'An accident waiting to happen'

This is a dramatic story of one man's memories of school, church, hospital, prison and his eventual surrender to God.

by a TfT Member in Northern Ireland (May 2008)

Under the pillows I couldn't breathe. Saturday morning at home in County Fermanagh. No school. Fourteen and lying in bed, tossing and turning with images of boys in my class in my head, the blankets pulled over it. Trying to conjure up images of girls. I can't. Why not? I wish I could fancy girls. I struggle and hide under the pillows. I let my mind go completely blank. Surely now I'll be able to fantasise about girls. I want to, yearn to. I starve my thoughts of images of boys. Surely now I'm ready to be re-programmed, made normal, able to talk about girls the way other boys at school do? 'Ok, I'm obviously not trying hard enough', I think. So I try to stop breathing and hide underneath my pillow but it doesn't help. No choice.

An image from my haunted, traumatic childhood in Northern Ireland. 'He's number 4, my wee accident', my mother pronounces me unwanted. Sibling sexual abuse, religiosity, attempted suicide, loneliness, no way out, no choice. For whatever reason I was gay and no one could ever understand that in 80s Northern Ireland.

The Rev. Fury says God's wrath and judgement will pour like an unquenchable flood on those whom wickedness has defiled. Sodom and Gomorrah. Fire and brimstone. He never talks of love and compassion, grace or peace. Fear, hell and sin and - worst of all - the unpardonable sin, a sin so bad it cannot even be mentioned...yes that was my sin... my sin of liking boys, not girls. No help, no hope, no one to talk to about all this turmoil...best left buried.

10 years later married and time moves on...2, 3, 4 children...time-bomb ticking away...another 10 years... waiting to explode. Bombs in Northern Ireland shatter lives...and this bomb would be no exception. Suppression meets deception: I meet someone who I think finally understands me, a man who will always love me...he has the face of my brother, my abuser.

I stand on the cliff-face equipped with valium and piriton. Inhalants. Wine. Soon I'll keel over on the blue carpet, overdosed. Death cocktail: dry chalky tablets, need liquid: wine, light head. Bright lights as I inhale long sniffs. Getting there. I reach for the paperwork on divorce, turn it over and start to write my suicide note. 'I ache for him, I long for him...' the note starts. A wife, four children, police involvement over my declaration of sibling abuse, irreconcilable situation.... 'I can't go on', the note concludes.

'Where am I?' I ask.
'Down hospital', says the nurse.
'What happened?' I ask
'You had a serious car accident.'
'What?' I say in disbelief.
'You've been sleeping for 2 whole days'....

'Prisoner' is a label I never thought I'd wear. Badge of humiliation: symbol of resignation; freedom abandoned; control lost.
'Death by dangerous driving. Number F1207', the escorting officer says as I'm assigned to cell 12. The cell door crashes shut for the first time and heavy metal door echoes like the Enniskillen bomb. I wish, like CT Studd I could be happy to have the whole of my life written across the sky for all to see. But not now...not this way. Layer after layer of guilt...

As with a broken clay pot, restoration is a long arduous process, but carried out with the steady, loving hand of the Master. Stripped back, laid bare, dross removed - only then can He begin His work.

Remorse, restitution, counselling, learning. 4 years later a work in progress.

'The truth will set you free...' Wish I'd realised when I was fourteen that I didn't have to hide...that God loved me exactly the way I was. We're all broken and He's there to accept, to love wherever we're at.

I now hope that my story will be of use to others...
'Just be honest, be yourself, let the light in...only then can God work. Know you have a choice and choose God each bit of the way,' I find myself advising to others just last week.

Hand over the clay of your life to the Master. Let Him re-shape you one small piece at a time.