Does that mean I'm Fated?

[davidjh7]

I know I am late to the discussion, and as far as most of the ideas, I can't add much. My own experience mirrors yours, though. Coming to terms with being gay in this world is not easy--it never has been. The world view, despite the fact that homosexuality occurs in every species on the planet, is that homos are bad, evil creatures hated by God and man. Who would willingly choose to be part of this group? The point is, we are who we are. We are shaped by many forces, bilogical and mental and emotional and social. Most of the things that shaped us at our core are things we had no control or choice in. I fouht accepting my own sexuality until I was 31. Mulitple suicide attempts, because of the self hate that society imposed on me for what I felt. I reached my crisis, and finally accepted myself. Did my life get any easier? No. Did I suddenly get lots of boyfriends clamoring for my attention? No. Did gold fall from the sky to make me richer? No. But what DID happen, was that I stopped hating myself for being gay. I accepted that my desires were well and truly there, and not changable. I am technically Bi, but most of my emeotional feelings are towards guys. Does that mean that the attraction to some women goes away? Of course not. I guess I am either too much on the gay side of the eqation, or too lazy to pursue being fully Bi. That takes a great deal of work and commitment for everyone involved. BUt the only way you have a chance of being happy with yourself, and your life, is to just BE yourself, for yourself. Loving yourself takes as much work as loving someone else, but you are the most deserving of that work. DOn;t worry about lables, or anybody elses ideas or perceptions. We have to live in the world, along with the other multiple billions of idiots and their opinions, but we don;t have to buy into anybodies but our own. First step is learn to LIKE yourself, just as you are. Then love yourself. THen others will love you for you as well. And as far as your sexuality? When the person you desire and want to love comes along, love them with all your might, no matter what their sex is. Your sexuality will take care of itself at that point. And that is the only time when your sexuality really matters, anyway. Life is damned hard. It isn;t for pussies. Do your very best not to pile any more shit on yourself, than the world gives you already. You're a good man. Learn to believe it!!!

 

[headbang8]

Sorry to come late to the discussion. Plenty of wise words have been written. Let me echo them.

Whether or not you come out to your homophobic family and community is secondary. The real challenge you face, now you see a homosexual side to yourself, is to embrace it as a real and valuable part of you.

Tough, when everything around you says it's wrong, sinful, weak, disgusting, and all the rest. But it IS a valuable part of you, simply because...well, because it's a part of you.

Yes, it's tough for a bi- or gay man to love himself in the face of a homophobic world. But it's even tougher to do from the inside of a closet.

Imagine it this way: think how hard it would be to eat a healthy diet if you had to be ashamed of your desire for food? Could you learn to drive safely with no-one to teach you? Paint a painting with no access to paint, nor having ever seen a painting before? Not long before you've spent an entire lifetime starving, at home, staring at a blank wall. Nice life, eh?

That kind of shame drove me, uncomfortably, into women's beds until I was in my thirties. Yes, I rather liked many of the women I slept with, and enjoyed their company. And the sex was not unpleasant; hey, what man can complain about a decent, willing bonk? But as I got older, it didn't fulfill me in the way that we humans are programmed to want. And so with great reluctance, I tried having sex with men.

This meant swallowing my distaste, and, at the very least, paying a call or two on the gay community. Where else do you meet a gay man, pray? (We only had steam-powered internet in those days.)

News flash: gay and bi men come in all shapes and sizes, from flaming effeminations to sports jocks to regular schmucks. They hang around gay bars because its easier than going to a straight bar and needing to talk to ten times as many men before they finally find another gay one. If you actually start talking to the other guys in a gay bar, you might find many of them don't fit a stereotype.

After all, straight guys don't walk into a party and expect that they'll want to bed every woman they meet (though some come close) and neither should you.

When you're starved for gay male companionship in a small town, though, the lack of a gay gene pool in which to dive can prove frustating. But you gotta dive in, eventually. It's like swimming in a cold lake; you walk into the water up to the top of your bathing suit, and you know that once you put your head under, you'll be fine. It's just working up the gumption to do it.

But diving into the gay world and feeling good about it takes courage. That's another way of saying it takes self esteem. Would I be right to assume that this may be an issue? I mean, SGOT, it's a pretty dysfunctional family in which uncles can call and berate you for not having a girlfriend. My suspicion is that if you had the world's most perfect girlfriend, there'd be calls about something else.

Take strength from knowing that this board has helped others from harsh, marrow-minded families and environments to come out. (Don't want to call out Cale, but howya doin?)

Bi or gay, you'll face the same problem. But face it you must. And other gay and bi men are a necessary part of that. Even--no,especially--the ones who have "been around the block a few times". You'll be practicing safe sex, so it really doesn't matter if they've been around the block more times than the mailman. You WILL be practicing safe sex, won't you?

headbang8

 

[SomeGuyOverThere]

Headbang, another fantastic reply.... where can I begin?

I think I more have a dysfunctional uncle more than anything else. He's lonely and single and 56, and I pity him more than anything. I think he's worried I'll turn out like him.

My immediate family is much better. My parents are great people, and I regard my mother much more as a friend than a relation - we meet for lunch and talk and listen to the same music, and its great. I think she suspects I'm bi or gay but won't confront me with her suspicisions, it is her opinion that I have to work such things out for myself.

I know that they will support me pretty much regardless (unless I suddenly became a member of the Nazi party or something, they may be a bit fazed by that!) but I'm more worried about society at large.

You also hit the proverbial nail on the head about self esteem. I have virtually none. I've taken a long time to accept who I am and what I look like, (I don't think I've quite gotten that one under control yet), and doubts about my sexuality hurt my already poor self esteem further. Infact I think it may be hiding in the back of my mind, trying to stop me kicking it anymore. :frown1:

And yes you are right, I would be making mini-me wear a hat if I were to bonk anyone, and make their mini-them wear a hat too if they were to bonk me, so that is almost a non issue (barring skin-to-skin things like genital warts...).

In any case, I feel rather spoilt with all the support i'm seeing here, so perhaps Dr Rock could come in and tell me I'm being a stupid fuck? Might balance things out a bit. :tongue:

 

[coolioc]

You know what honestly helped me in my assessment of my sexuality? I read in a few other threads about the concepts of homoflexibility and heteroflexibility. I think those concepts, while still labels, are so all-encompassing for the "in between" people who can't say they are gay, bi, or straight exactly, that you really can't go wrong by choosing either. I really hoped they would make it to the Oxford dictionary's annual list of newly-coined phrases (podcast made it in 2005 for example :tongue.

I'm still coping with trying to figure out life as are someguy, bryan, and a host of other people on this board. For me, I add 2 components that I still haven't reconciled and need opinions on:

1) My career is professional, and my livelihood depends on clients' impressions of me (their decision to choose my business may depend on my interpersonal relationship with them and their attitudes towards it, and living in a smallish town, it would make it around town if my sexuality were known). Keeping in mind that society is still overwhelmingly anti-homosexual, how can I come out without it adversely affecting business? It's one thing to say "fuck it" that friend is not worth keeping if they can't support you but another to say "fuck it" I don't want this clients' money anyway!

2) It is also easy to try to detach from people by taking the "morally superior" ground so to speak of "well if they cared about me, it shouldn't matter what my orientation is" ... but what if other than in matters of sexuality you are happy about your relationships with homophobic people who would not even suspect your sexuality is not like theirs? See this happens for me, and I am not dying to come out, but I am being a little pressured to take things to the next level by my straight friends with a platonic friend that is female. I feel kind of guilty for leading these friends on pretending that I really have interest in this platonic friend, but they have taken more interest in my life as of late discussing my options for getting together with this girl so I find it hard to stop their interest. Maybe I just don't want to be "the gay one", whatever that really means. Is it better not to rock the boat with some friends and to separate your sexual life until you are ready to expose it? What has made it easier for guys on this board? (very complex issue i know)

On a related but separate theme, I think the spectrum of homosexual and homoflexible people sometimes makes it hard to come out. I mean one thread on this board even mentioned how to be gay you have to know showtoons. It was kind of tongue-in-cheek, but at the same time, there was an implication in that statement that their is one somewhat eclectic gay cultural identity gay men must subscribe to. I hope that being gay and that gay identity thing that has come about over time will very soon be made mutually exclusive as far as general society is concerned. I don't identify with it, and a lot of other gay or homoflexible :smile: men don't, so why must it persist as a definition still?

Well thanks for reading my diatribe. Maybe if I checked in more often on this board (last post 4 months ago) I wouldn't have so much bottled up to blurt out when something strikes a nerve! hehe

 

[JustAsking]

SomeGuy,

I find this board to be unique in its collection of highly thoughtful articulate people. I just happened onto this thread and found the responses to be wonderful. I do have something to add, though, that I think many others would agree with if it had occured to them.

I agree that there may not be conclusive proof that all homosexual behavior is genetic, but there is good reason to believe that some of it is. What is certainly true is that some people who come to a realization that they might be gay, are deeply disturbed by the notion. Its a clear indication that being gay wasn't something they made a conscious decision to pursue like someone choosing a new religion. It seems that in most cases, whether its genetic or an unconsciously acquired emotional tendency, its not something they have "volunteered" for.

I had an occasion where a friend of my son's confided in me that he was gay having not told anyone else. This was a teenager living in a conservative small town, where this was not a popular condition. Besides his concern about the opinion of others, he brought up another source of his anguish which I haven't seen mentioned here. This boy articulated the fact that all his dreams for the future were heterosexual ones. In other words his very identity of himself was formed around a heterosexual life. His dreams were of a family with a wife and kids, and lots of friends in the community. All these dreams which helped formulate much of his identity in his own eyes were formed independently of his gayness. So a big part of his anguish was the realization that most of these dreams would never realized unless he practiced massive denial and lived a lie for the rest of his life. He was faced with having to reinvent his dreams for the future around a completely new vocabulary and set of possibilities (and lack of possiblities).

I agree with Mme. Zora's referring to her alcoholism, because an alcoholic who has decided to seek treatment has to reinvent some of their identity and aspects of their lifestyle as well. In either case, the need for abandoning certain dreams may be more traumatic than the worry about the societal "shame" aspect.

This is something I never would have thought of as being part of this struggle. However, I find it easy to relate to, even though I am not gay. My point in bringing it up is just to give voice to something that you may have felt, but were not able to express.

Anyway, I have no advice that has not been already given in this thread. Counseling is always a good idea, especially in its ability to help you pull out and deal with all of your fears and concerns with some help. It doesnt sound like fun to me to be doing this by yourself.

I wish you all the luck in working this out. I hope you find people in real life to confide in, but it sure is good that there are such thoughtful and compassionate people on this board.

JustAsking

 

[JustAsking]

Oh, by the way, that boy did reinvent his life. He went off to a college in a big city where he knew he could become part of a rich and diverse gay community and pursue some of his original dreams. I am sure the situation looked bleakest to him when he came to his realization while still living in a small midwestern town where it was probably impossible to yet imagine another kind of life style. Last I heard he was thriving socially, academically, and emotionally.

 

[hotnmpls2000@yahoo.com]

To both Someguy and Bryan,

I am the gay son of two ordained ministers. (Assembly of God, for the record, a very evangelical/Pentecostal denomination.) Growing up, homosexuality was (my perception) almost the unforgivable sin. Mom and Dad weren't hateful about it, but it clearly was considered wrong.

As I look back on life, I had plenty of signs that I was gay. I remember in kindergarten, my mom had the church ladies gathered at someone's house. All kids (one girl, for of five dudes) were playing in the basement. Being the good pastor's kid that I am, I organized a strip show. I made a point to go to the bathroom when it was the girls turn. I'd only organized it because I wanted to see her brother naked. (He was a "big kid" being in second grade already... Dumb stuff like that.

Anyway, I did my best to pretend that my interest in other guys would go away. My Junior year in high school (at another church event funny enough) I hooked up with my first guy. We only traded non completion BJ's, which convinced me that it wasn't that bad. Kissing would have been gay, and we avoided that. We hooked up every couple of weeks before graduation, when we both went to separate Bible Colleges. I did that hoping if I ignored it long enough it would go away and I'd marry my childhood best friend and have a family. I basically fell in love with 70% of the roommates that I had in college, so that didn't work as planned. Finally, a year after I graduated I started going out with a girl (just friend) I worked with. That's when I met the first guy I dated, (as well as the first guy I fooled around with that wasn't church related..

That was when I started being honest with myself for the fist time. If I had a boyfriend I had to admit I was gay. (Internally I had started to use the Bi crutch when I left college. It just wasn't true for me. I was as gay as they come.) Then I told one friend, then another, than a cousin. I couldn't be honest with other people before I was honest about myself with myself. Once I could talk about it to someone I trusted, who I knew loved me, the entire process started to be easier.

The tough thing at that point was I HATED going to gay bars. I felt like everyone around me was trying to out stereotype the guy next to him. I still feel like that sometimes now, but I got over it. So I tried to be the Un gay guy in the bar. I grew my hair to my ass and went a little goth. Anyway, I was doing the same thing in a different environment that I had done my hole life, tried to fit in, but purposefully trying to look as uncomfortable while doing it as I could. Eventually I figured out how to just be me. Then I figured out how to let the Queen posing next to me in a bar be him.

But it all starts with internal honesty. Then let it spread.

I'm going to quit before I stop babbling and start pontificating...:biggrin1:

 

[GoneA]

hey JustAsking


that was really an incredible post ..... i actually didn't think of that

 

[Pikie mongrel]

I want to say you are all incredibly generous, candid and compassionate.

Such support and outpouring in a forum such as this restores my faith in humanity.

How beautiful is the day when labels are replaced by relatedness. When humanity ceases its obsession with separatism and definition. When we get we are all beings seeking love and community and the distinctions and measures can fall away.

Cheers to all of you... :biggrin1:

 

[headbang8]

Very articulate and fair points you make, coolioc. And in discussing them, maybe I'm about to adopt a stern tone; it's just rhetoric, so please don't be offended.

My career is professional, and my livelihood depends on clients' impressions of me (their decision to choose my business may depend on my interpersonal relationship with them and their attitudes towards it, and living in a smallish town, it would make it around town if my sexuality were known). Keeping in mind that society is still overwhelmingly anti-homosexual, how can I come out without it adversely affecting business? It's one thing to say "fuck it" that friend is not worth keeping if they can't support you but another to say "fuck it" I don't want this clients' money anyway!

Would you hide being a Jew because society is anti-semitic? There was a time when it was physically dangerous--even life threatening--to admit you were Jewish. That's a mighty fine reason to conceal your religious orientation.

There was a time when it was physically dangerous for men to declare they were gay. They'd get beaten up. Maybe that's still he case where you live.

If not, then you really have to ask yourself if coming out is worth the expense, in order to live a life of freedom and dignity. Many sexual decisions in life cost us money--having kids, for example--but we make those decisions because it's a part of our soul, where the financial cost is not the most important factor.

For me, I sometimes wonder if my decision to come out at work hasn't cost me a promotion, or at least some level of professional success. Then again, I look around me. Of the six senior partners in my department, two of us are gay men and one a lesbian. Our company offers same-sex partner benefits. And the CEO of my company is a gay man. Yet our clients are amongst the most conservative white-bread corporate elite. I do think that you might overestimate the effect your revelation may have on business.

For example, one of our clients is a large corporation which a kind description might call rather right-of-centre. Two client execs with whom I work are gay. One is in the closet at work (though when having drinks with us, his ad agency, he lets down his guard). The second is open about his sexuality. He's not waving any rainbow flags, but honest about it when asked. The second, through his simple self confidence and ease with himself, is much more politically effective than the first. And there's no gossip about him.

Are you a health professional where you need to see and deal with the private parts of people's bodies? That's a field where you may wish to keep your orientation discreet. But otherwise, damn well SHOW them that a gay guy can do the job.

It is also easy to try to detach from people by taking the "morally superior" ground so to speak of "well if they cared about me, it shouldn't matter what my orientation is" ... but what if other than in matters of sexuality you are happy about your relationships with homophobic people who would not even suspect your sexuality is not like theirs? See this happens for me, and I am not dying to come out, but I am being a little pressured to take things to the next level by my straight friends with a platonic friend that is female. I feel kind of guilty for leading these friends on pretending that I really have interest in this platonic friend, but they have taken more interest in my life as of late discussing my options for getting together with this girl so I find it hard to stop their interest. Maybe I just don't want to be "the gay one", whatever that really means. Is it better not to rock the boat with some friends and to separate your sexual life until you are ready to expose it? What has made it easier for guys on this board? (very complex issue i know)

Do you consider these people close friends? Close friendship DOES demand a level of honesty, I think. If they're close enough to be setting you up with a girl, they're close enough to need to know you're gay (or gay-ish).

And if they don't accept you, well...how would you feel if they rejected you because you were too short? Or bald? Or spoke with an accent? Kind of shallow friends if you ask me.

I worried about the same issue before I came out to my straight friends. But I felt that they were such good friends, whom I want in my life for the long haul, that I really needed to be honest with them. The self-consciousness of being "the gay one" disappeared very, very quickly. Many of the gay men here have remarked that their friends were surprisingly supportive when they came out. After all, that's what friends are for, aren't they?

What about "if other than in matters of sexuality you are happy about your relationships with homophobic people who would not even suspect your sexuality is not like theirs?" Again, it's a bit like saying that you'll keep schtum about being a Jew because those Nazi guys are great drinking pals. (And yes, in my opinion, comparing real homophobes to Nazis IS justified.)

Coolioc, as you point out, you can probably coast along with things as they are. But at 28, you've reached the age where a young single man starts to become a confirmed bachelor. If they're truly good friends, they'll know anyway.

Take care of yourself, HB8

 

[SomeGuyOverThere]

I want to say you are all incredibly generous, candid and compassionate.

Such support and outpouring in a forum such as this restores my faith in humanity.

How beautiful is the day when labels are replaced by relatedness. When humanity ceases its obsession with separatism and definition. When we get we are all beings seeking love and community and the distinctions and measures can fall away.

Cheers to all of you... :biggrin1:

Ok, now I know I'm gay.

I was crying as I read that.

:tongue:

 

[SomeGuyOverThere]

Just a little update for anyone interested:

I'm just back from a holiday with my family, and I realised on the way back that I've become very comfortable with who I am [finally]. I've come to accept that I am attracted to men, and I am interested in hooking up with them, and that feeling isn't going to go away, I can't hide it, I can't deny it and I can't wave a magic wand, click my heels three times repeating "I wish I was strait".

I also realised that I do want relations with women (though I still have no idea what attracts me in women, but i could give you a list of things i find attractive about men) and at some point it would be nice to have the 2.4 childeren society would like me to have.

This has finally settled this massive issue which has been looming in my head like a dark cloud on the horizon and manifested itself as a proverbial 800 pound gorilla in the corner of the room when any sexual discussions have cropped up, with me having to feign disgust at homosexuality and feign interest in women.

So, does this mean that the next time this discussion comes up with friends, I'll announce my Bisexuality?

Err... well.... probably not. :redface: