It's driving me insane!

I am a 61-year-old male. I've always considered myself 100% heterosexual. I have never felt an attraction to another male in my life. Last year, I moved to a new community. There is a young millennial male that frequents a bar I go to. From the first moment I saw him, I not only felt a sense of intense love for him but also a strong sexual attraction. He was a complete stranger! I have an extremely difficult time dealing with my feelings and it has affected me beyond belief. Maybe if I could get some insight as to why I feel this way about him, and only him, it might help me to deal with it better.

Hello Last Leg: Thank you for bringing your concern here to PC. I noticed this is your first post. So... welcome to Psych Central. (By the way, you mentioned you're 61. I'm 71!)

I don't know if I can really be of much help with regard to what you are experiencing. One thing that occurs to me is perhaps this is, to some extent, a matter of perspective? Throughout most of my life, & perhaps most of yours as well, sexual orientation was pretty clear-cut. You were either heterosexual or you were homosexual... either straight or gay. I think nowadays sexual orientation is being viewed differently, more like a continuum with completely straight being at one end & completely gay at the other. But the reality is that many of us, perhaps most of us if we were really honest, fall somewhere in between the two ends of the continuum. So perhaps what you're experiencing is simply an indication that you're not as absolutely, unalterably straight as you had always presumed? I don't know... it's just a thought. That doesn't mean that somewhere within you there is some hidden desire to embark on a relationship with another male... the one you're finding yourself attracted to in particular. It perhaps just means that finding this young man attractive is becoming aware of a part of your psychological make-up, so to speak, you didn't realize was there.

Of course the other possibility here, I suppose, might simply be that there is something about this young man's appearance that is reminiscent of someone in your past, either a woman or a man, (perhaps a relative?) that you recognize subconsciously & are attracted to? I enjoy learning about current findings of research that is being done into the workings of the human brain. And one tidbit I've picked up is that much more of who we are, & what we do, is controlled by areas of the brain to which we have no conscious access than we would typically imagine. So perhaps the attraction you're feeling toward this young man is tied, in some way, to material that is stored in non-conscious areas of your brain. Here again, I don't know if that is in any way even close to accurate, or even relevant. But it's something else that occurs to me.

The important thing here at least from my perspective is to realize that, whatever the cause of the attraction you're experiencing, it's perfectly normal. The danger in it, to the extent there is any, lies in the potential for it to become something you ruminate over causing yourself ongoing upset & confusion. To the extent that you can simply accept it for what it is, & let it go, I think it can be just one of those little odd experiences we all have from time-to-time as we pass though life... no big deal. I hope you find PC to be of benefit.

Perhaps this young male represents a reminder of your own youth and what you had been at one time or wanted to be and that's what this attraction is really about instead of your actually being suddenly gay. Envy is a strange feeling and can be confusing.

Thanks so much! You've both given me info to think about.