Scarleteen

I know that there's probably a gazillion posts about this around here, but I just wanted to get my words out somewhere. So, I am a 17 year old girl, who has never dated, and has obviously never had sex before. I have plenty of guy friends, who have tried asking me out. I always said I was not interested in dating, which I still feel is valid for me, because I want to wait until college for that. I speculated I was just aromantic and asexual before, but I really don't think I am. I know I want to have a romantic life in the future with someone, along with a sexual life. I'm just not sure what my deal is. I never found myself extremely attracted to any boys I knew, or maybe I was, but again, I just wasn't interested in a romantic life. Lately, I've figured out that I seem attracted to women's bodies more than men's. I've never looked at full on porn before, but I've seen plenty of suggestive gifs/pictures of women, along with lesbian couples and things like that. I often feel shameful after doing these things, but I often get aroused when looking at or thinking about women, sex (with any type of couple. Does not matter the gender) or having a sexual encounter with women. I'm not sure if I'd even want a romantic life with a woman, but maybe thats because I haven't even had a real relationship before. I'm just not sure what's going on here, and would like an idea of how I can figure it out.

Hi A!

So firstly I felt a little bad when you said "I'm just not sure what my deal is"... I don't think there is a deal just because we don't want to date the people who are approaching us at a certain time! It could have just been you were just plain not into any of these boys and that is totally fine. It can also be hard at 17 to feel comfortable dating with all the life events and living situations that tend to be going on at that point in our lives, not to mention the high stress global crises ongoing in the world right now!

That said, sure! You've observed yourself being into women, or the idea of seeing women in sexual media. There's nothing shameful about that! Atrraction and fantasizing or seeking to see stuff that turns us on is totally ok and when that stuff is a bit gay that's also 100% fine. It's ok for this to be the totality of what you're seeking right now.

I can't say what sort of relationships with which sorts of people you might like to be in the future but for now it both sounds like the options are relatively open, but also that you're not feeling the idea of dating right now, is that fair?

Perhaps if you do find yourself wanting to date it could become clearer what your personal style of dating is and with whom. I'm not sure you can know all of it right now though... Do you think it can feel ok to not know for now?