For you people who experience heterosexual attraction and who may come across this blog in an effort to understand the issue of mormon homosexuality a little better, let me see if I can help you understand what goes through my head and heart on a daily basis. Now, I can't fully justify my apparent indecision and my difficulty in focusing less on this issue than is helpful and due. I feel a need to do that moreso than I am doing now. But maybe it would be helpful to hand you my shoes to wear for a few minutes to consider a reason or two that it is so difficult to do that. Not so you can feel sorry for me, not so I can feel justified in being weak or undetermined, but...just for understanding.
In that light, consider the following, if you will:
1) Single guys of my age always think about relationships, girls, dating, prospects, etc. I know this because I do sometimes spend time with/around straight guys and I know what they vocalize. Single girls of my age probably think about it moreso. My female friends are always talking about dating and relationships and the cute guys they run into. That being considered, it is sometimes wearying to graciously smile or nod understandingly when someone tells me I'm dwelling on my attractions too much by noticing the cute boy at the store and saying so. Not vocalizing it does not, in fact, make it go away. Been there, done that. And "noticing" does not mean "lusting after" or "going insane with desire for", at least not to me.
2) Consider how you might respond if you, as a heterosexual male (I'm choosing males as the example because I am one, so if you're a female, just flip it around), were told that you are not to be with a woman. That in order to have a family of your own and live according to the gospel, you were to marry a man and have children with him (assume the biology works here, OK?). If you are faithful enough, you will learn to rely on the atonement to heal you, and you will find a man with whom you can build a happy marriage. If you choose not to marry a man, you must remain celibate and not date women. You may have female friends but must never do anything that could be construed as romantic. You must not date women because it's against your eternal identity. In fact, it's probably best that you not spend time with women who are interested in men because of the temptations it would present. Even if those women are determined not to date or have romantic relationships with men, spending time with them is not going to help you want to find a man to marry, so you'd do yourself a favor to limit your heterosexual interactions. And it's nice for you to have guy friends. That's OK. But you need to work on dating them one-on-one and finding one who can be your eternal companion.
Now, this is obviously weird to think about, and it would never happen. It's not a perfect analogy, and it's not meant to fully represent what I am going through because even though I am mostly attracted to guys, there is still something deeply ingrained in me that makes being with a woman feel "right" in a sense, whether that's because it's an eternal truth, indoctrination, etc. But the point is: why don't you just buck up and make your decision to do what you know is right by working towards marrying a man? "Simply" have faith and shun those women and start dating a man like everyone else. Have some maturity and realize that being with a man is what God wants for you and is what we were ultimately created for and start doing what you can to diminish your attractions to women and increasing your attractions to men.
Again, I'm not trying to justify myself, but I do hope someone can understand a little better by thinking of it in these terms. I am trying to be mature about this and look at it from an "eternal perspective", but I guess I have to admit that I'm just not quite there yet.
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