I'm not being silly now; I have no "inner child" or other psychological syndrome to deal with. I have a condition clinically called Hypogonadism or "delayed puberty," cause unknown and undiagnosed during my formative years.
It's one of those frustrating illnesses that is not common enough or obvious enough for people to understand or sympathize with...no, you're just labeled a "late bloomer" or more callously dismissed as being "immature" or "undernourished" or something more vulgar.
Though I grew to adult stature (the bones do not stop growing due to lack of testosterone in the body), I developed none of what are called the "primary or secondary sexual characteristics."
What that means bluntly is that, while my friends developed muscles, a deep voice, hair on their face and exhibited sexual prowess, I remained physically a child though mentally I was intelligent and a successful student.
My family, stooped in religious fundamentalism, never discussed sex with me; I felt secure ignoring the issue and looking at my peers and their sex-talk with disgust. I soon lost all of the friends that I had grown up with and associated with younger boys that I could identify with more freely. I had just enough testosterone in my body to produce a severe case of acne, but that was about the extent of the "changes;" red spots all over my face. I became an extremely negative, lonely and unhappy child.
I questioned our family doctor about my lack of development during high school days, but he dismissed it...even going to the point of pulling down his own pants and comparing his (rather modest) genitalia with mine!
Attendance at a religious college further masked my problem and most of my classmates looked at me as kind of an oddity, probably good for some kind of Christian sideshow, but certainly not suited for the mission field.
After "Bible College," I found with many others (that have come before and after me) that my undergraduate degree was pretty much useless and began to work as an airport limousine driver...driving around successful business people who had seemingly made more sensible career choices than I.
About that time, while living back home with my parents in Bloomfield, New Jersey, I came down with a flu bug and hobbled down to the neighborhood doctor's office. The elderly physician took one look at me and startled me with the assertion that "The flu is the least of your worries." He took a book off the shelf and showed me some photos of naked men with their faces blackened out. "These men all have Hypogonadism," he explained...and referred me to a specialist.
The specialist, an endocrinologist or gland doctor, started me on testosterone replacement therapy, a small injection of testosterone once a week. But there were more delays, for whatever reason, and it took a few more years for me to start to see changes in my body.
The first time I had an erection and a "wet dream," I felt a strange mixture of satisfaction and of guilt...like "now I am a man and isn't that great?" with (on the other hand) "God wanted me to be different and now I'm becoming just like everyone else." This dichotomy remains with me all these years later.
Now, while other men my age were becoming established in their careers and starting families, I would stare at young guys playing basketball in an inner-city lot on my way to the airport, just longing to play the game with them. And I became angry at the loss of my adolescent years. Emotionally, I was an angry teenager, yet, a teenager with adult responsibility and expectations by others that I was ill-equipped to meet. I felt like no one understood me, perhaps I did not understand myself.
And I imagined that I was alone, until the advent of the Internet and the discovery that many other men (and women also) suffered from conditions similar to my own. Commiserating with others in groups like that, I found, has it's own rewards as well as liabilities. My first impression was that "Most of these people are crazy!" which didn't place myself in a favorable light. Many of my hypogonadic "brethren," (or at least the more 'vocal' ones) did have serious emotional, sexual and gender issues. More positively, I did receive some very good advice about finding good doctors and choosing treatment options. ... and I've been encouraged to explore my own emotional and sexual issues...which I will elaborate upon sometime.
The saddest thing that I can identify with is the massive bad self-image that delayed puberty has imprinted on me and others. No one with my condition that I have met has been particularly successful in creating and obtaining long-term goals for their lives. It seems that no amount of affirmation or encouragement is enough to instill confidence or a sense of accomplishment or self-satisfaction.
So I remain, still not having found what I am looking for, whatever that may be.
(Diagram courtesy of: http://www.andrologyaustralia.org/ )
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