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Feeling like a fraud?

Discussion in 'LGBT Later in Life' started by TheStormInside, Jun 27, 2015.

  1. TheStormInside

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    Does anyone else ever feel this way? I ask this in the "later in life" section because I suspect for those of us who have or are in the process of figuring out our orientations at a later age, perhaps it challenges the concepts of ourselves we've already formed in our teen and earlier adult years.

    I still feel that being gay is very new to me, and sometimes I feel very surreal, and almost like there's "me now" and "me before." Sometimes I find myself instead of making sure I do not come off as gay, as I often did in the past, try to make sure I now do not come off as straight. It's a strange shift.

    I sometimes feel like I'm lying, or that I'm putting on a show, when I present myself as gay. But I know I'm attracted to women, and that is not a lie. Am I just struggling with coming to terms with this new part of my "identity"? Has anyone else felt this way, and if so how did you start to feel more genuine and at ease?
     
  2. wisefolly

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    I feel the same way but for different reasons.

    I've known I was gay since I was 11 but haven't really "come out" to anyone other than a few friends. I had to hide it during high school, which was just a hellish experience since I didn't want to face rejection or hostility. I thought things would change in college but when I reached out to someone in my campus's GSA (someone I had known in high school) he never e-mailed me back. I thought maybe the e-mail had gotten lost but I realized that wasn't the case when I ran into him not long after and he sure as hell recognized me, and just as surely turned and walked away from me. I still have no idea what the hell that was all about but joining the GSA was out of the question after that.

    At the same time my best friend, like the one friend who helped me get through high school, expressed his frustration at my not coming out completely (he was gay too, and out) and eventually he just stopped talking to me altogether. Years of friendship were gone just like that. I thought things would get better with a new school and stuff but I still stayed quiet about it because people would randomly say ignorant or homophobic things, and I really didn't want to be the ONE gay guy they knew. I did try to reach out to gay folks on campus not through any groups but online, but even then it was either put downs about being closeted or a meat market (I'm no prime choice apparently). I did befriend a few people but by and large I just kept to myself.

    Even after college it was the same thing. Any gay folks I met either looked down at me for not being out or they were only looking for hookups. Even online I made friends with other "closeted" people and helped be a friend to them. They would eventually come out and then they'd just be too busy to keep in contact after that.

    So I feel like a fraud within the gay community because my experiences aren't that of everyone else's, and now also within the "straight community" because now they're getting married and having kids and I'm just kinda there.

    I'm tempted not post this because it doesn't really offer any kind of advice but I figure if you at least knew someone else felt kinda sorta the same way it might help.
     
  3. BlueEyes321

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    I stated in a previous post of mine that when I was 35 I cut my long, beautiful hair off. It's short now, shaved on the sides, kinda like ruby rose, lol. To my friends and family this was a big change that became accepted and normal. My kids think it's hipster and cool. But, to strangers who don't know me I appear gay and I love it. It feels right when im out at a bar or restaurant and everyone thinks I'm gay. Although not fully out to loved ones this odd gesture of cutting my hair and feeling the way I was meant to be is empowering and gives me hope that maybe someday when I completely come out it will be ok. im sure you have always had the attraction for women, that's not the new part. The new part is making others aware. Your not Putting on a show, your simply ready to show the world something you've probably always felt.
     
  4. Monraffe

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    It's understandable when people who spend a lot of time posing as someone they are not never have a chance to get in touch with who they really are. The common thread in LGBTQ is the right to self determination, and that's great and all, but how does having that right help people actually determine who you are? It doesn't. It just gives them the right to make those choices. Don't get me wrong, it's wonderful that the LGBTQ movement has come as far as it has, but we still have some work to do to help people feel okay with the exploration process. Not everyone is celebrating at the finish line when they finally come out and we need to stop expecting them to be.
     
  5. greatwhale

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    To challenge "the concepts of ourselves" that we formed in our youth is to challenge our ego and the self that it created.

    There may be another way to look at this: try the thought-experiment that you, your "self", is actually a performance, or, to say it another way, your performing self is suddenly aware of your performance as a performance.

    By becoming aware of a desire for members of the same sex, a desire that you had no say in creating, you became aware that your former "self" was a performance (a fraud, perhaps; not the "real" you), and yet now, in your new incarnation, you still feel this fraudulence.

    But maybe, what you have picked up along with the realization of your actual sexual orientation, is a sense that there is no underlying geological bedrock under the performing self, that in a real sense you are your performance. You played straight before, now you play gay...only this time you are aware that it is something you are playing.

    All the more disconcerting is that it doesn't matter whether or not there is a core self! What you are living with now is the profound side-effect of the dissolution of your straight ego. The concept of yourself as you were before no longer exists and this ego-dissolution has allowed you to peer beneath the veil, like discovering The Wizard of Oz behind the curtain, you can no longer un-see that the self is first and foremost all in your head...

    So, then, what exactly does it mean to live authentically? You may deem that your current performance is something that you are still rehearsing, but that nevertheless feels closer to the truth and that it is in greater harmony with your desire...perhaps that is the best we could ever hope for!
     
  6. 50ishandout

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    For 50 years I played the "Straight" guy. Now that I'm Coming Out all of a sudden my character is the "Gay" guy. The problem is when I played the Straight guy I knew that I was just playing a character. Now that it's for real that I'm the Gay guy I don't know how to play that character.

    I never relished the Straight dating scene. Now that I'm Out, at 51 the Gay dating scene is even more difficult. Most Gays that I know are either in a committed relationship or to young to run with.

    It's not easy, but it's a lot better than living a lie.
     
  7. womaninamber

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    All I can offer is sympathy. I feel the same way. And I always feel like if I told people the whole story (including that I've never really been with a woman) they wouldn't accept me. Which means sometimes I tell that to people because I feel like I'm fooling or tricking them if I don't. I don't mean I just blurt it out in totally inappropriate situations, I've got more social skills than that, but still... I totally feel like a fraud. Some of this is my own mental issues but I think a large part of it is that lack of experience. I'm really not sure if I'll ever meet a woman I can be with though so it's rough.

    I feel a little more at ease now than I used to though, so I think there is hope (for all of us, not just me!)
     
  8. paris

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    I'd say that after so many years of pretending to be someone we're not we just don't know how to be truly ourselves. The way people think, the beliefs of society can weigh heavily on us. All of us have been told what's considered wrong and right and it makes us believe we have to hide our true selves and keep our light inside for fear of being "different". Therefore we learn to ignore our instincts, do not follow our heart's desire and forget how to live genuinely. The constraint to be "normal" and the pressure of what other people might think of us work like a very bad prison that we need to gradually learn how to break out of. It's not easy to do but it's definitely not impossible. (*hug*)
     
  9. bi2me

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    I kind of feel like that too. Being bi, no matter what kind of long term relationship I were in could potentially erase that identity, but particularly being in a straight marriage, I feel very hidden. Since I'm still mostly closeted, some days this doesn't feel so bad, but other days it does. I'm trying hard to be out with my opinions and values and that helps... A bit...
     
  10. Billy the kid

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    Yes I feel that way, I have stayed in the closet keeping myself straight acting for years. All my friends are straight and I have developed my own straight identity. Now I feel that I don't even fit into the gay scene at all. I guess by staying in the closet all those years I kind of brainwashed myself into being straight. So I think it took all those years to develope the personality of who I'm not. How long will it take to develope who I really am? Does your sexually really determine how you act? I think I am the same person I have always been, I have the same hobbies, have the same habits and so on. So how do you change? Do you really have to? I do struggle with it, I feel like a stranger in a strange land. I feel like I don't even know who I am anymore. You can get caught up thinking about what you need to do to act gay. When you find yourself doing that just step back and take a break from it. Breathe, you don't have to fit into a stereotype. If there was a pie chart for life, your sexuality would only be one small sliver of that, don't make it the whole pie. Just be yourself and take it day by day and do the things that make yourself happy.
     
  11. Logan40

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    Yeah, this is part of my questioning process. I certainly don't feel like I fit in with the gay female culture and doing so isn't really important to me, I just happen to find women attractive and am coming to terms with the fact that I've not ever wanted to pursue a sexual relationship with a man outside of when I felt more pressure to when I was younger. I felt a bit more hopeful though the other day when I stopped by a pride event geared toward women and there seemed to be other female couples that looked like me (30's-40's and more feminine presenting scale of things). Also, in my head I'm imagining when, or if, I tell my friends depending on how this all plays out, that if they buy me a Melissa Etheridge CD, I'll beat them with it :wink:

    I agree with the poster who states that your sexuality is part of the pie chart of your life, and that doesn't look the same for everyone.