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Sexual Orientation long-term Rumination/Checking Misery


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Hi everyone

I'll start by giving a little background. I am a 35 years old male and have never had a relationship which I understand is very unusual. I go on dates and the online stuff and try and meet people but haven't found anyone yet. I am sociable, friendly decent person with no ties. I am constantly confused by the idea that at times I may find men attractive. I'm not sure If I really do, or if it's just in my head, I become so confused and tormented by it all that I really don't know what is going on anymore.   It is making me very depressed, costing me hours of my life thinking and ruminating and to my mind has no resolution in sight. It goes on and on and I thought it's time I ask for advice because it has been a very private problem that has stayed in my head in many years now.

I had ten sessions of CBT this summer two years ago, and I know I need not to check and look at photos etc but it is so so hard. Also how can I stop thinking about the subject even if I am not checking, ie the ruminating about who I am?

I seem to spend lots of time on many days, looking at photos of people and celebrities on instagram, facebook and the internet to see if I find guys attractive, or how I feel about them shirtless. I will click on a friends facebook page and click to friends of theirs I do not know to look at the photos of all their friends too. I'll look at people when I am shopping and get anxious if I think I find them attractive. I know looking and checking is very much a reassurance method and a way of checking things. Other days I am convinced I am straight and someone who is just totally confused by everything. But I really do not know.   The reverse happens and I look at women and worry I am not attracted to them as much as a straight man would be.  I do not seem to care much for breasts like most guys do which is a trigger for me to ruminate. And a time when most people have had several relationships, and some married with babies it's hard to get to this time of life and still not know yourself. I couldn't tell you if I am straight, gay, bi-sexual, a-sexual but it is making my life so tough at the moment!  I can find a guy with a 6-pack on instragram attractive, but I am not sure if this is gay or just being able to see that someone good looking and air brushed and spending their life in the gym looks good.  (again ruminating whilst I type this, you get the picture).

I have read lots about HOCD (excuse the acronym) and much of it seems to ring true with the obsessing and anxiety I am experiencing around my personal life. I was just hoping by posting on here, someone might be able to give me some practical advice of how I can help myself and get to the bottom of this. I've some bad times with the OCD but I have never felt so low as I do with issue which gives me many dark thoughts and hours of ruminating and anxiety.

I know I shouldn't check and analyse but it seems it be on mind morning, noon and night and I can't escape it. I have self-referred to the NHS once more to try and have a final crack at overcoming this as I know it is possible as I found with my OCD for intrusive thoughts in my university days where myself and my therapist worked so well together and made huge progress on a different subject matter.  This subject I have ruminated, googled, and analysed for a decade and I am still stuck.  I panic because life goes quickly and I am not getting anywhere.  I genuinely do not know my orientation and feelings and such like and I need some good advice and even a kick up the bum and I know this is always the best and most informed place on OCD to get that.

Thanks for taking the time to read my post and hopefully you will have some good advice for me.  Enjoy the weekend guys and keep smiling :-)

Best wishes,

Jon.

P.S - I read a quote from PolarBear to another person's post on a similar theme that I looked at on here this morning.  I think it is a great quote and one I definitely need to take on board: "Keep doing the same things you have been and you'll be doomed to that twilight zone forever".

Edited by Mcajshaw
spelling errors.
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So, here's the thing. You don't stop thoughts. You stop the actions and that stops the thoughts.

It's not an overnight process and it's not an easy one. But that's what you do. From reading your post, you have the thought and you end up getting reeled in by it, one way or another. The checking and the ruminating gives it weight, so the more you can cut down on that, the less weight the thought will carry.

You've gotten to a point where this thought registers as important. If you can find the strength to say, okay, right now I need to tackle the OCD and get better and maybe the rest will work itself out, that can only benefit you. Put your age and where you feel you 'should' be to one side. You are where you are and that's what really matters right now. Invest in what the CBT taught you and told you, tell yourself that getting better is THE most important thing you can focus on right now, because it is and try to cut out the OCD actions, the ruminating and the checking, as much as you can.

If you can get back into therapy and work with someone on a guided ERP plan to help you through it step by step that'd be cool. If not, I'm guessing you know the key points from the CBT and what to avoid.

One other thing I'd say is, where you're at right now, the thoughts will keep popping up, certainly at first. Remember that that's okay. Don't let that dissuade you or dispirit you.  Stick with it. You don't have to feel like you need to stop them or escape them, all you need to do for now is work out what they make you do to try and stop them and work on stopping those actions.

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Doubt. That is what is at the core of your problem. You are unsure if you are 100% straight, gay, bisexual, asexual, pink, blue or striped. So you check and test. The checking and testing doesn't bring a definitive answer, which leaves you in doubt. You don't like the doubt  so you check and test again. And round and round you go, and before you know it you've spent 10 years on the OCD merry-go-round, getting absolutely nowhere.

I think you'll agree you are no closer to a definitive answer than when this all started. You won't be any closer in another 10 years, if you keep doing the same thing.

What to do... go to the core. For 10 years you have carried on with the belief that you must know. That's gotten you nowhere. So change the belief. "I am okay with not knowing. I am okay with not being certain." Change that and you no longer need to check and test. It will be easier to stop those compulsions. Stop the compulsions and you take away the fuel for the OCD engine. With the engine sputtering, the thoughts diminish... you are no longer spending every moment thinking about something you can't answer. Your life improves. You feel better. There is more motivation to just leave the question alone.

Make sense?

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Thanks so much to both Chris B and PolarBear, very clear advice and practical instruction.  As an OCD sufferer you kind of know deep down what needs to be done but it can help so much when someone else sees it from a different angle.  Thanks so much to the both of you, I will keep re-visiting your thoughtful replies. You will have seen Polarbear that in my original post I included a quote from a previous post from you in reply to somebody else, sound advice for sure.

Thanks again to you both,

Cheers Jon.

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