Scarleteen

Sorry in advance for the awkwardness, this is probably going to be a really long and boring read and there have probably been so many 'confused' posts on here before, but I’ve found this website helpful in the past before and I’d just really like to talk about stuff to be honest as I've been fretting about this for some time and I’m not really sure who else to turn to. I hope also that I've posted this in the right place; as a newbie I can't seem to post on the Sexual Identity board so hope this is okay.

I’m an 18, nearly 19-year-old cis girl, have never been in a relationship, had sex or even an actual crush, and for probably the greater part of my teenage years I’ve been questioning my sexuality. I assumed I was straight when I was younger, as this just seemed to be the ‘default’ that everyone expected me to be, and I did have some vague feelings for boys too, though nothing particularly strong. Then, when I got a bit older and educated myself a bit more about other sexualities, I realized that the way I felt about boys probably wasn’t the same as the way other girls my age felt, plus I found the idea of having sex just as alien and unappealing as I had when I was twelve, and so I self-defined as asexual for some time. Weirdly enough for a long time I also had a strange revulsion towards my own genitals, to the point where I was afraid to touch or look at them while washing, avoided using tampons and even reading written descriptions or looking at scientific diagrams of ‘female’ genitalia made me feel oddly squeamish and uncomfortable. It’s not like I’d been sexually abused or shamed for my body at any point, that was just how I felt for whatever reason. It was only when I actually had to use a tampon, at the age of sixteen, in order to go swimming with my family on holiday, that I properly ‘discovered’ my genital area for the first time and finally became fully comfortable with my own body.

After that point, things kind of changed; I suddenly stopped feeling anything towards boys whatsoever, and felt more strongly towards girls instead. Fast-forward a couple of years and I feel kind of like a ‘lesbian-in-theory’; I envision myself being in a relationship with another girl some day, and in certain, occasional situations I have experienced feelings of what I think were arousal, which I certainly never felt previously. I feel like I would really like to know what it is to love someone else, in the purely romantic sense, yet this time I also feel like I might actually want to someday engage in sexual intercourse with someone of my own gender, whereas before I found the idea of sex in general utterly repulsive. These examples have made me less certain that I am asexual, or at least, not purely 100% asexual anyway. The thing is, I just don’t seem to feel any kind of deep attraction towards anyone in real life, as opposed to my own imagining. There is one person whom I did feel slightly more deeply-than-average attached to compared to my other friends—though not really in a sexual sense—in a way that did sort of make me wonder, and I think I ‘loved’ her as a friend, but I don’t think I truly felt the ‘love’ that everyone else feels. I’ve wondered in the past before if it’s because I haven’t had that many close friendships and that maybe I need to find someone I can bond with more deeply, yet I’ve known so many people who’ve known relatively little about each other before entering a relationship with one another. I’ve also wondered if maybe I just haven’t found the ‘right person’, but I’m starting to wonder at this point whether the ‘right person’ really exists at all, bearing in mind I’ve known many people of different genders whom I’ve liked and gotten along well with, yet just never really felt anything deeper than friendship towards. It’s hard to describe, but I sort of feel as if I were a ‘normal’ person with a sexual identity who has been shut in a box away from humanity; I feel like I’m gay based on how I feel in my head, but is somehow unable show those feelings to anyone else…if that makes any sense?

And then, just to confuse things even more, I just so happened to read an article in a health magazine recently about low libidos in women, and it listed ‘lesbianism’ as a possible cause, without really stating how or why, and it got me wondering…am I just a lesbian with a really low or non-existent libido? I have tried masturbating several times in the past before, and it felt nice at first and then after a few minutes everything quite literally dried up and I ended up just staring at the ceiling wondering what on earth I was doing. Is that a sign of a low libido? If that’s the case, can it be fixed? What does a libido even feel like? How the heck do I know if I’ve got one or not? Does it make it any easier to feel attached to people in a romantic way, besides just a sexual way? If I’m asexual, why do I think I might want to have sex? And if I’m a lesbian, how come I’m not attracted in anyone in particular? What am I missing that I am supposed to feel?

Ugh, sorry again this post is so long and awkward, I know the sensible answer is probably just to ‘just forget about it’ and let things happen in their own time. I just feel like I’ve been unsure of myself for so long now and it’s really been grating on me, so if anyone has any suggestions or comments at all I would really appreciate it.

The 'low libidos in lesbians' thing might be talking about 'lesbian bed death', which has been disproved a lot. http://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/truth-a ... ed-1210134

http://closetedlesbianopinions.tumblr.com/ might be handy to read through if you're debating whether you have attraction to women. Just woke up so I'm not very insightful today but second resource has been so handy for me navigating this stuff.

Hi there fairlylocal, and welcome to Scarleteen.

I appreciate that Iwanthelp already noted this, but honestly I can't imagine why someone would cite "lesbianism" as a cause of low libido. It makes no sense to me at all (unless referring to LBD which, as noted above, is a problem in itself).

In terms of your identity, you don't have to actively have romantic or sexual feelings towards anyone in particular to decide that "lesbian" is the term that fits you best. Some people tend to get crushes or form romantic attachments easily and often, others take more time or have those feelings less rarely - but that doesn't mean you can't know what sorts of people you tend to have those feelings for. Does that make sense? It doesn't mean you're doing things wrong, but that there are many different ways in which people feel romantic or sexual attraction.

I think the culture of assumed heterosexuality means that a lot of people feel uncertain about their "right" to claim any non-straight orientation if they don't have concrete examples of themselves being attracted to or intimate with people in a queer way. Most people don't ask straight folks to defend or explain their straightness if they aren't actively interested in anyone, but queer folks have to defend their orientation all the time! I wonder if that's part of what's making you feel uncertain, or feel worried about your lack of concrete attraction, right now.

As for your libido, it's a little tricky to make any sweeping declarations here. It could be that you have a low desire for sex in general, it could be that being in a relationship with someone you have strong feelings for and/or getting direct experience with a sexual partner might "kickstart" those sexual feelings, it could be that your sex drive fluctuates throughout your life. It's very common for people to experience fluctuations in sexual desire throughout their lives, so even based on what you've said here I can't predict how you'll feel in the future.

Ultimately it's ok to be a little bit unsure about these things; I know that uncertainty can be awkward and frustrating, but it's also a really normal part of figuring out one's sexuality. It's ok to say you're a lesbian if that's what makes the most sense to you, even if you feel unsure sometimes, and even if that changes later.

Thank you so much for your responses Iwanthelp and Mo;

Iwanthelp wrote:http://closetedlesbianopinions.tumblr.com/ might be handy to read through if you're debating whether you have attraction to women. Just woke up so I'm not very insightful today but second resource has been so handy for me navigating this stuff.

Just been spending some time scrolling through this and am surprised at how many of these posts I can actually relate to, which is really reassuring, makes me feel a bit better to see people who have been in the same boat. Thanks very much for sharing!

Mo wrote:I appreciate that Iwanthelp already noted this, but honestly I can't imagine why someone would cite "lesbianism" as a cause of low libido. It makes no sense to me at all (unless referring to LBD which, as noted above, is a problem in itself).

It's really weird, I typed it into Google to see if that would shed a bit more light on it and there were other articles which again just sort of vaguely mentioned 'lesbianism' without actually saying why, I guess it must just mean LBD then.
The part where you said about being uncertain about my 'right' to claim a non-straight identity actually makes a lot of sense; looking back, in the days when I thought I was attracted to men my feelings for boys and men were actually quite vague when I think about it now, and yet I never doubted them in the way I have constantly doubted and scrutinized my feelings for girls. Maybe I should probably stop doubting and scrutinizing so much and just sort of be a bit more trusting of what I feel. Where you mentioned about libidos being kind of fluctuating and changeable is kind of reassuring too; I've heard the phrase 'sexual urges' being used before in the past and wondered if people just sort of felt these urges commonly and I was an anomaly for not feeling the same.

Again, thank you both so much for your responses, they've both been a big help to me and I at least feel a bit less pressured to 'prove' my identity to myself, which I guess I have been lately; I had been kind of worrying whether I was just overthinking or subconsciously faking it all, but knowing that what I do and don't feel at the moment compared to everyone else doesn't necessarily mean I'm wrong to assume I might be lesbian makes things quite a bit clearer now.

I'm so glad you're feeling a bit better about this! I find that it can be SO easy for me to overthink things when I'm at all unsure of how I'm feeling, or start to doubt my own experiences. Trusting yourself can be tough but I think that impulse is a good one to follow.