The Lie: A Memoir of Two Marriages, Catfishing & Coming Out

by William Dameron

I realized the question for me was not why a person would pretend to be someone they are not, but, when our supposed truths are unmasked for lies, What do we do with all of that pain and lost hope?

This is the heart of his story: what do with the pain and lost hope

It’s strange how two memories in your life, separated by decades, can touch, as if the years have curled into one another, forever locked in a fatal embrace, tethered together by a defining moment. I can’t see one now without the other. I’m a beaten-down middle-aged man driving a minivan by the village green on my way to the Walmart in a cold, New England town. I’m young and full of promise, driving a white pickup truck up a steep Rocky Mountain road as the summer sun rises.

I liked his writing style where he wove past and present.

When I look back, I can see now that my relationship with Katherine followed the classic example of a catfishing/social-engineering attack. Except in this case, I had been catfishing both Katherine and myself. It was not what I planned, and it pains me to illustrate the points, those that make me look both like the villain and the fool, but when a breach has been detected, one of the most important steps is gathering all artifacts and details in order to analyze the origin and impact of the attack.

He ties together the concept of online catfishing (putting out a false persona) with his relationship with Katherine.

First, I gained Katherine’s trust. I had few friends, and those I did had no idea who I really was. We both felt lonely in our own worlds, and this formed a connection. I told myself this connection was enough to build a life on. Our vulnerabilities exposed each other’s. Katherine’s trauma around the idea of family was perhaps her greatest vulnerability. She wanted desperately a family of her own. The face I shared was not mine. Outwardly, my face expressed ambition, certainty, and that of a straight man. For years, I told myself I could be straight. I gaslighted her. I pretended not to understand the undercurrent of doubt that she felt in our relationship. My stories were vague. When you live in the closet, you become superorganized so that you know where everything is at all times, so that you can alter your stories if needed. To maintain this lie, I had to tell myself many different versions of my own story.

I took what was not mine. Katherine’s love, trust, and hope were her most valuable asse...

But despite all of this, in the end, Katherine was the only one daring enough to ask the question that unmasked me, to bury the imaginary man, so that the real one could survive. She did this, understanding that everything she held of value might be hacked into and taken from her. Often, I stay up late at night marveling at how brave Katherine was, and how she taught me more about honesty than anyone I know.

For years, the lie supported my work, my life, and my family. It was necessary to keep telling the lie in order not to lose everything, but eventually, it began to sag, like a roof filling with too much water, until it broke.

In order to make amends, you must first see the world from the viewpoint of the one you hurt.

Before forgiveness could enter, anger needed to be extinguished, and like wildfire it would often jump paths and spring up in surprising and terrifying places. Resentment over lives unlived smoldered in both of us. Often, I wondered if I even deserved to be happy.

Making amends is not the same as forgiveness. It is undoing a wrong. I can’t go back and unlie. I can’t go back and change the past. The only way I know to make amends is to live in the truth and to be humble with those I’ve wronged—Katherine and my daughters—and through the sharing of my tale, to give those I’ll never meet the chance to speak their truth as well.

And I understood. We are all of us an assimilation, a collection of bits and pieces of everything and everyone we love.

After twenty years of marriage, I discovered that at the heart of every lie is a seed that when watered and cultivated grows mighty, like a windswept tree. The source of my lies—the biggest lie of all—was the idea that a gay boy could not be loved. It was planted inside me as a child, and it was fruitful and multiplied. This was where the limb of lies that twisted throughout my marriage—and within myself—began. But finally, the gnarled roots were unearthed and exposed to the light. Here was where the lie withered, the roots upended, and truth bloomed.