Very Sexualy Confused Teenager

[Redskies]

Like Sam and Snorkmaiden said, it's very common for the kinds of people we feel attracted to - especially by age - to shift over time. Too, everyone has a different route and different experiences, so you feeling different from your friends at the moment doesn't tell you anything about what things might be like in the future. Most likely, all of your friends will experience some changes in their attractions over time, too.

It might help to know that feelings or attractions, in themselves, aren't a problem. We can choose whether or not we act on those feelings. We can choose our actions and behaviour, and it's our actions that are what's really important. Of course, if we're having feelings that distress us, that's hard for us - but we're not doing anything wrong. So, no matter what you might feel in the future or what attractions you might have, it's not really a big thing that you need to be scared of.

You said that you worry if guys you look at might be too young for you to be attracted to. You didn't say anything about young women, so am I understanding correctly that you don't have this worry about young women? You're a pretty young person yourself, so it's completely age-appropriate for you to feel attraction to some other young people, no matter what gender they are. If you're only struggling with this around young men and not around young women, then it sounds like some internalised homophobia might be part of your picture here. We all have some of that: plenty of homophobia, sometimes obvious and sometimes not so obvious, floats around in the world around us, and of course we pick some of it up without meaning to. There's one particularly nasty strand of homophobia which says that gay men - or men who are attracted to other men - are paedophiles, or are much more likely to be paedophiles, or want to harm children and young people. That's not true. Gay, bi or queer men aren't any more likely to harm or abuse a young person than straight men are, and they aren't any more likely (when they're older adults) to feel attraction to young people than straight men are. If you're attracted to men as well as to women, your future (in this context) isn't going to be any different than what it would be if you were attracted to just women.

[Redskies]

Oh, another point extra to what I said above.

"Twink" is a term that's most commonly used in porn, and porn is notorious for showing only a very narrow range of types of people, so I wondered if a broader view might help you.

As individuals, any of our attraction patterns can be more detailed than simply "men" and/or "women". It's possible - out of oh so many possibilities, I really want to emphasize how very open to change your attractions can be in the future! - that you might find in time that there are some presentations of men who you find attractive, and some who you don't, and it might not be connected to age in the way you think it is. There are adult men who are less stereotypically masculine: perhaps smaller, shorter, less body hair, or perhaps they're feminine or androgynous men. Sometimes, we don't see those kinds of men represented at all, in popular culture or in porn. But they very much exist, and are pretty common. There are people whose attractions to men are strongly or exclusively towards more stereotypically "masculine" men, or towards more feminine or androgynous men. All of that is absolutely okay!

[Tarho]

You said that you worry if guys you look at might be too young for you to be attracted to. You didn't say anything about young women, so am I understanding correctly that you don't have this worry about young women? You're a pretty young person yourself, so it's completely age-appropriate for you to feel attraction to some other young people, no matter what gender they are. If you're only struggling with this around young men and not around young women, then it sounds like some internalised homophobia might be part of your picture here. We all have some of that: plenty of homophobia, sometimes obvious and sometimes not so obvious, floats around in the world around us, and of course we pick some of it up without meaning to. There's one particularly nasty strand of homophobia which says that gay men - or men who are attracted to other men - are paedophiles, or are much more likely to be paedophiles, or want to harm children and young people. That's not true. Gay, bi or queer men aren't any more likely to harm or abuse a young person than straight men are, and they aren't any more likely (when they're older adults) to feel attraction to young people than straight men are. If you're attracted to men as well as to women, your future (in this context) isn't going to be any different than what it would be if you were attracted to just women.

Thank you for awnsering my post.
I'm sorry I took so much time about awnsering you (I end up not being able to awnser always as quickly as I would like). But I guess that, I can sort of give an update and explain what I currently feel.

Altought I still sometimes feel the last problem I spoke about, I don't think I can say its as bad as it was, my brain as always, ends up dropping the current stressful problems that I have, only to get other problems right after, ( first it was the "I'm not sure if I feel feelings for guys" wich to be honest its still one of the big problems, then it was the idea: "forcing this homosexual feelings into my head", then the sort of "pedophilia" problem, now its the constant insecurity and axiety about trying to understand the feelings I have for my friends and the closest people from me and having low auto-estime about everything, either its my appearance, sexual confusion, sexual performance, inteligence,etc...) this is just to give the idea that all of my old problems end up being problems that still exists but that my brain just can't stress as much as before about them.

About the last part of your last post (the part I quoted), to be honest I don't think that has to do with internalized homophobia. Its just that when I feel atracted towards women, I feel atracted to women mostly on their 20-30 but I can still easily cross out of that range, for example: finding people of my age atractive or even older then the range I previously said.
With guys its not the same thing, I feel basicly attracted on this very small range of ages, mostely my age to about 30 years old. Sometimes I do feel atracted to men outside of that range, but mostely if their slightly younger then me.
Thats why I said that it scared me the possibility of ending up having those feelings when I was older and even stated that they seemed sort of "pedophilish", altought I agree that all of us have some sort of internalized homophobia due to our culture, I don't think this is the case, altought I'm glad you suggested something towards helping me with my problem.

Again, I can't thank you all enough, for all the kind feedback you have gave me during this insane ride of mine. If anyone feels that there is something that can help me in anyway please, don't hesitate to tell, I would try anything at this point.

[Carmen]

Hi Tarho,

Thanks for the update and I am happy things have been getting better for you. When you say you have been dealing with "constant insecurity and anxiety" lately, what do you mean? Do you want to expand on what's been going on there (or anything else going on in your life you want to talk about)?
In regards to age, as has been mentioned before, it is totally okay to be attracted to different genders (and just different people in general) in different ways (whether that be different ages, looks, personalities, etc.) and like Sam said earlier, you really can't predict what your attractions will be in the future so it is not worthwhile putting energy into "what if"s. Rather, it is best to focus on the present and where your attractions are in the here and now

[Redskies]

Too, I wouldn't describe early teens to 30 as a "small" age range. Especially considering the amount of personal development and changes that happen for people over that time, I'd say that's a pretty big age range! It's not unusual for people in their early or mid teens to not feel much attraction to people older than 30, although of course some do, and both these things are fine.

And, speaking of early teens to 30 being a big age range: again, I'd try not to worry too much about what your attraction patterns will be like when you're 30. There are a lot of personal changes for everyone during that time, and our attractions shift and change in response to the life stage we're at.

[Tarho]

As always thanks for anwsering.
I understand that my atractions can change during the years, but its still hard to ignore the possibility they won't, I think I will just have to wait and see.

Hi Tarho,

Thanks for the update and I am happy things have been getting better for you. When you say you have been dealing with "constant insecurity and anxiety" lately, what do you mean? Do you want to expand on what's been going on there (or anything else going on in your life you want to talk about)?

Thanks aswell for your awnser
I think I might have wrongly used the expression "constant insecurity and anxiety". I mean that sometimes I have an increase of anxiety for several reasons. The truth is that I think too much, I always have done so.
When I'm doing my normal life sometimes this unpleasent toughts about my problems and insecurities go trought my head, I could just ignore them but most of times I don't. I'm still not quite sure why I don't ignore them, maybe its because I'm a sort of mental "masochist", maybe theres a part of me that thinks I can resolve this problems by thinking about them, maybe its just because by feeling bad I keep focused on my problem, maybe I have an atention deficit and I like to do this, or maybe by "forcing" my self into feeling bad that proves I have a problem and therefore I need a solution, or maybe its not intentional if I choose to truly think about this things or not, I just don't know and that drives me insane, because I'm constantly thinking about if I have a true problem or if I'm just being weak and stupid, and that just makes those toughts go again trought my head and then the cycle restarts.
And well, what are this toughts about?
Well, their mostly about my sexual confusion, my auto-estime problems, my relationships with my friends and family, (wich I don't think there are that much problems on them, but my auto estime interferes alot with what I think about this relationships) my future life,(because I have no idea what I want my future to be and no idea what types of people I will have romantic relationships with) and the question that I constantly do to my self wich is "Am I exagerating my problem, could I just stop having it if I really tried it?", in general this are the sort of things that bother me.

I know their weird and disperse, but thats just who I am.

[Redskies]

You're not weak or stupid. You're having some feelings which are hard for you, and your brain is presenting you with some thoughts and feelings that worry you or make you feel bad. That's truly not weak or stupid: it's simply human. It happens to everyone sometimes, and for some people, it happens more often. We also can't simply stop thinking or feeling these kinds of things simple by deciding to stop and trying until it works - that's just not how thoughts or feelings work

When we're having a lot of difficult feelings, or lots of thoughts that are troubling to us and it seems like we're stuck going round and round in those thoughts or always moving from one troubling thought to another, that's a time when getting some trained support can be really helpful. There are strategies that people can use to manage these kinds of thoughts and feelings so that they're not so big, unpleasant or disruptive. A mental health professional, like a therapist, can help figure out what things might be helpful to you, and help you use those strategies. I know when you talked with us a few months ago, you weren't feeling able to talk to anyone else about your thoughts and feelings. Are you feeling like it might be a possibility for you now?

[Tarho]

To be honest I don't really know If I feel confortable or not to do so.
When I started going into all of this I didn't really want to tell my parents or anybody else actually. I decided at the time that I would explain people (mostly adult people) how I felt when I sort of had an idea of who I was in terms of sexual orientation.
The problem is that I'm sort of the same or slightly worse comparing when I started this. My feelings are weird, change constantly and the truth is that when my problem started I thought alot and alot about it, constantly. For some reason my brain can't do that anymore, and sometimes I even feel like I'm going to take a very long time to understand who I trully am because I can barely think about it and if I sort of force my self to think about it I only think about negative stuff.

I'm not going to figure my self out anytime soon, thats obvious by now. So should I tell my parents or a responsable adult?

Well, to be honest I don't feel like doing so, but I don't think I ever will. The people who I would preffer to talk about to this, before getting mental health or anything like that (assuming that I would do that in fact) I feel like I need to tell my parents.
I don't know how they will respond if I do tell them. They are accepting, they accept different sexual orientation people but thats sort of the point, one thing would be if I approached my parents and I said: "I'm gay" or "I'm bisexual". But I really can't say that, I would need to say I'm sexually confused, and I have no idea how they would deal with that.

Besides I would like to ask help on this because I know that Scarleteen Staff has alot of experience on dealing with people: I recently found out by my mother that her brother in contrary to what I always was told during my life did not died in a crash accident, he was gay and he died on the eightys of VIH. My parents named me after him.
I feel that this could be complicated on dealing with my mother because I think she would sort of be reminded of my uncle. So what do you think would be the best way to approach this?

I'm not sure If I will tell my parents or not soon. But I will eventually have to do it some day. And I think that will be the only way I can start telling other adult people.

As always, thanks for any help given.

[Ashleah]

Hi Tarho,

I'm headed out for the day but wanted to jump in

I think ultimately telling your parents is your decision. You know them best but from what you have said here, they sound like they are very supportive people and love you deeply. I think that if you decided to share what you have been going through that would not change and they would try to be there for you. I think it could be helpful to think about what you hope to achieve by telling them. Do you just want someone who loves you to know? How do you want them to support you in this? Is that just listening? Helping with metal healthcare (if that is a route you choose to go)? You might feel more comfortable with the conversation if you have an idea of what you would like to get out of it, if that makes sense. It's also okay not to know the answer to this either. You could have this conversation with no particularly outcome in mind and just tell them this is a part of you that you want to share or you think it is important that they know.

It's also important to know that you don't have to figure yourself out in order to talk to others about this. As you and others have said here, figuring all of this out is not something that has to happen or even will happen right away. It is a process and one that is life long. And that is okay If you do decide to tell them you can say exactly what you have said here. I know these things can be difficult when we say them out loud, but you have expressed your thoughts and feelings very clearly here and, if you feel comfortable, you can say the same things to them. You don't have to identify as gay, straight,- or anything else. You can share your feelings and what that means to you right now.