Nobody knows I do this. Nobody knows.
It can be both thrilling and exhausting living a double life.
There is an incredible sense of freedom. One decides that the rules and strictures that others have to abide by don’t apply to oneself, liberating oneself from social conventions. There’s a certain feeling of power in keeping secrets. The need to keep my transgressions hidden forces me to control other people’s perceptions of me. I have a secret life they’re completely unaware of. As one escort put it, “I get off on being in public an hour after an appointment and nobody having a clue about what I was just doing.” The excitement derived from the risks I take (especially considering I’m remarkably risk-averse elsewhere in my life) can’t be discounted. To do something dangerous and get away with it, to transgress and then return to “normal” life unscathed, with no one any the wiser, can be exhilarating.
But there’s a cost. I’ve developed a split personality, the formation of an alternate self and the inner conflict attendant with that. Tammy’s invocation of Jekyll and Hyde was apt. I lead the ultimate Jekyll and Hyde existence: the good Christian on the one hand, the sexual adventurer on the other. There’s the pubic persona and the private behavior. There’s the one who is morally upstanding in front of family, friends, parishioners, associates; then there’s the one consumed by lust. No one really knows me. I have been keeping up the façade for so long that I’ve been able to compartmentalize my sin. I inhabit a contradiction. It’s impossible to lead a life of integrity; my character is opaque. Even my double life has a double life. When I was cavorting with Rhonda, she was unaware that I was also visiting call girls. Secrecy and duplicity are inescapable. I’ve had to develop increasingly labyrinthine lies to obscure my behavior. The pressure to keep up pretenses and appearances is exhausting. My behavior induces shame. I’ve been living dual lives.
Dr. Beth Wish describes the mindset of one living a double life: “‘Oh my god, I’m doing this in the dark furtively. I have a part of my behavior that is closed. The black curtain has been drawn on how other people see me and how I present myself to others.’”
“When you’re an escort, you constantly have to lie,” Stephanie once complained to me. Yet I suspect that’s exactly what she finds so exciting about her lifestyle. Leading a double life, with all its stresses and contradictions, can be an adrenaline rush. (Or as she once said, “It’s walking a tightrope, but it’s a blast!”) Stephanie told me that when she was younger she seriously thought about working for the CIA, so something about leading a double life obviously entices her. I imagine her clients at her “straight job” in real estate would be shocked if they discovered that this sweet young lady worked as an escort.
The stakes are high for me. If my other self were discovered, I would most likely lose my position at my church and any future in ministry would be foreclosed to me. Having to face family and friends in light of any personal revelations would be humiliating. In short, my entire world would be upended. Yet I can’t surrender these parallel lives.
Lutheran Guilt 