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Stephen_5

Sophiesdad,

You've posed a difficult question. I know how you feel. I have a very good memory, I didn't forget anything that ever happened to me but now I can look at it from a more enlightened perspective. My only advise would be to continue talking to your T, explore what your feelings are, where your desires are, where your love is.

My wife and I were married for over 33 years. The SA affected our relationship but she stood by my side 'til the end. I'm widowed now and I've met a guy my age who is loving, sincere and really loves me too. I feel blessed to have two real loves in my life.

Take good care of yourself,

Steve
 
Hello,

I'm glad that you have found MaleSurvivor. It is a safe place to bring all the different worries and concerns that come to us in the aftermath of sexual abuse.

As you probably already know, the question about sexual orientation that you raise is one that many of us have had to address in different ways.

I think that Stephens message is very wise indeed. Sexuality is not a simple black and white, on and off switch type of thing. Couple that with the fact that sexual abuse inflicts its damage across a huge swath of our lives and our psyches and its complexity is magnified to the point where the problems can seem insurmountable.

The great thing about a place like MaleSurvivor is that we can come and talk and listen and realize that we are not alone. That others have had the same burdens to bear and have found ways to successfully negotiate some of these very difficult personal matters.

You are so right to give yourself the time, space and help you need to begin to sort this out. I hope that you will continue to come here and post and read as you feel necessary. People here do care, and whether you realize it or not, your questions and concerns can be very helpful to the next guy who comes along.

What I would offer you is what was offered to me. Some gentle counsel regarding the way we treat ourselves was very helpful to me.

Since you are currently in a stressful and confusing time in your life, I hope that you will remember to be extra gentle and loving to yourself. If you have favorite things to do or favorite music to listen to, give yourself those pleasures.

I know that when I am down and hurt by what life has given me, I have tendancy to neglect my own well being, which only serves to intensify my discomfort. Eventually i realize how counter productive that is.

With help now I can be aware that I need love, compassion and comfort more than anything else.
These will help me make it safely through the tough times better than any amount of forcing or pushing or beating myself up ever would.

Take it easy and realize that you are on the right path and in the right place.

I hope that you will find the same peace and hope that I have. I struggled with sexuality for over 30 years, due to the fact that I am gay, was sexually abused by a man in my religion which condemns homosexuality in no uncertain terms.

In the last couple of years, as a result of addressing the issue of the sexual abuse in my life, I have come to know a deep acceptance of myself for whoever or whatever I may be. Loving myself has freed me to fully love everyone else in my life.

Thanks for the post,

Regards,
 
Okay, this will be my first posting, I'm been just sitting back and listening to what others have to say and I now feel a bit more comfortable sharing my thoughts with others on here.

Before I say anything, I would like to thank you for your posting because I can certainly relate to a great majority of what you have said. I am also glad that you decided to post all your thoughts regardless of how embarrassed you felt about them, because thats exactly what people like me are looking for, to see that I am not alone and others are feeling and thinking the same things I am.

As you already know, you are asking a very difficult question to answer; however, I can tell you this from what I read. I get the feeling that you may be making your original question even more complicated than it should be. SA will have its impacts on your adult development and so will any positive or negative relationships with parents and anyone else who plays an important role in child development.

You will find your T to be a very important person who will help you sort some things out. It sounds like that is what you are looking to do. However, there is no science to explain or change what your heart feels, thats what makes us human beings. Feel very lucky that you are loved by someone, regardless of that persons gender. And dont feel guilt to be attracted to other men, the male physique and chemistry is a very unique and special thing that I know most men feel but rarely admit to.

Lets take a look at the things that are making you fall apart from your spouse, I am certain that they are not solely on how attracted you feel to your spouse. There are other factors that are contributing to it as well. Now lets take a look at what your heart honestly feels about things, what does your gut say? Chances are that your heart is speaking the truth and you just need to listen to it. You dont need a label to define who you are and how you feel about men or women. Our society focuses so much on these labels that we all forget that at the end of the road, we are all human. Thats more important than any label anyone can give you.

Work with your T and work with yourself. Dont place more stress on a situation that is already stressful and dont look for your T to create a fix for you because that will not happen. You will find yourself answering your own questions as soon as your T begins to ask you questions that come from a different perspective. I wish you the best and I once again thank you for posting your question because I get to feel a bit more normal when I see that Im not all that different after all.

Willy :-)
 
Welcome Willy!! I know you've been on the site for a while BUT glad you're posting!!

Sophiesdad - Oy vay!! What a question!! Seriously I know that tough spot where you're struggling. My sexual abuse was extreme over a long period of time. My parents although not the sexual abusers (?) knew about the abuses and were unwilling to protect me. As a by product of their "help", I was exclusively homosexual from 13 to 22 years old and very active I might add. This resulted in such a gender confusion that I finally acknowledged a bisexual orientation. I have passed through many of the doubts and feelings you express throughout the 35 years of my marriage. For the last 26 years I have been faithful to our marriage even though I have temptations and urges beyond our relationship. My wife and I have a strong emotional bond, a strong commitment to one another and an okay sexual intimacy. She knows of my past and the struggles in the present and we are able to discuss them when necessary. This has taken quite a lot of self-work, honest exploration and facing what it is I want and can live with in our marriage. Society has many labels which makes it easy to "pin a situation down" but most of us don't fully fit under societies labels. Life is your life to live how you and your partner work things through. I found asking "Am I gay?" or "Am I straight?" was not as important as "This is who I am!" Perhaps we could discuss this over cybercoffee? Keep on journeying, you can find the answers that make sense of all of this and happiness is there as well. You are not alone... you journey among many men, just a few us are ready to speak out!!

Howard
 
I'm gay, but I spent a lot of time sorting it out from my SA even before I recognized that I had indeed been abused. I never repressed the memory of the abuse, I just didn't make the connection between it and the problems in my life. I'm also a pretty intellectual / political guy, so I've done a lot of research about sexuality issues and have argued them a lot with members of the radical religious right.

What follows are random thoughts, in sort of a general response to your post.


Sexual behavior is NOT the same as sexual orientation, especially in men.

Behavior is about where I put my penis and we all know what it's like when the little head starts doing all the thinking. Orientation is about who I love, who I connect to emotionally & spiritually.

Psychologists have clearly established that constitutionally straight men in all-male, high-pressure environments (such as prison, or a battleship in wartime) will engage in sex with other men. When the circumstances change, they return to their base-line orientation. It's also well documented that constitutionally gay men can and do have pleasurable sex with women, if sufficienly horny & the circumstances are right, or if very highly motivated, like the guys in those sham "ex-gay" programs run by the radical religious right.

And then there are bisexual men, who love and have sex with either gender.


Many men, straight AND gay, are wounded by not having a strong bond with their father, but this does NOT cause a man to be gay.

The theory that male homosexuality is caused by a "distant" father and a "smothering/domineering" mother is an idea that has been totally debunked for several years. What the very best science currently proposes is a combination of genetics, fetal development and possibly very early experiences - regardless, sexual orientation is most probably fixed by age five.


Sabotaging relationships is not a gay/straight thing, but a survivor thing.

Most male survivors do it to one degree or another - our heads got so screwed up by the SA that *any* relationship with another human being is going to be difficult.
 
Sophiesdad
My personal experience was from the age of 11 I had sex with older boys and a teacher until I was 16.
This happened so frequently that I actively participated in the sex, asked for it, and in all honesty enjoyed a lot of it.
A lot of that was due to the closed all male environment of a boarding school and the fact that my home was in the country so I had no contact with girls until I left school, even the primary school I went to at 5yo was segregated.

I left school in some confusion, understandably. But I soon started at a college doing an engineering apprenticeship; and there were girls there, and a very relaxed atmosphere.
I found it odd that there were girls that actually wanted to date me, but I overcame my shyness and very clumsily started dating girls. I had sex with one of them within weeks, I was still 16yo. And from that day I have never looked at anyone other than a female and fancied them sexually, or from a 'partner' point of view.

To this day I have had sex with more males than females, but I just don't fancy males.
Yes, I've had sex with males since, but that was a lingering effect of my abuse.
I felt extreme confusion during that relatively short period, partly because my relationship with my wife was at rock bottom - in all respects.
But despite the sex with other men, I couldn't leave my wife.

Abuse doesn't seem to alter our sexuality, I agree with the previous posters that our sexuality is somehow decided for us.
Sex as a by product of our abuse - acting-out - is also completely unrelated to our orientation as well.

I've never denied the pleasure of sex between men, but I just don't have the attraction to them to go and seek it for MY gratification, not even on a bi-sexual basis.

Love and attraction is between the ears, not between the legs. ;)

Dave
 
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