Good stuff Yitz!
I wish I have the strength to go to a gym, or the company. 
One Point I want to make, it seems that you are on the right track and you have realized that you have more options than you thought, why not take it deeper? 
What is really pushing you to do this and be excited about other guys? Is it the need for attention and feel worth something? I know that for me thats what caused me to be like this. I know clearly that I was always shy and nervous around other people, I made friend's very rarely, I still dont have any. So think to yourself, what do I really want to be? Do I want to get married with a healthy Women and raise a beautiful family? Am I able to be attracted to girls? How can I figure out how to have close relationships with guys and not need anything else from them. 
I wish someone had given me this advise when I was still single. 

Extremely well written buddy.  The gym, although a challenge, may actually be a refuah for the urges, over and above the endorphine rush. Some SSA fellows found that developing a healthy masculine relationship quieted their drives. There is a school of thought that some guys developed SSA due to unhealthy masculine relationships in the past. Distant fathers, severe bullying by brothers and classmates, molestation and similar stuff created a thirst for man-to-man connection. Since these fellows did not learn how to develop normal connection, they slipped into the sexual realm. By coming to the gym and developing healthy camaraderie while pursuing good physical and mental health, a guy finally tastes what he has been looking for so thirstily for so long. (Of course, this may not apply to guys who struggle with SSA either from birth or due to other causes.)

Very well written yitz!
I'm not gay so I can't relate to everything you wrote.
I do look in the mirror every time before I go out & care more than regular men about how I look, I also like attractive & good looking men & my friends would typically be guys who at least I think that they are good looking, however it never occurred to me that I might be gay since I'm not drawn to guys by a sexual means.
But now I wonder maybe I'm wrong...
Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

I also love it when people compliment me on my appearance,
People who know me well (incl. my wife) tell me that I have a strong Feminine part in me (in many aspects).
does this mean anything? just wondering...

Regarding going to the gym that seems to have helped you a lot & I can understand why, I used to go to the gym but cant remember it helping me much back then, however I do want to start going again, will see when it happens.

I find what you wrote about self care really helpful & will try following some of your advice.

Thanks for your sharing wishing you tons of hatzlacha & siyata dishmaya.

True_self 

chancy wrote on 15 May 2023 20:29:


Wow what an honor to receive replies from the GYE heavyweights!

I do want to clarify about my use of the "gay" adjective, it has (rightfully) been causing unclarity.

I thank Hashem that I am attracted to women. I cannot even imagine the despair faced by those who didn't receive this blessing.

I call myself gay for a couple of reasons: I am attracted more to men than to women; I feel a connection with the gay community, particularly the frum one; and I have a weakness for saying things in a way that gets a rise out of people, and this term definitely has done so many times. Sorry.

I do hope to marry a woman and build a family (although I wasn't always sure about that).

That being said, I am aware of different weaknesses that I have that I think are underlying to my same-sex attraction, and I am trying to work on them with therapy and other things, but I don't see how they can go away so fully as to relieve me of any attraction to other men. Also, from reading what others have written here on the forum, SSA doesn't seem to go away very often.

A part of me is happy with the gayness and all the sexual stimulation and experiences and emotional release it has given me, but are you kidding? I wish I could just hang out with the boys and not want anything else from them. That's my dream! My life would be so much simpler... I would be in such a different place socially, emotionally and spiritually.

What exactly is the advice that you wish you would have gotten when you were single?

My 22nd clean day today! Shavuos will be my 32nd day bezras Hashem and I'm really hoping to make it to matan torah with a וקדשתם היום ומחר. (Also, I am getting a big prize from someone on day 30.)

My issue is, what about after that? Do I really want to never masturbate again? To never do any touching with a male again? I feel so much more comfortable saying that I hope, for now, to only masturbate once a month or something. I just fear that without keeping my streak I won't have enough motivation to continue.

But I don't want to bite off more than I can chew, if you skip rungs on a ladder, you can fall right off CV'S.

Do I just tell myself that it's one day at a time? Who am I fooling though?

keep killin it yitz

you're putting pressure on me to show some muscle too:)

Of course you say one day at a time. Or one week, or one month etc. anything that helps you stay clean today. the questions about will you be able to do it forever or who you are fooling- are likely coming from the yetzer hara.

I would love for someone to have told me what my attraction meant and that i dont need to act out physically with gys but rather work on making close relationships with them. Because nobody told me this, 2 bad things happend/ 
1. I acted out with lots of guys, and its bothering me till today, because i still crave that. Remember that every time you give in, you are just making it harder in the long run because your mind will need to forget that stuff. 
2. I dont have any friends, because i was only interested in the guys that wanted to do it with me! I wish I have friends. 

Right now, I am as sure as now is day that I will NEVER touch another guy willingly, its been years and years and years. I would rather die then do that again! 
However, my mind is still afraid that I might act out of impulse and do something stupid and that scares the living daylights out of me. Im terrified of this! Let me share a story.
I started going more often to the mikva and taking my glasses off, i find that this actually decrease my SSA because I see what 99.9% of men look like and it makes me nauseous..... and the few good looking ones I cant see clearly so it works. 
Friday I was in a very depressed mood and I went to the mikva and I wanted to escape my depression, I come into the mikva and i see a Bucher, I went my way and showered and did everything, and this guy is still showering its been 25 minutes now, and hes very clearly not embarresed to show his stuff, but i ignored him. When i got dressed I saw him looking at me the whole time. I said to myself, Im not putting my glasses on! 
But then as i was leaving and i put my glasses on, he came very close to me and was sort of in my face, i still didnt look directly at it, but i got crazy turned on and i ran out of there. 
As i came home, i didnt know what to do with myself, i was so aroused, but it passed after a few minutes. 
But that made more depressed, What the hell is wrong with me? Hes a teenager, you could be arrested if you so much as brush up against him! Why cant i get over this? I asked Hashem so many times that He should save me from this terrible SSA! How can I go on? What if one day im alone with someone like this and the other guy acts like this? will i be able to withstand! Truthfully, I think yes, because ive been training my resistance muscles for a while now.... but still. Am is totally sick?  
Im still upset by this. And i dont know an answer. 

Why am i telling you this? So you can save yourself now, its much easier the younger you are and the less you lay in this stuff. So the earlier you can learn how to get over this, the easier it will be for the rest of your life. 

Good luck!

Definitely one day at a time, one challenge at a time, each challenge comes with a new twist, what worked today might not work tomorrow. We have to be creative. 

Who your fooling? How about fooling yourself? You think you cant make it, correct? Prove yourself wrong. Its going to be hard, very hard and you might slip somewhere along the way, but that's okay we are all human, it doesnt make you a failure nor does it mean that you cant start again.

Stay strong, keep posting,

Take it one day at a time, I completely believe in you, though try building yourself up while you're doing well, it will help you get over the bad days when you know you can make it through!

First off I really enjoy reading your posts because they are brimming with honesty, keep it up.

Are these behaviors, masturbation and innappropriate acting out, negative harmful behaviors? Forgetting about any sort of commitment for the moment. Are these behaviors which cause pain, in this world and the next?

The answer to this question is not yes for today, or yes for this year, or yes for the rest of your life. The answer is simply yes. They are harmful, pain-causing things. That's just a fact. Regardless of whether you ever do it again.

Now in terms of taking that fact and using it to direct your behavior to something less painful. Taking it one day at a time doesn't mean that you don't believe this is inherently negative behavior, and that the logical next step would be to never do it again. It's not addressing what should be. It's addressing something else - the actual focus of your behavior. You only need to focus on overcoming the actual challenge in the moment. And tomorrow you'll focus on a different moment.

true_self wrote on 15 May 2023 21:33:

Yes, try not to make it more complicated than need be. Trust me. 

All the best

Crabapple18 wrote on 17 May 2023 05:46:

Thanks Crabapple I just needed to hear that from others.
I accept what you say & also believe so.
You are very straight to the point & I like that.

much appreciated
True self

yitz23 wrote on 16 May 2023 17:19:

Hi yitz.
I remember myself having the same thoughts in the past when I used to masrubate daily & sometimes even several times a day, (just as you described yourself in a previous post) I said to myself that I can't suddenly stop masturbating completely because I might not yet be on that level & it can cause me to fall down quickly & I'll lose momentum, so I'll start to masturbate only once a week, later on once a month until I'll reach the top of the ladder.
However from experience i've learnt that its the yetzer hara trying to fool us (as vehkam wrote) real change only comes once you you make a strong decision to become totally free no matter what it takes, period.

​Of course there are many strategies how to reach freedom (as the oilem are suggesting here) nevertheless the key starting point of the journey towards real freedom requires making this decision & to believe that you can achieve it!

Visualizing yourself being completely free from all these unwanted behaviors can also help much to improve motivation (after all visualizing your self masturbating once a month might seem great but still not the same as being totally free) (my 2 cents).

I might be wrong but I'm sharing my experience & hope you find it helpful.

Keep on testing your strength & never give up!

I also love your honesty!!!

All the best
True self 

Wow you guys are amazing! thanks so much for all the love. I owe you guys so much.

So many great points, I'm still absorbing all of it.

Chancy, your post was so raw and so powerful, thank you for opening up to us. You are very insightful. While I've been somewhat aware of the emotional underpinnings to my undesired attractions, you crystalized so well how following through with the desires doesn't fix the problem, and causes so much hurt.

At the same time, no one knows better that you the difficulty of creating and maintaining deep, healthy connections with male peers. It's one thing to know that you need it. It's another thing to execute it.

I am getting depressed thinking that I will never have another male experience ever again. Even if I get married and have sex with a girl, I will always be celibate klapei that deep emptiness of, and longing for, the deep, loving connection with another man that I've never had.