It wasn’t so very long ago that I said would never add anything new to this website, I guess I was wrong. This blog, however, will be a little different (and longer) from the rest. Yes, I’ll be talking about image abuse, but specifically it will be orientated around #digitaltechabuse, which I think is probably a better term (and descriptor) for #onlineabuse. It’s a change from the norm, because it’s become fairly standard for me to discuss and advocate for non-consensual image taking and distribution. Whilst my public advocacy days are over, it’s obviously a subject that ignites a spark and I suppose a significant amount of passion. This blog piece is providing me with an opportunity to 'write out' some of my emotions, some of which are quite complex, so you should expect it to be self indulgent. But this is my website with some of my content, and writing about how I feel enables me to deal with the past more effectively. As ever, it may also help someone who has experienced something similar or might be feeling the same way.
But before we arrive at that point, I wanted to write about the last year (2021) and specifically how it affected me personally. You can, of course, gloss over this bit because in many ways it’s purely a cathartic exercise for me. A chance to reposition, within my own mind, some of the worst parts of the last year, so that I can simply deal with them and move on. I’ll be talking about my ex-love, falling off my drug sobriety waggon and where I want to head next. There may be sections of my writing that may be triggering, or the discussion might be too close for comfort. In which case consider this is a warning that you may not want to continue to read ahead. In terms of my relationship, I write from my perspective and about my feelings. My ex partners take on certain happenings might be different and these are views that he is allowed to have, and the same applies to me also.
2021 was a bit of a double-edged sword for me. In February my relationship, with my most recent ex-partner, came to an end. At the same time, I threw away 2 years of sobriety from recreational drug usage. At the time I wasn’t sure why I did this, but with time and retrospect, it was because the ‘glue’ that held my sobriety together (my ex-partner) was no longer there. He will no doubt feel that I am blaming him for the loss of my sobriety, which is not the case. At the time I thought that I was doing it for myself, and whilst that might have been true for the first 6 months, it was my ex-partner that gave me a reason to continue. I should have thought enough about my own life, and the effects of associated drug usage, to provide more than enough glue to hold it all together. I obviously didn’t have the self-respect that I thought I had. As I write this, I've now noticed up a month and a half on a new sobriety journey, and one where (this time around) I’m doing it for myself, and myself alone.
After a few months of separation, we began communicating with each other once again, and eventually (very abridged story!) we decided to give the relationship another chance. All was going well until Christmas arrived, one where I was spending it alone and without family, he hadn’t been communicating with me very much and I sent a text message purely to say that it would have been nice to have heard from him a little more. Before I knew it that simple message had turned into a torrid argument of words, where (as was par for the course) I used some words that I knew that I would later regret.
After 3 days of what amounted to a communication blackout and mind games (on his part) coupled with a flip/flop attitude toward whether he loved me or not. I found that I had little choice but to do something that I really very much did not want to do. To bring our time together to a proper close, and step back to make way for someone else in his life. I didn’t know it (but suspected as much), that the ‘someone else’ was already waiting in the wings, ready to step into my still warm shoes, and no doubt had been waiting to do so for longer than I was fully aware (or care to know or imagine). When someone commits to rebuilding a relationship, the expectation is that there won’t be another person being dated at the same time, and then hooked up with on Christmas Day. It's a horribly self centred thing to do, and it's a narcissistic thing to do to another person.
Walking away from someone that, I had considered to be, the love of my life, was/is the most painful thing I have ever had to do. But I felt that he had backed me into a corner, one where he intentionally wanted me to bring things to a close. A chance for him to be with someone he had met earlier in the year, who I doubt knew anything about my existence either then or now. My ex stepped into the possibility of a new relationship, whereas I had to deal with the emotional fallout and loss. A broken heart, and the pain and anger that comes with it, is difficult to reconcile and makes us act and behave in unexpected ways. I did both.
Was my last relationship a healthy one? No, it wasn’t, and I feel sure that I’m better off not knowing how my ex-partner really thought of me (especially toward the end), as opposed to how he claimed to feel. But it is what it is, and my meddling with the universes decision making processes wasn’t the wisest of moves.
So, 2022 will be about doing what I should have done in 2021, and that’s to close the door on what was and focus on what is. It’s also about getting my drug sobriety back on track, and as I’ve already stated, this time around, I’m most definitely doing it for me. One step, and one day, at a time. Failure is not an option, because as my years progress, I have a decreasing number of them in which I can correct my fuck ups, and quite frankly I feel that I’m already pushing my luck.
It’s also about repairing a rift that has made me somewhat estranged from my family for over a year, and finding my ‘happy place’ both mentally and physically. Part of that process will take me away from where I’m currently living and I couldn’t be more excited at the thought of leaving it behind. There are too many memories within that space for me to adequately cope with, and I would like to advance into my future years without having to look back, or ponder upon, my notions of ‘what if’s’ and ‘if only's’. You can’t change the laws of physics, you cannot turn back time, therefore you can only move forward.
The reason why I moved back home, no longer exists. Yes, it’s been a painful process for my family, notably my sisters and myself, but long term the solution will provide my mother with the proper, and ongoing care that she will need as she battles with Alzheimer’s. I hope that rift can be fixed, I need my family, I have an incompleteness without them. But a lot of angry words were said and emotions flared. So, time will tell, but a person has an obligation to at least try.
So, what happened to David between 25th December and 3rd January? I’ll tell you what happened, my life nuclear imploded. The drug usage came back, in a self-destructive attempt to blur what had happened with my ex. Did it help? Of course not, my messy mind just became messier and for a number of days I couldn’t climb back out of the hole that I had created for myself.
And this is where I fall victim to my own past, after all what do people find more amusing to gawp at than someone who was an advocate for Image Abuse/Revenge Porn (call it what you will) fall off his sobriety waggon and return (albeit briefly) to the lifestyle that fucked him over in the first place. And as every gay man knows, some aspects of the gay ‘community’ (and I use that term in the VERY loosest possible sense) love to expose, and play with, another gay man’s emotions. Some of ‘us’ get a never-ending pleasure out of destroying others. Don’t ask me to explain why, because it’s not a part of my own psychology…so therefore it’s quite literally something that I will never understand. It's totally alien.
And this is how I came to discover new levels of #digitaltechabuse that I had naively overlooked. If you can’t record an image, then why not record the dialogue of a hook up instead? But your perpetrator doesn't stop there, he records the moans and groans of sexual ecstasy into the mix as well, and despite being told numerous times over and over again to “put the fucking phone down” he keeps waving it around in a threatening manner. Then he plays it all back for all of his mates to hear. It’s great, isn’t it? Very soon we will all be in a place where we fear dating, and all because of incidents like this.
It’s because of ‘people’ (again used in the VERY loosest possible sense) similar to the person I hooked up with, that the one thing that gay men fear the most (fact by the way), is having their ‘meet’ surreptitiously recorded, visually or otherwise. And yet why is it that whilst we fear it, we can’t fucking talk about it or expose it?
So, David, did you report this to the Police. Yes, David did. Was my experience any better than when I eventually found the courage to report my image abuse experience in 2016? No, it wasn’t. I was greeted with the same arrogance by Hampshire Constabulary, as I was with the Metropolitan Police in 2018. I can’t help but wonder whether my report would have been dealt with differently if I had been a female. In all honesty, there’s a better than 50% chance that my worst fears might be correct.
I have little respect for Police Authorities when it comes to the way they handle reports of technology abuse, their methods and approach are as outdated as their understanding of what it means…. despite the fact that it’s extremely prevalent in the modern world and particularly in the 'gay modern world'.
It’s been a very triggering event for me, in many respects. Not least of all it’s absolutely proven that whatever I said, during my days of advocacy on the subject of image/technology abuse, were absolutely on point (no pun intended). But how sad it is to realise that they still apply, and that nothing, absolutely nothing has changed!
For all of the many differences that exist between myself and my ex-partner, he was right to try to get me back into the world of IBSA (Image Based Sexual Abuse) advocacy. He told me that it was “hugely important, there still isn’t anyone else doing it David”. Of course, now I have some new enlightenment on the new lows that (some) gay men will stoop too, just to get a rise out of someone else’s misfortunes.
Every gay guy knows that it goes on, do we say anything or give an actual shit? Apparently not. Consequently, it’s allowed to go on, and on, and on and remain unchecked. Do our Police forces care? No, not in my experience, although please if you work for one of them prove me wrong…. providing that you have supportive evidence on the subject….which you won’t have because no one holds any of these authorities to account on their poor performance in bringing such cases to prosecution.
So, the fight continues, just not in the format that I would have done so in the past. Also, I have some self-healing to do and that must come first.
I have always credited my ex-partner for his unswerving and steadfast support in the early days of my advocacy, and despite my current negative feelings toward him, I will always recognise and be grateful for that support. We got back together, and split up, more times than Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor and no doubt with the same amount of dramatic flair. But when the mutual respect for each other has dissolved and it’s become toxic and argumentative, and when that little internal voice tells you that it’s time to walk away (no matter how painful that action may be) then it’s time to act and preserve your rapidly depleting sanity and protect yourself from any further damage.
I started this blog by stating that it would be in a ‘different format’, than those of the past. Perhaps the tone has been one of anger, for which I make no apologies. Perhaps the tone has been harsh, and the words stronger than those used in the past. But the subject matter warrants them. It NEEDS them. If you don’t like them, or what I’ve written, then you can always shuffle off and read somebody else’s wordy trash instead. The internet and social media is generally quite ripe with ‘em!
That’s your lot for now, as I ride off on an Avanti West Coast Train to Manchester, dropping bits of my vegan sausage baguette all over the show and admiring the unknown handsome (and somewhat sexy) mister, sitting in front of me (Coach B, Window Seat B37). If you have a love in your life, nurture and take care of it….it could all be over in the blink of eye.
Love & Respect
David ❤️
PS The ‘sexy mister’ got off at Wilmslow. It’s also raining, well it is the North after all 😁
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