I am an 18 year old female questioning my sexuality. For the majority of my life I have assumed I am/identified as straight, but for the last year or so I have been so unsure. I really want to be able to label myself for my own sanity, I respect that some people do not want to be categorised but for me, not anyone else, I just want to know who I am. My sexuality is a big part of my identity and I feel as though if I do not know my sexuality I do not know me. It scares me to be so unsure, I do not know if I am straight, bi-curious or bisexual (or perhaps another label of which I have not explored). To be clear, I will start by saying that as far as I remember, so far, I have never had a romantic interest in anyone of the same sex (other than trying to picture myself in a relationship with them). However, I have been sexually attracted to ‘femme’ (only) women, mostly people whom I have not met (i.e. celebrities), but some people whom are my acquaintances. I do not have any type of attraction towards any of my female friends because I can only think of them as, just that: friends and my natural instinct is to treat females as friends, not as people I could potentially be attracted to. I think if I did find I was something other than straight the thing I would be most scared of is my female friends distancing themselves from me because they think I would become obsessed with them all. I have good, open-minded friends but I just think it would change things; from their perspective, not mine. I am definitely romantically and sexually attracted to men, I have enjoyed sexual experiences with men and wanted to be in a relationship with certain men, of this I am sure. My natural instinct is to act differently (i.e. flirty) around men ever so slightly and find myself trying to impress them more and I become more self-conscious, even with friends (unlike how I feel with women). Throughout my childhood I always had crushes on the boys in my school and would play silly games with my friends about ‘your top 5 favourite boys’ and etc. but never even considered girls to be a part of it. From what I have heard people who have come out as gay, lesbian, bi etc. usually always knew or had an instinct of it, but I do not think I did before maybe the age of 15. Hence why I am confused, as I know the feelings I am having are not a straight girls thoughts but I do not know what exactly they are. I have always been a very sexual person, the earliest I remember myself masturbating is from when I was 6, even though I did not know what I was doing I always somehow knew it was taboo and I would hide and be embarrassed of it. I discovered porn when I was 11 and was searching on YouTube for videos of people kissing and saw a YouTube comment saying something along the lines of “why watch this when you can just search for porn”, and so I did and have been watching it ever since. Saying this, I would not have sex with just anyone, in fact I am a virgin, but have had sexual experiences, I have to be attracted to the person or at least feel comfortable in the situation. I have never shared any of this with anyone for a number of reasons: 1. I feel as though people will think I watch porn because I do not have a sex life of my own 2. I worry that I will be the only one and people will think it is perverted 3. I worry that people will think I am slutty or desperate. In regards to porn, I watch just as much lesbian porn as I do straight porn. This has always confused me because I would make what I think now could be excuses about why I watched lesbian porn, or focused on the female in straight porn. For example, because I liked to see them enjoying sex and would imagine it was me or because I am not generally not attracted to male porn stars (or female, but mostly male). Once one of my female friends told me she had had a sexual experience with a girl and I found myself being jealous, not because I wanted that with her (because I cannot picture my female friends sexually) but I wanted it with the girl she had been with, or just another girl, but solely sexually as I was not even that big a fan of her as a person. The furthest I have gone with a girl is a kiss when I was 14 and I pinned it down to ‘drunken banter’, and did not really think anything of it. In my early teens I was best friends with a boy who I remember casually coming out as bisexual to. He had earlier told me that he watched and was turned on by lesbian porn and I do not remember if I said it because I was trying to impress him *DISCLAIMER: my more educated 18 year old self would obviously never do this now* (and also a girl who I really looked up to who always said she was bisexual) or if I was really having those feelings. Although I do not understand my feelings I think I can say that I am not straight and I would hope to be able to label myself as bisexual, even though I do not fully identify with that category or feel fully comfortable using that label (please do not let this influence your advice, I am giving you permission to share your thoughts, do not hold back). Ultimately, I am confused, I wish I was someone who knew how they felt and did not question it but I really do not know and I desperately need someone to help me find my way, tell me what they think I am (PLEASE). I am also very sorry about how long this is but I felt as though everything included was relevant as my feelings are not black and white. Thank you for listening.
This means nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing. All of that and less. That's the first point to make here: relax. Porn is designed to turn you on, regardless of your orientation. And you also guessed some more perfectly reasonable reasons. If watching lesbian porn meant you were gay, practically all women would be gay. But don't stop. You're not a perv, slutty or desperate. But still, regardless of that... you sound like someone who sort of "wants" to be bi. The term is definitely bi-curious for you. But that term rarely lasts. You wind up doing something about it (or not) and figure out a label. My recommendation: read other peoples' posts on this forum. You will get a much better picture of what's common (your feelings!) and what people do about them.
It's possible you might be closer to bisexual, since 1. You are still sexually attracted to men. 2. You felt jealous of a friend having sexual experiences with women. However, two points I have to make here: First, the fact that you are more attracted to celebrities and acquaintances than friends is not a sexuality. Some lesbians are only attracted to people they know, others only attracted to people they don't know, and others do both. Personally, I am a lesbian that has mostly only been attracted to friends, but they don't take offense or distance themselves from me either. It's simply never happened. For the porn thing, porn doesn't actually tell you what your sexuality is. There are a lot of straight women that prefer lesbian porn, and a lot of lesbians that prefer gay male porn, but it has nothing to do with attraction to the actors. For example, some straight women prefer lesbian porn because straight porn can be violent or sexist. They want to identify with women enjoying themselves even if they aren't attracted to the other women. Some lesbians view lesbian porn as unrealistic and cringy, so they watch gay porn because the scenery is more passionate (despite not liking the men involved). I wouldn't think too much into that.
First of all, no-one can tell you what your sexuality is (as great as that would be), so rely on your own instincts over anything said here. Given everything you’ve said, it seems pretty clear that you like men, so I wouldn’t consider you gay. However, I’d say you’re probably not 100% straight, since it’s been playing on your mind for so long and your thought process is so well-thought-out. I can’t speak for straight people, but I doubt those who know they’re completely heterosexual would doubt themselves in such depth. (Saying that, there’s absolutely nothing wrong or inherently not straight about questioning your sexuality, so don’t take that as an automatic indicator. Plenty of people have questioned themselves to find they’re completely straight, and it doesn’t make them any less straight than before). Just to begin, I’d say the type of porn you watch isn’t really relevant in this situation – masturbation/fantasies tend to be a much better indicator. I’ve heard that a lot of straight girls watch lesbian porn for varying reasons. For the record, it absolutely does NOT make you slutty or desperate – people with and without healthy sex lives watch it, and it’s nothing to be ashamed of. It might be worth noticing, outside of porn, whether girls feature in your sexual thoughts at all, as that probably has a better bearing on who you are or aren’t attracted to. What you’ve mentioned about your friends probably isn’t worth worrying about either – regardless of sexuality, everyone has friends that they see as purely platonic. As for their reaction, I understand the fear even if they’re open-minded. However, they are NOT your friends if they react badly to a situation where you might not be straight. It might take them time to process things, but if they’re uncomfortable then they’re not worth having in the first place. Though it might sound daunting now, can you imagine yourself with a girl in the future? The kiss you had when you were younger doesn’t sound particularly remarkable, but then neither was my first experience – you can be attracted to a certain gender without enjoying all experiences with them. Would you be happy to kiss a girl in the future? Can you imagine yourself doing anything further, or having a relationship? The fact that you seemed jealous of your friend’s experience with a girl suggests you might want that in some way. As for the fact that you seem to be sexually but not romantically attracted to girls, that’s nothing to worry about. Some people have differing sexual and romantic attractions and that’s totally valid. However, sometimes it can be the result of denial/heteronormativity - I know I started off thinking “I like girls but I’d never date one!”. Also, it’s pretty common not to realise these feelings until later in life, especially if you’ve liked boys from a young age as you have. Sometimes it just takes some time and self-acceptance for your feelings to change (if they do at all). Obviously you don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to, but maybe you might get some relief from thinking about whether you actually want to pursue something with a girl. Perhaps not what you want to hear right now since you see sexuality as such a big part of your identity, but there’s no rush in finding out what you are. I know it’s so frustrating and confusing when you’re questioning yourself, but some things can’t be overanalysed and only come with time. I’ve identified as gay for about a year now and there are still days where I doubt myself. I’m sorry to hear you’re confused right now, I hope things are cleared up for you soon Sorry for sending you an essay, but feel free to PM if you want to talk about anything else!
Thank you so much for your reply! I couldn't figure out how to reply to you underneath the thread because I am new to this, so I hope I have done it right. :icon_bigg Don't apologize for the length, I need all the help I can get. With regards to your questions: Would you be happy to kiss a girl in the future? Definitely, under the right circumstances (if it was someone I did not know well and who I was attracted to, obviously). Can you imagine yourself doing anything further, or having a relationship? To answer the first half of this question, definitely yes, but the part that confuses me is whether this is experimental or something more because where things get blurry is at the second part of your question. Yes, I can imagine it but whether or not I feel fully comfortable with it, I don't know. I can definitely see the glamorized side of it because as I am a femme attracted to femme girls (from my experience so far) I do think it seems ideal, I just find it scary that I don't know for sure. I wish there was a word that underneath it had the definition of exactly what I am feeling so I could identify with it, because at the moment I wouldn't feel completely comfortable or satisfied with being told I am or identifying as straight, it just doesn't seem true, and I don't completely identify with being bisexual because so far my feeling are purely sexual and non-romantic. Thank you again!
Thank you for replying! I really appreciate it. What you have said makes complete sense and I will think more about it.
Thank you very much! I will look on the forum, I am new to this so I think it could be helpful for me in figuring things out. I also now understand that 'bi-curious' is a temporary term and so I might identify as that for the time being until I understand whether I am straight, bi or something else.
You are so polite. I predict your social skills (yes you have them!) will lead to a lucky girlfriend some day soon. Whether it lasts... as the saying goes: prediction is difficult, especially of the future.
