Confused...

Hi Jrparch, welcome to EC and thanks for starting this thread. I'm going to reply only to a couple of portions of your post, the ones which I have first hand experience.

1) I understand the wall. I've had one my whole adult life. I married and have kids. I never felt that I 'belonged' with them, always apart.

2) I have always found the male body very attractive, in my case much more so then the females. But I never allowed those thoughts any time out in the sun. I only entertained them when i was alone. I didn't at the time understand what I was feeling or why I was feeling it.

3) I found my 'right girl', but our relations was a harder one then most straight couples we knew. What i mean by harder is our sex life. I really had to work at it, she didn't understand why it was so hard for us.

4) I only used the male form for j/o. I never explored having ANY kind of relationship with a man beyond that.

Now, since coming out to myself, these items have all changed for me:
1) I know why I felt apart. I was gay and trying to live a straight life. You can't do that without sacrificing part of yourself, hence the feelings of 'otherness' or standing apart from everyone.

2) I hid my fantasies away. I didn't think of them outside of my horny times and just thought that i was kinkier and kind of weird. I'm not, I'm a normal gay man, with normal gay man fantasies.

3) I married and had kids trying to fit into a stereotype which is clearly not me. Being gay meant it was harder to ramp the drive to have hetero sex, not impossible, just harder. It also made ANY
excuses not to have sex really easy, and I didn't care if we went 3-6 months without any.

4) Coming out has made the thought of being in a relationship with a man really possible. It's no longer a 'bad' thing. Its right and natural and I WANT IT.

hope this helps you a bit:eusa_clap

 

I know I'm a bit younger than you, but I used to feel the same way about emotional/physical attraction. After a while, I started thinking on it more, trying it out in my head, you know? Pretty sure I would date a guy over a girl any day, now.

 

Hey, welcome to EC. This place really helped me in coming to terms with my sexuality, and then "coming out" so I hope you find it helpful too.

I could relate to some of what you said so I'll try offer some of my own experience. I too was insanely confused about my sexuality for a long time, I've only recently become comfortable calling myself gay. I was confused because, even though I knew inside I was attracted to the male body, and not sexually attracted to females, I could never ever see myself going out with another guy. It seemed weird......but I guess we shouldn't be surprised that we meet the idea with some resistance. Growing up we are exposed to a very straight world, society tells us that if we are male we will go out with girls, we will get married etc etc. So its only natural to find being with another guy in a relationship weird. I did. But I don't now. Over time (and time is very often the key) my internal resistance to the notion of being with another guy was breaking down as I accepted myself more and more. Now it doesn't feel weird at all, it feels natural. Because it is natural.

Another thing that confused me was sometimes feeling romantically attracted to girls. I'd feel like I'd want to go on a date with them or something, I liked the "romantic" idea of hanging out with them, going to the cinema, getting to know them and all that, but I've never felt like wanting to have sex with them. And therein lay the problem. I realised that these emotional attachments were often exaggerated, I simply liked these girls as I do any other friends. I didn't want to be physically involved with them, at least I had no urge to. In contrast I feel physically attracted to some males, and it was shaking off the guilt that I associated with those feelings that finally made me come to terms with being gay.

Don't be ashamed or embarrassed that you're still not sure, it often takes time to work it out. But it will work out. Try not to keep repressing feelings because they won't go away. I tried ignoring them too, but its not something you can change. You don't even need to tell anyone but try to gradually open your mind to what you truly, naturally, feel. Instead of being ashamed, try to see it as just another part of your nature, another part of being a rounded, complex human being. As I said, if you allow yourself to be open, with yourself at least, you will gradually come to accept yourself. You've already made the first step in writing all of this down, that takes courage and strength. Writing things down, after keeping them stored in your head for years, really helped me and I'm sure it'll help you too

 

Within the past year or so, I looked back at what I wrote in my diary in 2004, where I had written something along the lines of "I'd only be interested in men for sex, not a romantic relationship, so I shouldn't say I'm gay, because I get on with this girl, and that could be fun". I was actually fooling myself then; even if there wasn't a particular boy I fancied right then, and there were a few girls around the same time that I did, I had had crushes on boys before then.

What I'm getting at is that your experience isn't at all uncommon. It took me till 22 that it all made sense to me, how to put what feeling I had for girls in the right perspective.

You ask about coming out, and what people will think of the fact that you seemed to be living a lie. I think people understand that for you, it wasn't necessarily a lie, it was how you made sense of things for you then. When I did come out, the first few people were to other gay people, some of whom had been out in our social group for quite a few years. But there weren't critical, they understood. People get that when there's an expectation that boys like girls, just from the culture, from any number of children's cartoons and programs (apart from a few more recently like Glee), people can easily make the mistake of thinking that being gay is something out there, not something that pertains to them.

Given that you're thirty and haven't been in a long-term relationship, it's quite likely that some people have begun to suspect. All the better then really, it will mean that it will be easier for them if you decide to come out. At the least, it will explain why you hadn't had too many relationships before now. It was that way with me. Few had thought I was gay, but it made sense for them once I came out.

Don't rush into anything, make sure you think carefully about who to tell first, as you'd like it to be someone who'll give you the time to talk through things up to now for you a bit. And take the time here to engage with people. There really is a lot of similarity in many people's stories, particularly, I think, those who come out after the age of 20, after thinking that they aren't quite gay enough, and then realize they are.

So good luck and take care!

 

It's not at all uncommon for us to feel a stronger emotional/romantic pull towards women than towards men. This is in part because women tend to be more emotionally open and so it's easier for us to form emotional bonds with them. This does not mean you are incapable of forming a romantic attachment to a man, just that it hasn't happened to you yet, which considering your being so closeted is pretty understandable.

I've had several crushes on girls, and only two serious crushes on guys. This isn't because I'm not all that gay, but rather because it was easier for me to form emotional bonds with girls.

 

I'd echo what everyone above has said. I'd also add that I am just starting to come out and I'm in my late twenties.

One of the biggest things I was afraid of - perhaps terrified of - was that I was so old and other people would judge me. For what it's worth, I've shared these fears with a lot of people in my social circle - both gay and straight - and they almost laugh it off. They understand my concern, but they also understand how difficult this can be AND that this is not atypical. A lot of people are coming out much earlier in life, and you tend to read a lot about them online. That's great, but remember that even 10 years ago we were growing up in a much different environment. In fact, since talking to people, I was shocked to find out how many other people around my age came out much later in life - as in late twenties / early thirties. So you're not alone.

The questioning phase you are going through is also very difficult. I remember wanting so badly for someone to tell me whether I was gay or not, but it really has to be something you figure out. I think, for me, I kept over-analyzing everything - I had dated (a few) girls, so how could I be gay? I wanted a wife and kids, so how could I be gay? etc... but I found that when I started accepting the idea that I just might be gay, I was better able to go with my heart. And then I knew. So resist the temptation to rush and come to an immediate decision. If you're 30 and are gay, it is going to take some time for your mental side to let go of everything society has taught you regarding relationships over the past 30 years.

 

this is what we're all here for. First to get help for ourselves and then in turn to help others.

 

I think I can sum things up by destroying the notion of a "love orientation." I don't believe there is such a thing...love is just love. You're already half there. Date some guys and see if they're really your cup of tea. If you got sexual attraction to men, chances are you'll find some guy you'll fall in love with as well if you just don't block yourself from doing so.