Can I be a lesbian if I've loved a man before

[AnonAS]

I don't know if I'll get any responses, but today has just been rough for me. Since I was a child I've known I liked girls. I thought I liked men, but apart of me just thinks it was heteronormativity. I have always and probably will always find fictional men attractive, but I'd never wanna actually sleep with any of them. I don't find myself finding any men attractive at this point in my life at all, and feel like for most of my life I just have to fit in. I did however love my ex a lot. He was a cis man, and I had slept with him. During this though I never really was super attracted to him, or enjoyed it, and only really did it to make him happy because I loved him. I'd also like to mention it took me 7 months of dating to finally agree to sleep with him since I really didn't want to. He in no way pressured me, I really did it to myself. I realized I might be a lesbian after breaking up with him because I tried seeing other people, and the only man I tried to talk with I didn't feel comfortable with him, or the idea of any other man. However now I see myself only being truly happy with a woman. I still can get off to straight porn, but generally just don't find men sexually appealing. I just feel guilty since I did love a man, and my brother today told me that he didn't think I was a lesbian because I dated a man. Once I explained it a bit more he agreed I was, but I guess I'm just overthinking and worried I might not be. What if I'm lying to everyone around me and making this up, what if it's just because of a few bad men that I feel this way? My parents also don't think im lesbian, but when I came out as bi they didn't believe me either. Every girlfriend or girl I've talked to they always just tell me that they are a friend even if I say otherwise. Despite this they have been super supportive of my brothers gender and sexual identity and it's very depressing. Am I faking being lesbian like my parents think?

[Michaela]

Hi AnonAS, and welcome to the Scarleteen boards!

First off, I want to say that I'm sorry that people around you are not hearing and believing you. It sounds like you do have a pretty good understanding of your sexuality but that other people's opinions are making you feel confused. No one else or your past relationships define your sexuality today, only you do, because only you are the expert on yourself and what you feel.

Love can also look like a lot of things. I have no doubt that you did love your past boyfriend a lot because there are so many ways to love. It is entirely possible to love someone deeply but not feel sexually attracted to them. Also, what you can enjoy in fantasy, like porn, does not say anything about what you like in real life, and that's completely normal too.

Not feeling understood by the people around you and having to feel like you have to prove yourself to them can be exhausting. How do you feel about your relationship with your family around this? Are you wanting to talk with them more about it?

[AnonAS]

You worded that very well, thank you! You're right, feeling the pressure of having to "prove" to everyone what my sexuality is is exhausting and ups my anxiety, so I just gotta not be bothered as much by it! People can think what they want, I know me the best. In all honesty, I'm 19 and my mom and I have never had a good relationship and it's only good when I don't speak my mind to her. So I'll probably just not try to talk to her about it, especially cause I'm only living with her for 4 more days. Maybe if I get a girlfriend again and she insists it's just friendship I'll probably talk to her, and if she can't accept it I'd just cut contact. I'd be shocked if she didn't, because she's not anti lgbtq+ as proven by my brother, but she just doesn't believe me I guess. Everyone else in my family believes me so it's not all too bad!

[Valerie J]

Hi!

Just wanted to jump in and highlight how hard this situation is for you and how well you are handling it. Queer woman, or people percieved to be queer women, are constantly gaslit by society and often their close intimate circles about their own identies. It is so invalidating and can be super upsetting. So your anxiety and exhaustion is well warranted.

On top of all that, I really wanted to highlight that sexuality is so exceptionally fluid and changes over time and place. You can fully identify as one thing and then change to another and that doesn't invalidate your previous identity. Also from a personal perspective, I am a person that identifies as a queer lesbian and generally am not into cis men but I love fictional character's that are cis men. They are fictional; interest and intimacy in fiction fundamentally functions different than intimacy and attraction in real life. I share that to say you can strongly identify this way and also be interested in fictional characters or even a man in the past. None of how you feel now needs to erase how you felt previously.

I'm really glad you do have supports that believe you. And as you stated, the most important person to believe and understand your identity is YOU. But that being said, it stinks that you can't get that support from your mom and I don't want to move past that lightly.
Keep doing what you are doing and take pride in how you care for yourself.