am i a lesbian?

[cornpop]

ever since coming to the realization that i think im a lesbian about maybe a little under a year ago after identifying as bisexual for a decade, i haven’t been able to stop obsessing about whether or not im right. like in my heart i feel like i am lesbian, but i keep doubting myself and second guessing and trying to like evaluate myself and test to see if i am attracted to men or if i want to date a man. because i feel scared about like what if i say im a lesbian and then one day i have some grand realization that i do like men and i can suddenly see myself ending up with a man, and then i have to go around and be like “oops i guess i was wrong im not actually gay”. but when i try to take away my self-doubt and stop obsessing over it, i do think im a lesbian. like i want to date and be with a woman, i want to have sex with a woman, im attracted to women (which i identify during times when i look at women and think “what she did was so hot” or im admiring how her body looks or im fantasizing about kissing her, etc.). on the other hand, i don’t want these things with men. i don’t want to have sex with men, in fact the idea of penetrative sex with a man grosses me out and freaks me out and doesn’t seem appealing. i don’t want to end up dating a man or being with a man because i just don’t enjoy being around men. i kinda feel like why would i be with a man when i could be with a woman? i think where i start to doubt myself is during times when i see an attractive man and recognize that he’s attractive and good looking, but during those times, i don’t think i’m feeling attracted TO him, i think im just being able to see that he’s a conventionally good looking man like everyone can recognize when people look good without necessarily being sexually attracted to them. but i think i get that confused with being attracted to them because whenever i felt “attracted” to a man in the past it’s always been centred around how that man is perceiving me and im thinking about how i want him to think of me. i would be like “that’s a hot guy i hope he’s watching me and thinking that im really pretty or funny or whatever it may be”, which i think in reality is just wanting male attention and validation because as girls and women we’re taught that that is what we need to i guess find value within ourselves. but now when i find myself feeling attracted to women, it’s always me thinking something like “she is so beautiful, she’s so sexy, what she just did was so hot”. so it’s a difference between wanting to be seen as attractive by men and make myself look good for them vs. me actually finding women attractive and focusing on what i like about them.

also i feel like i have the opposite experience that i’ve seen a lot of other “later in life lesbians” share. i mostly see women say that they always knew they were into girls and didn’t really care for guys, that maybe they just chose a random boy to have a crush on in school because they didn’t have genuine interest in any but saw their friends having crushes and that they never really noticed cute boys, that deep down they always knew they didn’t like boys, etc. but my experience is that i have always been “interested” in boys - i had crushes on boys growing up, i’ve been “attracted” to boys/men and when i identified as bisexual, there was a time when i believed that i preferred men to women. now as i’ve done a lot of work to deconstruct my male centeredness and desire for make validation i think i understand why i was that was as i’ve previously mentioned, but i think because i can’t relate in this way to other lesbians, it makes me question wether my early experiences mean im not actually lesbian.

my fear around calling myself a lesbian and coming out to my family as a lesbian is just that one day im gonna realize i’m not a lesbian and find myself attracted to a man and wanting to be with him, and then having to admit that i wasn’t actually a lesbian.

im hoping someone might be able to offer me advice on wether it’s common for other lesbians to doubt themselves and their attraction to men/wanting male attention, and if my early experiences may actually indicate that im wrong about my sexuality.

[mikky]

Hey cornpop,

I can relate to a lot of your worries and concerns as someone who has had obsessive thoughts and compulsions around sexual orientation since I was very young. I was actually just thinking about writing some longer form piece around this experience and how to manage uncertainty around sexuality this morning!

Sexual orientation is not a diagnosis. We don’t (and I wouldn’t want to!) administer tests to figure out what someone’s true orientation is. In my beliefs, informed by reading a lot of queer theory, sexual orientation is something that is extremely social and cultural. Nobody will ever be able to have absolute certainty about their sexuality, in my opinion. Gender is fluid, sexuality is fluid, and rigid boxes can’t encompass the way we actually live in the world.

I don’t see a reality in which you would need to tell people you were wrong about being gay. You clearly have a deep desire and attraction to being with women. If you ever found yourself very attracted to a man, wanting to date a man, or even dating a man, that wouldn’t take that away. I think that we see a lot of very purist language around attraction and desire and what it means about sexual orientation.

In your own words, “i want to date and be with a woman, i want to have sex with a woman, im attracted to women (which i identify during times when i look at women and think “what she did was so hot” or im admiring how her body looks or im fantasizing about kissing her, etc.). on the other hand, i don’t want these things with men.”

Even if you did find yourself experiencing some attraction to a man, that doesn’t mean you need to pursue that. It sounds like you don’t want that, so you don’t ever need to do that. If using the word ‘lesbian’ for yourself feels like the most accurate and affirming way to describe yourself, I think you should use that word.

I want to focus more on this experience of obsession and testing/evaluating yourself. From my personal experience, that is a really difficult thing to experience, and deserves some kind of intervention. To note, I do not have the qualifications, desire, nor nearly enough knowledge of you to do any kind of diagnosing, but, I think resources made for people with Sexual Orientation OCD (SO-OCD) could potentially be helpful to you. Two things I really don’t like about a lot of SO-OCD resources is they tend to be made for straight people who are worried they aren’t straight, and that they draw on this idea that sexuality is fixed and immutable. I don’t click with that and I think understanding queerness can be so healing and helpful for those of us struggling with these types of constant worries about ourselves, alongside getting help for constant obsessive thoughts.

Again, sexuality is not something we test for. For me, letting go of trying to have an answer about my sexual orientation, and instead, just letting myself experience it, has been really helpful and peaceful. I still absolutely experience obsessions and compulsions around these things, but so much less. And I have been able to maintain affinity and community and connection with other queer people, which at least for me has only ever re-affirmed how diverse our sexualities are.

Let’s say you did have a grand, sudden realization that you liked men a whole lot and wanted to be with a man. What do you feel like would be the worst part of that? You mentioned telling other people you were “wrong” about yourself a few times in your post- is that especially scary to you? Can you imagine someone you love telling you they learned something new or different about themself- how would you react?

[cornpop]

hello mikky,

i like what you said in regard to the fact that even if i realize one day that i do in fact feel attracted to a man and want to pursue a relationship with one, that it wouldn’t negate the attraction and desire i already have for women. i think that i feel scared and hesitant about telling people that i’m a lesbian because i think i would be embarrassed to claim that and then one day have a relationship with a man. i know in reality that it’s not a bad thing for people to change their labels, but i think there is a lot of rigidity and almost like stigma (?) about people identifying as lesbians and then going back on that later on. to get over this i think i need to just try to accept that i can choose a label that fits how i feel right now instead of trying to anticipate how i may feel years from now, but im really struggling with that.

i also really appreciated what you said about if the label of “lesbian” feels the most accurate and affirming, then i should use it - that felt very validating.

“Let’s say you did have a grand, sudden realization that you liked men a whole lot and wanted to be with a man. What do you feel like would be the worst part of that?”. to answer this, honestly i think the worst part would just be people knowing that i was wrong about being a lesbian and sort of contributing to the stigma about “fake lesbians” or whatever. maybe that’s just a really online problem though, because i don’t think anyone in my life would think less of me if that were to happen.

i was also wondering if you happened to have any advice for working to overcome internalized homophobia. i think i struggle with that a lot, because aside from not being 100% sure of my sexuality yet, im also scared to come out to my family because honestly im a bit embarrassed about being a lesbian. like i just cringe when i think about talking to a straight person about having a crush on or feeling attracted to a woman. i especially feel this way when i think about coming out to my parents, which is so weird because my mom is literally bisexual and i know i would face zero judgment from them. i feel badly about this internalized homophobia because i am so outwardly pro-lgbt and i don’t want to feel this way towards myself. three of my best friends are also lesbians and i don’t feel as embarrassed when talking about women around them, and they’ve also talked to me about experiencing internalized homophobia. i just don’t know how i can move past these feelings, because they’re holding me back from coming out to my family and some of my friends and becoming the truest version of myself.

[Heather]

Hi there, cornpop. I'm so glad that what Mikky offered you was so helpful.

Something I am seeing in some of this post is you suggesting that if you ever had feelings for a man, that would somehow make your being a lesbian "fake."

i think that i feel scared and hesitant about telling people that i’m a lesbian because i think i would be embarrassed to claim that and then one day have a relationship with a man.

“Let’s say you did have a grand, sudden realization that you liked men a whole lot and wanted to be with a man. What do you feel like would be the worst part of that?”. to answer this, honestly i think the worst part would just be people knowing that i was wrong about being a lesbian and sort of contributing to the stigma about “fake lesbians” or whatever. maybe that’s just a really online problem though, because i don’t think anyone in my life would think less of me if that were to happen.

I want to say a few things about that.

The words we use to describe parts of ourselves (I personally don't love the word "label" for this, so that's not how I talk about it) can only ever be about what we have experienced so far and/or are currently experiencing. They can't be about the future, because we can't predict the future. So, whether what those words are are "lesbian," "atheist," "Canadian," or "doctor," all of those things can only be about the past and present, and no one should ever have any expectation they tell us anything about who we or someone else may be in the future.

And that's because it's not just the words we use to describe ourselves that shift and change, but because who we are as people is rarely the same in every way across a whole lifetime. That's part of why there are a whole lot of lesbians who have had male sexual or romantic partners before, might even have them while they are lesbian, or why they may have them later in life after being solely or mostly with women. "Lesbian" as a term means that someone is a woman who only or mostly feels sexual, affectional, and/or romantic attraction and desire for women. It doesn't mean someone has to only ever be with women to be a lesbian. Over time, what may change is that person themselves being a woman, that person's partner being a woman (I have so many friends who started out in relationships where both people were women or where one or both of them later transitioned to a masculine or nonbinary gender), or that person only or mostly being attracted to women in general. There's a lot to say about how much variation there is in what people even mean by "lesbian," but people can still be lesbians and not only be cis or transfeminine women who love only cis or transfeminine women.

Too, because we were one thing once and later become something else doesn't mean it was fake in the past. It just means something changed for us. I was born with ten fingers, and two of them were cut off when I was a kid in an accident. That doesn't make the time I spent with all my natural fingers fake. I used to be an early childhood education teacher, and that was a huge part of my identity. That I primarily work with teens and adults now doesn't make that identity before false, it just means I and my life changed. Before we had the language and frameworks we have now for nonbinary gender, I used to identify myself as a woman, even though I didn't really feel like one. But even that isn't a situation where that identity was fake. Rather, before I had better frameworks that fit me, I was doing my best to adapt the one I thought I didn't get a choice about. Get what I mean? You know how you feel now and have felt up to now. That's all you need to know to choose words to describe this part of yourself, and that just isn't something you have to somehow legitimize or prove by being the exact same person across a lifetime.

The stigma about lesbians who have been, are now with, or may later be with men don't come from anything good or legitimate. They come from things like ignorance and a rigidity about gender (and sometimes even transphobia), gatekeeping that probably mostly comes from a place of fear, given the awful long history of how queer people and communities have been considered not-real or ill, and some other things that just aren't sound or good for any of us.

In terms of what you're asking about with internalized homophobia, my feelings about this tend to be that bias and bigotry always thrive in the dark. So, when we take all of this out into the light, it's a lot harder for them to keep a hold on us or other people. Study done during the fight for gay marriage holds that up.

So, I think that coming out to what sound like your very safe (and some queer, even!) parents, family and friends will probably be great for you, and help a lot with this all by itself. It's a lot harder to feel bad about your queerness when you're being actively supported in it, and the joy and belonging of it, by people you care about and who care about you. How about you start with that step and then we can take it from here? <3