I am 24-year-old gay, but I think the way I feel towards other guys maybe a bit weird, some said I don't love them, I just admire them, I am not sure. Case: I have had a crush on 2 charming and sporty guys, one after another, and both ended up to be my best friend, both of them I consider to be superior to me in certain ways, I want to be like them, certain qualities in them I admire so much and wish I can acquire the same qualities. I examined my way of "logic": - I like their qualities, eg manly, daring, adventurous, knowledgeable, bright and cheerful etc - If they like me, I consider we are about the same kind of people - ( Both of them ended up to be my best friend, but I distant myself with the first one after he got married ) - But the need is insatiable, after they become my best friend, I will psychologically yearn for more, although I won't show it and request, eg I would hope to get closer and closer contact, my way of logic, if he can have sex with me, if he can show me whatever that is most private to him, physically or mentally, I would feel that I am valued and important, later I would yearn to be the only one that is valued by him. - If I am valued, I must have the same qualities eg daring, adventurous, knowledgeable, bright and cheerful etc ( birds of a feather flock together kind of mentality ) Therefore, I want him because I want to FEEL I become that kind of person, I even have a certain kind of vanity, whenever I go out with him, I like to be seen, with a subconscious running like " Look, this alpha male is my best friend, so I am great also, you all should envy and feel jealous ". So, is this love? or mere admiration? or I am psycho? Karl
I'm not sure it has a name but it's definitely not love. Don't get me wrong but it sounds like you use these men to make yourself feel superior to those around you. Do you think of how women think of you when you're with them?
Thanks October, that's what I suspect. It is like a hole inside me that I need others to fill that hole for me, and it is insatiable. "Do you think of how women think of you when you're with them?" I would like to know, please enlighten me. ---------- Post added 17th Apr 2012 at 11:33 AM ---------- Some say this is an cannibalistic urge, any remedy?
Okay I'm going to pretend I'm straight for a few moments. From a "straight" girls perspective I think you would just fall in his shadow. She would be drawn to them for the same reasons you are just not seeking the same outcome from the relationship. I think you need some more confidence in yourself. Wether you are seeking the admiration of a guy or girl, you shouldn't feel like you need someone else to give it to you. Besides, what are you going to do when you go on a date and it's just you and one other person? Or even the guy you admire? He is going to see you for all you are and he won't see his admirable qualities carrying you through the evening. I hope that made sense.
Shadow is the word, I do feel the same way. If he lost his qualities, eg at one time he showed that he was such a coward, I would immediately loss my interest in him. I distant my first best friend besides he got married, I also felt at that time I was more competent than him in certain way, which made the leaving easy. Am I such a jerk? But it seems so hard for me to control my feelings. Any advice?
Are you a jerk? Yeah in some ways but you don't mean to be. Advice wise you really need to be more independent. Raise your self esteem. Instead of becoming the admirable one be that from the start. Or just be equal. Find someone that your own admirable qualities mesh with. That way you both benefit from the friendship. It sounds like you were able to leave your first friend easily because you were "done" with him. I wouldn't be so worried about controlling your fellings as I would be changing them. Instead of working so hard and putting so much effort into looking good through someone else, put the effort towards being happy and confident. Right now you seem very unhappy and not very confident, hence you dependanct on others.
October you are so right, I have this 'cannibalistic urge' to swallow him in order to be him. Is this how most gays feel? Confidence issue or it is just me? ---------- Post added 17th Apr 2012 at 12:21 PM ---------- I can leave them whenever I feel I am better than them, because at that time I have nothing to look forward to, so when another better man comes by, I would fall for him again, I don't want to repeat this cycle, I want to settle all these. Yes, it makes me extremely unhappy and psychologically so attached to these people yearning for their approval, I want to break free, just that I cannot control my heart and feeling... ---------- Post added 17th Apr 2012 at 12:33 PM ---------- I am also on the verge of nervous breakdown when the man I love brings a girlfriend home, someone who can have his body suck his cock that I cannot. I feel like she can access to his private part that I have been yearning to touch and feel. The yearning - according to my logic again - is that if he lets me to have a sexual relationship than I feel valued, if not I have no value. You are right, I should not depend my value on him, but oh god why I cannot come out from this???
Hi Karl, It sounds like you've been thinking pretty hard about why you feel the way you do. When you're attracted to someone, I think it's pretty normal to want things to become as intimate as possible, especially when you spend a lot of time with them. It sounds like you're in it pretty deep, though, and I'm unable to relate to the strength of yearning that you have. That said, it might help if you try and think of this in as simple terms as you can-it's very easy to get overwhelmed with problems and complicate them, so maybe you could take a breath, step back and think about the simple facts. How do you feel, how do you want to feel and what things could you do to change these feelings? You seem to focus a lot on how your traits relate to his. Maybe you'd like to think about the redeeming traits that you hold, and the things that you feel proud of yourself about.
Hi Ben, Yes I have been analyzing the way I feel or think, because I need to get a way out from this predicament, it has been torturing me like hell for a year since he has a girlfriend, I was extremely jealous because I cannot get what I wanted so badly. A lot of things I know I should not feel this way or that way, but it seems like I cannot control my urge to be as intimate with him as possible. Contrary to the impressions that you might have after reading my previous posts, he admires me a lot too, he bragged about how good I was to his circles of friends, and brought me to most functions or gathering, so his friends became mine, he told me he was afraid if I leave him, and didn't want to leave him, he even told me I was his source of strength, he told me all his past and little secrets. He would cuddle and have some kinds of body contacts whenever we share the same bed while traveling, and we stayed under the same roof but different rooms, and there were a lot of other kinds of intimacy between us..... but the problem is, strictly NO sex, he regards me as a best friend and he has a girlfriend. Why would a straight guy do and say something so suggestive to another guy? ( I never told him I am gay ), someone told me it is biromantic heterosexual, but anyway, I "love" him so much and cannot stand the sight of him with his girlfriend. So as I put in earlier post, with replies from others, this psychological problem of mine may be lack of confidence in myself -- even though he values me so much as well and share almost everything with me, but this is a hole with insatiable needs, no matter how much he gave me, I still want more to feel good. The problem is ME myself. But I don't know how to get out from this, I have written down all the logic that run in my head, I say I want to focus on myself instead of him, but after a while I would be back to the same old state of yearning for him. It has been swinging back and forth for a year now. I am so tired and want to end this, once and for all, I want to face it directly and deal with it, I don't want to run away, because if I run away I will meet someone and the whole problem will start again. If the problem is ME, I want to settle it without running away. The suggestions from previous posts I find useful are: As you put the following questions, here are my answers: - I feel my whole life brightens up when I am with him, I have no juice of life when he is not around, I am in a torturing hell when he is with someone else intimately. ( I should focus back on myself ) - I actually want to feel like a Real Man, manly, daring, adventurous, bright and cheerful. ( my terrible logic is, he is the kind of person with all these traits, I need his intimacy to confirm me as such ) - What can I do? Focus on myself, be the person I want to be ( but it sooo not easy to keep pretending ). Please HELP. Karl
Ah damn.. I both hate it and love it when I come across someone who can express what I'm feeling better than I can. EC's great. Let me just bore you with my version of the same thing. I have this friend who I used to work with. He's an image of self confidence, he's sickeningly open to the point of literally having no secrets, so direct when it comes to himself and so considerate of others that you just know you can rely on him. Well, confidence and openness are definitely what I am looking for in my life. He's not my type. Physically, I don't find him attractive at all. I don't want to have sex with him, I know that. But I have this irresistible urge, need, to be with him. I get happy and sad, both at the same time, when I see his Skype status go green. I want that he likes me and I yearn for his approval. I want to be with him all the time. And I want that connection to be symmetrical. I have no idea how to make it, how to be special to him. The only seemingly logical course of action is to be more intimate, more close to him. Could I go out of my way to make a stupid favour absolutely disproportionate to the amount of energy spent for it from my side? Oh yes, please! Anything I can. I want to be connected to him, mentally close. So maybe if I just make him feel better? If I cause him pleasure? A massage, fellatio, sex..? If I can get him to let me in his pants, am I then not one of selected few closest to him? .. no. The enormous yearning I feel for him is only as huge as the difference in my image of myself and him. Yes, we have a lot in common and could easily be very good friends, but this is not about that. What I find attractive in him is that which I would like to see in me. I don't find him attractive, but by being close to him, I want to believe I am what I currently am not. There is this other guy, who I do find attractive, painfully so, in emotional, intellectual and physical sense. Now, his pants I want to get into to see what's there I want to hug him because I want to feel him. I want him to touch me. When speaking to him, I don't need to impress him (not for the reason above, anyway, of course I do want him to think highly of me), I just enjoy listening to his voice, watching his face as he talks to me. With the first one, I am never happy, always just feeling the void, something missing. With the other, when I am close to him, I am really simply happy. And with both, I am sad when we part. So I have a huge crush on the second one and I am terribly drawn to the first one. But finally I think I can see the difference. I will not be with any of them, but with the first one I could never be happy anyway. I would never have enough, because physical intimacy is not the goal I seek, it's just the closest relation I can think of. But even if I achieved that, it wouldn't satisfy me. Solution? I don't have one. As I get more comfortable with myself, more sure of myself and more confident, I think I can see the possibility of getting over him and then we will maybe even be able to be just friends, if by then we don't drift apart too much. Sucks. I hope I helped at least so much as I can show that there's someone who can relate to you. Btw, below is an image from A softer world which I think perfectly describes what I mean. Pathetic though it is, I carry it in my wallet to take out when I feel I miss him so much that I want to cry. P.S. Oops, sorry for the monologue.
Thanks Dalmatian for your helpful story. It really is easier to look at others than myself and I definitely can relate to your experience. I need to feel this way real soon, it is more like make or break kind of situation for me at the moment, I am on the verge of nervous breakdown. I really loved your attached image, " It turns out I don't really want to have sex, I guess I just got confused because you're so great! " Thanks for helping! Karl
