Thinking thoughts...
In an almost perfect Karl Childers…
“Well… I’m out here, with my thoughts again, mhm.” (Eat your heart out, Billy Bob. 🤭)
In the year since coming out, I haven’t really had luck finding friends that I could potentially have as partners. I don’t mean to say that everyone I encounter and try to be friendly with is a potential victim partner, because I’m honestly not that desperate. It’s more of a “me” thing in that I’ve never been good at being outgoing - pretty much every non-familial relationship I have was initiated by the other party. I guess this is a function of the autism and my childhood that makes it so. I have been reaching out more to people, even pursuing friendships with at least two guys that I have found to be quite lovely. So, I’m getting better, but I’m just not there yet.
As Spring kicks into high gear, my badger hormones are firing up and I am having… needs. There’s a few people that have really struck me as interesting and possibly fun to play around with, but here I am again with the social anxiety, backward ideas about sex (that are changing slowly), and being so bashful and polite that I can’t articulate my desires in a way to see if the feelings are mutual. The greatest fear I have is that if I express my interest, and the other party isn’t - then they’d get weird about it. It’s happened to me in the past (before Mrs. B came along, so this was a LONG time ago), and I just can’t shake those feelings of shame for ruining what might have been a positive relationship… because I expressed an interest. I adore all of the people I’m interested in, so naturally my fears are heightened. I don’t want to break something that’s still growing, but many of these people are very sex/kink positive and I feel like that even my being demi, there’s enough there to make the experience worthwhile for us. I’m conflicted, confused, and beginning to feel a little depressed about it.
So… what do I do? Do I risk a potentially good friendship just because I feel like it might be fun to fool around a little? People are so weird about sex, me especially… so that’s the conundrum I find myself in. I’ve tried to be subtle and maybe a bit coy about the subject with some of them, others are definitely down, but schedules and distances are the barriers there. Still others are really lovely people that seem to have connected with me in some regard, but I feel that they may not want the same thing from me, no matter how badly I want them to. These challenges are bringing back all sorts of memories of my younger days, when all I wanted was to assert and prove my virility and “straightness” by bagging as many ladies as I could… it was a major source of frustration and sadness for me when I blew things up for merely suggesting that I’d be interested in them. It always hit me hard, and then the awkwardness from that point on only made it worse.
The other thing is that some of the people I’ve found to be very desirable are women… not cis women, mind you, but even if they were - I would probably still be attracted to them because of their personalities and how fun they are to interact with. Being attracted to a transgender person for me as a gay man… it makes me question my sexuality a bit. Maybe I am more of a pansexual, or I’m just a gay guy with an open mind. I don’t even know why I’m trying to put a label on it… I guess that’s the autism showing again. Fuck. I think my attraction to people has always been less about the physical being, and more of the personality. I’m drawn to people that are more fun than me, simply because I want to learn how to be fun. I don’t feel like a fun person. I take things too seriously in my life, and that hasn’t gotten me very far socially. So, I gravitate towards people that are silly, fun, and maybe slightly unhinged. Oh, I still like people that are quiet and reserved like me… but usually it’s because I see something in them that brings me closer to take a look. waving hands Anyway… yeah, I’ve met quite a few transgendered people since joining the fandom and the queer community at large… and I’ve definitely felt attraction (not necessarily sexual, but maybe a desire to be close) for some. There are some that I do have a desire for a more intimate relationship, but again… I’m brought back to my initial issue: I don’t want to fuck up a budding friendship even if I think they might be into me - no matter how badly my heart wants it.
Maybe I’m martyrizing myself… denying my own chances at happiness to prevent others from feeling uncomfortable with me. It’s definitely on-brand for me… I mean, if you’ve read my coming out story you’d know already. Perhaps I’m just navel-gazing and over-thinking it… it could be that I’m just too emotionally broken to even risk trying to find some added happiness in my life. I could just choose to be celibate and exist as the kind, sweet, and loving person that I am at my core and deny my baser instincts to protect myself and others from the emotional harm of me shooting my shot… FUCK, there I go again.
I don’t know… I had to get this out of my system so I can try to put my thoughts on other things… although, I don’t think it’s helping. I think I’ll just shut up now.
Sorry, I’ll try to be more coherent next time.