Denial or hOCD. Dont know anymore

Hi everyone,

I'm a 21 year old male and since of late I'm not sure what my sexual identity is. The last 3 week's I've red most of the forum post about this topic and couldn't find a story that fits mine. Mostly because most of the topic starters where still in their teens.

I became aware of the thoughts when I watched the film "Lady Bird" in the plane. *spoiler* The boyfriend of the main actor, in the movie, is suddenly gay. At that moment the thought popped in my head: am I gay? It wasn't getting easier since I was flying the SanFrancisco. So I was I big surrounded by gay stuff over there. Everyday the thoughts bothered me more. Eventually I got groinial responses if I'd see a male who is sort of attractive. After that I totally lost it. The thoughts changed to; I am gay just admit it, you want to suck ****. Even if a try to imagine myself in a sexual situation with a man I get groinial responses plus a very tense feeling in my quads and lower legs. Most of the time paired with a gag reflex.

I have a background with intrusive thoughts. I've always had them and think they will never go away. Been in therapy the last year for thought about killing myself. Difference there was i could simply reason with that thought because I knew I'd never do that. Also got thoughts like I had cancer or some kind of tumour. Atwell as some intrusive thoughts with family members/friends of family(male/female) "what if I kiss them:

What is also notable, I think, is that I was a big user of marijuana and hash. Used to smoke up to a gram or more a day. I stopped marijuana and hash a week before the gay thoughts popped up. Maybe there's a relation between them two. Couldn't find anything on Google.

Now I'm back from holidays and I find myself scared of doing things with friends (gym etc). The thoughts, what if they think I'm gay, what if I started to like them.

Sometimes my mind get so crazy I think I am really gay. In the past I had relations with girls and also had sex. Later in my last relationship the sex wasn't that good anymore. I always related it with marijuana abuse and low libido.. that was also the time period the intrusive thoughts started to kick in about being sick.

The therapist said, if I remember well, that I had pure-O. Problem is because of my marijuana abuse my mind then wasn't really good with remembering things. So I could have made it up to reassure myself the last month.


I'm really in distress and planning on making a therapist appointment.

If anyone red the story, thank you in advance!

After a lot of thinking i've decided to contact my previous psychologist. I hope the queue is not that long. Since i've done that i feel a lot better. Dont know why. I'll be posting further progres in this topic for myself and anybody who's intrested.

Have a good night.

Happy to hear you're feeling better.
I'm on the opposite side right now, I've been on medication for at least 2 years, but I don't feel it can help me because I truly am gay.

Just now I fantasized about a guy in his underwear standing next to me and I had an urge to imagine touching him and I really enjoy it. I'm trying to make it sound more unsure so people could reassure me, but I really do think I enjoy it

I'm gay/bi and there's nothing I can do about it and I'm having a panic attack right now and on the edge of crying. Just because I'm afraid of accepting it and coming out. I just wish all of this was a nightmare, but I am actually gay

hocdsufferer wrote:Happy to hear you're feeling better.
I'm on the opposite side right now, I've been on medication for at least 2 years, but I don't feel it can help me because I truly am gay.

Just now I fantasized about a guy in his underwear standing next to me and I had an urge to imagine touching him and I really enjoy it. I'm trying to make it sound more unsure so people could reassure me, but I really do think I enjoy it

I'm gay/bi and there's nothing I can do about it and I'm having a panic attack right now and on the edge of crying. Just because I'm afraid of accepting it and coming out. I just wish all of this was a nightmare, but I am actually gay

I've red alot of your post on this forum. It sucks to have those feelings bro. Espescially when you think the feelings are real. You might have spend to many hours on this forum and have other people thoughts in your head.

Did you ever got any other fears? Like the fear of commit suicide, being terminal ill and ''feeling bad'' around people. Those were my biggest fears in recent years. Funny thing is that since I have this gay thoughts i dont even think about suicide and being terminal ill. Its like my biggest fears have been replaced with a fear I've never thought i could get. Pretty weird and quite intriguing. That's my way of telling the thought aren't what i really want to feel, but to be honest my thought are pretty strong and most of the times they're hard to accept even though i sort of know they are not real. I try using the app Headspace. Learns you to let thoughts go instead of fighting them. On good days i can easily let them go. On the harder days they still get stuck in my head. Practises takes time.

Today in the gym i was pretty scared. i felt ''attracted'' to most people i see everyday in the gym. Quite weird and i felt really conflicted and stressed(when i feel stressed I've the urge to vomit). Like I've been living my life in a lie. As you can presume this was a hard day. When i was about to leave there was this girls i haven't seen in a few years. The thoughts were gone for like 30mins and i could laugh about having those thoughts. It felt like such a relieve.

I hope you get well soon. Nobody deserves to be in so much discomfort.

Braincanbeweird wrote:

hocdsufferer wrote:Happy to hear you're feeling better.
I'm on the opposite side right now, I've been on medication for at least 2 years, but I don't feel it can help me because I truly am gay.

Just now I fantasized about a guy in his underwear standing next to me and I had an urge to imagine touching him and I really enjoy it. I'm trying to make it sound more unsure so people could reassure me, but I really do think I enjoy it

I'm gay/bi and there's nothing I can do about it and I'm having a panic attack right now and on the edge of crying. Just because I'm afraid of accepting it and coming out. I just wish all of this was a nightmare, but I am actually gay

I've red alot of your post on this forum. It sucks to have those feelings bro. Espescially when you think the feelings are real. You might have spend to many hours on this forum and have other people thoughts in your head.

Did you ever got any other fears? Like the fear of commit suicide, being terminal ill and ''feeling bad'' around people. Those were my biggest fears in recent years. Funny thing is that since I have this gay thoughts i dont even think about suicide and being terminal ill. Its like my biggest fears have been replaced with a fear I've never thought i could get. Pretty weird and quite intriguing. That's my way of telling the thought aren't what i really want to feel, but to be honest my thought are pretty strong and most of the times they're hard to accept even though i sort of know they are not real. I try using the app Headspace. Learns you to let thoughts go instead of fighting them. On good days i can easily let them go. On the harder days they still get stuck in my head. Practises takes time.

Today in the gym i was pretty scared. i felt ''attracted'' to most people i see everyday in the gym. Quite weird and i felt really conflicted and stressed(when i feel stressed I've the urge to vomit). Like I've been living my life in a lie. As you can presume this was a hard day. When i was about to leave there was this girls i haven't seen in a few years. The thoughts were gone for like 30mins and i could laugh about having those thoughts. It felt like such a relieve.

I hope you get well soon. Nobody deserves to be in so much discomfort.

I've had fears I can't really comprehend now. I once cried everyday when I was going to school because I guess I always feared I didn't know or study enough? I'm not sure about that, though. It was weird and I don't even know what was going on there.

Then, of course, I had fears of being terminally ill or my family being terminally ill, but my life wasn't "ruined" because of that. I just kind of feared it.

Since the start of the gay "obsession", when I was in the phase where I was kinda going crazy and crying 24/7, at the worst point, I feared of wanting to kill myself, feared going crazy etc.
I ocassionally have panic attacks about being a pedophile, aswell.

But I think not one of them can compare to what I feel towards guys. I actually have real feelings towards guys, I have feelings that can't be made up or "made out of fear". It's too real to be just a mental state. I am truly gay and not able to accept it and I, therefore, live in denial and searching for ways to excuse or ignore my real feelings. I get erections on girls, I usually don't on guys. But the feelings I feel are stronger than an erection. I could probably easily get an erection if I let myself to it. I can literally feel the urge of wanting to be with a guy and touching him, kissing him, etc.
I don't know how to explain, but I just can feel that it's real. And I'm only depressed and having panic attacks when I have a kind of "reality check" where I let myself into the thoughts on purpose and then I get an even worse panic attack because I can see that it's all real.

I come on the forum because I sometimes read something that will reassure me a little bit and I will be able to ignore being gay easier, because I will have a way to deny it, I feel. So it's all just denial, it really is. Also, the big difference between me and other people with this obsession, is that they "know deep inside" that it's not real. I just don't. I am only denying it.

I just watched The Handmaid's Tale and it showed a sex scene where it kept switching between the guy's and girl's body and I thought it was showing a girl's body and got an erection, but then I saw that it's a guy and I panicked.
Every time I see the guy now, I keep imagining him unclothed and I just feel attracted and like I'm suppressing and erection and other feelings. I feel like I would like to masturbate to him if I wasn't trying to deny it.
And I feel like this all the time and it can't be "fake feelings", it's just too real. I don't know what to do, I can't accept being gay/bi. I'm really desperate to be straight again, but I know it's not possible and it makes me really depressed and I'm in panic constantly. I'm truly a gay in denial and I can't believe it

Also, I feel like now that I stopped watching it, I'm again more able to ignore everything and just pretend nothing happened in order to deny it. I just try to deny being gay in every way possible and I know that I'm gay

I can't deny it anymore. This just triggered me so hard, I don't know what to do. https://www.instagram.com/p/BmjxhLhAwFM/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

I just masturbated and I lose a lot of the attraction towards men after doing it. That's another proof it's not OCD, because people with OCD always think they get aroused, because they only think they do.
I, on the other hand, actually lose the attraction when my libido is low. I don't know what to do I'm going crazy.

hocdsufferer wrote:I just masturbated and I lose a lot of the attraction towards men after doing it. That's another proof it's not OCD, because people with OCD always think they get aroused, because they only think they do.
I, on the other hand, actually lose the attraction when my libido is low. I don't know what to do I'm going crazy.

You can't "prove" a sexuality. It is not something you go into a lab for, perform rigorous double-blind testing, publish in a journal, and then go on doing the thing. Sexuality is something that you are and something that you do. It is beyond logic, beyond reason. It is primal and fundamental. In other words, you cannot use logic and reason to establish your sexuality, especially if you potentially have OCD.

As I, and many others have said, you need to move beyond this. You have to stop seeking reassurance on the web, you need to stop trying to relate to other stories on the web, you need to stop checking with pornography and masturbation. You need to face the uncertainty, and go on into the world, do your thing, and let the sexuality figure itself out on its own. It is like breathing. When you are busy doing something, you do not even think about breathing, it is just something that you do, it is something that you are- a breathing person. Same with sexuality. It is something that you non-reflexively do and are. It is not something you "prove."

Some people figure out their sexuality, sure. But they do not have OCD about it, and they do not do "tests" for it. People who are actually questioning are doing so because they have certain feelings or think that they do. But they do not go on OCD boards and obsessively question everything. To them, this question is not a big deal.

Please get a proper OCD therapist, stop visiting this board, stop doing your compulsions, and you'll be fine.

Finally, lets say you are indeed gay or bi. Do you want to spend the rest of your life questioning this for several hours a day and in misery? Accept what you feel and do not question or try to figure it out. If you are straight, cool. If you are gay, cool but also fabulous. You'll be fine.

fidelio520 wrote:

hocdsufferer wrote:I just masturbated and I lose a lot of the attraction towards men after doing it. That's another proof it's not OCD, because people with OCD always think they get aroused, because they only think they do.
I, on the other hand, actually lose the attraction when my libido is low. I don't know what to do I'm going crazy.

You can't "prove" a sexuality. It is not something you go into a lab for, perform rigorous double-blind testing, publish in a journal, and then go on doing the thing. Sexuality is something that you are and something that you do. It is beyond logic, beyond reason. It is primal and fundamental. In other words, you cannot use logic and reason to establish your sexuality, especially if you potentially have OCD.

As I, and many others have said, you need to move beyond this. You have to stop seeking reassurance on the web, you need to stop trying to relate to other stories on the web, you need to stop checking with pornography and masturbation. You need to face the uncertainty, and go on into the world, do your thing, and let the sexuality figure itself out on its own. It is like breathing. When you are busy doing something, you do not even think about breathing, it is just something that you do, it is something that you are- a breathing person. Same with sexuality. It is something that you non-reflexively do and are. It is not something you "prove."

Some people figure out their sexuality, sure. But they do not have OCD about it, and they do not do "tests" for it. People who are actually questioning are doing so because they have certain feelings or think that they do. But they do not go on OCD boards and obsessively question everything. To them, this question is not a big deal.

Please get a proper OCD therapist, stop visiting this board, stop doing your compulsions, and you'll be fine.

Finally, lets say you are indeed gay or bi. Do you want to spend the rest of your life questioning this for several hours a day and in misery? Accept what you feel and do not question or try to figure it out. If you are straight, cool. If you are gay, cool but also fabulous. You'll be fine.

I'm not sure whether I am in a relapse right now or what. I was fine for a period of time where I could ignore most of the things, but maybe I just didn't notice many guys in that time.

Right now, I'm literally going crazy. I think about it all the time and I feel such strong feelings, I don't think I've felt them so real before. I guess I will have to realise that I'm gay once and maybe it's now. I just don't want to accept it.

I would go to a specialists, but there is not much choice here. It's free health care and they give one to you and I suspect not many OCD specialists are around here if I wanted to pay anyway. I don't know what I need one for anyway, because I'm clearly gay but in denial. I'm 100% sure about it now.

Thanks for your replies, though, they were helpful. I'm kinda hopeless, depressed and desperate to be straight again but it's not happening. I don't know what I'll do. Guess just cry myself to sleep.