Outted myself in a most horrifying way...read on

[MtnSwing]

Wow. What a situation. If it was me, with my luck she wouldn't have answered. Thank GOD it wasn't on voicemail. Hey Honey, come listen to this voicemail that Jenny left me. Is that wierd or what? What do you think we should do? Do you think we should call Father Smith?

At least it's still your word vs hers. There's no permanent record of the conversation.

[interested-05]

its a tough spot you find yourself in. I too was raised in a church that this lifestyle would be tough to swallow, and it could be very tough to deal with.
which is why i no longer go to church.
On the one hand Intuition, this could be a good thing, just a bit hard to face, until you get through the repercussions. The preferance would be for your friend, to accept that you have thoughts and fantasies, that you try to keep to yourself. This time you believed you were simply verbalizing to yourself, a personal issue you were trying to work through. A suggestion you might consider, As I am fairly sure your friend understands we all have thoughts we arent supposed to have. And one way of dealing with them is to talk about those feelings, you were simply struggling with feelings and desires and working your way through them.
If I remember correctly, over the past year or two, you have mentioned something along the lines that you wish it were out in the open, no longer a secret. It is tough to hide something you secretly love doing, And wish your friends could share it with you. Maybe this will get you past the secrecy and allow you to feel freer.
This next part is not intended to start a fight, i certainly hope not, especially with you , because you have had so much valuable insight here, tht i would like to continue listening to what you have had to say.
As far as the church goes, they are good people who really mean to help, and care about you, but sometimes that caring "hurts" more than it helps. Some call it hypocricy to feel the same desires and fantasies, but my understanding is that unless they are saying don't swing or play outside of marriage, and then they do play or swing, that is hypocricy. What one feels is neither right or wrong it simply is what they feel. What they "do" may be right or wrong, not what they feel.
for example, we all feel angry from time to time and say things we feel like doing, but we do not act on those feelings and bring them under control. The feeling may have been strong, but our discipline kept us from causing harm. Is it wrong to feel angry? No. Is it wrong to injure someone because we are angry? Yes
Is it hypocricy to feel angry, but not injure them? No
Nor is it hypocrytical to have fantasies we never act upon. Acting out a fantasy is not hypocritcal. Sometimes it takes a lot of courage to act upon a fantasy, that seeks no harm, encourages honest conversation with a loved one.
Say to a playmate, "I LOVE you", with all the depth of meaning these words carry, when we are simply lying and really dont mean it, solely to fuck them, that is hypocritical.
You have had a lifetime friend, It may go through some rough times but in the end they will still care about you and hopefully you can work out something, where you still understand each other and retain that friendship, even if it does change a bit.

[JustAskJulie]

Have you talked to her again since this happened?

I outted myself in similar fashion to my mom a few years back. I emailed her and accidently hit the "hot key" to include my signature for a website I had at the time. It wasn't this website, it was a website that featured me doing very naughty things. the only saving grace I had was that at that particular time the front page of the site had a picture that was PG, if not G but the text was definately X-rated. She read the text of course and wanted to know if it was true. I ended up passing it off that it (the text about swinging) was just an act for the website.... which was more than bad enough in her book.

[DBL D]

I liked what interested-05 had to say.

Intuition, you know we admire your thought processes and hope that nothing said here will change your mind on continuing to share them with us.

We don't know what kind of a friend this lady has been to you. Whether she is someone you shop with or talk about the kids etc. We have the friends we have who resemble this scenario for one reason or another...but usually because it fits at the time. If this lady starts to harp on you about wanting to know the real inner feelings you have or saying things like there must be more to all of this then you'll have to make a decision as to whether you can continue your friendship.

If you have mislead her in thinking that this would be so out of character for you to even think about these things...you know, a really close friendship where she finds that you have been leading a double life, then it may well be over.

Does that mean your life will end? Nah...but I say that from N. California...(kinda detached).

I just hope this gives you the opportunity to now "Practice what you preach". If you are able to enlighten her the way you have with all of us...well, I hope you have found that true friend for life.

M.D.

[intuition897]

MtnSwing: The very same thought ocurred to me, too. It could've been worse. Voicemail. One of the kids. Her DAD, who often babysits...and is a minister.

interested: When I said that I wished we didn't have to hide what we do, I was telling the truth, but it's different than saying "I wish I had the balls to come clean." While I can't and won't apologize for being who we are and doing what we do, I would still feel very awkward because this knowledge would cause many people we love dearly to feel very uncomfortable around us...for no good reason at all.

The hard truth is, wishing is one thing, reality is another.

Julie: Your MOM?!? OMG... Now that is my #1 worst nightmare. No, I haven't spoken with her yet. I might, though. See if I can't get us back to where we can pretend it was a bad dream or something. Cowardly? maybe. I can't say exactly what I'll do when the moment comes, but whatever happens happens. The sun will come up the next day.

M.D.: "I just hope this gives you the opportunity to now "Practice what you preach". If you are able to enlighten her the way you have with all of us...well, I hope you have found that true friend for life."

Smarts when it bites you in the ass, don't it? I doubt I'll be able to reason with or "enlighten" her, unfortunately, but I have found our relationship evolving anyway. I guess it's going through another set of growing pains. This is by far the worst and biggest, though. *sigh* I guess it's a growth experience for all involved. Shit. I just wish it had never happened in the first place.

[DBL D]

Yeah, it does smart a bit. At the risk of sounding trite or simplistic, I would have to say that life is like swinging...you fuck someone or get fucked by someone and move on. Sometimes you hang around a bit.

Every friendship has its moments; This is one of them.

I didn't mean to say by enlightening her that you would convince her to change her ways, but hopefully that rather she would see in you a person full of deep complicated feelings that only you can resolve...with her help?....

Really when I think of it, it's almost like we been listening in on your thoughts all thistime as if you'd been driving along all the time. You reason and argue and rest your point. Be like that with her and hopefully things will be stronger than ever between you.

M.D.

[Vjklander]

I have a sex-positive philosophy and don't try real hard to placate those who don't. If they won't accept me the way I am, that's just too bad. Some day when I have some time I'll have to relate the Concerned Women of America story for y'all.

[interested-05]

So true intuition. thats why most of us choose discretion over," having the balls to come clean".
You are a good person, with a great sense of who you are. Thanks for all of your insight, we all hope and wish you the best.

[gandm]

Originally Posted by JustAskJulie

I outted myself in similar fashion to my mom a few years back.

Julie, I remember when that happened. How has it worked out with your parents since then?

[SW_PA_Couple]

Originally Posted by Vjklander

I have a sex-positive philosophy and don't try real hard to placate those who don't. If they won't accept me the way I am, that's just too bad. Some day when I have some time I'll have to relate the Concerned Women of America story for y'all.

I could not help myself. I just had to look it up (Goggle). Concerned Women for America! It looks pretty scary to me. And I wonder if they really mean "Women Concerned for America". OK, I'm ready for your story. My paternal grandmother, incidentally, was a leading member of the WCTU in her day. Granddad had to become more and more clever with time in how and where he hid his whiskey bottles.

Michael

[Cpl2share]

Don't have time to read through all of the other responses, so here goes:

We are both from very religious families, and are very active in what is considered an extremely, extremely conservative organization. You never know if she may want to explore this lifestyle too. Do not assume someone is too straightlaced. If you two have been so tight since early childhood and she did not know this about you.........She may be a closet "freak" too.

[tjomc]

Intuition; we feel for you this wouold be terrible to have happen, First off she sounds as if she is a true friend and if that is the case life and your friendship will go on however she may pray for you often. I think there have been lots of great ideas as how to handle this situation but i personall don't think trying to cover it up is a good idea, If she feels you are being untruthful that will end your friendship. Personally i would just act normal and if it comes up then sit down and talk it out. My life long best friend came out of the closet to her parents with me sitting there and although it wasn't what they wanted to hear it was the facts, your friend will understand no matter how wrong she may feel you are. "judge not least you be judged" and i feel that she will do you right it may just take some time for her to recover. After all its just talk and nothing more..

[intuition897]

Thanks for all the advice, folks. I'm probably going to try to just pretend like nothing happened. If she wants to confront me about it, she's free to do so, but I'll warn her upfront to not go looking for truths unless she realizes they may not be what she wants to hear. If she persists, saying it WAS me she heard, no doubt about it, I'll probably just say that I'm not going to try to explain it because the truth of it is probably stranger than what she happened to overhear. And it really wasn't meant for her to hear anyway, so I'm sorry for burdening her with the worry of it. Please, can we both just forget the whole thing? It really isn't something she needs to worry about...honest.

She IS a good friend, and it would be her concern for me that would cause her the grief I had hoped to spare her from by being discrete about our activities. If she knew the real deal, she wouldn't be worried, but the trouble is, her upbringing has made it utterly blasphemous to even consider questioning what she's been taught. So...ignorance of the issue at hand reigns supreme, and because of that, fear and superstition cripple any attempts at effective dialogue. You can't convince a mind that doesn't want to be convinced.

I'll update you when I speak with her next.

[JustAskJulie]

Originally Posted by gandm

Julie, I remember when that happened. How has it worked out with your parents since then?

It was a bad situation for a couple of weeks and then it just got dropped and it has NEVER come back up.

With people you love you have to learn that some topics are best left OFF the table.

[intuition897]

Originally Posted by JustAskJulie

It was a bad situation for a couple of weeks and then it just got dropped and it has NEVER come back up.

With people you love you have to learn that some topics are best left OFF the table.

I think that summed it up perfectly. It's precisely what I was thinking. I probably won't even be talking to her until after Christmas anyway, and by then it will likely be a foggy memory. The mind has a way of blurring the details of things we'd rather forget. And I'm hoping she'd realize that if she went digging for truth here, she'd be toying with the loss of our friendship, because it seems to me she wouldn't be able to let it go. There would always be this "thing" between us. I've already lost one friend because she couldn't respect my lifestyle choices...and SHE was the open-minded one! Losing this one, whom I've know much longer, to what amounts to nothing more than ignorance would hurt like hell.