Therapy for Unwanted Same Sex Attraction
Early attempts at making same-sex connections failed.
Here’s what one* of my male clients told me about his life growing up.
“As a child, sometimes I felt rejected, alone, and questioned if anyone liked me. I wanted to connect with my peers at school and in the neighborhood, but there was always something that would go wrong. I would try to join the other kids on the playground or the sports field, but I always seemed to get in the way, or someone would tease or make fun of me, and I would end up walking away feeling excluded.
Things weren’t much better at home. My dad was never happy with me, always finding something I did wrong and yelling and criticizing me. I would try to hang out with him, but he was always too busy or not interested in the things I liked.
As I got older, things only seemed to worsen. At school, it seemed I would get teased and insulted daily. The bullying got so bad that I was afraid to walk down the hallway or go to class, fearing that someone would humiliate or embarrass me in front of everyone.”
Lack of early connection with his peers and father resulted in unresolved trauma that followed him into adulthood.
Failure to connect can increase same-sex attraction.
Bullying and experiencing shame by one’s peers and family members can leave a young male feeling rejected and abandoned, even questioning his masculinity. At puberty, this longing to become accepted by other males can result in objectification and sexualization.
This story can be familiar to some people who experience unwanted same-sex attraction. Traumatic experiences of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse can be common. When we use a proven, evidence-based therapy method to treat these negative, shameful, and traumatic experiences, the person’s sexual attractions can change on their own.
Therapy helps process the shame and Trauma.
Effective therapy involves a collaboration between the client and therapist to work together to achieve the desired goals defined by the client. Using established, evidence-based therapeutic methods to treat the identified trauma experienced by the individual is one of the most effective ways to help the individual heal. One of the possible ripple effects of this healing process can be the client’s sexual attractions changing on their own.
Clients are never encouraged to change their sexual feelings/attractions at any point in the process. The client and therapist simply work on healing the traumatic experiences, and as the trauma is healed, the person’s sexual attractions can spontaneously change as a byproduct of the process.
Experiencing same-sex attraction is fine for some people but inconvenient for others. For some, the same sexual attraction goes against the person’s values or religious views. Others tried the gay sexual lifestyle and found it not fulfilling or satisfying. Still, others want to have biological children with their spouses.
Whatever the reason, it is a person’s choice of how they want to handle their unwanted same-sex attraction. Furthermore, studies have shown that peoples attractions can be fluid and can change.
Give me a call today, and let’s begin the process.
*Example is a composite narrative and does not reflect an actual client.