Context: For context, I am a 19-year-old who has just finished my first year at university. For my first year, I have been living in student accommodation. On my floor, there is about 15 of us. The majority of us have become close. Obviously, as we're in university we do the usual uni/college student stuff; get drunk and go out (less so for me but I still too out to hangout). Anyway, over the year I have also grown apart from someone I thought I loved for reasons I would say are logical... That is that I don't feel like we have anything in common anymore, plus he is someone who is very sexual and me... not so much. Problem #1: Can I feel romantic attraction? To phrase this question another way; is what I’m feeling normal. That is to say that I while I am able to somewhat easily decide who I like and who I don’t like as a person and who I feel physical attraction to, I don’t feel like I would be able to make the leap from that to romantic attraction should the time come. At the moment, I’ve chalked it up as a fear of commitment (that is to say, I have plans for my future which I don’t want to ruin because of a relationship with someone who might not stick with me throughout the whole thing anyway if that makes sense?). However, I have/ had two flat mates who both in terms of personality and physical appearance I find attractive. Had they been bi or gay I would probably have tried to get their attention somehow. But as they are not I don’t want to do that. However, something occurred to me; these two guys are probably the best two friends I’ve met in a while (with the exception of one other) however even if I had become boyfriends with either one of them, how would I know that what I was feeling was love and not some motions that was masquerading as love (if that makes sense?). It’s not something that is unheard of for me. In fact, it was very much something like that with my first crush. I am a firm believer that attraction does evolve into love. However, how can I stop myself from believing I’m mistaking one form of attraction for another? I suppose in short; how can I tell that what I’m feeling is ROMANTIC love and not SEXUAL ATTRACTION/ BLIND PHYSICAL ATTRACTION? Problem#2: As a homosexual have you ever felt that you’ve alienated yourself? On a subject which I’ve recently thought about in relation to these same two guys. In a group of your straight friends, have you ever thought that you cannot interact with each other in the same way that all your other friends interact with each other do? For example, those two guys I mentioned before and one other used to wrestle with each other or make flirtatious comment to each other when they lay in each other’s beds with them. However, I don’t feel like I could even lay in the bed for fear of it being mistaken that I have a serious crush on them (which I fear would then cause alienation from the person). I suppose another way to explain my fear is in the words of a guy who lived on my floor until recently “Had you been straight, it would have been okay because I would have known it was a joke but because you’re gay you can’t”. How do you deal with this, if you’ve noticed it at all in your life?
