How did you know if you were lesbian/gay or bi?

I'm very much like you were/are = with the genders reversed obviously. I dated women until my early 20s. I had been with several girls, in a few relationships, but I never really felt "excited" or "thrilled." I was always left feeling some sort of shade of confused and unfulfilled.

About 5 years ago during my last girlfriend, I was my most confused. Since about the age of 12 I've had feelings toward guys, but sort of repressed/hid them. My guy friends all dated girls, and I desperately wanted to be like them; to be "normal." As time wore on with my girlfriend, I was always left wanting more than what I was getting. Plus around that time I really noticed / began to come to terms with checking guys out. At the beach, I would spend 90% of my time looking at dudes, and sort of deny to myself what I was really doing. And it started to become too much.

Finally, around the time we broke up I had to take a hard look in the mirror and realize I wasn't happy because I wasn't being true to myself.

It would take another year before I finally found myself having my first kiss with a guy and that confirmed everything about what felt so wrong with girls. I didn't like girls at all. The kiss felt so right. I wanted him so bad.

It's not uncommon for LGBT people to through what you're going through. See, a LOT of people are some degree of bisexual. It's not all that common for people to be 100% gay or 100% straight and have ZERO attraction to the other sex. It's just that people spent their lives stuck in their perspective roles. Sometimes out of fear/societal pressures, other times simply because while they may have some slight feelings for people outside of their singular sexuality, it's not strong enough to want to act physically on those feelings.

Anyways, if you want to chat more, feel free to message me on my wall. Also, you might want to check out The Kinsey Scale and take the Kinsey Test to get a sense of what your attractions really are. It seems likely you're about a Kinsey 4, but try the test out for yourself.

 

There's definitely a lot of pressure on girls to be interested in guys so with all the messages you've been getting since birth it's not weird that you would be confused about your feelings toward them. Plenty of lesbian/bi women have had similar issues sorting out if their attraction to men was real or just an ingrained societal expectation. I'm glad you decided to vent about it, and we are always here to support you!

As for how I knew, I suspected it as a child but didn't have the words to really figure it out, also the homophobia of my family and friends prevented me from considering it as an option. In grade school I briefly came out as bi but was told that every straight girl has sexual/romantic feelings for girls and it's normal and as long as I like guys I'm straight, so I crawled right back in the closet until my senior year of high school, where I dated my first girlfriend and subsequently was forced to deal with my sexual orientation haha.

 

I knew I was gay when I fell in love for a guy.
Before that, I was mildly interested in girls.

 

I've considered myself bi for years, while simultaneous ignoring it. I had to be bi. I've got kids and most of my relationships have been with men.
Now, after coming out to my male partner as bi, I'm realising that I'm not bi at all. I'm lesbian. At last, I'm trying it on for size and seeing how it fits lol.
Right now, it feels right and explains a lot about me. And I feel like I've come out of hiding finally. It feels much better than bi ever did. Maybe I questioned if I was bi for so long, because I wasn't?

Anyway. Just use whatever feels right, no matter whatever anyone else thinks.

 

Oh, also, I saw Lucy Lawless as Xena




and I couldn't deny it anymore..

 

Well, I'm still figuring stuff out, but I've basically never liked guys. Like, I have friends who are guys, but I feel zero romantic or sexual attraction to them. I can't even really appreciate when guys are good looking.... I started noticing that when I was watching a movie with a pretty couple, I would be watching and thinking about the girl and how great she looked, and not the guy.

 

hmm lets see, when did i know i wasn't straight?... well when i was thirteen, i found my dads porn file on the computer, so many..."lady bits" and i ended up staring at it for a ridiculously long time, and i just kept thinking why? why am a looking a regular 13 year old girl would not be looking at this, and i shut the file really fast and went back to Narnia..also her

 

I should have realised when I signed up for a game at 13 years old that was supposed to be 16+, so I sort of made up a character for myself which involved me pretending to be bisexual. But I never dwelled too much upon why...

And then... I don't know, I began to question it around 14, and then all of a sudden my current best friends brother developed a crush on me and wanted to hold my hand and stuff, and I really liked him as a person but I realised that I couldn't date him. Or any boy, I just didn't like them. And then I realised I was gay. Whoop whoop.

During the denial phase I had, I pretended to have such an avid interest in boys. I convinced myself that I loved my ex from year 5 (I was 10 when I dated him) and forced myself to have a crush on Jack, our French TA. And now I look back at it and cringe.

 

You don't have to hate men to be gay. In fact I had fun on some dates with guys more than with women because it was like hanging out with a friend. So it's possible you haven't met the right guy yet, that because you like them as a friend you could one day develop romantic feelings. But if you find you enjoy dating women and go with that for a while, eventually you can ask yourself if you miss dating men. If you don't, well then maybe that's not the kind of relationship you seek with men.

My general experience was not one of realizing I don't like the opposite gender; it was of realizing that I can like people of the same gender in a much more world-shattering, life-changing, genuine way. At first I thought I was bi because I had had decent experiences dating men, and I didn't want to limit my options. But as time went on I realized i wouldn't miss dating men at all. I was always waiting for some sign that I didn't like men, but it never came. There are men I love having in my life. But by and large my life since dating women has been so much better and that's sign enough that I'm going in the right direction!

 

I've always liked women and men but denied my attraction to men for a long time. I know now that I'm bi because I'm attracted to both genders on all levels. Physical, emotional, mental, romantic, sexual, etc.

 

@Guitar, your post really resonated with me. I don't have the ability to send private messages yet, but is there be any other way I can talk to you?

 

You can chat on your walls. A lot of us do that

 

Well...I knew who I was attracted to...and some were girls and some were guys.

And I knew the kinds of things I fantasized about doing...and some required a woman, and some required a man.

It was pretty easy to figure it out from there.

 

Well, I never had feelings for a guy before so I didn't think I was gay, even though I masturbated to men. Things just didn't add up, and that was because I was basing what gay meant off of stereotypes, which I did not fit.

The reason why I identify as gay now is because relationship wise it is not possible for me to be with women in that way. Period.

 

For me it was realizing that hey, I, personally, can be attracted to girls sexually. Growing up with lots of close girlfriends, I kinda always assumed that every straight girl was "a little gay" and I was able to dismiss it. Part of it was mentally maturing and realizing the difference between my romantic, sexual, and aesthetic attractions. Looking back, it's really ridiculous to look at how far my brain went to convince myself I wasn't anything other than straight.

Then, finally realizing that I was pan opened up a lot of new doors I hadn't thought about before, like what's my romantic identity? (which I'm still questioning) and what's MY gender identity?

The jury's still out on that one, but basically what I've discovered is:

1. that people's gender identity and genitalia don't really affect who I feel attracted to
2. I have no idea what the hell gender is so screw that

 

I never really thought that being gay was an option. I always thought if someone were gay they would know it definitively when they were young. I looked at women, and I sometimes deep down didn't know whether I thought I wanted to be them, or have sex with them. I thought that all girls checked out other women and thought about things like that. I guess I was in denial because when the gay rights stuff started being on the news and stuff, I started thinking about it and it kind of explained everything. I was in a relationship with a man and I was extremely unhappy and unfulfilled. I didn't understand why I didn't enjoy sex or looking at him, or anything. I said okay, I must be bisexual then. When I finally left him and started dating a woman, everything fell into place and I realized that I'm a lesbian. I think I knew I was gay the first time we slept together. There's just nothing like it.

I agree with justaqueerhere. I can't believe how long I went without knowing who I was because my mind was trying so hard to convince the rest of me that I was straight. I struggled with it for a while but I'm coming to grips with it and I'm becoming proud of who I am.

 

This is me too. From the age of puberty, I was fascinated by women. I would be enchanted with women who I thought were beautiful, sophisticated, and kind. I didn't know if I was envious or was attracted to them. As a teenager I engaged in sex with both boys and girls. Around 18 or so I began to fantasize about women and realized I was attracted to them but continued to be in a heterosexual relationship. It wasn't until almost 10 years after that I even started questioning my sexuality. I had a husband of 7 years and more than one affair. About a year later I had this movement inside of me and I thought, OMG how did I not know this before! In retrospect it is glaringly obvious that I loved women and didn't particularly enjoy men.

 

Welcome to EC! It's a truly fantastic place. (!)

I was interested in female bodies from early childhood, and I think even before I saw myself as female. It may even have been when my "femaleness" got shoved down my throat that I started to realize I could not fit in with the world the way it wanted me to. I don't know if that means I'm confused about my gender - I'm confused about the concept of gender altogether since I was pretty much raised to be a geek more than a "girl."

A lifetime of looking at women and feeling it was wrong to want to touch them... that's how I knew I was seriously repressed anyway! As to what it says about my sexual preference... I am still on a journey to understanding that.

I don't think this was any help at all - but at any rate, welcome!!!

(&&&)​