I want to be with a woman but some things are holding me back.

Hey. I'm a 26 year old woman. I identify as queer. I thought I was a lesbian when I was younger, then in high school I starting dating men as well as women. After high school I got into a serious long term relationship with a man. We broke up and I spent some time being devastated and after a year I got into another serious long term relationship with a man. I haven't been with with another girl since high school.

I feel embarrassed because of my lack of knowledge about sex between women. In my earlier relationships with women I never really went all the way- I guess depending on how you look at it. I'm 26 years old and I feel like I would make a fool out of myself if I met someone I liked and wasn't a good lover and didn't know what to do. I have never been able to get off from oral sex, so I feel like I wouldn't know what she would want.

I think I kind of put the idea of women out my head after being hurt and bullied when I was younger. I had a crush on a girl and she would kiss me and hold hands with me. I thought she liked me, too. I wrote her a letter telling her my feelings for her and she passed it around the high school and made fun of me along with everyone else. It turned out she was just kissing me because she thought boys would like it. I had a serious girlfriend in high school and I thought it was love. We were official, had the label of girlfriends, went to prom together, etc. We were together for about a year and one day out of the blue she told me that she got back together with her male ex. She had cheated on me and started another relationship without even talking to me about ending ours. I guess she didn't think it was a 'real' relationship or something. But things that like hurt me really badly I think some of my fear of putting myself out there comes from those things.

I also have NO gaydar- and I feel really uncomfortable flirting with women unless I know for sure that they are gay. I'll see girls that I'm attracted to and I can't force myself to talk to them unless I know for sure. So a couple times over the past 3 or so years I've gotten the courage to go to a lesbian bar (there aren't many in my town). I am a femme and I like other femmes or soft butch types. i guess thats another issue because those types of girls didn't seem interested in me. I'm moving to a bigger city that is more gay friendly so I'm hoping that might make it easier- having a bigger selection.

I've been talking to a girl online who lives near me now. We have a ton in common and we've been really hitting it off. I'm ashamed of my inexperience at my age and it's held me back for years now. I want to put myself out there.

This has gotten pretty long so I'll end it here, but i would really appreciate any advice.

Thanks in advance

 

empty....... something. maybe if no one here can offer any idea you could point me in the direction of a somewhere else that maybe could. Possibly a forum that's just for women?

 

Thanks for the reassurance guys. I think it's a confidence thing in general. I'm going to keep talking to this girl and hopefully it'll go somewhere.

Frac- I see what you're saying about not pretending to be something I'm not. I don't know if I should talk to her about my situation beforehand. Like if we were to get into a sexual situation, to like warn her I don't really know what I'm doing or something. I feel like that would be really awkward and I wouldn't know how to say it.

And the oral sex thing. I'm all for giving it, but I have never enjoyed receiving it. Maybe it's because the few people who went down on me didn't know what they were doing, but I could never imagine have an orgasm from it. It's not very pleasurable at all for me. I'm interested and kind of wonder if maybe a woman who really knew what she was doing could get me off that way. If I couldn't get off that way or didn't really enjoy it I feel like that could maybe hurt someone's feelings.

Basically, I'm super nervous and way overthinking things. I don't know. This is exciting and scary at the same time.