Hi there! Just so you know, I'm from Italy so I am no native speaker, so if I make some mistakes, that's the reason. (Sorry for the length of the post... it wasn't my intention, the thoughts just overflowed.) So, I am 17 years old and, as the title suggests, I've been questioning my sexuality since age 10. A little background on my childhood: I didn't like boys nor girls as a kid or so I remember. It may sound weird but I was a really independent kid and didn't feel like depending on a boy. Moreover, I thought boys sucked because that's what my four years older cousin was always telling me but I didn't feel anything for girls, just friendly feelings. I always used to play with my two female cousins and since I was the less girly among the three of us, they always made me act as the boyfriend or the wolf or what and I could not stand it. I guess I only had two male crushes throughout my childhood, a real child and Jeremy Sumpter in that Peter Pan movie, and I think I was suppressing others because, as I said, I didn't want to like boys and in a way I felt embarrassed about it. I recall two times drawing women in a provoking way, just as I had seen on tv, because I thought "I don't understand why, but that's what pleases men". When I was 10 I already knew about gay people but it didn't bother me. In primary school I was called a lesbian because I kissed one of my friends on the cheek in front of the class but I just clarified I wasn't and I wasn't really bothered about it. Last year of primary school a new maths teacher arrived to our school and she was really strange and one of my first thoughts was that she liked women, I don't even remember the reason why. Anyway she didn't, or at least she had a boyfriend. Before you start wondering, NO, I wasn't in love with my teacher, that's gross. But there was this Christmas play we did and when we finished it she kissed every single kid on the cheek and I was like "what the hell is wrong with this woman???" so, no, I didn't really enjoy it. That school year I started developing more feelings for boys and I still felt something for the real male crush I was talking about earlier (and I'll tell you beforehand, I had those feelings until age 13). The fact is, as I was watching the video of the Xmas play, there it was the kiss again and, all of a sudden, a question hit me: "What if I'm gay?" and I was like "What the freaking hell? I've just accepted my feelings towards boys and now this?" and I started being really bothered by it. I don't know if the chronological order I'm giving you is correct 'cause it's been too long but more or less we're there. So at a certain point looking at half-naked women on tv made me feel like peeing. I didn’t really understand it, I just knew I didn’t like girls, I didn’t have crush on girls, I didn’t want to do anything with girls. One of the problems was that for boys it was the complete opposite since I felt all of those things but it was harder to feel like peeing with them. I was so worried about it! Summer 2008 I went to Paris and I recall being on the tube and looking at an Asian girl talking on the phone and thinking “oh so she’s already in a relationship” and that thought was really scary and got me like “What was I thinking?”. I mean it’s fine if you say “she’s in a relationship” but that “already” got me feeling sick!! I could not enjoy the rest of the journey because I was always looking at people’s shoes in order not to have strange feelings about other people (that wasn’t the only reason but I had some other physical problems not connected to this). So that’s when it all started. I wasn’t constantly thinking about it but at times it popped into my head… the fact is the older I grew, the more I wanted to be in straight relationship. I swear to God, it was never a way to fight the gay vibes back. I know you’re probably thinking that because recently I’ve become so obsessed about my sexual orientation that I started to doubt it too. But, believe me or not, I was really into boys. As I said, I was not interested in having straight relationships as a child but then it just came natural to me to want one and to like the ones I saw on tv. I had been masturbating since I was little (of course, I didn’t know I was, I have to admit I found out much later on, and besides it was never under my panties but on) and at one point I started doing it thinking of straight sex. So you may ask “are you sure you were looking at male parts and not female parts?” and my answer is I was looking at both. I felt like I was excited about having a penis in me and stuff but when I was thinking about breasts, for example, I didn’t want to touch them or doing things to them or what, I wanted those things to be done on me. I was like 14 I guess and for a long time I felt ashamed about my thoughts also because I had NEVER kissed anyone nor had any slightest relationship with anyone AND I didn’t like penises. I guess it’s just I had never seen one and I was scared, I felt like it was something gross etc. And besides, I still wasn’t feeling that great arousal in front of male bodies. I don’t know if that makes sense? It never did to me and I was always thinking that one day I wouldn’t have been interested in guys and in straight relationships and sex anymore and would have started having feelings for girls. But, Jesus, it never happened. And that made me feel anxious about my friendships, about other girls showing too much skin off, about being alone with a friend not only in a room but also out on the street, about having a too close relationship with a girl friend, about talking too much to a girl, about a girl taking off a piece of clothing in front of me, about other gay or bisexual girls… I just wasn’t feeling pleasure, I was feeling stress and anxiety and I was sad because I felt like friendships with girls would have never been the same. I felt the pressure to avoid pictures of naked or half-naked girls and I felt like testing myself in front of picture of males. It was always difficult for me to approach boys and that’s why I wasn’t in relationships but that made me think it was because I didn’t actually like them, that as soon as I kissed one I would have felt nothing and stuff. A male friend of mine asked me if I was a lesbian since I could never get a boy to like me and I always failed at starting a relationship, and that made me feel SO angry because I didn’t want guys I liked to think that too and also because at the back of my mind there was this thing that had been haunting me for years. Last December I started becoming miserable. I watched the Connor Franta coming out video and it hit me so hard I couldn’t think of anything else. I started watching One Tree Hill and there was this girl, Anna, who was bi. I never really thought about bisexuality, I thought it was stupid… but since then I started looking up bisexuality online, stories of bisexual people etc. but while some of them made me feel better, others said that bisexuality was just a phase and that a lot of people then identified as gay. The more I told myself that I was gay in denial, the more I felt like it wasn’t the case. So I thought that bisexuality would fit me more… I started telling some friends and their responses made me feel even worse… some were saying that it could be just a phase (but towards what?), some were convinced that I was straight because I had never liked a girl (that led me to think about the times I got anxious about gay girls and other girls but as I compared them to real crushes, they were totally different), some said that they had felt the same but it had faded away and one of them totally DESTROYED me. She suggested I started thinking of myself doing things with girls and that FUCKED my head up. I would never want to do those things in real life, NEVER. And that made me even more confused. This confusion lasted MONTHS. I kept on having crushes on boys and checking boys on the streets. One boy hit on me via Facebook and, since I didn’t like him, I was telling myself that was because I was gay and I’d end up telling him “sorry I don’t have feelings for you, but I don’t have feelings for boys in general” AND THAT WAS NOT THE TRUTH! One of my crushes I knew he was gay (even though he still hadn’t said it publicly) and said “well, maybe we could do things together and we’ll find out together that we are gay”. Those thoughts were no-sense!! I wanted to make out with this guy and at the same time I was convinced I didn’t like boys. My mind was fucked up and the thoughts were sucking the life out of me. Finally, they stopped. I mean, I was still having doubts but at the end of May I started talking to a boy via WhatsApp. In Italy we have this public entity that gives the opportunity to children of people who work for the State to leave for journeys in Italy or abroad at a lower cost. Scotland was my fourth experience of this kind. So the other kids that were going to leave with me and I started talking via Facebook and WhatsApp. When I first texted this guy, I wasn’t thinking of hitting on him. AT ALL. It was just some random thing I wanted to talk to him about. A few days later, I texted him again for a different reason and again, it was not my intention to start anything weird. I realized I liked talking to him a lot, and I would just continue until one day it was him who texted me first. It wasn’t until I got “jealous” of another girl in the group that I realized I was interested in him. You know, I was always against getting to romantically know people via social networks but with him it didn’t feel wrong. Talking to him at least once a day made me feel peaceful and relaxed… however, I kinda screwed it up when I told him how I felt. I mean, he knew but that night he wanted to really KNOW and he made me say it. Actually, he was the first to say it, in a really non-chalantly way, (long story) and I just said it too afterwards. Why did I screw up? I felt like he owed me to be more open with me about his feelings, as I was with him. The fact is, it takes a lot of effort for him to express his feelings and of course he wouldn’t have wanted to do it via WA with a girl he barely knew. So I got a bit upset and I told him that maybe he was right when he had told me that we should talk less. And so we did and that was totally frustrating. I was scared that he might start talking to other girls and forget about me… anyways he didn’t. In July we finally left for the journey and met in person and we spent two weeks together… like TOGETHER. He was the first one to return my feelings, the first one to kiss me and the first one to touch my body and although he was also the first one to make my heart ache with pain, I felt so good when I was with him. Unfortunately, the “demon” inside me eventually showed up in two occasions. When we first kissed, it felt a lot weirder that I thought it would and I just started blaming myself because probably it was my fault. Anyway, I eventually understood that it was just the feeling of the first kiss because the other times that we kissed I felt pleasure and arousal. The second time the “demon” attacked, it was devastating and I felt like stabbing myself in the brain. It was the last day and I wanted to enjoy it fully and I was. It was our last night there and everyone was crying or hugging or what. I don’t even remember why the unwanted thoughts just started flowing in my head, I just know that while they were, the guy came to me and the tighter I held him, the more powerful the thoughts became. It was one of the worse sensations I had ever felt in my life. I wanted to be there with him but “I” was just there, at the back of my mind, not wanting me to enjoy him. The thought eventually went away and the guy and I spent the night together… we didn’t do it of course, I mean I barely knew him, but we were a bit more intimate than usual. You know when I said penises freaked me out? The constant double checking I went through got me feel I had to face this fear. So I just started looking at penises. Guys showing them off, sexual gifs… and I just understood it’s goddamn skin!!! And it makes no sense feeling scared about it. And having understood that, I started feeling sexually turned on by the thought of a guy taking his pants off more than of him taking his shirt off. Which felt weird but whatever… anyways, again, I was being more intimate with the guy and since he had kind of touched me there (and I say kinda because he was not really an expert and didn’t know what to do) , I felt the need to kind of touching him there too… at the beginning I didn’t want to and he understood that I was scared. Eventually I just did it and… I wasn’t the tiniest bit grossed out by it. It felt like I was doing the most natural thing in the world and I felt like doing it to him was just RIGHT. Anyway I failed at doing the handjob just as him… but HEY, I did in two weeks what I had never done in 17 years, so give me a break. After all of this, we just fell asleep. The following day we left. We live far away from each other so, at least for the time being, there’s no chance for us. We just parted ways and it was the most painful thing I have ever had to do. The week after our departure was kinda chill. Everyone was sharing photos, remembering things and the guy and I were still talking. However, the more I looked at our photos together, the more the “demon” was climbing up through my mind. The feeling became so strong that one day I told myself “from today onwards, I’ll start living as a lesbian, because if that’s what my minds is convinced I am, then that’s what I am”… I started crying the shit out. That was not what I wanted. I wanted to be with him and I wanted to think that there could still be a chance for us. I didn’t want to deny everything I had felt for him like my mind wanted me to. If I had become a lesbian, I would have never been able to touch him, hold him, kiss him the way I had done in Scotland if I had ever met him again. However, the intrusive thoughts wouldn’t let me think straight (what a word game). For three weeks now the double checking has been constant, the need to search for other gay and bisexual stories and stuff. I hate porn, but I started watching sexual gifs in order to understand what is turning me on the most. While I was looking for those things, I found someone talking about a particular type of obsessive-compulsive disorder called HOCD where the H stands for homosexual. I read about it and the most of the symptoms match. I would never give myself a diagnosis just because of information found on the Internet of course, but I can relate to the obsessive thoughts. The problem is they are not a 100% groundless as they should be in HOCD since I have been turned on by the female body before while getting aroused by the male body is harder for me. To me, If that really was the case, having a different sexual orientation would be 99% okay. Of course the 1% represent society, relatives and stuff but if that meant feeling comfortable with myself and my sexuality, I’d much rather be honest. I have 0 problems with the LGBT community, I am a full supporter. The problem is my mind is constantly fighting with my feelings. As I read “Empty Closets - A safe online community for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender people coming out” I didn’t feel like I belonged. I would really love to talk to someone about it but Italy is not the USA. I guess a lot of people there seek the help of a therapist but here if you do, you are labeled as problematic or crazy. I feel like if I told my parents, they would just think I am not straight and they would probably not consider it a real issue. But sometimes I feel like I will just have to deal with it forever and that it will drive me insane. I don’t care about my sexuality... I mean, I do but right now I just want this obsession to stop.
