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Bisexuality Scientifically Supported

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SHIRT & TIE [small] (final)A friend of mine and a fellow psychologist, who is married to a woman but considers himself as strictly gay, has told me emphatically that there is no such thing as a bisexual. According to him, science indicates that you have to be either attracted to men or women but biologically you cannot be attracted to both. He bases his beliefs on the rat studies of the 1980’s involving the use or hormone injections and  more recent studies that seem to link gay or heterosexual orientation to the mother’s hormone production during pregnancy.  In either case, to him,  it seems to be either or, but not both.

However, nine million Americans who claim they are bisexual, or at least feel attraction to both men and women, cannot all be wrong. In a recent study (2011)[1] conducted in Northwestern University, researchers found “evidence that at least some men who identify themselves as bisexual are, in fact, sexually aroused by both women and men.” These findings overturn their earlier studies (2005). Using more stringent guidelines, the researchers recruited subjects from online bisexual venues. The  participants had to have had sexual experiences with at least two people of each sex and a romantic relationship of at least three months with at least one person of each sex. In both studies, men watched videos of male and female same-sex intimacy while genital sensors monitored their erectile responses. While the first study reported that bisexuals generally resembled homosexuals, the new one found that bisexual men responded to both the male and female videos. The earlier study suggested that bisexual attraction was due to subjective arousal rather than a genital response. The second study clearly showed that bisexual men did indeed have a genital response.

So what do these studies mean for us bisexuals? It is reassuring to know that we are indeed sexually aroused by both men and women (as if we didn’t know that already). For many years, I have been under the delusion that I was sexually (genital arousal) attracted to men but psychologically (subjective arousal) desired intimacy with women. This is simply not true. We cannot separate the two.  Arousal and desire for intimacy go together. Genital arousal leads to desire for intimacy and intimacy leads to genital arousal, whether it is with a man or a woman.

What has been confusing in the past is that my relationships with men were based on a quick fix, genital arousal with no subjective involvement, simply find a willing partner and engage, whereas my relationships with women demanded courtship and foreplay leading to intimacy and arousal. While I was married, I did a man thing; I compartmentalized. I got my gay fix (genital arousal) quick and easy and saved my moments of intimacy (subjective arousal) for love making with my wife. Because of the emotional intensity of my gay encounters, I came to the inevitable conclusion that my real drives were gay.  But this is simply not the case; it was merely my personal way to deal with my powerful sexual desires for both men and women.

So what is the solution? Simple me – I still think the answer is love. Find love and have sex, not have sex and perhaps find love. We seek intimacy and enjoy the genital arousal within the boundaries of a meaningful relationship. This can be with a man or a woman.  We are bisexual. This requires an open relationship where feelings and desires are open for honest discussion. And if we are not yet in an intimate relationship than it is perfectly fine and certainly enjoyable to experiment and have genital and subjective experiences with both men and women until the right person comes along.

 

[1] Rosenthat  A.M., Sylva D., Safron A., amd Bailey JM. .Sexual Arousal Patterns of Bisexual Men Revisited. Biol Psychol. 2011.

A Bisexual Man’s New Year’s Resolutions

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New Year’s day. Time for New Year’s Resolutions.  Here are mine.  You can borrow them if you like.  I wish you the best year of your life.

 

 

  1. I will know myself – forget my weaknesses, know my strengths, and know my talents. I will be a curious conscious human being.
  2. I will Love myself. Unconditionally. Period. No ifs. No buts.  I will start every morning by looking myself in the mirror and saying “I love you”. I will not only say it but I will mean it and feel it.
  3. I will spend fifteen minutes a day meditating.  I will seek that place where I feel one with all things. My focus will not be on nothingness but on me and my place in this beautiful world in which I live. Throughout the rest of the day I will take time to smell the flowers, to hug the trees, and say hello to the eagles.
  4. I am the most important person in my world so I will take good care of myself. I will be responsible for supplying all my own needs.  I will not depend on anyone else to do what I alone can do.
  5. I will evaluate all my wants and make plans to obtain and achieve them.
  6. I will spend some quality time with myself. I will take time each day to focus my attention on me. I will ask myself what I would really like to do today and then do it.
  7. I will be honest with myself. I will cut through the crap that my ego wants to throw at me. No sad stories. No excuses for not being true to me. I am a beautiful, powerful human being. I will not just act it; I will live it.
  8. I will be honest with others. I will let them know my feelings and my desires, what I do and why I do a the things I do. I will not make excuses for my behavior. I will accept the responsibility for being me. I will explain my reasons for doing what I do and feeling what I feel. If those I love cannot live with the real me, then I must be prepared to let them go. I will live with the consequences of my actions and beliefs.
  9. I will come to grips with my sexuality, my gender and my orientation. I will understand that it is a part of me but not the whole me.
  10. I will control my sexuality and not let it control me. I will understand the intricacies of my gender and sexuality. It is my physical expression of my desires and my capacity to love. I will not fragment it by separating it from my need to love and be loved.

Best Wishes

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img_1394-1I wish you all a Merry Christmas and I give you this present. For those of you who are young – enjoy. For those of you from my generation – enjoy even more. Be conscious or just how precious these good moment really are.

 

 

Christmas

It comes in the middle of the sad season,
When the skies are gray and the rains fall,
In that moment where sadness covers all
With a blanket of cold.

Old days, long gone, hidden behind the clouds.
Moments of when life was young and free,
And the sky was limitless and it was all ok to be me,
Free to be all I could be.

New days, too suppressed with knowledge,
Cloak the reality of the moon and the stars,
Choking the dreams with cold gray iron bars
Keeping my heart captive to my thoughts.

But there is a new reality,
Christmas reborn,
New presents to open,
New loves to love,
New dreams to dream,
New purpose to embrace,
New gifts to give.

And I embrace all the loves I have known
That flows unhindered from my wife,
My children and my grandchildren,
Flowing through old arteries into an old heart,
Pumping new blood to tired tissues,
Sucking in life giving breath,
Enriching the mind with new thoughts,
Creating a doorway to a new life
Where the past and present are the future
And this moment is worth all of my tomorrows.

Bisexual Christmas

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img_1394-1Christmas is often a tough time for anyone experiencing social anxieties and that certainly includes us bisexuals. When scouring the net I came up with gift ideas for bi’s including sweatshirts, tee-shirts and pendants.  But that’s not the real gift, is it? I suppose we could look at the Christ story and look for some kind of rebirth, but I think most of us are happy with the life we have. The key is not to wish for anything new but to enjoy and celebrate the important things we have. So here is my wish list for Christmas.

  1. The present – just to live a life free of anxiety, to enjoy the present moment regardless of where it takes me.
  2. Family time – to enjoy my children and grandchildren now and throughout the new year and to celebrate the fact that they do indeed still love me in spite of all the concern I have caused them.
  3. Love – I am thankful for the solid relationship I have with my wife of two and a half years. She knows I am bi, she encourages me to talk about my past and present gay desires, and she gives me the freedom to explore both sides of my bisexual nature. Above all, I am so thankful that we can enjoy each other’s bodies, minds, and souls.
  4. This beautiful planet – I live on Vancouver Island and we are presently moving up-island to live on a bay along the coast where I can greet the morning sun as it rises over Bayne’s Sound. I am thankful for the pairs of eagles that fly overhead and the sea lions that bark all day. I am thankful for the paths that wind through the old growth forest where I can stop and hug a giant tree and know that I am part of an awesome network of living things.
  5. And me – I am thankful for me, my bisexual nature, my masculine straight side and my feminine gay side. I am thankful for all the experiences my bisexuality have caused and yet opened up for me – the beautiful, the bad and the ugly. Without them I would not be who I am and I am proud and happy to be me.

Understanding the Bisexual Man

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An excerpt from my book “Bi – A Bisexual Man’s Transformational Journey”.

 

For everyone out there that is confused by bisexual behavior, it is helpful to try to understand what it’s like to be a bisexual. Prior to the 1980’s when I was growing up, bisexuality was considered just a transition stage from heterosexual to being gay. It was not until the mid-1980’s that science took a serious look at bisexuality because of the AIDS epidemic that was spreading from the gay to the heterosexual population. Most of us did not see the third choice; our struggle was between being gay or staying heterosexual and trying to live a “normal” life.

In my experience, bisexual men, particularly men with a feminine side to the gay side of their personality, seem to experience greater levels of social anxiety during childhood and adolescence, which coupled with their feminine enhanced psychological nature, makes them vulnerable to rejection, particularly by fathers, older brothers, and by potential male friends at school and in the community. Some cover it over by trying to hide behind a strictly masculine persona. Either way, they often grow into adults with serious issues related to their sexuality.

What is it like to be a bisexual man and what is the relationship, if any, between bisexual orientation, social trauma, and mental illness? It is not easy for bisexuals to deal with their gay side. A study by Susan Cochran[1], indicated that gay and bisexual men have significantly higher rates of major and recurrent depression, generalized anxiety, mood disorders, and higher rates of suicidal thoughts. Contrary to popular belief, this new generation is not coping any better. Research indicates that the bisexual population in American high schools has grown to three to six percent with an additional three percent who are unsure of their sexual orientation[2]. About one in four experience bouts of depression and attempts at suicide.

The occurrence of mental issues is even higher for married bisexual men. How does a married bisexual man with children deal with compulsive overwhelming drives that compel him to engage in behaviours that he knows will destroy his life and his marriage? They have to deal with the issues of the gay side of their sexuality while trying to maintain their social heterosexual image. The occurrence of suicide is very high; however, the exact numbers are difficult to establish, because the bisexual motivation for suicide is often concealed from the public eye. Bisexual men appear to have anxieties that may last a lifetime.

Most bisexuals that I have interviewed do not allow themselves the privilege of open and carefree gay sex. They avoid gay relationships because intimate friendships may interfere with their heterosexual lives. They seek out places for anonymous encounters, such as parks and bathhouses, where they may engage in multiple sexual acts on any given day or night. They make anonymous contacts through gay dating services and pickup gay bars. They do not care if these encounters result in intimacy or relationship. They just need gay sex as a release valve for their suppressed gay desires. Based on my observations, many bisexual men continue to lead this life until they reach a crisis point brought on by discovery of their lifestyle by their spouse, or by reaching a point where they crash and have to make the decision to accept their gay orientation and seek a relationship with another man.

In my experience, the bisexual person not only has to deal with typical gay issues, but he also has to face the mental issues brought on by repression and denial. In extreme cases, this repression can lead to a gender identity disorder which seems to involve a significant segment of the bisexual population. I believe the term “sexual identity disorder” does not exist in isolation; it has to be included as part of a personality disorder where a person denies their own identity with their own wants and needs. The sexual orientation then becomes an impossible complication to their already fragile identity.

My observations suggest that the bisexual man frequently has no self-identity or has two conflicting identities. He tends to use his gay orientation as a means of self-abuse, self-punishment, and self-destruction. Because he cannot face his true sexual identity, his sexual drive may become a compulsion that is based on fear and the subconscious emotional pain from denial and repression. This may lead to an addiction where there is only one stimulus available that can break through the hopeless feelings of self-imposed withdrawal, and that is to seek out another gay sexual rush. This compulsion, if unchecked, will eventually lead to sexual addiction, with a cycle of stimulation, action and then withdrawal, which can eventually lead to a mental collapse and suicidal desires.

[1] Cochran, 2002.

[2] Center of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),2016

Bisexuality and Fluidity

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Our bisexuality is not a static orientation; it changes; however, we consistently perceive and interact as bisexual over time.  Lisa Diamond of the University of Utah, using a subset of participants from a longitudinal study, measured variability in same-sex and other-sex sexual motivation over a span of 10 years, during which women also provided saliva samples for the assessment of their estrogen levels[1]. Using a dynamic wave approach rather than a static model she was able to place processes of change at the center and discover multiple processes responsible for stability and change over time. She concluded that we adopt different sexual identities at different stages in our lives, and that these identities may shape our subsequent awareness and participation in same-sex and other-sex relationships. In other words, the label affects the behavior, as well as the opposite, that the behavior affects the label. Although her research applies mainly to bisexual women, there is some indication that her findings may apply to bisexual men as well.

Diamond’s research provides the first empirical examination of competing assumptions about the nature of bisexuality, both as a sexual identity label and as a pattern of nonexclusive sexual attraction and behavior[2]. The findings demonstrate considerable fluidity in bisexual, unlabeled, and lesbian women’s attractions, behaviors, and identities over the life span. The notion that bisexuality is a transitional stage that women adopt “on the way” to lesbian identification, or is an experimental phase among heterosexual women, is not consistent with the results of this study. Women who entered the study with bisexual or unlabeled identities were significantly more likely to subsequently change their identities than were lesbian women. Most of these changes were between bisexual and unlabeled identities, and not toward either lesbianism or heterosexuality.  Furthermore, these women showed no evidence of progressive changes in their ratio of same-sex to other-sex attractions over the 10 years of the study. They were (and remain) sexually attracted to both men and women, but they label these attractions differently now than before[3].

I find her conclusion to be quite fascinating:

“The overall number of women adopting bisexual or unlabeled identities did not decline over the course of the study. If bisexuality were a temporary stage, then one would expect fewer and fewer women to maintain these identities as they moved into adulthood. Yet, to the contrary, the percentage of women claiming a bisexual or unlabeled identity hovered between 50% and 60% at each wave of the study. Even more interesting, by the end of the study, 80% of women had adopted a bisexual or unlabeled identity at some point in time. These results do not rule out the possibility that some women adopt bisexual as a transitional label, but this pattern appears exceptional rather than normative.[4]”

One of the interesting outcomes in the study was the use of labels. The “unlabeled” category was the most frequently adopted identity in the entire study. This suggests that bisexuals may adopt this label for different reasons at different times. Some bisexuals appear to be uncomfortable with the label and when they enter an opposite-sex or same-sex relationships they tend to identify as gay, lesbian or heterosexual, but these labels do not stand up over time as we tend to change our sense of our own awareness and our sexual practices over time and come back to the bisexual or unlabeled category. Most bisexuals appear to be uncomfortable with the use of any kind of label, preferring to view sexuality as something beyond the political and intellectual discussion of the rest of the LGBTQ community.  The most common label, “Unlabeled” (which has ironically has become just another label), may represent a state of being attracted to the person, not the gender. It also demonstrates our willingness to be open to change in erotic experience, not for the sake of kink or erotica but as an exploration of a sexual relationship with another human being. But regardless of the label or the “unlabel” the fact remains – we are and remain bisexual.

Another interesting findings is that most women had settled down into committed monogamous relationships. When women were in their teens and early 20s, they tended to be involved in multiple successive experiences; yet 10 years later the majority had settled into long term relationships.  This provides a notable counterpoint to the popular stereotype that bisexual women are incapable of committing to a single partner. Not only did bisexual women tend to pursue exclusive, monogamous relationships over time, but they were more likely to do so than either unlabeled or lesbian women. This again leads to some interesting conclusions about bisexuality.  It appears that we do not just seek sex for the kink and pleasure but more as a process of finding significant intimate connection.

In my review of the literature, I found reference to another survey of 394 men and women, but unfortunately, I was unable to track down the actual study for more intensive scrutiny. Apparently Desmond found that there are almost as many men who decide to identify as bisexual, queer, or “unlabeled” after identifying as gay earlier in life as there are men who first identify as bi, then as gay. The researcher originally assumed women are more sexually fluid than men but found that bisexual men also maintain a fluid sexual orientation. This again seems to be contrary to the popular belief that lesbian and bisexual women seek relationship whereas gay and bisexual men tend to be promiscuous.  It would appear that this is just another example of prejudice against gay and bisexual men. If the finding are correct, we are not just sexual deviants, but we too seek meaningful relationships and genuinely are searching for meaningful expression of our sexual bodies and souls.

 

[1] Diamond, L. M. (2012). Female Bisexuality From Adolescence to Adulthood: Results From a 10-Year Longitudinal Study Lisa M. Diamond University of Utah The desire disorder in research on sexual orientation in women: Contributions of dynamical systems theory. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 41, 73-83.

[2] Diamond, L. M. (2008). Female bisexuality from adolescence to adulthood: Results from a 10-year longitudinal study. Developmental Psychology, 44, 5-14.

[3] Female Bisexuality From Adolescence to Adulthood: Results From a 10-Year Longitudinal Study Lisa M. Diamond University of Utah

[4] Female Bisexuality From Adolescence to Adulthood: Results From a 10-Year Longitudinal Study Lisa M. Diamond University of Utah

 

Poem – Long Nights and Short Days

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cc01c6b7-a6fb-44c2-90ac-256d0b2874e8 (2)This is a difficult season watching the days get shorter. You need to find things to do to fill the dark hours.

Long Nights and Short Days

The days are short and the nights are long,
Living is not easy because there is too much striving,
Too much urgency to do something that does not need to be done,
Too much urgency to be someone I do not have to be.
The flowers are all tucked away beneath the ground;
The mulch has been laid to give them a cozy bed;
But the hope of a bright spring makes the toil worthwhile.
And I sit here in the dark before my screen
Searching for some important thing to say,
But knowing deep inside that everything has been said.
The years are piling up.
One more season before three score and ten,
And the seasons are all blending together,
And the winter tales are no longer worth repeating.
So meaning has to lie somewhere else.
Somewhere within.
Somewhere where the sun never shines,
Some place where there is no darkness,
Some place where the ticking of the clock stops,
Some place where there is no need for sleep,
No need for rest and recuperate,
Nothing to complain about,
Nothing to brag about,
Just an endless parade of moments within moments,
Where all is as it should be,
And just BEING is all that there needs to be.

Anal Intercourse and the Law

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SHIRT & TIE [small] (final)Did you know that anal intercourse for gay and bisexual men is still part of the criminal code in Canada? The law is never enforced but it is still on the books.  It makes anal sex illegal for consenting adults with the exception of consenting heterosexuals over 16 who engage in the privacy of their own homes, which by the process of illumination, leaves it illegal for gay and bisexual men. This “crime” carries a maximum sentence of 10 years.

The question of anal sex between men has been a problem for society for centuries. Sodomy has been criticized by the intellectual community, declared an abomination deserving of eternal punishment by religious groups, and criminalized by various societies. The question is “why”.

Based on the nature of the above law, and my own personal observations, I must conclude that it is because it is a sexual expression involving men.  Men engaging in sex with men is something that society feels is a perversion of sexuality.  Men are supposed to be macho and driven to become alpha males where the biggest and best compete to spread their genes into the gene pool. To avoid competition for women and intercourse is a sign of weakness and a betrayal to the collective advancement of mankind. Gay and Bisexual men are therefore labelled as pansies, ferries and fags.

The second reason involves the esthetic view of eroticism. Sex between women is viewed in general as sensuous and erotic, while sex between men is vied as in bad taste (pun intended). Take for example the sex scenes in the movies Brokeback Mountain and Carol. To most people the passionate energy and urgency in Brokeback Mountain left most people squirming in their seats whereas the one in Carol was viewed as erotic and sweet. Another popular example is the voyeurism expressed in pornography and sexually free parties. A man and a woman engaging in oral of vaginal sex is considered amusing and entertaining. Sex between two women will gather a group of interested watchers. However sex between men simply would not happen in mixed groups and would only be consider as entertaining by gay and bisexual men.

The third reason, I believe, is that the act itself is viewed as disgusting.  Somehow it is acceptable between a man and a woman but should be carried out in privacy; however,  when men engage in anal sex it suddenly becomes dirty and revolting. Another example is the variation in oral sex. A close female friend recently asked me if men do indeed perform anal oral stimulation. Now she is a very open minded individual, but when I answered in the affirmative she was obviously disgusted by it. Perhaps people feel that both anal oral stimulation (also known as rimming) and penetration are dirty because of the possibility of feces as opposed to the remnants of urine in vaginal oral sex. However, obviously, gay and bisexual men are very much aware of this and take precautions with washing and lotions to make sure they are clean, and probably cleaner than most experiences of vaginal oral engagement. This oral stimulation for men is also very erotic and pleasurable and can become an integral part of foreplay for bi’s and gay men.

In conclusion, I believe all forms of sex are private matters between individuals. What people choose to do in the privacy of their own homes is strictly up to them. Laws against sexual privacy are absurd and archaic. If others want to fantasize and be disgusted by their own imagination that is their problem. Get over it.  This law should be taken off the records. It is disgusting and an abomination against fair play and justice.

Sex, Pleasure, and Beauty

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SHIRT & TIE [small] (final)As I am getting older, I am learning to savor the pleasures of this life with all the passion that my mind and body can muster. I have become conscious of beauty.  I seek it throughout each and every day.  As I explore the pleasures of my senses I am much more selective in how the next moment should be spent.

Sexuality has become much more than experiencing orgasm. My sexual passions meld with the other senses. Making love is no longer a ritual or a tension and anxiety release; I make love because I love life, I love the moment, and I love the person that I am with. The feelings of togetherness dominate my moments and I can focus my arousal on exploring the beauty of his/her body and soul. Sometimes this sense of attraction and oneness leads to sexual passion, but most of the time, I just want to settle into the glow.

As I continue to read Elizabeth Gilbert’s book, Eat, Pray, Love[1], slowly and thoughtfully, I am impressed with the beauty of her words. I would like to explore some of her thoughts on the topic of pleasure and beauty and apply them to bisexuality.

“In a world of disorder and disaster and fraud, sometimes only beauty can be trusted . . . .  Pleasure cannot be bargained down. And sometimes the meal (sex) is the only currency that is real.” (page 114)

This one is about forgetting about the negative aspect of gaining weight and just settling in to consciously enjoying a gourmet Italian meal in a quaint restaurant on the streets of Rome. The same thing can be said about sex. We have to learn to forget the consequences, ignore the negative feelings, and just enjoy the sensuality of touch and taste. For much of my life, perhaps due to my religious background, the beauty of sex has been watered down and devalued, at times to the point of shame and guilt. All of those thoughts imposed by well-meaning individuals have interfered with my sense of pleasure. I have come to realize that those thoughts are not to be trusted.  I will no longer bargain my right to enjoy one of the greatest pleasures of life. The only thing that is real is the pleasure and the knowledge that I can gain through my senses.

“To devote yourself to the creation and enjoyment of beauty, then, can be a serious business – not always a means of escaping reality, but sometimes a means of holding on to the real when everything else is flaking away into rhetoric and plot . . . . You were given life; it is your duty (an also your entitlement as a human being) to find something beautiful within life, no matter how slight” (page 115).

I am leaning to see beauty in everything, especially in the act and art of making love. Seeing the beauty of my own body, mind, and soul has been like coming out of Plato’s cave and seeing life the way it really is. I am beautiful.  My feelings and sensations are beautiful.  I can reach emotional orgasm smelling a flower or seeing a doe curled up in my flower bed, but best of all by experiencing the love that comes from the exchange of touch. Holding my partner consciously and sensuously is the greatest pleasure I know.  She/he is beautiful. I am beautiful. We are beautiful.

”And I will leave with the hope that the expansion of one person – the magnification of one’s life – is indeed an act of worth in this world. Even if that life, just this one time, happens to be nobody’s but my own” (page 116).

My sole purpose is to see myself as I really am and to expand into the most beautiful person that I can be. I have learned to live selfishly.  My own personal pleasure and my own pursuit of beauty is the purpose of my life, but it is a purpose I can share with another human being. By exploring another’s beauty sensuously, sexually, and consciously and reflecting it back  to them,  I provide the divine energy that enables that person to expand and grow individually. And when we perform this act of love together, living and growing itself becomes something beautiful and the source of ultimate pleasure.This is a pleasure that I have chosen to experience with one person because of the intensity of the feelings we can share.  I have become monogamous not because of any restrictions on my mind but because of the expansion of my soul.

[1] Gilbert, Elizabeth. Eat Pray Love. Penguin Books. London, England. 2006.

Bisexuality – the Search for Intimacy

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SHIRT & TIE [small] (final)I am sitting at my writer’s desk, getting ready for my next entry in my Bisexual Blog, my next book on bisexuality, and thinking of the loves of my life. My bisexuality has made it difficult for me at times, because I have not been able to give my whole self to the pursuit of love with one man or one woman. On the other hand, I have had the soul filling opportunity to experience intense feelings of genuine bonding with some truly wonderful people. And is that not the true and only meaningful purpose of life?

As bisexuals, our primary pathway to intimacy is essentially sexual in nature. For heterosexual men and women, even in the workplace, they are always subconsciously and sometime consciously aware of the attractiveness of someone from the opposite sex.  As bisexuals we come from a different planet than heterosexuals and even our close cousins the gays and lesbians.  We are totally oversexed. We are wired so that everyone and everything is sexual in nature. All our perceptions are channeled through our limbic system. Our brains are wired so that we directly respond, absorbing the energies and pheromones of both men and women. Everyone is potentially a sexual partner. The truth is that we hunger intensely for touch, connection, and bonding with both men and women. We hunger for intimacy.

For us bisexuals, who often find early same-sex exploration psychologically disturbing and painful, we are often led to a heterosexual relationship where as women we are pursued hotly by lustful males, and as men, we are urged into a committed and permanent relationship by women. For both bisexual men and women this gives us a sense of worthiness (which we desperately seek), love, belonging, and that terrible word – normalcy.

But because of our bisexual nature we somehow never feel complete.  Eventually that relationship is not enough.  The search for wholeness drives us from the safety of a heterosexual relationship to seek out something more with another man or woman. This need cannot be filled with just friendship, and it cannot be filled with chance encounters. The only thing that will complete us is intimacy; and that intimacy is though touch, and that touch is primarily sexual.

This places us at the crossroads in our lives and our relationships. We have to get past the “sexuality” in bisexuality and focus on the “bi”.  We have to have intimate relationships with both men and women. It does not have to be orgasmic, but it has to be more than a hug, much more. The search of sexual connection ultimately has to lead to deeper emotional satisfaction.

At his point we have to make choices, hard choices, choices that involve others, choices that require honesty with ourselves and with those we love. This requires boundaries that are sometimes difficult to maintain. In my case, I seek intimate and sexual satisfaction with my heterosexual mate, and intimate but non-sexual relationships with my male friends.  It has been a long journey, one that I am not sure I would have been able to make when I was younger and hormone driven. But regardless of the path taken,  I have come to a place of comfort with my male friends where we are aware that we are gay or bisexual; we are aware that we are potential sexual partners; we flirt and banter much like married heterosexuals do with other men or women, but we know that our relationship is too important to let it become sexual. We have moved on to the greater satisfaction of intimacy.  We love each other like brothers, but yet more than brothers, but not as lovers.