I feel weird dating younger guys?
Hey all,
Probably not the best place to be asking this but r/askgaybros is autodeleting my posts so fuck it.
I'm a 22M (turned 22 in May), fem leaning, and I've only recently started dating and becoming sexually active again after taking a long break from relationships. I'm looking for some advice about age gaps and whether the way I feel about them is normal.
The weird thing is that even though I'm 22, I still feel mentally closer to 18 or 19. COVID kind of feels like it stole a few years of social development for me, and I don't really feel as "adult" as my age suggests.
Lately I've had several guys who are 18 or 19 show interest in dating me or hooking up with me. I'm a bottom, and for some reason I've always had this idea in my head that the top should be older than me. The thought of an 18-year-old topping me feels strange, even though they're legal adults and they're usually the ones initiating things.
Growing up, I also always felt like dating someone more than a year apart in age was a big deal, so maybe some of that mindset has stuck with me.
The issue is that I'd ideally like to meet a top who's my age or maybe slightly older, but there aren't many around me that I'm attracted to. At the same time, I don't really want to date anyone older than about 25.
Part of my discomfort is also that I feel more "progressed" in life than some of these guys. I'm working full-time as an electrician, have my own goals and finances sorted, house, and I sometimes feel like I should be the more responsible person because I'm further along in life, even if the actual age gap is only 3 or 4 years.
What I'm struggling with is this feeling that I'm somehow "preying" on younger guys, even though they're adults, they're pursuing me, and I do find them attractive. It's like I have this mental block that I can't get past, and it's causing me a lot of stress.
Has anyone else felt this way in their early 20s? How did you get over it, and do these age gaps actually matter as much as they feel like they do in my head?