When we began gathering for meals or drinks, he always chose Diet Coke over a martini. He claimed not to use drugs or smoke, which gave me the impression he had a great head on his shoulders. I thought to myself, “What a great guy.” As a sucker for talent in crafts and art, I was also deeply impressed by his work, which was amazing even before his drug use. I admired his achievements as a creative director and partner in a local architecture firm with mainly Mainland Chinese clients.

Before we were intimate, I asked him multiple times if he was STD-free, and each time he assured me he was. After our early spring trip in 2014, I didn’t return to Asia until July. During those three months apart, we exchanged 650 photos and thousands of text messages. Despite his reservations, he kept hinting that he wasn’t a good person, but I defended him because he seemed like a million dollars to me. I adored him and fell in love.

In late May 2014, I confronted him about his reservations and forced him to admit he had lied about his HIV status; he was positive. His excuse was that he feared I wouldn’t have met him if he had been honest. He apologized, and I reassured him on the phone, saying, “I fell in love with you, so it doesn’t matter!”

I returned to Hong Kong in July. That summer, I was on cloud nine and beyond—elated, blissful, excited, and filled with butterflies I hadn’t felt since 2000. I miss those feelings, but I’m not sure they were worth the hardships that followed. There’s a strong chance he was just acting to get what he wanted. We had a three-hour encounter at the Mingles or Butterfly motel. We were beyond electric in bed—playful yet very sexy. We were extremely attracted to each other and thoroughly enjoyed each other’s features, scent, and sweat. It’s rare for me to experience such equal attraction; usually, one person is more into the other. With Con, it felt like we had met in a previous life. We became comfortably compatible very quickly. I thought to myself, “This is so cute! We’re so cute!” Everything was almost perfect; it would have been more perfect if we could have spent an entire night together in a bed. He knew that was my dream and my motivation for everything I did for him. The sociopath knew it was a card he could play for years to come. Later, he conditioned me by neglecting me for days and then sending a couple of encouraging texts, giving me a glimpse of hope. I became his starved lap dog, loyally pitching in and thankful for a bite to eat.

After extending my trip twice, a few days before flying back to NYC on October 23, he surprised me with a HK$12,500 duotone Bvlgari ring—a replica of one I had loved and worn since we met. The ring symbolized commitment, and his thoughtfulness moved me. I immediately booked my next few round-trip flights to secure his hopes and feelings.

It couldn’t be more true that happy times fly by. The truly happy, carefree time was all in 2014. That was it. Between leaving Asia in late October 2014 and returning for Chinese New Year in February 2015, about 10 weeks passed. My theory was that if I met my “THE ONE” at age 40, we only had 20-25 good years to share experiences, so we should seize every valuable second. That’s why I always tried to stay in touch through any means possible—to keep the connection alive. You could call me sweet, attentive, and devoted if you liked me, but if you had something to hide, you found me annoying and controlling.

During Christmas 2014, he flew business class to his hometown in Warsaw with his boyfriend. Remember, he was still employed with a HK$75,000 monthly salary. He splurged, brought tons of gifts, and played the role of the successful son/brother/cousin/war hero/Santa Claus. Consequently, he stacked up an enormous amount of credit card debt, assuming he could pay it off in 2015. He lived like a celebrity on an okay salary, never saving for rainy days and even putting his 15% annual income tax on his AmEx. He acted like he was an American. This was just the tip of the iceberg for his following series of unfortunate events, and our Titanic romance became collateral damage as he began to use me as his ATM, meal ticket, and gift provider.

He was very upbeat and good at replying to my texts until New Year’s 2015. Then, for a couple of days, he was slow to reply, which I understood due to roaming issues. But I always thought to myself, this is the turning point. This trip changed him. Seeing sex as a sport, and having a big appetite for it, we had an agreement after he gave me the Bvlgari ring: he would only have casual sport sex with his five frequent partners. It was a promise he couldn’t keep for more than a month. On that trip, he met his “Eve,” who brought him the first forbidden fruit, and they had chem-sex (also known as party and play). He later confessed—I have the texts to prove it—that he couldn’t climax during chem-sex.

Note: He had always been anti-drinking and anti-drugs because his daily HIV medication already stressed his liver and kidneys. Therefore, the idea of him getting addicted to drugs was the farthest thing from my mind.

The Con we all loved—the worked-out, successful Con—was gone after that trip in 2014. Ever since 2015, a short-fused, skinny, heartless Con had returned to Hong Kong. Over the next few months, a series of unfortunate events forced him out of his partnership, and his boyfriend was hospitalized due to the stress of his infidelity and drug addiction.

A 16-hour direct flight back to Asia is never easy. But this trip from Newark to Hong Kong was different; it was the first after I received the ring, and I couldn’t wait to see my “THE ONE” again. I was eager to see him and was invited to meet up immediately. At first, he seemed a bit distant, but I thought it was normal since his friends were at the bar Tentra. However, his normally short-fused personality became even shorter, and it was difficult to predict his anger. Our first big fight occurred just 45 minutes after I landed, despite me bringing him gifts and requested items.

After Tentra, I walked with him to his home on the west side of the city. We talked about how the Australian government does not sponsor HIV patients to apply for residency independently. This led to him yelling at me for being ignorant and not having enough information. I thought I was being supportive by saying, “Then I don’t need to visit there then; hate the homophobe Oz!” but this only angered him more.

He yelled at me in public, calling me a “know-it-all,” “not a good listener,” and a “narcissist” for expressing an opinion without enough information. He escalated to insulting American cities compared to Australian ones and calling me names. I was frustrated and confused by his sudden change; it felt like I was dealing with a completely different person from the Con I knew in 2014. I tried to de-escalate by asking if he was okay and what had gone wrong, but he pushed me away. I fell and injured myself on an ancient staircase.

That night began a pattern of manipulation and emotional abuse that would continue for months. My heart was broken and has never fully healed. Even now, as I write this, my heart still aches from the pain of that night.

Nevertheless, after his Christmas 2014 trip to Warsaw, the more I reached out to connect, the less he reciprocated in both communication and intimacy. I tried several times to cut my losses and suggested we just be friends. Each time, he would passive-aggressively talk me back into it, telling me he needed me. But his actions never matched his words. I assume this was a side effect of the highs and lows from his busy work life and his chem-sex marathons.

Looking back, I should have cut all ties with him right then; I would have at least saved myself HK$160,000 in loans and interest. But I stayed. If I stopped texting for a day, he would become a little nicer, texting that he missed me “so so much.” He claimed his short fuse never lasted more than 12 hours for people he loved. He would apologize and sweet-talk me the next day. Frankly, our relationship was never the same as it was in 2014 before Poland. Intimacy practically stopped.

He is a master of passive-aggressive play. He returned communication in a highly controlled manner, starving me of what I craved so that when he sent just two “Hello” texts, I would be elated and appreciative.

He would casually set a date or plan a meal to make securing a loan easier, especially after I asked him clearly: “Con, please don’t disappear after you cash the cheque. Let’s have dinner on Thursday?” Of course, he would say yes. Predictably, when the time came for confirmation, he would go missing in action for days—what I called “being muted.” The time would come and go while he ignored my calls. He knew that ignoring me was the one button to push to make me upset. Wouldn’t anyone be upset when left high and dry? He would then use my reaction against me, making it the main issue to be debated. I was damned and guilty of sending a “tsunami of SMS.” Thus, the real issues—where he had been or why he abandoned our plans—were never addressed. He successfully painted me as an immature, crazy crybaby, turned every situation into my fault, and deliberately diverted attention to my “ridiculous” number of texts. What actually went wrong was never the focus. He rarely explained his absences. If he tried, he just used work as an excuse. I ended up always being the one apologizing for texting too much, while he probably used my deposit to pay rent and buy drugs for a multi-day binge. He was so natural at shifting blame that he didn’t see he had a problem; he believed I was the entire problem—he was just busy at work (well, in his world, drugs and sex don’t count). He ended up telling me off, saying, “You are an unnecessary load. I do not need you!” It was like a knife to the heart. He said this shortly after the sixth and final loan.
magine this tactic practiced and repeated on me almost weekly. It’s a recipe for brainwashing someone into a battered wife or kidnap-victim relationship—the most powerful way to mind-control without physical force. The victim is conditioned to be trapped in his world, always loyal and staying by his side. I guess that’s why I was conditioned to be there for him for so long. Forty months is a long time to give so much with almost nothing in return.

He knew how head-over-heels I was for him. Instead of reciprocating, he decided to use me to the maximum from that point on. I remember he posted an Instagram photo with the quote “Don’t give a fuck!” I guess it echoed his state of mind as he was losing his conscience. He wouldn’t cut me off but would leave breadcrumbs to lead me on. He let me masturbate him once at a movie in Pacific Place, pretending I was still in the picture. He licked my neck once after I transferred $25,000 to his new Standard Chartered Bank account. Those were the only two intimate incidents between April 2015 and March 2017. Yet, he never cut it off, and hopeless me was in a drought, thirsting for his merciful drops of attention. He knew all this and didn’t care if it was mental torture. He just didn’t care. All he wanted was to not burn the bridge in case he needed assistance.

Until early 2017, Con had led me on to keep investing in “us,” pretending we had a future. He dangled sex in front of me so I would chase it like a horse chasing a carrot. I became his escort to meals he normally couldn’t afford. I spent US$4,500 in the summer of 2015 dining out with this con-man.

In September 2015, I started loaning him money. There were six separate wire transfers. The second time he needed money, he asked me to dinner. The FIRST thing he gave me when I sat down was his new Standard Chartered account number written on a piece of paper. He then asked for a second loan. When I asked what it was for, he rolled his eyes and told me for the hundredth time it was a credit card payment. What an ass! Little did I know he used it to rent a new apartment without telling me so he could live his single, promiscuous life on Crystal Meth and chem-sex in orgies and saunas.

He never cut me off; he always gave me hope for a future while juggling his chem-sex life, work life, and Grindr life. He was just distracted and busy, buying time to audition for a new milk ticket. If he couldn’t find a better boat with US citizenship, this silly, resourceful lapdog—the only one who trusted him enough to lend him HK$160,000—would be more than happy to marry him!

In February 2017, he thought he had secured a new relationship with his fiancé, paving his way to become a NYC citizen. Therefore, it was also okay to cut me out completely.

The following WhatsApp conversation happened one month before I narrowed it down to one person to confront about whether he and Con were a pair. He graciously admitted it, and we have since established a friendship. I found out through him that they had been officially dating since January 2017 after meeting through chem-sex two years prior. AND Con had sex with him at his own place because he had already moved out from his boyfriend and had been living alone since March 2015.

Regarding Con’s Polish trip in Christmas 2014, he later told me he hooked up with a rich 24-year-old Polish man and they had chem-sex. He specifically mentioned he liked it a lot but didn’t climax. The Polish kid flew to HK in the spring to stalk Con. According to Con, his boyfriend went into a deep depression. Who knows if he was telling the truth? I once asked him why he did it with the Polish kid, and he said it would be easier to leave his boyfriend for me. It sounded cute when he said it, but now I realize it was just another tall tale to avoid responsibility. He was bullshitting me to defend his cheating and make me feel responsible for it! If he needed an excuse, Con had dozens of Hong Kong “friends-with-benefits” on speed dial to leak information to break up his relationship.

Nevertheless, perhaps the drugs and sex addiction didn’t change him; they were just an instigator that opened him up and brought out his true self. Meth enhances self-esteem for the insecure. For Con, it turned him into an egomaniac who lives without reservations or conscience—a terrible, calculated user, a con-man who plays with others’ kind hearts. It is now understandable why he stopped using protection: because he only cares for his own joy and pleasure, and whatever benefits him, and no one else.

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