In short, I used to identify as gay, but after more than a decade i'm feeling different as the result of a sea change in the quality and depth of my closest relationships. I'd love to hear from anyone at all who struggles with coming out as straight? I feel quite alone. The full story below. My parents divorced when i was younger (9) and I lived primarily with my mom. and I was left to age with very little male guidance. I used to be terrified of spending time with men, I was afraid of them, deeply. I always bonded with women easily. I was teased a little bit in school and went through puberty late, but was sort of in the popular crowd by graduation and elected president of my school, and even went to prom with the most beautiful girl in school. The thing is when I was playing fighting video games, especially when i picked the more muscular bodied character, I would get an erection. I was so stimulated by the masculine form and I was just a waif. For years I hid this attraction and I would masterbate to muscular men online. I would get erections looking at pictures of them. And so, I was embarrassed by it so i hid it from everyone. After some difficult soul searching, I finally had the courage to come out as gay at 19, dated a guy in college for about a year. My mom was not supportive and we didn't talk for years, but my dad was. I figured this was my path and I had to own my sexual interest in men. Plus I dated this really handsome guy with an amazing body and we had a lot of fun together, travelled together. I was never really into the sex, he wanted me to dominate him and I wasn't really interested. Although we were very close, I ended the relationship after 9 months. It didn't feel right anymore. He was devastated. I quickly dated several men, all of whom were sort of borderline unstable or generally just "off" personalities. But I thought it was my duty to find a boyfriend, I was gay. During this time I lived with all girls. And I started questioning my sexuality, especially because I became close with this girl who was my roommate, Lauren. She and I especially enjoyed each other and one night I crawled into her bed, cozied up to her, and surprisingly I had an erection when I brought myself close to her. Which was again, a total surprise to me. I was embarrassed and I didn't want her to see it, I was nervous what to do with it. Something in me told me not to discuss it with her, myself and just let it pass. I then took my first professional job out of college (22 y/o). I stopped dating all together, for like 4 years, no sex. And during this time, I grew apart from my old friends, and family. I started to act more responsible, grown up. I grew away from my parents and lost close friendships from my childhood. I worked too hard. Emotionally this took a toll on my which i'm still recovering years later. As this first job ended (26 y/o), I started to confide in my roommate, who I knew I liked for some time. I just didn't realize I wanted more from him. We would talk for hours in the living room about friendships we had lost. and it was wonderful to have someone to confide in, who lived with me, and i felt a special closeness to him. He was more able to understand me than my father even, and after several night with hearts pounding while talking to one another, i made a move. I crawled into his bed. And we ended up forming a relationship, which lasted 4 years. He had never dated a guy before and I felt like I needed to show him something. We were very close. We broke up last year. After building a house together, planning a life together and both being dominate and submissive with one another, it became clear that we were not compatible. Other friends I had met their future husbands and wives, dated and were married in that same 4 years we were together. I still felt like i was searching for stable ground with this guy. It never felt right. I was working a lot again, professionally and started a new job months before the breakup. My new boss was a little older than me, she was a marathon runner and I could see a sparkle in her eye. I never bring up my sexuality at work but it became clear that she thought i was straight and single. She wanted to connect me to her lawyer friend, she wanted to know what I was doing on the weekends, she wanted to know personal and private details of my life. Eventually she favored me over others, which created problems for me and my team, and I decided the position was too uncomfortable and left. When i told her I was leaving, she cried. And I think she had a crush on me. And I started to question what signals I was sending out that led to this end. It was this moment, I had just turned 30, that I started really questioning myself. What was I? Who was I? This was just about the time my mother decided to divorce her second husband. OF course I rushed to her side to support her. And we had a heart to heart about her husband, who i never liked, but she always seemed to support. Sometimes she supported him over me, which was really hard to deal with. But seeing her so angry with him for being unfaithful, it validated my feelings toward him, that I had felt for 20 years! She had never been honest with me about him. And now, it became clear that she was sort of using him. money. support. and I unfortunately thought less of my mother but also into the psyche of someone who has to resort to such tactics to survive. It was truly a game changer. I knew that the love I saw was fake, and her intentions with him were less than pure. And I felt badly for her, and for me, being a little boy growing up with this sort of family. It made me so sad. My father had also recently divorced his second wife. My family was tearing up again, from both sides. I really liked my step mom, who has a heart of gold and now she was going to be left behind forever by my father. Given this turmoil, I was really challenged emotionally. I had saved enough money to just stop working and take a break. I was holding it together pretty well still and some friends asked me to marry them, which i thought such a burden. Why me? I've only seen marriage fail! But I really cared for these friends so I put my own feelings aside, got ordained online and researched how to write a wedding ceremony. I became really close with these friends in talking with them about what marriage means. I married them on a beautiful day overlooking the sea. And actually this created a shift within me. I actually became so close with them, I moved in with them for 9 months after breaking up with my last boyfriend of 4 years. I was a mess underneath it all. I could hardly get out of bed some days. But i gave myself time to just be. I became a bartender through another friend. And i hated serving women. Especially the ones who were sexy and expected something because they had boobs. I had no tolerance for them. I realized that I was hating my mother. I started therapy and all this anger came out about my mother. I realized I had an enormous amount of embedded anger under my sugar coated surface. And I had never let it out, nor did I have a mechanism to express it. It destabilized me deeply. Eventually, I had to draw the line with both of my parents, i realized i hated them for destabilizing my life, over and over. I was angry at them for creating so much turmoil in my life. The instability of their failed marriages really fucked with me. I was tired of their shortcomings, their failures and felt i needed to protect myself from their lives. They were both single now and more interested in themselves than my life. They needed support. I've alway been one to give it. So I said fuck it! I'm tired of supporting people who can't make lifelong relationships works. I don't want to be influenced by these types of people. And I've effectively cut off my parents, both mom and dad. And it's really really hard. I miss parts of them, but the parts I miss aren't even around anymore. My mom is dating again and she's lost a ton of weight, does not look good. My dad is so unattached from his "center" that he thinks he'll travel to cuba one minute and then buy a sailboat and sail to thailand the next. He is a dreamer. They both are very manipulative. So I said fuck it! With the guidance of my therapist I drew a very strong boundary. Any communication is now on my terms. Meanwhile I've cultivated good mutually beneficial relationships with my uncles, aunts and friends i married last summer. But I'm desperate. I work out everyday. I eat well. I try and enjoy my life more, I work part time and still have enough money saved to just get through each day without focusing on a job. I have a wonderful dog. A beautiful house. I have a couple good old friends I see occasionally. But i'm desperate for a relationship. I want to love and be loved back. The thing is, after all this instability, I really want to be straight and I'm getting indications that I think I am. By carving away all this pain and emotional instability, by pushing away these manipulative parents and pulling in people who really seem to care for me, I feel more security and love myself more. I feel like I could manage a relationship soon. And I want to be open to a relationship with a man or a woman. But i've found my center, more confidence, more clarity and I think I want femininity in my life. I am a man and I'm strong. I'm active, I like things that guys do. I don't feel like my soul would be complete with another man. Although I love men, I've been able to understand men so much better than most of my friends, in an intimate way. I really enjoy hanging out with guys and the care and tenderness between my friends and me is very supportive. But we can also tell dirty nasty jokes and call each other out on bullshit. In no way are these relationships sexual. I feel like i'm just finally supported by a strong group of men. I've been avoiding female friends all together. And so, last week my old roommate from college, lauren, who I think I liked. I got a boner for her in bed that one time and didn't know what to do. Anyway, she wished me a happy birthday. It's been 10 years. We stay in touch from time to time but she called me and we talked for 90 minutes about her breaking up with her boyfriend. She cried and I tried to listen and help. Anyway, I'm interested in her. She's super smart and really active. She lives 2 states away but I fantasize about spending time with her. It brings peace to myself, a calm, just thinking about her. And she's so beautiful too. Her smile makes me smile deep down inside myself. So i've been just allowing my mind to become comfortable with feeling sexually charged by women. It's strange because it's nothing like a sexual charge for men. There is no competition involved. I find it so erotic to know that I could temp, tease, pulse, toy with a woman's delicate body until she squirms and squeals. Until she cries out. Until she can't wait for more of me inside her, outside her, loving her, feeling deeply loved by her. This even gives me a half typing this. I just don't know though. Most of my long term relationships have been with men. I'm 32 and I thought I was gay for the past 12 years. Now I'm feeling like I will live my life with a woman. And it's ok. I just wondered if anyone else has had these thoughts or feelings. I feel quite isolated. Thanks for reading.
First of all, you don't really need to label yourself if you don't want to. Second of all, if you are going to label yourself, that's fine but you should at least understand the labels and find the right one for you. From what I read, you are not straight. A person can't simply go from being gay to being straight. I think the word you are looking for is bisexual. Bisexual is where you can be sexually and romantically compatible and attracted to both males and females. It's not always a 50/50 thing either. It's a spectrum that you can fall anywhere on. Being gay means that you are only sexually and romantically attracted to the same gender, while being straight means that you are only sexually and romantically attracted to the opposite gender. A person's sexual orientation does not change over time, but a person may think they are one sexual orientation at one point, only to later find out that they are a different sexual orientation. If you liked guys before and had relationships with guys before, especially the type you said you did, than you are definitely not straight. Wanting to be with a female now, doesn't make your past feelings about guys non-existent or fictional. So you are probably bisexual or maybe even pansexual. Either way, you aren't straight, and that's okay. Also, I read that you said you really want to be straight, but sexual orientation doesn't work like that. Its' not a choice or a switch, but since you seem to also be able to be with girls, that means that you can choose whether you want to be with a guy or girl. It's your heart that will ultimately decide, but you can at least start walking in the direction you want to go in. So now that all of that is cleared up, just remember that labels are only applicable if you want them to be. You can be with a girl and call yourself straight, but you won't actually be straight. That doesn't matter though. You don't go with a gender for a label/title. You go for the person. So don't worry about labels/titles so much, and only come out if you feel like it. If you do come out using a label though, make sure that you use the right one. Hope this helps.
Hmm, I'm in no position to tell you what you are, especially considering I was in a similar position not too long ago. If I may play "pop psychologist" for a moment, perhaps a part of you wants to "right" the wrongs of your parents? It would give you another incentive, if you previously identified as something other than straight. The fact that you've found your past experiences with men to be unsatisfactory, while seeing the "successes" of your friends and their marriages might also play a part. Maybe you feel like you're getting older, and having to catch up? I think sexuality is less black-and-white than most people would like to believe, with most people falling somewhere between "100% straight" and "100% gay", with plenty of diversity within those two populations. It's clear that you're attracted to men on a sexual level, and even romantic, since very few completely straight people could be convinced to be in a four year relationship with someone of the same-sex. Your motivation for having a relationship with a female friend seems to be to want to "be there" for them, and less for that raw, sexual urge a lot of straight guys feel (or even what you described as masturbating to men online; again, many straight guys would have had their first sexual leanings towards the opposite sex, more so since it's more accessible, and even encouraged). One boner, or even a couple, really don't mean much - cold wind can make many young men "excited". They shouldn't be treated like goals to be reached. They shouldn't feel forced. You wouldn't have to "allow" yourself to become comfortable with the idea of being sexually attracted to women, unless you experienced some severe trauma that prevented you from getting close, but even then... I'm sure those automatic, sexual responses would still be present. And it definitely wouldn't create attraction towards same-sex members. I've known heterosexuals who have wished they were gay, whimsically, but it never goes further, because for them, the attraction just isn't there. Ditto for those who have experimented, but found it not to their liking. Anyway, I don't think coming out as straight is necessary, since most people would already assume you were (unless you were super campy, flamboyant, or butch, in the case of women)! Heterosexuality is seen as the default, and most people don't even feel a strong connection to their sexuality - it just is, and they assume most people are just like them. Bisexuality isn't like some on-off switch people seem to think it is. Tell someone they couldn't be attracted to one of their "types" and see how that goes. If you were to enter a relationship with a woman, it would only be fair to tell her of your past, as it would only lead to *huge* problems down the road, and considering that's what you're trying to avoid, leaving you in a worse place than the one you started.
gravechild - super helpful commentary. thanks for your insights, it means a lot. Just to be heard through this complexity. I have faith the right outcome will bubble up from my soul. just the simple act of publicly communicating about these issues continues to be effective. I'm going to let your words sink in a bit over time, but wanted to thank you again, for your insights, you are good a this! shadowspirit - thanks for the time you spend responding to me. I appreciate it.
