sexuality support

[Heather]

Have you ever tried using something on the regular to help remind you about those healthy coping techniques? Something like always keeping some kind of touchstone object with you, for instance, or snapping a rubber band on your wrist? Just a simple habit you acquire over time to remind you, in a kinetic way, that yep: you're in a traumatic or uncomfortable place in your head, so need to employ your healthy coping tools. If not, that's something I'd suggest you try (even just keeping a simple small stone in your pocket can work for this).

Per the reading, okay, got it.

You know I don't hear anything in this that sound like excuses or whatnot. And even if I did, any of this is about what you want and need for yourself, not about meeting anyone else's requirements, anyway. We can talk about what makes you fearful about reading sexuality guides if you like, but the kind of self-help reading I was thinking of for now was more help for coping with fear and anxiety in general, including around sexual or gender identity.

Since you mention those books, though, I do wonder if you think perhaps reading more creative work on all this (rather than an informational guide like my book) and more personal stories might be good for you? Sometimes kind of going through other people's journeys can get you through or inspire some of your own, and also really provide a sense of comfort, and not being alone, with all of this. For instance, some queer fiction, or a memoir like, for instance, Jeanette Winterson's "Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit". I'd be happy to hook you up with some good reading lists out and about in this arena.

It does sound to me like one thing you're really lacking is just comfort and support. I wonder if you might be able to kind of back off of yourself a bit with any self-imposed pressure with all of this and be sure to also give yourself some plain old comfort and care? I get the feeling there's something that might feel kind of like an emotional or developmental deadline of sorts under all of this. If it feels like that to you, too, I think seeing what you can do to dump that would probably be really worth your while.

[Science_Geek]

I have tried the rubber band thing, but I kind of used it too much and it turned into a negative skill more than a positive one. I tried drawing on my hand to remember to breathe and relax, but not have it obvious, and I tried to have my phone set off a reminder. I can try to find a stone.

We can talk about that, if that is ok.

I do like reading about other people's journeys. Yes, please send me some books. That "Oranges are not the Only Fruit" sounds interesting.

I can try to back off on myself...self care in terms of my self just always felt selfish and I felt bad doing it in the past.
Didn't think of it as a deadline. I just feel like I don't really know who I am, never really have, minus all that has happened to me and my diagnoses (mental and physical). I just feel like once I get this squared away I can learn more about just that and move on. I am starting to understand sexual orientation is fluid, but right now I wish the orientation that I am thinking I could just accept, I guess.

[Heather]

There's nothing wrong with being selfish: it's okay to do things for and focus on ourselves sometimes. In fact, if we don't, we're not likely to be or stay of use to do things for others for long, so being selfish -- or, more to the point, taking care of yourself -- is something that actually helps us help others better, rather than taking away from that. But even if it wasn't, honestly, it would still be not only okay, but necessary for your well-being.

In terms of books, I'll think of some more to toss your way soon.

With what you said in the last bit, I wonder how long, if at all, you CAN accept what feels like your right sexual identity to you right now. Like, literally: if you take a breath, sit down, and just accept yourself in that regard, how long does it hold for? What seems to undo it? When you move from acceptance into nonacceptance, what do you do to combat it?

[Science_Geek]

Thanks.

Literally, I get through the "I am asexual and " then I freak myself out and can't even think of the rest. SOmetimes I can say it and write it, I can get through the "I am asexual and bi-something" but then I second guess myself a few seconds after saying it. It is very Jekyll and Hydeish...it's the only way I can think of describing it. Sometimes I think that maybe the bi-something isn't real for me, but then those thoughts I put in my first post come to mind and it makes it real. Not sure what you mean about combating the move from acceptance to nonacceptance... but if it is what I am thinking, then lately it usually involves some bad coping skills. I try talking to the switchboard people, but I feel bad going to them once a week so I am trying not to chat to them. I have written in a journal about this and that kind of helps but I feel like I need more. Like I need someone to provide feedback and bounce ideas off of.

[Heather]

I think coping with your feelings and pushing back against nonacceptance when you tried to be accepting are different things.

For instance, one way of pushing back might be, when you have the kind of reaction to trying to just have an accept identity words, to just keep saying "Nope, I hear you jerkbrain, but you're wrong, I AM asexual and bisexual, and that's just how it is," every single time. Another might be to go just do something affirming of either or both of those identities, like maybe taking in some kind of art or media that celebrates or embraces them. Make sense?

I do just want to tell you that hotlines, switchboards and help services like ours literally exist to help people. Using them isn't anything to feel bad about, because we exist expressly because we WANT to be here for people. I know you're going to feel however you are, but please do what you can not to let those feelings keep you from using services that are designed to be used, and staffed by people very glad to be here for you and do the work.

[Science_Geek]

Ok.
The asexual part, I have accepted for a few years now. I was laughed at and told it was because of the abuse so I just kept it to myself. The other half I am having trouble with. I didn't think about art or media that celebrates and embraces them.... I drew one photo but I don't want to display it as my mom is coming to visit and she doesn't know. I will have to try to find some. I think I got my next art idea, so thank you for that.

Thanks for the reassurance about the switchboards and other help services. I have a difficult time calling hotlines because of a hotline telling me insensitive stuff when I called.

[Heather]

You know, even if any part of our identity DOES have a why, that doesn't change it. For example, let's say someone isn't into monogamy because they grew up in a household where it played out in really icky ways. They're still not into monogamy: doesn't really matter why.

By all means, if you have sexual aversion, it may be because of abuse. That happens. And it would be okay if that was a why for you. (But it also could have zip to do with this.) OTOH, asexuality is really more about sexual disinterest or apathy, which is not a common response to abuse. And sexual orientations usually aren't about or influenced by abuse experiences. But again, even if that were the case, that wouldn't make yours somehow less valid.

If it helps to hear it back, I see you here, identifying yourself as asexual and I accept you and I believe you. I see you.

[Science_Geek]

Sexual disinterest and apathy is definetly there. I don't have any desire. When I talked about those thoughts and desires I have been thinking about to the switch board. They suggested perhaps companionship and wanting to be close to someone is what it sounds like.

Im just so confused.

What is OTOH mean?

I think I am ok on the asexual part of this. Its the bi-something that seems to be the part I cannot accept at times.

Thank you. That does help.

[Heather]

OTOH = on the other hand (sorry!)

So, I wonder if you're familiar with -romanic frameworks rather than just -sexual. For example, some people identify as asexual and biromantic, usually meaning they don't have any interest in being sexual with someone else, but they DO feel desire to be in romantic (whatever that means to you: I always get tripped up here personally because "romantic" outside classifications for art periods just doesn't really land with me) relationships or interactions, and with people of more than one gender.

Even if that isn't a framework that works for you, the idea that the desire for sex and the desire for emotional or physical intimacy HAVE to be intertwined, which sounds kind of like what was suggested to you, is problematic. You can have desires to be emotionally close and intimate with people and have no desire to be sexual with people, and the former really doesn't tell us anything about your asexuality, nor would a desire for the former mean you aren't asexual. Honestly, it just sounds like the switchboard folks you talked to may not have been super-current with their sexuality education or this particular framework (which isn't a shocker: a lot of people who don't work in the field aren't).

Have you ever poked around AVEN? http://www.asexuality.org/ They have forums as well that might turn out to be a nice pair with your use of the forums here.

It sounds to me -- holler at me if I'm wrong -- like you are saying you desire intimate, just not necessarily sexual, relationships with people of more than one gender. Do I have that right? If so, some people will use the term bisexual for that, even if that's about way more than just sex (and it usually is), whole others won't even file that in the -sexual terminology place. So, it might be that some of the issue you're having with that term isn't so much about shame or internalized biphobia: it might just be that it doesn't feel like a fit with your other frameworks. If, when you think about it, that does, in fact, seem like part of the issue, why try and claim something that doesn't feel like the right fit for you, period? Why not instead just make up something that does or just leave things be, seeking out whatever relationships you care to with whomever you like, and wait to see if maybe some language doesn't just show up that feels better?

[Science_Geek]

Sorry, I am not caught up on my lingo.. LOL

I think what I want is stupid. Harsh, maybe, but I also know what I want will never happen... and it scares me that I want that and makes me sad to know it wont happen. Its the Jekyll and Hyde Thinking again.

I use to go on AVEN quite alot when I first learned about asexuality. And in terms of romantic orientation, a few years ago I would have considered myself aromantic. I do not know why I stopped using that site . But when these thoughts started to appear I went back and there was a post that sounded quite similar to what I was/am going through. The comments suggested biromantic. I just no I don't have a desire to have sex and never really have even before I remembered the abuse.

I just want a label. And I know that is bad and I shouldn't want that but haveing that label or identificiation of whatever then helps me read, research, and understand myself better then. Maybe thats the science/school nerd in me.

I wouldn't even know how to get in a relationship or seek something like that out.

I just feel like I don't understand what is going on with me, my mind, and my body, and that is what is frustrating me.

[Sam W]

Hi sciencegeek,

Heather is off for the day, but I wanted to let you know this had been seen and that they'll respond when they're back.

[Science_Geek]

Hi,
No worries/no rush.

Thanks for letting me know.

[Heather]

It's not bad to want words to name things. We have language because of that common human desire, after all. Personally, I love language, so I gotta thank anyone for wanting words.

It might help to remember that names for things can really only describe what we have experienced so far and are now experiencing. So, you want a word? Take one. Maybe it's one that works for your whole life, maybe for years, maybe for weeks, maybe only for hours. But that's okay. Without going totally cheeseball on you, think about how many words we have for the state of the sky, which also shifts a good deal and doesn't really have a permanent state, other than the state of being the sky. It's no less any of those words at a given time because words for it change or its state changes. And we can know it as the sky even though it isn't always the same, or we're not even always sure what state it's in exactly. Same can be true of people, our identities, and what words we use for them.

I know it's also hard to accept we can't always fully know or understand ourselves, but that is just kind of how it goes. Personally, I think anyone who tells you they're 100% sure about any part of who they are either may not have experienced much of life yet or is maybe a little delusional. I think this is another big part of self-acceptance; accepting that we can't always understand or clearly know ourselves and learning to be okay with that.

[Science_Geek]

Thanks. I think at this point, I don't care anymore. Maybe its the horrible day, maybe I am back to suppressing it, I don't know. I think suppressing is going to have to be the way to go. As much as I want to accept it and need to talk about this... which I was hoping the LGBT+ organization would have helped with...I don't think I can do it in the way I was thinking I could in my mind. I'm sure it will change tomorrow and I will be back wanting to know, and wanting a label and to understand what is going on.

[Heather]

I'm hearing this simply as "I don't want to talk about this today because today I just don't care." Which is always fine, perhaps obviously (and also is going to be the case for a person with many things in life, really). This is a talk that's only about what you need and when you need it.

[Science_Geek]

Thanks. Sorry about that post. I think there is just too much going on and with no therapist things seem to magnify to really bad in a matter of seconds. I do want to talk about this but I think my fear is getting the best of me along with stuff from today. I just need things to go right and smoothly for more than a few hours...and I just want answers to this and so much more.

Sorry for wasting your time.

[Science_Geek]

Sorry for Monday's post.

I was still hoping I can talk about this stuff and if there are any books on bi-something you can recommend?

[Heather]

No need to be sorry. But you also don't need to post when you don't want to talk: you can just not talk.

I was out all darn week with the flu, besides. (Ugh.)

So, you're looking for nonfiction, fiction, or both?

[Science_Geek]

Bad habits...apologizing and stressing/worrying when I haven't emailed or texted someone back.

Hope your feeling better

Probably nonfiction as I tend to like those books best. Very odd on my book selections.

I want to ask another question, if that's ok, and I apologize if its dumb. I have tried googling it but haven't had much luck. Are there physical reactions to being turned on? Is this something that will be obvious or how do you know? Is this just a sexual thing?

[Heather]

Thanks, I'm getting there.

That's not a dumb question. Yes, there are. They aren't always exactly the same from person to person, or the same for even a given person every time, but when we are sexually aroused, our bodies tend to do common things, such as to experience erection (not just for people with a penis: there's erectile tissue in the whole of the clitoris as well) or skin flushing. For more, check out the arousal section of this piece: Sexual Response & Orgasm: A Users Guide.

In terms of nonfiction books about bisexuality, besides looking in the orientation and identity portion of my book, which I know you have, you might also look for:
• Bi Any Other Name - Bisexual People Speak Out, by Lani Ka’ahumanu and Loraine Hutchins
• Getting Bi: Voices of Bisexuals Around the World, by Robyn Ochs and Sarah Rowley
• Bi: Notes for a Bisexual Revolution, by Shiri Eisner
• Queer: A Graphic History, by Dr. Meg-John Barker and Julia Scheele

There are also a few pieces here on the site you also might find helpful if you haven't read them already:
• http://www.scarleteen.com/article/advic ... coming_out
• http://www.scarleteen.com/article/advic ... _and_women
• http://www.scarleteen.com/article/advic ... _hear_abou (there's also a nice list of resources at the end of that one)

[Science_Geek]

Thanks for the books and the articles.

After reading some of those articles, I feel like I am even more confused and uncertain about my sexuality and have even more questions.

I'm probably just over thinking it.

[Heather]

This is personal, but it is a common experience, so what I'd say is that thinking it at all is likely not the right way to go. This is more a feeling thing than a thinking thing, and more something where we're just observing feelings than trying to codify them. So, if what you're doing is more thinking it than feeling i -- or almost ONLY thinking than feeling -- then yeah, I'd say you're probably right about overthinking it.

Do you get what I mean?

[Heather]

That's actually one reason for books I was going to personally suggest more memoir and fiction, because those kinds of writing tend to be more vivid, and, IMO, have more of the capacity to cue feeling than thoughts so that you can get help feeling what resonates with you and what doesn't more emotionally rather than going to an intellectual thinky-place.

[Science_Geek]

I am really bad at feelings and emotions. I'm scared to feel what I have been feeling around this. (If that makes sense).

If the fiction books are better, then please do suggest them. I have never really read any books on any of this and the books that I do read are all history or science based.

I think fear is playing a big part in this.

[Heather]

Can you talk to me some about what you're afraid of? What are the fears of, specifically?