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JimS007

Listed below are comments made by JimS007 between Thursday, 25th June 2009 and Friday, 26th June 2009.

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Bible codes and gay genes 12:16pm on 26 Jun 2009 Thank you, Orthodox-tradition, for daring to ask me the questions. Ive a lot on with my job today so I need to keep my answers brief. Ive a family to support and dont want to lose my job!

YOUR QUESTION
(1) What were the childhood issues that required to be resolved? I appreciate this is plunging straight in and deeply, but it seems like such a crucial issue in this discussion.

MY ANSWER
I must state that I entered counselling/therapy with NO INTENTION of being cured or changed of homosexuality. I was contented with being gay and everyone around me was contented with this too. Some even celebrated my gay identity and practice and saw me as a role model for others.

In my early/mid-20s I had problems sleeping and friends recommended I might benefit from some counselling. I met regularly with an awesome therapist who took my life to pieces gently yet severely. I came to see that, although I got on great with my Dad and older brothers, I didnt have any strong, significant and deep emotional connection to them. The fragile relationship I had with the guys in the house meant that I compensated for this by connecting more deeply than was healthy for me as a male with my Mom and sisters. I lived in the male world (all boys school, etc) but I couldnt seem to gain access to my Dad or brothers hearts, and this meant that although I had lots of friends at school, I never felt deeply connected and known as the other guys seemed to. So, in short, relationships with the men and the women in my family needed to be seriously addressed (even though I had an incredible upbringing compared to most people).

Another issue was the fact that I was introduced to porn at a very young age, when around 8 yrs old. The older boys off the street who kept showing this to me were teenagers and had hit puberty and so had the means to process (at least a little) what porn was all about. I was pre-pubescent and didnt have this means. My hunger for deep connection with other men became eroticised at a very early age (as is happening to MANY young people today through porn, so there WILL be a huge rise in gay and bi guys in the coming years, and we are beginning to see the first fruits of this already VERY worrying!). I was then sexually abused for a time by an older male which sewed deep into my psyche the fact that (i) I must be gay, (ii) my body is made for sex with men, (iii) which woman would want a man whose body has been with another mans lots of time? No wonder I was unyielding in believing I was born gay. The essence of all that is homosexual was sown into the inner fabric of ME and then into the outer fabric of ME over many years. I was directly sexually abused, and it took time for me to really admit this to myself and face the consequences. Many of my gay friends have been sexually abused in some shape or form, although they find this difficult to admit because they live in such an erotic world. They honestly cant see (as I couldnt) their childhood sexual experiences as a problem, and yet these can offer determine their present desires more than they realise.

There is not space here to go into all I had to begin to face, but the therapist I saw was AMAZING at leading me through the maze of my past and helping me to put things back together. The thing is this: I was not looking to deal with homosexuality whatsoever, but as I slowly found resolution to all sorts of issues it is as though this repressed heterosexual, or the dormant man I was looking for in other men (and I slept with over 100 men trying to find that right man!) was actually living deep, deep within ME. As I very slowly came to the realisation that maybe, just maybe, I was not born gay I had a tough decision to make. I totally reject the gay ideal or I remain encamped in my old beliefs that state once gay always gay. I had nothing to lose. I left my (wonderful and faithful) long-term boyfriend and left the gay community and everything it stood for. Ive never looked back, although the road was ridden with potholes!

YOUR QUESTION
2) In what way did this throw up the choice that you could choose to be heterosexual? Or, how were the two issues related?

MY ANSWER
Nobody chooses to be homosexual. This is where I stand united with the homosexual community. Dont judge us for feelings we have always had at the depths of our beings. However, as I came to realise that my feelings WERE as a result predominantly of nurture and that I could find resolution of past issues, I felt I had a responsibility to ME to dare to walk this pathway and to look underneath every stone of the past to see if there were areas deep within me that needed resolution.

I know many gay men and women and EVERY one of them has a similar story to mine in some shape or form. I also KNOW, having fully lived their lifestyle and outlook, that there is a PROFOUNDLY SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCE between being gay and being straight. It is not, and cannot, be the same and equal. EVERYBODY loses out, gay and straight alike, if we kid ourselves otherwise.

In fact, I came to realise that there is one continuum of sexuality along which there are many places we can each make our home. Those of us who are/have been only homosexually inclined have, dare I say (and I know Ill be judged for this word!), been stunted in our developmental growth into true and healthy manhood or womanhood. Those who are/have been bisexual are generally (and this is all general speak because EVERY life is different and unique) a little less formed in their sexual identity. Yes, there are deeply broken heterosexuals, but their brokenness, i have come to learn, happened after they had made a sufficiently deep connection with their own gender thereby meaning they were interested not in sexual connection with their own sex, but with the mystery of the opposite sex.

YOUR QUESTION
3) There seem to be a significant number of people who have tried such therapies and say they just dont work. Why are you so certain that they can work for everyone? Why do they appear not to?

MY ANSWER
Huge question from you! Finding the RIGHT therapist is one thing. I also dont think anyone should enter therapy/counselling to be cured/healed/whatever of homosexuality. This issue is NOT homosexuality, but rather all the underlying stuff that, when added together, makes a man crave for an erotically overtoned connection with another man (or a woman an overtly emotional connection with another woman). You cant be healed of something that isnt a thing as such. Homosexuality, as I have come to learn over many years, is the name given to the OUTWARD MANIFESTATION of many other inner issues that need carefully, respectfully, and very tenderly, often over a number of years, to be faced, challenged and allowed to be healed (not the right word but it will have to do here due to constraints on time).

You dont go to the gym on ten, or even thirty, occasions to deal with years of overeating. It takes a whole new way of seeing exercise, food, your body, your value, your relationships with others as well as yourself, and MUCH discipline and encouragement to deal with this. Therapy, again in my opinion, doesnt work for everyone because they approach the journey ahead from the wrong angle. They want to stop being so deeply (and powerfully) attracted to members of their same sex. Yet THIS IS NOT THE PROBLEM. I am probably more deeply attracted to members of my same sex now than ever before. HOWEVER, (and this is the MAJOR difference), there are no erotic undertones to my finding them, or them finding me, attractive. Men are no longer a mystery to me, hence the reason why I began to yearn for woman, who will always be mystery to man because we are always going to be different.

The challenge to the gay man is to FACE HEAD ON THE WORLD OF OTHER MEN, and to face WHY he is so powerfully and erotically drawn to other guys. Of course, when you begin to look at these issues you discover that deep, deep down there is an innate fear (and profound grief) that as a boy you never bonded sufficiently deeply enough with the guys around you. Many men, and many therapists, wont, or dont know how, to go deep into this fear. Or if they do they cant bring the guy out the other end. This is why many men feel it doesnt work for them, or they feel harmed by the clinical care they expect to receive.

I know this can work for everyone who is TRULY SERIOUS about the cost of taking this journey because I have met gay men of every age, shape, experience and desire who have entered this journey and have made significant progress.

The hardest thing to do is to TOTALLY REJECT the message and agenda of the gay community which now runs much of our Media. This leads me on to your next question.

YOUR QUESTION
4) Have you been persecuted for your sexual identity, as a gay man and as a straight man? Which was worse?

MY ANSWER
I was NEVER EVER persecuted for my sexual identity as a gay man. I mentioned earlier that it was applauded and rejoiced over by anyone and everyone. EVERYONE!

However, when I chose to eventually leave my boyfriend, burn my gay porn and eject everything from my life that was in any way linked with the gay world I started getting hell from my gay AND straight friends. Everyone told me I was mad. A vicar and a priest I knew both told me to go back to my boyfriend and to stop believing in any chance of change. My family became worried about me and I was told by many that I was born gay and should just accept it. I DID ACCEPT IT! I just found a secret doorway that intrigued me, thats all. Wow. How awesome was that secret door to my future!

I have been persecuted much, much, much more as a straight man. Yet I meet with gay men all the time who tell me that they dont really want to be gay, and who want to believe in change but they keep getting drawn back into the web of (misleading) evidence pumped out by the gay-right and the Media that people are born gay.

YOUR QUESTION
5) What advice would you give to gay people who wish to become straight? ie how should they select people who are qualified to help them?

MY ANSWER
I would recommend they do A LOT (and I mean A LOT) of research around the issues of change. The evidence is out there if you want to find it, although it is constantly being swamped with the mountains of gay propaganda that now exist. I would remind people that THEY DO HAVE CHOICE, and if they have tried to walk the journey out and feels as though they are going nowhere, KEEP GETTING UP AND TRY AGAIN. I felt lost at many points on the journey, but at least kept trying, and the right person in the right place came forward every time.

Re who to select to help them make this journey, I cant fully answer this question but know this. First, find out about the roots and issues around homosexuality. There are a growing number of books on this topic available from Amazon. Buy them! Read them and then approach a therapist and ask him or her if (s)he can help deal with these specific issues. It is also important to establish at the beginning if a therapist is open to someone changing their sexual leaning and what this may look like for them. No point in forking out well earned cash to someone who will try and convince you that you are born gay. This is bad, bad practice and VERY dangerous.

Today, most, if not all, of my gay friends have different addictions. Some of the gay men I used to hang around with are now dead from
Either having suicided from the appalling way they were treated WITHIN the gay community by different boyfriends
Or from drug overdoses
Or from the effects of HIV and AIDS

I got out of the gay labyrinth while still young, and you have no idea how thankful I am. I hope those reading will make wise and FULLY INFORMED decisions too.
Bible codes and gay genes 3:00pm on 25 Jun 2009 Comment 44 states that it should not surprise us that some psychiatrists are also inflicting serious harm on gay and lesbian people through programmes like NARTH and Abeo. One day they may realise the harm they have caused, the lives they have stunted, the dreams they have turned into nightmares, and on that day I would not envy their conscience.

You do not speak for the many gay men and women like me who have only received only good, professional, and life changing care that have helped lives to mature and that have made dreams actually come true. Trained therapists who help others can only have consciences that are clear, good and healthy. You know a tree by its fruit and on the whole their fruit is good, good, good.
Bible codes and gay genes 2:44pm on 25 Jun 2009 I have taken the time to read and digest all that has been written on this blog. I enter the debate as a man who believed and proclaimed publicly for years that I, like others, was born gay. (When youve always been gay, how can you even begin to entertain that you have somehow been shaped into being gay?) My sexuality, I always believed, was something innate and unchangeable. I fully embraced and lived the gay lifestyle with lots of flair and had a blast doing so most of the time.
Some years ago I underwent some therapy to help resolve some childhood issues. I had no idea that en route I would be challenged at the deepest core of my very being. In short, after some deep and often painful resolutions, I have come to wholeheartedly believe, and live out the truth, that WITHOUT ANY QUESTIONABLE DOUBT sexual orientation is not immutable and that with the right therapeutic/psychological care individuals with homosexual attractions should they wish to (and no one is forcing anyone to do this!) can change their sexual orientation. If it can happen to me and youd better believe it has! then it can happen to anyone. Even my gay mates recognize the beneficial and deep inner changes within me.
Since the therapy, I have closely examined over 100 years of professional and scientific literature as well as literally hundreds of reports from clinicians and researchers mostly published in professional journals, and this includes the incredible (and well-worth reading) tome by the intellectual iconoclast, Jeffrey Satinover. They all come to the same conclusion change is, and always has been, possible for those who want it.
I got married and now have a family. My wife knows what I say is true. Many other men I know are now on this journey of change, and they like me feel seriously shortchanged by the lies that other gay activists, lavender therapists and the Media in general keep spouting about people being born gay. We DO have choice!!
Im grateful for the professionals who are dedicated to upholding the rights of those dealing with unwanted homosexual attraction to receive effective clinical care, and who rightly confirm that a change in sexual orientation is possible for some individuals and does not cause psychological harm on average. (NB: a therapist who does not understand how a homosexual identity is formed cannot help, and will therefore harm, an individual so choose your therapist wisely, guys!)
Having met with hundreds of individuals who have benefitted from the help of therapists, we would be a poorer world if every person werent given the right to independently determine their own course in life and for many that involves seeking counselling options that affirm their personal beliefs.
For all those of us who have screamed our core belief, namely that we were born gay, maybe, just maybe, we really have got it wrong

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