When I was a kid I was attracted to girls. I thought every other girl was attracted to girls as well. I did hear about girls starting to like boys at puberty and I assumed it would happen to me as well. When I was about ten I started to check out other girl's bodies. I thought this was because I was looking forward to puberty. I thought this was normal as well so I just ignored it. When I was eleven I noticed that other girls were starting to talk about boys. I assumed they were only talking about boys because they wanted to seem more mature. I knew I didn't like boys yet. When I was twelve I was starting to like girls even more. I also noticed that the other girls were becoming boy crazy. That made me feel immature. When I was making my Facebook account I remember having to fill in the interested in part of my profile. I put in men even though I wasn't attracted to guys at all. After that I kind of questioned if I was a lesbian. That scared me so I pushed that thought aside. I tried to make myself like guys. I would usually pick wimpy effeminate guys or super hot guys. I didn't like them that way, but I made myself stare at them and I also made myself slightly giggle whenever people mentioned them. I also constantly complained to everyone about not having a boyfriend. I wanted a boyfriend because I wanted to be popular. I remember watching a movie and thinking one girl in the movie was very hot. I remembered getting that feeling a few times before, but that time it was more intense than before. This disturbed me. I wondered again if I was a lesbian. It tried to push it away again. At that time I was also having problems with my dad and step mom. This, my issues with my sexual orientation and just feeling like an outcast in general led me to self harm and think about suicide. I talked to the counsellor about all my worries but my sexuality. I escaped from my problems by listening to a lot of music. This worked for a bit and I sort of forgot about possibly being a lesbian. Not much happened to me when I was thirteen. I did question my sexuality a few times, but I mostly managed to push those thoughts away. I felt very immature because I didn't like boys. At that point I didn't know if it was worse to be immature or a lesbian. When I was fourteen I started high school. I met a girl I liked. I though she was cute and I thought it would be cool to date her. I thought that thought was a bit ridiculous, but I wasn't scared of that thought. Coincidently I got asked out by a girl later that year. Too bad it wasn't the girl I liked. A bit after that I got asked out by a guy. I only liked him like a friend, but I accepted because I thought that dating him might make me straight. When I was dating him I kind of enjoyed how happy other people were for me. It felt like something was lacking in my relationship. I did enjoy holding his hand, but kissing him felt awkward and fake. I never wanted to make out with him. I thought it would be gross to make out with him. Eventually he broke up with me. When he broke up with me I told him that I might be a lesbian. When I told him that he just laughed. After that he started making lame lesbian jokes. After that I told my mom. She thought I was just going through a phase and told me that it was normal to like girls in early puberty. She told me a story about how she thought she was a lesbian when she was twelve and how she is now a happy normal heterosexual. I kind of expected that reaction from my mom. When I told my dad he started to make lesbian jokes. I didn't think they were funny. After that I watched porn to prove to myself I was not going through a phase. I ended up not liking lesbian porn and enjoying gay and straight porn. This confused me even more. After that I avoided coming out because I was very confused. I started to get attracted to guys a bit in real life after I watched gay porn. It was weird. When I was fifteen I watched even more gay porn. I enjoyed looking at muscular naked guys. I occasionally even felt like I liked guys more than girls. I'm sixteen right now. I don't really feel that attracted to guys anymore. Right now I feel like I definitely prefer girls. I'm not sure if I'm bisexual or not. I don't really want to be bisexual because I don't want my sexuality to be unstable. I also don't want to be lesbian because I don't want to deal with people not taking me seriously. Right now I'm mostly closeted because I don't know what to come out as. It feels more right to call myself a lesbian, but I always feel like I'm not a real lesbian because of my history of occasionally being turned on by guys. I've come out as bisexual because I'm not sure if I'm a real lesbian. I'm also afraid that I'll fall for a guy when I'm out as a lesbian. I'm sorry this post is so long. I wish I could decide on whether I'm lesbian or bi. I just hate being on the fence about this.
hey think of it like this, you can be anything you want. Don't label yourself as something if you don't want to, be yourself and be happy... I'm sorry I'm not much help. I'm new here, but never be anything you don't want to be. C
Well, I don't think I've ever met a bisexual who experienced her identity as unstable. "Bisexual" is a stable identity. Not being taken seriously is something that both bisexual women and lesbians have to deal with. People who try to convince you that you are not what you say you are do it because they're homophobic, not because they're right. What I hear you saying, over and over, is that you are not attracted to guys, which is not something I usually hear bisexual women say. Your experiences with porn are very common. I read a study a few years ago in which subjects were asked to try to get off to a variety of different kinds of porn, and it was discovered that the women, regardless of their sexual orientation, could get off to anything-- the only difference between straight women and queer women was that the queer women were honest about that. Fun fact: so many lesbians love gay male porn that it's kind of a joke.
Thanks for your reply. I was mostly posting because I enjoy writing down my experiences. It kind of drives me crazy when I'm on the fence about my sexuality. I guess it's partly denial and partly lack of experience.
Sexuality is all about sexual attraction. It is distinct from romantic attraction and other forms of attraction. Who you enjoy to look is basically aesthetic attraction. Falling for someone doesn't necessarily means you're sexually attracted though a indicator.
Also, there's a gray area between lesbian and bisexual (and a similar one between heterosexual and bisexual) where you have the ability to be attracted to both genders, but strongly prefer one over the other. If you're in that gray area, nothing wrong with using the label that indicates which gender you prefer, even if it's not 100%.
You sound pretty lesy to me. There's nothing wrong with being a lesbian. I'm 31 and I've just come out and people have tried to tell me it's a fad. Just ignore them, it doesn't sound like a fad to me. It seems to me that straight people like to say 'it's just a fad. Everybody goes through it.' Then when you ask them if they went through it, they say, 'no, I didn't'. So don't worry about that, it's just something they try to tell you because they don't understand how somebody can be attracted to a person of the same sex. I don't think they realise that we don't understand how they can be attracted to members of the opposite sex. Their sexuality is as odd to us as ours is to them, only straight people assume they're right because there's more of them than us. You don't have to label yourself if you don't want to. Just be who you want to be, it doesn't have to have a name.
