When I was younger I came out as bi. One thing I couldn't handle was the penis pushing. Penis pushing is basically other people encouraging me or pressuring me to date guys. It makes me feel incredibly uncomfortable and insecure in my sexuality. How can I deal with it?
Simply tell them this: "I date whatever gender I want, and if I need your advice on it, I'll ask. Until then, shut up! It's non of your concern who I date. As long as I don't tell you who to date, you don't tell me." Or something along these lines...
People can set up as many dates for you as they want or constantly hound you, but in the end you can tell them to take a hike. It's not up to other people to set who and when you date, do what you want and when you want it.
Riiiight, I clicked on this thread because I wanted to know what "penis pushing" was, thought it was a medical condition which I knew nothing about.
when you are younger people will push your boundaries and tell your what to do. It is of course completely disrespectful, but it happens. How I learned to deal with this over time is to establish firmer boundaries and enforce them. Enforcing them means putting ends to conversations: "No thank you", and not giving 'hooks' to the other side to answer/doubt you. Try to give answers which terminate the conversation, rather than answers which 'excuse' your position. Don't make it sound like you are apologising/giving explanations about why you are not interested in something. You are just not intersted, they don't need to know why. Also I think disentangling your sexuality from the whole thing and not including it in the arguments why you are refusing to date men. Making it into a particular issue about a particular man, rather than a general issue about 'men', could work. Women have the right to refuse/be not interested/ don't care about dating a particular guy: if somebody suggest :why don't you date XYZ?: response: "because I am not attracted to him": why not?:"because I am not". If somebody starts talking about men in general and asks you general questions you could also try turning it into asking *them* to provide you with a particular example- that you can then easier respond to with "no, not for me". Let them come with examples, that you can bat away, one by one, eventually they get tired and will get the picture. It is perfectly ok to not want to date a man, or men, or anyone whether you are straight, or bi or gay, your sexuality is not the only 'excuse' to shut unwanted attention off. The main thing to remember is that you don't owe explanations to anyone: you don't want to date men, fine, people don't really need to know why and for what reasons: present them with the status quo and let them deal with it. I think that women in general are made to feel that they "owe" to like men: and if they don't, they "owe" and excuse/apology/reason as to why not. Don't give in to that feeling of 'guilt', and feeling that you owe to explain yourself. It is precisely that little 'hook' that draws you in into their questioning line, and opens you up to being argued with. Rehearse conversations in your head: look at the answers which you usually give to people and how they are used to draw you back into a debate by them, then try to imagine answers which shut the conversation down, instead of leaving weaknesses and room for questions. Eg: "What about XYZ, why don't you date him?" - this question is designed to get a 'reason' out of you- but *you don't need to provide a reason*, you don't owe reasons to people for not dating a man "Because I don't want to date him", or "no reason" are all good answers. "not my type" - is an assertive but not an ideal answer, because 1) it gives in to what the other person was asking, 2) opens you up to further questioning: eg. "what is your type then?"etc. Also try to turn the conversation around, by asking questions, rather than being put on the spot to answer them yourself: but *them* on the spot. Eg: "why do you want me to date him?", "why do you want me to have a bf?" "what is in this for you?" .
This happens to every lesbian regardless of age or relationship status. You just have to be firm in your boundaries. If they really question you further, question THEM on why they want to date men. I've literally had to force women on straight girls to get them to shut up.
