Hey guys, this .. is a weird post haha, just read on you will find out.
Any advice for someone who .. i know labels irk some people.. but in all sense is Demisexual?
I'm finding that i am only sexually attracted to women once i have known them for a good while. I'm a 31 male and i've felt a lot of pressure and anxiety over my dating/love life in the last three years. All of my close best friends have all gotten married in the last two years, and , particularly from the female side of the equation i get a lot of questions and when the opportunity allows it to be set up with people. It just makes me feel uncomfortable. Before all this I was never bothered by it, i was so a normal person who just got on with life, enjoyed his hobbies, but that has been turned upside down.
Throughout my teenage years, and being in my twenties, i presumed that i was a normal straight bloke, but as i have been reading more and more in the last few years it seems maybe i'm not? I always had a strong physical attraction to girls - where i was worried at one point i was coming across as somewhat perverted - the thing is i'v come to realise that those physical attractions in reality meant nothing to me. I have only experienced strong sexual attraction a few times, only after getting to know that person over the course of a good while.
I thought maybe that perhaps i was not straight and gay instead, but i've never thought about men in that way, never been sexually attracted to them. Although that question for some reason has caused great anxiety in me - but i think that is down to ocd and intrusive thoughts - its been eating me up for almost three years now - i think it is ocd because the ruminations are 24/7, constantly check and seek reassurance and the thoughts are irrational, and i know have told me lies - i have also had variations of topics under scrutiny - for example i convinced myself i wanted to be a women for a few months a couple of years ago (which looking back on it , just makes me laugh)
The problem is i don't have a way of meeting new people - my friends are now transitioning to full adult lives- they got their own lives to lead, in some cases children and i fully accept that and happy for them- but at the same time it kind of limits any potential additions to our friend group. I don't socialise at all anymore. I also live in a rural village so again my chances of meeting someone are slim. I also have social anxiety which again which puts pressure on me.
I want to actively put this to one side and get on with other stuff in my life, but i just can't seem to allow it. I can't focus on anything else and i'm not sure how to rectify that.
It is also crossed my mind that maybe that i am a normal bloke and i'm putting myself under so much pressure that it's dulling any attractions i do have or overthinking everything that i'm not allowing nature to take it course or recognising it, basically i am so consumed in thought that i can't allow my self to relax like i used to. Basically depression and anxiety could be playing it's hand. The girls i have developed sexual attraction for for example i initially did check them out and noticed them before we were friends. The friendship obviously courted stronger feelings of sexual attraction, so in a way that is no different to dating right?
I've 75% decided to take a year out next year and go travelling to actively take me out of everything around me - and it is something i always wanted to do, but i just feel like a pressure pot about to go off and worried i won't enjoy it because of all this. I try and go cycling once a week as i thought exercise would help clear my head - it works sometimes , others it is just a time to overthink everything. I'm also considering moving to a city to see whether it just my mind needs occupying and that would help.
The thing is.. despite all this anxiety and confusion, in the last two years i have had stronger sexual emotions than i have had probably throughout my entire life - I got really close to one friend which got a bit awkward because she had a long term boyfriend. We had been friends for a few years and confided in each other a lot, i know that the feelings we had for each for other were mutal. Awkwardly, i have current strong sexual attraction to a colleague at work (who again has a long term boyfriend, but there is a chemistry there- can't be a douche though!) and there is another girl at the moment that i been thinking about at home ; i often think of wanting to ask her out, but at the moment i think it is more of a romantic attraction - i see my self doing day stuff with her or travelling and that. I see her quite often, some days it feels good to see her, the other days it doesn't, but again i don't know if that is the pressure i am putting myself under. Perhaps all this is relatively new to me (late bloomer perhaps), whilst i eyed up girls for example i only ever been actively interested in a couple.
Eh.. started of a dating question and ended up as something else. i think you can see how irrational my thought process is at the moment, and the mess i have knotted myself up in. It is probably making me appear ugly to other people, i've lost confidence in myself and my self esteem is low. I have a speech impediment that has gotten worse, and i struggle to hold a conversation. Just think i have reached that point where its about to bubble over and not sure what to do. I want to take a break from it, but don't know how? Writing this out as helped a bit because it shows how silly it all is, particularly what is going on in my head, but i know that 'relieve' will be temporary. Everything feels so abstract.
Sorry for the long and rambling post.