myself for the first time.
Who I am and what I want.
A one-and-a-half-year process of healing begins that only reached its peak a few weeks ago, when the knot in my soul suddenly burst and my subconscious * realized that tender touch was fine and that it never meant that you had to be touched immediately.

It is frightening to think that about that it has taken so long, but just a few months ago I was sitting in a group of people and pushed myself against the wall in a very tense motion to avoid touching anyone.

* (Book recommendation: “The child in you must find a home” by Stefanie Stahl)

It’s a nice and liberating feeling.

My name is David and I’m 31 years old.

I have been called many things in my life:

Sensitive and soft.

A late bloomer. A slut. A fagot. A hypocrate.

I was too thin, too open, too closed, too prudish, too gay, too bad, too good, too nice, too nasty, too weak, too thoughtful, too timid, too helpful, too selfish,
… and what do I know everything else.

But all that I was in other peoples eyes was what they wanted to see.
Maybe I was a topic of conversation to complete a rather dull day for a few minutes.
Or maybe a disappointed person said something about me whose expectations I could not meet.
Maybe someone just worried about me.

In itself, it is not important, because first and foremost I am just me and that is completely sufficient. For between all the completely contradictory qualities that someone else can give me, there is finally a self-esteem that I give myself:

I am an artist with a lot of ambition to get the most out of my own talent. I am self-taught and without any artistic education I designed walls, pictures, signs, canvases and logos in Germany, Colombia, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
I am a convinced feminist and have spent the entire year and a half in an open-minded long-distance relationship with a strong, proud, loving and beautiful woman, with whom I want to grow together for the rest of my life.

I was brave enough to question everything that I was taught and ended up getting rid of enough and taking a lot of consequences.
I am still reluctant enough to leave a great woman free to develop independently, and in the end I am selfish enough to demand it for myself.
It may be that I will not financially reach the status that I once had, but let’s be honest: What is a secure job in a world that is increasingly focusing on digitization and downsizing?

I thank every single person who reads these words and accompanies me in any way. All the texts you find here are written and translated by me. They are part of a process that started several years ago. Since the first entry, I have met a lot of people who have left a positive impression in almost all cases.

I always emphasize that the real journey begins when I get on the plane to Germany in a few days. Only then will it really become apparent how all the experiences will be combined with my new everyday life.

But I’m less worried about that.

I have some savings left to buy some important things that I now know I really want.

They are not expensive sneakers. It’s not a new phone, no TV, no car.

Only a good tablet with drawing program, a small projector, new running shoes …

… and spicy sausages with ketchup and mustard!

In addition, I look forward to warm hugs and a lot of warmth when I come back. I definitely have some to give away 🙂

A lot of love for you and maybe see you soon

David

9 thoughts on “Chapter 10: only days before my return”

  1. Weiterhin mega Respekt!
    Bleib wie du bist bzw veränder dich weiter 😉
    Komm gut zurück und viel Glück beim vereinbaren des neuen David mit dem alten Deutschland.

  2. Ich bin sehr beeindruckt von deinem sehr offenen Text. Ich wünsche Dir, dass alles weiterhin so läuft wie Du dir das vorstellst. Das Einzige was ich nicht bestätigen kann, dass das ein Phänomen bei Männer auf dem Land ist. Ich bin auch auf dem Dorf aufgewachsen und auch meine Familie wohnt noch dort. Genau so wie in der Stadt gibt es immer verschiedene Menschen und darunter leider auch Machos. Aber ich muss sagen nach 3 Jahren Dating in einer Stadt kann ich nicht sagen, dass die Männer respektvoller mit Frauen eher das Gegenteil. Menschen sind immer verschieden egal wo so her kommen. Wichtig ist, dass man sich mit Menschen umgibt die einem gut tun. Ich hoffe wir sehen uns dann bald mal in Stuggi wieder 😊glg Nicole

    1. Hey Nicole,
      danke dir 🙂 Du hast völlig Recht. Menschen sind verschieden, egal woher sie kommen. Ich drück dich fest und ich vermute auch stark, dass wir uns bald mal in Stuggi sehn. Ich bin über Silvester da und dann auch nochmal im Februar für ein paar Tage.
      Außerdem wird es immer irgendwo einen Geburtstag geben, den es zu feiern gibt 😉
      Ich freu mich und liebe Grüße
      David

    2. Danke nochmal für deinen Hinweis. Ich hab entschieden eine kleine Änderung zu machen, damit es nicht mehr “Viele der Jungen, die vom Land in die Stadt ziehen…” sondern generell “Viele der Jungen…” heißt.
      Im Nachhinein betrachtet passt das besser. 🙂
      Bis bald.

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