HOCD?

Hi everyone, I am new to this forum and wanted to talk about something I've been dealing with since November of last year. I would like to get your opinions and inputs on my situation and see responses of how you guys coped with HOCD and how recovery would be like for me for those who have underwent HOCD and are not fully cured.

Back in November of last year, I met a girl on Tinder and we started hanging out a couple of times (going for drinks, going to the mall, etc) but I never saw her more than just as a friend and I let her know that from the beginning. I was currently going through a break up with my ex girlfriend, and I had lost my friendship with one of my best friends (she was a girl) so I was trying to feel the void that those two people left me. It wasn't until I introduced her to my cousin and we all decided to have drinks at my cousins house.. about an hour or so passed, she got really tipsy from the alcohol and told me that she doesn't think I'm the person I say I am, and I asked her what she meant, and she told me that she thinks I'm gay. I immediately began to feel that big swarm of anxiety built inside me because I just couldn't understand why she would think I was gay when she knew I had just gotten out of a relationship with my ex girlfriend. I confronted her about it and she told me that she thought I was gay because I bought my girlfriend flowers, and that it wasn't very masculine to do something like that. I started to laugh at the comment because of how stupid she sounded in making such a bold accusation against me because I bought my ex gf flowers. Even though I laughed at the situation, it didn't stop my mind to cling onto what she had said. I started questioning everything about myself from there.. I am currently suffering with a pornography addiction as well, I've watched straight porn my entire life and shifted into watching different categories because straight porn was becoming too repetitive, so I will admit I have probably watched every porn category there is out there-including gay porn. My mind completely disregarded my past romantic and sexual experiences with my partners (females) and immediately alluded to that I was gay because I had watched gay porn.

The situation has become so bad that I see myself paying more attention to guys than I ever have before. I can't even watch a basketball game, baseball game, or go to the mall without my mind saying im gay because when they point the camera at a good looking guy on the team, my mind says "oh you think the guy is good looking, huh? you must be gay." . It can even be a old guy and my mind will say "oh you think that old man is good looking huh, you must be gay". And it's like dude, that guy is like 70.

I know thoughts are just thoughts but these thoughts feel so real and I have some type of emotional attachment to them. I feel like I can't even look at a girl or guy anymore because my brain immediate sexualizes the person as well, framing a question, if I would have sex with them. I believe this comes in part with my pornography addiction but I'm not sure.

I constantly ask myself, would I be happy dating a guy if I was gay or bisexual? Would I be able to have sex with a guy? Would I be open to at least experimenting with a guy? And the answers are all no. I've always been romantically and sexually attracted to woman so this situation is so sticky for me because it completely disregards my history with woman.I want to be able to date a girl, but I just feel like my thoughts are so over whelming that I don't know if any girl would ever accept me if she knew I had these thoughts.

In my heart and soul, I know I'm into woman, but my attraction for woman is non existent for the moment, and I believe it has to do with me being depressed. I currently quit my job due to my mental health, and im undergoing a break up with my ex. I just don't even have the desire to talk to any girls because I'm still hurt and because my mind is constantly over thinking. My thoughts say that my attraction for woman should always stay with me and that me not having any attraction for any woman means that im gay but I've read online that your attraction can be lost when you are depressed but for some reason that answer only gives me temporary relief and then an hour later it all comes back.

I've spoken to a therapist about my situation and she thinks im in the closet, and im just not admitting it, but I just dont think she understands my situation. If I was gay, or bi sexual, I would end up accepting it but its so hard for me to accept something that I dont believe is true about myself.

I know I've always feared in people thinking im gay because my voice isn't as masculine, and I also went to a night club the other day and a girl asked me if I was gay because she said I was "clean cut, handsome, and that my eyebrows were really nice", how the hell does that make someone gay? It just doesn't make sense to me. I feel like I take people's opinions of me very seriously and I don't know what to do in order to not care what people think, and what I should do because im constantly ruminating about this. there's not an hour or minute in the day that goes by where my thoughts don't accuse me of being gay.

I would like to get your guys opinions on all this.. I definitely need to stop my pornography addiction but what else can I do to get the thoughts under control.

Hello, and welcome to the forums!

dexterman21 wrote:she thought I was gay because I bought my girlfriend flowers, and that it wasn't very masculine to do something like that.

Well I guess that's what passes for pop music has taught young people. Seriously, when did taking your girl flowers stop becoming a thing? Not masculine? Says who?

dexterman21 wrote:I've spoken to a therapist about my situation and she thinks im in the closet, and im just not admitting it, but I just dont think she understands my situation.

If you're in the closet, you're still in there with yourself, and your body knows what turns you on, and what doesn't. Being in the closet doesn't equate not knowing what you are. If guys don't turn you on, they don't. I don't know what all you've told that therapist but this sounds a mite irresponsible of them from where I'm sitting.

dexterman21 wrote:a girl asked me if I was gay because she said I was "clean cut, handsome, and that my eyebrows were really nice"

Oh, we're supposed to be slovenly, now?


Do you have a history with OCD style symptoms? Irrational fears; compulsions designed to try and ward off the feared thing, intrusive thoughts, etc? This sounds very OCDish- especially as you make it sound as if it began with a stupid comment. I'm male and Bisexual- and I've known what makes me excited since at least 11 or 12. Self-denial isn't cluelessness. Being in the closet isn't cluelessness. You'd know, and you would have known, if you wanted to do things with other guys. If you haven't- and anything that happens in and around adolescence in itself doesn't count, by the way, because kids will experiment with whomever's handy- then... you're not gay.

But you have to convince yourself of that; I can't do it for you. Sexual OCD is very pernicious. I have intrusive harm thoughts (thoughts that I'll kill people or pets) and you just have to outstubborn intrusive thoughts. You have to learn to worry about it when you're doing it with another guy, not before. If you have no history of wanting to be with other guys; no history of being titillated by it- and if you were, you'd know it- then you have to just throw these doubts back at your brain and just somehow learn to not dwell on them. OCD puts the cart before the horse, every time- making us worry about things that haven't even happened. Worry about your sexuality when you find yourself turned on by something, not before.

And please don't check. Too many people check, like looking at gay porn or something, and that's just not a good idea. Sex is sex; and looking at something while trying to get off to it, is only going to reinforce the fears because sex is sex and watching people do sexual things while doing something sexual to yourself is only going to make it worse. You'll misinterpret sexual reactions for being into it. And that's not necessarily the case.

Hi, thank you very much for your response. I actually do have a series of OCD events that have happened in my life.

For the longest time, my thoughts would tell me I would have an STD, so I would constantly go to the doctors and get tested for STDS and it would always come back negative but my thoughts wouldn't accept that as enough proof. I'm not sure how I was able to overcome the situation but I imagine that this is another one of those OCD events occurring in my life where my brain picks up something and interprets it as something I need to be obsessing over and getting certainty for.

As far as the HOCD post, I've tried putting myself in the position of dating guys to see if I could be gay or bi sexual and I just couldn't. I felt very out of place, it didn't have that enjoyable feeling/spark I felt when I dated girls. I tell people who have questioned my sexuality that I know I'm straight because it's just something you know in your heart and soul already. I almost feel like if I knew I was gay or bisexual, I would ADMIT to it so I wouldn't be going through this. But it's hard for me to accept any of those titles when I've always identified as straight. I like girls so there's no way I can be gay but my brain says I have to be gay, not bi, just gay. I can admire a good looking guy but I genuinely wouldn't ever be curious to go down any further with a guy. I just don't know what I could do in order to put these thoughts away. I want to be able to date again without my thoughts coming in and intruding my relationship with a girl.

Well I would refrain from doing any checking. And whether you want to admit you're Gay or Bi is beside the point- I don't like saying I'm Bisexual! But I know I am- no need to 'check' ever forced me to look at same-sex porn- if I look at it, it's because I want to. If a person is something I'm convinced they figure it out pretty early on, regardless of whether they admit it to themselves or not. And I don't think there's much doubt, deep down. There's self-denial; there's coming up with excuses; there's burying it; but there's still undeniable attraction and excitement to the idea of being sexual with what you're wired to like. Too often in this forum people confuse 'denial' with being clueless. Oh, if you really wanted to mess with other fellows, you wouldn't be clueless about it. Not for long, anyway. Once that switch got turned on it my brain, it broke off and can't be unswitched.

You'd know.