Scarleteen

So recently, I discovered that I might be a lesbian. Now this isn’t my first time thinking about this, and I’ve known that I liked girls ever since I was younger, but the problem is that my family is super religious and I’m not, and they don’t know this. So as I grew up, I knew that I was supposed to like boys and not girls. So I have never dated a girl before, only guys. I’m also 17 and a virgin, and I’ve only had a few sexual encounters with boys, and they were okay, like I was turned on during, but after, I would always feel so insecure and uncomfortable about the experience. I would begin to really hate myself for doing anything sexual with them, but for a little background information, these boys are toxic people, so I just guessed that’s why I felt that way. I would blow up and feel so sad that I was treated badly knowing I did something sexual with them, but after a while, I got over it.

I also noticed that I would run through crushes at my school like crazy, just picking any boy to have a crush on. If they were nice to me for a second, I would just randomly start crushing on them, and even if I don’t do anything sexual and I just have a crush on a guy, it fades within like 2 weeks or so, and if the person happens to like me back, I begin to lose interest in them and feel bad because I basically egged them on to think I like them just for me to not be interested anymore. This type of behavior has been happening since middle school (minus the sexual stuff, of course), and I would always just think it's because I have commitment issues.

Now, this would lead me to believe that I am a lesbian, but I still find guys sexually attractive. If I see a cute boy on TikTok, a celebrity, or someone in real life, I will think they are attractive the same way I would a girl. But it's different with girls because I'm attracted to them more romantically, so when I do get the opportunity to be with a woman, it’s going to feel different on all levels, especially sexually. So this has gotten me thinking that maybe it’s the comphet that makes me feel this way towards guys. And this has become such a problem that a few years ago I thought I was aro-mantic because my feelings for guys never stayed the same, and sexually, it felt so rushed like I was doing it to feel more normal like my other friends and to just feel safe because of how religious my family is.

I can imagine myself marrying a woman, and it makes me really happy thinking about it, but knowing how my family would react, I have always struggled with internalized homophobia and religious trama (also im black and I know when I say this it’s not 100% like this all the time but it’s so much harder dealing with this in my community while also being queer and non religious so it scares me a lot if my family finds these things out bc I don’t want to disappoint them) So can someone please help me understand why I am like this? (PS: Im so sorry this is all over the place. I just really needed to get this off of my chest because I have more mental problems, like losing sleep over this)

Hi escapism!,

There's a lot to untangle here and it sounds like it's, understandably, really stressing you out!

We can for sure talk about what things are indicators of different sexual orientations, but I actually think a helpful starting place might be this: does it feel urgent to you to have this all figured out now, or at least soon? If so, why do you think that is? (it's okay if the answer is"I'm not sure").

I ask that in part because what you're describing sounds like a really common process of sexual development for folks your age, where you're trying to sort through all this information you're getting about your attraction patterns and what they means, when what they mean is just "I'm still figuring things out."

I do think that you're right that the messages and pressure you've gotten from your family and community are playing a role in this all feeling so tangled. As you said, when only one gender of partner is presented as safe and acceptable, even if you DO feel attraction to that gender you can end up doubting whether the attraction is genuine or being done out of need to survive or be left in peace.

That being said, if you could snap your fingers and suddenly you could date whoever you wanted without any negative consequences, what would dating look like for you?

I really am sorry that you're stuck in a homophobic environment and that you have religious trauma that you're dealing with on top of all that. Have you found any ways to safely feel connected to other queer people or affirmed in your identity? Or any resources for folks who are trying to deal with religious trauma?

Hi Sam Thanks for reaching back out to me and to answer your questions. I think it’s urgent for me to finally understand who I am. I have always thought about this type of situation, but I never really took it seriously until it became more of a problem than I thought it would. I want to go to college, and moving into a new environment makes me happy because I finally get to have the opportunity to actually be myself without always being monitored by my family. So I thought it'd be a good time to start working on myself now. And if I had the power to snap my fingers and date whomever I wanted to date without any negative consequences, it would be women, honestly, because I wouldn’t feel the constant fear of having to hide and would be able to express myself freely. And to your last question, no, I don’t have anyone I can talk to about that type of stuff properly other than venting to my friends.

Thank you for those additional details! I will say your answer to who you'd date in an ideal world does suggest to me that your main, or possibly only, romantic and sexual interest is in women, which would make lesbian a term that could for sure apply to you! Too, at the end of the day, you get the final say for which, if any, words you use to describe your sexual orientation, because you're the expert on your own experiences and feelings.

I will say that, while I 100% get the "I need to figure this out NOW" feeling, especially if you maybe feel like you don't want to be "behind" in understanding yourself compared to other folks at college. But I think a way to lessen the stress you're feeling around your identity is to remind yourself that there isn't actually a deadline for figuring this all out, and that many people you'll meet in college (and beyond) will still be in the process of learning new things about their sexual orientation.

Going along with that, one thing that can really help lower the "am I X" stress around sexual orientation is to remember that it's okay if the word you use to describe it changes over time. We describe our sexual orientation, like any other part of our identity, based on the evidence we have about ourselves at the time. Sometimes that description doesn't change as we move through life, and other times we learn things about ourselves down the line that makes us decide another term is the one that resonates with us (for reference, I described myself as straight until my mid-20s). That doesn't mean we were wrong or faking that previous orientation; it just means we got new information. Does that make sense?

I'm really glad to hear that college is presenting a chance for you to get away from your family and maybe live a little more comfortably and openly, and I'm also glad you have friends you can talk to about all this. I think you might get some use out of these two pieces, which talk about connecting with and nurturing your identity when stuck in an unaccepting home: https://www.scarleteen.com/article/advi ... lationship, https://www.scarleteen.com/article/poli ... ant_be_out

omg thank you so much for the help I really appreciate it. :3 !

You're very welcome!