Dear JW:

Anxiety and obsessive thinking are closely related, one fuels the other. It looks like a combination of (1) heavily smoking weed for about five months, and (2) not having much to do/ no distractions and lack of socialization because of Covid-19, and (3) watching a lot of porn, all led to your obsessive thinking about being gay.

It seems to me that you need to (1) stop using weed, (2) continue to no longer watch porn, (3) lower your anxiety by having a daily routine of exercise, integrating perhaps daily guided meditations, mindfulness practices and other healthy or non-harmful relaxing practices, as well as socializing with people, (4) try to understand that thoughts by themselves have no power, and are not dangerous. The thought: “I am gay” does not make you gay- it is just a thought, a temporary mental event, and nothing more.

Let me know what you think of what I wrote here and if you want to, we can talk further.

anita