New twist on GSA?

[Avsfan47]

I'm not really even sure if this board is the right place to turn to for advice and such but I've spent quite a bit of time scouring the net looking for information on my situation. This board seems to be the only true sincere board out there dealing with a very touchy subject. Anyway, I thought I'd lay out my situation and let the members decide if this topic is worth discussion.

I grew up as the 3rd youngest of 4 kids living pretty much the normal life of a boy. When I was in the fifth grade, my parents divorced and my father left the scene and ended up remarrying some time later. My mother, who at the time was your typical housewife, went back to school and got her nursing degree. My siblings were fairly devastated about the whole breakup and had difficulty moving on. Me, on the other had, decided that I was going to pick up the slack and help mom out with the house while she pursured a career to make money to support us.

Skip forward a few years. As I hit puberty, I was not your average boy..or maybe I was. I was going through your typical changes but found that I was constantly sexually charged and really had to do my best to surpress it in order to be able to still help out around the house and also do well in school. I also sunk all my free time into soccer which I played year round so between that, school and home, it was a very busy and tiring life. That paid off in the future as I got a college scholarship and moved away after high school graduation. I spent the next few years playing soccer and finishing a masters. During that time I didn't get home too much as you could imagine. My mom had an empty nest during that time and continued to excel in her career.

After my master's, I moved back home like any college graduate does while I searched for work. It was wonderful to actually get to spend so much quality time with my mom as it felt like we both never even knew each other. We talked extensively about my childhood and how I kinda missed most of it taking on the role of the man of the house. During this time we got very close and I ended up feeling a bond to her that I never did before most likely as I was too busy not being a kid over the years I was there before. Before long, we both were inseperable; going to lunch together, out to movies, dinner, plays and basically doing stuff that normal couples do and really enjoying each others company and learning about each other. After a few months of this, I could tell my feelings were changing but kept pushing them aside saying I was just crazy and such until one night after we went to go see a local theatre show. We arrived home and I was overcome with feelings and emotion for her and went up from behind her and gave her a huge hug and told her how much I loved her. In that instant, she turned and we embraced in a deep kiss and ended up having sexual intercourse. To say it was an amazing experience would be an understatement and afterwards we spent hours talking about it. Questions like, was it a mistake? What are we doing? and your typical confused by the feelings type stuff but decided that it wasn't wrong for us to if we both consented and felt the same. We couldn't get enough of each other after that. We continued this relationship for many months and acted like teenagers would as most couples do. After some time, we started talking about where to go from there and decided it would be best to try and re-establish the traditional mother-son role and see if we could move on with our lives and chaulk it up to something we both needed. That was not easy as you could imagine but over time we've developed a very strong mom-son bond.

My dilemma? Good question. I've been searching the internet for research on this type of topic or explanations as to what we went through. Was it normal? Do others have this type of bond? Anyway, as I mentioned before, after reading what BarbGonyo has written about genetic sexual attraction, I became very curious as if what I experienced was something similar even though I didn't go through the adoption/reunited aspect.

[Luke]

Well your situation certainly is a twist on GSA!

Obviously your situation is not one of adoption/life long separation, but it sounds like you missed out on a lot of the "child bonding" process, by substituting your father, and taking on his role, and then moving away for some time.

So it would seem that you almost had a "reunion" when you came home to your Mum again, and you had time for each other this time, experiencing feelings that would normally have been supressed by the normal bonding, growing up process you would have had as a child.

I'm no expert, this is just my opinion and view on your situation, but it certainly would seem this has some kind of GSA link, especially as you are obviously two very intelligent people who have sat down to discuss and question what has happened between you.

[Avsfan47]

Luke,

Thanks for the reply. I really do appreciate the thoughtfulness of your message and a thorough understanding of our situation. I'm sure you can understand why I have such a difficult time finding exactly what the situtation I was in with my mother is called and if others have done the same. When I stumbled across this GSA forum, I spent quite a bit of time reading the posts and had to conclude along some lines that my situation was similar to GSA .

The situation with my mother was very intense and we both felt an extreme sense of happiness. Getting out of the sexual aspect of it was not an overnight thing and we had occassional relapses as would be expected. Do I feel that I've been harmed by the situation. On the contrary, I felt as if I was finally fulfilled somehow and I was able to move on with my life. My siblings are still caught up in times long ago when my father was around .

Anyway, I'd appreciate any other comments on this and I welcome anyone to IM me (look at my profile for it on yahoo) if they'd want to discuss anything else.

[BarbGonyo]

Welcome to our forum. I hope you will get responses from others that will be helpful to you.

As for my opinion, I can only give you my thoughts about your situration as I don't have expertise on that part of GSA since not too many cases have come up. That doesn't mean that there aren't any cases such as yours, only that no one has shared their stories.

Sexuality is so complex. What is the difference between sex with strangers and sex with family members? I feel it is the social taboo.

I'm not talking about sexual relationships between adults and children. Children should not have sexual relationships with anyone because they are children. Their bodies and minds aren't ready for what comes with a sexual relationship and they don't know the right and wrong of it. It is not the child chosing the relationship but the adult using the child.

When reading your story it made me think of someone I know very well who had a mother who was in a bad marriage with this girls father. There were other children in the family also but the mother chose to use her older daughter as her sounding board to complain about the father, to go everywhere with her and become her constant companion. Even after the girl was married she felt guilty if her mother wasn't included in all of her activities. Eventually this weighed on the girl until she had to remove herself from that situation as it became draining to her.

There was no sexual need or attention but this mother used her daughter as her mate, her companion.

You may say what is the comparison? As I see your situation, you were her mate as you were by her side all the time helping, sharing, and being her helper. After you went away and came back, you jumped back into that position but this time wanted her all to yourself without her sharing time with your sibs.

She was now yours. Because you are both needy and of course love each other because you are bonded as mother and child, emotions get strong and urges follow.

I don't know if this will explain any of what happened to you or if I'm correct in my assumption. But I hope that you will have a relationship with your mother that you both can live with that will be healthy for both of you.

I'm not here to judge, just give my opinion.

I wish you both a long and happy relationship.

Barb Gonyo

[Avsfan47]

Thanks for such the warm welcome. I hope I will be able to contribute more to this forum as time goes along.

Barb, thanks for the insightful reply. It sure does get one thinking which is the exact reason I turned to this forum!

I couldn't agree more with regarding sexual relationships between adults and children. Children just are ready mentally to deal with the complexity of sexuality and what it entails and I fully believe that if I entered a sexual relationship before I left high school, then things would have turned out so much different and not as positive.

To be honest, you present a new perspective here regarding how our bond grew into a sexual one. I absolutely believe it was a co-dependancy thing for sure and we both recognized that early on. Once the relationship became sexual, I realized that what I was getting was that emotional bond I didn't get when I was younger due to our extenuating circumstances. She also felt like she was then able to give me the affection and love she wasn't able to give during my childhood years. We had a fantastic sexual relationship and I learned quite a bit during that time and she confessed that she felt that it helped her relive that time she lost when her boy became a man before her eyes. She said she felt like she helped with that transition. I have not felt anything like that since and know it was the situation and that has helped us move on.

Do we feel bad or guilty. Of course we did but have had very good talks and discussions. We know we had to keep it secret and have done so with no problems. In addition, we were able to move on with our lives and it has been a few years now. We wil always have that time and it's helped us become quite close emotionally.

Thanks again for your comments. I'm glad you didn't run me off this board and knew I was in the right place

[BarbGonyo]

Thank you for your reply. I see your situation clearer as you tell more. My only disagreement might be that a parent would think it is their job to teach their offspring about sex by having sex with them. I don't know what you meant unless what you meant was that you learned more about each other by having a sexual relationship.

I want you to know that the only time I would want someone off this site is if they are using it for peversion, porn or spammers.

Everyones story and opinion is what this is here for. It is to educate, not debate. But if someone is using it to get attention for purposes other than educating others or sharing feelings because they are in need of support, then they should look elsewhere.

So I hope you will find this site informative and supportive and educational, if so, Welcome.

Barb G

[LongLostSib]

I'm inclined to say that you experienced incest but not GSA. The phrase "genetic sexual attraction" was coined to differentiate incest between long-lost relatives from what one might call "garden variety" incest between relatives in intact families.

In other words, GSA is a particular kind of incest.

Your family situation clearly fits the profile associated with incest. I addressed this in another post on this board months ago, so I'll quote myself:

"Psychologists appear to have come to a rough consensus that one or more of the following things has happened in these cases:

1. The family has become dysfunctional, with serious role confusion (e.g. a sister takes on the responsibilities of an absent or incapacitated mother, a brother becomes a provider and father-figure, etc.)

2. Siblings are unable to get their emotional needs met in conventional ways with conventional relationships. Their parents may be unwilling or unable to show them the affection they need. They may be isolated from their peers for some reason. In the absence of alternatives, they cope by embarking on a sexual relationship with each other.

3. The imprinting process (Westermarck effect) with normally desensitizes relatives from feeling sexually attracted to one another has been disrupted. Psychologists don't seem to have come to any firm conclusions about the robustness of this imprinting (How much contact is required? How much separation can be tolerated?), but it seems clear that the window of opportunity closes completely by the age of six."

I was writing specifically about siblings, but I think the same principles apply with other relatives.

I hope this helps.

[Luke]

LongLostSib - I think some of what you are saying is surely contradictive? What you seem to be saying is that "garden variety" incest and GSA are one of the same thing? I really don't see this.

Yes, GSA is a certain form of incest, but one reason for this is the failure of the imprinting process (Westermarck effect) and those involved have an overwhelming feeling/emotion for the family member which can be very difficult to control, where as incest, family members are fully aware of their actions in performing a sexual act.

I would say AvsFan47 situation is one far more closely related to a GSA situation than incest, due to the lack of contact/relationship with a family member from a young age.

Just my opinion.

[rollingrocker1972]

GSA is a form of incest, but it is not typical of what people normally think of when they hear the word.

Typical incest involves introducing sex into an established familial relationship. That relationship need not be based upon blood. In today's world of second marriages and ad hoc families it is quite common for people to have step siblings. The "ick" factor for sex between step-siblings is almost as high as it is for siblings related by blood, especially if they were raised together from a young age. This is the westermark effect at work. These relationships, while always transgressive in terms of the norms of society, are not always abusive. I would argue that cases like Avsfan47's are not that unusual. What makes his case different is not that it happened, but that he has found someplace where he feels safe in revealing it. The reason that abusive incest is what we hear about almost exclusively is because those who have experienced non-abusive incest keep it a closely guarded secret.

I've been involved with my half sister for the past six years. It wasn't until about two years into our relationship that I even heard about GSA. As a result I spent those first two years looking for information on consensual incest because that was the only label I had to describe our relationship. Information on this topic is hard to come by, but it is not impossible. According to Kinsey, roughly 3% of the population has experienced sex with a close relative, and of that percentage only half were described as negative by those reporting them. What this means is that for every case of incest you hear about on the news where someone is being abused, there is another case you will never hear about where no one is being abused.

I've kind of gotten off topic here.

What makes GSA different from regular incest is that it does not introduce sex into a pre-existing relationship. The very thing which distinguishes GSA is that those involved had no prior relationship of any kind. We are, in a way, only related in a technical sense. When I first met my sister I had no history with her, no knowledge of her existence in fact. Most importantly we were not raised together as children. The reason this is important is that children who are raised together tend not to prefer one another as mates later in life. This is what is known as the westermark effect. It has been demonstrated that lack of a blood relationship between those involved does nothing to diminish this effect. Unrelated children who are raised together in close quarters in Israeli kibbutzes are notoriously averse to one another sexually in adulthood.

What makes the Westermark effect important is that it shows how the incest taboo works for humans. Many animal species are able to use subtle cues and phermones to distinguish close relatives and thereby avoid inbreeding. But because human beings are advanced social animals, our incest avoidance method came to be based upon familial relationships and especially upon proximity during early childhood. When the Westermark effect is disrupted, the natural aversion is not there and incest becomes far more likely. What does this mean for siblings who are essentially raised apart from one another due to divorce or other disruptions to the family? If they were to later become involved sexually, would that be due to GSA or simply because they lacked the normal sexual inhibitions that define most sibling relationships?

I guess what I'm trying to say is that incest is not any one thing. GSA is one kind of incest, but it is far from the only kind. Of the other forms of incest that exist, some are abusive and some are not. Trying to lump all of these into one pot just isn't possible.

One of the things that I've noticed in coming to this forum and the yahoo group is that there are many people here who have a real problem accepting that their GSA relationship is a form of incest. I think that this is why so many relationships that are not otherwise troubled fail. Denial isn't just a river in Egypt. If you cannot be honest with yourself about the nature of your relationship with someone, then you'll never be able to deal with whatever issues or resevations you have about its nature. I am involved in an incestuous relationship with my sister. That is an inescapable fact. The fact that we did not grow up together, while important in understanding our relationship, does not alter the fact that what we are doing is incest. She and I used to have a lot of problems because we were unwilling to accept this fact. Once we did we were able to take the next step of addressing our feelings about it. From there we were able to finally get off the rollercoaster that oscillates between "I love you, I want to be with you" and "I can't do this, we have to stop."

I see so many people whose reunions end in a new separation, all because they are on the very same rollercoaster and it ends up tearing them apart.

These sorts of relationships are never easy, but when you're not honest with yourself and each other, they're impossible.

As for Avsfan47, all I can say is that if he and his mother are happy with the path their relationship took, then I'm happy for them too. There is no cause for guilt or shame over a relationship between consenting adults who have made an informed choice to be together, especially when neither is involved with anyone else. They chose to walk to the beat of a different drum. They did so with both eyes open and from what Avsfan47 says they are both happier as a result. It is very hard to argue that they did anything wrong.

[Avsfan47]

I just want to say thanks to everybody who took the time to respond and take the post seriously. Barb, I do understand your suspicion but I was just trying to clarify myself and guess it didn't come across that great. I apologize for that.

As for the other replies, I'm just glad that everyone took me serious and were able to debate what the definition of my experience should be. I've always felt that it didn't fall into any standard category so hence my serach to define what we experienced. Anyway, I hope this discussion continues and would welcome any feedback.