Hi,

I am an indian man aged 23, currently experiencing a difficult phase in understanding my sexuality. I will go some key events of my life and any help will be greatly appreciated. Sorry for the long post, but I have had so much pain in my life and I want to vent it all out...

I was brought up in a highly conservative hindu society, where a boy falling in love with a girl is highly taboo (considered immodest), people usually marry through an arranged marriage (a setup where parents find a girl for you). Girls are restricted from talking to boys and vice versa, and sex before marriage is a huge offence, and we are wired in a way to have strong moral inhibitions to have sexual thoughts. In summary, both homosexuals and heterosexuals have to be closeted or in other words, your sexuality or sexual behavior is highly constrained by the collective moral code that the society imposes on you.

I started having sexual thoughts at the age of 11-12, when I used to fantasize women, used to get extremely aroused by watching 'F TV photographers' when I get to see hot women. I had my first nocturnal ejaculation when I had a dream of having steamy sex with an indian actress.

When I was 13, I overheard a conversation that my grandma and mother were having, where my grandma said that my horoscope says that I will never have children in future, and that horoscope predictions have never failed for any member of my family. As a 13 year old boy, this affected me greatly. I didn't know the distinctions between sterility and impotency, and I was completely convinced that I will never be able to grow up and satisfy a women sexually or father a child. [ This might sound silly, but think of it from the perspective of a 13 year old boy growing in a conservative sexually constrained society. ] I don't know if it was coincidence, I didn't grow hair on my body or face when my friends were catching up with their puberty [ Even now, I have less body and facial hair and cannot grow a full ], this worsened the botheration that I will never be a COMPLETE MAN.

When I was 15, I first got to see a girls' boob on some midnight TV show, and that was when I masturbated and had my first conscious ejaculation. This is when I realized the difference between impotency and sterility. Still the botheration that 'I will never be a father' and ' I am not a complete man because I don't have a moustache or beard' was increasing in intensity, and I remember praying to god for more body/facial hair. I thought i was suffering from hypergonadism, delayed puberty. Anytime, I see a guy, I used to look at his facial hair and feel discouraged.

This naturally intensified my insecurities ('my **** is not long enough', 'my testicles are smaller than average') this insecurity translated into a curiosity, I wanted to look at how big an adult human **** was. This curiosity/insecurity coexisted with a sexual desire for the female anatomy. I started watching porn when I was 16, I was sexually aroused by women, and feeling insecure when I saw hairy men with dicks much larger than mine ("OMG! I am never going to have a **** like that, and I am not man enough")....

Because of my insecurities and the society in which I was brought up, I never had the guts to have a relationship with a girl. And the insecurity/curiosity for male dicks slowly started to become an obsession/attraction. I started googling for websites that have pictures of human penises, gradually started watching gay porn, stared at dicks at public toilets. The feeling was 90% "OMG! his **** is much bigger" and 10% "attraction". Curiosity about men was slowly starting to border homosexuality.

In 2009, I got a chance to goto france for an internship and it was a first time I was living alone and had some privacy. I was 20, I knew I had a cute face, but I was ruminating over the same old ' I am not man enough, because my **** is less than average, I don't have body hair, I am lean and thin, and I will never be a father'. I was sexually desperate now, visited a few strip clubs and had a couple of lap dances from hot women. I was looking for women to have cam to cam sex on the yahoo messenger forum, but online forums only have men, and given my curiosity, I started ejaculating with men. This became a huge obsession/compulsion and I have done it close to 100 times now. It was rewarding and reassuring when people said "your **** looks good", and I was slowly getting attracted to the male physique. I started getting erections on seeing a nude men who are well-built.

Only last year, it hit me that I could be a homosexual, it was quite a shock to deal with. After that, I have been trying to avoid online chat with men and gay porn, tried to shift my sexual focus on women. This artificial forcing complicated things a lot, and I figured out that I was drastically loosing interest in women. I started telling myself that I was gay, but I find it extremely repulsive when I think of sucking a man's ****, or having **** sex, I don't know if it is just denial.

I still do experience strong sexual arousal on seeing lesbian porn, but there is something in my mind constantly telling me "You like men more than women", "You are not a complete man and you can never be father", "You have ejaculated with men online, obviously you are gay", "You are not actually getting aroused by women, you are gay and you are in denial"... This goes on in a loop and is confusing me a lot.

I am very successful in other aspects of my life, Been a topper through school and college, doing a PhD now in a top 5 US university, a semi-professional violinist, my friends and family love me a lot. But, I have never been in a relationship, never had sex.

I feel this is a combination of gender identity crisis, homosexual OCD. Desperately need help. Thanks for your time