I work with a "Member of TCOJCOLDS" (even typing that out is a mess). He admits that he has SSA, but that he isn't gay. And with the help of the church co. he is going to beat his affliction, get married and have kids. I have tried to explain to him that being gay and SSA are the exact same thing. He's not buying it. I let him know that he needs to read some of the boards about how wonderful it was for MORmON women to be married to SSA men. Won't do that because he is afraid it will turn him against the church. He still thinks that with the right amount of prayer and chuch co. help he will be able to pull this off. What a sham. The church just needs to accept the fact that you can't turn a gay person into a normal functioning heterosexual!

"Ignorance is bliss."

And if you are pretty sure that "Knowledge may hurt", the former is a good credo by which to live.

Human sexuality is a spectrum.

His identification might not be gay.

Same Sex Attraction is I don't know what.

This poor guy has gay tendencies. If he more and more identifies with being more than inclined God help any woman he marries who wants a fully on the other side of the spectrum man.

He may be 100% gay.

He SHOULD NOT MARRY A WOMAN. My husband said (in 1983) that he had hoped all his life that the right woman would come into his life to help him with this "affliction." He didn't say affliction. I'm not sure what he said. I have asked him many times why he didn't marry Jolene then. She was his girlfriend at Ricks. Save me from the craziness.

May I add that "same sex attraction" doesn't fit because PEOPLE it isn't JUST ABOUT THE SEX.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/2019 02:08PM by cl2.

Great song.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IW25foOMkwI

She came to see him after he had left me. She had no idea that he was separated. I told him that he should tell her that he is gay as I know what it is to pine after the guy who got away, but he refused to do so. I think that he should have. She had no idea why he broke up with her.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/2019 02:10PM by cl2.

Amen, cl2!

I was my husband's best friend starting in high school. He felt comfortable with me. He even loved me..in a platonic way I found out. We got engaged. He served a mission and he missed me. He was just sure he could keep everything suppressed and he wanted a family and a BYU career. He got it all...4 beautiful kids and a distinguished career at the university he loved. He served as a bishop. Everything according to plan. BUT! As the years went by, he was more and more restless, distant and unhappy. He burst out of the closet when our oldest was on his mission and our youngest was 9. It was the most devastating blow to both of us because I was STILL his best friend.

I absolutely hate the term SSA because it makes an imutable part of a person's DNA seem like an affliction they can "get over".

A mixed orientation marriage is NOT the answer. For either partner.

It can also indicate bisexuality, which is compatible with heterosexual marriage so long as the person is attracted to their spouse.

Someone above, rightly points out that there is some degree of a spectrum about sexuality. A lot of people are not 100% gay, or 100% hetero, depending on the circumstances. You get people like Freddie Mercury who was NOT gay. I keep on having to point this out - most of his sexual conquests were make, but the main love of his life was a woman and he certainly slept with several women I know of.

* male

I love the example you bring to the table is one you have to defend. I take that back. I hate it when someone makes definitive statements about other people's sexuality when they have no idea what they are talking about.

YOU may have decided Freddie Mercury's sexuality, but as far as I've been able to tell, he never definitively stated one way or the other. He kept quiet about it. For a lot of reasons I'm sure. Being openly non-hetro at that time wasn't easy. Even today with Pride fests and "It Gets Better Campaigns" it's incredibly difficult for people to understand and accept personal sexuality. He seems to have gone through a lot trying to figure out his own sexuality himself.

As for the "love of his life", you do understand that it's possible for a Gay man to love, even very deeply a person of the opposite sex and still be gay. There are many types of relationships and ranges within those relationships.

The point is you don't know any better than the large number of people who have been guessing and making claims about this for years. Maybe he was gay and had a hard time with it due to social pressure, maybe he was bi, we don't know for sure. Only he can answer that and unless you've got a working ouija board, we can only make guesses.

Also, I don't understand why, when all evidence to the contrary, people are trying to say that SAME Sex Attraction is somehow the same thing as Bisexual. It's not "All Sex Attraction". It's "SAME".

If this guy was Bisexual, then the churches policies wouldn't be something he'd need to worry that much about. Sure he'd have some concerns but he'd be able to keep looking for a woman he was attracted to. It wouldn't be the same if he was only attracted to men.

Finally Free! Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> If this guy was Bisexual, then the churches
> policies wouldn't be something he'd need to worry
> that much about. Sure he'd have some concerns but
> he'd be able to keep looking for a woman he was
> attracted to. It wouldn't be the same if he was
> only attracted to men.

Nice reply.

I'm bisexual and I looked for a woman. I fell for some men before my marriage but I knew that wasn't a possibility.

I claim ignorance about the OP's friend. No one I know uses the term SSA. I don't like the term because of its Mormon connection and its inability to describe anything. It isn't an orientation and is being considered as such.

No one does use SSA outside the church, but what is the big issue with it? It means practically the same as homosexual, which means same-sexual. "Homo" here doesn't mean "man", it is from the Greek for "same" and the same element can be found in homo-genous, homo-phone etc.

I can think of much worse terms than SSA, which the church could have used which are actually much more offensive. I'm not going to even list them, but one refers to a place near Gomorrah. In some ways SSA is an improvement on previous LDS thinking, since at least it acknowledges it as a fact of life, not just something the Devil does.

My ex "needs" me and I care deeply for him, but he says he is 100% gay and I believe him. I've been here and lived it. When people say he was able to have sex with me once (as we have twins), we chuckle. We don't discuss it. So people would think he was bi, but he says he is not and, like I said, I believe him.

Even my ex's gay ex-boyfriends and gay friends say he is emotionally attached to me in a huge way, but HE IS GAY. And he is the one who gets to determine it.

When I saw Bohemian Rhapsody it was as if I was watching part of my own story. My kids felt the same way. I was concerned about what my TBM daughter would say and, as I've said before, she said, "Being gay is a lot more complex than people think." She was MOVED by the movie, as was my son.

But given how much my ex "needs" me, I still don't fit the bill.

How have I "decided" Freddie Mercury's sexuality? What nonsense. He slept with both genders (more if you're so minded), and certainly loved people of both genders. That's not "my decision", that comes from people who knew him, from his own behavior and from written evidence. Mary Austin is far from being the only woman Freddie ever slept with by the way.

You say he never declared his sexuality. Maybe not in public, but there are documents in which he does so.

There is incidentally a whole phenomenon which the fashionable types have dubbed "biphobia", which is not a fear of the number two, but a denial that one can have both kinds of attraction. I have heard of gay people even abusing bisexual people and accusing them of being traitors while homophobes get at them for their same-sex activities. But some people are this way inclined.

"people are trying to say that SAME Sex Attraction is somehow the same thing as Bisexual. It's not "All Sex Attraction". It's "SAME"."

Here we go again. Modern people are so conditioned to take offense at anything that is not phrased in fashionable buzzwords. No one said what you claim. Bisexuals experience SSA as well as heterosexual attraction. It's not difficult to understand. Sure, the ratios vary, one person might be biased more one way or the other, but there are plenty of other famous people in this category.

Just because someone experiences SSA doesn't necessarily preclude heterosexual feelings. In some cases it will and in others it won't. In a few cases, one or the other may only happen once in an entire lifetime.

>"How have I "decided" Freddie Mercury's sexuality?"

Do you read what you write? "You get people like Freddie Mercury who was NOT gay. I keep on having to point this out" It certainly sounds like you are trying to definitively state that he was "NOT gay". You know no such thing. Why you would use that in your argument, I have no idea. There are plenty of actually self described bisexual people that you could have used but you chose someone whose sexuality isn't actually known because he didn't say clearly. As for writings, as far as I can tell, they are all guessing too. I can show you plenty, from people who knew him who state he was gay. It's all guesses.

Also, I don't care how many women he slept with. You don't seem to understand how difficult it was and still is for people to figure out their sexuality. Had he lived longer, we might know more. So, How 'bout stop trying to define other people when you obviously don't know what you're talking about.

You say there are documents where he states his sexuality, please produce them, I'm sure they'd be worth something. If you really have them, you might be able to make some money."Mercury's statement didn't mention his sexuality—meaning he maintained his policy of not commenting on the matter to the very end." - https://www.biography.com/news/freddie-mercury-sexuality

On SSA... Most people when they use that term they are using it dismissively. They state say someone "has" SSA, not that suggesting that they are homosexual. There is a difference. The church and other organizations uses that term on purpose because it makes it sound like it's something that can be changed. They are trying to make it sound like a disease that can be cured. That's why it's not liked and no one else uses it.

Also, just because there are worse terms doesn't mean that it's a term that should be used. (I'm not surprised that you could list alternative terms, and even decided to hint at one... Um, we know there are derogatory terms for homosexuals) There are plenty of "not so bad" terms that aren't used in polite society because they aren't polite. But please continue to try comparative derogatory terminology as a defense.

Just because words mean the same thing does not mean they are not different.

There are several words to describe people of color. Some are respectful and some are not. Decency begs to call them what they choose to be called.

I don't care if SSA happens to mean the same as several other choices. It is a phrase made up by the religious to denigrate us just as Slave owners made up a term to refer to their 'workers."

I am tired of your arrogant semantic technicalities and games, Jordan. Why don't you trot off and use the "N" word all you want? It just means the same thing as "people of color" or "black" you know.



SSA is an insulting term and anyone who uses it around me will not be happy they did for long.

You could learn a lot if you would just honestly listen to Finally Free. FF nailed you to the wall.

I too thought that I could beat "SSA" with prayer and dedication. I was wrong, so very, very wrong.

Please feel free to share my story with your coworker, most of this is written as if I'm talking to him directly. I don't know if he'd read it or not, but I hope he will. I'd like to think that if he would read it, he'd use it as a cautionary tale, because I know what he's going through. It's likely very similar to what I went through, and he's likely to end up in the same place, or worse. If we survive at all, we are far more damaged for the effort. That's not hyperbole, the suicide rate for people in our situation is far too high.

The idea that you can change a fundamental part of who you are via prayer and dedication to the church is dangerous. So much so that the church itself has officially pulled away from that idea. Unofficially, that concept is still being pushed by people who have no idea of what they are talking about.

As early as pre-teen I knew I was different than the other boys I was hanging out with. I wasn't entirely sure what it was, I was very sheltered and the church was pretty much the universe of basis of my world view. But I didn't think of girls and even other boys the same as my friends seemed to. I knew enough of how the world worked to keep quiet about it and not make waves.

In my early teens, I learned about sexuality via priesthood lessons, yes, I even heard the dreaded "little factory talk". I was terrified because I knew that if people found out that I was having fantasies about guys, my life would be over. The church, at least where I was, wasn't even using terms like SSA. I just knew I was attracted to men, not women and I had no idea what that meant, except very bad things. I "knew", based on what the church was telling me, that a part of me was evil and that I had to do anything to get rid of that part of me.

Late one night before a youth temple trip, the guilt was overwhelming and I told my mom that I "was confused because I liked seeing guys in underwear ads". She told me it was a phase and that it would go away and not to worry about it. We never spoke of it again. It's over 40 years later, I still like seeing guys in underwear ads, sorry Mom, it wasn't a phase.

After that night I was determined to be the very best Mormon (or LDS church member, but at that time "Mormon" was still OK) I could be. I prayed almost constantly for strength. I carried my scriptures with me everywhere. It got to the point that Teachers and leaders would ask me for scriptural references even as a teenager. I was giving talks at Stake conferences. Everyone "knew" I would go far in the church, even before I served a mission.

I say this not to brag, but to let you know that I didn't do this half-way. I was determined to expunge this "evil" part of me. I was going to do it, whatever it took.

I served a mission in a foreign land, ending up with a crush on a good number of my companions, even though I couldn't say anything or even show a sign or I would be found out and my life, as I knew it, would be over.

I got home and my parents immediately tried to set me up with one of the women in church, I balked at that because I didn't feel I was ready for that type of thing. But eventually I did get temple married. Article after article that I very quietly researched put out by various members of the church members stated that the only way to "fix" my problem was marriage after all. My marriage was very, very awkward, I can count on two hands the number of times we had sex over the years. Each time was difficult and left me feeling guilty and ashamed. That's with believing with my whole heart that I was doing what God wanted me to do. We never had kids. In some ways I'm glad about that, in others it makes me sad. And yes, the stories of what happens to women who end up in these relationships, is heartbreaking and should be enough to stop this alone.

The lengths that I went to try and stop "being gay" were psychologically and permanently damaging. You can not try to change something so fundamentally a part of you without breaking something. Prayer and distractions via church just won't cut it, you end up doing more and more extreme things to try and stop it, and it doesn't stop, because it's a core part of who you are and how you interact with those around you, even if you never implicitly state it. You are constantly on the watch for anything that might be thought of as "Gay" or showing signs of "SSA" even internally. It is a constant invalidation and denial of yourself.

Thoughts of suicide have been my constant companion and likely always will. There were times that I even made the plans, in such a way as to look like an accident, I wouldn't even allow myself to leave a note to let those around me know why I was gone.

I have gotten more help with those issues, but to be clear, the major thing that has helped me the most is accepting who I am, and not trying to change myself anymore. I have so much regret in my life, I hate to hear someone going down that path themselves. Please don't end up like me. Be true to who you.

Even staying a member of the LDS church, you don't need to be married to a woman. The church is changing it's views on homosexuality. Slowly, yes, but it is changing. You don't want to have made decisions that are hard to take back, potentially damaging your life and others (say a woman whom you've married in an attempt to save yourself) only to find that the church has changed it's policies and you could have been with someone you love.

Too many people have lost their lives to this. I look forward to the day when people are simply accepted for who they are.

Thank you for posting this.

Great post, Anon. Even if Shylock's co-worker doesn't read this, others of us have benefitted in reading it, to better understand your situation. I hope you have found happiness!

I agree with Elder Berry in disliking the term "same-sex attraction." Where did this definition from? Did the Mormons coin the phrase? Do other religious groups use this? "SSA" is not a concept or term that educated psychiatrists and psychologists use.

If I were Shylock, I would be tempted to warn the girls that the co-worker dates. This guy is living a lie. At best. At worst, there could be potential abuse, and the ruining of an innocent girl's life. And what about potential children? These marriages don't last. Divorce isn't all that bad (I'm all for divorce--it saved my life!), but living a lie is horrible.

Mormons will disagree on this, because living a lie is what they do best.

Living a lie will hurt the co-worker, too, as it hurt "Anon". He had thoughts of suicide!

I saw the term SSA used by a local fundie Christian church. When I saw it, it told me everything that I need to know about that church. IIRC, the church was running a support group for "people with SSA."

I agree with those who say it's a term of denial, a term of bigotry.

I also don't like the term SSA. It is not accurate. AND I also found out my ex is gay when they didn't talk about SSA. It was the sin that was not to be spoken of. I was told to tell NOBODY. Okay, throw that one at me and then have no one to talk to EXCEPT the boyfriend. We lived this HUGE SECRET for who knows how many years. IT IS very damaging to everyone involved including, and more than anyone knows, the children.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/2019 04:23PM by cl2.

SSA is a term that diminishes one's sexuality. An "attraction" is like a fondness for chocolate mint ice cream rather than a fundamental human attribute. It implies that a person has a choice not to act on the attraction.

It's like saying an African-American is "dark complected," an approach taht denies the personal identity, the history, the politics of being black. SSA is a phrase people use so they don't have to recognize who other people really are

"Same sex" means exactly the same as "homosex(ual)". Just like "legal and lawful" mean the same, despite the church's notion that they do not.

I would be much more concerned about how the church treats people than this particular piece of terminology. Conversion therapy is a lot more serious than whether you use the Germanic or Greek prefix, which mean the same ("the same").

The church could use the most up to date terminology, and it wouldn't matter a dime if they treated LGB people like scum.

There are no homosexuals in the church.

Above you said that "Same Sex Attraction" is only used in the church. That is false. It is used by a large range of conservative Christian groups.

Here you adopt, and defend, their terminology, which is your right. But as Orwell explained, words have meanings--and the substitution of one phrase of another will only be successful if there is powerful motivation behind that change. There is indeed a reason why the opponents of gay rights prefer SAA to homosexuality.

Why you feel the need to defend that neologism while also claiming to sympathize with gay people is a question you'll need to answer for yourself. The rest of us will pay attention to the unmistakable nuance.

I agree with everything Anon wrote. I did EVERYTHING a good Mormon was supposed to do (except get married in the temple, thank God). No matter what I did or how hard I prayed nothing ever changed. I worked as hard as I could for a decade not to be gay. The only thing that changed was how much more I hated myself for being a failure.

After a couple of suicide attempts I finally reached the point where I started to consider that maybe I'm perfectly fine the way God created me, and that the church was wrong. (Yes, I'm pretty thick-headed. It took me a while.)

We are all created in the image of God. God is not only a heterosexual white man, he's also a gay white man like me, and an African American woman, and a transsexual Asian, and a woman trying to juggle a career, a marriage, and children, and a bisexual Latina, and on and on and on in every possible combination you can think of.

The scriptures say I'm created in the image of God and that God is perfect. Therefore, gay or straight, I'm exactly the person God intended me to be.

Exactly.

A lot of Mormons went through what you and Anon did growing up. Kids who discover their sexuality and start doing natural things that the church condemned as unnatural. There were boys who committed suicide over that and countless children who grew depressed.

What gay people experienced was far worse than what happened to most Mormons; they collectively represent the extreme end of the spectrum. But the notion that "original sin" doesn't exist in Mormonism is nonsense: when the natural man is an enemy to God, he is "naturally" a sinner.

I'm sorry for what you guys went through. I'm not sure I could have survived such pain.

Thanks for your addition to the thread Anon.. some people are talking spectrum... If someone is talking about SSA in reference to themselves they probably register 100% or close to on the spectrum. Those that are in between can manage. I am 100% gay. I couldn't imagine all the work it would take to sleep with someone that I am not in any shape way or form attracted to especially the opposite sex. I personally don't see the church moving in that direction of full acceptance like the Pentecostals... Especially since the Mormons are trying to align themselves with the Evangelicals and Catholics.

shylock Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> If someone is
> talking about SSA in reference to themselves they
> probably register 100% or close to on the
> spectrum.

I think this statement is a bit reductive. I've talked about my bisexuality. I dislike the term same sex attraction. Homosexuality is a great term. We are attracted to some people and not others.

You were so right, shylock, to tell him to find out how it is for the women.

DON"T do that to a woman. Think about her.

IF he wants to be Mormon he needs to do what the church says and stay celibate and sit at home and feel awful and desperate and sad. Hope he doesn't choose that, but leave the women alone.


I knew by the time I was seven what I was. Most of the gay guys I ever knew had always known what they were from fairly young. When those hormones kicked in, they came with directions on who to use them on.

Still, like anon and others, I did the whole Mormon deal including the mission, so sure that Heavenly Father would bless my diligence and "fix" me. Thank goodness that never happened. I love my life.

I wasn't straight and I wasn't Mormon and not killing myself to be either was the way to go--100%.

Awhile back, in another thread, I wrote about a young Mormon married couple I know where the husband is gay and the wife said she was ok with that, even though the husband told her it meant they would probably never have sex. It has caused significant problems in their marriage, and the husband complained that his wife has been pressuring him to have sex with her. I heard them say that they believed that in the afterlife, Heavenly Father would heal the husband of being gay and that they would then enjoy a normal sex life in the eternities. (They are sealed to each other in the Temple.)

Although they no longer live in my area, I've heard they are still trying to do their best to make the marriage work.

So very sad. . .

His marriage ended in divorce, he posts about it in great detail in a post from Jan 2018, http://joshweed.com/2018/01/turning-unicorn-bat-post-announce-end-marriage/

In addition to anon's post above, Josh's post about the reasons why they are ending their marriage might be good to send to shylock's coworker. His explanation is detailed and heartbreaking, there's even a blurb from his wife and kids. And, they come from an apparently still believing member of the church, with a section on the link above as to how he resolves his feelings for the church.

There's a lot there, but it's worth the read.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/2019 08:46PM by Finally Free!.

Gay people have an attraction to the whole person just like straights do.

I wish my ex had taken the path Done & Done did as my ex is damaged, but then he was anyway by the time he was 25 when I met him by being raised mormon and wanting the dream the church promised us. He wanted it more than I did and I wanted it BAD! VERY BAD!

And now he is 62 and still searching desperately. It has always been a desperate search and he really can't see what is staring him in the face. Some of it comes from his family life.

My ex says he knew at a very, very young age, like 5, that he was attracted to males. Never any question in his mind. Knew he could never become straight, like they told me he had to be or be damned.

SSA makes it about the sex and a lot of people want to believe that being gay is only about the sex. It is about the whole person, mentally, psychologically, emotionally, physically, sexually.

HAVING been in a gay/straight marriage and that was my only sexual experience, so I had no idea (ask gemini--we've discussed this before). I had dated my current boyfriend back when I was 20. I was a very good little mormon girl and would kiss him, hold his hand, hug him, but I wouldn't make out, I wouldn't french kiss, and he KNEW not to push me as he felt it might destroy me. BUT I always knew he desired me. I NEVER forgot. And so I kept in touch with his good friend over the years and I found out he was getting divorced after 27 years of marriage. I then had sex with a straight man who desired me. OH, SO THAT IS WHAT MY EX WANTED FROM SEX!! And had from sex with another man. There is a PROFOUND DIFFERENCE. There is a connection you cannot explain unless you've experienced it.

Thank you EB for bringing up Josh Weed. I was thinking of that today when I was driving to Brigham City to visit my brother for his birthday.

Jordan has a lot to learn. I can't figure out where he got his warped ideas. Even mormon people I talk to who are very ill informed about gays don't act like Jordan does.

I have to say this that there has been good that has come from what we have experienced--our kids the big one--BUT most of my friends and family now have situations where they have benefited from knowing me and my experience. My sister has a gay grandson who just graduated from high school and I'm going to his graduation party on Saturday. His mother's brother is gay (not mormon). My good friends, a couple, have a gay son. My best friend, who I cut out of my life last week, has a gay nephew. My dear sweet aunt who wrote the e-mail about my daughter's temple wedding has a gay son and I KNOW the reason she has found me to be someone she needs in her life (I didn't speak to her for 19 years and she showed up on my doorstep) is because of my experiences. Her son just went through his second divorce from a woman. I'm not supposed to know he is gay, but my mother told me before she died. My aunt doesn't know I know. As my sister said, he is not allowed to be gay in THAT FAMILY. But my aunt does reach out to me for my input on gay issues like "should gays marry women." I told her about the mormon guy who i was dating at the same time I was dating my gay husband. An ex-druggie. My roommate's brother, so I knew the whole family. He would have been an excellent husband. It tore him apart when I got married. But I had to save my gay husband. I had to figure this out as I was SO MESSED UP by the mind F they put me through, so I really was STUCK. Oh well. I should stop talking about all this.

I have done all the work needed to start SS. I turn 62 in about 3 weeks. I get my first check in August. It has been a LONG life and the last 7 months have taken forever to pass.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 06/07/2019 01:13AM by cl2.

"SSA makes it about the sex and a lot of people want to believe that being gay is only about the sex. It is about the whole person, mentally, psychologically, emotionally, physically, sexually."



Had to highlight what you said there, cl2. Perfect.

As has been said ---

Human sexuality is a spectrum. It just depends on where each person is on that spectrum.

If I find that I'm attracted to another female for [insert reasons here] that just means I find that person attractive.


If I find that I'm attracted to a male for [insert reasons here] that just means I find that person attractive.


That's not the same as an exclusive sexual -- not just romantic -- desire for other people of the same sex.

By this logic though, then everyone also has some degree of different-sex attraction.

If that really was the case, there'd be no such thing as a sham marriage.

*** Admin note: Please pick one username and stick with it. We don't allow sock puppeting here. ***

shylock Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
He admits that he has SSA,
> but that he isn't gay.

you can now have a penis and testicles and prostate but identify as a woman

you can now have a vagina and clitoris and uterus, and identify as a man.

you can be genderfluid, pansexual and non-cis-oriented

what's wrong with being SSA, but not gay?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/11/2019 04:40PM by Concrete Zipper.