(no subject)

[yafah.livejournal.com]

i have a question and it doesn't directly concern vaginas but i suppose it kinda has to do with it -

i'm just wondering how you know if you're gay or straight or bisexual or what. like, for those who are lesbians, how did you know that you were a lesbian, or what made you realize it? (bad experience with guys or just one day you woke up and were like "i'm a lesbian!" ...well, not quite .. but you know) and, if you're straight, how do you know that you aren't a lesbian? (totally turned off at the idea of being with a girl or did you try being gay for a little and realize it wasn't for you?)

if anybody was offended by my question, i'm sorry :( didn't mean to offend, i am curious, that's all..

Comments

[feroluce.livejournal.com]

i consider myself bi, but i've never actually been with a woman. but hey, you can still be straight if you've never even TOUCHED someone of the oposite sex, so it works for me. i have a lot of lesbian friends, and i think over the years as i hung out with them, more and more i've opened myself up to how beautiful women are too. i like the ways the contrast from men, soft smooth feminine (or not! heh) rounded, etc.

i still definately like men though, too...very much! i think it's come down to the fact that...lord knows how or when we'll find who is right for us, or mr or ms. "right now" even :) so why narrow it down to only half the human race?

[rockstarbob.livejournal.com]

you can still be straight if you've never even TOUCHED someone of the oposite sex, so it works for me.

That's brilliant! Thanks for saying it.

[ex-wolff493.livejournal.com]

i COMPLETELY agree with the last thing you said. im not really fond of labels, but i guess i am bi b/c im interested in both men and women, though i have had more experiences with guys.

[velmaodella.livejournal.com]

Well I always had crushes on boys. And I was always attracted to women, though I didn't recognize it as such. My first crush on a girl was summer after my freshman year of college (ironically while I was dayting a boy). I didn't start calling myself bi til soph year in college. And even then I never thought I'd date a girl. When I dated a girl a year later I was surprized myself.

Lots of people get stuck on the label. Lots of other people say fuck the label. I consider myself bi. I like the label. I envision myself marrying a boy someday. However I never thought I'd date a girl, so who knows.

It's important for me to identify with the queer community, even if I never have another (or had never had) a romantic relationship with women. When homophobes do their thing, I take it personally, because even if I'm with a boy, I still dig girls.

In conclusion, I always knew. But I didn't realize I always knew because society is so heterosexist. Once I concretely realized it, I looked back and thought "duh. Everything makes sense now."

[hissyfit.livejournal.com]

i don't think that it necessarily stems from having a bad experience with one sex or the other. i think it's more of an intense connection with one sex or the other. or both. of course there are lesbians that hate men, and straight women who hate most other women, but i don't think that they're the majority.

[feroluce.livejournal.com]

that makes me think of the easter bunny, santa clause, man hating dyke, and fem lesbian example from chasing amy...:)

but you're right. once again, the minority gains a generalization that sticks with the majority. i dont think that "hating" one gender or the other has much to do with sexuality either.

[tarafuzz.livejournal.com]

i'd say that i'm basically straight, although it's slightly complicated: i do find women very attractive and i like to think of women sexually. however, i don't ever see myself having sex with a woman or ever dating one. i definitely am for men when it comes to actually doing things. for a long while i considerd myself 'bi', and maybe i am; i'm not completely sure. i'm in engaged, so i really doubt i'll ever have any sexual/romantic experiences with another woman. if i was single, i would at least consider it; i try to be open-minded.

it's taken a lot of thought (over the past few years) to come to this conclusion. umm... i hope that helps!

[punk-is-so-dead.livejournal.com]

i am the exact same way.

[buttaflii.livejournal.com]

I don't think it takes a bad experience with men to suddenly become a lesbian or whatever, but that's just me, I wouldn't actually know.

I'm straight and I know I'm straight simply because I don't really find myself attracted to women like that. I can't see myself dating a woman, I don't think it'd happen. I entertained the idea of being bi for a bit (I never actually said I was, it was just an idea that I thought about), but I realized that, as wonderful as women are, I'm just not attracted to them like that, and that's all. :)

[harpseal.livejournal.com]

no matter if your straight, lesbian, or bi, we've all had bad exprinces with men. It seems to me it's not who you don't like....it who you do. I'm bi because I find women sexually attractive, but I'm a person who loves men in the reltionship sense. So I do like labels, but theydon't define who I am, they try to explain to theres what kind of person i am. Does any of this make sense?

[garygetsnolove.livejournal.com]

Close your eyes and picture the most romantic piece of skin. Is it the soft curve of a woman's thigh, or the jagged edge of a man's jaw?
For me, I never could picture myself with a man. Ever. The thought made me really ill, in fact. But it just came naturally that my first kiss when I was 14 was with a girl, and it felt good to hold her, and from then on, I had one sexual experience with a guy which was really horrible. It wasnt sex, but it was sexual and I felt nothing except emptiness and terror.
Its about where you feel good.

[babycola.livejournal.com]

I consider myself born with a preference for my own gender. As a child I had girlfriends who I played 'sex' with and even 'married' sometimes. When I entered puberty I realized that girls were suppose to be with boys and quit the queer thing for several years. I did get crushes on girls during that time though but I didn't identify them as that. Nowadays I consider myself bisexual.. but I prefer women sexually and emotionally. I've never been able to see myself with a guy.

[rockstarbob.livejournal.com]

I think it takes a certain stepping back to realize things. It's like, one day someone said to me, "why do you shave your legs?" and I said, "Oh! I don't know. Actually, it's pretty annoying. It takes a long time, I often cut myself, and the hair always grows back. I don't know why I do it! In fact, I think I'll stop now." And I never shaved again (which, incidentally, happened long before I identified as feminist or discovered that [not] shaving could be construed as a political statement.)

One day one of my faculty mentors at college came out to me that she was bi. She said this: "For me, it's not the gender of the people in the relationship that matters, it's the quality of the relationship and the people in it." That just sounded really right on to me. I thought, "Why haven't I ever had a relationship with girls or even considered it a possibility? Why do I limit myself to half the population? What's keeping me from acknowledging and acting on my girlcrushes?" The answers are complicated, but I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I came from a tiny little conservative town in the middle of the United States where no one is queer (which of course, isn't true -- people just learn how to be good actors and secret-keepers). Because if they were queer, they'd get the shit beat out of them by a bunch of alcoholic hicks. Since that was always my reality, I never even considered the possibility of being queer (or vegetarian or feminist) until I got out of that environment -- I did not know those possibilities even existed. Does that make sense?

I mean, I guess I have always known what I am, deep down at a super primal, subconscious level. But I never understood it or could put it to words until I found feminism -- that's when I stopped living a binary lifestyle (on/off, gay/straight, good/bad, right/wrong, liberal/conservative, etc.) and I started questioning everything that happened inside and outside of me and my world. I was asking why? all the time.

To me, it's a mixture of logic and instincts.

What about you? If you identify a particular way (queer, straight, bi or all the options in between), how do you know? Why did you make that choice? (It's a good question I especially like to ask straight friends.)

[poopsmoothie.livejournal.com]

Wow, see, I was girding up my loins to try to make a long post about this, and then I saw that you had posted something which said it all! Yay!

[fnord23.livejournal.com]

Its just always been with me. From the time i was a little girl, i always had crushes on girls and boys. I played doctor with the little neighbor girl when i was 3 and 4. Then i went through a period where i hated everyone and didnt even think about sex until i was 14 and then i started dating a guy and after him a girl. I've been with 4 women and 3 men and i feel like there are things i like about both sexes so why limit myself. I'm now married to a man and i am monagamous but if the opportunity to be with a woman came about then i would do it, all long as my husband was cool with it.

[minniemoonshine.livejournal.com]

What a great conversation.... and some words of wisdom from rockstarbob and all the rest.
I agree with a lot of whats been said. Sexuality is very personal and deep and complicated, and I think it is something that our culture does not ponder very much. For years I wanted to be "asexual" and shun sexuality altogether... I've just come to accept that I am bisexual. As far as I am concerned, people are just people. Anyone can be beautiful or sexy to me. Their gender is secondary.

[linzbinz.livejournal.com]

The first time I really realized I liked girls was when I was about 8 or 9... I remember coming home from my grandma's house, and I was in the car with my mom, and I started crying and asked if she'd still love me if I didn't like boys, and I liked girls instead. This was even before I knew what a lesbian was, or anything like that. Luckily, she said "I will always love you, whether you like girls, or boys, or both". Until then, I never KNEW I could like BOTH! I thought it had to be one or the other! So basically, from then on, I guess I unofficially condidered myself to be bisexual...of course, at that time, I had never even heard that word before. *Giggle* I like guys and girls equally...they both rock my world. :)

[purple-person.livejournal.com]

I think sexuality is waaaay too complicated to be put into boxes of gay/straight...even bisexual (which would imply that everyone who uses the label likes both sexes equally) is a little restrictive. Ideally, we would live in a world without labels, but we don't so I guess that's out of the question for now. I've been identifying more often as queer, rather than just gay, or a dyke who thinks boys are cute too...haha.
I love women, I love everything about them. However every now and again there comes a boy and I think to myself "wow, what I couldn't do with him on top of a pool table!!"...but I never think of men in an emotional way. And with women, I think of them sexually and emotionally. I can never see myself being in a relationship with a man, and most of the time not even involved sexually with a man, but sometimes Ryan Adams still looks like a tasty treat. Sexuality is about more than just sex. It's about sex, and emotions, the whole shebang! So yeah, labels opress. They suck. there's my 0.02$!

[linzbinz.livejournal.com]

Wow...that was so totally hardcore PERFECT. You rock my post-teenage world. :)

[eroticpuppy.livejournal.com]

I think I was really lucky, because my mom helped me realize I was bi.

I once had the most beautiful roommate known to man. She had long red hair, and perfect pale skin, and got me into Tori Amos and Tool and Ani and gave me books to read that told me things I already held to be true about women and society in general. Our mouths formed words like "feminisim" and "spirit" and "eternity". I've never really made friends easily, so finding someone that thought just like me was amazing.

One night, I was watching "Chasing Amy" with her. And somehow, by the end of the evening, we'd ended up in each other's arms, crying. She gave me a chaste kiss on the forehead, and my whole body shivered.

At any rate, I took my best buddy home to meet Mom, and Mom just laughed. When she went to use the bathroom, Mom grinned.

"You've got the biggest crush on her. Its so cute." I realized she was right. I've never looked back in my bisexuality, and never regretted it. My sexual experiences have been more with men, but that's because I live in a town where if you're queer, you're more quiet about it. Not for lack of trying, though.

I've always rationalized it this way: I like mindfucks more than physical ones, although the physical ones are nice. If someone strikes me enough for me to fall in love with them, then I want to love them in every way possible. Sex is easy to get - love is not.

[http://users.livejournal.com/devnull_/]

you're so lucky.

i got kicked out of my house by my mother for liking girls, which is when i moved in with my father. he didn't really care either way, he never even brough it up.

my mother, on the other hand, claimed i was saying it just to hurt her and told me that i wasn't welcome there anymore.

i have since been allowed to return there and she hasn't made the claims about it...

...but she never remitted, either.

it hurts like that, you know?

[geminigirl]

For me...knowing and acknowledging were two totally separate experiences. I can pick out crushes, moments when I really noticed other girls and all that. I knew a long time ago...I can pinpoint being in seventh grade as an absolute certainty...and I hadn't had sex with anyone and only kissed boys.

When I look back at my coming out experience, I'm still surprised and amused at the number of people who said "Oh, I knew already," because I wasn't willing to see it.

You asked what made me realize it. I don't know what made me realize it...I know what pushed me to a place where I had to confront it. I spent a whole lot of time in high school actively surpressing and hiding it. Norman, from the first season of "The Real World" made me go crazy-because I saw him, and knew that I was bisexual and couldn't deal...just fought it and fought it as much as I could. And continued a secret relationship with a girlfriend (who I was with for about a year) and with a public boyfriend at the same time (who I'd been with on and off since fourth grade) and my first year in college was with several boyfriends, got engaged, and so on. I also had a gay best friend (I met him cause I was dating his roommate.) But in September of my sophomore year in college, I was date raped. And what that did was make me assess everything that was going on in my life...it didn't make me queer at all...and I can't say that enough, but it made me figure a whole bunch of things out.

[kamil.livejournal.com]

I have always considered myself straight, but with a bi-curious side. I was in a very long term straight relationship that I was pretty certain would end in marriage, it didn't. I am now single and have a sexual partner, male, that encourages me to explore all aspects of myself. I believe it will eventually include sexual experiences with women, but as one of my friends put it, it would never be exclusively with women, although I wouldn't rule it out never having tried. I am just glad to be with someone who accepts me for exactly who I am and encourages me to find the true me. Perhaps this wandered a bit off topic, but I am still in an exploration phase.

for what it's worth, my advice

[isolt.livejournal.com]

I've always thought about girls sexually, from the beginning of puberty onwards. I've always thought about boys sexually, too. And I always knew it. For a long time, though, I identified as straight, because I didn't think I would ever date a girl, or even hit on one - just have graphic sexual fantasies about them ;) Slowly, over the past couple years, I've been moving towards a different identity. I've refused to call myself straight for probably about a year now (using terms like "mostly straight"), and recently I've begun dealing with the fact that I am bi. I think it's just that I've been in a pretty queer-friendly environment in college, and that's helped me to be OK with who I am, to just say "I think girls are hot" without having to add on any qualifications or addendums as to what I might actually do with them or not. As of right now, I've only kissed a girl, no more, but to me it doesn't matter if I ever actually do anything because the attraction is there. There haven't been a hell of a lot of epiphanies, just a set of attractions that's always been there and a slow coming to terms with it.

Last week or so, though, I had a pretty intense sex dream about a girl :) I woke up and I was just "Whoa... why have I been doubting this?"

if you're straight, how do you know that you aren't a lesbian? (totally turned off at the idea of being with a girl or did you try being gay for a little and realize it wasn't for you?)
Just by thinking about it out of curiosity, I imagine - if someone talks about two girls kissing, do you go "eeew" or "Oooooo..."?

[koala4life.livejournal.com]

here's my story...
i've always had big emotional crushes on boys. no question about that. however, in 8th grade, my friend showed me a porn that portrayed 2 women in one scene. nothing else in that movie turned me on at all... but watching two women definitely did something for me. i've experimented with women sexually since and liked it a lot.
right now, i'm in love with my boyfriend. but sometimes i have days when i am more lesbian than straight, i suppose, and vice-versa. i used to call myself bisexual, but now... well, i really don't know what to call myself, or care to know. i'm attracted to who i'm attracted to... no pigeonholes.

great fact

[natrlred.livejournal.com]

some study i heard about shows that all mammels are 80% bi (ranging from equally liking girls and guys, while some like guys more other like girls more kinda thing...) and ONLY 10% of the population is truly straight and the other 10% is only truly gay.
i love that.

Re: great fact

[rockstarbob.livejournal.com]

I'd love to read that entire study; it sounds neat.

Anyone Feel The Same?

[circebe.livejournal.com]

You know, I have the hardest time even explaining myself TO myself. But I finally figured out a way to put it. I fall in love with girls/wimmin. Just all the way. It could be more about the person, because I'll start fantasizing about them the more I like them. When I like them everything else starts falling into line. That's why I thought it was so neat that someone brought up that it's more than about the 'sexual' part of a relationship, because it certainly works that way with me.

Men turn me on, but I definently do not identify with being straight at all. I just know that ultimately if I was dating a guy, and a girl came along in which we both took a liking to each other...I'd DEFINENTLY go for her. I just feel at home in the gay community, and pretty always have felt a little queer.

[ex-wolff493.livejournal.com]

ok. reading all the comments people wrote really made me think about my own sexuality. i have mostly been with guys, but the few girls i have been with have pretty much been for the experience. this was when i was much younger, and we were together b/c i wanted to be with a girl and so did she. needless to say it didnt work out very well, and i wish i could have another experience with a girl i liked not b/c she was a girl, but b/c i liked her. unfortunately i have a lot of trouble meeting people (guys or girls) b/c im pretty antisocial and i have a few bad experiences in the past. i also feel really awkward b/c for me its easy to tell if guys are straight or bi, but with women i can never tell, so if i think a girl is attractive, i usually dont do anything about it at all. does anyone know what i mean?

[peppersnot.livejournal.com]

I like both, but I'm more attracted to guys and it's always been that way. My first sexual experience was with a girl when I was 13. I wanted it to happen and I was attracted to her. Then the next week I went out with a guy. I wanted that to happen and I was also attracted to him. I don't know, besides the occasional questioning(which I think we all do) I've always known that I liked both men and women.

[weetziebat.livejournal.com]

So many wonderful comments!! I didn't get a chance to read them all, so this may have already been said:

Try to find yourself a girl you think you may be attracted to (i know.. easier said, then done. I was lucky enough to have a friend ~who was later my girlfriend for 2 years) If you liked it then great! If you didn't, oh well :) you have the experience and thats all that matters.
You don't need any labels hun, just let yourself be you. Don't try and fit yourself in someone elses stereotypes ;)

[amylynn.livejournal.com]

I would have a very difficult time believing that one's sexual orientation is dictated by a "bad experience" with either sex.
That said... hmm. I'm queer. I don't like the other words (bisexual, lesbian, etc), because they just aren't me, they don't *fit* me.
How did I figure it out? Ehh. I didn't always, like, KNOW that I was queer, like some girls do. Back in high school I always sort of *identified* with LGBTQ people/groups, though, even when I was insisting I was straight. Then there were other days where I went "you know? I MUST be a lesbian, this boy thing just isn't working for me"... but then the next day, I'd be sure I was straight, again. Confusing times. I came to the conclusion that I'm queer without a shadow of a doubt when I suddenly developed a hardcore crush on a girl at work... so no, it's not like I woke up one day and said "Hey! I'm queer!", but it was sort of this increasing awareness. I guess. I don't know, it's not like I have an outside perspective to compare it to. How do straight people know they're straight? I have no idea... the only way I "knew" I was straight, when I was insisting that I must be, is that 90% of the people on earth are hetero, so if I wasn't sure, the odds go toward heterosexuality, right? I was such a logical little high school student... ;)
Hi, my name is Amy, and I like girls... a lot.

Re:

[yafah.livejournal.com]

well, i mean.. i know that it's not likely that a girl would have a bad experience with a guy and be like "fuck that, i'm a lesbian!"

but like .. for example, if a girl never really had a good sexual experience with a guy, would that mean she don't enjoy sexual experiences with guys?