Looking for resources for a specific male issue - Fear of Women
As someone who was raised in baptist evangelical circles and socially stunted for most of my youth, I wasn't provided a good basis for "how to socialize with attractive women". Bear with me here. This is a tough subject. I'm posting under a completely new throwaway account because this topic makes me so uncomfortable.
Purity culture hurts men and women both, and I've never been able to find much information about the male side of the equation. I have struggled with the longest time with the fear of accidentally "ogling" women or looking at them inappropriately. This fear became socially crippling in the past, and was largely the cause of a brutal period of unemployment three years ago when I ended up racking up an embarrassing amount of credit card debt. I was effectively so beside myself that I fled from the workforce altogether, and tried to survive without a job. After pursuing therapy, I've been able to put most of my cognitive delusions to rest, but I still haven't excised this fucking spiderweb from my psyche completely. It's so deeply embedded in me that I am still fighting this.
I would become so terrified that I was somehow hurting or offending women with my eyes, that it would bother me intensely when, let's say, certain parts of their bodies appeared in my central or even peripheral vision. My fear made me act strangely around women, and then people in workplaces and other spaces began to suspect actual perversion from me. When this fear was at its worst, it created a scenario that I suffered through at least three times, and in therapy called "the cycle".
My fear created unnatural behavior > people tried to figure out why I was so strange > they noticed I'm odd around women, or specific women felt "targeted" by me > I am suspected to be a tremendous pervert and am either forced to leave the job or fired
Experiencing this "cycle" so many times has inflicted a level of PTSD in me for workplace environments. When these effects were at their worst, my fear of hurting or offending women with my gaze began to expand from just "attractive women" to "most women". At one excruciating low point during those times, I was so gripped by this fear that I had to leave my own birthday party and broke down in tears. This has also put a terrible strain on a relationship with a (former?) friend. All of a sudden, one day, I noticed that I found part of her attractive... and then I was disgusted and afraid of myself, and something resembling a partial "cycle" began. That one was particularly horrid because I found myself locked in this OCD-like state where I felt like I had to check on her to notice whether or not I was making her uncomfortable, while simultaneously being extremely afraid that looking at her was causing her to be uncomfortable... like I was trying to protect her from myself. I cannot fully explain in words how supremely unpleasant that experience was. I haven't ever tried to breech the subject because it's so taboo, and I've pretty much let that friendship drop off a cliff entirely. I haven't spoken to her in three years. Putting this to words almost makes me want to cry.
I just wish I could be around attractive women and not be afraid of noticing their attractiveness. To be able to be fully myself and not clammy or weird because I was taught from childhood that even intrusive thoughts are the same as outright molestation. My therapist was stunned by me - she said "you know you can just notice that people are attractive, right?". This absolute nightmare was completely foreign to her. God I wish that was the same for me.
Therapy has helped me overcome a great deal of cognitive distortions related to this. I used to believe that having a flushed face automatically marked me to everyone as a "pervert". Now I don't. There are other small examples of thoughts that had an iron grip on my mind that I've since been able to remove entirely. I want for all of this to be gone from my mind completely. From the fucking root. Recently I came to realize that the likely source for these things is the incredible stunting of my religious upbringing.
The particularly insane thing about it all is that I've never really looked at women that way (outside of porn). Nor have I ever been interested in pursuing casual, outside-of-relationship sex, or even been interested in being IN a relationship at all (thanks mom and dad). This isn't about "boo hoo women don't like me" or any of that incel shit. I am fighting a war with a cognitive nightmare that was inflicted upon me when I was a child, that still isn't gone. At least lately, I've been winning.
I shouldn't be afraid to converse with attractive women, and I am actually capable of doing so, now, most of the time. The fear of appearing lecherous by accident still has a grip on me, despite having no real interest in pursuing that sort of thing currently. I am currently working in a new job that has a few specific triggers, and some days are a real struggle to convince my brain that what I'm afraid of is not happening. I've come a long way, but I'm not fully done. I want this sickness to be gone, and I know I will NEVER find the answer to my problem from ANY church.
Obviously I need to go back to therapy... but I was wondering if this community happened to be aware of any resources about men who suffer from side effects of purity culture in similar ways... or at all. Anything relevant would be extremely helpful. Thank you.