Today: Claude*, 63 years old
In recent years, Claude has lost the use of his legs and his hands, but everything else is going very well. Interview.
“I have lots of friends for whom nothing happens anymore! It’s still funny! “, tells us the man, aged 63 and suffering from multiple sclerosis, quite active, thank you, with the same lover for 10 years.
It was his brother who wrote to us earlier this year to invite us to meet him. “My brother, despite his major disability, still has an active sexuality. […] I find his story inspiring and hopeful. My brother has a very nice personality, which can explain this relationship. » This is not false, we will immediately see.
Claude, for his part, can no longer really type on a keyboard. He can no longer eat on his own either, or do anything with his hands. Exit solitary pleasures, we will have understood. “I have someone for that!” », he will tell us, with a knowing and no less naughty air.
He welcomes us into his bright apartment full of green plants and colorful paintings, with a smile on his lips and the dog at his feet (or rather on the wheels, if you prefer, since he is obviously in a wheelchair all day long) . “And I still have someone in my life, strangely…”
Sexuality has never been a problem. It’s pretty incredible. Nothing works anymore, but this works!
Claude, 63 years old
We’ve barely settled in when his phone rings. He’s an old one chum, today a “great friend”. “All my old lovers are still around me,” he said, smiling. I shouldn’t have been that bad! », he adds, with a lightness that won’t let him out of the interview.
It is told with ease, in a slow but confident flow. “I always knew I was gay. For us, it wasn’t a tragedy. My great uncle was gay, there was never a problem with that. »
It’s a very first chum at 19 years old. “An Englishman from England,” he said, laughing, “I’ve never forgotten him!” » New lover at 20, still his friend to this day. “I shouldn’t have been that bad,” he repeats.
In his twenties, he had a few stories, and “it was never complicated,” he repeats, without elaborating on the subject. “I like being with someone consistent. Adventures are not in my temperament. » In his thirties, Claude meets someone more significant, a story which this time lasts more than 10 years. They even got married in their mid-forties before separating a few years later. “We had a really nice wedding,” he remembers. And then he fell in love with someone else…”
The man in question was a “great seducer”. “We had naughty evenings,” he remembers. I haven’t been bored in my life! »
I have no regrets. I did everything I wanted to do.
Claude, 63 years old
Once separated, he entered into yet another relationship, and it was at this time that the diagnosis was made. Claude is 50 years old. “There must have been changes in my behavior that I didn’t realize. Maybe I was slow? My sister thought I was lazy! »
One fine day, he found himself completely disabled on one side. “I thought I was having a stroke…” When he learns that he is ill, and that it is not going to get better, he declares to his current lover: “You don’t have to stay”. “I wanted to get by. » They leave each other, but also remain friends. “Morally, it did me good…”
Without transition, Claude continues: “And then I met another man who had multiple sclerosis! » Their story lasts two years, until by a strange coincidence of fate, Claude meets his current lover, a former long-term health care assistant. At the time, he had just found himself in an adapted wheelchair.
Do you understand ? It was 10 years ago. “He comes, he shaves me, he changes my diaper, he washes me, it’s extraordinary to have met someone who did that for a living! » The lover in question comes by every two weeks, for their “ritual”, as he says.
Why aren’t they a couple? “He wants to feel free,” he believes. And obviously, that suits him too.
In bed ?
There, I admit, it’s much less acrobatic!
Claude, 63 years old
But they know what, and how to do it. “At the beginning, I said to myself: will it last a week, two weeks, three weeks? It’s been 10 years! I must have qualities! »
Monsieur gets him up, carries him to his bed, they have fun orally for one, manually for the other. No, they don’t practice penetration. “But it was never something that appealed to me,” he explains.
When they first started, the three of them even had fun in his bed. “There, it’s quieter!” […] That’s life ! I trust life. If something happens, something happens! I let go, no choice with illness! »
We can’t help but find him to have a rare resilience. “I am not a victim, I have never been a victim, and I will never be a victim!” », he confirms.
His inspiration? Sister Angèle, replies our man, with a final declaration that is as surprising as it is inspiring. “Yesterday is too late, here it is now, tomorrow, we don’t know,” he paraphrases it, before concluding: “it gave meaning to my life!” »
* Fictitious first name, to protect anonymity