Some of you might remember me (hopefully not so many, B"H, those who knew me no longer need the site).  I joined a few years ago and was struggling with sexual identity problem in addition to porn addiction.  I have had several developments in my life over my long hiatus.  I did meet a girl and we were together for over a year.  I was being too bold, I think for trying that.  Eventually we became sexually active with eachother and while i thought I had lost all my addiction problems, I discovered lust.  This led to me not being satisfied and wanting to have sex every time i saw the girl.  Eventually, I got so frustrated with it that I ended it.  I started to backtrack to my original dillemma: that sometimes I was attracted to men.  That, coupled with the lust problem led to me to believe (possibly truthfully) that I was bisexual and started to have encounters with men I met on a special gay social network and accrue a collection of both homosexual and heterosexual pornography on my computer, in magazines and on DVDs.  I recently went through a change of heart (yesterday actually) and threw out all my pornography and deleted all those clips from my machine.  So. That has led me back here to start from square one and hopefully successfully conquer my yetzer hara and be the master of my own neshoma, eyes and mind.  As i said, I'm back.

Welcome back to the forum.

That wasn't easy being honest about what's been going on, and coming back here.

Good luck,

--Eye.

Hi Coby,

I have not yet read your previous posts, but will do so.  I had some of the same issues that you mention, and are happy to share some of my experiences.  I also know some people who had similar issues - perhaps even more extreme (who are now married).

Baruch Hashem, I am quite happily married now.

thank you for your encouragement, both of you.  B'siyata Dishmaya and with your help i can finally be over this.  I'm more read now,y and determined than I was before.  Thank you

I shared a little on others' topics, which are slightly relevant to yours:
www.guardyoureyes.org/forum/index.php?topic=3913.msg106560#msg106560
www.guardyoureyes.org/forum/index.php?topic=3882.msg105771#msg105771

It is how I see this issue nowadays, having gone through it a little.

My first experience with a male was when I was a child, with an older boy, who got me to do things to him about which I felt horrible at the time.

I also considered the possibility of bisexuality...  Which I now find totally strange. 

Incidentally, I had a friend in high school who was "groomed" by a gay neighbor, and then later decided that he was gay.  I've been deeply involved with the seedier side of growing up, and I've seen people change and be changed, through outside circumstances and their own internal issues.  You don't get to choose what happens to you, or what you're given within yourself.  You cannot even be angry about it - the anger gets in the way of your own actions.

There are also realities that people like you and me know, namely that things that repulse others actually feel good.  Emotionally, physically...  And then there is this terrible guilt.  How can that be reconciled?  We want to feel good, we want to be true to ourselves, but we have beliefs that we cannot reconcile with these things!

More than just wanting to feel good, we want to be content - both spiritually and emotionally.  Someone who identifies as gay has a huge problem balancing these two.  Some people change religious beliefs altogether.  Some people repress the latent attraction to men.  Some people turn the attraction to men into something else.  Each person does their own thing.

I fought a battle with those tendencies within myself, and Hashem seems to have taken pity on me and removed those particular challenges.  The battle instead (like you) moved on to women - my "crimes" in that respect probably went way beyond what I had previously done with men.  Who can judge, other than Hashem?  At any rate, I too had a massive issue in acting out with women - I did it for the sake of my own existence - I needed to prove myself.  I needed the rush of conquest.

Some of the issue goes right back to the first "molestation", if you want to call it that.  Some of it comes from feelings of inadequacy.  Some of it was anger and reprisal.  Who knows what the rest was?  I can find dozens of excuses...  But at some point, I had to admit that I am an adult, and excuses are for others to find good in me (and me to find good in myself), but not to justify what I was doing.

I realized that my acting out was just an extension of the same issue I had when I was younger - the homosexual element was gone, but the deeper, core issue remained.

So for me, there were two stages.  One was to eradicate the homosexual tendencies.  The second was to manage the lust.  The first was so, so, so much easier.

I agree whole-heartedly that the homosexual issue was much easier tackle than the lust is.  I do still find myself attracted to men sometimes, but I think that comes from more as a desire for my body to look as good as theirs, not neccessarily want to have sex with them.  My original feelings started similar to yours.  I was going through a very bad depression (went on half my life, became very strong in my teens and early twenties, started coming back here and there, etc.) and my best friend (a year younger than me) told me to come to him anytime for help.  one night i felt particularly bad (exaggerated by my insomnia) and i ran around the corner to his house at about 2 AM.  He had the entire basement to himself and I knew he was up late so I wouldnt be disturbing anyone when I knocked on the back door. He let me in, heard me out, comforted me and invited me to stay the remainder of the night.  He gave up the bed for me. So I climbed in and he went into the other room....basically he came out naked, got in next to me and stuff happenned.  That was the first and only time I've experienced penetration.  I was sexually naive at the time, I mean, I knew about sex, all kinds of sex, but I was not interested in trying.  I was 15 and he was 14 at the time. After that I started seeing him for sexual activities and felt horrible about it, but it felt good physically. Wait.  A thought just occurred to me : I've had a lust addiction for a very long time I realize! I happen to be very good at telling jokes and everyone enjoys my humor, and most of it is very funny, but it;s all basically dirty jokes!  i've been collecting them and making them up for years and now I realize my addiction was probably the driving force!  To end the story, that's basically what happened to me and my life just kept getting worse and worse from there until I discovered this forum many years ago.  Thinking that I had been satisfied and done I haven't been here in years until now when I realize I really need it.  I'm ready to take the challenge head-on now.  I've been studying judaic philosophy and practices for years and had a scholarship to a Chabad yeshiva in Israel, where I first learned about, experienced and fell in love with Chassidus and kabbalah.  I started looking at different schools of chassidus and I consider myself a firm follower of Nachman of Breslev's teachings and philosophy.  I have started to put those ideas into practice and it has helped me pretty much eradicate my personal depression, get me through the day, and make others feel good about themselves and the world in general.  I think the reason Hashem sent these challenges back to me is that I should really grow in my studies and practices, follow through on them, and ipso facto be able to cope with these feelings and automatically erase them without much difficulty.  So that's why I've returned.  At least I like to think so anyway.

coby613 wrote on 28 Jun 2011 20:26:


I would not make the same connection, and I think it is erroneous to do so, but I am sure others would disagree.  It is, in my opinion, more the prevailing social perspective and conditioning on these issues that allows them to be funny.  Inappropriate?  Certainly.  "Normal" people find them funny, too.




Very nice - Chabad philosophy is very, very helpful for people in suffering and confusion, if you let it work with you.  Were you able to open up to the Mashpia, and take his advice?




Beautiful (if painful in parts) story.  It sounds as if you are tackling and overcoming this!  Have you cut all possible connections to the gay network?

Here are my honest and politically incorrect feelings about gay networks:
"Gaydom" is an artificial culture that, like all cultures, is self-promoting.  It recruits, and maintains members.  It aims to persuade people that they are something - and for the most part, they are correct.  Some people can be attracted to men, and some people are attracted to men.  There is no flaw in this assertion of theirs.  I would go further and say most men are capable of being attracted to men.

They then push the idea that it is natural, good and healthy.  The strength of this argument is that it builds on debunking the general notion "I cannot be attracted to men!" - when this falsehood is toppled, it makes people receptive to everything else pushed at them.  Whole networks exist to find, convert, recruit, discover and help people to achieve this.  Some networks are purely evil (grooming children), and some are extremely well-intentioned (helping victims of homophobia).  Thus, with a full spectrum of views, outlooks and political infighting, the gay community is now accepted as a mainstream culture in most Western environments.

Now...  The same could be said about people being attracted, not to men, but to children.  And this makes people squirm.  And it could also be extended to animals.  People want to reject this, but cultures throughout history (including the illustrious Romans, Assyrians and Greeks) practiced these behaviors, and instituted rules and practices to support them.  Almost anything or anyone could be converted into a sexual lust object.

And Torah recognizes this, and forbids homosexual relations (amongst other stuff).  Torah recognizes that people could want to do this very much.  I believe that it is (Jewish, from other) social conditioning into denial of this as an issue ("it's completely unnatural, and frum Jews don't have these issues, and neither should you"), that makes it both so appealing to those inclined, and so dangerous to those in it, searching for self.  Torah spells out that it is an abomination - which I certainly would not have figured out on my own.  What I have done is to make gay acts revolting to myself.  Or at least something that I now instinctively keep well away from.  On the flip-side, I feel very, very close to people who are caught in that world, and they do not revolt me at all, whatsoever (unlike those who are "afraid to shake their hands").  Do you know what's weird?  I can now feel less self-conscious about being physically close to men (OK, some Chassidishe kissing is just going a bit too far, especially when it leaves you wet...) then I used to be when it was still an issue for me.  I don't ever want to be complacent, but I honestly believe that Hashem performed a nes in my case, so as to take this challenge away from me.

But to those who feel that "being gay (whatever that means) immediately precludes them from frumkeit (whatever that is)", there is an outstanding issue, and a whole lot of damage to repair.

But, in the way I see it, it is a challenge like any other, and yes - it is possibly (almost universally) lust related.  I didn't ever label myself as anything other than a yid.  I often feel that the label, and the networks, are the biggest challenges.

---

Would I be correct in inferring that you no longer consider yourself gay, that you are wondering if you are "bi" (whatever that means), and you know for a certainty that you can enjoy a physical relationship with a woman?

that would be correct i guess.  I did cut off connections to the gay community but when I was with my girlfriend I enjoyed being with her sexually at firstm but i soon became frustrated as noted above.  I dont have the time right now to comment on everything you said, so please email me.  I do have a lot to say.  just please copy and paste your post to the email so i can answer correctly.  you can click on the link next to my name and i will send you a pm with my address.

to continue from this morning.... I have felt that same idea about the gay culture at times and then was able to shrug it off sometimes.  I also agree that most men are capable of being attracted to other men, so is it really feelings of homosexuality that led me into those circles, or was it because it really started because i was attracted to the way the other boys' bodies looked compared to mine and was a little envious.  I guess I was also feeling inadequacy and looking for acceptance into any social circles at the time, and the first ones that popped up were the gays.  Now though, I realize that yes, men do find me attractive (and I have been hit on more than once) but that I am also attractive in general.  I actually do have girls flocking to me hoping that I pick them to be in a relationship with!  It took a long time to realize that was going on and even then i had to do it from a very far away viewpoint.  I'm starting to acknowledge now that maybe it's true, but as i said, the lust addiction gets in the way if i do happen to start dating someone.  My last relationship ended disappointingly for me because I knew I brought about my own destruction regarding how to behave appropriately with her.  Let it be known though, that I took the initiative and ended it with her before I took it too far and end up a father or, chas v'shalom with some venereal disease.

Rabbi aaron feldman, rosh yeshiva of ner yisroel has written an essay in his latest book about being frum and having feelings for men.I forget the name of the book but you should be able to pick it up in any seforim store.hatzlacha

MAALIN BAKODESH wrote on 29 Jun 2011 21:57:

it's called The Eye of The Storm

Very interesting.  Homosexuality is not something that is talked about in depth in religious circles, from what I've experienced.  Breaking free from it goes well with the GYE philosophy though.

it's taboo.  With all of this "alternate lifestyle" in the news, media and whatnot, it's surprising that most religious readers haven't brought it up