Not Another Bisexual Panic
I haven't really posted about my sexuality on this blog, but recently I've done some soul searching and figured out more about who I am. Who I've always been. I've always known I was bisexual. It took me until I was 14 to actually be able to say the word bisexual out loud due to the internalized homophobia from being raised in an ultra-conservative, Baptist family.
So yeah, tragic queer kid backstory lol. And yes, I did take the BuzzFeed "am I gay" quiz at least twice. I think growing up the way I did, in the environment that I did, it always brought me a bit of comfort that I could in some way be "straight passing". Especially since I would never be white passing while living in a town filled with predominately privileged white republicans.
My first exposure to sex was nonconsensual with an adult man when I was very young. To say this affected the way I viewed sexuality, and intimacy would be an understatement. My first consensual sexual experience was with a girl in a mental hospital and led to me being outed at 15 to my parents. I've never to this day had a sit down, in person conversation about my sexual orientation with either of my parents and I doubt I ever will.
My therapist at the mental hospital sat me down in her office and gave me an ultimatum. Either I would come out to my mom or she would out me to my mom. Either way it was going to happen. So two months after my 15th birthday, I while actively crying and hyperventilating, told my mother, "Mom, I like boys, but I like girls too." And she said, "Well you know the Bible says that's a sin, but I guess I still love you." Then we literally never talked about it again.
As long as I wasn't actively being, doing, or saying anything queer in my day to day life, my identity, who I was as a person, was ignored and swept under the rug. I wasn't allowed to have sleepovers anymore, or go to friends houses, or even be alone with my younger siblings. Because in their minds being queer automatically makes you a predator, despite the fact my father literally groomed me for the majority of my childhood. But yeah, we didn't talk about it.
I've always said I didn't want to get married or have kids, but recently I realized that maybe I do. I just don't want to marry a man, have his babies, and have to wake up beside him for the rest of my life. I realized that when I wake up beside her, and kiss her goodbye, and cook with her, and listen to her talk about her day, that maybe I do want a wedding. Complete with cheesy vows and bridesmaids. Maybe I do want kids with her eyes and my sense of humor. Maybe I do want to spend the rest of my life waking up beside her.
I know I'm attracted to men. I've slept with men and enjoyed it from a purely physical standpoint, and I mean have you seen heated rivalry. However, I have never and will never be able to have romantic feelings for a cis man. So yeah, I'm bisexual, but I am not biromantic.
Aesthetically I find men hot, but the attraction is only skin deep. Oddly enough I had this epiphany after hooking up with a man who on paper would be the guy you would want to fall in love with. A genuinely good guy. Our politics aligned, he had a good job, donates to charity, had hobbies and interests, and was physically attractive. But there was no spark, no butterflies. I could not force myself to want anything but a strictly physical relation with him. And then it hit me. I couldn't truly love him because he wasn't a she.
