Lonely Gay Catholic, & Problems w/ Single Life

[ssa_fellow]

I would post in the prayer intentions forum, because I really need prayer. My own prayer life isn’t the best its ever been right now…

But, I’m posting here bc I feel stuck in a rut, and I want to get out of it.
The most obvious thing would be a long addiction to pornography. I’ve been doing better recently (but, that means having more days where I don’t fall). So… I might fall on 4, 3, or 2 days a week, rather than falling 4, 5, or more days a week… So yeah…
I still fall several days a week. Even if I’m trying, and even if I feel like I’ve been doing better…

Also, I am gay. I feel lonely a lot. I had kind of a bad day today bc I felt lonely.
I would’ve been pure today. I mean, I was pure for like the whole day until around 11 p.m.
I got lonely, and I tried to reason with myself. Idk…

“Porn isn’t going to cure your loneliness”
“I need love, and porn isn’t going to give me love”.

So… I knew.

I knew it was a bad decision to look at porn. And, I knew that I’d be disappointed… but, I’m an addict. And, it was the decision I ended up making.

I wanted a man to hold me. Or just to be around me. And, being alone and lonely, that just gradually became lust.

What am I supposed to do?

I ask Jesus to hold me. I pray for God to love me. And I know God loves me. But, I do forget that at times. I mean… why is God’s love not enough for me? I’ll still often be lonely even though I prayed.

Is it because I still want to be with a man? Maybe if I just crucified my desires, then eventually Jesus really would be enough for me, and I wouldn’t get lonely?

I’ve been having a lot of self-esteem problems recently too. Idk, from my perspective it seems like just about everyone has centered their lives around romantic relationships. I know that’s not true, but… since romantic things are utterly alien and foreign to me… it seems like this.

Most of my friends are in dating relationships. Some of them are even married now. What do I do? I don’t really have too many role models who are single, or are wanting to be single…

I really wish someone would hold me. I don’t even really want it to be a romantic thing. Why can’t one of my friends hold me? If none of my guy friends will, bc men just absolutely 100% can never do that in our society, then why can’t one of my female friends do it? *

I feel like I have all these unmet emotional needs, and yet there’s really no way I’m allowed to fulfill them. The Church requires me to be celibate. **I have not done 1 romantic thing in my life. If anyone reading this can say the same, then please tell me how you’re coping with life! **

Just pray to Jesus! Jesus is all you need!

I don’t want to belittle Jesus. But, right now, I’m having a very difficult time with how His Church envisions life for a celibate gay person. Does she have a vision at all? How am I supposed to have love? It seems like most people have significant others that they love, in addition to Jesus.

Not so with me. ​

That’s from my heart. I’m really miserable, and I really want to stop being miserable.*

 

[pianistclare]

I’m praying for you

Peace.

 

[ProdglArchitect]

First off, I want to commend you for trying to live according to God’s law. I know that it must be incredibly difficult for you, and I pray for your strength and for your healing.

Now, to move on to your post, you must stop looking at pornography. I do not say this as an outsider who cannot understand the difficulty that entails, but as a fellow addict. I’ve been actively viewing porn since I was around eleven years old. At twenty-eight, I still have not found freedom from this addiction. (Admittedly, I’ve only been trying for freedom for around three years, but still…) Like you, I was prone to engaging in this sin multiple times per day, sometimes as many as six or seven times. This went on for years.

Now, I’m generally find myself failing once every couple of weeks.

It’s not perfect, and I’m still working on it, but it is certainly progress.

The longest I’ve gone during this process was right around two months, and let me stress the fact that I have never been happier in my life. All of my relationships and interactions were so much better when I didn’t have the constant, nagging drive in the back of my mind, endlessly prodding to be indulged in. Despite being married, I frequently feel very lonely while engaged in this sin, and afterwards. I feel isolated, cut off, and devoid of affection. Much like yourself, my self-image and self-esteem seems tied in to how well I’m doing in this regard. The longer I’m sober, the better I feel about myself; whereas giving in is almost always accompanied by an immediate self-loathing.

I have two pieces of advice for you:

#1: Get in touch with a COURAGE group near you. COURAGE is a ministry dedicated to helping individual with homosexual inclinations live chaste lives in keeping with God’s commands. I’ve met a number of men who are part of COURAGE who cannot speak highly enough of how it’s helped them. One man I met in my men’s group had been very active in the lifestyle, and had been completely and totally miserable. (much like what you’re describing.) He said that COURAGE literally saved his life, and that he had never been happier than he was now, after freeing himself of his addictions and living with Christ.

#2: Find a men’s purity group. They’re a little hard to find, since they’re not often advertised, but if you ask the priest at your parish about it they’ll probably be able to tell you if there is one in your area. I am part of the St. Augustine’s Men’s Purity Group, and I cannot overstate how much they’ve helped me. Sadly, I’ve not been able to attend meetings for a while now, and my sobriety has suffered as a result; but I saw my greatest improvement while I was attending meetings regularly. If there is a group within driving distance, then you should make every effort to attend.

I can state, with almost absolute certainty, that your feelings of loneliness and depression stem from your pornography addiction. Yes, being unable to engage in intimate physical relations with other men will never be easy for you, and that is a cross you will carry for your life; but this deep, empty feeling you have does not have to be a part of that cross, and can be cured if you can find freedom from your severe addiction.

I will pray for you, and ask that you pray for me as well.

God Bless!

 

[Allegra]

You didn’t say how you are getting porn to look at. Obviously, if it’s a hard copy in your home, you should throw those out yesterday. If it’s on your computer, can you get one of those softwares that prevent you form uploading porn from the internet? I don’t think they are too expensive. I lived as a single person for nine years after I moved out of my parents’ house and I often felt lonely, and not even just from a romantic standpoint. I came from a large family and I missed living with other people and having a family.

Make sure you get plenty of socialization with friends and family during the day. Also, consider trying to find an environment to live where you can have roommates to talk to at meal times and in the evenings. I don’t know if this is an options where you live, but I have a friend in a similar situation who lived for several years in a co-op. It was really good for her as she got the “family feeling” without the risks generally associated with roommates. All residents adhered to a strict contract in order to stay there. The rent was really cheap and consistent, even if someone left the house. Each person was assigned chores and responsibilities and had to attend meetings where they voted on how to run the house and planned meals and events. In the years prior to her moving to the co-op, my friend had suffered from depression didn’t really respond to any treatment. While she lived there, most of her symptoms diminished significantly and she feels it was from the constant social interaction with the other members of the co-op. It’s something to consider.

 

[Markhc]

**I have not done 1 romantic thing in my life. If anyone reading this can say the same, then please tell me how you’re coping with life! **

I think what you have shared is very romantic. The desire to follow Gods will and not your own is no simple gesture. I find the fight you are waging against evil and the temptations of this world to be very romantic. I have no doubt the Lord, as well as Our Lady are moved by your desires for chastity, if not celibacy. They want you to be faithful, because that is where true happiness lies; even under the heavy weight of your circumstances.

While I’m not SSA, I have experienced many of the same feelings you have expressed. For me it continues to be a battle of self worth. Too often I trade temporary pleasure at the expense of long term peace and happiness. Feelings of loneliness and despair lead me to thinking I must not be worthy of happiness. That’s when I will give in to the temporary pleasures of lust, gluttony, avarice, etc.

You express the desire to be held, but I think you have already identified that is really just an outward sign of what you desire to feel inside. Safe. Secure. Loved. Not only for who you want to be, but who you are. I don’t know that these feelings really have as much to do with physical intimacy, as they do with the unmet emotional needs you talked about. I believe we all have unmet emotional needs, otherwise there would be little need for message boards. So don’t feel alone.

In addition to ProdglArchitect’s advice, I wouldn’t shy away from counseling or therapy to help you identify and reconcile those unmet needs. I also encourage the Sacrament of Confession. Above all, I pray for God to send you someone- male or female who will walk with you, encourage you to remain faithful and chaste, to love you for who you are, all so that you come to know more fully the love of Christ and the depth of his mercy. God bless.

 

[SonOfMan]

I can state, with almost absolute certainty, that your feelings of loneliness and depression stem from your pornography addiction

Im not trying to debate here, just offering my perspective on this as another addict. I believe that porn addiction is a symptom of lonliness and depression, not the other way around. People who want to love and be loved who have no outlet to express that, turn to porn and get hooked.

From my personal situation and feeling, if only I had real love in my life I wouldn’t “need” porn and wouldn’t have made a lot of the bad decisions Ive made in my life. I only made those bad decisions because I was desperate.

 

[anonymous_in_fl]

Besides availing yourself of the sacraments of the Church (daily mass, confession) and the powerful prayer of the rosary, you may wish to consider professional help to combat sex/porn addiction.

Certified Sexual Addiction Therapists (CSAT’s) have special training to help you. You can follow this link to try to find a therapist near you: iitap.com/promote-your-services/sex-therapist-directory

There are also a few free 12 Step Fellowships out there such as Sexaholics Anonymous, Sex Addicts Anonymous, and Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous. They have meetings all over the country and via chat/web. Just do a “google” search to find them.

 

[ProdglArchitect]

Im not trying to debate here, just offering my perspective on this as another addict. I believe that porn addiction is a symptom of lonliness and depression, not the other way around. People who want to love and be loved who have no outlet to express that, turn to porn and get hooked.

From my personal situation and feeling, if only I had real love in my life I wouldn’t “need” porn and wouldn’t have made a lot of the bad decisions Ive made in my life. I only made those bad decisions because I was desperate.

Sorry, but the evidence does not bear this out. If this was the case, men who are happily married to a woman they love wouldn’t feel the need to have recourse to pornography. Instead, we see the roughly the same rates of pornography viewing between married and unmarried men, and getting married does not typically reduce the rate at which men view pornography.

Some people may turn to porn because they are lonely, but pornography use will only compound and exacerbate those feelings.

 

[GEddie]

First off, I want to commend you for trying to live according to God’s law. I know that it must be incredibly difficult for you, and I pray for your strength and for your healing.

+1.

Your struggles are not unique to the SSA orbit. I am not SSA, but I too am alone and unheld. Due to various factors, I never learned to “speak flirt” when I was young, and that’s not a language you pick up on Rosetta Stone.

It does seem, when one is alone, that everybody else has “centered their life” around erotic relationships. That is inaccurate, but it makes being alone harder to take.

I know it’s not much comfort, but our LORD too was lonely. His human Dad died when He was a youth, requiring Him to financially support his mother and to absorb her grief. He knew that He would be killed young, and so there was no point to seeking a female relationship. And in His moment of greatest anxiety, all His friends were asleep!

So our aloneness and brokenness bind us to Him, stronger than many other penances in this life.

He can only enter through the cracks of a broken life.

God Bless and ICXC NIKA.

 

[ProdglArchitect]

I know it’s not much comfort, but our LORD too was lonely. His human Dad died when He was a youth, requiring Him to financially support his mother and to absorb her grief. He knew that He would be killed young, and so there was no point to seeking a female relationship. And in His moment of greatest anxiety, all His friends were asleep!

…This is literally the most depressing retelling of Christ’s life that I have ever heard… I’m going to go sit in a corner and cry now…

Your points are excellent, and I agree with them completely… but sheesh…

 

[GEddie]

…This is literally the most depressing retelling of Christ’s life that I have ever heard… I’m going to go sit in a corner and cry now…

Your points are excellent, and I agree with them completely… but sheesh…

I am sorry that my remarks saddened you; but after all, HE’s not called the Man of Sorrows for nothing.

Me, I find it an encouragement that with one exception, anything I face HE has been to already.

ICXC NIKA

 

[LoyalViews]

A man who falls in love with another man, yet understands the nature of their attraction, and that it isn’t something that can be acted on, can still play a role in a relationship that brings something to Christ or helps each other find the peace which they cannot give to each other. Of course, this wouldn’t be called a relationship but rather a strong spiritual friendship.

Whenever I’ve brought up this idea, I’ve been yelled at and told it’s an occasion of sin but I don’t understand how - if the point of such a friendship is to avoid the sin that tempts both the same kind of person. It’s like saying a recovering addict can’t help another addict stay sober - they can. Moral support. An alliance of similar mindsets.

Everywhere in the world is trying to support same-sex relations, relationships, and inventing a union of “marriage” so that those pursuing gay lifestyles might settle upon some sort of legal stability; and these endeavours do not help the cause for moral righteousness.

You, OP, cannot find what you’re looking for IN other people, but you can come to it BY or THROUGH other people. Being held by someone is what you want, but it might not be what you need. As far as I’m concerned, only Almighty God can give us what we need and he knows the desires of our heart and its condition far better than we, it’s holder, could ever know. In motherly care the Blessed Virgin will look after you.

You can be that person whom others see through and find the hand of Christ that reaches out to all that require His mercy. The Cross is heavy and the will is weak - but by God, you’ll suffer through it. This isn’t a “textbook problem” because it deals with the loneliness of the heart and the romance you’d love to experience…but that romance cannot bring a permanent happiness. It will fade away, and it will cause a lingering bitterness that you’re better off without. The mantra is exhausting: pray hard, and ask for God’s help. But where is God’s help?

 

[ProdglArchitect]

I am sorry that my remarks saddened you; but after all, HE’s not called the Man of Sorrows for nothing.

Me, I find it an encouragement that with one exception, anything I face HE has been to already.

ICXC NIKA

I get that from it to, but wow…

 

[InNomineDomini]

… HE’s not called the Man of Sorrows for nothing.

Well said.

Christ’s loneliness shouldn’t depress us, it should inspire us to a deeper love for Him, to a greater desire to console Him, and to a deeper contrition for our sin. I think we should meditate on these aspects of His life frequently.

For the OP: in order to determine how the Holy Spirit is leading you in all of this, you need a spiritual director to help you reflect, and to help you correctly interpret certain promptings. Have you taken step to find such a spiritual director?

Also, the spiritual director can assist you in finding out which areas of your psyche are really problems that need to be addressed by a trustworthy psychologist.

I would definitely recommend you try to pursue spiritual direction.

 

[Allegra]

Sorry, but the evidence does not bear this out. If this was the case, men who are happily married to a woman they love wouldn’t feel the need to have recourse to pornography. Instead, we see the roughly the same rates of pornography viewing between married and unmarried men, and getting married does not typically reduce the rate at which men view pornography.

Some people may turn to porn because they are lonely, but pornography use will only compound and exacerbate those feelings.

I think it’s most accurate to say that they work together as a vicious cycle. A person who is lonely and depressed is more likely to succumb to an addiction in the first place, however, the addiction only brings on more isolation and depression, which drive the person deeper into the addiction and thus, deeper into despair. That’s why it affects married men as well as single men, and that’s one of the worst aspects of the addiction. The married man has a real woman in his life who loves and supports him, but he still feels isolated, unworthy, unloved, etc because of the porn addiction.

 

[SonOfMan]

Sorry, but the evidence does not bear this out. If this was the case, men who are happily married to a woman they love wouldn’t feel the need to have recourse to pornography. Instead, we see the roughly the same rates of pornography viewing between married and unmarried men, and getting married does not typically reduce the rate at which men view pornography.

Some people may turn to porn because they are lonely, but pornography use will only compound and exacerbate those feelings.

Like you and me, many people get started with pornography at a very young age. By the time they actually get married, they have already formed an addiction to porn and are bringing that with them into the marriage. Perhaps those who got started young were left alone too much by our parents. Maybe we didnt have many friends. Porn was there though, readily available for pleasure at any time, just like a drug. In my view, porn is the symptom not necessarily the cause.

I doubt people who married first and then discovered porn for the first time developed any real problem with it, although there are always exceptions I am sure.

Personally, if I was married it would be so easy to break the habit of pornography and I can say that with absolute certainty. If I am even friends with a girl or am talking to one for a small period of time, I lose all interest in porn. Its only once I feel invisible, lonely, helpless, and desperate that I turn back to it.

Like I said, only speaking from my experience and I guess everyone is different. If the scientific evidence says otherwise, then it says otherwise. I wasnt trying to debate the point.

 

[pianistclare]

Im not trying to debate here, just offering my perspective on this as another addict. I believe that porn addiction is a symptom of lonliness and depression, not the other way around. People who want to love and be loved who have no outlet to express that, turn to porn and get hooked.

From my personal situation and feeling, if only I had real love in my life I wouldn’t “need” porn and wouldn’t have made a lot of the bad decisions Ive made in my life. I only made those bad decisions because I was desperate.

I hear you, but witness the many threads of wives whose husbands are addicted to pron. They have relations with their wives, but it’s never enough.
Porn is much more sinister than simply a mechanism for release.

 

[ProdglArchitect]

Personally, if I was married it would be so easy to break the habit of pornography and I can say that with absolute certainty.

I used to think this as well. Sadly, it has not born out. T_T

 

[Allegra]

Personally, if I was married it would be so easy to break the habit of pornography and I can say that with absolute certainty. If I am even friends with a girl or am talking to one for a small period of time, I lose all interest in porn. Its only once I feel invisible, lonely, helpless, and desperate that I turn back to it.

Like I said, only speaking from my experience and I guess everyone is different. If the scientific evidence says otherwise, then it says otherwise. I wasnt trying to debate the point.

Don’t be so certain. The romantic thrills associated with meeting a nice girl and getting some attention from her wear off quickly. Most marriages endure periods where the spouses may feel neglected. The wife is post-partum and isn’t interested or comfortable having sex. There are four kids and they haven’t all been asleep at the same time in over six years. The husband got a new job and has to impress the boss by going on constant sales trips. Don’t expect marriage to be a cure for porn, because statistics shows that it isn’t and if one doesn’t kick the habit before marriage, there is a good chance of it manifesting itself during the marriage.

 

[pianistclare]

Don’t be so certain. The romantic thrills associated with meeting a nice girl and getting some attention from her wear off quickly. Most marriages endure periods where the spouses may feel neglected. The wife is post-partum and isn’t interested or comfortable having sex. There are four kids and they haven’t all been asleep at the same time in over six years. The husband got a new job and has to impress the boss by going on constant sales trips. Don’t expect marriage to be a cure for porn, because statistics shows that it isn’t and if one doesn’t kick the habit before marriage, there is a good chance of it manifesting itself during the marriage.

Yes. Do a search on threads re: porn in the marriage and you’ll be shocked at how many couples suffer from this devastating addiction.