Why Am I Questioning My Sexuality Again
If anyone has been feeling this uncomfortable emergence of feeling so please feel free to reach out and tell me your experience. I know it may audio odd that I say "suddenly". Considering it actually is of a sudden, I have never gotten the feeling that I may be bi sexual or lesbian until now. I don't feel like myself anymore, in fact and take always felt girly and womanly. I was e'er very emotional, very drawn to men, passionately, emotionally, physically, and the manner they carried themselves and their characters. I accept ALWAYS identified equally straight. Never have I always questioned past sexuality twice like I am now. I am 21 years old and currently in a year long relationship with my amazing boyfriend that's I love with all my heart and soul. Right now we're doing great, we are doing long distance so it is tough but we are very much in dearest. Nosotros accept talked about marriage, having a kid, etc. If in that location'southward one thing I can imagine with my fellow is having a kid with him, and taking care of information technology together. My boyfriend and I perfect for each other. Everything leading upwardly to us becoming a couple was perfect, we clicked and so well and he's never felt this way virtually any girl before. He talks almost me being the female parent of his child and getting married, he's caput over heels in love and well, and so am I. We are very sexually active with each other and never have I imagined another adult female being present to heighten the awareness like other bi sexuals or lesbians accept. In fact the idea of having a 3 some would be repulsive to me and a deep rooted fearfulness in me that I would never agree to practise. And the reason beingness is watching someone I dearest give someone else sexual attention. Ive e'er been competitive with women in looks and many other aspects.I've e'er been pretty insecurity with myself and in relationships especially, incredibly a jealous and envious person. I've never crushed on a daughter or felt any sort of attraction, only admiration for their social status and their style of physical appearance. I always wanted to BE them, not be with them. This is virtually to go very confusing. But comport with me, please. I've ever felt very uncomfortable with myself and was very emotional as mentioned before and my only happiness would depend on if guys I wanted wanted me back. I remember beingness very emotionally involved in all my past relationships with men. I did not have a great relationship with my father growing up as he was very neglecting during my adolescent years. I would be Incredibly devastated and heart broken when men in my past broke upward with me or I found out they cheated. It would impale me. My current relationship is a lot healthier than my past ones and perhaps I'yard not used to such a consistent and piece of cake going human relationship like this i. Of a sudden I started getting uncomfortably aroused by pictures of women on Instagram that I would usually judge and compare myself with or imagine "wow my fellow would probably thinks she'southward hot". I do watch porn, I accept for a majority of my life. I would say I have a pretty high sex drive. My boyfriend can easily ostend this. Lately I've been feeling as said before uncomfortably drawn to women… why? Not as in I'm plotting going on dates or doing annihilation sexual but these recurring thoughts are making me think I'm full accident lesbian, when I know I'm not. As soon equally I started feeling this I freaked out. I cried uncontrollably, had panic attack's, called my mom, paced effectually in my room, would constantly reassure myself I was straight through online forums/discussions and definitions, if anyone else has these sudden feelings out of no where. Aside from the sudden feelings, I don't feel like myself, prior to this fear, I felt completely dissimilar than how I experience now. I don't even feel like a woman anymore, or like myself, what I possess, what I'm passionate about, naught. All of my mental free energy has been focused on this. I don't exit my bed, don't drink enough water, I don't eat, I weep, I pace around the room and and endeavour to make these thoughts get away. I'g not religious only I've prayed to god to make these thoughts go abroad. And no, information technology's non because my family won't be accepting, they don't heed annihilation and my mom was super understanding in talking near this. I have not even so seen a therapist for this only I remember that will be my next footstep. I've suffered with feet my whole life, information technology is genetic since my aunt and mom both have information technology. I've avoided beingness around my woman friends due to this issue. I have never and I mean never thought of them in a sexual fashion or way, I've always lacked consistent adult female friendships though because I don't have the best taste in people. During the past 5 days, periodically I would feel completely and totally normal and not question if I was bi or gay. I wouldn't even question my relationship with my boyfriend, everything was fine and normal during these times then the thoughts would come back, similar something I can't run away from. I've experienced farthermost paranoia due to this. I'm reading upward on HOCD and if I match the symptoms. Basically I match every single one, but, you tin never diagnose yourself through google. Deep down, I know I'm straight, information technology's just these thoughts that get to my head that make me think I'm not. I've had very shut emotional relstionships with friends only never was drawn to buss them or appoint in sexual activity. I've seen some of my friends osculation their friends and was a flake disturbed but it happens to everyone. When sexually fantasizing, it was e'er me imagining sex with the contrary sex and becoming incredibly aroused and climaxing. Then I began watching porn, and I think perchance that this fearfulness rooted from over excessive use of porn. I would watch porn at most 5-half dozen times a day , sex became and so interesting to me. I would crave sex constantly the more than I watched porn and porn would assist me void something I felt was missing. I felt like a nymphomaniac. Whenever I'g with my beau, i feel like a nympho, wanting to accept intercourse mostly every day. I would never watch gay porn, it would only be a man and woman. I withal get turned on by sex between a homo and woman, lesbian porn looks weird to me and does not really arouse me. That'south where the defoliation is, when I actually imagine kissing and having sex with a girl i feel very uncomfortable, and disgusted, like information technology just doesn't experience right. I also have been smoking marijuana since high school, in which has been very detrimental for me through out my life. Maybe I'm bored with men and have incredibly stressful experiences with them that now I feel more bonded with women in which I mistake that in allure. I cannot run across myself with a adult female long term, a relationship with a woman would non exist ideal. I've asked 3 of my friends and been totally and completely honest with them and they said they oasis't idea for a Econd that'due south I could be gay, and this feeling may be a longing for an emotional and physical connection that's I'thou not receiving from my boyfriend at the moment since it is long distance. These intrusive thoughts are getting in the way of everything, literally, and I need advice on what to exercise. What scares me most is leaving him and my urge to leave him that is unwilling, I don't actually want to be out of our relationship, I truly relish communicating and beingness in his life day by day. We are so comfortable in each other's presence. If anyone has any questions for me feel free to inquire, I'grand just as confused as you well-nigh likely. This also began during my pre me Sutran wheel phase, so I don't know if that has anything to do with it.
Dearest Anja:
I will be able to read and respond to your post when I am back to the computer, which will be in about fifteen hours. I promise other members will reply before I am back.
anita
Dear Anja:
You asked for advice, hither is my advice to you:
1. Cease watching porn ("I do watch porn, I have the bulk of my life… this fright rooted from over excessive use of porn. I would watch porn at near 5-half dozen times a day").
two. Stop smoking marijuana ("I also have been smoking marijuana since high schoolhouse, in which has been very detrimental for me through out my life").
3. Attend psychotherapy so to manage and heal from your anxiety ("I've suffered with feet my whole life").
You lot are now focused on the issue of sexual orientation but your issue is not your sexual orientation just your obsessive thinking which is fueled past anxiety.
anita
- This reply was modified three years, 6 months ago by
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First, delight do not believe your thoughts specially if they are then destructive and if they make you feel crying and completely unable to maintain your usual daily activities. There is a skillful technique which helps to combat such thoughts, where you try to altitude yourself from them and just notice a mental spot where you lot can find them and you will very soon realize they are not you lot. Maintain this position every bit long as you tin. ˝I am not my thoughts, I am thinker of the thoughts, but I am not my thoughts. They have no power over me. No descending into them. I am gratis.˝ Feel this with both your heart and mind and you lot volition be soon free of them and take a clearer picture.
Second, I urge you to stop watching pornography, because it is highly destructive to the psyche, especially at young age such is yours. Porn is very suggestible because information technology relies on basic homo need / instinct of sexual bulldoze, but it completely distorts it. Information technology counts on torso instincts alone. Since we are visual beings, those images literally go into our consciousness and get life of their own which overburdens the psyche. The psyche instinctively knows pornography leads mental health downward and that it distorts true purpose of sex (emotional attunement and loving wedlock of body, listen and emotions which leads to nearly beautiful climax.)
Please, cut it out and whenever you feel the urge to sentry information technology, try to channel that urge into something creative. But y'all need to realize this for yourself.
Hope this helps.
Showtime of all, I'd like to let you know that you are always the good on your own sexuality – no one else can define it except you. If a label feels uncomfortable, you never accept to utilise it. You're under no obligation to tell anyone else, either. Your sexuality belongs to you.
Just from what I'm reading, it seems like the idea of being gay or bisexual disgusts and upsets you. Yet you constantly take this idea and have trouble focusing on anything else. This really does seem like information technology's an intrusive thought which is a symptom of many dissimilar anxiety disorders – your enquiry on OCD may be substantiated. You need to see a professional psychologist or LCSW. There are often resource bachelor if you can't regularly access this care, I would suggest doing a targeted search in your area.
I had a similar experience I'd similar to share as someone with diagnosed OCD – I would captivate over the thought I was secretly directly and somehow faking my attraction, or that it would go abroad. That thought was heartbreaking to me and caused me a lot of distress – I just KNEW it wasn't truly who I was. Thinking of living life equally a heterosexual person filled me with dread and depressed me. I remember that you might experience the same fashion virtually existence lesbian. It's important to know this idea is difficult to get rid of because information technology is upsetting to y'all – non because it's true. It sounds like you lot're afraid that you'll lose your boyfriend (and good relationship) if you lot were gay and that scares you.
In general (and equally a gay person who has spent a long, long time in the queer community) gay and bisexual people do not feel disgust at the thought of being attracted to the aforementioned sex. We may experience shame and struggle with internalized homophobia because we have been told information technology is bad/sinful or fear the way being gay volition impact our lives (bigotry, loss of family/friends, etc.) but genuinely feel happy and excited at the prospect of loving and dating other women/men. It's a part of realizing ourselves.
Lastly, yous accept your whole life to effigy out who you are and who you honey – if your answer ever changes, that'due south fine. It doesn't invalidate anything y'all've felt in the by, or are feeling now. Information technology does not change your worth as a person. I hope you receive unconditional love & acceptance for yourself and from others as you cope with your anxieties, whatever the outcome.
It is but an intrusive thought trust me it can and will go abroad if you search how to handle them
Hi Anja!
I know you've posted this a while ago, however I am at present going through the exact same thing you lot wrote nearly. Reading your post was exactly like if they were my words. If y'all don't mind, I would love to know how it turned out for you and if yous are all the same having these thoughts. These thoughts suddenly came to me concluding night and I oasis't been able to sleep and I've been reading through forums similar this one but so far your post was the merely was that fabricated me feel okay and know deep down that everything is fine with me. I am too in a human relationship with my boyfriend for 1,v now and we've also been doing lost distance for the past 4 months. Plus, I am also about to get my period. If it's better nosotros tin can talk about this somewhere else just this public site, just allow me know. Thanks in advance!!
I am also going through the aforementioned affair. I'g not currently in a human relationship but when I was in a relationship with my boyfriend I never questioned my sexuality. I experience the same as you when you said that this post feels like information technology's your own words and it'southward the just thing that has made you feel okay. I've been having these thoughts for about a week now. I have started going to therapy, simply information technology'due south only been a couple days. I'1000 afraid I tin't offer you any advice, just I'd dear to talk to y'all more if y'all're open to it!
I'thou very happy I found this. I was searching this upwardly and read almost what you said and patently I'm going through the same exact thing. I feel like a horrible person nigh it because I have the fear of labeling myself as gay/ lesbian knowing that I'yard not. I was never like this before until I reached pre-machismo and it started happening. I know for a fact that this isn't normal and has naught to do with my sexuality. I don't know if it's an OCD issue simply I promise I tin can get aid.
I am having the aforementioned problem .and I am freaking .out like I cant draw what I am feeling because when I am not having the thoughts that I am a lesbian I will not feel that I am attracted to a girl only when I am having them it doesnt accept any science crusade I know that I dont similar girls it is like there is a lesbian in my head that makes me think like that. I am freaking out and I actually really need help it is so confusing and frustrating.
Wow i literally just joined this website because of this thread. I have been experiencing the same thing and its terrifying. Im a pace away from having a panic attack about this. I too have NEVER questioned my sexuality until about a month agone. And even the thought of it caused me sooo much distress i panicked. I have been in the almost incredible relationship with a man the past 2 years. I fantasize almost getting married and starting a family with him constantly. Its the healthiest relationship ive ever been in. I do occasionally lookout lesbian porn that i volition acknowledge to. Its merely more focused on the womens pleasure, its softer, more skilled. I dont do it often, possibly once a month? I have never felt attracted to another woman to the indicate where i wanted her. And so i cant tell if im full blown lesbian at present or really its just a fantasy. Considering if i really really try to imagine myself doing something with another woman im kind of disgusted. My man and i also just moved in together. But reading your post, Anja.. makes me believe that it is totally normal to of a sudden question this. You speak in the way that i do, you two accept great intimacy, desire to go along and outset a life together.. so quite honestly it sounds like such a human being thing to enquire before you settle down. Is this truly the right thing for me? Really coming from your (and mine!) own insecurities about the fear of losing the relationship especially if you were gay (thanks asher!!!) Its also such a sensitive topic for people. Who u cull to exist intimate with emotionally and sexually is the ultimate human demand. And information technology seems similar youre just making certain you are safe emotionally. That all your needs are met. Living with my boyfriend has heightened my sensitivity most this because i love him and so much and information technology scares me at times. And my mind thinks of all the ways i could lose him. Existence gay is one of them. U.s.a. constantly fighting and non making solutions while living together is i of them. I could go on. I as well like that someone pointed put that Intrusive thoughts cause us distress and arent the truth.. that is proficient advice.
Dear Ag:
"I dearest him then much and it scares me at times"- fright fuels overthinking, sometimes so much so that nosotros captivate, and your obsession is: am I gay?
I am non a gay detector, but I didn't read a unmarried affair you wrote that suggests to me that you are gay.
You lot wrote that 1 matter that scares yous is "Beingness gay", and the other: "United states constantly fighting and not making solutions while living together". Constantly fighting is a real danger to a relationship. On the other hand, an allure to both sexes is not a danger to a human relationship:
When a strictly directly woman marries a man, she needs to not give in to her attraction to other people (men) during her marriage. Similarly, a woman attracted to men and women, has to do the same thing: to not give in to her attraction to other people (men and women) during her marriage.
I personally know of a immature woman who identifies herself as a pansexual (not limited in sexual choice with regard to gender) who married a man and stated conspicuously that she believes in monogamy and will exist faithful to her hubby.
anita
* PD, Bre, Jin and Shahdra: I just noticed you posted hither in April this twelvemonth. If any of you is nevertheless post-obit this thread, please post once again: I would like to communicate with y'all further.
Hi anita,
thanks for your insight. One affair i did realiE is how sudden and intense these thoughts were and how much they scared me. Ive washed some research that i think may be a great resource to everyone on this thread. I too have suffered from feet for about of my life and have gone to therapy for it and at times it still gets the best of me. Ive realized im more OCD than i thought. Reading through this resource was as if someone took the situation right out of my life. The fact of the matter is: an unwanted intrusive thought causes extreme worry and feet and distress, discomfort, embarrassment. And it usually pertains to doubts about a human relationship, orientation, viruses (how-do-you-do corona), life decisions etc. its important to realize information technology for what it is, a junk thought that crossed your mind. I think its important to turn to self dear and acceptance during this time and understand why these triggers are presenting themselves in such a way. It usually is the complete opposite as well ive found. Ie those that recall of suicide in fact love life. In my case for example, im and so in beloved and took the next stride with my boyfriend and this is triggering my own insecurities. Its an contrary end of the continuum. I hope this resource is equally helpful to someone as information technology was to me
https://adaa.org/larn-from-us/from-the-experts/web log-posts/consumer/unwanted-intrusive-thoughts
Dear Ag:
You are welcome and thank you for offering others a resources that helped you. I looked at it and reads like a skilful resource. Here is role of what it says: "People who experience unwanted intrusive thoughts are afraid that they might commit the acts they pic in their heed. They as well fright that the thoughts mean something terrible about them"- detect the words afraid and fear, and this is what OCD is about: being afraid of thoughts.
Thoughts are mental events, they happen quickly and without effect; there are many thousands of thoughts happening in every person's brain every hr or so. None of the thoughts are dangerous. Even so people suffering from OCD are agape of their thoughts as if the thoughts are unsafe, dangerous to one's human relationship, to one's moral integrity (believing that a idea makes a person bad), and fifty-fifty to one's life and others' lives. I suffered from OCD since I was six and diagnosed with information technology many years later, so I am very familiar with the topic. It took me a long, long time to really understand that my thoughts are not unsafe to me or to others, that they have no ability whatsoever.
The website you provided suggests to remind yourself that the thoughts we don't want to have aka intrusive thoughts are automatic, not a matter of option (therefore we are not bad people for thinking this or that), to accept them and the anxiety that accompanies these thoughts instead of rejecting the thoughts and trying to button them out. Basically, it'south about not panicking and instead of rushing (which we instinctively practice when afraid), slow down. In regard to slowing downwards the rushing, panicking encephalon, mindfulness exercises are helpful.
anita
Hello!
I am going through something like. A few years agone when I was younger I had questioned it earlier. After a few months – half a twelvemonth I was doing better and came to the conclusion that. I am straight even though I occasionally had a beat out on a girl… But it was never like I could imagine a relationship or something.. it wasn't romantic or sexual it was more like I though they were really pretty and cool. Withal after I had this "phase" I had several crushes on boys that lasted a lot longer and were more than intense.. these crushes definitely made me happier … cause dorsum when i was questioning my sexuality I would merely similar you get stressed and anxious cause it wasn't something I wanted and I knew information technology wasn't me. Now iv years later a week ago I started having these idea again.. I had a panic , anxiety and a lot of sadness and I still do and this Forum kinda helped me.. I definitely don't like the idea of dating a daughter or whatever intimate relationship which means I am straight but yet the thought and "fright" comes up all the fourth dimension. It hess. come to the point where wherever I think I'll get a crush on girls when information technology's just all in my head. Deep down I know that I am not attracted to them in this mode but it's a constant fight betwixt what I know and what my mind is maxim because those thoughts crusade a lot of stress and discomfort in me in oppose to the thoughts of boys that I like.. I know I should just stop thinking just I can't assistance it. I don't know what to practise nigh it or what it is from and it'south not like I would have a problem if I was bi or something I already talked to several ppl about information technology and it have very understanding and supportive people around me but It'southward not that. It'southward not that. I am afraid of what society would say or something not at all… it's all almost me. It's about me not liking this feelings of uncertainty and of abiding overthinking. I know that the idea Doesn't flatter me and I liked / like beingness guy crazy but yet it nevertheless comes upward and causes a massive amount of unhappiness and It's also the first time I have heard of OCD just eventually it is what I have because I noticed that ever since I Ma young I always overthink something .. there's always something that my mind chooses to stress over and equally much as I don't desire to it continues to think almost it and worry about it until I become and then upset that I go to therapy or something… I have too started it overthink all past experiences and to meet if there were and sights maybe and I know that ever since simple school I had crushes on boys just I as well liked girls just never in that way , does that make sense? I liked them and tried rlly hard to exist friends with some simply I never imagined anything sexual or something and the idea does not flatter me at all…
Source: https://tinybuddha.com/topic/suddenly-questioning-my-sexuality/