I thought he was bi-/gay, he says he's not, what do I do?

[ORION75]

I am a guy, 28, and live in London. I have been attracted to both men and women for as long as I can remember. Being very shy and busy with work from an early age, I never really pursued either sex actively, and thus only ever had the chance to fall head over heels in love with my two best (guy) friends when I was 16 and 22. Living in the closet insofar as that part of me is concerned has thus lead to a great deal of heartache along the way, enough that I decided only to pursue women about four years ago.

 

As it turns out, however, I met someone considerably younger than me via work and unexpectedly fell for him. He is 19, but extremely mature for his age, and I thought he was nearer 25 when I met and befriended him. In any case, neither of us seem to notice the age difference. He is literally everything I could ever want in a boyfriend (or girlfriend), and I was instantly attracted to him when we first met. Before I let myself drift too far, however, I tried to be careful not to let things go before I figured out whether he would even be interested in a relationship. Careful as I was, I have been left in a state of severe pain and confusion after a six month ordeal.

 

I'll make this as short as possible. Our relationship started the way many romances do - in the eyes. For several months I would catch him staring at me from accross a crowded room, and he would look away every time I caught him doing so. When we finally started talking to each other, we would look each other dead in the eyes for what seemed like an eternity, even when chatting about trivial things. We would also make very obvious excuses to wander over to talk to one another, which became more frequent as we got to know each other. The stares, smiles, blushes, and what I considered to be general flirtation carried on for over three months. It was like being in school again. After a while, he even sorted out which gym I go to, and started showing up there religiously whenever I did, and carried that on until we started seeing each other regularly.

 

We started hanging out together and quickly found ourselves spending every afternoon and evening together. I would take him to lunch and/or dinner nearly every day, and on the rare days we would miss seeing each other it was clear that neither of us were too happy about it. At meals and at other times, the eye contact would continue. He cooled off for about a month, but then his flirtations came back like wildfire about two months ago, when he would routinely look right into my eyes, smile an ear-to-ear grin, and blush before shyly looking away. If I played hard to get, he would always respond. He allowed me to pay for everything, and loved it when I gave him gifts. Now he wants to travel with me, and is clearly very excited about it.

 

On the flipside of things, he always seems to carefully avoid physical contact with me (I live a fairly straight life and have absurdly straight friends, and they have 200 times more physical contact with me every day than he ever has). He has never once given me an impromptu gift in response to my generosity, or made any gesture of that nature. On my birthday, he attended the party, but I don't remember him even saying "happy birthday," and all he could muster up was a bag of Hershey's kisses. We have slept in the same over a half-dozen times, and despite ending up quite close together in the middle of a King-size bed, nothing ever happened.

 

He also has a girlfriend, whom he has more or less shunned for six months to hang out with me, and about whom he complains constantly. He refuses to call her his girlfriend in my presense, and gets irritated if I do, even thought they have been together for over a year. He says that she would call herself his girlfriend, but that he feels otherwise. He constantly minimises the fact that she even exists, and has talked about planning to break up with her from the day the subject came up.

 

What exactly made me think he might be gay or bi? Aside from what I considered to be fairly standard flirtations and patterns of behaviour for a person interested in more than friendship, I thought he might be on the fence for several reasons. The fact that he is politically very liberal had little to do with it, but that he would go out of his way to tell me that he thought gay marriage should be legalised got my attention. I never brought the subject of homosexuality up in his presense, and yet he would work it into conversations frequently, from politics to trivial things. He demonstrated a working knowledge of "gay" things that rivaled my own, all without provocation (i.e., did I know that this celebrity was gay, always interested to note that we were in the gay part of town, did I think the two guys sitting accross the restaurant were gay, &c.). I am not sure, but I think I also caught him checking out other guys several times. It's hard to put a finger on it, but I just got the general sense that beneath his otherwise masculine, straight-acting exterior, there was a very shy, gentle, tender person with a number of secrets. I could go on, but I'm sure you get the picture.

 

The story takes an abrupt turn for the worse here. I ended up taking him away for the weekend, and two days into the trip took him to dinner and told him how I felt about him. He had, in fact, sensed that I wanted to tell him something and had been playfully trying to pry it out of me all day (which made me think he wanted to hear what I had to say). When I did, he was very accepting, but very straightforward (almost in a calculated way). Much to my shock, horror, and disbelief, he very quickly said that he had no problem with it, and that in any case I shouldn't be too disappointed because I must have known he could NEVER feel the same way. Ready to burst into tears, I told him that I, in fact, thought he DID feel the same way, and he seemed genuinely perplexed at how I arrived at this conclusion. I mentioned a few of the things described above, and he blew each and every one of them as mere coincidences. I asked him if he had ever been attracted to another guy, or felt capable of it, and he said he had not and was not.

 

He then said something that made no sense to me at all. This guy, who is extremely shy around everyone he meets, not even comfortable enough with his own body to walk around in his underwear in front of me, is so conservative that he has never tried drink and never had a cigarette in his mouth, the same guy who refuses to call his girlfriend his girlfriend, tells me that he is basically a (hetero-) sex addict. He quickly volunteers that at the ripe old age of 19, he recently calculated that he has had sex well over 1,000 times with four girls. In shock, I asked how that could be, and his response was that he "guessed this was [his] only vice." He said he had sex for the first time when he was 15, and it was so much fun he couldn't stop, and that he did it constantly until he was 17. Since then, he still has regular sex with his girlfriend who is not his girlfriend (i.e., 2-3 times a week), but it isn't "as much fun," and "doesn't feel the same way," so he doesn't do it as much . . . I don't know whether to believe this or not, as it seems so highly uncharacteristic of him (even as a straight guy). I certainly don't want to believe him, as it would mean I have the worst gaydar of any guy on the planet. Whereas before his reason for breaking up with his girlfriend was that "he didn't want to be in a relationship right now," he added for the first time that the reason is so that he can date other women for a month or so, sleep with them, and then break up.

 

Somewhat in disbelief of his story, I told him this would be much easier if I thought what he was really saying is that he simply couldn't deal with same-sex feelings right now. He once again claimed that he had no same-sex feelings for me or anyone else. The farthest he went was to say that he supposed it could happen some day in the future, since it appeared to be happening to me and we were so much alike, but that he wouldn't bet on it. In short, I felt like I was talking to a completely different person than the one I had come to know and love over the past seven months. Horrified, I said that I wished I hadn't brought it up. He suggested that it was probably just a stage I was going through, and that my feelings would go away. Above all, he made it very clear that my secret was safe with him, and that this didn't change things from his perspective one bit. He was frighteningly cool about it – to the extent that he went right back to small-talk and, had I not been on the verge of tears for the rest of the trip, we could have simply pretended it never happened.

 

I could barely muster a smile for the last day of the trip, and couldn't wait to get him home and be away from him. I now have no idea what to do, or what to make of this situation. While it seems clear that there is no chance of a relationship beyond a friendship with him, I cannot simply disregard all of the signs that led me to this place. Your advice would be much appreciated, particularly with regard to:

 

a) What you think is going on with him? What is your take on our relationship and his sexuality? There is no question that this has not been a normal male-male platonic friendship. If he's straight and not interested in me, how can his behaviour be explained?

b) How likely is his story about his sex addiction? If not, why would he make that up? If he's had that much sex with women, how likely is it that he's bisexual?

c) Given the evidence, what should I do? Could he be needing a bit of a shove, or would that make things worse? or, Is it worth it to try to get over my feelings and just be friends, or if that is even possible (right now it seems neither possible nor of interest to me)?

 

Two weeks ago I was literally thanking God for sending me somebody to love after a five year drought, and now it feels like I've lost everything. And what about the eye contact, the smiles, and body language? Have I lost my mind, i.e., was I making all that up?? Above all, does one believe a 19 year old under these circumstances? Every instinct in my body tells me he has feelings for me and that, like the previous two times in my life, this is all a tremendous waste.

 

Thanks for reading if you made it this far. Your comments and advice are most appreciated.

[chblueguy]

Well I think you posted a storyline for a soap opera...haha....but seriously, this seems to be a serious situation. Well, I know the idea of straight men is hot. But sometimes it's simpy out of reach. And our gaydar is sometimes wrong. Sometimes we're blinded by our attraction o someone that we don't look at it objectively. As far as his sexuality, he could be bi or gay, but you have to accept his word w/o any proof beyond your instincts. For some people, by not admitting something to yourself, it's not true. And also, as a rule of thumb, if something doesn't make sense, it's more than likely not true. So his story about 1000 times with 4 women (250 times per woman on average), sounds very unlikely. However, it doesn't matter, if you haven't seen him with a guy affectionately, or found gay porn on him (like i did with my friend), then you unfortunately don't have that much of a chance with him for now. I would say that if this haven't ruined your friendship, just take things one day at a time and if he has feelings for you, he may slowly come around. But he has to admit it to himself first before anything can happen. I hope this helps you.

 

Could you respond to my post on here. I would really apreciate your input. Thanks

[falloutboy]

orion75, this seems to be really serious, and I hope I can make some

helpful remarks. First, I have to tell, that I have been like the guy on the other end of your story, to some extent at least. I once met a guy (who's been openly gay what I didn't know at that time) and we became friends. We've had a great time together, and everything was fine. When he told me being gay, I told him I was fine with it. (That's not been entirely true as I was not sure about my own sexual orientation that time.) To make it short, he told me little later he's in love with me and asked me if I was gay, too. I denied being gay (but, in fact I've ever been attrected to either sex). It seems to me, that you are at his point right now. What he gave me next was like what you referred to as "bit of a shove". The result was that we somehow ended up in a relationship. After we broke up recently, I feel like I did something what I've never really wanted, because I never really loved this guy. And I think it would have been better to keep on denying being gay, at least as this guy is concerned. As mentioned above, this is a very short version of my story, but now back to yours: His behaviour is quite strange indeed. He might be still figuring out his own sexual orientation, or he knows he's bi at least but he has decided not to give in his feelings towards men. I think you should absolutely respect his decision. It doesn't matter so far if his stories about his sexual activities are true. It seems to me rather he is pretending. That is a shame becaus it could influence your friendship. So he might be bisexual indeed, but if he doesn't want a relationship with you ( and that might well be the reason for his lies), it makes no sense to try and persuade him. This is just my opinion which is likeky to be biased by the things I went through in recent years. I will be thinking about this again and make a second reply.

I want to add that there was something in your story which I didn't like too much. You said that you were the one to pay all the bills and make the gifts. Did you feel fine with this? Were there any reasons? I mean, wouldn't you consider this situation being a bit strange: two guys, none of them openly gay, but one of them making gifts all the time? Or did I get something wrong?

I'm not going to judge his behaviour, but it would be nice, if you could tell us more. (You don't seem to be too lazy in writing, do you?)

[jamesy1234]

Forget about it mate! this guy is straight and you have been getting all the wrong signals. Pick up and move on .

[Mun]

Hello there,

I think that your friend knew what was going on. You say he would flirt with you and allowed you to give him gifts, even going away for the weekend with you, yet he didn't give you gifts in return? Come on, one would have to be blind not to notice so much attention from a man--he had to have known something was up. (As a woman all this attention from a man speaks volumes--we know what it means!)

You say he is mature for his age, but I just don't see this. I think he knew what this was all about (enjoyed the attention and the gifts) and once he was faced with your feelings--he backed off and even tried to turn everything that had been going on into a big misunderstanding--as if YOU were the one who didn't see clearly.

 

It sounds as if he is not ready to face his inclinations( I think he likes men--hence the exaggeration about hetero sex). In this case it is best to leave him alone. It will only hurt you to try and change his mind.

 

It's a shame he wasted your time. Someone more mature would have at least repaid you for some of your expenses and might have been more likely to at least ask himself: Am I bi? Why am I so drawn to this other man? instead of denying everything.

 

Good luck to you

[ORION75]

Thanks to everyone who has posted so far in reply to my saga. Sorry it was so long, but it is such a complicated mess, it didn't make sense to simply summarise it.

 

I, of course, must take him at his word (although every day he continues to behave in manner one would expect a spurned lover to do). I am just very, very confused, and very, very sad. It seems such a terrible waste. We became such fast and close friends, I miss him and I know he misses me, too. He, of course, wants to carry on as always, as if nothing happened. I just can't do that right now. I at least need him to acknowledge strong platonic feelings for me, which I know he has, but is incapable of expressing for some reason. Otherwise, our friendship is doomed to failure, and I am doomed to playing big brother to a kid who will never acknowledge what I mean to him. In this case, simply knowing is not enough.

 

How does one reconcile his behaviour for the past seven months, i.e., the flirting, the looks, allowing me to pay for everything, &c., and his current behaviour (seems quite curious if not jealous of what I am up to instead of hanging out with him) with his denial of any real feelings? Is it possible he just needs more time to sort them out? Should I bite the bullet and subscribe to 6 more months of pain?

[jamesy1234]

I bet it not you he misses, but the free trips, free gifts etc. Stay away from this sponger !! Thats all he is a free loader, thought he was on a gravy train and had to do nothing or show nothing in turn. You gave it, he took it, now he misses it.

 

Forget about it !!!