I’ve been nervous about sharing my coming out story. I’ve told people bits and pieces when I thought sharing my experience might be helpful to someone but writing down the whole thing is daunting. *TRIGGER WARNING* Trauma didn’t cause my sexual orientation, but it effected how I came to terms with it, so I feel it’s an important part of my coming out story. I was abused as a kid. I got herpes in preschool, that kind of abuse. I have PTSD and a dissociative disorder. Having a dissociative disorder makes it very easy to lie to yourself. I actually don’t remember much of what happened to me but sex is very much tied into the PTSD. I was probably in my 20’s before I could get turned on without overwhelming anxiety. Thankfully I was raised in a very open minded, LGBTQ friendly family. Both my parents are bi, my aunt is a lesbian and I knew her partner growing up. I learned from a young age that loving women was just as normal and good as loving men. So it really doesn’t make much sense that I was absolutely dead set convinced I was straight even though my parents hinted at it. My mom straight up asked me “don’t you think you might like girls?” more than once. I shot that down hard. The problem was I hated being me. I was desperate to be normal, and normal people are straight. So I didn’t even consider the possibility that I might be anything other than straight. I was so out of touch with my real self that it was easy to believe I was straight. When I was about 16 I suddenly realized I liked girls. I mean out of the blue it just hit me like a brick. I felt so free! I came out as a lesbian not long after that. I told my mom first. I said “mom… I think I might be gay” she laughed said “thank God you’ve finally accepted it!” and gave me a hug. My mental health was still pretty much a shit storm for the next several years but coming out definitely helped me. A few more years of therapy later I had another, less pleasant, lightbulb moment. I realized I also like guys. I wasn’t gay, I was actually bi. I just had such a deep seated fear of men that I was in denial. Again. At first I was devastated. I hated it and I hated myself. I was perfectly happy being gay, why would my brain betray me like that?! After a bit of an existential crisis I realized that I couldn’t change it, and if I wanted to have peace I had to learn to live with being attracted to men. That took a while. I joke that I’m a lean ground beef bi. I 90/10 prefer women over men and enbies. Even though men are only a small part of my orientation, it’s still a part that I can’t deny or change. The journey to being ok with being attracted to men was long and painful. It took a few years to get there fully. It was worth it. I’m now more confident and comfortable in my own skin than I ever have been. I can honestly say I’m happy to be bisexual. Will I ever date/have sex with men? Probably not. Either way it doesn’t bother me. That’s a choice that I can make, and not just out of fear.
