Ep.#32 -Gay Fathers; Thanksgiving Reflection: Acceptance, Family Dynamic, Embracing Change & Freedom
December 10, 2024 • 40 mins
In this conversation, Brian and John reflect on their Thanksgiving experiences, discussing themes of family acceptance, the journey of coming out, and the complexities of relationships. They share personal anecdotes about their families, the challenges of maintaining friendships post-coming out, and the importance of self-acceptance. The discussion also touches on the dynamics of community, sexuality, and the evolving nature of relationships as they navigate their identities.
Coming Inside OUT is a safe space where listeners can find solidarity, inspiration, and the courage to embrace their true selves. Whether you're a gay father, a person exploring your identity, or an ally seeking to understand the experiences of the LGBTQ community, this podcast is for you. Tune in for heartfelt conversations, insightful advice, and the sense of belonging that we all crave.
Join your hosts, Brian and John, as they candidly share their own journeys out of the closet while navigating the joys and challenges of parenthood as openly gay fathers. In each episode, Brian and John connect with fellow gay dads, sharing their inspiring stories, victories, and struggles. They delve into the complexities of grappling with sexuality, discussing their experiences as teens, husbands, and dads. Together, they aim to foster a supportive community for those still in the closet, reassuring them that they are not alone in their journey.
Join us on this journey of love, acceptance, and authenticity! Contact us at cominginsideout@gmail.com
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Keywords - Thanksgiving, family, acceptance, coming out, relationships, self-acceptance, community, sexuality, identity, friendship
Takeaways: Thanksgiving can be a time of acceptance and freedom. Family dynamics can change positively with acceptance. Coming out is a continuous journey that affects relationships. Friendships may be tested after coming out, but they can also strengthen. Self-acceptance is crucial for personal growth and happiness. Community support is vital for LGBTQ+ individuals. Navigating sexuality can be complex and multifaceted. Relationships evolve as individuals embrace their true selves. It's important to allow others time to process changes in relationships. The journey of coming out is unique for everyone and requires patience.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello gay men and welcome to Coming Inside Out. I am John Duerler. I'm Brian Janes.
(00:08):
Brian, how are you? It's been a while. It has been a while. Happy Thanksgiving buddy.
Happy Thanksgiving to you. Did you have a good one? I did. I thought we would talk about that
because I have some kind of funny stuff about Thanksgiving. Yeah. Family to share with you.
Let's hear it. Well, yeah. So it's interesting because I'm taking perspective on a lot of things
(00:33):
happening with my family, with my children, just life in general. And I was looking back at how
Thanksgiving used to look as I was growing up and in my teens and early 20s and how boys were boys
and girls were girls and you looked how you were supposed to look and that was it. And I'm at
(00:54):
Thanksgiving and I'm looking around and I'm out and gay. My son is dressed very feminine.
My brother's daughter is dressed very masculine. She's a lesbian. Hope I can say that on here.
My sister's husband, my brother-in-law, he's like, I call him a geek but not in a
(01:18):
mean sense because it's an IT. He's like a geeky dude. They have a daughter.
He went with her to get a pedicure. So he has his toenails painted two different colors.
All right. And then my niece's three and a half year old son has his fingernails painted.
(01:40):
Okay. Yeah. Just like when we were growing up, that would have never existed. And so to just be
in a house full of people where everybody is growing up as themselves and totally being
accepted, I thought that was so cool. Okay. I have a perspective here. All right.
(02:02):
How did it go? How was the whole tone of the day? How was it?
It was the best Thanksgiving I've had and probably as long as I could remember.
Because my theory is everyone's free. Everyone is free to be who they are,
(02:23):
what they want to do, and there's no judgment there. And how beautiful is that? That's a great
Thanksgiving. You know, I think that I was just, I wasn't worked up. I wasn't, I didn't know they're
charged because when I see my family, a lot of time charged, but I wasn't charged because I was
missing my younger son because we didn't get to see him. He's at training and Marine Corps.
(02:47):
We didn't get to see him. So I just wanted to love on my older son and just be grateful to be with
those that I was able to be with because I didn't have him with me. That's fantastic.
That's fantastic. What did I do? I'm glad you asked. I'm glad you asked. Thank you. What did I do for Thanksgiving? How was mom?
(03:08):
You know, no, it's interesting. And maybe some, some people can identify to this. I,
I was planning on not having Thanksgiving with my future ex-wife here. Okay. And the boys. I thought,
you know what, we've been doing this for the last eight years. Those of you who are just joining us,
you know, I haven't officially divorced yet, but you know, we're there. We've served each other and
(03:34):
it's happening. And I thought, maybe this time I'll just let them have their Thanksgiving because
we went to, I took the boys before Thanksgiving. I took the boys last week before Thanksgiving,
took them to Vegas. I saw the picture. The football game and everything. We went to the
football, went to the Vegas game and there was an event because, you know, I've got one of my best
(03:57):
friends and he's a business partner of mine. He has a private suite in Allegiant Stany. It looks
sweet. It looked like a good time. It was a great time. So I got to bring the boys and then one
of my good friends, he always gives us tickets to the USC game and then a buddy of mine there.
(04:20):
And I was under the impression that thought this was sweet because the suite holds 22 seats privately
and then you have the bar in the back and then you have, well, anyway, it's just us, no one else
was there. I mean, I could have invited so many more people, you know, because this much, I mean,
not a lot of people get to do this. And it was, it was, it was lovely. The boys, we, we did that and
(04:42):
then we went and played Topgolf. I don't know if anybody's done Topgolf. That's fun. And they just
loved Vegas. We had such a great time. I had a really good time with my boys. So I thought, okay,
we had our one on one time and I would, I would have been okay to let, you know, Jill have the boys,
but then she goes, would you want to come? Yeah, I guess I'll do it. And I did it. And, you know,
(05:05):
we got into argument like, oh, fuck, you know, do it. Was it just the four of you? It's just
the four of us. Okay. And, you know, I went, I went, Jackson and I went and volunteered that
Thursday morning over at the American Legion for the veteran. He and I did that. And then Jill and
Liam were going to go ahead and cook. And that was it. So we get back and, and, and we had already,
(05:27):
she goes, yeah, take him. He's not going to help Jackson. I'm going to help in the kitchen.
Take, I did. We came back and then Jackson and I are just chilling out watching TV. And then she
gets pissed because we're laying around not doing the things. So, and I'm sorry I took a big circle
to get to this point, but I'm like, wow, you know, I don't want to do this. I get that.
(05:51):
And so I'm glad to hear that you had that, the freedom. It's a new one. It's a new beginning.
And I know, and I know, and I'm making there's some of you out there thinking,
you know, when am I going to do this? Or what am I, you know, it's going to happen. But I was
excited because I know probably next year it's not going to be like that. And so, you know,
(06:13):
well, you know, I spent two thanksgivings by myself. One thanksgiving, my family rented a house
and my ex-wife went and I didn't want to go with her. So I'm like, you know what, you go.
I have my dog. So it was going to be hard for me to go anyways. And then I think it was last year.
(06:34):
I just was not feeling it. And I took my dog and I went to the beach.
For thanksgiving. And my ex is, I've shared this before, is very close to my family. She's known
my family since junior high school. So she is as much a part of them as I am. So I was like,
you know what, I'm just going to let her go and spend time with the family.
(06:55):
With your family?
Yeah. I mean, because she's known them since junior high school.
No, I mean, look.
So she went and I took my dog and I just went to the beach.
You did your thing.
And I did my thing. But we were all there together this year.
Well, that's, I mean, seriously, I think that was, I'm glad you shared that because
your brother-in-law had the pages painted. I mean, I've always just, you know, traditionally,
(07:17):
you just don't do you, do you, do you have, oh, I'm asking you, do you have of the biggest,
because this is what I deal with my family since we're not all together.
Very attached to that.
And we group text you and I go, what's, what's one of your most favorite memories of
Thanksgiving growing up? What was good? What was your memory?
(07:40):
Well, you know, I, my father's Armenian, so I grew up in a big Armenian family in Glendale.
Oh, well, oh yeah. A lot of grandparents, my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, all kinds of,
so I just remember going to my grandparents' house, so thanks, give me time. You know,
you're like 10 years old and you've got a new shirt that you got to wear or whatever, you got
(08:02):
new pants or shoes or whatever it was, and you would go there and all the cousins would be there
and we'd just be running around, stealing candy out of the candy dishes that my grandmother had
laying around or whatever like that. I mean, it was fun as a kid. Those were my best memories.
It is because you're not, there's no, you know, there's no hangups. You're just a kid and you
(08:24):
should enjoy yourself, which maybe you were a kid again this last Thanksgiving. Well, you enjoyed,
you know, you enjoyed yourself. It was interesting because, you know, since we've put this on my
personal Facebook page and we've been promoting this podcast, my niece came up to me. She's like,
oh, I'm really enjoying your podcast. My niece said that to me and I said, what? You're listening
(08:46):
to my podcast. She's like, oh yeah, listen to your podcast. And so like a wave of anxiety came over
me and I thought, oh, what have I been saying on that podcast? And then my mom told me that she's
listening to your mom's listening. My older sister comes walking and I was like, oh, where is it on
YouTube? I want to listen to it too. And I was like, oh my God, my family's listening to this.
(09:10):
You know, Cass, that's, that's, but that's, you know what? It's, it's funny. It's so funny. There's
needs my nephew texted me. Oh my God, Uncle John, I've been listening to your podcast. Me and
I think my name's Diane. Sorry. Well, yeah, you're listening. Is it Diane? And like, correct me if
(09:30):
I'm wrong. Sorry. But they're, you know, in Tyler, they have a horse farm and they're just like,
listen to my podcast. You know, Uncle John, I love it. It's great. Isn't it crazy? I never thought
that we would have people that this didn't relate to directly. Right. Listen to it. But yeah, I think
it does. I think it, I think it does. And you know what? I kind of prejudge the younger generation
(09:56):
of that. This is cool. And I'm like, and I just like you. I'm like, oh my God, what, what have I
said? What, you know, I think we've said it all. We've slashed episode was the most recent. Was it?
I don't remember. I was asking for a friend. Remember, I do remember. I do remember. That was
(10:17):
for a friend. So, yeah, so, well, I'm going to bring something up. Yeah, this I, I've had two
friends that I've known since one of them since preschool, the other one since first grade.
Everybody else that's in my life has kind of come into my life as I've had kids or through work. But
(10:40):
these are two people that I've known my entire life. One of them has been reaching out to me
since COVID. And I have been blowing him off. I've like, no, he lives in another state, but
he was texting me and I'm like, I'm so busy. I'm sorry. And then he's calling me and I, hey,
(11:01):
listen, I'm over here. And I can't tell you this is again, this is the guy that I've gone to school
with since kindergarten. Okay. Um, he found out through Facebook that I came out as gay. I'd
never told him and I have had avoidance with him. And what I wrote down here is being abandoned by
(11:22):
others versus being the person that abandons relationships. A lot of men get abandoned by
people when they come out as gay, but I'm realizing that I've abandoned people since I came out as
gay and I'm like, holy shit. That's very, very good. So this guy starts texting me like a couple
weeks ago, he was like, Hey, I really want to talk to you. Hey, come on, come on, you know, what's
(11:45):
going on? And whatever. And he's like, Oh, you know, I thought you met somebody and they would be
jealous if you had a, if you had another male friend and that's why you weren't getting back to me.
I said, no, you know, I just really didn't want to explain myself kind of. Yeah. And so for four
years, he texts me, I text him back, he calls me up like, Hey, I'm not available. I got on the phone
(12:08):
with him two weeks ago. Had like an hour and change conversation with him. He was so kind and loving to
me. No one made my entire life. He said the most loving things to me. He also has listened to the
podcast because he saw it posted on Facebook and just had the kindest response to me. And I thought,
(12:34):
Oh my God, because I didn't want to explain myself to this friend, I abandoned the friendship. And I
did that for the last four years. And, you know, I guess some people are worried they're going to come
up to their family and the reaction. I was worried that there was going to be a reaction from him.
(12:55):
And I didn't want to explain myself. So
I do. Yes, I do. Yes, I have that habit. I'm like, I'm tired. There's part of me that's
fucking tired of coming out. Yeah. And I've talked to gay people all the time. We're lucky it never
ends. It never ends. And it just is just part of life. And so I, I gosh, yeah, there's a few of
(13:22):
my friends on Facebook. I'm sure there's stuff that has, you know, people have seen me or listened
to this, but they haven't come back to approach me. Okay, so, you know, maybe they don't, maybe
they don't know. And maybe they're on my family, my friends. And look, I don't have a book here
(13:43):
that I write and tell everyone. I'm like, did I come out to that person? I don't remember.
And so if it comes up organically, at least that's where I'm kind of my head right now. If it comes
up organically, then it comes up. And, but you know, there's a really good friend of mine from
sixth grade that, you know, I haven't come out to and, you know, I talked to him. I am coming in
(14:04):
to that. But just haven't, you know, all right. So you still talk to him, but you haven't come out.
Right. Right. All right. This guy knew that I had come out, but I've been avoiding you. Okay.
But so that's interesting. So you're still hiding part of your stuff because you're not
sharing with him. Why is that? Is it embarrassment? Is it shame? Is it you were not truthful with him?
(14:32):
I'll tell you what, there's part of it. I'm just tired of coming out. Okay. Fuck. I'm just, I mean,
look, you know, I come out every Tuesday. I mean, you know, I mean, it's like, okay, you know, I don't
have a quota. I don't have a quota, but I just, I love the guy. He's been one of my best friends
growing up. But, you know, we've lost touch. And, you know, there's, I don't know, I see all these
(14:55):
saints on Tik Tok or whatever a friendship, you know, can, you can have a friendship, you know,
that you don't speak to for years, but yeah, you still are the best friends.
That's got it. I will pick up the phone after not talking to him for a year and we pick up,
like we had just talked on the phone three days before. Yeah. Give a bond. And there's another
(15:16):
thing I don't know, because it's like, I don't want it to be all about me. I don't want it to be
all about me. I don't want to see how he's doing, how his family's doing. And, and there's times that
I would just come out, but there just really wasn't a time to do it. Do you think that there would be
a negative reaction or there's something preventing you? Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's why, yeah,
(15:37):
I think it's why who I've known forever too. They grew up. I think they, you know, yeah,
and I'm prejudging them. Okay. I'm totally prejudging them, but you know, they're not in
my life every day. So it's not like, you know, it's not like I have to or I live in the same town as
they do. So, you know, there's part of that. Yeah. Right. Well, that kind of bleeds into what I wrote
(16:00):
here, the next with your friend, all the number five, like, you know, I just jotted down some
notes for this episode. I have so much love for my children that I could never turn my back on my
kids. I love them so much. And that, you know, if there's somebody that turns their back on us,
(16:23):
it's not about us. It's about them. Sure. You're right. And we personalize and internalize this.
And it's, oh, it's, they've abandoned us. They've left us. They hate us. They, whatever. We prejudge
them. Well, just like my friend and his wife. Yeah. That they're going to turn their back on
you. No. Or that your relationship is somehow going to shift from that. Yeah. But in reality,
(16:48):
it's not about us. It is about them. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, I look at my Facebook messenger all
the time. Of course you do. You don't look at your Facebook messenger. And there are so many.
I'm like, I every day I'm chatting with like two, three, four people that are listening to the podcast.
(17:09):
I'm developing friendships with these people. They don't have mine. Do they have mine? Well,
all they have to do is go John Derriller and send you a private instant message. And you would,
well, a lot of them go into spam. You have to go into your spam folder to look for them. And I
discovered this months ago, but where's my Spanish? Yeah. Oh boy. You have to go up here. So you have
(17:34):
the red dot. You do have spam. Go red dot and then, um, I'll try to request. I don't know. Your phone
is so, John's print on his phone is so big. It's, you're getting letters per page, not
paragraphs for big. That's right. So I'm gonna see it. Very different. So here's the deal with this
(17:58):
spam folder is like, oh, 95% of it is going to be all sex related and whatever. But there's people
that reach out to me. Oh, spam. Oh, that's spam. That's going to go for a long time.
I don't know. It's going to take a while to load up on yours. But so, um, this is kind of what I
(18:25):
wanted to talk about with these people are sharing with me, you know, their families are not accepting
of them. They're in really bad places right now. It's the holiday time. They're feeling alone.
And I thought, you know, as gay men, I came out at 50. You came out at however, whatever age you
(18:46):
came out at. Not intentionally, but we have been deceiving people of who we were. Loved ones,
our wives, our ex-wives, we were deceiving them for years and years and years. We need to allow
them time and space to heal from our deception. And there's a lot of men that come out as gay.
(19:12):
And they, well, I don't want to say a lot of men, some of the people, and you know, I'll include
myself in that, you've come out as gay and we want immediate approval and acceptance of being gay.
Well, when you've been deceptive with somebody for 30 years, they're not going to turn a corner
in a day, a week, a month, maybe even a year. You know, and some people, their kids, maybe they
(19:37):
raised their kids in a way that was not accepting of being gay. And then you come out as gay.
Those people need time. You know, and we don't get to put the timestamp on, you know, how long
they're going to be able to heal. But I just thought it was important. It's interesting you say
(19:57):
that we've we've deceived them. In a sense, I'm like, oh my God, we lived a lie. Yeah, we lived a
lie. I went to a godly this morning. Oh, you did. I did. I went back to this is a church here. Yeah,
it was one and they're online. If you ever want to go online. And you know, he's talked about Dr.
(20:19):
Dr. Reverend Michael Beckwith Beckwith. Yeah, Dr. Beckwith. He talked about,
you're always changing, change. And he's talking about change your DNA, change your DNA, change
who you are every day, you're changing, live it, love it. And it's true. It's really true. Or if
you're aspiring to do something, that's what you change your DNA, change the way you think, change.
(20:42):
And you have that. And he's talking about the history of how we were, or what we were like
when we were kids, we're not like that today. And it was it was really cool service today.
Really cool service. And so I'm digging that. I'm digging that. Sure. Okay. Oh, I love it too.
Yes. And you can they do stream online. I think the only stream one of the services. Yeah, the main
(21:04):
one. I think that's nice. I love it. Yeah. Or love it. Yeah. But I mean, I'm, I'm like, yeah,
I'm really enjoying that. But yeah, you know, take the message. But then, you know, we were
always race, Catholic, what were you raised? I was raised, well, so my grandparents were
Presbyterian, but I did not. That's Catholic. Yeah, I didn't grow up in a religious house.
(21:26):
Well, when you talk about changing, look how much we've the more you allowed yourself to be
your true authentic self. Yeah, I think the more you change, look how much we have changed, look
how much a lot of our listeners have changed. We've fricking come out as gay talk about
changing our DNA. Well, that's why I'm like, wow, I totally changed my yes.
(21:49):
What would by coming out being truthful and, and yeah, it's like, you know, did we just,
you know, we deceive so many people. There's my nephew calling me right now. Oh, well,
this isn't live. So but if it was live, we could have had a caller.
We could have had our first calling. Oh, he's my God child too. Because we, I was raised
Catholic and he's my he's my God. He's a good he's a good young man from Texas. He's from Texas.
(22:14):
He's such and it was so loving. I mean, because he was I mean, I want to cry right now. He's like,
I'm so proud of you, Uncle John. I'm so proud of you. You know, just being who you are,
you know, and I would have projected him of possibly being upset about it. So that's a
perfect example of us prejudging everyone or anyone. And it is what it is, you know.
(22:40):
And, and, you know, if you're going to come out to them, if you're going to show, share your
authenticity with them, keep in mind that they need the time to process just like you're
simple. Yeah, brother, something about. Do you have 30 seconds or one hour, whatever it was?
Yes. But what was great about it? I kept telling them for those who haven't heard.
(23:04):
So I was coming out to my brother's like coming out would be like coming out to your father,
because my older brother was like my father growing up because my dad was gone. And so there's that,
you know, brother relationship. There was also that parent child relationship. And I was like,
Oh my God, you know, he's like one of the last ones that I was going to tell. And I texted him
(23:25):
and I said, Hey, he's back in Texas. I'm here in LA. Hey, brother, do you have 30 seconds or an hour
and or an hour to get on the phone with me? Because this is when I was going up from out to him.
And he texted me back, call me now. I've got time. So I called him and he said, Hey,
yeah, I've got you're okay. I'm seven five. He said, What's up? And I said, Well, and he goes,
(23:47):
Oh, by the way, he goes, I'm going through a dead zone here in about 10 minutes. So I'll lose you,
but I'll call you back probably 15 minutes after that. And so then I came out to him and I said,
Hey, brother, I'm gay. Oh, fuck you. No, you're not. Yes, wait, I'm gay. Fuck you. No, yeah,
I'm too. You know, so that went on. The answer went on. Because he, you know, he couldn't,
(24:09):
he couldn't believe it. You know, and, and so I go, wait, I'm being, we were disconnected.
And so you're talking about having time to think about my brother had 15 minutes to say,
wait a minute, this is a little motherfucker. True. Is he, is he bullshitting me or because we always
(24:30):
joke. He goes, wait, this could, you know, and then after 15 minutes, the phone call came in. Hey,
are you serious? And I'm like, yeah, brother, I am. He goes, it was fine. It was all good. It was
just, you know, it was great. You know, but, but you're right. They need time to process it as well.
And the, you know, how close they were, how much, none of us deceived intentionally. I'm, I don't
(24:57):
believe I did not deceive with intention. I deceived because I didn't know who the fuck I was.
I really, God, I thought I was going to grow out of this over and over and over. It took me until
I was 47 years old to like be like, damn it, Brian, this is not going away. You're fucking gay.
(25:18):
But, but I think, you know, you're right. And, but I think we can compartmentalize. And that's
what I did. I compartmentalized where, where I stuck it in a box and I pushed it out all the way
down and in the back and around the corner. And then it snuck up on you. And I think you, you know,
(25:38):
you, you listen to this manifestation and I'm straight. I'm straight. I'm not gay. I'm not
gay. Then you manifest that you live that until it just starts to boil up. Yes. You know, the
all you see Patrick Duffy on that is my speedo and then it all bets are off.
Did you get that? Yes. Yes. Dancing. Yes. And then the bar fight. Yes. Okay. Listener. So, so we all know
(26:11):
Brian loves Patrick. He just, when he first saw Patrick Duffy in his speedo, and he came on
live. He came on live. Like, wait a minute. And so I'm like going through TikTok and there was
just something from Dallas with principle, Victorian principle. Yes. And you know, she's
beautiful. I wouldn't know. No, she was beautiful. She was beautiful. But we weren't watching her.
(26:38):
She was. And her ass. We were watching Patrick Duffy. And so I had to follow her. Yeah. I appreciate
that. Yeah. That is so funny. I actually looked up Dallas because you can stream it and I started
streaming the first season again. And I was like, did you know that it's hard? You know, the very,
well, this is very off topic. The very first house that we're using is different than the house that
(27:01):
they use. Exactly. Yes. That was that was not their house that the original house that was some
other house. Yeah. Yeah. No, I was probably like five or six of the episodes. Yeah. Oh my god. I do.
Yeah. I did love me some Patrick Duffy and his speed and his speed. Yeah. Taking his little son to
(27:22):
the swimming pool. God damn it. That's when I know that's when I know. Yeah. But well, you know,
I knew that I was attracted to him, but I had no idea what that meant. But see, that's the other
thing too. You know, we all see beauty. We all live in a certain way and and we can appreciate. I mean,
(27:44):
that doesn't mean you have to go fuck them, you know, but you see like, look, man, a lot of straight
men, a lot of straight men check other men out more on a competitive. I think this is my theory.
Yeah. I'd be wrong. But I, I, because I, when I was straight, you know, working out with straight
men, you know, they're like, oh, look at that fucking dude. Oh, he's got the he's, it's more of an
(28:08):
admiration or jealousy of it. And, you know, and I'm like, just a competitive macho. Well, I think
it is a competitive macho thing. I think women look at other women. Oh, and it's nothing sexually.
It's like, you know, they're admiring, you know, or judging. They are there like fucking judging.
(28:29):
Cat nails. I think it's across the board, but I think it's across the board with men and with them
and they, you know, the them and they are doing it now. Right. We, I think we all do it. We all do
it just to a certain, you know, I agree. I agree with that. Yeah. Yeah. Although, you know, if you
talk about the gym, I keep saying this because it's, it's true. The gym is a gay man's church. Oh,
(28:54):
yeah. So you get all these hunky, good looking men in there and they're there and they're tight
shorts and they're little tank toppy shirts or they're, are you in the steers, the steam rooms,
you know, I haven't had, I haven't had an experience in the steam room. Well, when I was in the sex
addicts group, you know, I would visit it. I was part of, you know, if you were a man or woman,
(29:19):
I mean, it would be, it would be if you're a traffic man, do you not go into the wet spaces?
Don't go to the wet space. A wet space. Wet spaces, the shower, the jacuzzi,
or the steam room or the sauna. Wow. Because that is a definite trigger to act out and to have sex,
(29:40):
because the gyms, like you said, I mean, it's, it's all happening in the shower. Okay. Wow.
It's not happening to me in the shower. Let me ask you a question. I'm going to ask you a question.
You don't have to answer this because not everything that John and I talk about, do we,
you know, I don't know anything about you. You talk about being in a sex addicts group. Yeah.
(30:02):
You joined that to pacify your wife at the time because you were coming out of this gate or
do you, did you feel at the time that you were truly a sex addict? I didn't know what a sex
addict was. And I went, I went to, I didn't do too, would you say pacify? Oh, appease.
Maybe I just word please. Yeah. Appease. Appease. I went there just to get help because, you know,
(30:28):
I wasn't, you know, and I'm embarrassed. You know, I was not faithful. I was not faithful.
But does that make you a sex addict because you weren't faithful? No. No. I mean, my therapist,
who's an amazing therapist, she's going to be on, she was like, John, I don't think that you are a
(30:48):
sex addict. I think you're just exploring sexuality and who you are. And, and so yeah,
no, because I mean, addiction in my book is if it takes over your normal life and takes over your
work, it takes over and you're not showing up. Yeah. That's an addiction. So it's really how
(31:12):
do you manage, you know, whoever's, you know, sex or if you, you know, in the gay community,
a blow job's like shaking somebody's hand as straight. Okay. Wow. We hang out with different
people. I mean, seriously, it's, it's, it's like, you know, the gay, you know, it's like, good,
(31:32):
good, okay, great. Yeah. Oh, what's your name? Yeah. After the fact. You know, so it's all out
there. It's there. I mean, man, come on, man, we, at least I'm not going to speak for all men, but
I mean, think about the heterosexual men that cheat on their life. Yeah. And they're out there just
trying to, you know, I don't know if it's a primal thing of conquering or doing that. You know,
(31:57):
it's, but, but in addiction, I learned a lot and I learned, I mean, I was in it for years. Oh, wow.
I was. And you know, I was probably using it more for therapy as, you know, not to meet guys.
No, no, not to meet. No, I mean, I have met some extraordinary men in there, extraordinary, gay,
(32:17):
bi, straight, you know, it was, it was, it was just, I needed that at the time. At the time of my life,
I needed that community and a connection with sex because it was part of, you know,
because I questioned myself on it. No, okay, am I bi? Am I straight? Am I gay? Well, I know I'm not
(32:39):
straight. And at the time, my wife, at the time, you know, look, I'm not, I'm not approved if you're
bisexual, we can possibly work this out. But she gave it time, we, you know, and, and I'm like,
no, I'm not, I'm not bi. And so that was, you know, the end of us, you know,
(33:01):
your sex addict, when you were going to like sex addicts, anonymous group, you were doing that
after your wife discovered the in-house or before. Yes, after, after. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. After she,
yeah, after that. And because, I mean, I didn't know. Yeah, I didn't know. And so, yeah. All right.
(33:24):
I don't know the definition of an addict, but you're right. A person that enjoys having sex is
different than a person who's destroying their life over a needing to satisfy themselves sexually.
I think so. I mean, look, I'm not the superior being in this, but I just think it's kind of
common sense if it's alcohol, if it's drugs, if it's on your phone, my boy, you're always on your
(33:51):
phone, there's an addiction there. But I mean, it can destroy people, it can destroy a lot of people,
the addiction. And I thought that I was, and then I'm like, and she's like, I don't think you're
an addict. You know, and, you know, and I just was educated a little bit more, that, you know, at
least, and I'm not gonna say every gay man, like, has sex all the time, but you look at me.
(34:17):
I looked at him up and, um, but, but, but you're a perfect example of that. You know, people are
like, oh, you guys don't always fuck it. Well, no, they're not. No, unfortunately, they're not always.
No, but you have such, you know what, you have, I mean, you have great morals that, you know, you
(34:41):
didn't cheat on your wife. And you, I mean, you, you respected her of that. But yeah, you, you
cheated in your modeling. Yeah, 100%. You know, but that's, that was your truth, that you weren't
out fucking a lot of people and, and doing that. So I think all of our listeners are all on some
(35:04):
different type of level that can identify with Brian and that can identify with me 100%. That,
you know, it's, you know, it's not, it's not just in print and it's not just one way. Yeah.
You know, yeah. So, wow. So, you know, I, you know, I have my hot, hot neighbor. Yes. With his
(35:25):
husband. Yeah. Very hot. He was, he was invited me to go over there multiple times.
The last one was for nude switch video games. And I'm like, no, that's okay. I'm not going to go
over there and play video games naked. When was that? When did they actually? This past weekend.
(35:47):
I could have been there right now, but I'm here. And I said no. So, you know, I need to come,
I need to come. You should. Well, listen, I'm going to give you even more reason to come visit me.
So last month, I live in a townhouse. There's four units per building. This hot couple lives in
(36:07):
the building next to me, but one of the units in my building sold last month. Okay. This gorgeous,
gorgeous thick-headed hair, dark skin, just gorgeous man and his wife move into the unit.
(36:28):
Okay. I meet both of them. I say hi to them and I'm like, wow, he's really good looking.
Right. They have a very small dog. I have a big dog. How old are they?
Uh, well, I know how well. He's so old. It's like, I, how old is he? How old is he? I, so, his wife is
older than him. His wife is at, I would say 10 years older than him to be nice. He's not going
(36:50):
to listen to this podcast. I hope they moved from, uh, Teran, Iran. Is that how you call it? Teran?
Teran? Iran. Six months ago, they were living somewhere. They bought this unit. They moved
into it. He was telling me about his life in Iran and he was telling me about his husband, his husband,
(37:14):
his husband. His husband. Yes. And then he said, oh, I met my wife and I said, oh, okay.
So his English is, his English, his thick accent. Even bad. But he's so hot.
Uh, so I text my hot couple neighbors and I'm like, oh, have you met? It goes by Danny,
(37:36):
but his name is Daniela. Okay. Have you met Danny? Holy smokes or whatever. Right. Last night
at 10 o'clock at night, I'll show you on my phone, my neighbor, my sexy hot couple neighbor, text me
and said, I think I just found Danny on Grindr. No. No. Really? I, so I deleted the Grindr app
(38:00):
from my phone. So I have to download the app, I log back in and there's fucking Danny. 40 years old,
six foot, 105, this head of hair. He's gay. I, when he talks to me, he's, I listen, he's very good
looking. He's too young for me. He's 40 years old. But he talks very well for me. He talks.
(38:28):
For you and I know, I'm 30s and 40s. But he talks to me very close and, you know, we're both
tall and I was just like, so you think it's an arranged marriage? Yes. Yes. Is she American or
she, you know, from Iran also, but she has lived here, you know, I don't know the whole story,
(38:52):
but story there because he, she could be a citizen and then she married him for, for his
neighbor here to have his citizen. His citizen could be, but oh, when we get done with it, I'm gonna
show you. He has like, well, show me. Did you say, well, the grind spirit? Oh, I didn't
favorite him on grind. Well, yeah, you favorite. Yeah. Yeah. Favorite him then you'll see what's
(39:16):
going on or not. So I live in a desert of a gay community. There's no, there's, it's like, there's
nobody around and now there's four of us. Listen, there's more than that. There's more than
there's closets. There's more. And that's why I think honestly, people, there's been statistics out
there that 10% of the population is gay. Yeah. And another 10% is closeted. That's 20%.
(39:42):
That's 20%. So really, you know, what, what, what is the ratio? What is the ratio? Because I don't
think it's 10%. I think it's more. Well, the last census that they did, I think is 2020. I don't
think there's been anything since 2020 when I researched it. There's some serious fucking going
on. Well, you're right. No, seriously. I wonder if that's gonna be the next one. No, not the next
(40:06):
boomers because of the baby boomers. And then we have the millennials, right? Aren't they the big,
another big surge? I think I don't know. I think I'm gonna look, you know, I'll look that up. I'm
gonna look that up. I'm gonna do some research. All right. You look that up, you're gonna bring it
to our next slide. We'll do for the generation. So, okay. All right. Well, we're at about 40 minutes.
(40:27):
How do you think this is a good time to sign off? I think so. I think we did time and I'm just looking
out the window. Yeah, I know. I know. Well, yeah, I brought my dog with me today and I was worried
he was gonna be part of the people, but I think he's annoyed with me. So he's looking at it.
He's looking at it. He's looking at it. Yeah. Thank you guys. Thanks guys. Take care. Bye. Bye.
Hello gay men and welcome to Coming Inside Out. I am John Duerler. I'm Brian Janes.
(00:08):
Brian, how are you? It's been a while. It has been a while. Happy Thanksgiving buddy.
Happy Thanksgiving to you. Did you have a good one? I did. I thought we would talk about that
because I have some kind of funny stuff about Thanksgiving. Yeah. Family to share with you.
Let's hear it. Well, yeah. So it's interesting because I'm taking perspective on a lot of things
(00:33):
happening with my family, with my children, just life in general. And I was looking back at how
Thanksgiving used to look as I was growing up and in my teens and early 20s and how boys were boys
and girls were girls and you looked how you were supposed to look and that was it. And I'm at
(00:54):
Thanksgiving and I'm looking around and I'm out and gay. My son is dressed very feminine.
My brother's daughter is dressed very masculine. She's a lesbian. Hope I can say that on here.
My sister's husband, my brother-in-law, he's like, I call him a geek but not in a
(01:18):
mean sense because it's an IT. He's like a geeky dude. They have a daughter.
He went with her to get a pedicure. So he has his toenails painted two different colors.
All right. And then my niece's three and a half year old son has his fingernails painted.
(01:40):
Okay. Yeah. Just like when we were growing up, that would have never existed. And so to just be
in a house full of people where everybody is growing up as themselves and totally being
accepted, I thought that was so cool. Okay. I have a perspective here. All right.
(02:02):
How did it go? How was the whole tone of the day? How was it?
It was the best Thanksgiving I've had and probably as long as I could remember.
Because my theory is everyone's free. Everyone is free to be who they are,
(02:23):
what they want to do, and there's no judgment there. And how beautiful is that? That's a great
Thanksgiving. You know, I think that I was just, I wasn't worked up. I wasn't, I didn't know they're
charged because when I see my family, a lot of time charged, but I wasn't charged because I was
missing my younger son because we didn't get to see him. He's at training and Marine Corps.
(02:47):
We didn't get to see him. So I just wanted to love on my older son and just be grateful to be with
those that I was able to be with because I didn't have him with me. That's fantastic.
That's fantastic. What did I do? I'm glad you asked. I'm glad you asked. Thank you. What did I do for Thanksgiving? How was mom?
(03:08):
You know, no, it's interesting. And maybe some, some people can identify to this. I,
I was planning on not having Thanksgiving with my future ex-wife here. Okay. And the boys. I thought,
you know what, we've been doing this for the last eight years. Those of you who are just joining us,
you know, I haven't officially divorced yet, but you know, we're there. We've served each other and
(03:34):
it's happening. And I thought, maybe this time I'll just let them have their Thanksgiving because
we went to, I took the boys before Thanksgiving. I took the boys last week before Thanksgiving,
took them to Vegas. I saw the picture. The football game and everything. We went to the
football, went to the Vegas game and there was an event because, you know, I've got one of my best
(03:57):
friends and he's a business partner of mine. He has a private suite in Allegiant Stany. It looks
sweet. It looked like a good time. It was a great time. So I got to bring the boys and then one
of my good friends, he always gives us tickets to the USC game and then a buddy of mine there.
(04:20):
And I was under the impression that thought this was sweet because the suite holds 22 seats privately
and then you have the bar in the back and then you have, well, anyway, it's just us, no one else
was there. I mean, I could have invited so many more people, you know, because this much, I mean,
not a lot of people get to do this. And it was, it was, it was lovely. The boys, we, we did that and
(04:42):
then we went and played Topgolf. I don't know if anybody's done Topgolf. That's fun. And they just
loved Vegas. We had such a great time. I had a really good time with my boys. So I thought, okay,
we had our one on one time and I would, I would have been okay to let, you know, Jill have the boys,
but then she goes, would you want to come? Yeah, I guess I'll do it. And I did it. And, you know,
(05:05):
we got into argument like, oh, fuck, you know, do it. Was it just the four of you? It's just
the four of us. Okay. And, you know, I went, I went, Jackson and I went and volunteered that
Thursday morning over at the American Legion for the veteran. He and I did that. And then Jill and
Liam were going to go ahead and cook. And that was it. So we get back and, and, and we had already,
(05:27):
she goes, yeah, take him. He's not going to help Jackson. I'm going to help in the kitchen.
Take, I did. We came back and then Jackson and I are just chilling out watching TV. And then she
gets pissed because we're laying around not doing the things. So, and I'm sorry I took a big circle
to get to this point, but I'm like, wow, you know, I don't want to do this. I get that.
(05:51):
And so I'm glad to hear that you had that, the freedom. It's a new one. It's a new beginning.
And I know, and I know, and I'm making there's some of you out there thinking,
you know, when am I going to do this? Or what am I, you know, it's going to happen. But I was
excited because I know probably next year it's not going to be like that. And so, you know,
(06:13):
well, you know, I spent two thanksgivings by myself. One thanksgiving, my family rented a house
and my ex-wife went and I didn't want to go with her. So I'm like, you know what, you go.
I have my dog. So it was going to be hard for me to go anyways. And then I think it was last year.
(06:34):
I just was not feeling it. And I took my dog and I went to the beach.
For thanksgiving. And my ex is, I've shared this before, is very close to my family. She's known
my family since junior high school. So she is as much a part of them as I am. So I was like,
you know what, I'm just going to let her go and spend time with the family.
(06:55):
With your family?
Yeah. I mean, because she's known them since junior high school.
No, I mean, look.
So she went and I took my dog and I just went to the beach.
You did your thing.
And I did my thing. But we were all there together this year.
Well, that's, I mean, seriously, I think that was, I'm glad you shared that because
your brother-in-law had the pages painted. I mean, I've always just, you know, traditionally,
(07:17):
you just don't do you, do you, do you have, oh, I'm asking you, do you have of the biggest,
because this is what I deal with my family since we're not all together.
Very attached to that.
And we group text you and I go, what's, what's one of your most favorite memories of
Thanksgiving growing up? What was good? What was your memory?
(07:40):
Well, you know, I, my father's Armenian, so I grew up in a big Armenian family in Glendale.
Oh, well, oh yeah. A lot of grandparents, my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, all kinds of,
so I just remember going to my grandparents' house, so thanks, give me time. You know,
you're like 10 years old and you've got a new shirt that you got to wear or whatever, you got
(08:02):
new pants or shoes or whatever it was, and you would go there and all the cousins would be there
and we'd just be running around, stealing candy out of the candy dishes that my grandmother had
laying around or whatever like that. I mean, it was fun as a kid. Those were my best memories.
It is because you're not, there's no, you know, there's no hangups. You're just a kid and you
(08:24):
should enjoy yourself, which maybe you were a kid again this last Thanksgiving. Well, you enjoyed,
you know, you enjoyed yourself. It was interesting because, you know, since we've put this on my
personal Facebook page and we've been promoting this podcast, my niece came up to me. She's like,
oh, I'm really enjoying your podcast. My niece said that to me and I said, what? You're listening
(08:46):
to my podcast. She's like, oh yeah, listen to your podcast. And so like a wave of anxiety came over
me and I thought, oh, what have I been saying on that podcast? And then my mom told me that she's
listening to your mom's listening. My older sister comes walking and I was like, oh, where is it on
YouTube? I want to listen to it too. And I was like, oh my God, my family's listening to this.
(09:10):
You know, Cass, that's, that's, but that's, you know what? It's, it's funny. It's so funny. There's
needs my nephew texted me. Oh my God, Uncle John, I've been listening to your podcast. Me and
I think my name's Diane. Sorry. Well, yeah, you're listening. Is it Diane? And like, correct me if
(09:30):
I'm wrong. Sorry. But they're, you know, in Tyler, they have a horse farm and they're just like,
listen to my podcast. You know, Uncle John, I love it. It's great. Isn't it crazy? I never thought
that we would have people that this didn't relate to directly. Right. Listen to it. But yeah, I think
it does. I think it, I think it does. And you know what? I kind of prejudge the younger generation
(09:56):
of that. This is cool. And I'm like, and I just like you. I'm like, oh my God, what, what have I
said? What, you know, I think we've said it all. We've slashed episode was the most recent. Was it?
I don't remember. I was asking for a friend. Remember, I do remember. I do remember. That was
(10:17):
for a friend. So, yeah, so, well, I'm going to bring something up. Yeah, this I, I've had two
friends that I've known since one of them since preschool, the other one since first grade.
Everybody else that's in my life has kind of come into my life as I've had kids or through work. But
(10:40):
these are two people that I've known my entire life. One of them has been reaching out to me
since COVID. And I have been blowing him off. I've like, no, he lives in another state, but
he was texting me and I'm like, I'm so busy. I'm sorry. And then he's calling me and I, hey,
(11:01):
listen, I'm over here. And I can't tell you this is again, this is the guy that I've gone to school
with since kindergarten. Okay. Um, he found out through Facebook that I came out as gay. I'd
never told him and I have had avoidance with him. And what I wrote down here is being abandoned by
(11:22):
others versus being the person that abandons relationships. A lot of men get abandoned by
people when they come out as gay, but I'm realizing that I've abandoned people since I came out as
gay and I'm like, holy shit. That's very, very good. So this guy starts texting me like a couple
weeks ago, he was like, Hey, I really want to talk to you. Hey, come on, come on, you know, what's
(11:45):
going on? And whatever. And he's like, Oh, you know, I thought you met somebody and they would be
jealous if you had a, if you had another male friend and that's why you weren't getting back to me.
I said, no, you know, I just really didn't want to explain myself kind of. Yeah. And so for four
years, he texts me, I text him back, he calls me up like, Hey, I'm not available. I got on the phone
(12:08):
with him two weeks ago. Had like an hour and change conversation with him. He was so kind and loving to
me. No one made my entire life. He said the most loving things to me. He also has listened to the
podcast because he saw it posted on Facebook and just had the kindest response to me. And I thought,
(12:34):
Oh my God, because I didn't want to explain myself to this friend, I abandoned the friendship. And I
did that for the last four years. And, you know, I guess some people are worried they're going to come
up to their family and the reaction. I was worried that there was going to be a reaction from him.
(12:55):
And I didn't want to explain myself. So
I do. Yes, I do. Yes, I have that habit. I'm like, I'm tired. There's part of me that's
fucking tired of coming out. Yeah. And I've talked to gay people all the time. We're lucky it never
ends. It never ends. And it just is just part of life. And so I, I gosh, yeah, there's a few of
(13:22):
my friends on Facebook. I'm sure there's stuff that has, you know, people have seen me or listened
to this, but they haven't come back to approach me. Okay, so, you know, maybe they don't, maybe
they don't know. And maybe they're on my family, my friends. And look, I don't have a book here
(13:43):
that I write and tell everyone. I'm like, did I come out to that person? I don't remember.
And so if it comes up organically, at least that's where I'm kind of my head right now. If it comes
up organically, then it comes up. And, but you know, there's a really good friend of mine from
sixth grade that, you know, I haven't come out to and, you know, I talked to him. I am coming in
(14:04):
to that. But just haven't, you know, all right. So you still talk to him, but you haven't come out.
Right. Right. All right. This guy knew that I had come out, but I've been avoiding you. Okay.
But so that's interesting. So you're still hiding part of your stuff because you're not
sharing with him. Why is that? Is it embarrassment? Is it shame? Is it you were not truthful with him?
(14:32):
I'll tell you what, there's part of it. I'm just tired of coming out. Okay. Fuck. I'm just, I mean,
look, you know, I come out every Tuesday. I mean, you know, I mean, it's like, okay, you know, I don't
have a quota. I don't have a quota, but I just, I love the guy. He's been one of my best friends
growing up. But, you know, we've lost touch. And, you know, there's, I don't know, I see all these
(14:55):
saints on Tik Tok or whatever a friendship, you know, can, you can have a friendship, you know,
that you don't speak to for years, but yeah, you still are the best friends.
That's got it. I will pick up the phone after not talking to him for a year and we pick up,
like we had just talked on the phone three days before. Yeah. Give a bond. And there's another
(15:16):
thing I don't know, because it's like, I don't want it to be all about me. I don't want it to be
all about me. I don't want to see how he's doing, how his family's doing. And, and there's times that
I would just come out, but there just really wasn't a time to do it. Do you think that there would be
a negative reaction or there's something preventing you? Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's why, yeah,
(15:37):
I think it's why who I've known forever too. They grew up. I think they, you know, yeah,
and I'm prejudging them. Okay. I'm totally prejudging them, but you know, they're not in
my life every day. So it's not like, you know, it's not like I have to or I live in the same town as
they do. So, you know, there's part of that. Yeah. Right. Well, that kind of bleeds into what I wrote
(16:00):
here, the next with your friend, all the number five, like, you know, I just jotted down some
notes for this episode. I have so much love for my children that I could never turn my back on my
kids. I love them so much. And that, you know, if there's somebody that turns their back on us,
(16:23):
it's not about us. It's about them. Sure. You're right. And we personalize and internalize this.
And it's, oh, it's, they've abandoned us. They've left us. They hate us. They, whatever. We prejudge
them. Well, just like my friend and his wife. Yeah. That they're going to turn their back on
you. No. Or that your relationship is somehow going to shift from that. Yeah. But in reality,
(16:48):
it's not about us. It is about them. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, I look at my Facebook messenger all
the time. Of course you do. You don't look at your Facebook messenger. And there are so many.
I'm like, I every day I'm chatting with like two, three, four people that are listening to the podcast.
(17:09):
I'm developing friendships with these people. They don't have mine. Do they have mine? Well,
all they have to do is go John Derriller and send you a private instant message. And you would,
well, a lot of them go into spam. You have to go into your spam folder to look for them. And I
discovered this months ago, but where's my Spanish? Yeah. Oh boy. You have to go up here. So you have
(17:34):
the red dot. You do have spam. Go red dot and then, um, I'll try to request. I don't know. Your phone
is so, John's print on his phone is so big. It's, you're getting letters per page, not
paragraphs for big. That's right. So I'm gonna see it. Very different. So here's the deal with this
(17:58):
spam folder is like, oh, 95% of it is going to be all sex related and whatever. But there's people
that reach out to me. Oh, spam. Oh, that's spam. That's going to go for a long time.
I don't know. It's going to take a while to load up on yours. But so, um, this is kind of what I
(18:25):
wanted to talk about with these people are sharing with me, you know, their families are not accepting
of them. They're in really bad places right now. It's the holiday time. They're feeling alone.
And I thought, you know, as gay men, I came out at 50. You came out at however, whatever age you
(18:46):
came out at. Not intentionally, but we have been deceiving people of who we were. Loved ones,
our wives, our ex-wives, we were deceiving them for years and years and years. We need to allow
them time and space to heal from our deception. And there's a lot of men that come out as gay.
(19:12):
And they, well, I don't want to say a lot of men, some of the people, and you know, I'll include
myself in that, you've come out as gay and we want immediate approval and acceptance of being gay.
Well, when you've been deceptive with somebody for 30 years, they're not going to turn a corner
in a day, a week, a month, maybe even a year. You know, and some people, their kids, maybe they
(19:37):
raised their kids in a way that was not accepting of being gay. And then you come out as gay.
Those people need time. You know, and we don't get to put the timestamp on, you know, how long
they're going to be able to heal. But I just thought it was important. It's interesting you say
(19:57):
that we've we've deceived them. In a sense, I'm like, oh my God, we lived a lie. Yeah, we lived a
lie. I went to a godly this morning. Oh, you did. I did. I went back to this is a church here. Yeah,
it was one and they're online. If you ever want to go online. And you know, he's talked about Dr.
(20:19):
Dr. Reverend Michael Beckwith Beckwith. Yeah, Dr. Beckwith. He talked about,
you're always changing, change. And he's talking about change your DNA, change your DNA, change
who you are every day, you're changing, live it, love it. And it's true. It's really true. Or if
you're aspiring to do something, that's what you change your DNA, change the way you think, change.
(20:42):
And you have that. And he's talking about the history of how we were, or what we were like
when we were kids, we're not like that today. And it was it was really cool service today.
Really cool service. And so I'm digging that. I'm digging that. Sure. Okay. Oh, I love it too.
Yes. And you can they do stream online. I think the only stream one of the services. Yeah, the main
(21:04):
one. I think that's nice. I love it. Yeah. Or love it. Yeah. But I mean, I'm, I'm like, yeah,
I'm really enjoying that. But yeah, you know, take the message. But then, you know, we were
always race, Catholic, what were you raised? I was raised, well, so my grandparents were
Presbyterian, but I did not. That's Catholic. Yeah, I didn't grow up in a religious house.
(21:26):
Well, when you talk about changing, look how much we've the more you allowed yourself to be
your true authentic self. Yeah, I think the more you change, look how much we have changed, look
how much a lot of our listeners have changed. We've fricking come out as gay talk about
changing our DNA. Well, that's why I'm like, wow, I totally changed my yes.
(21:49):
What would by coming out being truthful and, and yeah, it's like, you know, did we just,
you know, we deceive so many people. There's my nephew calling me right now. Oh, well,
this isn't live. So but if it was live, we could have had a caller.
We could have had our first calling. Oh, he's my God child too. Because we, I was raised
Catholic and he's my he's my God. He's a good he's a good young man from Texas. He's from Texas.
(22:14):
He's such and it was so loving. I mean, because he was I mean, I want to cry right now. He's like,
I'm so proud of you, Uncle John. I'm so proud of you. You know, just being who you are,
you know, and I would have projected him of possibly being upset about it. So that's a
perfect example of us prejudging everyone or anyone. And it is what it is, you know.
(22:40):
And, and, you know, if you're going to come out to them, if you're going to show, share your
authenticity with them, keep in mind that they need the time to process just like you're
simple. Yeah, brother, something about. Do you have 30 seconds or one hour, whatever it was?
Yes. But what was great about it? I kept telling them for those who haven't heard.
(23:04):
So I was coming out to my brother's like coming out would be like coming out to your father,
because my older brother was like my father growing up because my dad was gone. And so there's that,
you know, brother relationship. There was also that parent child relationship. And I was like,
Oh my God, you know, he's like one of the last ones that I was going to tell. And I texted him
(23:25):
and I said, Hey, he's back in Texas. I'm here in LA. Hey, brother, do you have 30 seconds or an hour
and or an hour to get on the phone with me? Because this is when I was going up from out to him.
And he texted me back, call me now. I've got time. So I called him and he said, Hey,
yeah, I've got you're okay. I'm seven five. He said, What's up? And I said, Well, and he goes,
(23:47):
Oh, by the way, he goes, I'm going through a dead zone here in about 10 minutes. So I'll lose you,
but I'll call you back probably 15 minutes after that. And so then I came out to him and I said,
Hey, brother, I'm gay. Oh, fuck you. No, you're not. Yes, wait, I'm gay. Fuck you. No, yeah,
I'm too. You know, so that went on. The answer went on. Because he, you know, he couldn't,
(24:09):
he couldn't believe it. You know, and, and so I go, wait, I'm being, we were disconnected.
And so you're talking about having time to think about my brother had 15 minutes to say,
wait a minute, this is a little motherfucker. True. Is he, is he bullshitting me or because we always
(24:30):
joke. He goes, wait, this could, you know, and then after 15 minutes, the phone call came in. Hey,
are you serious? And I'm like, yeah, brother, I am. He goes, it was fine. It was all good. It was
just, you know, it was great. You know, but, but you're right. They need time to process it as well.
And the, you know, how close they were, how much, none of us deceived intentionally. I'm, I don't
(24:57):
believe I did not deceive with intention. I deceived because I didn't know who the fuck I was.
I really, God, I thought I was going to grow out of this over and over and over. It took me until
I was 47 years old to like be like, damn it, Brian, this is not going away. You're fucking gay.
(25:18):
But, but I think, you know, you're right. And, but I think we can compartmentalize. And that's
what I did. I compartmentalized where, where I stuck it in a box and I pushed it out all the way
down and in the back and around the corner. And then it snuck up on you. And I think you, you know,
(25:38):
you, you listen to this manifestation and I'm straight. I'm straight. I'm not gay. I'm not
gay. Then you manifest that you live that until it just starts to boil up. Yes. You know, the
all you see Patrick Duffy on that is my speedo and then it all bets are off.
Did you get that? Yes. Yes. Dancing. Yes. And then the bar fight. Yes. Okay. Listener. So, so we all know
(26:11):
Brian loves Patrick. He just, when he first saw Patrick Duffy in his speedo, and he came on
live. He came on live. Like, wait a minute. And so I'm like going through TikTok and there was
just something from Dallas with principle, Victorian principle. Yes. And you know, she's
beautiful. I wouldn't know. No, she was beautiful. She was beautiful. But we weren't watching her.
(26:38):
She was. And her ass. We were watching Patrick Duffy. And so I had to follow her. Yeah. I appreciate
that. Yeah. That is so funny. I actually looked up Dallas because you can stream it and I started
streaming the first season again. And I was like, did you know that it's hard? You know, the very,
well, this is very off topic. The very first house that we're using is different than the house that
(27:01):
they use. Exactly. Yes. That was that was not their house that the original house that was some
other house. Yeah. Yeah. No, I was probably like five or six of the episodes. Yeah. Oh my god. I do.
Yeah. I did love me some Patrick Duffy and his speed and his speed. Yeah. Taking his little son to
(27:22):
the swimming pool. God damn it. That's when I know that's when I know. Yeah. But well, you know,
I knew that I was attracted to him, but I had no idea what that meant. But see, that's the other
thing too. You know, we all see beauty. We all live in a certain way and and we can appreciate. I mean,
(27:44):
that doesn't mean you have to go fuck them, you know, but you see like, look, man, a lot of straight
men, a lot of straight men check other men out more on a competitive. I think this is my theory.
Yeah. I'd be wrong. But I, I, because I, when I was straight, you know, working out with straight
men, you know, they're like, oh, look at that fucking dude. Oh, he's got the he's, it's more of an
(28:08):
admiration or jealousy of it. And, you know, and I'm like, just a competitive macho. Well, I think
it is a competitive macho thing. I think women look at other women. Oh, and it's nothing sexually.
It's like, you know, they're admiring, you know, or judging. They are there like fucking judging.
(28:29):
Cat nails. I think it's across the board, but I think it's across the board with men and with them
and they, you know, the them and they are doing it now. Right. We, I think we all do it. We all do
it just to a certain, you know, I agree. I agree with that. Yeah. Yeah. Although, you know, if you
talk about the gym, I keep saying this because it's, it's true. The gym is a gay man's church. Oh,
(28:54):
yeah. So you get all these hunky, good looking men in there and they're there and they're tight
shorts and they're little tank toppy shirts or they're, are you in the steers, the steam rooms,
you know, I haven't had, I haven't had an experience in the steam room. Well, when I was in the sex
addicts group, you know, I would visit it. I was part of, you know, if you were a man or woman,
(29:19):
I mean, it would be, it would be if you're a traffic man, do you not go into the wet spaces?
Don't go to the wet space. A wet space. Wet spaces, the shower, the jacuzzi,
or the steam room or the sauna. Wow. Because that is a definite trigger to act out and to have sex,
(29:40):
because the gyms, like you said, I mean, it's, it's all happening in the shower. Okay. Wow.
It's not happening to me in the shower. Let me ask you a question. I'm going to ask you a question.
You don't have to answer this because not everything that John and I talk about, do we,
you know, I don't know anything about you. You talk about being in a sex addicts group. Yeah.
(30:02):
You joined that to pacify your wife at the time because you were coming out of this gate or
do you, did you feel at the time that you were truly a sex addict? I didn't know what a sex
addict was. And I went, I went to, I didn't do too, would you say pacify? Oh, appease.
Maybe I just word please. Yeah. Appease. Appease. I went there just to get help because, you know,
(30:28):
I wasn't, you know, and I'm embarrassed. You know, I was not faithful. I was not faithful.
But does that make you a sex addict because you weren't faithful? No. No. I mean, my therapist,
who's an amazing therapist, she's going to be on, she was like, John, I don't think that you are a
(30:48):
sex addict. I think you're just exploring sexuality and who you are. And, and so yeah,
no, because I mean, addiction in my book is if it takes over your normal life and takes over your
work, it takes over and you're not showing up. Yeah. That's an addiction. So it's really how
(31:12):
do you manage, you know, whoever's, you know, sex or if you, you know, in the gay community,
a blow job's like shaking somebody's hand as straight. Okay. Wow. We hang out with different
people. I mean, seriously, it's, it's, it's like, you know, the gay, you know, it's like, good,
(31:32):
good, okay, great. Yeah. Oh, what's your name? Yeah. After the fact. You know, so it's all out
there. It's there. I mean, man, come on, man, we, at least I'm not going to speak for all men, but
I mean, think about the heterosexual men that cheat on their life. Yeah. And they're out there just
trying to, you know, I don't know if it's a primal thing of conquering or doing that. You know,
(31:57):
it's, but, but in addiction, I learned a lot and I learned, I mean, I was in it for years. Oh, wow.
I was. And you know, I was probably using it more for therapy as, you know, not to meet guys.
No, no, not to meet. No, I mean, I have met some extraordinary men in there, extraordinary, gay,
(32:17):
bi, straight, you know, it was, it was, it was just, I needed that at the time. At the time of my life,
I needed that community and a connection with sex because it was part of, you know,
because I questioned myself on it. No, okay, am I bi? Am I straight? Am I gay? Well, I know I'm not
(32:39):
straight. And at the time, my wife, at the time, you know, look, I'm not, I'm not approved if you're
bisexual, we can possibly work this out. But she gave it time, we, you know, and, and I'm like,
no, I'm not, I'm not bi. And so that was, you know, the end of us, you know,
(33:01):
your sex addict, when you were going to like sex addicts, anonymous group, you were doing that
after your wife discovered the in-house or before. Yes, after, after. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. After she,
yeah, after that. And because, I mean, I didn't know. Yeah, I didn't know. And so, yeah. All right.
(33:24):
I don't know the definition of an addict, but you're right. A person that enjoys having sex is
different than a person who's destroying their life over a needing to satisfy themselves sexually.
I think so. I mean, look, I'm not the superior being in this, but I just think it's kind of
common sense if it's alcohol, if it's drugs, if it's on your phone, my boy, you're always on your
(33:51):
phone, there's an addiction there. But I mean, it can destroy people, it can destroy a lot of people,
the addiction. And I thought that I was, and then I'm like, and she's like, I don't think you're
an addict. You know, and, you know, and I just was educated a little bit more, that, you know, at
least, and I'm not gonna say every gay man, like, has sex all the time, but you look at me.
(34:17):
I looked at him up and, um, but, but, but you're a perfect example of that. You know, people are
like, oh, you guys don't always fuck it. Well, no, they're not. No, unfortunately, they're not always.
No, but you have such, you know what, you have, I mean, you have great morals that, you know, you
(34:41):
didn't cheat on your wife. And you, I mean, you, you respected her of that. But yeah, you, you
cheated in your modeling. Yeah, 100%. You know, but that's, that was your truth, that you weren't
out fucking a lot of people and, and doing that. So I think all of our listeners are all on some
(35:04):
different type of level that can identify with Brian and that can identify with me 100%. That,
you know, it's, you know, it's not, it's not just in print and it's not just one way. Yeah.
You know, yeah. So, wow. So, you know, I, you know, I have my hot, hot neighbor. Yes. With his
(35:25):
husband. Yeah. Very hot. He was, he was invited me to go over there multiple times.
The last one was for nude switch video games. And I'm like, no, that's okay. I'm not going to go
over there and play video games naked. When was that? When did they actually? This past weekend.
(35:47):
I could have been there right now, but I'm here. And I said no. So, you know, I need to come,
I need to come. You should. Well, listen, I'm going to give you even more reason to come visit me.
So last month, I live in a townhouse. There's four units per building. This hot couple lives in
(36:07):
the building next to me, but one of the units in my building sold last month. Okay. This gorgeous,
gorgeous thick-headed hair, dark skin, just gorgeous man and his wife move into the unit.
(36:28):
Okay. I meet both of them. I say hi to them and I'm like, wow, he's really good looking.
Right. They have a very small dog. I have a big dog. How old are they?
Uh, well, I know how well. He's so old. It's like, I, how old is he? How old is he? I, so, his wife is
older than him. His wife is at, I would say 10 years older than him to be nice. He's not going
(36:50):
to listen to this podcast. I hope they moved from, uh, Teran, Iran. Is that how you call it? Teran?
Teran? Iran. Six months ago, they were living somewhere. They bought this unit. They moved
into it. He was telling me about his life in Iran and he was telling me about his husband, his husband,
(37:14):
his husband. His husband. Yes. And then he said, oh, I met my wife and I said, oh, okay.
So his English is, his English, his thick accent. Even bad. But he's so hot.
Uh, so I text my hot couple neighbors and I'm like, oh, have you met? It goes by Danny,
(37:36):
but his name is Daniela. Okay. Have you met Danny? Holy smokes or whatever. Right. Last night
at 10 o'clock at night, I'll show you on my phone, my neighbor, my sexy hot couple neighbor, text me
and said, I think I just found Danny on Grindr. No. No. Really? I, so I deleted the Grindr app
(38:00):
from my phone. So I have to download the app, I log back in and there's fucking Danny. 40 years old,
six foot, 105, this head of hair. He's gay. I, when he talks to me, he's, I listen, he's very good
looking. He's too young for me. He's 40 years old. But he talks very well for me. He talks.
(38:28):
For you and I know, I'm 30s and 40s. But he talks to me very close and, you know, we're both
tall and I was just like, so you think it's an arranged marriage? Yes. Yes. Is she American or
she, you know, from Iran also, but she has lived here, you know, I don't know the whole story,
(38:52):
but story there because he, she could be a citizen and then she married him for, for his
neighbor here to have his citizen. His citizen could be, but oh, when we get done with it, I'm gonna
show you. He has like, well, show me. Did you say, well, the grind spirit? Oh, I didn't
favorite him on grind. Well, yeah, you favorite. Yeah. Yeah. Favorite him then you'll see what's
(39:16):
going on or not. So I live in a desert of a gay community. There's no, there's, it's like, there's
nobody around and now there's four of us. Listen, there's more than that. There's more than
there's closets. There's more. And that's why I think honestly, people, there's been statistics out
there that 10% of the population is gay. Yeah. And another 10% is closeted. That's 20%.
(39:42):
That's 20%. So really, you know, what, what, what is the ratio? What is the ratio? Because I don't
think it's 10%. I think it's more. Well, the last census that they did, I think is 2020. I don't
think there's been anything since 2020 when I researched it. There's some serious fucking going
on. Well, you're right. No, seriously. I wonder if that's gonna be the next one. No, not the next
(40:06):
boomers because of the baby boomers. And then we have the millennials, right? Aren't they the big,
another big surge? I think I don't know. I think I'm gonna look, you know, I'll look that up. I'm
gonna look that up. I'm gonna do some research. All right. You look that up, you're gonna bring it
to our next slide. We'll do for the generation. So, okay. All right. Well, we're at about 40 minutes.
(40:27):
How do you think this is a good time to sign off? I think so. I think we did time and I'm just looking
out the window. Yeah, I know. I know. Well, yeah, I brought my dog with me today and I was worried
he was gonna be part of the people, but I think he's annoyed with me. So he's looking at it.
He's looking at it. He's looking at it. Yeah. Thank you guys. Thanks guys. Take care. Bye. Bye.
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