Scarleteen

Hello,

for months now (think 8-10) I've been having trouble being attracted to people. People in my life said it was probably circumstance and that I hadn't met the right person yet and I tend to agree. But I'm in university now, I've met countless new people and only two interested me romantically (both guys which I believe are not gay).

I want to date a woman because that's more socially appropriate where I live. The problem is, I really haven't felt a spark in 2(?) years from one. You could argue I'm gay, but that invalidates my feelings for my past girlfriends and sexuality isn't supposed to change.

So that begs the question, why am I not interested in women anymore and how could I change that.

I'm also addicted to pornography and would like some information on stopping. Could one be a consequence of the other?

That's all, thank you

Hi Beepboop,

Romantic attraction is not something that we tend to have the ability to control. In terms of sexuality, you are the one who decides what you feel and for whom, and at what point in your life these feelings come up. It is completely normal to have experienced romantic attraction towards women in the past, maybe not as much present and maybe that will change again later, and the same goes for attraction to men. That is because sexuality not only can change but often does especially as we begin to get to know ourselves better and have new experiences.

I want to throw in one of our flagship pieces about sexuality because it really dives into the complexity of sexuality like how it can be fluid: Sexuality: WTF is it Anyways

You mentioned that where you live does not tend to be very LGBTQ+ inclusive. Sometimes there are communities within larger cities that have more of a queer scene. Does that sound like something you could be interested in?

On your note about porn, addiction has very specific requirements that don't tend to fit with sex because it requires a dependency in your brain for certain chemicals (If you want to read more about it Sam talks about it in this advice piece Advice: Sexual Addiction). However, it does sound that there are things about your current media usage that you would like to change. What worries you about the way you engage with sexual media or other fantasy?