How do you reconcile years of hetero sex with La Vita Nuova?

Do you identify as gay now? I really like what you said:

Romantic desire has little or nothing to do with the real person--but is a displacement, an attempt to connect or invent in the other something that cooresponds to something else... something that belongs to your own latent, unrealized desires.

I think this can explain how you fell "passionately in love". I think people often even fall in love with the idea of being in love. Certain ideals (finding someone of the opposite sex who you fall in love with, getting married to them, having children etc.) are so ingrained in our culture that we automatically assume that's what our life is suppose to be like. Maybe you had issues realizing you weren't straight because you had never been exposed to the idea that you could live your life differently. Very few people go "hey, I'm not like everyone else, so I'll just live a totally different life than everybody else".

I myself had no problem reconciling having homoerotic fantasies with being straight... when I was near my mid teens (and the fact that I'm not exactly a Kinsey 6 probably added to that). I guess homosexuality wasn't as accessible a subject when you were growing up as it is today, no?

 

It can be puzzling, I guess. Some people look at it as a new chapter and move forward. Others will be bewildered by it and do a lot of analysis and reflection. It's sort of like there are two different types of people - the "jump in, the water's fine" types and the "test the waters" types, and then some.

 

I've said before that there was a huge difference in my mind between the gay LIFESTYLE, which I saw as clubbing, drugs, promiscuity, brief relationships, no family etc., with my own ORIENTATION, where I found men very attractive and appealing, but off-limits because a straight relationship was the only way to be socially acceptable and as close to "normal" as I could ever feel. The closest I came to bringing the two together was my college roommate, whom I crushed on for 3 years, and if he had ever had any real interest in me, I might well have made the leap 30 years ago. But while we were inseparable during the school year, I ceased to exist on vacations, and was so pathetically naive that I assumed all guys would treat me like that, and really, I gave up based on that single bad experience.

When my wife came on the scene, I thought she was attractive, and kind of crushed on her in some ways, but had no real drive to get together with her when she was single. We were basically girlfriends, I suppose, and I really hope we can eventually move back in that direction once the dust settles. What finally made her exciting and appealing was that she was in a really bad marriage with a total jerk (which probably made me feel she could overlook any emotional distance I might have), and she was actually INTERESTED in me, which very few girls ever were, and our relationship was clandestine and dangerous and exciting. If I had dated guys, I would have lived up to the expectations of all the people over the years who called me a fag with such derision, but by getting together with her, I was such a man that I was stealing some woman away from her husband! I was inventing a reality that didn't actually exist, and I could not sustain. And as the fantasy lost momentum, so did the sex, and the eating and depression ramped up.

Now, of course, I have so completely and enthusiaastically accepted myself as gay that putting on the show seems kind of ridiculous, even though every time I write out portions of the story here, I understand my thought process more and more clearly. I really was a mess of fears and misconceptions. And because I have no real reason in my head to put on the show anymore, it's getting harder and harder to pretend. I'm still holding back a little, of course, since I still have people who need to be told the truth in as sensitive a way as possible, but at this point, I care about what this will do to them, not myself, because I feel like the pretense over the last 51 years of being straight did far more harm to my psyche than coming out ever could.

 

I've heard many formerly closeted guys say things like this. It never made much sense to me, because when you act like this, you think you're giving them the middle finger, but what you're actually doing is letting them bully you into becoming how they want you to be.

 

I disagree that there is such a thing as the gay "lifestyle". All of those things that you mention can be engaged in by someone of any orientation (straight, gay, bi, whatever). Of course they addresses of the clubs they go to might be different, but that's about it

What cannot be engaged in (at least by straight people) is emotional, romantic, and yes sexual connections with someone of the same sex, which is what you describe (correctly) as orientation.

 

It doesn't make sense to me when I look back on it! But when it was happening, it seemed like the only option.

When I was a toddler, I remember watching a bunch of adults throwing stones into a pool and diving in after them. I was not even 3, but I vividly remember thinking it looked like fun, and I wanted to do that too. So I jumped in, and of course nearly drowned and had to be fished out. What I did later wasn't much different. I jumped into something because I liked the way it looked and thought it was what I wanted to do, but I didn't have the experience and maturity and sense to know that I was going to drown. Some of us have to take in more water than others to learn our lesson, I guess.

---------- Post added 16th Aug 2013 at 03:40 PM ----------

Oh, I completely realize that now. But at the time, that was my perception of what being "gay" was. And that terrible misconception really messed me up. I certainly don't want to suggest that I still think that way!

 

True. There are many "lifestyles" a gay person can engage in. It's offensive to suggest clubbing and casual sex is exclusively a gay thing.

 

We have such a desire to know/understand "what we are"...we forget that we're not a finished product; we're a process.

In many of us, our sexualities shift over our lifetime...this is part of what makes many bisexuals assume everybody is bisexual (an assumption I take great issue with, but that's a topic for another thread).

A good friend of mine was bisexual for years and years. Loved sex with both men and women. Had lots of both. Then realized about 5 years ago, y'know what? I can't really call myself bisexual...I'm just really not into men anymore. This kind of thing happens more than you might think.

So if you consider yourself gay now, at least consider the possibility that perhaps you were straight at one point...or maybe bisexual, but never acted on male desires...and that your interest in women has waned. It could come back.

It would be nice if life was so clear-cut that we could confidently state that we're one thing, have always been, and will always be. But no aspect of life is clean. Our memory of what we were is colored by what we are...and we have no clue what will be. So figure out who/what you *are*, and enjoy that to the fullest.

 

Interesting discussion points as I struggle with this now. I don't really understand how I could have been in a hetero relationship for so long. After coming to terms with being gay and meeting a bf, my sexual interest in women completely ceased to point that the idea of sexually relations with a woman frankly now seems gross. The female form which I once thought I found attractive I now find distasteful. The thought of kissing a woman I simply can't stomach. This all from someone who was married and only came out in their 40's. I am so comfortable being 100% gay that I find myself not mentioning that I was ever straight. I know this may sound strange but I would simply prefer people to think I was always gay. I won't lie if asked but I don't mention it all if not. This is issue I am working through but I can't seem to get past it to accept that I was once hetero I just want to forget it. Anyone struggles similar?

 

I think the biggie is that there are people out there that equate "my sexuality shifted" with "I can control my sexuality". The first one happens. The second is BS.

There are details that I simply do not need to get into, but I have a sexuality that makes me incompatible with most straight women even if I find them attractive. I am simply not a "real man", have no interest in being one, and will leave it at that.

I mention it because that sexuality has definitely shifted since coming out. Not toward men. If anything, the more comfortable I am with myself, the less interest in men I have. But what exactly "sex" means when I think about other women has definitely changed.

Then there's the other problems. So let's all be honest. You read me saying "the less interest in men I have". So I had some before right? What went through your head right then? Yeah that's the other thing.

So if you view me as a man, and you hear me saying something like that, you're thinking "okay that's a little suspect". You view me as a woman, and it's just me figuring myself out. What gives? I call that "pressure to be straight" is what I think gives. As long as straight is normal and gay isn't, you'll always have more wiggle room with some things in other people's eyes than others.

So I can explain what I meant. I really feel like a huge part of why things change is because part of our sexuality is us responding to that pressure. I've never been able to find men attractive, but when I did try, I did feel really validated as a women and thought that there might be more to it. And now, I don't. That's what really changed. The pressure left, and with it, my brain stopped trying to make me feel like I should just conform to what my options are.

And I think that happens with all of us. A gay man in a relationship with a woman is going to have a lot of pressure on them to conform to being straight that a gay man in a relationship with a man will have. And part of that pressure I really feel goes all the way down to survival. I think at some point we feel like "okay, if this is going to cause THAT many problems, we'll just give him a straight fantasy or two".

That's what I feel makes this stuff so hard to figure out for people. When someone says "what's my orientation" I read "what's my orientation if I were on a desert island and found a genie". In real life you just can't make all the pressure and other people's opinions go away.

 

I craved, wanted, desired intimacy. That was wonderful with women. And in that context, the sex was sometimes mind blowing, other times, well, there were those thoughts about guys at the same time.

Being the "good gay boy" -- I bought virtually every handbook on sex with women there was. I recently cleaned out my closets (ha ha!), and found 17 books on hetero sex (GONE NOW!). I studied hard, played hard. I can tell you that the women I slept with had a great time. I got lots of pleasure knowing that I was giving them pleasure.

I just didn't get the pleasure that I would have liked from hetero sex. I am SO working on that now with men ]:-> I have to admit, there are still times when I feel like I'm more of the pleasure giver than getting what I want during gay sex. Habits die hard.

Just will say, I need no books on gay sex. Completely, totally, fully natural. Wowza.

 

Ha ha this is me too, PeteNJ! I actually studied how to be the best hetero lover I could be. What I found is that I am "in tune" with women like no other man (supposedly). Well yes, that might be because I think I actually should BE a woman! But the man who tries and actually cares about how his partner enjoys intimacy is the man in demand. And that just confuses the hell out of a man who is closeted and searching for the way to be authentically gay.

It really confused the hell out of me when my wife had an issue with me wanting men because she was so taken care of sexually and also had the best, most understanding "girlfriend" she could ever have (even though I acted the man part and only admitted to bi).

 

Boy can I relate to the distance you speak of. If that went away some day, I would be thrilled! I'm just beginning to question my sexuality, so I do often wonder if that distance is because I've been holding back. In some cases I know it is. Like when my female friends hug each other or say "I love you." It always makes me uncomfortable because I feel that they (obviously) mean it in a very platonic way, and I've always feared that if I did those things back, they would notice that perhaps I didn't mean it in a platonic way. And so I kept my distance.

As for the other question, I've been pondering a lot how exactly my sexuality in the past could be so different from my desires now. I'm not sure if I'm bi or a lesbian, but in either case I'm shocked looking back that I didn't at least experiment with women. I have many thoughts on it. For me, I feel like I did have genuine crushes on men. I didn't really know much about being bi, I assumed that there was only gay or straight. And well, I liked a boy, so that answered that. I must be straight. I swept all other feelings about women under the rug. I think I also assumed that ALL girls had some sexual thoughts about other girls. And if I believed that even straight women were turned on by other women, then there was no contradiction. Looking back though, there are so many signs. I'm still puzzled by how I overlooked all these little signs. One that comes to mind now is when a male friend of mine confided in me that his girlfriend had cheated on him with another woman. I should have felt sympathy for him, but my main thoughts were of jealousy towards his girlfriend. I was jealous that his girlfriend could just run around sleeping with women with no concern for who found out. And that she was able to find women to sleep with at all. I mean, how did that not make me think "hmmm, maybe I like women."

 

I actually figured it out somewhat earlier than most of those posting in this thread - 19 or 20 - but I had assumed I was heterosexual up until that point. And it wasn't that I was deluding myself, or pretending to be something I wasn't. It was just that my libido was apparently strong enough to push me along. I didn't find women gross or anything - they just sort of were...there. None of them really caught my eye, none of them made me hornier than any others. What little straight porn I managed to see was mainly softcore - so mainly just "naked women standing around" - and it turned me on only in the sense that "this is what is around you when sex happens". Associative, mainly. Even now, rather tame softcore straight porn can make me horny (because I associate it with my adolescence and "this is what sex is") even though anything more hardcore doesn't do a thing for me. So the idea of dating and having sex with women wasn't a turn-off for me, but I was confused that I didn't seem to "click" with any of the women I was getting to know.

When I first "discovered" guys, if you will, it was like...well, it was like a lot of things. It was like when a baseball batter takes the weight off his bat, and suddenly he can swing like a pro. It was like kicking off weighted boots and finding I could run like the wind. It was like what used to be a static-y signal picked up with a rabbit-ear antenna was now being played on DVD. I was still horny and wanting to have sex...but in a much more complete way. It all made SENSE, for the first time.

Lex

 

^^^^^^^^++++++++++++

Said perfectly Lex!

 

Every word here is absolutely true. My life in a nutshell!

 

Except that you both returned...YAY!!