AS THIS THING AFFECTED ANYONE SEXUAL IDENTITY?

[Mateo]

Marks letter makes PERFECT sense to me.  No, of course having breasts does not make a guy gay, that would be outrageous; however, masculine envy can become so strong that it becomes an obsession and at some point it can and often does become sexualized.   Boys who envy other boys be it because they have more masculien physiques, hairy chests, bigger penises or even because they are better than them at some typically masculine activity such as sports, can become so focused on that it can turn into a same-sex crush (very common in young boys and early adolescence) and at some point it can become sexualized.  I won't bore you with the details and I don't want anyone to tell me that I'm full of "BS" but I had a seimilar experience during my high school years with guys butts.  Mine was flat adn all the girls were commenting on cute butts.  It became an obsession to me to have a butt as cute as the other guys to the point that I was checking them out all the time, to this day even after developing a well rounded one myself, it is an unconscious habit.

[matthew1]

 

[angel_allen]

Marks letter makes PERFECT sense to me.  No, of course having breasts does not make a guy gay, that would be outrageous; however, masculine envy can become so strong that it becomes an obsession and at some point it can and often does become sexualized.   Boys who envy other boys be it because they have more masculien physiques, hairy chests, bigger penises or even because they are better than them at some typically masculine activity such as sports, can become so focused on that it can turn into a same-sex crush (very common in young boys and early adolescence) and at some point it can become sexualized.  I won't bore you with the details and I don't want anyone to tell me that I'm full of "BS" but I had a seimilar experience during my high school years with guys butts.  Mine was flat adn all the girls were commenting on cute butts.  It became an obsession to me to have a butt as cute as the other guys to the point that I was checking them out all the time, to this day even after developing a well rounded one myself, it is an unconscious habit.

So, how DID you get your butt more rounded? Im serious.

[KE25]

I'm not afraid to reply.  For those of you who are offended by frank sexual speak, please bypass this post now.

I am a 44 year old man with gynecomastia.  I've had it for as long as I can remember around age 10 I suppose.  Here is how this condition has affected my sexual identity:
I began right away comparing my chest to other boys' chests early on.  I would (and still do) shop the guys for the perfect pec shapes.  Starting this so early was one of the things that conditioned me for sexual identity issues.  The other thing that I learned through therapy was that as a young man, masturbation became a way to feel good when I was feeling bad about my self image.  I would imaginge guys with perfect pecs while I masturbated.  This created a chemical/biological response in my brain to manly pectoral visuals.  When my brain wanted a feel good fix, it would conjur up the pictures that I had been feeding it to get that chemical feel good fix that came from sexual realease.  I didn't realize any of this for many years.  It was just recently through therapy for depression because I see myself or want to see myself as heterosexual but I kept having this sexual fantasy life that seemed homosexual.  I am happily married and have two grown children.  I didn't and don't want to mess this up.
My therapist helped me to see the pain that I was medicating through sexual release.  He then helped me to recondition myself. I used the rubber band on the arm thing to give myself pain when I started thinking sexually when visually stimulated by manly pecs.  I then had to and still have to make myself replace those images that my brain recalls for pleasure chemicals with new healthier images.  If I see in my head perfect man pecs and start to become sexually stimulated, I am now more conscious of that fact and replace that image with images of my wife.  I have to say that this is a process I would imagine similar to addiction to certain drugs or alcohol.  One of the things that has helped too with this sexual identity issue is not keeping it a secret any more.  I have certain family members and certain very good friends that I can talk to about this.  I made myself (during therapy) reveal the secrets to them.  It was the most difficult thing I have EVER done.  But the acceptance and the extreme freedom from this dirty little secret helped provide a level of healing and healthy relationship building.  The other thing that helps with the healing for the sexual identity issues is being able to share in formats like this.  verbalizing feelings helps me a lot.  Then, I seem to have more energy for focusing on what I see as more healthy feelings and thoughts.
This is my own experience and I don't intend to apply my experience as the answer for everyone.  I recognize everyone is an individual.  I am so thankful for going to therapy and I highly recommend it.  By the way, I had to try 3 different therapists before I found one that would deal with this from the perspective of I wanted to be heterosexual.  They are out there but I found them to be few and far between.  The first 2 therapists wanted me to just accept the homosexual feelings and experiment with them to see if that was the path I should be on instead of the one I'm on.  For me, that was and is not an option because I have a life that I am happy with.  I never wanted to lose that and I know I can't have both healthily.  I am a lot happier now.  Plus now, I am starting to seriously consider getting the gynecomastia surgery so that this is not a continuous issue and pain in my life.
I hope this answers your question.

Mark

Sorry, but stories like this are further proof to me that most of these self-declared "therapists" are nut cases. No offense, but you might have spent that money on a surgeon instead. The notion that your (or our) condition has anything t do with your sexual preferences seems rather odd to me. I like feminine legs, you like male chests. So what?
Well anyway, I am glad that you are happier now and none of the other shrinks could talk you into "trying out" things that YOU did not want.