Most of the time i'm sure i am not straight but occasionally, like right now I think "what if my mind just wants me to be different" , and right now...I do want to be gay if that means spending my life loving a woman. but listening to myself say this sounds like I am choosing my sexuality? I am worried that my subconcious is just trying to be different, even though I am so hyper aware of actively trying not to be different i.e. to fit in. and so i put it to myself that i could be straight, despite not wanting to be with a guy, but then would someone question for nearly four years if they were straight? and then I wonder why consuming gay media is the only thing that can temporarily fill that void of isolation caused by my sexuality. and i wonder about my female crushes, especially the one that consumed me for a couple of years...could i just have wanted to be her? and what about my "crush" on a guy at age 12? which was really just me wanting to impress him and blushing all the time...surley that makes me straight? but now, looking back after truly feeling for someone, i see how shallow it was. help a girl out, i'm having a new year, not so new identity crisis
Tough question and I don't have a solid answer. If the answer to the questioning is not satisfactory, I'd say that yes someone could question for four entire years and maybe more . Some neuroscientists' work does back up the buddhist idea that a static self is an illusion, and that we are all constantly changing and there is a certain malleability in the self,.. basically we are not statues so maybe the gender identity is affected by that as well. . On the other side there are also researchers that show that there are brain structures, which do not change throughout life, and that correlate with sexual preference so gender identity therefor is a hard constant and it does not move once you are not afraid to see it and accept it for what it is. ---------- Post added 4th Jan 2017 at 03:44 PM ---------- Correction, for the third paragraph: I remember the research i was referring to was done on dead individuals via autopsy, so the fact that those structures change or do do not change throughout life was not established. It was just established that, at the time of the autopsy they were consistently in a way in cis people, and consistently in another way in gay people. The fact that these structures were fixed throughout life was an assumption on my part based on other opinions and research I have come across, and not part of the actual research I was referring to.
I'm questioning my sexuality for years, it's complicated to but when I was a kid I like dressing like a tomboy and doing boyish activities. Then I grew into a phase where I wanted to fit in so I dressed girly and liked boys. I don't think I'm all that it but getting boys to like me was never hard. I was on an on and off phase in high school one day I'm girly the next sweatpants and ties etc. I wanted to go to prom with a girl but I didn't have a date so I didn't want to go and was forced to go with a stuck up guy. Anyways I graduated ended up dating a guy who I thought I loved got pregnant and married later. May sound weird but on the day I got married I just wanted to run away. I've been separated for awhile after three kids later. I've dated a woman and it felt great like I could be myself. Only issue is I'm afraid that I'll be terrible with the sex part so I shit down every time it's mentioned. I want to but I deal out like I'm going to fail. Long story short she left me. I find doing guys boring and I'm not sexually attracted to them. I'm so confused because I know my family feels I can't be gay or bi
Your title question could be interpreted in two ways: 1) If someone were straight, would they question it for 4 years? I think the answer to that is probably "no". However I suspect you meant the following: 2) Would someone who was not straight spend 4 years questioning it? The short answer to that is "yep." Definitely. Very common. If you browse around on EC you will find this is one of the most common questions, or issues that arise in the bodies of the postings. This is not to minimize or brush away your experience, more like to say "Hey dear, you have company." I'll go farther to say good company, based on the thoughtful (in both senses) way that people on this forum relate and advise. Actually looking back on what I read and just wrote, you could have had (maybe not intentionally) both meanings in mind. Because in both cases, my answers suggest the same thing: that you could be gay or bi. Yikes I hope I haven't just tangled the web of yarn even more, as we were trying to straighten it out (no pun intended). Post more about yourself and maybe we can figure more things out.
