I think discovering your sexuality isn’t restricted to realising you are not cis/straight but also is about realising what turns you on, what you are comfortable with, how to please yourself.
So despite this little story of mine being about how I realised I was a lesbian there a parts that could apply to anyone.
looking back now I do realise i had an attraction towards women for as long as I remember... since about the age of 13 (around the time i started my period) I had many daydreams about engaging in sexual acts with other women. whether that be friends, teachers, celebrities. even girls that didn’t particularly like me.
but the idea I could be gay was so alien to me. I was a feminine, considerably attractive girl who did gain attention from boys. and i think back then only women who where ‘butch’ and liked sport could be gay in my head and that was the complete opposite to me. so even though i was literally going out of my way to think about having sex with other girls because it made my vagina feel all tingly i still didn’t even acknowledge i could be queer.
I had many boyfriends in the first few years of high school. all of which lasted about a week ending in me being dumped usually because i was ‘frigid’ and ‘had no tits’. Since realising I have no attraction to boys whatsoever I wonder wether the ‘frigidness’ came from me deep down being a lesbian. and i do think that plays a part but it was also confidence. i had no confidence at all until the last year of high school so i do think even if i was straight i probably would have still been reluctant to engage with boys in ways they wanted me to.
My first memory of actually acknowledging my attraction to girls was a time in english.. we had pictures of celebrities on the wall next to quotes about why they love reading. one was ‘Zoella’ and a boy i sat next to asked me ‘would you like les off with Zoella’ (such a high school boy sentence) and i just simply said yes.. because i found her attractive and why wouldn’t i agree? why was it considered something i shouldn’t agree too?
This boy now claims he was the first to know I was a lesbian.
this same boy also asked me if I ever masturbated (or ‘flicked my bean’ as he put it) he said he knew many girls who did it so i shouldn’t be embarrassed if I did. I hadn’t at the time so i went home and thought i may as well try it .. there was a lot of prodding around my vagina entrance and i hadn’t even heard of a clitoris so it was uneventful but non the less the next day i went in to school and told him i had masturbated. he then went on to tell one of my best friends at the time which did make me very embarrassed and almost ashamed.. but to anyone reading this , there really is nothing to be ashamed of when it comes to masturbation. it’s one of the greatest experiences in the world. i now have different friends one of which i actually compare wanking techniques with a we send each other recommended vibrators. so you shouldn’t just put up with being embarrassed about the discussion of self pleasure around friends. there are people out there who thrive if this sort of conversation.
Back onto me discovering my being a lesbian (though i do think masturbating plays an important part of discovering sexuality). I first heard the term ‘bisexual’ when someone i sat with in geography told me he had a girlfriend who was bisexual. he explained to me what it meant and i do think it was somewhat of a revelation to me.
It’s so bonkers thinking now how before then I had no idea someone could fancy both genders. I still didn’t click that i actually fancied girls for another almost two and a half years after this conversation but i do think it helped.
In the summer between year 10 and 11 I found myself a best friend. she was a girl i had known since i was 4 but our lack of confidence meant we where never ourselves in school and didn’t know each other’s interests. until we started messaging each other and realised we both loved the band ‘arctic monkeys’. something so simple lead to me finding not only a best friend but someone who gave me confidence. i think she is an important part of my story. there is no one else in the world i could have confided in when i needed to about realising i liked girls. i don’t think i had it in me before i met her to think independent thoughts and take myself out of all the girls i was around and to realise what sexuality meant for me.
There was a girl who only started in year 10. we didn’t speak at all the first year because of different classes and she gravitated towards a completely different friendship group but at the start of year 11 we started talking after i came across her on instagram and i really liked a jumper of hers and wanted to know where she bought it. we spoke most nights after that, no one in school knew we where becoming so close.. and i started to develop the feelings of butterflies when i was around her or thought about her. and that was when it finally hit me, i fancied her. which meant i fancied GIRLS.
i still couldn’t possibly comprehend the idea i didn’t fancy boys. but i knew the word bisexual didn’t i? i thought i must be bisexual. i told my best friend... a few weeks later i told her i liked this girl in particular, she said i should tell her see if she feels the same. she didn’t but will still remain great friends. shoutout to her though because there are so many girls i knew at the time that i knew would have told people or not wanted to speak to me again. but she didn’t at all and i’m forever grateful for our friendship.
a few months later i began to get over my infatuation with this girl. and i began talking to yet another boy, he was kind and apparently fancied me which was all it took for me to believe i liked a boy.
we started officially seeing each other a week after i turned 16. the day before our final gcse. i think every other high school relationship for me was just a silly little immature thing that didn’t mean much but now i was finishing high school. i was legally allowed to have sex and i wanted to take this seriously.
there’s many things that within the two weeks of this relationship that made me think you know what ‘i am gay’
first of all i had began an obsession with the band pulp and if you have ever heard there lyrics you would no how absolutely horny for girls jarvis cocker is - which i realised i massively related to secondly, dan or phil came out as gay. i had never watched these youtubers before but my friend did and i was interested so i sat through the 40 minute video and by the end i was sobbing to myself thinking ‘ i am gay, i can relate, i know exactly what you mean’ but the next day i convinced myself i was panicking because this is the first relationship i had since realising i was bisexual.
and then one day i invited him around my house, in the days coming up to this i prepared; i tidied my room- ensured my parents definitely wouldn’t be home as they would never have aloud a boy in my room at that age, and i also tried masturbating again... the rupaul phrase ‘if you can’t love yourself how the hell are you gonna love anybody else?’ was in mind and i though. what if this boy wants to finger me? or wants me to give him a blow job? i have no idea how to experience sexual pleasure. i wanted to know what it felt like to have an orgasm on my own before i did it around anyone else. by now i knew the clitoris was an important part of pleasure but i still i had no idea why or where it was. so i googled a diagram of the vagina/vulva and found my clit and still to the day it is the greatest discovery ever... and it does confirm masturbation really does help you discover your own sexuality.
i saw that boy still but i spent the time showing him my record collection instead ( which he said was shit) and eating pom bears. a few days later i went told my best friend i thought i was gay and she said ‘you should really tell your boyfriend’ she said even if it turns out i’m not gay, if i’m feeling that way he should know. on 27th june 2019 i started my life as a lesbian, i ended the relationship and i realised he was a prick anyway. he now shares homophobic, racist and misogynistic things on his snap chat stories. i spent a long time beating myself up for apparently ‘ruining his life’ when realising i was gay whilst being in a relationship with him but i now see he really was not worth it. no one is worth it.
I drunkenly told the whole class at after-prom only two weeks later and then came out to my parents when i was in a bad situation and they had to know in order to help me (which isn’t the greatest way to come out) but they’re very accepting people so it’s okay... maybe i could go into depth about coming out another time if any one is interested but i think this story is long enough.
I started college openly gay. i study a fashion course and there are many ranges of sexualities and genders amongst my peers so i find myself very comfortable there. I was drawn straight away to the only other lesbian. we became great friends and now a year and a half later i find myself very much in love with her.
I spent many years in high school confused about my sexuality and very shy but i have now blossomed into a confident person who accepts myself and who i love, i could start a whole new story on the person i’ve become today.
What i’m saying is once you realise who you are and surround yourself with people who will also accept you life does get better.
