In the Shadow of Sin: the Confessions of a Sex Addict

Prologue
My name is Lee Thames. I'm Joe's ex-wife. I couldn't believe what I'd almost accomplished: killing my ex-husband. After nearly twenty years of marriage, he walked out on me. In my madness, I'd decided if I couldn't have him, then no one else could. I wanted him as dead as the slimy bloody spot on a highway. After what he'd done to me our entire marriage, I had no qualms about killing him. Part of this was due to my bi-polar illness, my disassociative disorder and my intense anger that he was an incorrigible sex addict.
He'd cheated on me our entire marriage while honey coating his undying love for me. He never loved me. I hurt so deeply that at times my breath seemed to catch in my throat with a pain in my heart that made breathing something I wished would end. All this was due to my thinking he had loved so many other women. But in time, I learned about sexual addiction and realized that he was incapable of love. He was only capable of conditional love or infatuation.
Although I didn't kill him, I did self-actualize enough to live my life without him, I knew I needed to make sense of the senseless. I knew I had to climb inside Joe's head and see things through his eyes. Maybe when I understood his illness, his life, the interplay of the two, I'd be able to find peace. Throw in my own illnesses fanning the fires of dislike that gradually turned into hatred and I'd finally see that I was not a victim but an active player in my marriage's demise. This is Joe's story, put together by what he'd told me.

Chapter One
Sylvester and Mildred Thames had raised Joe along with his two sisters in a fundamentalist home. No drinking, dancing, or smoking allowed. Although Sylvester was a mechanic, he never swore like those he worked with. He was mild-mannered, and Joe inherited his dad's laid-back personality.
"Joe, you're my favorite child. You know that, don't you?" Mildred told him. "Don't you dare disappoint me at Vacation Bible School. Sometimes I don't know what gets into you besides the Devil."
"I promise, Mama," Joe replied. "I'll make you proud of me."
"I ain't holding my breath."
At the tender age of six, Joe never questioned his parents' views on life. A good boy who helped his mother around the house, he took care of his sisters and worked in the big garden. For his size and age, Joe was strong because he chopped wood for his daddy.
High school football and church were the two big social events in his family's lives. Joe's church was a Primitive Southern Baptist focused on hellfire and brimstone—all the "thou shalt nots" rather than love and forgiveness. Joe was too young, at first, to understand the implications of his sin. As he aged, they manifested themselves and warped Joe's personality, creating a monster that controlled his life. Feeling powerless as to the hurts and pains he inflicted on others, most of the time he just didn't get it, although he tried.
Hidden from the main highway by cutting itself off physically from the rest of the world, Antioch Baptist Church created a world unto itself. A whitewashed cement block building that appeared a little off center, it endeared itself to its congregation of about twenty families and demanded fierce loyalty. Upstairs was "church" while down in the small basement were its fellowship hall, a bathroom, and a tiny kitchen. They held Vacation Bible School, much like an old one-room schoolhouse. Ten kids, ages five to twelve, attended. Joe's mom was the teacher.
Since his grandparents on both sides attended every Sunday and Wednesday service, Joe loved his church. For special occasions, the men of the congregation would wash each other's feet in obedience to Jesus' example. Joe always watched this ceremony with fascination.
Clueless that there was a loving God, Joe felt the weight of the unsaved world on his small shoulders. Feeling God's calling, he never questioned the church's doctrine. He looked up to and admired Brother John McGinny, often comparing him to Jesus.
When he preached, Bro. John's Broadway voice boomed its way to the back pew, echoing off the light pine-colored floor. Sunlight filtered through the frosted windows—no expensive stained glass in this understated décor. A ceiling fan whirled lazily, stirring up a steady breeze, albeit a light one.
Women fanned themselves with their Jesus-carrying-the-lost-sheep cardboard fans on wooden handles. The church smelled like women's overly sweet cologne and men's perspiration. All the men, decked out in suits in the stifling heat, had sweat-stain rings—giving away the suits' hard times as well as their ages—much like the Southern pine tree's rings. This congregation couldn't afford air-conditioning. The only thing of any real value in the church was the one-hundred-year-old red Bible on the pine pulpit.
Bro. John traveled from Macon, Georgia, every Sunday morning and Wednesday evening to do his preaching. Special times like Easter, Christmas, or Vacation Bible School, he would drive from Macon, get a room at West Point, Georgia—since Cusseta, Alabama had no motels—and spend a couple of nights visiting his congregation and catching up on the news of the community.
West Point was a thirty-minute drive down a long, narrow winding road in the backwoods of Alabama. On pretty days, Bro. John would crack his window to smell the scent of the pine trees that lined the road. His car was air-conditioned because he worked in Macon as a car salesman.
In the midst of a sermon, sweat glistened off Bro. John's sunburned dome, looking like a picked-over cotton patch with thinning gray hairs. Joe loved to hear the rise and fall of Bro. John's stage-projected voice—a sound like warmed molasses smoothly poured over a hot, buttered biscuit. But Joe hated it when he got louder and louder.
"Homosexuality is an abomination to God. God created Adam and Eve—a woman from Adam's rib—not Adam and Steve. Unmarried people engage in all kinds of sinful activities. Married couples act shamefully, committing adultery, which used to be punishable by stoning to death. Godly people do not tolerate Satan's follies."
He left the pulpit to strut as his voice got louder and louder with each word. Bro. John wiped his forehead with a limp handkerchief he kept crumpled up in his pocket, stained from previous sweat. He walked to the podium and picked up a smaller black Bible laid out on top of the large, ancient red one decorated inside with pictures of all the Biblical greats. He lifted up his personal worn-out Bible high into the air, shouting at this point.
"Anyone who gives in to these temptations has bought a one way ticket straight to Hell!" He strutted off the pulpit down the aisle. "Teenagers, dancing is wrong! Drinking and smoking are the Devil's curse. Using the Lord's name in vain has a special torment and punishment reserved for them. Doing these things will bring down God's wrath, brothers and sisters."
Loud Amens emanated from the congregation, by now stirred into a frenzy of righteous indignation for sinners. They punctuated Bro. John's message. His pacing made echoing sounds on the plank floor since he was a heavy built man. He wore a shiny white suit that gleamed in comparison to the old yellowed-white suits in his congregation. From the screaming, his face was as red as the top of his head as his tirade picked up momentum.
Bro. John frightened Joe when he preached about Hell, which he seemed to do a lot. The boy truly feared going to Hell. He often prayed and made promises to God, bargaining that he'd never do anything to bring down God's anger and judgment. He sometimes heard that God was love, but he didn't understand that other side of God.
Due to his age, Joe couldn't comprehend the sermon that morning—well, the part about homosexuality and adultery, although they were mentioned often. Joe prayed nightly to God, asking Him to lead him from all temptations, but most especially those two. They were too sinful to even ask his parents what they meant. Bro. John brought home that point about thinking about either of them was also a sin. Joe innately knew not to talk to his parents about the issues. He didn't want to cause them to sin by thinking about it long enough to answer any questions. Besides, he just needed to forget all about it.
That was, until the temptation of a quarter changed everything.
At age six, Joe had also wanted to be a preacher—feeling God's call, he gave mini-sermons in Vacation Bible School that summer of 1957 in the Antioch Baptist Church of Cusseta, Alabama. Towheaded with a sprinkling of cinnamon freckles showing through his rose-colored sunburn from working in the garden with his dad, he looked like the perfect picture of purity and innocence. But when Bro. John tested him and he failed, Joe was doomed to live in the shadow of sin for the rest of his life.
On the last day of Vacation Bible School, Bro. John asked, "Would you like to stay over and help me and earn a quarter?"
"Ya'suh!" Joe replied eagerly. "I'll make you proud. I'm a good worker."
"I'm sure you'll provide whatever I need you to do."
With eyes widened with excitement, Joe ran off to find his mama so she could grant permission to stay after everything was over. Since Joe didn't get an allowance, this money would buy paradise—a Coke and a hamburger. Thinking about being so grown-up made the corners of his mouth break into a Cheshire cat's grin, except for the gap where both front teeth were missing
"Mama, Brother John wants me to help him clean up the church. Can I stay? He'd even going to pay me."
"Why would Brother John choose you? You know you ain't no good for nothing." The words that Joe had heard so many times stung him like a wasp that flew up your sleeve.
"Mama, please. You know I'm a worker. I'll do the family proud."
"I swear, I don't know what's gotten into Brother John. There are so many other kids that would do better than you."
"Mama, please say yes. I'll walk home from church and be home in time to do my chores."
"Well, okay. Just make sure you do your chores when you get home." The promise of making some money gave Joe enough joy to control the pain he felt.
Joe helped empty the trashcans. While sweeping the floor in the fellowship hall, he heard Bro. John calling.
"Joe, can you come here a minute?"
"Yas'uh."
Joe drawled with a thick Southern accent. Each syllable glided into the other, smooth as cake batter. He tried to figure out where the pastor was. As Joe rounded the corner in the kitchen, there stood Bro. John, relieving himself in the bathroom with the door left open. Joe felt awkward, but Brother John seemed to have no shame as he turned around to face Joe with his fly open and his thing sticking straight up.
"I'll give you a quarter if you'll put this in your mouth and lick it."
"Naws'uh, I don't think I should."
"It's okay. No one will hurt you. Besides, I thought we were friends."
"Naws'uh, that would be wrong for me to do that."
"Come on, would I ask you to do something that was wrong?"
Something in his eyes scared Joe, even though he was the pastor of the church. Still, Joe trusted him to know what was best. How could Bro. John sin? Ministers didn't sin. And, besides, Joe had already had that money spent. He figured that if Bro. John said it was okay to do something, then what was the harm?
Bro. John tasted musty and salty. The pungent odor of sex—a mixture of the damp crawl space under Joe's house and his father's overalls on washday—wafted upward to his nose. It was hard for him to get his mouth around Bro. John's thing. Soon, Bro. John was breathing heavy and moaning, which scared Joe and made him stop for a moment.
"I can't do this. I'm scared."
Bro. John, forced himself back into Joe's mouth by grabbing him by the back of his head and thrusting himself hard against Joe's closed lips. This scared Joe worse than thinking about the wrong he was doing. When he stopped struggling, Bro. John let go of Joe's head.
Joe felt sick and wanted to gag when a watery fluid started going into his mouth. He started to lift his head, but Bro. John grabbed it again and thrust enough into Joe's mouth that he did start gagging. At that moment, his reflexes saved him from swallowing the nasty stuff, wetting the front of Bro. John's pants with what looked to Joe like whitish Jell-o.
"Damn you, Joe! Look what you've gone and done. God told me to test you. You are a miserable little homosexual wretch! Son, I'm going to pray for your soul. This will be our secret. I'll try my best to protect you from anyone finding out the truth about you, but you'd better repent and never do this again." Bro. John's eyes glared with a viciousness that Joe had never seen on anyone's face before that day.
Joe realized his mama was right. He was no good and should have listened to her and not kept on begging.
Joe fell to his knees, crying. "Bro. John, I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to do this, honest. Forgive me. Am I going to Hell?"
"Only if you talk about this with anyone."