Turning Gay in Middle of Your Life

[sera300]

Always around! Happy to help & hope this clarifies some confusion for you and provides for a direction. Now, get back to college! LOL! Just realize you ARE normal.

[sera300]

Originally Posted by DVDBear

Yep, there are those people like your friend and my partner to which the idea of straight sex is absolutely DISGUSTING. lol There are of course straight men and women (usually NOT the ones who are homophobic) who are not threatened by gay sex but would rather slide down a razor blade banister than perform it. On the meter of human sexuality there is most definitely a "100%" that some folks fall under. But in the entire length of their lives who knows how strong that feeling will remain? Take Doc's experiences. I'm not saying people hit a certain age and decide "Hey, I think I'll try same sex relations" of course, but the idea might not be so strongly a turn off as it once was. Even my partner, who's put forth some pretty extreme things he'd do before having sex with a woman admits that, in the later stage of life, if I passed away first he could see being in a live-in platonic relationship with a woman (he gets along with most of them great). And who knows if, at some point that would cross over into some degree of physical intimacy if the situation was right?

Ya never know.

I fall into the banister group...not threatened by it, DEFINATELY not homophobic; I can look at a woman and see she is attractive/gorgeous, has a nice figure (wish I had her breasts instead of mine) be drawn by her intelligence, etc. But friendship is all there is for me since there is a absence of sexual arousal for me. I can hang out with straight, bi, or gay friends but there is no sexual desire or interest for me. Heck, if I was attracted then the dating pool would increase for me! LOL!

[masse7326]

Originally Posted by sera300

Always around! Happy to help & hope this clarifies some confusion for you and provides for a direction. Now, get back to college! LOL! Just realize you ARE normal.

Me=normal????

NO WAY?! lol

[dancingdoc2]

> Me=normal????

> NO WAY?!

Hmmm....had Sera used the term "ordinary" one could then counter with the fact that perhaps you are extraordinary.

I'm not sure how we can boost your normalcy. You certainly are not "ab-" and "para-" doesn't fit either.

How about just being unique?

[sera300]

Unique is correct! And not the ordinary--rather you are your own person & this makes each unique!

[DVDBear]

Originally Posted by sera300

I fall into the banister group...not threatened by it, DEFINATELY not homophobic; I can look at a woman and see she is attractive/gorgeous, has a nice figure (wish I had her breasts instead of mine) be drawn by her intelligence, etc. But friendship is all there is for me since there is a absence of sexual arousal for me. I can hang out with straight, bi, or gay friends but there is no sexual desire or interest for me. Heck, if I was attracted then the dating pool would increase for me! LOL!

lol Yes, quite true . . . . I think it was one of the Ellen Degeneres sitcoms where someone mentioned what goes on in the "gay world". Ellen quipped "Oh yeah, Gay World . . . . . isn't it just down the street from that other amusement park Bi-World? I heard they were better . . . had twice as many rides".

[BTDTWoman]

Responding to your thread title more than the content of your original post, I would say that no one "turns gay." We all have erotic desires throughout our lives over which we have no control. May I elaborate?

Bottom line: What makes you hard and wet?* That's your erotic desire.

At each point of our lives, certain erotic desires will be stronger than others and we make decisions about which erotic desires to act on and which to repress or place on the back burner. Sometimes the conditions of our lives are such that we are not feeling much erotic desire. Work, love, family, health, babies, stress, aging, religious beliefs and community laws - all play a role in shaping and regulating the intensity and expression of our erotic desires. If we couldn't do this, we might spend all day and every day having sex, reveling in "polymorphously perverse" pleasure.

Sometimes, erotic desires that we have repressed in the past demand their way off the back burner and onto the front burner. Sometimes there aren't enough front burners to accommodate all of them at one time. Whatever is up front at a given time is pressed into a cultural mold of sexual identity; that is, our society has created categories (little boxes) for people who desire and practice specific erotic acts: gay, straight, bisexual, pedophiles, celibates, etc.

None of the above categories exist in nature or biology; they are all social constructs (the product of collective social agreement). Some are valued highly in our culture, e.g., heterosexual identities, and especially a reproductive, monogamous, legally married, gender-polarized heterosexual identity. Some sexual identities are devalued, e.g. gay male sexual identity, and especially a hedonistic, nonmonogamous, gender-subversive gay identity.

Our modern society and culture (unlike past societies and cultures) demand that every individual's erotic desires and sexual activities get squeezed (or will be forcibly squeezed) into one of the above categories. We give individuals a grace period of childhood and early adolescence before they must assume a sexual identity or be presumed heterosexual. That is why teens who express same-sex erotic desire are said to be "experimenting" rather than "gay." There is cultural agreement that children and early teens are heterosexual until proven otherwise when they reach late adolescence or adulthood. Heterosexuality is our culture's default sexual identity.

Given the difficulty of negotiating any same-sex erotic feelings in a heterosexist society, many individuals of every age first try to follow the socially valued path of dating, marriage, and reproductive heterosexuality. Most also try to stay in the "vanilla" zone and feel guilty (even tormented) by their desires for what we call "kinky" sex. How can we blame people for trying to take the only socially acceptable path? Yet if you are aware that your strongest erotic desires are for the same sex today, you should know that this is unlikely to change significantly in the next few years and possibly the rest of your life.

How you manage to fit your erotic desires felt at different times in your life into culturally manufactured little boxes is complex. So you can't "turn gay," you can only push your erotic desires into a sexual identity box labeled "gay." Or have others do it for you with or without your consent. Or you can stay in a box that feels more comfortable for you than dealing with contradictory erotic desires. (That box is usually called a "closet" if you have same-sex desires but claim a heterosexual identity, openly or by default.)

Hope this helps, even a little.

*Hard and wet: For males, this means an erection and preseminal lubricant (precum). For females, this means clitoral erection and vaginal lubrication.

[masse7326]

Originally Posted by BTDTWoman

nt (precum). ~~~clipped~~~

But in your opinion, why did I change drastically like this?

[BTDTWoman]

Originally Posted by masse7326

But in your opinion, why did I change drastically like this?

There is no why. There is only desire.

Desire exists. It ebbs and flows. Your awareness and acceptance of your desires change. Looking for a reason for your desire usually is a futile and meaningless exercise. What answer would bring you comfort? What would you prefer to hear? If you have answers, follow those clues for further self-exploration.

That being said, are you taking hormones or psychotropic medications?

Also, do you think this is related to an emerging TG identity?

[masse7326]

Originally Posted by BTDTWoman

There is no why. There is only desire.

Desire exists. It ebbs and flows. Your awareness and acceptance of your desires change. Looking for a reason for your desire usually is a futile and meaningless exercise. What answer would bring you comfort? What would you prefer to hear? If you have answers, follow those clues for further self-exploration.

That being said, are you taking hormones or psychotropic medications?

Also, do you think this is related to an emerging TG identity?

Not taking hormones
What are psychotropic meds?

It could be related to an emerging TG identity? I honestly don't know