Okay so I'll try to keep this honest and brief Hello everyone, I just want to say that over the past few years I have been contemplating my sexuality. I have been trying to convince myself that it was due to a lack of a father figure and such that is the reason for my latent homosexuality. Ever since I was young the (living in an unstable house) I have always dreamt of having the Wife, the kids, ect. I know this day and age Gay people can have kids, but I hope you understand that it is my desire to have the "ideal" image that I created as a kid. Over the past few years, I have been struggling to come to terms with (in the nicest way) what I fear. I don't "feel Gay" (but what does feeling gay mean, right?), but I don't understand how I feel. I've always been more likely to show off and try to get male attention and in honesty female attention does not "do it" for me, as much as I would hope. When I get drunk I go on a vain quest to try to "prove myself" and any girl I talk to I am eager to show off to my friends, but the sexual part of female contact barely crosses my mind. It's like I'm trying to hold on to a 4 sided triangle and trying to convince myself its real, I have had limited experience with girl and to be honest I never felt that sort of "spark". If I had to be honest, male contact seems to be more appealing to me but I never even thought of my friends or anyone I know more in that way. But I do try to get close to them. I know it may or may not be obvious to you, but I am kinda alone where I am, I'm afraid to talk about or mention it to anyone. As I used to get bullied badly for other issues and only recently have I made genuine friends and I'm afraid that being gay might make the friendship awkward? I know I have a lot of irrational fear. And I have never had any contact with a man.. So what I am asking is that if you can just offer some advice or point me into the right direction. I know that sexuality comes down to the individual and only I would know, but there is too much going on in my head for me to rationally come to a conclusion after 8 years of keeping it in. I just need some help sorting my head out, its literally has brought me on the brink of life at times.
Welcome to EC! For someone with too much in their head to come to a rational conclusion, you've done an awful lot of legwork. I mean your post goes through the thought process very well and is one paragraph away from a meaningful conclusion, which I think you already know deep down but don't really want to say it or write it down. (Fear will do that to you, we all know it!) Tell you what, I'll write up some of my own thoughts (from before I realised my gender) and you tell me what you think my orientation might be. -Basically thought I was straight for most of my life -Dad wasn't around a lot so I tended to get attached to people that reminded me of him -Wasn't that interested in girls during secondary school in any meaningful way. Occasionally tried to get a girlfriend but never really cared enough to try -Started to think about non-specific guys. Liked the idea more than I liked the idea of girls but didn't find any of the guys I knew attractive -bullied at school for being different so didn't want to discuss it with anyone What do you reckon? As for your friends, if they are worth the time of day this won't make it awkward for very long.
Well this is where some of my confusion comes in, couldn't some of what you are feeling come down to your Dad? It would also suggest that you are more happy (romantically) with the thought of being in a relationship with a guy but too afraid to commit to it because the fear of being bullied and rejected.. I do feel you are right in saying that I probably know the answer to my own question and feelings. But I cannot comprehend the idea of actually being gay rather than it being in my head. It feels alien and weird, but probably the truth. I guess i have conditioned myself to feel contrary to this, and to really believe I am straight? I feel that if I do take the final step, it feels like i'm locked in and my friends may not understand how I'm feeling at this moment. I go to an all boy school so I'm not entirely sure what to do there, as the furthest I've known someone to come out is Bi and that was 4 years ago and they were years above me. I also feel like I will be making a mistake and that there might be that one chance, it will probably be like trying to find that 4 sided triangle I have been looking for that one chance for a long time in a lot of different places. I guess I fear of what is waiting on the other side of that closet door (eh eh get the analogy )
OK so I wasn't COMPLETELY honest with you just then. The bits I wrote up there were essentially your first post, bullet pointed and with a little hint of me in them. Point is you came up with this: "It would also suggest that you are more happy (romantically) with the thought of being in a relationship with a guy but too afraid to commit to it because the fear of being bullied and rejected.." Which is a lot closer to a solid conclusion than you had before, even if it only seems like a very minor change to what you originally said!
Ahh that is very clever of you, I appreciate your help thank you. I can see rationally now that I probably would find more happiness by accepting it rather than chasing a fantasy that leaves an empty feeling, but now it comes down to the question of; How do I accept something I do not want to be? Its funny how people say it is a choice, when I would conscientiously choose one over the other. I feel like this "choice" was made for me and has been eating at me for years trying to pick the "right choice" till I really couldn't take it any more and needed some help.
"How do I accept something I do not want to be?" Did you ever, as a child, save up for something amazing only to realise it was completely not worth the money? Do you remember those Razr scooters or whatever they were called? Everyone had one. My brother got one for his birthday and I was super jealous. I felt like the only person who didn't have it. So I saved up £50 to buy one of my own. Took a lot of hard work (filled up a wheely bin with stones from my grandma's garden because my dad promised me £10 if a filled it, then the bastard emptied it before we got tot he top!). Anyway I finally got what I wanted and what was supposed to make me happy, just like it did when I borrowed somebody elses. Used it probably 3 times in total. HUGE disappointment. The point is, all the time we see things that we think we want and completely ignore the reality of the situation. Now in my case, if I think about that scooter I can list the things I thought were good about it. 1. Everyone else had one 2. It was more fun than walking 3. You could do tricks Now once I bought it, several things became apparent. 1. Now I had one, it's not so interesting that everyone else has one too. 2. No it wasn't, it was hard work and nobody could keep up if they were on foot, and if someone was faster than you, you couldn't keep up with them. It made going out with friends a nightmare. 3. My best trick was to hurt my ankles over and over again. AND THE BONUS THING!!! 4. Suddenly some kid turns up on his mountain bike or BMX. Who gives a shit about a scooter, that thing has STUNT PEGS. You look for the things you want and you see the good things. Now you look at that 'ideal future' you pictured, with a wife and children. Now ask yourself, how happy are you in that picture knowing that while you may get on well with your wife, she really doesn't do anything for you romantically or sexually. Not for lack of trying, you just don't like her in that way. How happy are your children, when every day they see that mummy and daddy don't actually get along that well any more. That ideal is there because that's what you see around you. It's natural, in exactly the same way I thought a scooter would be a great idea, for you to think from a young age that this is what will make you happy. Now think about it, what screwed my 'happy ideal' as a child? The kid with the BMX. That was the cool thing now that everyone wanted. For you, that might be a guy you happen to meet and just fall for. Completely by accident but all of a sudden your 'happy' life has fallen to bits. Now let's think about your question again. " How do I accept something I do not want to be? " The first thing to do is to figure out WHY your brain is telling you that you don't want it. So far we have fear of rejection and bullying. Is there anything else?
That is a very clever analogy, I see that my expectations may exceed what may actually be the truth? I would hate to put my future family through something like that as my Dad put my family through something similar. I guess I can picture myself with a woman because that is what society has told me and that is all we see, and growing up in a house where there wasn't much happiness I always idealised my "perfect life". From my wife's job to the colour of our carpets in the guest room. I guess being gay didn't cross my 6-8 year old mind when I was creating this image that i have held on to for so long. As you with the scooter, I have been working hard to try to get my scooter. If this helps, in my life I have boiled down my issues into 3 main areas; through talk therapy with my friend and him being very keen the past 6 months to make me "man up". But it simply is, fear of abandonment, rejection and commitment. Bullying was just a by-product of these issues along with; anxiety, neediness, low self-confidence/esteem. Also there might be a little bit of an identity crisis here, as who am I now? If I am not the person I have been for the past 17 years then who am I? I guess I feel like I maybe letting myself and everyone down by accepting what I think we can both agree is the actual truth. By talking to you I have come to understand that what I am feeling maybe in fact homosexuality but for some reason I still cannot say it out loud or actually type the concluding sentence that will eventually come.
"through talk therapy with my friend and him being very keen the past 6 months to make me "man up"." This may be the most troubling sentence you will ever write. Let me ask you this, do your feelings matter? Are they important? Are you worth the effort it takes to feel good? If the answer to one or more of those questions was 'no', then go read them again and give me a different answer. If the answer to one or more of those questions was 'yes' then the next paragraph may bother you. What does 'man up' mean. Be a man, suppress the SHIT out of those feelings and get on with things. Now your friend may be trying to help but 'man up' or any of the million associated phrases he could come up with are just a slap in the face. Your feelings matter, they are important. If you feel scared then you acknowledge it, you figure out why and you deal with it. If, instead, you decide to try and 'man up', you feel scared, call yourself a little bitch and pretend nothing happened. That isn't healthy...trust me, I did that for what...20 years and it led to nothing but trouble. Now you've mentioned 3 things here. "abandonment, rejection and commitment. " Now I don't know the details of WHY you feel those things, and you don't have to tell me if you don't want to, BUT they need exploring. If you need to, go to the GP and ask to be referred for therapy or something. If not, find someone who will actually let you TALK about your feelings and explore them instead of trying to force you to 'get over' them. "Also there might be a little bit of an identity crisis here, as who am I now? If I am not the person I have been for the past 17 years then who am I?" What makes you think you're not the same person, just because your orientation might be different? Everyone has ambitions and dreams and ideals that will never come to be. They change due to circumstances. For every child that dreams of being an astronaut, how many make it? Almost none, but how many get to school and think "You know what, actually I want to work for NASA". How many manage that? Still not many, but a hell of a lot more than the astronauts. Perhaps later on they get really interested in engineering and all of sudden they don't want to work for NASA any more, they want to use the skills they've learned to build aircraft for commercial or military purposes. Now how many are doing that? LOADS OF THEM. Imagine that all happened to one child. Is he a different person just because he repairs fighter planes instead of working on the ISS? So now ask yourself. Are you your orientation?
Well maybe I put him in a bad light, but he has been a huge benefit for me has he has helped me recover faster from as long term depression and has stood up for me numerous occasions. I see your point of view and I do believe that you are right that I should't just suppress how I am feeling, and for that I do condone him as well as he does do that and classic phrases such as "oh get over it" do come up when I get a bit moody. Ahh well I guess you've helped me this far its only fair to open up as I do want this issue to be sorted after all these years. Basically my Father a few years ago destroyed my family by claiming he was transgender (note I have nothing against transgender people), he drained a lot of my families money on himself and when it was gone he left. He didn't complete the transgender journey and gave up half way through. He used to make my family a misery before and after he decided to do this, with the constant comments about hating us and moving our family around the globe and causing even more drama there to the point where he was arrested. He never liked having people around and to be very blunt he was a bit of dick. But he left me and my mother with nothing and we lived in a car for a whole summer and every time I speak to him it is always very bitter. I do suspect that you are right I have never been able to get my feelings out and have always bottled them in, which may be a cause to my drastic mood swings. My mother has agreed to therapy but suggest I wait till after the exams as they are close and she doesn't want me to have a melt down during a crucial time in my life. As my brother had when he went to therapy as he uncovered many suppressed memories. Well I guess you can't define yourself off of your 7 year old beliefs, but going against a code, arguably that child might have always wondered "What if" he did become an astronaut? Surely we believe something for a reason? Well I don't think your orientation defines you 100% but it is a part of you, and as I am assuming you understand the conflict that can go on when someone is not sure? which makes this part bigger than it really is? (I have to say I do love your arguments they are very clever and I may use them )
I have to agree with your mother, get your exams over with and then get some therapy...it hurts like hell! Well I guess you can't define yourself off of your 7 year old beliefs, but going against a code, arguably that child might have always wondered "What if" he did become an astronaut? Consider our child again. Age 7 he wanted to be an astronaut. Age 9 he goes on his first roller coaster. He throws up. He's sad, but he's young and it's the first time he ever did something like that, he'll get over it. Age 10, his dad (knowing all about how his son wants to be an astronaut) buys him a video about space travel. He watches it over and over again. He learns about the training astronauts have to go through. He decides he wants to try another roller coaster. He asks his dad to take him. He throws up again. He spends all day going on different rides and each time he feels sick to his stomach. He ends the day trying not to cry in front of his dad. From that day on, every time he watched his space video he noticed something different. Instead of wondering how they floated like magic, he thought how lonely it must be up there. Now our little boy has just learned something. He once had an idea that seemed amazing, but he now knows it's not going to work. For reasons he has no control over, he will never be an astronaut. You can't be an astronaut if you throw up that easily. This realisation has crushed him. He's now seeing all the negative things about it. The worst part is that his dad is so proud of his son, the "future astronaut", because in his fathers own words "Spacemen are god damn heroes son!" He's scared of letting his dad know so he keeps watching the video, desperately clinging to the dream. Now you have no control over which gender(s) you find attractive. It's not something you learned it's just "part of you". You know that for this reason, this 'ideal' situation of a wife a children can't work, and that hurts. It's confusing too because you've thought that for a long while. You are also worried about what other people will say. Now at age 13, something happened to our little boy. His dad, still certain his son was going to be an astronaut, took him to a space museum. They learned about all the people involved in space exploration. Designers, engineers, scientists, everyone. All of a sudden, that empty feeling he held inside for the past three years starts to fade. His dreams of space are not dead yet. He won't ever be an astronaut, and that might upset his dad, but our little boy has discovered the work of the scientists. Astronauts may go in to space, but the scientists invent the rockets and the equipment. To him, the astronaut is nothing without the scientists. Suddenly our little boy has some purpose again. He's still scared to tell his dad, because he was so proud, but he knows his future lies in a different direction. When we are little our dreams are big and vague, because that's all we know. We want to be doctors and firemen and astronauts because we don't know what an engineer or a bio-chemist or a CAD-artist is! We want a happy family, with a wife and children because that's what we see around us, especially when our own families break down. We look around and we see what other people have, we see the way they appear to be happy and we think "that's what life is for". When we grow up, we learn more, we discover that things go so much deeper than we ever thought they could. When we get the things we want, we will always think 'but what if I'd had the other thing', and the simple answer is "I wouldn't have what I have now". This is where conflict comes in. You're not sure. This phrase is misleading, and I think it's worth trying to remove as many misleading phrases from your own head as possible. In reality, you are pretty sure you are at the very least romantically attracted to guys. Nobody specific, but the idea of it appeals to you in a way you just don't get with girls. Imagine our little boy again. Except he isn't little any more, he's a grown man. 25 years old and a scientific expert. Physically fit too. His career has followed the same path it was always going to. This boy knows space science inside and out. But now he has a choice to make. He's currently working as one of the leading experts in rocket design, he's leading the team designing a new space station that's will launch in a few years time. The job is everything he thought it could be and he is completely happy. But this morning he got a job offer. This morning, he was invited to train as an astronaut. Our little boy who couldn't ride a roller coaster has been made a once in a lifetime offer to do the job that would make his father (who is now dead) look at him with pride such as he has never seen. But, our boy still knows deep down that he couldn't possibly make it through training. He still can't handle a roller coaster. He's kind of iffy on boats! He would never make it through training, and if he tried, he would just feel miserable. He has learned a lot about himself since he was a little boy, and he has learned a lot about being an astronaut (he's met several!). He sees his childhood dream for what it was. A vague fantasy based on the best thoughts about something he didn't know much about, and things he learned from his dad. What should our little boy do? Surely we believe something for a reason? Well I don't think your orientation defines you 100% but it is a part of you, and as I am assuming you understand the conflict that can go on when someone is not sure? which makes this part bigger than it really is?
Sorry for the late reply, was kinda ill D: Yeah I think it is for the best, but I do feel a lot of my depression and other problems are rooted in this as well -.- I read through that post twice because there was a lot of helpful stuff! I think you are right the only thing holding me back is that I feel like I am letting myself fall short of something impossible, like I am letting everyone down. It is difficult to know for sure what I really am feeling, like I know when the girl is attractive or when she is not. And I have had offers from girls to get into a relationship but always turn them down for some stupid reason, or I make myself do something so stupid it ruins it. I understand what you are trying to say about how I should think about what would make me happy rather than what I feel would make others happy. But I just cant seem to shake this and it does put me in a bad mood, like I wanted to tell my friend that I might not be into girls but the thought of it just made me confused and angry. Then I get the feeling like "may you just haven't met the right girl" or "maybe you don't know what these feelings are".. I know they are normal but I cant seem to sort them out... I also don't know what it would be like to be gay, I guess I wont know till I try right? it just seems so alien.. (I know this post maybe a bit disjointed I wrote it late at night and I kinda had a lot on my mind )
I first realised I was attracted to other boys around the age of 12/13 (maybe a bit earlier even) but it took me many more years before I was prepared to accept it... I was a lot older than 17. At 17 I was still trying to convince myself that it was a bit of a phase and would pass, but it didn't. Deep down I knew I was gay and it took a crisis and support for me to finally accept it. Sometimes, we just need to tune in to our feelings and I wasn't giving myself the space to do that. I didn't want to be gay, so I suppressed it and did a pretty bad job at convincing myself that I wasn't. I did myself a lot of damage. I think many of us have this ideal view of the world and if being gay was a choice, I'm pretty sure many of us would not choose it. But it isn't about choices (despite what some people say). Coming out as gay does have risks - the risk of rejection and abandonment is always there and I can't pretend otherwise. Sometimes the fear of a bad reaction leads us to suppress our feelings and true identity for a long, long time, and it is incredibly damaging. Feeling the fear and doing it anyway is the only real option. If/when you decide to come out, choose who to tell and when to tell carefully. Better to build up a support network first, I think. At 17 there really is no rush though. If you need more thinking time, take it and don't put yourself under pressure to come up with definite answers. Let your feelings 'breathe' and guide you.
