First time poster here-- I figured I have spent enough time reading through this site and thought it was about time to reach out to this lovely community. I am a lesbian student at a women's college (a very LGBT friendly place). I am on a sports team and at the start of the semester, I developed a crush on one of my teammates, but I wasn't sure of her sexual orientation-- she looks straight and is a relatively shy and private person. On the contrary, I am an open and outgoing person whom everyone knows is lesbian. Still, something intuitively kept telling me that this girl might not be straight and that I shouldn't throw my hopes away yet. As time went on we talked to each other more and more. She would find excuses to talk to me and I started to cautiously flirt with her in very subtle ways. During group conversations with more of our energetic and enthusiastic teammates (who mostly talk over her), I would occasionally catch her quietly make a "gay" comment-- for instance, we were all talking about characters we would have sex with on a TV show and she named two women-- but then when I would bring it up in our private conversations later, she would completely ignore it and/or change the subject. One night, we were in her room talking for a long time, and I directly asked her if she liked women. She immediately dropped eye contact with me, started blushing, and told me that was an area of her life she "hadn't put much thought into yet", followed by some rambling about not imagining being able to explain the Kinsey scale of sexuality to her mom, etc. The conversation changed topics and I eventually went home. The next morning, I got a text from her saying that talking about her sexuality made her uncomfortable and that she wanted to keep our conversations on other topics for the time being. So, I thought that was the end of things. But she kept approaching me, some time went by, and I started cautiously flirting with her again. She opened up to me a little tiny bit more. She told me about how she is sexually inexperienced, and I told her that I am too, which surprised her because I appear so confident. We got high together one night at a small get together with friends in my room-- but I got VERY high-- so much so that I don't remember anything from that night, and she told me the next morning that I tried to grab her at one point, and invited her to get in bed with me. I was shocked and slightly embarrassed, but I was even more shocked that she seemed so okay with it. She even told me "I would just prefer to be propositioned in private from now on"! After that, the flirting became more direct, and she even started flirting back with me a little bit. One night, I flirted with her less than usual, and the next day when I reaffirmed my interest in her she was happy and told me that she was "worried I had given up on her" because my flirting was in such "poor form" yesterday?! Enough is enough, I told myself. I asked her out on a date right before we left for winter break, and she told me that she needed to think about it and that "eventually" that could be a possibility after break. We texted all the time, even when we were both on our flights home, where she told me via text that she was "confused about me", and when I told her I hoped she had someone to talk to about that confusion (thinking it maybe was related to coming out issues), she mentioned that she had been talking to one of her best friends about it but that the situation is "challenging" because there is "so much at stake". She also expressed that she was worried that "most of the possibility of messing things up would fall on her" because I already know "what I want" (to date her? I don't know what this was referring to). I told her that if we dated, things didnt work out, and we just wanted to be friends-- that would be fine, and that it would be a bigger disappointment to never try at all. She agreed, and we eventually stopped talking for what I thought was the day. Soon after she got home for break, she shut off almost all communication with me. (I didnt hound her or annoy her, she just wouldn't reply or would reply very minimally to the few texts I sent.) We texted a few times but that has been it. The last time was when I very subtly and cautiously made a flirtatious comment to her and she literally has not replied since. She stopped replying immediately after that. So... What the heck is going on here? Why is she in denial of/so uncomfortable with the fact that she clearly is attracted to a woman/women? (or, is she not? But it seems like what she's said has spoken for itself...) I should mention that I don't know all the details of her personal life, but I do know that she does not come from a family that rejects LGBT people. That being said, she is also an only child who has had a parent die, so I can understand maybe some added pressure in that regard? We go to a very LGBT friendly college and she lives in a very LGBT friendly city. So I'm not sure what the extreme apprehension is about. Even though she has definitely flirted with me and enjoys me flirting with her, she STILL refuses to talk about her own sexuality. Please help me, Empty Closets!! :icon_sad:
