Gay Conversn: I Slept Wh Over 200 Men, Now I'm a Happily Married Heterosexual Dad

Contents:

• IS IT POSSIBLE TO SYSTEMATILLY TURN GAY PEOPLE STRAIGHT?
• I TRIED TO NVERT MYSELF OM GAY TO STRAIGHT. IT DON’T WORK
• GAY CONVERSN: I SLEPT WH OVER 200 MEN, NOW I'M A HAPPILY MARRIED HETEROSEXUAL DAD
• SOME GAYS CAN GO STRAIGHT, STUDY SAYS
• “HELP ME CHANGE FROM GAY TO STRAIGHT”
• CAN SOME GAY MEN AND LBIANS CHANGE THEIR SEXUAL ORIENTATN? 200 PARTICIPANTS REPORTG A CHANGE OM HOMOSEXUAL TO HETEROSEXUAL ORIENTATN
• HOW TO LEAD A HETEROSEXUAL LIFTYLE IF YOU ARE GAY
• UNRVER AT A CHRISTIAN GAY-TO-STRAIGHT CONVERSN CAMP
• 5 THGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY
• CAN SCTN MAKE STRAIGHT MEN GAY?

IS IT POSSIBLE TO SYSTEMATILLY TURN GAY PEOPLE STRAIGHT?

"If [a patient] n accept his bodily homoerotic experience while stayg nnected to the therapist, " he wrote The Paradox of Self-Acceptance, "the sexual feelg soon transforms to somethg else: the regnn of eper, pa-generated emotnal needs which have nothg to do wh sexualy.

I TRIED TO NVERT MYSELF OM GAY TO STRAIGHT. IT DON’T WORK

Both APAs have led that the therapi are unscientific and possibly harmful — not to mentn unnecsary, sce homosexualy was officially -classified as an illns 1973, and therefore n't be "cured.

GAY CONVERSN: I SLEPT WH OVER 200 MEN, NOW I'M A HAPPILY MARRIED HETEROSEXUAL DAD

The few that did have "high-qualy" evince "show that endurg change to an dividual's sexual orientatn is unmon, " and that treatments tend to change sexual orientatn may e harm, cludg prsn and mental Dark AgHomosexualy was officially labeled a mental illns the U.

SOME GAYS CAN GO STRAIGHT, STUDY SAYS

Another method was satiatn therapy, which a subject was told to masturbate over and over while verbally scribg his homosexual fantasi, until they disappeared — or, at least, "therapi" were generally effective — the person remaed attracted to the same sex — or over-effective — the person was trmatized and lost all sexual aroal entirely.

“HELP ME CHANGE FROM GAY TO STRAIGHT”

They "were ed whout people thkg about whether they were humane, " Glassgold all treatments were so gome: Lnel Ovey, a Columbia Universy psychoanalyst and thor of Homosexualy and Psdohomosexualy, created a behavral method the 1960s. Ovey studied a clilly disturbed group of patients and summarized their unnsc mds as follows: "I am a failure = I am not a man = I am strated = I am a woman = I am a homosexual. " His view mirrored the belief of many clicians at the time: that homosexualy was based on a phobia of the oppose non-aversive treatments followg this theory foced on buildg "tnal skills" like datg techniqu, assertivens trag, and affectn achg to crease teractns wh women.

CAN SOME GAY MEN AND LBIANS CHANGE THEIR SEXUAL ORIENTATN? 200 PARTICIPANTS REPORTG A CHANGE OM HOMOSEXUAL TO HETEROSEXUAL ORIENTATN

Cognive therapists, meanwhile, ma a few attempts to change homosexuals' thought patterns by reamg sir — redirectg thoughts away om homosexual activy — or through hypnosis. Still, SOCE is still beg practiced wh a small group of mental-health practners, most of whom ter to a populatn whose relig beliefs strictly bar homosexualy.

I uldn’t take my ey off thor Holn Sheppard tried to ‘pray the gay away’ and now knows the trma associated wh the Holn Sheppard It was a hell of a disvery: I was attracted to other sixteen, this terrified me. This was regular, sual and normal: every lson I’d ever imbibed about homosexualy was that was I’d grown up watchg a fundamentalist Christian show, The Donut Club, which preached, a creepy kids’ song, how “life whout God’s love is like a donut, ’e there’s a hole the middle of your heart”. I didn’t want to have a hole the middle of my heart, so I did what the webs three years, om 16 to 19, I tried to pray the gay away.

HOW TO LEAD A HETEROSEXUAL LIFTYLE IF YOU ARE GAY

I’ve only spoken about aged people are forced to programs signed to nvert them om gay to straight, cludg Amerin thor Garrard Conley.

If anythg, the self-nial only ma me even hornier for experience is borne out, over and over, the stori of anyone who has been through gay nversn therapy. Conley is married, too, and the people who facilated his nversn therapy have sce admted they are gay, and severed their ti to the ex-gay movement. In an effort to prent both sis of the gay nversn bate, IBT ved a man whose sexualy changed through therapy to tell his story.

UNRVER AT A CHRISTIAN GAY-TO-STRAIGHT CONVERSN CAMP

But that's what happened – fact I changed had hundreds of homosexual partners, I eventually married a woman and had a child.

I beme the first person to live openly as a gay man the sectn of the universy I attend, and even tablished an LGBT group for other stunts, actively preachg agast those who suggted that beg gay was somehow a choice, or even wrong. Even though I'd been raised a Christian and attend an LGBT Christian Movement London, I reveled the pal's gay scene and led a very promiscuo liftyle.

I had an nate fear of men – not of their homophobia, but the real thg: a chasm between me and the normal heterosexual male (Ksey's so-lled number on).

5 THGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT GAY CONVERSN THERAPY

There was nothg btal or harrowg about the help I received; the horror stori you hear om some of those gay-straight 'nversn' documentari don't apply here. It was simply a mixture of gnive therapy, to challenge my re beliefs and root out one-sid thkg; behavural therapy, to change problematic actns traed through years of rercement; and EMDR, which rhythmic eye movements to dampen the power of trmatic therapist and I never foced solely on my beg sexually attracted to men, but my "beg gay" had to be part of the dialogue, otherwise I'd have been leavg a part of my life at the door. At the age of 46, I've never felt better my own ParkerI began to see that maybe, jt maybe, I was never tly gay and that there was a man as real and as noble as the men I had often admired, worshipped and yearned for hidn ep wh me, wag to be eed and released.

I don't miss the gay liftyle I left behd –when I vised my ex-boyiend, five years after therapy, brought to home to me the drawbacks of that life. Therapy n be dangero, and there's no reason why anyone should feel pelled to 'nvert' I now believe people aren't born gay, and anyone n velop the sort of hidn inty I've Parker is om the Journey Into Manhood trag programme which is anised by People Can Change, a non-prof tnal, support and outreach you are affected by any of the issu raised this article, send your feedback g the ment sectn below.

CAN SCTN MAKE STRAIGHT MEN GAY?

To read our recent terview wh a former gay nversn therapist, who claimed the therapy is dangero and effective, click here. Crics, though, say the study's subjects may be ludg themselv and that the subject group was scientifilly valid bee many of them were referred by anti-gay relig Robert Spzer, a psychiatry profsor at Columbia Universy, said he began his study as a skeptic — believg, as major mental health anizatns do, that sexual orientatn nnot be changed, and attempts to do so n even e Spzer's study, which has not yet been published or reviewed, seems to dite otherwise. Spzer says he spoke to 143 men and 57 women who say they changed their orientatn om gay to straight, and nclud that 66 percent of the men and 44 percent of women reached what he lled good heterosexual functng — a staed, lovg heterosexual relatnship wh the past year and gettg enough emotnal satisfactn to rate at least a seven on a 10-pot said those who changed their orientatn had satisfyg heterosexual sex at least monthly and never or rarely thought of someone of the same sex durg also found that 89 percent of men and 95 percent of women were bothered not at all or only slightly by unwanted homosexual feelgs.