Hi there! ^^ So, I've been on here for a little while now, and, since joining, have come out to pretty much everyone in my life as bi and even have an amazingly awesome girlfriend that I met back in October. My life has changed so much for the better, and I've honestly never been happier nor have I ever felt truer to myself. Thing is, though... maybe I'm not actually bi? In hindsight, I should have realized my attraction to women back in the 8th grade (huge teacher crush), but I didn't really realize I wasn't straight until 2010, and hadn't accepted it until early last year. I am 26 and have had relationships with only 2 guys in the past, each lasting only around 1 year and there were like 5 years between them. I've never really been *that* interested in men. Sure, I had a few guy/ celebrity crushes, but never for the guys that most girls go gaga over. A chiseled body never really did anything for me, nor ruggedness. I always preferred rounder, cuter men. And the men I was attracted to were very few and far between. Women, though? I am attracted to WAY more women. I notice them more. I get, erm, turned on by them more. After only 2 months, I am already enjoying being in a relationship with a woman way more than I ever did with a man. I have found that I *definitely* have a preference for women. I'd say the ratio would be somewhere around 20:80, and that might be being generous. I'd be perfectly content, honestly, never being with another man. So.. is it enough to say that I'm bi with a preference towards women? Or am I homoflexible? Or perhaps even gay? My friend thinks it's a possibility that I'm actually gay, because honestly, my interest in men has dropped even more since coming out and being truer to myself. But, on some level, I still get turned on by the male body, and I did enjoy sex with the men I was with. That fact doesn't just go away now, does it? I did talk to my girlfriend about this (who is out as a lesbian but actually considers herself more bisexual homoromantic), and she thinks I lean more towards being homoflexible. *sigh* I'm so confused. Just when you think you have it all figured out. What do you guys think?
Most bisexuals do not have 50/50 attraction to both sexes. "Homoflexible" is just another word for Kinsey-5 bisexuals (bisexual with strong preference for same-sex). It's not its own sexuality. If you would be "perfectly content, honestly, never being with another man," then why does it matter? What's to be confused about, really? You like who you like, right? Some have been guys, but most have been women. That's enough to comfortably call yourself bisexual...if you even need to call yourself anything.
I'm a person that needs order in their life, so having a label to go by helps me, I guess. And I guess the confusion comes from the sudden shift in my interests. I mean, I thought I was straight for a good portion of my life (albeit not overly interested), but now I notice my interest in guys fading more and more, though I *did* enjoy being with guys in the past. I guess I'm still just getting used to this and the emergence of all these repressed feelings/desires. Thank you.
How can you say that it is not its own sexuality? Do you sit in other peoples heads and can measure their private experience? Anyone who places themselves somewhere on the Kinsey scale does this for a particular reason, and those reasons will be different. One Kinsey 5 person might be bisexual, because they could be with both, another might be gay but have some low level attraction to people of opposite gender to a level where they would not consider being with them- they would choose to all themselves homoflexible to signal that they are not capable of equally strong connections with both genders. It very much *is* its own thing.
I agree with biAnnika, except that I can't address what is or isn't it's own category of sexuality. Some people prefer to group a variety of orientations under the bisexual umbrella, and others want something more precise. If you aren't ruling out the possibility of men in your life at some point, some sort of bi or homoflexible label seems accurate. If that's the case but you want to call yourself a lesbian because you don't think you'll date any more men, that's fine even if you have a past history of being with men. I'd probably opt for some sort of bisexual label if you don't know if you'll go back to men. There was a time I thought I'd never get involved with a man (after some unenlightened experimentation in high school), but I'm with one now.
With sexuality labels, I use the same convention that we use for handedness. Handedness is another one of our orientations, and like sexuality, it exists as a spectrum. The difference is that, with handedness, we aren't influenced by stigmas or societal pressures when deciding on a label. When we call ourselves right-handed or left-handed, it doesn't mean that we use only one hand for every task, to the exclusion of the other. It means that we have a dominant hand. And that's how I approach sexuality labels. If you have a dominant sexuality, you are straight or gay. From your description, it sounds like you have a dominant sexuality. Therefore, I think gay works perfectly well as a label. To call yourself bisexual would be to hide the fact that you have a definite preference for women. I suppose homoflexible could work as well, but not everyone is familiar with that term.
I love this analogy. I'm going to use it from now on when explaining things to people (and I'm left-handed, so either way I'm of the minority).
