A little help from those who've been there...

Hi everyone,
I'm 33 and male. I suppose I've come hear for answers.... From those who've 'been there and done that'.
Over the last 10yrs I've put myself through a lot of pain and anxiety because I couldn't come to terms with my sexuality. Denial can take you to some dark corners.
When I read posts from people who have an easier time accepting themselves I think I've been a fool all this time.
Up until the age of 16 or 17 I considered myself straight (I was going to write 'normal' - but fuck that) and had had sex with a couple of girls. I fell in love with my first girlfriend, and those were good times.
I first acknowledged that I wasn't completely 'straight' when I was 18. I can remember the moment it happened - I was on holiday in Greece with a girlfriend. I was up at dawn one morning and went to the beach to watch the sunrise. I sat on the sand in the perfect coolness of a summer sunrise and asked myself how I could carry on? At 18.
I told myself I would kill myself if it turned out I was 'gay'. I was a masculine guy, I like bikes, engines, sport - does not compute!!!!
I denied myself, my soul, stuffed the thoughts down tight as a drum, punched them under when they popped up and told myself "you cannot be gay if you like girls, you will not be gay". It was always black or white in my mind, you are either straight or gay - how can there be an 'inbetween' - that makes things messy and embarassing, you are no longer 'normal', 'one of the crowd' or a 'bloke'. You're 'a poof' ,a 'fag' you know the drill.....
Within a short period of time I had lost contact with friends from college and stopped seeking relationships with girls because all the time I was with them I was doubting myself. If I was in bed with a girl I would try to imagine how I would feel if it were a guy lying next to me. It usually felt good; but only deep down at a core level, day to day I denied it and hid it. The more I tried to deny myself the more I thought about it - not necessarily sexual thoughts just the fact that the potential for them was there.
Some people drink to counter their problems, I don't want to go into detail here but I went down a similar route for 8yrs and emerged at the other end 8 yrs older with very little extra to show for the time. The frustrating thing is that I judged myself more harshly than I would ever judge another at this time. I felt it was wrong and something to be ashamed of. Where does so much shame come from?
I've been in recovery for a year and it's about time I bite the bullet and live my life again. I need to deal with this and learn to accept myself. Accept the fact that I am a bisexual man who has sexual desires for men and women. I'd really like to hear from others about their experiences coming to terms with being bisexual. I know it's a bit of a ramble but I feel like it needs to be out there............Simon

 

Hi there, Simon to Simon.

I'm 59 and I had my first m2m experience when I was 19, apart from puberty joint masturbation sessions with another boy. Between then and 40, when I married I probably had about 65 m2f and 12 m2m liasons. I was 98% monogamous in my marriage until about 5 years ago when I started searching out other m2m liasons. About 9 months ago I was outed by my wife (I had told my wife about the m2m before marriage, so it wasn't a complete surprise to her) and after lots of soul-searching we realised how much we loved each other and so we opened our marriage and began to play together in a 3-sum with another bi-guy.

We have both found that we love this and get really turned on by the experience - we feel that it has actually strengthened our marriage.

I consider most people are potentially bisexual but suffer from our conditioning and upbringing. A person's sexuality can also be a fluid thing and change over the course of a lieftime. There is nothing wrong being attracted by people of the same sex - look on it that you're lucky - you have a huge choice.

We are all unique and different in our own ways and what attracts or turns one person on will be different with another. There is a huge gap between 100% hetero and 100% gay and you may like guys sexually but cannot imagine an emotional realtionship with one, or vice versa. Assess your desires and go out and experiment.

relax, enjoy and be at peace with yourself.

Simon :sunny:

 

These two are probably the most important. Does not compute really? There are plenty of example of butch gay guys around. Why do you ignore them? And dont go blaming everyone elses attitudes. Why do YOU want to believe the butch ones dont exist?

No inbetween? All that stress and carry on, when half the guys out there are in the same boat as you, not to mention half the girls. The inbetween is the norm, its just all hidden

You are so normal, it actually isnt very funny

 

The real root of most of our sexual identity related problems really comes from the sadly exaggerated (narcissistic) sense of self-importance.

When you come to think about it, does anyone really care or give a flyin'? Nope. Actually, not.

If you came out and told a few people, you were gay, bi, or whoever, yeah, this would be the news of the day or maybe of the next 3 days. Soon, the daily reality and the usual grind sets in and the life goes on...

So, you agree that you ARE who you really ARE. And that it really does NOT matter at all.

You focus on running your life and living well. You go out and meet whomever you find attractive to bed and you put on your moves and see what happens

And you just keep on living your life NOT worrying about the others, their thoughts, your tastes and choices. Do not go around hurting anyone but DO stop hurting yourself.

KD

 

In the last few years, I've become a big fan of the "not over thinking it" way of looking at things. It is what it is, as they say, and Kewldude66's reply is really on point. If you want to have gay sex, it's a desire that's really not going to go away. Be honest and be safe. For me, my level of homosexuality has increased as I've grown older (I'm 41) and I finally realize that no level of denial is going to change anything. For many years, I tried to suppress and deny what lies within me largely due to values instilled in me and my own feelings of self-importance. It's taken a long time to realize I'm just an insignificant biological life form that is a prisoner of my own DNA.

All things considered, I'm comfortable with the decisions I've made in life, but if there is one thing I could change, it would be that I would have been more honest with myself and others about my bisexuality long ago. It would have saved me a lot of mid-life inner conflict. Good luck.