My romantic and sexual orientation are different. Thoughts?

For a while now I have been identifying as a lesbian because I can only see myself ending up with a woman. I am sexually attracted to women, get strong crushes on women (which I can't help getting-- you'll see why I mention this in a second), but have never fallen in love with a woman. I have never been sexually attracted to men and have had lots of weak crushes on men due to feeling as though I needed to have a crush. I have, from my understanding of what romantic love is, fallen in love with both of my boyfriends despite me not being sexually attracted to them.

Since I seem to be romantically drawn to both men and women and because I am only sexually attracted to women I thought biromantic lesbian would be a good label. However, I just spent a lot of time on tumblr reading about the label and watched how so many lesbians felt so defensive of the term lesbian and felt that it could only mean that someone is exclusively romantically and sexually attracted to women. That description does not fit me very well.

I know labels are subjective and everyone interprets them differently but I can't help but feel that no label accurately fits me. Some might say that bisexual would be a good fit for me. However, I don't identify with the bisexual label as I am not sexually attracted to men. I can't see myself having a fulfilling relationship with a man, despite my capacity to have romantic feelings towards them. I can't be with a sexual man as I won't be able to satisfy him and I also can't be with a man because I am a sexual person who would want to have sex with women. Therefore, bisexual seems like an improper fit as I'm not interested in dating men.

One possible explanation is that the feelings I have had for men are actually platonic, and I have simply interpreted my feelings for them as romantic due to heteronormativity. However, this doesn't seem to fit either as the feelings I had for my boyfriends were unlike those I've had for friends.

It could also be that my sexuality has changed and that I am truly lesbian (not sexually or romantically attracted to men) but was biromantic in the past. I haven't felt strong romantic attraction to men since I was 18 (once the honey moon phase of my most recent relationship with a man ended). <-- this may be disputed, but our relationship felt much more platonic to me after approximately 6 months.

Part of me just want to identify as queer and explain what that means to me when people ask. Aka I am romantically attracted to men and women (and possible non-binary) but only sexually attracted to women.

I also think part of the reason I have hung onto the lesbian label is because I feel more part of the LGBT community when I use that label. When I consider identifying as queer or bi I don't feel "gay enough".

Does anyone have any thoughts about this?

 

First of all, thank you for sending me that link. It was a helpful way of thinking about my relationships. To clarify, you think that romantic love is closest to eros? Because if that's true I've never experienced that in any of my relationships. I've dated 1 woman and 2 men and I have never experienced this as I was not sexually attracted to any of them.

My first relationship with my girlfriend was purely philia. We were really close friends and she really wanted to date me so it kind of just happened. I never really fell for her though.
My first boyfriend was primarily a ludus type of love. We didn't even last two months though (he broke up with me because he cheated on me). From the start we were very playful and always interacted with each other by playing games or flirting.
My second and most recent boyfriend was a mix of philia and pragma. There was a touch of ludus at the beginning but never eros as there wasn't sexual attraction (for me at least). Our relationship came out of friendship, there was a bit of an euphoric state, but then it quickly settled into pragma. At least for me it did.

When it comes to labeling, I have been the most comfortable calling my self a lesbian until I saw how some lesbians really hate it when biromantic people call themselves lesbians rather than bisexuals. However, upon reflection it may seem like I need to do more exploring when it comes to my romantic attractions. I don't feel like looking at my relationships gives me an answer as to what my romantic orientation is as I never dated anyone because I wanted to. I dated people either because I was insecure and wanted someone to make me feel worthy of love, or it was because they simply wanted to date me (I passively accepted because I didn't value my feelings as important). I have had crushes on men and women, but my crushes on women tend to be more spontaneous and harder to get over (probably because sexual attraction is also involved). With men I can feel emotionally drawn to them but can usually get over them easily (the exceptions being my boyfriends as I was close to them).

---------- Post added 20th Jan 2017 at 01:08 PM ----------

Thanks for your comment. It is nice to see a lesbian that is accepting of a bit of diversity within the lesbian label rather than just including people who are exclusively physically and emotionally attracted to women. What I found interesting about these lesbians on tumblr was that they were very accepting of asexual lesbians as they are only attracted to women (but only romantically), but were very hateful towards people that were only sexually attracted to women but their romantic orientation was more fluid. They claimed that there was no room for fluidity in the lesbian label. To me this doesn't seem right, as I've seen quite a bit of diversity among people who identify as lesbians.

 

I completely agree. It is completely unnecessary to be policing peoples' identities and I don't understand why some lesbians feel like they can label others. I find this particularly annoying as research has shown that romantic attraction is much more fluid than sexual attraction, especially in women.

Also, I'm sorry to hear that people have been telling you that you need to identify as asexual. I think that's ridiculous considering you are actually demisexual. I am a sexual person but I also do not identify with the hypersexuality that you described either. I like to wait a bit because I want to be able to trust someone before I get too vulnerable/sexual. So you are definitely not alone when it comes to not wanting to be physical with women you barely know.

 

So I just had a few questions about what you said.

From what I have read about Eros it appears as though there is a sexual attraction aspect to it. Do you believe that's true? Because if so, doesn't this seem to suggest that sexual and romantic attraction only occur together. What do you think about that? Just curious because I have been reading up on it and some people think that the only thing that makes a romantic relationship different is the sexual nature of it. For me that might mean that some of the strong feelings I have had for these boys were not actually romantic attractions or that I am mildly attracted to men (even writing about being sexually attracted to men seemed really wrong to me... So unlikely). Thoughts?

I agree I shouldn't let labels define me. Perhaps more of the frustration here is not understanding how I could be homosexual if I have had such strong feelings and have been sexual with men in the past. Without understanding that it is hard for me to want to come out as I feel like I won't have strong evidence to support me (I'm femme so I'm expecting to be questioned by everyone when I come out).

 

This might end up being a long post. I apologize.

So first of all, your last question is a good one. It is actually something my therapist asked me because I was struggling with how my relationship with my ex-girlfriend made me feel less gay. It was abusive, so it makes sense that I wouldn't fall in love with her. Even though I cared for her deeply. To answer your question, there really is no reason. I think my problem is that I keep watching too many coming out stories on YouTube and it is more typical for these lesbians to have dated guys before they started dating girls. They felt like being with a girl for the first time was a huge realization. For me... It was not. Being in a relationship with her actually made me believe I was straight. Which gets me into talking about my ex-boyfriends.

5 months after breaking up with my ex-girlfriend, I went to a friend's birthday party. She invited two guys. There were a lot games at the party (hide-and-seek and twister). Of course twister can get a bit sexual. Me and this guy were both very competitive people and I wanted to win every game against him. That included us getting into somewhat sexual positions in twister. It was pretty clear from some of the things he said that he was into me. The idea that he was into me made me so excited. Since I was 12 I had desperately wanted a boyfriend. The next day my best friend and ex-girlfriend got a text message from him asking if I was single and if I was a lesbian (I think because I hung out with this girl who was openly bi people started rumors). When my friend told me what he had said 1)I got so excited and 2)I panicked because I thought people had known about my relationship with her. I started to obsess. All I could think about was whether or not he liked me or not. My friend gave the boy my number and he started texting me. He sent me the dumbest text message "Is this the hot girl from my math class?"... My heart skipped a beat when I saw this and got really excited. Soon all I could do was think about him or desperately wait for him to text me back. We eventually went on a date and him holding my hand made me feel warm/cared for. I liked the feeling of him being close to me. I loved it when we cuddled. It was great when we made out and actually one of the first times we did I thought "Thank God! This means I'm not gay!". However, anything to do with touching him made me uncomfortable, but I really liked him touching me. He left for 10 days, and it felt like forever. He came back and was really distant. He eventually drove me home one day and broke up with me on my drive way. He wouldn't tell me why, but I learned from a friend later that it was because he had cheated on me while he was away. For about a week, all I could do was cry. It took me about a month before I stopped crying regularly. I was at such a low point and did some pretty stupid things at the time. The whole relationship with him is so weird to me because I never thought he was physically attractive until I started to "fall for him". I also was not attracted to his personality at all but I would overlook his flaws (including some really awful stuff he did to me) just because I wanted him to like me. Looking back, I'm so embarrassed I dated him because we had nothing in common. We were just two competitive people who were apparently really horny. When I look at his pictures now I still don't find him attractive, plus I think some pretty colourful things about him as a person too.
TLDR: I was really excited and obsessive whenever I thought about us being together. He was all I could think about when we were in a relationship. I felt euphoric and had a hard time focusing on anything else. I was heart broken when he broke up with me. It took me a really long time to feel better and I haven't felt that heart broken since.

I met my second boyfriend during my first year of university. He apparently had a crush on me for a long time. Me... I was not thinking about him in that way. I had gotten more self confidence since high school and was a bit more selective of who I wanted to be with. I explored my options since I wasn't that interested. I was accused of giving him mixed signals during that time since sometimes it appeared as though I was flirting with him and then I would flirt with another guy. Honestly, I don't remember intentionally flirting with him. Anyways... We grew a bit closer as friends and he got a bit more confident in trying to pursue me. He tried to cuddle me and would let him as I still hadn't reached a point in my self confidence where I felt like I could say no. I kind of wanted it though too... As I was really lonely all the time... I felt like being single was the worst feeling ever. Eventually he asked me out and I said "sure" (because I was so clearly in love--sarcasm... but still couldn't say no). I got to know him even better and we started getting physical. That's when it started feeling a little euphoric to me. I wanted to explore myself sexually with him... Even though I had admitted to myself that I was not attracted to him and I did not like him that way. Being physical with him turned out to not be something I enjoyed and eventually that excited/obsessive/euphoric feeling went away. I felt really close to him as he was now my best friend, and cared a lot about what he thought and felt. We eventually started fighting all the time because I didn't want to have sex with him... So eventually we broke up. I started to question my sexuality again 4 months before we broke up. During that time I wanted to break up with him so bad, but had a hard time doing so because I didn't want to lose him as a friend. I stuck it out because I didn't feel like I had a choice. When we did break up we still hung out as friends. It was really hard for me to not get myself into bad situations. If was horny, sometimes I would call him over and we would do stuff. If I was lonely, I would invite him over to cuddle. I just couldn't let go of him... Even though I didn't feel attracted to him. I eventually had to end the friendship as I couldn't see myself stopping my behaviour. I knew it was self-destructive and I needed to stop using someone like that. I needed to find the sexual and romantic companionship I craved from someone where it wouldn't be empty. Looking back now... The only thing I really miss about him was how close we were as friends and how he would listen to all of my problems... Even those concerning my sexuality. He cared for me until the very end.
TLDR: No excitement until we got physical. Once I realized I didn't really like it, that feeling went away. I loved him deeply as a friend... and to this day is the closest I've ever been to another person. When he started to sleep with other people I was hurt and jealous. I think this was because sex was something that was very personal and special to me... and it really hurt that he would just give that away to someone else. That and the girl he slept with really hated me so it felt like a betrayal. It took me weeks to stop crying over that, but I got over it quicker than my previous boyfriend.

I only mention the context as I think it is important. In high school I was so insecure that I wore a full face of make up and heat styled my hair everyday. This took me 2 and a half hours every single day to do. I was obsessed with dressing in a feminine/attractive way. I always thought people were talking about me... and not in a good way. I struggled with my self image and only let myself be around 100 pounds. Now I'm a lot better... I don't feel like I have to wear a ton of makeup. I still do have to wear eye makeup or else I feel uncomfortable. But I can wear no makeup occasionally. I also don't heat style my hair and I wear what I want to wear. What I have been choosing to wear has actually been a bit tomboyish. I feel much more comfortable with myself overall and while I might still struggle with this feeling of insecure attachment in future relationships, I feel like I will only pursue relationships with people I'm genuinely into from now on.

---------- Post added 22nd Jan 2017 at 03:47 PM ----------

How did you eventually come to the conclusion that these feelings were due to heteronormativity?

 

First of all, thank you Bunnydee for reading this. I know you aren't a therapist and probably without more context this wouldn't all make sense. That and I understand that the post was heavily emotional charged and probably difficult to read (not exactly the most positive thing) so thank you.

I just wanted to clarify a few things. First of all, what do you mean by heterohomophobia? I've never seen the term before (I've heard of heterosexism and homophobia though). Are you saying that I'm experiencing homophobia typical of heterosexual people?

Also to clarify. Between my girlfriend and first boyfriend there was 5 months. Between my first and second boyfriend there was a year. I dated my girlfriend for 5 months, my first boyfriend for almost 2 months, and my most recent boyfriend for 2 and a half years. I'm just saying this as I'm not sure if my second boyfriend was really a rebound.

I guess you can kinda of see why I'm confused. I had lots of heterosexual feelings during my life, but right now I can only see myself ever being physical with a woman. I don't look at guys and think they are hot (I never have). Yet I've been able to get a lot out of them emotionally over the years. Meanwhile, I've been admiring girls physically for as long as I can remember, without me getting much out of them emotionally (with a few exceptions). I have only been having very strong crushes on women once I accepted that I experience sexual attraction to women.