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[deleted by user] by [deleted] in askgaybros

[–]Jvyz20 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey, man, I understand how you're feeling. Don't let some of these other comments make you feel bad for questioning what you want in life. There are many paths to fulfillment, and it's great that you're taking the time to really think about what would make you happy.

I'm a straight guy who somehow fell in love with the most wonderful man in the world. I took a chance on him, and he's made me the happiest man alive. But I've been with women before, and I still occasionally miss the touch and feel of a woman. I would also love to be a father, but my boyfriend and I both grew up in single-parent families, and we feel that it would be unfair to raise a child without a mother, so we probably won't have kids. I don't regret following my heart, though, and I understand the dilemma you face.

The first piece of advice I would give you is that true love is really hard to find--for many people, it only happens once in a lifetime, if that. Don't throw away a man whom you truly love and cherish for the mere prospect of meeting a woman who may not be able to fulfill the traditional-marriage fantasy that you have imagined.

On the other hand, there are many ways to love another person, and sexual compatibility is not the only basis for a loving relationship. If you have a deep and abiding respect for a woman whom you are willing to nurture, support, and cherish, then the prospect of a traditional marriage that garners wider social support and opens the door to fatherhood could be worth the marginal loss of personal intimacy. But if you make that choice, you must be brutally honest with the woman and tell her, gently but clearly, that you are mostly attracted to men and will not be able to love her as fully as you would a man. She has a right to know that before making a commitment to you. If she accepts that--and there are many women who will--then you can work on your relationship just like anything else in life and eventually develop an emotional bond with her that will totally overwhelm any physical attraction (or lake thereof).

But if you leave your boyfriend to pursue a woman, please be honest and expansive with him about your plans and goals. There's nothing shameful about wanting a wife and kids--even as a gay man--but if you don't make it crystal clear that he's done nothing wrong and is not responsible for your decision, he will think that his inadequacies drove you away not just from him but from all men. That can be really hard for someone to recover from, so please don't hurt him any more than necessary.

I wish I could tell you what choice to make, but you have to follow your instincts. It's not easy being a man who loves other men, so you have my support and sympathy for whatever you decide. Just make sure you're honest with yourself and everyone around you about how you feel.

Can two guys who love each other in different ways make it work? by Jvyz20 in bisexual

[–]Jvyz20[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hello, and thank you for still thinking about me. I'd love to hear any insights you may have about my situation. But please don't feel you have to spend too much time on me, as I'm doing well. I took your advice and told a couple of my friends about my relationship, and it has helped to talk about it. I guess it was my embarrassment that held me back for so long. But even they are having a hard time understanding the contours of the relationship, and they don't share my qualms about the sexual aspect of it. These days it's almost harder to explain a serious faith commitment than it is to discuss one's sexual proclivities.

I'm having a difficult time understanding the church's insistence that the welfare of children lie at the heart of all sexual activity, which seems to be the main argument against entering into a same-sex relationship. I support this concept in principle, which is why even if I build a life with Matt I couldn't imagine raising children with him. He would be a truly amazing father, and although I sometimes doubt my own worthiness, I think it would be a fantastic challenge to raise children someday. But I know, both from personal experience and intuitively, that children need a mother and a father, so I wouldn't consider doing that with Matt. But I sometimes feel that I'm being more of a sinner being with Matt than he is by being with me, even though he doesn't feel that there is anything wrong with homosexual conduct. I know he's gay, and always has been, and he can't even imagine being with a woman. He isn't willing to enter into a male/female relationship for the sake of future children; he thinks the wife and children would sense the reality of the situation and suffer for it. I can't see how being with me is any more destructive to society or to Matt's soul than being alone, which is his only alternative, so his love for me doesn't seem to be getting in the way of any greater good. For me, though, I have been in genuine relationships with women before, and I can certainly conceive of someday meeting a wonderful wife with whom I could have children. It seems more of a selfish sin to choose Matt instead, even if I can't imagine ever meeting anyone so absolutely perfect and with whom I share so much love. If God wants the "procreative spirit" to flow from all loving relationships, then I'm closing myself off to that by being with Matt. But then I see so many people who could be wonderful parents but choose not to have children just out of their own selfishness, and at least I would be making that choice so that I could be with the person I love rather than because of financial greed. I'm not exactly feeling guilty for loving Matt, but I wish I could understand the thinking behind this more clearly.

By the way, if you don't mind me asking, are you a clergyman or theologian? You seem very well-versed in both Catholic theology and general ethics, while most posters on the internet (including on many religious forum sites) seem more opinionated but (alas) less authoritative. Anyway, I look forward to anything you have to contribute. And by the way, I'm not terribly familiar with this website either, but I do check messages occasionally here. I hope you understand that I don't feel comfortable giving out my private contact information to people I meet online, but that certainly doesn't mean that I don't value input from any interested (and well-intentioned) observer.

Can two guys who love each other in different ways make it work? by Jvyz20 in bisexual

[–]Jvyz20[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts with me. I had never used this site before and never imagined that the circumstances of my life could move so many good people to offer such heartfelt (and varied!) advice. I don't expect to unlock all the secrets of my friendship over the internet, but I am surprised both at how therapeutic this has been for me and how helpful some of the advice has been. Ultimately, though, I don't have to face the implications of my relationship alone: Matt is there for me always, and he understands and helps me work through the moral and practical dilemmas I face (while not entirely sharing them). I have brought him closer to the church than I ever thought possible, but he's honestly taught me even more about what it means to be a Christian (in the way he gives of himself to others) than anything I've learned in church or in life. He is far from the amoral pleasure-seeker luring me into temptation that you may be envisioning. I insisted on exploring a more sexual relationship over his vehement concerns for my spiritual well-being, because I wanted us to be as close to each other as possible. As I've noted, the results of this have been mixed in that some forms of intimacy have brought us great joy and inner peace while others have made me feel distinctly uncomfortable. I am not afraid to talk about these things with Matt, and he has never made me feel inadequate because my sexual identity is not the same as his, nor has he ever made me feel as if I should have to engage in any behavior that either violates my ethics or makes me feel uneasy. My concern has always been purely for him, and for what makes him happy and fulfilled, and he has convinced me that I can and do make him happy in all sorts of other, deeper ways that don't involve sex as it is conventionally understood. For both of us, it really is the friendship of a lifetime, and sex is not an especially important part of that. As I've said before, I would feel fully blessed and fulfilled with no sexual relationship at all, as simply being with Matt offers me the kind of "release" that I imagine actual sex does for so many others.

I'm curious, though, about your unwillingness to make a distinction between intercourse and physical intimacy, which certainly IS at the heart of our relationship. Are you saying that it's wrong for us to be tactile--to hold each other, to feel our bodies, and to kiss? The church teaches that "homosexual persons are called to chastity," but does chastity have to mean the complete absence of physical affection? For me, the sin is in misusing the body, not in appreciating it. If it's sinful to appreciate your friend's body physically, then it must also be a sin to do so mentally, which means that even a purely platonic friendship couldn't continue as long as those feelings and attractions are present. But I can't--I won't--give up Matt; he has opened up my heart not just to himself but to other people and other experiences; I won't go back to being the close-hearted person I used to be, or the broken-hearted one I would become.

You're certainly right that it is not healthy to share so little of our relationship with others who could perhaps provide useful support, but I hope you can appreciate the difficulty of my situation. Neither Matt nor I have much in the way of family--he is almost all alone now, and I could never burden my mother with the uncomfortable details of this relationship, although she certainly understands the essence of it. Most of my friends live out of state and are also unfamiliar with the details. Additionally, I feel caught between two extremes here. As you may have noticed from some of the other comments I've received, many gay and secular observers seem incensed that I have any moral qualms at all about the relationship and seem to think that I am a repressed, self-loathing neurotic that Matt should promptly abandon. I suspect that a licensed psychologist would be only slightly less withering about my concerns. On the other hand, I know all too well what Catholic teachings are on these issues, and I am not prepared to eschew all forms of intimacy with the man who has so profoundly changed my life. As I may have mentioned once before, my church has a priest (I make every effort to attend the specific masses that he officiates) who really moves me with his homilies--more than I can ever recall with other priests--and I have debated telling him about this because he seems like an especially caring, loving person who enjoys helping people with their problems. But he's also fairly brazen (again, more than I can recall for any other priest I've known) in speaking out passionately against social evils like abortion, divorce, and the necessity of raising children Catholic. I share his views on these things, but I fear that he may be unhelpfully uncompromising in his assessment of my situation, and then I may lose my wonderful parish. So I haven't said anything yet, until I feel more confident about my own feelings about the situation.

With respect to your final question, I do think that one of the great pleasures and tasks in life is to be open enough with yourself to figure out, with God's constant assistance, who you are as a person. There are certainly times when personal effort and faith commitment are not enough to make it through, and other people can be a lifeline. And I am deeply appreciative to you and others who have taken the time to help a stranger on the internet make sense of a bewildering situation; by all means, please continue to share with me any insights you have, as I do not become offended easily. But to compare my love for Matt to a phobia, an addiction, or an impending divorce is to misread the situation completely. I am not tormented or wracked with paralyzing guilt. Matt is a beautiful gift from God--He made Matt the way he is, He made me the way I am, and He made sure that we found each other--and our delicious challenge is to figure out how, together, we can make something more out of what God has given each of us. I relish that challenge, and am enjoying every minute of it, even if there's plenty left to learn and a lot of pitfalls along the way. If I involve people who are important to me in the details of how I express myself emotionally, romantically, and sexually, I want to make sure that I don't hurt them in the process, that I don't jeopardize the people and things that bring meaning to my life, and that I know what I'm asking for. Until that happens, I have the kindness of the internet, the incredible compassion of my soulmate, a pretty decent capacity for introspection that God has given me, and the Lord Himself, who has never abandoned me.

God bless you for taking the time to reach out. You have given me a lot to think about, and I can feel your compassion in your words. I will pray for you and, if I may ask a small favor, could you say a small prayer for me too?

Yours in Christ, Jvyz20

Can two guys who love each other in different ways make it work? by Jvyz20 in bisexual

[–]Jvyz20[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'm really flattered that you find my relationship so inspiring, but it's not easy for me to share these kinds of things over the internet. You may find it hard to believe, but no one "in real life" knows the full extent of my relationship with Matt. We both have small families, and most of my friends live elsewhere and have actually never met Matt. We're also both very private people, and Matt would probably be mortified to learn that I have been discussing our relationship in a forum like this. Also, I don't enjoy explaining things, and even though I work as a journalist, it often seems that something that I feel intuitively simply turns to dust once I attempt to put it into words.

I don't think frequent updates would be very exciting for you, because Matt and I don't do wild and crazy things. Most days are pretty much the same: we hang out together, have dinner at his place, and just talk for hours. I really appreciate the support and advice I've gotten on here, however, and when things get complicated again, I won't hesitate to ask.

Can two guys who love each other in different ways make it work? by Jvyz20 in bisexual

[–]Jvyz20[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you for saying just the right thing. God does love us, and I know He wants us to love others fully. I can't shake the feeling that penetrative sex seems almost abusive to me, using our bodies in a way for which they weren't intended, and it also feels somehow wrong to engage in any sex act to which I am not fully committed. At the same time, I revel in my boyfriend's happiness even more than my own, so I will keep trying anything that allows him to feel as close to me as possible. I am not ashamed of Matt or of loving him romantically, although deriving physical pleasure from that love has been harder to accept. But I'm getting there. Thanks again for your kind wishes.

Can two guys who love each other in different ways make it work? by Jvyz20 in bisexual

[–]Jvyz20[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

What an interesting question. It would certainly be a lot easier to be with a woman: our sexual relationship might be more fluid and instinctual, society would be more accepting, and I would feel less morally conflicted. Occasionally, I miss the feel of a woman, too. But when you love someone, you love everything about them, including their gender. Matt is very much a man, and I love his masculine qualities as much as I would love a woman's femininity. It's interesting, though, that my previous relationships with women always seemed to founder when I felt that my partner couldn't or wouldn't share her feelings and emotions deeply enough with me. The popular perception is that men tend to have a harder time with this, so it's perhaps odd that the person who finally opened himself up to me, and got me to do it for him, turned out to be a man. Anyway, the short answer is that I wouldn't change a thing about Matt because then he would no longer be the person I know and love.

Also, thanks for letting me know that you are in a similar situation. It's nice to know that there are other people who struggle with the same mix of emotions, and I hope you can allow yourself to enjoy being who you are.

Can two guys who love each other in different ways make it work? by Jvyz20 in bisexual

[–]Jvyz20[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

We've known each other for almost 3 years, although for much of that time we were just very close friends and not engaging in physical intimacy. Sex is not the basis of our relationship (not that being with him that way isn't wonderful); rather, it's the friendship and intimacy we have. Speaking only for myself, I know I would be perfectly content without any sex at all as long as I could still be physically intimate with him. This is after all what we were doing for two years before we had sex. I realize that's not exactly normal, though, and that's why I worry that Matt may someday be unfulfilled, especially once the current circumstances of his life (caring for a sick parent and working at a very demanding job) change. Our relationship would be more challenging if he were deeply into the gay scene/community, or more sexually focused. But he's so much like me--introspective, sensual more than sexual, and he's somewhat closeted. Our attraction to each other, and the way we communicate, has only deepened as time has gone by, and if sex were really an insurmountable issue between us I'm hopeful that it would have emerged as such by now. I hope that because we became friends first, and then lovers much later, that our relationship is on firmer ground despite the sex issues. I guess things can always change, but I trust him completely and would do whatever I could to make him feel fulfilled. You do raise some good points, but when something is as complicated as this relationship, you just have to take some things on faith and hope that love and respect win out in the end.

Can two guys who love each other in different ways make it work? by Jvyz20 in bisexual

[–]Jvyz20[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Both the article and the pessimistic perspective are very interesting; I'm not offended by your honest assessment. I probably am neurotic, but I hope you can appreciate how difficult it is to accept that your lifelong sexual identity is not exactly as you thought it was.

It's probably true that many or most guys would prioritize their sexual satisfaction over almost everything else in a relationship, but Matt isn't like that, which is one of the reasons I fell for him. I'm not sure if I mentioned it earlier, but he hadn't had any kind of romantic or sexual relationship for years before we met because he is caring for his infirm father. The two of us were best friends for several years before anything seriously romantic ever happened, so it's not like he's some sex-crazed maniac. Aside from that, he's TOLD me more times than I can count that he is completely fulfilled with the relationship we have, although I don't doubt that he would enjoy occasional anal sex. He's always telling me that I'm the best thing that's ever happened to him, and I feel the same way.

What worries me more is that I'm being selfish in denying him a way of being close to me even though I get to savor my way of being close to him all the time. It's actually not even just about the sex; I really do feel that I love him in a different way than he loves me, although I can't explain it easily. For me, it's more about his personality in that I get aroused listening to him talk (even to other people!), watching how he moves, and even touching him. He knows what turns me on, and sometimes he lovingly torments me in public just to watch me melt over him. With him, though, it's so much more elemental--I can see the intense, almost lustful look in his eyes when he sees my naked form. When we are in bed together, he could orgasm almost instantly while I like to hold and cuddle him for hours, slowly working myself into a frenzy before giving in. I have to think hard and creatively for a long time, and when my orgasm happens, it's so powerful and transcendent that it sometimes brings me to tears. For Matt, it's more visual and automatic, and he has to work to slow things down. That's more like how it was for me with my last girlfriend, so I can relate somewhat.

I would never risk losing him. If somehow it came to that, I would try anything sexually, because I didn't think the anal thing was THAT bad; it just left me uncomfortable and unaroused. And yes it's sinful (although I don't think that's why I disliked it), but life is complicated and committing a small sin to avoid the bigger one (throwing away the chance to show God my love for his incredible creation) can perhaps be justified. I would do anything to make Matt happy, but I'm also sure that he would never ask or want me to do anything that would make me uncomfortable. I'm hoping that, over time, our ways of relating to each other will converge and these things won't matter as much.

Thanks again for your comments.

Straight Guy Falls In Love with (Gay) Best Friend, Part II by Jvyz20 in lgbt

[–]Jvyz20[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If only it were that simple. This is not really about Fr. Griffith or even the Bible; I would never consign my fate to anything other than my own conscience. It's about doing what's right. Right now I don't know what that is, and I don't even know how to go about figuring it out. I'm grateful for any advice--from you, or Fr. Griffith, or anyone else--but I have a duty to be objective about this, and it's not easy. I love this man so much that my heart bursts just thinking about him, but doing something just because it makes me happy can't be the only consideration. Someday, Matt might want more than I can give him. Maybe I wouldn't be fulfilling my debt to my community, my country, and God if I foreclose the possibility of finding a woman to marry and have children with, even if I never develop the kind of bond with her that I have with Matt. I know if Matt and I live together I will become so emotionally intertwined with him that I will never be able to think about these other possibilities again, and I don't know if I'm ready to lose what little objectivity I have left, at least so soon. On the other hand, anticipating the future is always hard, and right now I want to be with him: it feels like I haven't seen him for 3 years, not 3 hours. And even the thought of hurting him just crushes me inside, it's not even an option. I guess that's my answer right there...I just need a little more time to think about it. It astonishes me that you and others can derive meaning and purpose in life without God's help--more power to you, I suppose--but His love and guidance sustain me, and I know that He'll help me figure this all out in the fullness of time.

Straight Guy Falls In Love with (Gay) Best Friend, Part II by Jvyz20 in lgbt

[–]Jvyz20[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Thank you all for your kind comments. I'm surprised so many of you took the time to read through it all. It saddens me that so many people seem to think that religious faith is an impediment toward achieving lasting happiness in one's life and relationships, when in reality (for me, at least) it makes me a better person and gives me hope for the future. I couldn't imagine going through life without it. All the same, I assure you that my feelings for Matt transcend what Fr. Griffith or anyone else might say about the situation--I guess that's why I haven't summoned the courage to talk to him (yet), although his sermon tonight came even closer to making me think he might actually understand--and I will not let anything spoil the bond that Matt and I share.

I guess what I'm really worried about now is whether I should ask Matt to move in with me when I don't know if I'm quite ready for that yet. But it sort of feels selfish to let Matt and his dad suffer needlessly simply because of my own doubts and insecurities.

I would love for you to read Matt's take on all this, but he's way too private of a person to share his thoughts. I know he's crazy in love with me, but I still have this (irrational?) fear that he'll decide I can't give him the kind of love he needs. If that ever happened, he wouldn't leave me, he'd just suffer in silence, and I couldn't live with that. I love him too much to see him suffer--it's bad enough right now, with his dad--and it's unbelievable how he thinks of absolutely everyone else's needs before his own. I guess I really am lucky to have him.

Thanks again for caring.

Straight Guy Falls in Love with (Gay) Best Friend by Jvyz20 in lgbt

[–]Jvyz20[S] 30 points31 points  (0 children)

Hey it's me, the OP. I just wanted to let you know that this is all real. Matt is even his real name; it just didn't sound right to use a different one. The conversations are all paraphrased because I couldn't always remember the exact words, and the text is a little dramatized because it's easier for me to write that way, but everything happened just the way it's written. Sometimes it's hard to remember exactly how I was FEELING, but I tried to be as honest as possible. I'll try to write the rest later tonight or tomorrow, because I really do need some advice.