I was always a big kid growing up; I wasn't known as the fat kid in school or anything but my weight definitely limited me in a lot of areas of life, especially my social life. I wasn't disliked in school, actually I was quite popular. But because of self esteem issues from my weight I was really shy. I never had a girlfriend in high school - not because there were no girls who were interested in me, but because I felt like I would be a disappointment to them when it came to physical relations.
Early this summer I became reacquainted with a girl I went to kindergarten with(and hadn't seen since then, making it about twelve years) and we started dating. I really liked her and wanted to impress her. I'm not sure why she was so attracted to me, especially physically, but somehow she was. Despite this I was reluctant to expose myself to her for fear she would be less than impressed. I didn't want to mess up a good thing.
Long story short, I used the abstinence excuse to put off sex with her until I could lose some weight and get a little healthier. I didn't want to look like I'd just run a marathon after sex.
Problem was, just when I was beginning to do a lot more excercise and starting some good eating habbits, our relationship was broken off. The reasons for it are unimportant here, so I'll leave it at that. Anyway, I took the breakup really hard and for an entire month I almost didn't eat at all. I'm one of those people who lose their appetite when I'm feeling down. I know it wasn't good for me, but after a few weeks I started shedding some extra pounds and I thought to myself, since I have the ball rolling now, I'm not going to stop until I get my body the way I want it. I started a new job pushing shopping carts for a local grocery store, which, believe me, can be a lot of work and I joined a gym. Ever since the breakup my appetite hasn't been the same so even though I'm not starving myself any more, I'm still eating a lot less than I used to.
I've lost about 60 lbs(this is an estimate; I never weighed myself until I lost a LOT of weight) and put on some lean muscle. Now I'm working on the whole shyness thing. When I got a girlfriend I really came out of my shell and I'm a lot more outgoing than I used to be. Luckily for me she was very outspoken and she taught me to be that way as well. So now that I'm not backward anymore I am working on my shyness. I'm not afraid to meet strangers like I used to be, but I've still got the same bad self image as before. For instance, you'll never see me in shorts in public because I used to be embarassed of showing that much skin. Now that I don't have anything to hide, I want to do some things out of character to get in the game. Someone suggested playing strip poker because it's a good excuse to lose some clothes in front of people - since they won't have much on either, it won't be as embarassing. It'd get me used to having a little less clothing on in front of people. If you guys can think of other things that will help me get over the fear of people seeing my body, please share them.
I'm going to be a little more open about this than I usually would be, but since I've seen some pretty frank stuff on this board I think I can just be blunt.
I don't have anything to be ashamed of down there. However, just like any other man, I'd really like to have something to be proud of down there. I figure since I'm still on the outskirts of puberty(I'm nineteen) I might still be able to do something about it. Are there any supplements(short of those "male enhancement" products I keep getting emails about) that would encourage growth in that area? I think there are hormone supplements or something along those lines that I might want to look into. I don't want to damage anything(I.E. no pumps) and I'm not considering surgery(not that I could afford it anyway lol). Someone said something about human growth hormone but I'm pretty sure it doesn't work that way. I know my genes play a large part in that, but I'd like to give mother nature a little help. I am sure my first time will be fine for me, but I want it to be good for the other person as well.
I'd really appreciate any thoughts on this as well as the whole "coming out of my shell" thing. I think I'm on the right track when it comes to all of this building up my self esteem stuff, and I don't want to let this get in the way.