About seven months ago I was in an acting class doing an exercise (Meisner) where you and a partner make observations about each other. My partner and I were looking into each others eyes and I started to feel very deeply connected to her. Then she said, "You're a lesbian." This cold wash of fear came over me and something deep down inside said, "Oh my God, I'm a lesbian." Since then I've been panicking on and off, but lately (in the last few months) it's been getting so I can't ignore it. I realize that I've sort of always been afraid that I might be a lesbian. In middle school I was made fun of a lot for "being a lezbo" because of the way I dressed. I've always had really strong feelings towards certain older women. Usually they have been celebrities, teachers, or other big sister/young mother aged women. They feel like crushes, but I've never thought of them as sexual. I've had crushes on men too, but not as many. However, all my dreams and fantasies have been about men since I hit puberty. Is it possible that I've repressed sexual feelings towards women to the point that I don't even dream about them? I'm 24 and have a boyfriend of 3 1/2 years. I worry because I've never had that out of control, butterflies in the stomach, feeling before. My love for my boyfriend was kind of slow and gentle and warm and fuzzy. I still have a nagging thing in me saying "You're a lesbian." My sexual identity seems to change about 5 times a day. I'm very confused and scared. I guess I'm looking for anything. Advise, support, your own stories. Thanks!
Hi, welcome to the site =) Well it seems like you are looking at the situation in a very binary way. Either you are straight or lesbian, a or b, but its very possible you could be bisexual. There are many different ranges of sexuality. If you haven't heard of it you might want to look into the kinsey scale. If you are happy with your life and relationship then I don't think there is any problem. If you are dealing with a lot of confusion and questioning though then maybe you should take a break from him to figure yourself out. Either way I think it would be a good thing to express these feelings to your boyfriend. From personal experience, honestly is always a good thing in a relationship. Best of luck
Climbingivy, I'm wondering - did you have any thoughts that you might be a lesbian prior to this interaction? Any other feelings of same sex attraction? I'm in a 7 year relationship - I live with my girlfriend. I came to the realization recently that the nagging thoughts and feelings I've had over the years are real and are not going away. Unfortunately, I was a bit slow on the uptake, and now I'm trying to figure out how best to find my authentic self while minimizing the pain to her. Maybe you are a lesbian, maybe you are not. Maybe I am gay, maybe I am not. The conclusion I came to is that I NEED to find out the answer. I cannot go on ignoring or suppressing or panicking. Unfortunately, to find out the answers, I need to take a break from my relationship. I've tried a million different ways to avoid this conclusion - I just can't. I don't know if this is the right decision, but I don't see any alternatives for me. Of course, this might not be the right conclusion for you. For what it's worth, I REALLY hope you avoid my mistake - suppressing these natural feelings you are having. Regardless of whether you leave your relationship, experiment, etc. - try and be as true to yourself (forgetting about others) as you can be. Try and pay attention to the feelings and see what they tell you. I'm still trying to dismantle all the layers of denial and defenses I put in place over the last (close to a) decade - you don't want to do that to yourself. Here to be of help in any way I can. ---------- Post added 6th Oct 2011 at 02:30 PM ---------- Oh - and ditto on the mocking growing up and dreams. All of my dreams have been with women. I don't think I've ever had a sex fantasy involving men. I used this to facilitate my denial over the years. Even though dreams can be instructive, oftentimes the meaning is symbolic, or so I've been told.
On the topic of dreams. I can't recall ever having one sexual dream. I really can't, except for one that was with this really hideous girl... but I don't like to discuss that... I have on the other hand had a dream that I was pregnant, then end up lost in a subway system. I liked being pregnant in the dream. I wonder what Freud would say...
Thank you both for your replies Jon Snow: I think Freud would say you secretly desire to have a demon baby. Also, I think you're right that I am thinking about this in a very binary way. The trouble is, since my attraction to women doesn't manifest as sexual yet (or maybe I just won't let it) it's hard for me to know where I fall on the Kinsey scale. I've been talking to my boyfriend about this from the beginning. He's been very supportive. stilllovelyafte: Your post made me cry because I think we're in very similar situations. I, too, feel like I'm picking through over a decade of denial. I've had a recurring fear that I might be a lesbian since the girls started picking on me in middle school. I think maybe that just gave a name to something I already felt. My boyfriend and I have lived together for the past year. We're so close it's overwhelmingly painful to think I might not be able to be with him in the future. He has said that he'd be alright with me experimenting in order to find out what I want. I think I'm going to try that path, but I'm very scared.
Hi again, first I want to start off by saying that even though the Kinsey scale is considered a lot more in depth then the standard, gay/bi/straight, its still very simplistic compared to real attraction. Really you can fall into different spectrums for both physical and emotional attraction. Also, I've kind of had the same feeling that, I'll never know if I'm bi or simply gay if I'm never with a woman and my bf has offered me the same freedom to try experimenting with a woman if I felt I should or got the opportunity. That's awfully open minded of him.
Yeah, it sounds like we've both got great guys. Makes all this a lot harder and easier at the same time.
Climbingivy, if ever you feel you want to message me, of course feel free. I'm struggling with this myself right now and I know how hard it is, so if I can be of any help to you going through this I'm around. It's weird sort of looking at your earlier experiences, almost like a revisionist historian. I remember the kids picking on me at school - at the time, I never really thought about what they were saying, it was more that they were just attacking me. Now, I seem to recall some saying amidst the "you run like a girl" and other more harmless stuff, "dude he's a fag" and other stuff like that. You're lucky in one respect - you have been open with your bf and he's been supportive. It's great that you are not putting this aside and dealing with it yourself. For whatever reason, and I've been agonizing over this, I CANNOT bring myself to share my thoughts/feelings with my girlfriend. I moved out, sort of inexplicably a little over a week ago. She wants marriage asap, understandably, and I basically said I'm not in a place to give you that commitment right now, and I need some time and space to figure out why. I know she deserves better, but I'm still answering these questions myself. You sort of pose a third alternative, share with her and try to answer the questions together? For whatever reason, this just never seemed like an option with her to me. Anyway, sorry to divert from you to me, but thought some of my story might be helpful)
Hearing your story is totally helpful. It feels a lot better knowing someone else is going through pretty much the same thing. When I told my boyfriend about questioning my sexuality I just sort of blurted it out because I couldn't take not talking about it anymore. Sometimes I think it's hard on him to know what I'm going through, but he knew something was up and he says he's happier knowing what's going on than being left in the dark. If you do decide to tell your girlfriend, something that has helped me a lot is to think about what I would feel if the situation were reversed and my boyfriend was the one questioning. This totally rings true to me. It's kind of like, "Oh yeah, that's why that affected me so much."
Can I throw this question back to you and the group? I know this is a skewed sample group, but maybe there will be different opinions. You said: If you do decide to tell your girlfriend, something that has helped me a lot is to think about what I would feel if the situation were reversed and my boyfriend was the one questioning. Obviously, given my situation, I'd be completely supportive and sympathetic. But my gut and nightmare is that many partners (or me w/o my personal experience) might look at it as follows: [please ignore generalizations]not only is she leaving me, she was gay and i was completely oblivious to it! How long has she been lying to me? How long has she known? Has she been with other women? Has she been thinking about other women when we were together? Everyone's going to know I spent the last 7 years with a lesbian - people will think I'm damaged from this. What will I tell my parents? My girlfriend is an amazing girl - and I know (hope) deep down, in time she'd be supportive. In time, I hope we end up the best of friends. The question is more - do I tell her now? As of a month ago, she was certain we were spending the rest of our lives together. Three kids, a dog, active at the local church, etc. I'm still telling myself, and likely don't have the ability to answer many of her questions. Or, do I allow us to separate, get myself more comfortable with the idea, and then tell her? Once she's had a chance to get over us a bit, once I've had a chance to get comfortable with myself...
I honestly don't know which way is better for you. I sometimes feel like I'd like to runaway and get myself figured out then come back to my bf when the time was right. However, I'm scared because, among other reasons, I know I couldn't ask him to stick around and wait. I think not knowing how your gf will react is a legitimate concern. I mean, you can answer all those questions for her. Assure her that you have loved her and if you didn't know this yourself there is no way she could have known either. I've found it hard to get across the extent of my fear to my bf because I don't want to drag him through the mud while I figure this out. It might actually make your gf feel better to know what's going on with you so she doesn't think the relationship just totally failed for some other reason. I guess it's a "go with your gut" kind of situation.
