Fluid Sexuality?

I spend most of my life trying to be straight but feeling like I'm somehow failing at it. I didn't care about boys like other girls did, I didn't understand why they were exaggerating and gushing like that about them. But because I wanted to feel the same way and could tell apart those with symmetrical faces and pleasant presence, I assumed I was straight. My 'crushes' on men were fickle, changed as soon as they showed actual interest and only continued on men who were on the other side of the planet, or were gay, older and generally unavailable.

You see, I liked the idea of being with men...sometimes. Until a living guy and I actually dated. Then I wanted OUT! Before anything beyond kissing happened -which I mostly tolerated and didn't find any fun after a few dates. I felt horrible for being so happy after ending these dates.
In the meantime secretly I enjoyed everything about young and seductive women. Secretly because I held the belief that every woman feels that way and won't admit it (I was wrong). I felt weird in dressing rooms, weird that I found most guys unappealing and I was a mess.

Until I sloowly came to accept my fantasies for women wouldn't go away. Then I timidly started believing I'm bisexual. I came out to my mother and would loudly proclaim I'm not all gay. And this year I concluded I am in fact gay. Just gay. And I've been deep in the closet, feeling awful about it for years. Partly I know this was because I have had no exposure to lgbt community and our country is strongly homophobic at its core.

I'm trying to fix this now. I have ups and downs. It's not a 'straight' path lol.

 

Me, me, me!!
I lived a completely straight life up until a few years ago and I would have argued until I was blue in the face that I was straight. However, there were things and signs over the years that I completely ignored or would brush off as ‘well that feeling was weird, ignore and move on’.
It’s strange though as I always had this presumption that everyone thought I was gay and in my head they were all just waiting for me to come out. Even though I thought like this, I never questioned myself as to why. I just always felt like I didn’t want them to think that of me, like it was bad or something. And tbh it’s quite an odd thing to think and also fear if there wasn’t something more to it.
And then one day, literally out of nowhere, I stopped and just said to myself ‘I think I’m gay’ and a load of different things that had happened over the years came flying back into my head and it was a massive ‘oh shit’ moment.

That complete turn from straight to gay still confuses the hell out of me as those feelings before for men werent fake but I’m not sure that they were necessarily right if that makes any kind of sense. Due to my past I still chop and change between bi and gay, even though I can’t see myself ever being with a man again.
It can all be so confusing can’t it.

But what I will say, is that since I’ve been out i feel more like myself than what I ever have done before. And now it’s like I’m not hiding, even though I didn’t even realise that I was hiding beforehand.
Not sure if that makes sense at all.

 

THIS! This is exactly me!!!

I used to believe I was straight (though even then I knew I wasn't straight like other people were) and then I identified as bi because it was the label that made the most sense, it gave an explanation to my attraction to women and to the fact that I had some semblance of feelings for men at some point. (those were real but they also never felt right)

And since I came out, almost 4 years ago, I aven't had a thought for men, I can't picure myself dating them ever (that's why I didn't bother dating them when I identified as straight) and I don't fancy having sex with them either. Currently I just want women, and I used to think it was a phase, the same way I had managed to feel straight, I know felt gay and would eventually go back to liking men again,but I genuinely don't think I will.

I think I will always be able to appreciate a good looking guy (in an art kind of way) but I don't think I will ever want to date one or be intimate with one again.

labels and feelings are complicated and confusing to say the least.

 

This is completely my life story!! Since middle school, I have always assumed that people thought I was gay. And up until a few years ago, that really bothered me (homophobia much?). As a result, i would do everything in my power to appear "straighter," wear girlier clothes, wear makeup, etc. But in the past few years, I kind of developed a IDGAF attitude about what people thought of me and started to just be me. And when I finally realized I actually was gay, everything clicked. When I came out to two of my closest friends, they were basically like "I've known you were gay since the first day I met you and so has everyone else." So obviously, there is something to that.

The complete turn from straight to gay also still confuses me sometimes. I am in a period now of serious doubting and thinking that being gay is all in my head and that I have been making it up this whole time; that I really am straight. And it depresses the hell out of me. I don't know why I keep having these recurring periods of doubt, but it seems somewhat common among lesbians.

 

I'm of the sort where I've had my preferences flip from men back to women. But in the back of my mind, there always is a little bit of want for men...just that my preference for women is much stronger.

At this point, I've just stopped trying to sort things out identity-wise ASAP. I (hopefully) have a long life ahead.....things will sort out as long as I don't stop.

 

@sjax0628

That’s exactly what I did too, I mean doing things to appear ‘more straight’. Whenever I went shopping and I tried something on, if I thought In any way that it made me appear gay then I took it off quicker than anything. It’s ridiculous really as they’re only clothes but it’s what I thought it represented which was the problem.
Now I don’t really care, I mean I dress and present pretty straight anyway but my fashion has def changed, maybe a little more edgy? Whereas before it would have been girlie AF lol.

You’re not alone with that period of doubting, it still happens to me too. I even have a gf now, who is amazing but again those doubts sometimes annoyingly pop in. Also, on occasions I kinda mourn my old straight life where things seemed simpler even though I wasn’t necessarily happy. There wasn’t that need for explanation or for coming out to anyone etc...which is just tiring.
But when those moments happen and I wonder if I am making it up I always try to imagine my future and when I imagine being older and settled with a man, it makes me sad but when I imagine the same thing with my gf, it’s like ‘ahhhhh yeah, that’s the one’ and it does help. It’s like, sometimes you just need reminding even though often times the answer is staring you right in the face.

 

@Linning
What you said about wondering if your attraction to women was just a phase and could change just like it did for men.

That’s exactly it! Sometimes I do wonder if it changed so rapidly from straight to gay then could it change back at some point? I mean, I guess we’ll never know and only time will tell but like you, somehow I don’t think so. When I think of my friends, I mean none of them have done what I have, by that I mean be living a straight life and then realising that They’d somehow got it very wrong and then come out. I think those feelings have to be pretty strong for you to take those actions and I think that speaks volumes in itself

 

I feel like I'm in a similar position as you in that for most of my life I assumed I was (mostly) straight, until about a year ago I realized I was way more gay than just "a little bit bisexual". The thing is, this is a pretty common experience for people to go through, I mean, how many threads have you seen on this website where the OP wondered if they were simply bicurious, only to realize they were really bi/gay the whole time and didn't know it? While I do believe that sexuality is fluid to a certain extent, my understanding of sexual fluidity is that it isn't something that can cause a change in sexuality as stark as going from straight to gay. It's probably more likely that you're just accepting your true feelings for women. It seems like a lot of people assume they're sexually fluid while they're coming to terms with their sexuality, as they find themselves identifying on one end of the sexuality spectrum to somewhere on the opposite end. Of course I'm not denying that some people identify as fluid, or saying they're wrong for doing so.

 

This is so relatable! I'm starting to get out of another one of my doubting periods where I think I'm faking being gay. It actually depresses me, like it messes with my sleep, and I stop eating and stress out over it. I will never understand why this is so common in lesbians, and not so much in gay men (at least from what I've seen). Sometimes I also wonder if my attractions could shift back to men. I just want someone to tell me that all of my past experiences with men were all comp het and that there's no way I'll ever want to be with a man again, but there's really no way of knowing that I guess.