Okay I finally got a decent opportunity to continue this memoir. I have to say I feel relieved to be back active within Icarus. I was here often twice in my life, and both times I dropped off the face of the earth, but I always seem to be drawn here and I can't feel bad about that. This is a wonderful community.

As I think, reflecting and put time into finding my demons and approaching them I often come upon these two huge roadblocks. These two utterly unresolved issues that I just can't seem to escape. I feel like the relationship between the two issues are so interconnected that I have to fight a two front war against them. I can not help but wonder how one goes about starting a two front war which ones have to win?

The stakes of grappling with my past are very high. If I lose I could alienate my family and friends once again, fall out of my faith, even fall back into the darkness that I have been fighting my way out of for years. This begs the question is it all worth it? Is it worth going through your life and picking out the most painful gems and analyzing what they are worth, the impact on your life and getting over them. Honestly, I don't know. All I can operate on right now is faith. Faith that whatever I am doing is the right thing. I have seen the consequences of what happens if I don't actually handle my business. I alienate the women I most want in my life. I tend to smother them with so much energy and love they undoubtedly wilt away. I do not desire that in the least, that is not the life for me. I want a family. I want a successful relationship. I won't go as far as to say the white picket fence, but it does not sound horrible, as long as it isn't in some soulless subdivision that looks like the place yuppies want to go when they die.

My church is hosting one of those 'Porn & Pancakes' breakfast discussions soon. I definitely think I will go to check it out. I used to downplay the destructive influences of pornography, I mean, hell sex is natural isn't it? It is the expression of love, passion or lust isn't it? How is it unnatural? It would be along the lines of me saying boxing or soccer is unnatural. How? The idea is foolish. Yet undoubtedly within something so natural hides something destructive. Is it in the background? Is it something implied? Some sort of idea of dominance that rots the brain? Is it something about conquest and not love? About pleasure and not affection? I wish I could hold the answer. Yet I can not escape the knowledge that within it something dangerous resides. I know at the very least in my life it has been insanely destructive. I do not want to be one of those people who say 'x' is wrong and shakes their finger at you, judging you. Perhaps in moderation it is fine, but in my life? It has been nothing but a cancer, eroding away at my soul, and for that I can not think that it will ever be right for me in moderation. Maybe time will tell and sway my opinion one way or another, but for right now I know I have to grapple with the demon of Pornography and escape the profoundly negative impact it has left on me.

On battling my second Demon, I often wonder where to began. Molestation. That is a huge thing isn't it? It is a word that carries so much gravity. Few words seem as heavy as that. I do not doubt that things can happen in your life that are heavier, but in my life nothing has had a more profound impact. It has affected me on how I view relationships, sex, affection, trust, loyalty and it is all encompassing. It did not just affect these, but it seems as I evaluate and analyze it, it has affected everything. I know it had to been a big part of the reason I wrapped myself around the darkness in my life for so long.

To understand my life, and where I am now (and why I must deal with the past) you must understand what I mean when I say I wrapped myself in darkness. I believe the majority of my problem was self pity. I am not saying ANY other Bipolar person is in my situation. I am not saying depression=self pity or depression=learned helplessness. I do not mean to alienate anyone. I just know in my situation, it was greatly augmented by my self pity. I wallowed and thought ill of myself for so long that I thought I would never escape, I thought the only option and thus the best option was suicide. To me, being where I am and looking back at those wasted years, those withered and failing relationships? I have to understand it if only to ensure that it never, ever, happens again. I can not pass out of that darkness and merely breathe a sigh of relief and say that is that. If I don't fully understand how and why I behaved in that way I will never understand how to prevent it from happening again.

So here I am. Trying to understand. Trying to find a light in the darkness to guide me. Trying to cut through the garbage of the self created mythology around myself. Can I do it? I really don't know. Eventually I will come to peace with my past or fade away, becoming some apathetic father, husband or even just some drunk who lost sight of God.

Did being molested change my view of self, my view of sexuality and thus helped furnish an environment that appreciated pornography and placed it on a pedestal? Did it result in me making excuses for my behavior (the consumption of pornography)? Did the consumption of pornography allow me to create excuses for my antisocial behavior and thus lead to the current environment where I struggle in relationships with women? Am I entirely over-analyzing the entire situation?

Too many questions linger in my head and in truth I struggle with the idea of how to even grapple with the questions. I pray but I can not pray about forgetting my past. I need to forgive my past. These things are way bigger than me and I need to find something to hold onto. I know thankfully my church has several groups dealing with pornography, but unfortunately I can't attend a single one because of my work schedule. I am not entirely sure if I would want to go to such a group. I don't think most people can relate to what I go through, but then who am I to assume such things?

I feel like counseling would be a stupid idea at this point. I feel like it pussyfoots around the truth too much, the cold, hard, brutal honesty of it all. I think I am good enough at asking myself questions anyways.

Do you ever wonder if in all truth, the knowledge a person might want most desperately in their life is not concrete but utterly fluid? I am approaching this like I want an answer. Like it was some sort of equation that will just take months or years to figure out. What if what I should be looking for is something more fluid than that. I admit I am primarily looking for self forgiveness (I think), but what if that isn't a solid idea? What if I can only forgive myself on good days, and the rest of the time I am at best, okay with it? Can I accept that? What if I am really okay with it now and I should not try to strive for more?

So I really think I am going to cut this short again. I apologize but right now I am sitting in the commons at my school and somethings are best torn to shreds in private. Mainly my dignity.