I am not sure if I am a bisexual female...

[catsarecute]

When I was younger i used to hang out with boys a lot. This was before I knew about the lgbt community. I remember being such a tomboy at that point in my life. I wasn’t very interested in boys nor girls, but I did act like a boy. I cut my hair and everyone thought I was a boy. I dressed like one too. On the first day at my new school I sat with the boys. One time I even approached a girl feeling that I should I guess flirt with her. I felt like a boy, but I knew I was a girl, so I felt I couldn’t. I wanted to ask her out even though I didn’t know her at all. A little while after I learned about being lesbian (unknowing about being bisexual) I became worried. I Had already crushed on a boy, so I told myself I couldn’t be a lesbian. I got an ulcer from worrying so much and I had to look at pictures of boys to try and convince myself I didn’t have feelings for girls. The worrying stopped when 7th grade hit and it was so much work that I didn't have time to worry like that. I once complimented one of my closest friends on her eyes. I don’t think I was trying to flirt, but the fact is that I said it. I think I like her too. I pictured me kissing her. She is beautiful and she is nice which kinda makes me confused. I am attracted to women in certain ways. Ik it sounds weird but when I am kinda turned on by girls but also not at the same time. I don't know if it is because I have never thought I could like women in this way so I feel constrained or that I am trying to figure out if I am bi so I am a little nervous when trying to figure how I would react. I don't know if I feel the same way about girls as I do boys. One thing I notice is that I have a tendancy to stare at attractive girls faces without noticing. Sometimes I look at their breast without noticing too but when I realize I feel confused and not turned on. When I am not trying to find out if I am bi and I think about a girl couple or something I do get turned on. Thinking about having that kind of relationship gets me excited making me want to forget men completely. I may feel even more romantically with women than with men though. I do sometimes think gosh shes hot when I am watching a show or something. I watched a Kristen Stewart movie because I thought she was attractive. I live in a place where someone lesbian or bi would be hard to find so experimenting would be very limited. I want to be able to talk about girls in front of people too. That may be why I have felt comfortable with boys in the past. Once I had a dream where I was talking to my boy crush at a bar and a women approached me from behind and that really turned me on. Not sure what that really meant. I have looked at girls pictures wondering why I am so obsessed. Btw I am 14 and I have just started connecting the dots. What do you think?

[Redskies]

Hi catsarecute, welcome to the boards!

Orientation - whether someone's lesbian, or bisexual, or straight, or etc... - is about who you have romantic and/or sexual feelings towards, and which genders those people tend to be. If someone's havng those kinds of feelings about people of more than one gender, for example about a few men and about a few women, then it's fairly likely that that person is bisexual.

It's sounding like you're feeling fairly sure that you experience attraction to girls and to boys - do I have that right?

Orientation is really about how we feel, about who we think we'd like to kiss and/or who we'd like to date. So, it's not necessary to experiment in order to figure out our own orientation. Some people find that hanging out with other lesbian/gay/bi/queer people, or kissing someone they want to kiss, helps add to the information they have about themself and their own feelings, but it's definitely not a requirement in order for you to know how you feel or to know that your feelings are real.

I know it can be especially confusing to figure out how we feel if we grew up in an environment where it seemed like people were gay or straight, and we didn't know that bisexuality even existed or was a thing that anybody even is. It's really alright if you need some time! It's very common anyway for everyone to need time to figure out their orientation. it's not a thing that we can find out just by looking in the right place in our head, like we'd find a fact in a book or online. Instead, it's something we begin to realise over time from our own experiences and feelings.

Being bisexual doesn't automatically mean that someone will feel the same way about women and men. Some bisexual people feel a different kind of attraction towards people of different genders, and some bisexual people feel attraction more often towards one gender than another. So, no matter what your orientation is, you might not feel the same way about girls and boys, and that's absolutely okay.

How can we best support you? Is there anything in particular you'd like to talk about with us, or any information you'd like?

[catsarecute]

Thanks for responding! I could use a little more help though. I am not sure how I can figure out if I have a girl crush (like jealousy) or if I am really crushing on a girl. Do you think it could be a mixture of the two? Its like I told you I watched a Kristen Stewart movie because I thought she was attractive. Is there ways I could be sure it was because I thought she was that way or that I want to be that way. It's just things like that that make me not completley sure I am a bisexual. Another thing is that I don't know if I put up a wall sometimes that prevents me from having great feelings for girls. Like my best friend, I don't think she likes women, so I don't know if I just backed off or if I don't like her. I mean I still kinda have feelings for her but I know she couldn't love me the same so they don't necessarly grow. When I look at someone it is usually nope they probably don't like girls, so I am not sure if I just guard myself which makes my feeling just that more confusing (roles eyes at self).I hope this makes sense and I hope this got to you. I am not sure I replied correctly. Also I am considering flirting with another friend that I don't know is straight. I don't want my friendship to be ruined though! It is kinda worrysome because I haven't fully figured out I like girls and I haven't obviously came out. Do you think I should wait?

[Ashleah]

Hi Catsarecute,

I hope you don't mind if I jump in

Everything you said makes sense, but please correct me if I get anything wrong. It sounds like you are putting a lot of pressure on yourself to know right now! Which I could certainly see leading to a "wall" of sorts. I can understand wanting to have a clear cut answer, especially when it relates to something as big as your identity, but like Redskies said, it's okay to take some time with this.

It's also okay to feel what you are feeling, regardless of what your orientation is. Does that make sense? So even if "straight" felt most comfortable for a person, that doesn't mean that they can't have feelings and/or attraction for someone of the same gender. So either way, whether it be a girl crush or a crush crush, having those feeling towards your friend are perfectly okay.

As far as flirting goes, you know your friend best, how do you think it would go? Have you talked to this friend or any other about some of the things you shared here? If not, would that be a conversation you'd feel comfortable having?

[catsarecute]

I do not mind you joining this converstation! So, I don't think I would want to talk to this friend about this; I am not super close to her. I could probably talk to my bestie, but I don't want her to figure out I like her as more than a friend. You know I want to be able to identify as being bisexual because I want to date girls, but I just want to be sure. I get very mixed emotions like I said above because I haven't known about bisexuality for a long time and I have this big wall up that makes it practically impossible to see things clearly. It is hard for me to tell apart who I want to be friends or more than friends and who I think is attractive and who I want to be attractive like. I just feel very confused and I am trying to find ways to feel like my feelings for girls are true. Anxiety has always been a large problem for me so it is not easy for me to take it easy and let everything fall into place. Everything I do to try and figure my self out leads to a dead end. Hope this gave you a better idea of how I am feeling.

[Karyn]

Hi catsarecute.

With your best friend, I would say that you could probably talk to her about how you're questioning your identity without getting into the fact that you have a crush on her if that's not something you feel comfortable sharing. (And if you want to brainstorm a bit about how that conversation could go, we can do that!)

As far as figuring out your identity goes, there are a couple of things that stand out to me about your most recent post. First, you don't have to identify as anything to be able to date who you want to date. How we identify doesn't determine who we can go on dates with or find attractive, like Ashleah said. The words we use to describe orientation are just that: descriptions. They don't limit or define who we're 'allowed' to date, they're just a way of sharing with other people our patterns of attraction, if that makes sense. Secondly, it's understandable that you want to figure this out now, that you want to know whether what you're feeling is true; that's something a lot of people experience around sussing out their orientation, and anxiety can definitely make that process more tricky. It does take time, but we have a piece about questioning that might be useful to you in all of this (and "questioning" all by itself is a perfectly valid identity if you're looking for a word to sum up how you're feeling at the moment): Q is for Questioning

[catsarecute]

Thanks you all for the help. Definetly checking out that article! I will give myself time and hopefully I will be able to be more honest with myself about my feelings. This is all so new to me, but I think I am figuring things out! Once again thanks for helping me and being so patient!

[Ashleah]

No problem! Feel free to come back if there is anything else we can help you with.