Damaging past experiences with secretly gay/bisexual men

I feel incredibly damaged from two long-term relationships with (secretly) bisexual men.

Apologies in advance for the long post. Also apologies for any sweeping generalisations I may make in this post; they don’t actually reflect my thoughts on wider groups but I have used certain expressions to reflect how much experiences have shaped my views.

In the first relationship, before we got together my ex told me that although he had had long term girlfriends, he had also slept with multiple men; I didn’t have a problem with it (as I assumed that his homosexual encounters happened when he was not in a relationship) and didn’t let it affect our relationship. However, a few times in our relationship I did question things – for example his insistence that his close friend was secretly gay and one FB message I found between him and one of our mutual friend along the lines of “I hope last night won’t affect our friendship” – but being young and relatively naive I didn’t really think about it. After I broke up with him (for other reasons) I received a few texts on my old phone meant for my ex and, being curious, I decided to engage in the text conversation. The sender was a middle aged bloke (let’s call him ‘A’) from my ex’s area who opened up about how manipulative my ex was and how they had slept together. Feeling confused, I rang the A, explained who I was and we had a discussion about how they had had sex on a number of occasions during our relationship, how A knew who I was and my ex was very confused. I was angry but never bothered pursuing my ex for an answer/explanation because I had emotionally broken up with him long before I actually broke up with him and didn’t want anything more to do with him.

Fast forward a few years I started dating a guy (let’s call him ‘R’). We had a highly sexual relationship, spent a lot of time together and generally were a good couple – until one morning I saw a skype conversation he had left open by accident between him and another bloke calling each other “sexy” and asking to have a webcam masturbation session. I was horrified and shocked – as was he at me finding out – and we had a long discussion in which he explained his attraction to men was purely physical and expressed via the internet. I wasn’t happy but I loved him so much that I said if he could stop the webcam sessions (which, irrespective of the other person’s gender, I consider to be cheating) then we could continue. He promised he would stop and we continued as normal. However, after a couple of months I began to uncover more and more of his secret online life including dating profiles, pictures of naked men, porn sites, what’s app chats with other blokes etc – each time I would uncover something we would have a massive argument, he would tell me he loved me and it was nothing to do with me but that it was an urge that came up from time to time and then would promise to change (by not cheating). This carried on for months and after each argument he would reveal some more ‘truth’ e.g. that in fact he had had oral sex with men in real life as opposed to just masturbating online. He strongly denied that he had ever had sex with men because the idea of anal turned him off and he preferred to masturbate or have oral sex. Also he was certain he wasn’t gay as he didn’t want emotional intimacy with men, just sexual gratification. I tried to be as accommodating as possible by not grilling him on it, asking him to be open about when the ‘feeling’ to want men came up (his expression of the situation, not mine) and even watching gay porn etc with him so we could find a way to ‘release’ the tension and avoid the online cheating. The breaking point came when I was on his computer and discovered a skype chat between him and another guy in which they were arranging to meet up for sex. In the conversation R revealed that he had had full sex with guys before – something which he had vehemently denied to me – and because of the extent of the lies and the arrangement to cheat on me I broke up with him. A lot of other stuff happened around the breakup (including him then immediately arranging to have sex with another guy and then denying his intention to go through with it, him sending me articles about hypersexuality to explain what he had done) etc. It was a horrible breakup which, notwithstanding the cheating and the lies, which left me devastated. The revelation that he had had sex with men was particularly jarring because he was generally quite reckless with his sexual health (prior to me being on the pill he only used condoms when I strongly insisted) and thus left me having to deal with going to STI clinics for a HIV check whilst going through a horrific breakup. I didn’t open up to anyone about this because I wanted to protect him (he is well known in a certain media/music circle that isn’t particularly receptive to homosexuality) and because I felt so ashamed that this had happened to me again.

I did try to date other guys afterwards but I was too hurt to open myself up again. But the real issue is that I’ve now become obsessed with the idea that all outwardly ‘straight’ men are secretly gay or bisexual. For example, I obsessively look at craigslist and Grindr to see how many men list themselves as ‘straight’ or married yet are asking to meet with other men for sex. Gay men I know and I’m friends with tell me about the ‘straight’ and married men that they have met up with and have sex with. I find myself both disgusted and obsessed with this underhand and underground hidden side to seemingly straight men, which has now spread to become my view of all men. Based on the way R would explain his ‘urges’ to me, it is like forcing a meateater to become a vegetarian; it is against their natural impulse. I know not all bisexual people cheat but based on my experiences, particularly with R, the easy accessibility of gay sex which can be so easily hidden from the other person and R’s attitude (and the attitude of the men I’ve seen on craigslist etc) that the ‘urge’ was so separate from their straight relationship that they don’t even consider it cheating have made me incredibly paranoid.

Both of my exes were outwardly very straight/into women/into having sex with me – all of which is another shock to the system (let alone the self-esteem issues which also arise) as it seems that there is no way for me to even ‘tell’ who may be secretly hiding something from me (ridiculous I know but it is how warped my mindset now is) which would thus force me to obsessively check phones/emails etc.

The other side of the obsession that has come out of these experiences is that when I (rarely) watch porn, it is only gay porn or threesomes in which there is some homosexual activity. (I generally don’t like straight porn anyway as the women irritate me and it’s far too graphic). It’s like on one level I’m disgusted by the thought of what my exes were doing behind my back yet somehow turned on by the thought of men being together and this confusion disgusts me and reduces my opinion of myself even further.

I thought that the best coping mechanism was to cut myself off from men and dating, focus on myself and enjoying my own company. I have resigned myself to the idea that I cannot ever be in a relationship with a man because I could not trust them – modern technology makes cheating so much more available and accessible and I feel that in any relationship I would be obsessively checking their phone/computer (to their knowledge or in secret) in order to prove myself ‘right’ about hidden sexuality. I feel that the choices for my next relationship are either to be with an openly bisexual man or a man who is secretly bisexual. Of course I’m not saying that all straight men have disappeared, but as bisexuality or fluid sexuality seems more prevalent (whether hidden or out in the open) and the opportunities to explore it are plentiful due to Grindr, Craigslist etc it seems that it is easier and less painful for me to completely remove myself from the dating world rather than go through this paranoid rollercoaster.

Whilst in many ways I enjoy my own company and don’t have a problem with doing things by myself (e.g. going to restaurants or the cinema) and I enjoy living on my own, it does strike me that I’ve gone from being a huge social butterfly who couldn’t stand a night in alone to a complete recluse who actively rejects invitations from people because the thought of seeing people, combined with my low self confidence as a result of two disastrous relationships makes me anxious.

I feel like I’m at an impasse both with my attitude towards men and relationships and with my attitude towards myself. I’ve opened up to a couple of friends about what has happened; although they were helpful to an extent they didn't really offer much bar the generic ‘you’ll find someone else’ and didn’t appreciate how strong a hold this obsession has taken over me. I feel so much shame of having this happen to me twice and so much shame at the extent of R’s cheating that I was oblivious or naive to. I know it’s not healthy to be this cut off and pessimistic about my future but because of my experiences I’ve resigned myself to being alone for ever.

I don’t know what to do (if anything) but felt like it was something I needed to get off my chest, with strangers just to alleviate the constant black cloud and depression that follows me around.

**Mods feel free to move this to a more appropriate forum***