Hello and welcome to this feelings atrium open thread situation, which today is dedicated bi or otherwise multi-gender attracted women. Sit down and have some lemon water or perhaps a muffin!
We get a lot of feedback and questions from bi women who date men and/or who are in long-term relationships with men; while there’s bucketfuls of information out in the world about dating men, it’s aimed at straight people and doesn’t touch upon a lot of what comes up in different-gender relationships for bisexual people, and queer women’s spaces tend not to discuss the issue in much depth. Many of our bi staff and writers who date men have the same issues and questions. So many women feel like there isn’t a space to talk about their experiences in this area. So! That brings us here; we’ve tried to make the space we want to see in the world in the form of this open thread. Obviously one open thread is not the be-all and end-all of discourse about bi women’s relationships with men, but it’s a start. We have some amazing bisexual staff members and contributors who will be here throughout the day to chat and commiserate and share experiences! We’ll be here probably until about 8 pm EST/5 pm PST, although maybe people will be able to hang out longer! Who knows!
A few things before we begin:
+ This hopefully goes without saying, but this is a space created primarily for bi and multi-gender attracted women! If that does not describe you, you are welcome to be here, but please don’t make the space about you; you’re here to listen and learn and possibly support, but not necessarily to weigh in. Thank you! If you are a non-bisexual person and your comments are deemed detrimental to the thread, they may be deleted, and you won’t be owed an explanation about why.
+ All that anyone here, both readers and staff, can really talk about with authority are their own experiences — it’s not possible to make sweeping objective statements about things as broad as identity or relationships, so please don’t a) try to make them yourself or b) assume others are trying to do so without good reason! Let’s all walk into this with the best faith in each other possible! Yeah!
+ Unfortunately, it seems like essentially a foregone conclusion that someone will at some point say something deliberately hurtful, instigatory and/or trollish, because this is the internet and a bisexual tree can’t fall in a forest without someone popping up to say “Well my bisexual ex-girlfriend….” When these comments inevitably arise, please don’t engage with them if they don’t seem in good faith, and instead report the comment to us so we can just delete it. To do so, just use Autostraddle Social messaging to contact me, Rachel, or email rachel [at] autostraddle [dot] com with a link to the comment in question!
OKAY THEN let’s go! What’s on your mind? How do you stay involved with queer community, especially when involved in relationships with men? How do these romantic relationships support and affirm you, and in what ways are they challenging? What have you been dying to talk about with other bi women? Tell us everything!
A reminder: this space is primarily for bisexual women. If you’re a non-bisexual person and your comment is deemed unproductive to the conversation for any reason, it may be deleted. Keep this in mind and please be respectful!
Well, I’m a bisexual women who’s never dated anyone, so I’m actually really interested in hearing about other’s experiences. It’s hard for a lot of my friends (straight and lgbt) to understand how I identify, so I can only imagine what it’ll be like when I finally date someone, regardless of gender. Anyway, really excited to read this thread!
My girlfriend identified as bisexual for years and years before she ever dated a woman. People would always say things like “How do you know if you’ve never slept with a woman?” I always find that funny and ask them how they knew they were straight before they slept with a man. It just verifies that straight is “normal” and also that relationships must always be sexual to be valid. Have you had to deal with this question a lot?
straightness is perceived as the default, same as whiteness is. people don’t have to prove their straightness, but we have to prove our queerness, which is basically impossible if we’re in a monogamous relationship with an opposite sex partner. Too gay to be straight, too straight to be gay.
Jenn,
“Too gay to be straight, too straight to be gay.” Soooooooo true.
Never directly, but I can always hear it in their tone. Like a friend who says I’ll never understand what it’s like to have sex with a man because I’ll never date a man. I’m always like, that’s cool, pretty that’s not how my life works, but okay. They really don’t understand it because they’ve never lived it, or rather, they don’t try to understand. And, oh my god, it annoys me that they always view relationships through sex. That’s only a factor and it’s definitely not what I’m most interested in when I’m looking for someone to date.
^^^ That was to Ash
I totally experience this. But at the same time, it’s easy for ME to question MYSELF as well, which makes it all the harder to fend of other peoples’ aggressive questions.
I feel this so hard. Queer people are expected to defend their very identities even when we’re not always sure, even when we haven’t figured everything out.
We’re forced to pretend like we’re absolutely sure about everything ever or be totally dismissed.
I completely agree with everything you said. What I struggle with is actually labeling myself with the word bisexual because of the ‘sexual’ part of the word. I’m not a very sexual person, but I’m not asexual – I identify somewhere between sexual and demi. The problem then is explaining to this to people every time because I don’t have a word for it that feels comfortable, so sometimes I default to bisexual despite the fact that it’s not fully representative of my identity (at least based on the general public’s understanding of the word.) By doing this is I then compromise by identity for the benefit of someone else, when identity is first and foremost for yourself.
I used to get from my mom when I’d try to come out to her in high school, “How do you know you’re attracted to women when you haven’t been with any?” I asked her why she would assume I was attracted to men when I hadn’t been with any either. Never got a good answer for that one…
Just want to say I hope you are able to find a friend group. The bi-phobia in the LGBTQ community drives me crazy!
oh good heavens. i’m in tears. even just being recognized in this way is a lot. and awesome. a lot of awesome. thanks, you scissor sisters.
<3
What I meant to say there was ‘yes! Isn’t this awesome!’
Recognition and visibility can be such big themes for bi folks, I’m really glad we have a space to talk about this today.
aw! welcome jenn!
omg babies!
i also choked up just upon seeing the headline. i am so grateful for this space and hope it stays open/that this theme or area continues to be something autostraddle visits occasionally or more than that. i am frequently torn up about dating/loving a dude, especially as someone who came out as A LESBIAN!! NOT BISEXUAL!! at like 13 and then had to revise later and it’s very hard and confusing and weird and aaaah
anyway right here with u cryin
Yes yes so much. It would mean a lot for this not to just be a one-time acknowledgement of the joys and struggles I have as a gay woman in love with a man.
I feel you. I hate it when ppl say bi folks have it easier when coming out. I’m bi, came out as gay, then revised my position. Somehow ppl saw that as a betrayal of some kind, especially straight allies who supported me through high school.
I had the same sentiments! Its tough being bi and being in love with a man. Everyone assumes you’re straight, or that you’re ‘confused’. To have someone validate your legitimacy in the LGBTQIA spectrum is such a relief!
Honestly! I usually self-identify more with the ally role because there’s so much pushback about “how bi” I really am since I’ve been dating a guy for 10 years (and get married soon). This headline and discussion are warming my little bi-heart!
Totally agreed, and very grateful this space was created. I often feel like I don’t count as queer because I’m dating a man, and I feel like I’m some kind of undercover pansexual.
Undercover Pansexual would be a great band name and / or purrody comic about people’s ridicmewpuss bi/pan-erasing cattitudes. Not that anyone needs to know what’s inside my head…
Agreeeed. This thread was all I ever wanted ever* and I feel so … visible :3
*possibly slight hyperbole but close
This is me!!! I am a bisexual dating a man person and it is so weird sometimes. I’ve dated women exclusively for ten years, then about a year ago I had this strange and completely unexpected attraction to a man. I ultimately ended up with my boyfriend and he is super great–very feminist, aware of his privilege and completely supportive of my identity.
But I still sometimes struggle with what society expects out of a male/female relationship. When I dated women it didn’t matter–we were already breaking a big unspoken code, so breaking all the little rules of relationships was easy in comparison. We got to build our relationships ourselves, without any expectations about how things are “supposed to be.”
But now that I am with a man I struggle with jealousy. Which I have not really struggled with before. I tend to look at other women as competition. Again, I’ve not really done this before. And it feels like all of these little ugly rules about the way women are supposed to be are subtly insinuating themselves into my consciousness. It’s weird and I want to know if I am alone in this.
I can’t speak to the jealousy part Heather (I’ve encountered it in relationships with both men and women), but your point about society’s expectations really rings a bell for me. When I’ve been with women, there’s this thing where you know that we’re doing something that’s not quite the norm and for me that kinda meant that we could build our relationships however we wanted. In my relationships with men, I’ve felt more conscious of there being existing ‘rules’, people have opinions of how things should and shouldn’t be, and you don’t get that so much with same-sex relationships.
Yes!
I think I put a finger on the jealousy thing. I was raised to believe that men “just can’t help themselves,” and that un-virtuous women were shameless harridans who would just steal away your man given the first opportunity.
So this dynamic never popped up when I was dating women. But suddenly dating a man I find myself influenced by these old beliefs. Strangely, coming out as bi has helped to raise my awareness of some of my own super patriarchal attitudes about relationships.
I completely relate to you on this. It’s something I’ve struggled with a LOT in my current relationship. In my relationships with women jealousy was never an issue, but with men? I completely bought into the “men can’t be faithful, and women are competition” narrative, despite knowing my partner well enough to know better.
I’ve found I combat this best by seeking out things to praise in other women. I’m not sure what the correlation is in this being helpful — maybe it helps me to humanize the people I find myself getting jealous of.
Aaaah! Thank you so much for this thread! I am a queer/bi woman dating a queer/bi male identified person for almost 8 months. Early on in our relationship I let my mom know that my monogamous partner identified as bisexual, and her first comment was “Oh, so is he not really committed to you then? Does he sleep with other people?” The assumptions are so frustrating.
As many others have mentioned I’ve encountered biphobia in spaces that are supposedly LGBT spaces. I went to SF Pride this year and was kissing my partner in the street, definitely received some dirty looks and heard someone comment “Ew..straight people”. I struggle thinking about ways to let people know we’re queer without shouting it at every person we walk past…
Yeah. I’m just a little involved on a volunteer level with our local lgbt advocacy group, but the very idea of being out there feels so invasive of the actual struggles of the other folks. Mine really feels more like people don’t know all my exploits, and that’s kind of how it’s supposed to be. I guess if I ever am actually in a romantic relationship with a woman instead of just a sexual relationship, maybe I won’t feel like such a fake. At least I feel less fake now than when I hadn’t been with a woman at all.
100% relate.
hey heather! i relate to this a lot! i didn’t expect it at all, but i think when i got serious with the dude who’s now my husband, i felt like i must not be as good or as desirable a partner because i wasn’t straight. i think i felt like there were things straight women just intuitively knew or understood about being girlfriends to men, being attractive to men, being sexually active with men, etc that i didn’t, and that i was somehow a lesser partner because of this, that my person was “settling” for me or putting up with my less-than-ideal girlfriend capabilities. i still struggle with this sometimes, but it’s been affirming that when i have brought it up in some way to my partner, it all sounds totally foreign and wacky to him, which helps me remember it’s all in my head.
I have definitely felt that I was missing some sort of secret straight girl intuition. It has been a challenging adjustment.
@Heather, I have gotten the same feeling that I lack the straight woman secret knowledge, and felt it especially keenly when planning my wedding with my now-husband. I hadn’t even imagined I would get married, it was illegal when I dated women!
I relate to this completely. Thanks for putting it into words!
Hi Heather, I relate a lot! When I date men, I find myself falling into the more traditional female relationship roles in a way that makes me pretty uncomfortable. When I date women and non-binary folks, I feel a lot more liberty to construct a relationship structure and dynamic that matches my ideals because there isn’t really a set paradigm for us to fall into.
Have you talked to your partner about this? I wonder if it would help for y’all to have a really deliberate conversation about relationship roles, goals, dynamics etc.
We have. He’s very understanding. In fact, it wasn’t until I talked to him about it that I realized that part of my issue was that I was expecting the worst of him as a man–which is really unfair. I also was feeling like suddenly I had to fit all these feminine beauty standards. This is a silly thing to fixate on, but I worried I was too tall and too curvy for him, since he is about a half inch shorter than me. I never cared when I was taller than or shorter than a woman.
It’s so relieving to hear that other people have experienced this, too! At the time when I started my first relationship, which was with a guy, I mainly wore men’s clothes. When I showed up for our first date, I was wearing one of the only pink things I owned and carrying a purse. He told me later that it surprised him because it was such a change from my usual wardrobe. I had a very strong internal sense that guys liked their girlfriends to look a certain (feminine) way and that if I didn’t do that I was failing. It took me years to figure out exactly what I was doing and why because I didn’t stop to question it for a long time. My boyfriend never voiced an expectation that I look or act femininely – my general sense of “what guys want” was running its own programming unrelated to the actual specific guy I was with.
One of my biggest anxieties about potentially dating guys again is that I’ll fall back into those patterns and assumptions without realizing it. It’s heartening to see other people recounting how they’ve experienced and managed that.
So, the man I’m dating and I are in an open relationship. I’m certainly not saying that An open relationship is a solution for jealousy (I’m sure it isn’t), but the way we worked it out was by starting with a blank slate. No rules. And as we went along we quickly realized what *actually* makes us feel good, what makes us feel bad, and where to draw our own lines. I was able to realize that sometimes the jealousy thing was just a performance for me. A thing I thought I was meant to do, instead of a thing I did because I was really feeling left out or neglected. No doubt, we still hurt each other sometimes, but it’s honest. I think maybe this wouldn’t work for people who already have a jealous streak or who identify firmly as monogamous, but it’s where I’ve found a lot of comfort.
I couldn’t agree more with this. It isn’t for everyone, but being open has really helped my boyfriend and I strike down a lot of the bs rules for male/female relationships. Which has been really nice in my first serious relationship following an emotionally abusive marriage.
I’ve experienced the same thing. I dated a woman before I dated a man, and it’s so hard dealing with people who feel like they can now comment on your relationship. IDK, but when I was a freshman in college and my boyfriend came to visit and we were walking around campus holding hands strangers were commenting. Maybe when I held my girlfriend’s hand they assumed we were friends? I don’t know. Gender roles are weird and I hate them.
i had a really good comment just now that the server ate! um..
i don’t date men as often as i used to because i feel like in a way i’ve been spoiled by queer relationships – i expect a certain degree of emotional transparency, and i’m usually confused when guys aren’t on the same page. in my experience, they don’t expect to discuss every single fucking hint of a feeling every five minutes, and I NEED THEM TO GET ON MY LEVEL.
i’ve had guys act really weird when i’ve done something as simple as holding hands with my hand on the outside, and it’s made me feel like i’m gross or inadequate somehow – but really, i think this experience has just made me less likely to suffer bullshit. i’m glad to hear you found a cool, feminist guy who gets it; they’re rare, but awesome.
“feel like in a way i’ve been spoiled by queer relationships”
THIS!!! I’ve chosen to have relationships with exclusively queer, often gender non-conforming identified people since my early twenties because it seems so much easier to build and negotiate roles and expectations because you are already going off script in so many ways. I’m worried that if I act on the attraction that I have for straight cis-guys that I’ll fall back into accepted roles and norms or that building relationship roles that work for us as individuals will be harder and more frustrating because of these roles. I’m also worried that I’ll feel disconnected from the queer idenity that I spent the last couple years becoming ok with. I feel that as queer identified people the process of becoming queer has shifted world views and I’m scared that dating a cis-guy, especially a straight cis-guy would be really challenging because of this.
This. I identify as queer/pansexual for the most part, but almost don’t let myself pursue the potential feelings I have for guys because of what you just said. Also because if I were to state an interest in men, my family and friends, who seem to just now really accept that I am LGBTQ, would be like “wait… but you said you were gay”. I feel like the identity and community I’ve spent so much of the past couple years creating would just fall apart if I were to be with a dude.
I think about this a lot too, and being spoiled by queer relationships. I can’t do the straight relationship script, and I’m done trying to navigate the assumptions I see about who does what in a straight relationship. I’m currently in a relationship with a cis-guy, and it’s overwhelmingly positive (we’re moving in together this weekend), but one of the reasons I think it is that way is that he is bi too, so our relationship is sorta a bit queer, even though there are two opposite sex cis-gender people in it.
I identify as queer/bisexual because I experience some sexual attraction to cis dudes. But this society stuff I hear so strongly. I’m pretty sure at this point in my life I could not be in a romantic/sexual monogamous relationship with a cis dude because I could not deal with people assuming I’m straight/throwing out my queerness (which is stupid because I’m relatively femme-presenting, so I’m sure people assume I’m straight all the time).
“I NEED THEM TO GET ON MY LEVEL.”
I so identify with this! :) Fortunately this is not a problem for me currently, but I really love the way that many women are more intuitive about discussing emotions in relationships.
Yes! Queer relationships have spoiled me for good communication. I’m so much pickier about the men I date now. And I love playing with changing dynamics in the relationship. It feels like a true partnership and that is so fulfilling.
Maybe this won’t make a ton of sense to most of you guys here, but I feel like I’m sort of the opposite? Everyone is saying they have difficulty when they date men because you’re expected to do traditional gender rolls and you don’t want to.
I want to be the in the traditional lady-gender roll – even with women. I want to be listened to by my partner, but I also want them to take the lead (in decision making, in sex, in walking, dancing, driving, etc.). I really can’t handle the idea of dating someone and being completely equal to them. Maybe this sounds really screwed up (and maybe it is?), but while my needs and wants should absolutely be respected and I should be listened to, sometimes my needs and wants are to ‘submit’ to someone else (and I don’t mean in like a BDSM way, though that’s cool too).
Emma,
Girl I FEEL you! I identify as a pan/femme and am in a happy LTR with a cis male. However, any relationship I’ve been in I enjoy partaking in more “feminine, nurturing, submissive” gender norms. I’ve never found in any way that this makes me weak, I’ve found that we both take turns acting in this role (whether he realizes it or not). My main issue has been being able to even openly identify as pan because the LGBT community in my experience has been less than welcoming about it. Honestly, my current relationship aside, I’ve purposely avoided female relationships for that reason- like many on this thread have said the opposite of male relationships.
But I guess that is something that varies widely from one person to the other? My husband is way better than me in the whole talking about feelings and communicating. And the girl I dated before him was even worse at this than I am, so…
I feel you so hard. This is really eloquently put: ~But I still sometimes struggle with what society expects out of a male/female relationship. When I dated women it didn’t matter–we were already breaking a big unspoken code, so breaking all the little rules of relationships was easy in comparison. We got to build our relationships ourselves, without any expectations about how things are “supposed to be.”~
I try to do that in my relationships with men too, as a bisexual woman. I carry it over so we can build whatever we want a relationship to be, rather than what roles men and women are supposed to fill.
Piling on to everyone agreeing with this comment. I also feel the press of hetero-patriarchy in my relationship with my dude-partner. I know that the same dynamics CAN insert themselves into queer relationships, but I think that many queer folks, at some level, have had to “do the work” already and have a different layer of consciousness of queer theory, feminism, anti-racism, etc.
Cishet dudes may be the most enlightened of folks, may have read all the books and all the blogs, may donate to all the right orgs and say all the right words, but at the end of the day, they are told by society that they are on top of the pile and will remain so.
I love my cishet dude-partner, and I will work with him and for him as he works with me and for me. But he will never understand what it means to NOT be a cis, het, white, dude person. Ever.
whoops I clearly have no idea how to use HTML formatting because that did not come out the way I intended, and apparently there’s no way to edit it? The part of your comment I was referring to was this:
“When I dated women it didn’t matter–we were already breaking a big unspoken code, so breaking all the little rules of relationships was easy in comparison.”
Hi Heather,
Im a bisexual woman who has predominantly dated men. Before coming out as bi/ realizing I was bi, I had been with my ex for 3 years. I had a lot of trouble controlling my jealousy in my first relationships. I would be triggered by any attractive woman that would talk to my boyfriend. This huge weight was lifted once I realized I was attracted to the women I was jealous of.
I started reading a lot about open and polyamory relationships (which i suggest you do) to see how they dealt with jealousy, and in a nutshell….you just need to sit with it. sit with the feeling and accept its presence and dont feed it with your imagination.
Hope this helps!
Yup. Really identify with a lot of you are saying. I think a lot of the problem is to do with how other people read your relationship. When you’re dating a woman it can feel like you carry your own little bubble with you, even in public. There are no rules for who the two of you are. But when you’re dating a man people look at you and they slot you in to a heteronarrative, and it does affect your relationship.
“When you’re dating a woman it can feel like you carry your own little bubble with you, even in public.”
That is so well put. It’s like this thing that no one else gets a say in, because you’ve both already decided to be together despite the fact that you don’t fit the predominant narrative.
But going out with a straight dude there’s this kind of unwelcome acceptance and approval that I get from people I didn’t get before. It kind of grates on me, because people feel like they have the right to approve or disapprove, and they feel like they get a say.
Nobody gets a say but me and the person I’m with!
Yeah, I’ve dealt with feeling self-conscious about showing affection with him in queer spaces, worrying about being perceived as “the straight people”. And I feel gross about how open my mom is to talk about him versus my ex-girlfriend.
OMG this so much!
I so feel you!
I love my mom, love her. But she never once asked about my girlfriend when we were dating even though it was the most significant relationship I had had so up to that point in my life.
Now that I’m in a committed relationship with a dude she asks me about him every time we talk. She asked for a picture of us together to send to my grandparents. Like, she never would have done this in my past relationship.
I definitely have similar feelings! And sometimes the opposite. I listen to my straight girlfriends talk about feeling competitive towards other women or other things you tend to read about “straight” relationships and sometimes wonder if I’m a bad girlfriend (now fiancée…) if I don’t feel those things. My partner is really supportive–I actually didn’t “formally” come out (to myself or anyone, really) as bi until well into our relationship, and he handled it so well–better than I would’ve if he’d done the same, probably. I’m so glad to hear from other women who have similar experiences. Most of my friends are gay women and straight men, so it’s hard to find a space to talk about things I experience in my relationship. Thanks for sharing!
Oh my god, I relate to this so strongly! And I’ve said the same thing about how being in relationships with women have been this sanctuary where I could explore and build an idea of what I wanted a partnership to look like for me – from scratch! And I’ve been really grateful for that and my ability to carry over those standards into my current relationship with a man. It feels so much more like a partnership than any other relationship with a man I had before I ever had a relationship with a woman.
However, I fall into that jealousy for sure. And a worry that our lives will turn into some typical, straight, boring, cookie-cutter, Leave It To Beaver picture that I’ll resent, despite the fact that that is nothing like us and there is no reason to think that will happen. Those “ugly rules,” man. How do they wriggle into our brains like that?
Thankfully, he helps me remember that we aren’t the standard narrative and I remind myself that every day I have a choice to live the life I want, and it’s a pretty beautiful, loving, queer-as-fuck life I’ve got.
I’m not dating anyone at the moment but I’ve noticed that when I find myself attracted to a man I feel weirdly guilty. Like if I happen to fall for a guy all the work I did to get to a place of accepting myself as queer and coming out to the people in my life will be for nothing. Logically I know that who I date does not determine my identity and I’ve probably got some internalized biphobia going on, but there’s this small irrational part of me that just feels that way.
I wish I could hug you through the Internet. I also feel weirdly guilty when I find a cis-guy attractive. The internalize biphobia is definitely real and I think you’re on to something connecting it with the guilt. I feel like I would have to chose my community and my Identity or the guy who was giving me funny feelings, like they can’t co-exist, because on the outside it looks like I’m cashing in on Hetero privilege. And what I find frustrating and is probably the internalized biphobia but right now I can’t figure out how to come to some peace with myself so I’m choosing not to flirt or encourage the cis guys I meet because I’m not sure how to move past the guilt I would feel for being able to move about the world easier with a guy when so many in my community face violence. It’s similar to the feeling I get when I pass as straight because my gender presentation is within what is considered “acceptable” while so many of my friends and the people I date get read as queer automatically.
I relate to these comments so much. I also feel weird if I realize I’m attracted to a guy. It feels like, I worked so hard to get people to understand that I’m queer, and if I started dating a guy we would go back to square one with the explanations and assumptions.
Oof I am so late to this but thank you so much for sharing, y’all have articulated something about internalized biphobia that I have not been able to articulate. I have been sort of scared by the idea that I’ll want to date a cis man because I spent along time telling myself I couldn’t be attracted to women because I’d been attracted to men, and I’m still not done sorting that out. I still have days when that little, lying voice creeps back into my head. Part of that is guilt; I write articles from a queer perspective and talk about being queer and engage in queerness in very public ways so much that if I end up dating a man I’ll feel like I don’t fit into that space anymore, like I don’t have a right to it because I’m a traitor.
You are not at all alone. I also struggle with societal expectations of a male/female relationship and realize every day that my identity and sexuality are assumed as straight by everyone who doesn’t know me personally. Jealousy was never part of my relationship with women but has entered into my relationships with men. I also find that I judge the man I am in a relationship with more harshly (for privilege, who and what he is attracted to, etc.) than I did with women, which makes me feel ashamed of myself but can be difficult to get a grip on.
Nah you not alone. Struggled with this hard. But my man person did cheat on me and blamed my queerness and femme-ness (which was too masculine for his heteronormative tastes). So the jealousy piece felt a bit weird when he was also curiously encouraging me to start sleeping with other women, as a sign that he was actually interested in sleeping with other women, too (not including me). Now being submerged back into the queer dating scene feels a bit…disorienting.
Kind of joining the pile as well. The last bloke I dated was bi, and it was one of the better relationships I’ve had with a man because of the level of transparency, camaraderie and non judgement in not slipping into traditional roles. Whenever I date cis het dudes it’s all playing the rules, wondering how many dates should I wait to have sex so he doesn’t think I’m a slut, do I tell him about my queer history, etc. and it’s…exhausting.
It’s really interesting to hear so many express how relationships with men can make them feel limited by heteronormative structures and assumptions (both external and internal) and how that really does affect one’s relationship.
I have really felt this in the past, and the fact is that it doesn’t go away. I am bisexual, but homoromantic. I think distinctions between sexuality and romanticism (for me this is who is attractive/who I could enjoy having sex with versus who I could enjoy having a relationship with) are really useful for queer people who feel heteronormativity and heterosexism keenly in their lives. Some queer and bisexual people do feel the effect of hetero assumptions and expectations, and some don’t.
My understanding of myself as homoromantic, though queer/bisexual, basically comes down to not feeling comfortable with the expectations and roles that I and others carry in relationships with men. For all intents and purposes, the world sees me and my wife as a gay couple, and I’m more comfortable than that than with the world seeing me as straight (which does happen before people know who I’m married to, because who goes around saying, “hi I’m queer”). In more than a decade of married life, you come to realize that finding someone you want to spend your whole life with isn’t just about attraction and being in love but also about it being compatible with each other and your concept of self in this world we have.
What is that jealousy about? After 22 years of being exclusively with women, I am involved with a man. I adore him, and it’s mutual. But the bursts of jealousy I’ve felt since we’ve been together have been bizarre. It’s out of character for me, and it feels gross.
I think I love you. All of you. ?
Count me as one more bi lady who made an account because of this thread! I’ve actually been reading Autostraddle for a year or two now and was so happy to find this site.
I came out as bi in high school but I often feel like my bisexuality is invisible because I found love early – with a guy. We share a female partner as well (poly triad) and so I feel like I’m less invisi-bi these days. Although since we all live in the Bible Belt I always wonder if folks assume our relationship is religious/patriarchal (it is not). :)
Anyway, it’s so nice to find a place where I feel welcome. Thank you, Autostraddle! XoxoX
Heather, I so relate to what you are saying. I too dated women exclusively for many many years and then started dating men. Until reading your post I have literally never found anyone else who dated the same gender first. It has been hard because I feel I have really lost the queer community that I felt such a strong part of for over 15 years. I have definitely found myself struggling with traditional gender roles in my relationships with men as well. I think someone else used shaving as an example. Definitely felt more internal pressure to keep up with the primping etc. And I also strongly relate to the feeling like I wasn’t going to be an adequate girlfriend when compared to straight women. I still struggle with this. And with the idea of people perceiving me as straight. All really validating. Thanks everyone.
Yes! I am also in a relationship with a guy and while I love women, they have become people I am envious and jealous of. It is so bizzare but I’m glad I’m not the only one who has experienced this!
Been married a long time, just recently looked back over my life and had an epiphany of sorts…it all makes sense now. Have never dated a woman, and don’t plan on acting on anything because I’m happily married, but there’s truly no place for us on either side of the fence a women who identify with bi.
I like to think of myself as a little bird perched atop the fence, it’s got a great view.
NO HANNAH YOU HAVE TO MAKE A DECISION RIGHT NOW AND WHATEVER YOU CHOOSE IS YOUR REAL ORIENTATION SORRY.
THIS FOREVER CHANGING ALL OF MY AVATARS TO THIS:
I’m the blue one.
i’m the same. exact same. and for a really long time i didn’t feel…i don’t know. queer enough? queer enough to claim the label of queer. it took a long time for me to understand that “passing” as straight was erasure, not privilege.
This is amazing; I am clapping.
I was actually told by an ex-girlfriend at one point that I wasn’t QUEER enough (because I liked men).
i’m glad she’s an ex, then. >:(
OH. This is a new concept for me. “Passing” as straight IS erasure, but I thought it was privilege, too, and that somehow the privilege took away my right to feel sad about the erasure. I need to change my ideas.
It is both erasure and privilege, unless you somehow experience discrimination for being read as straight (i.e., in housing, employment, etc.)
I know erasure is fucking terrible. But it’s not cool to say that one isn’t systemically privileged by heterosexism or to say you experience many forms of day-to-day homophobia (and until recently the legal privileges of marriage which were numerous in terms of planning retirement, end-of-life decisions, health care costs, etc).
Relate so much to this. I’ve been in one relationship my whole life, just happens to be with my male partner of 7 years. I knew I was bi/pan since as long as I can remember, but I don’t “feel queer enough” to affiliate with queer groups, or show up to queer events with my boyfriend in tow and be called out/questioned.
This is me, too.
Me too! I have spent a long time trying to figure out if I’m “queer” enough and how to deal with bi-erasure because I have been in a relationship with a man for 12 years. I have been told I’m not sexually free for not being poly. I’ve been told I’m not actually queer or even really bi because I’ve never been with a woman. Hell, I’ve thought that for myself and the self loathing is overwhelming.
I’m finally working through it so that I can proudly call myself a bisexual woman.
This means so much to me, I’m so glad I found this thread! Most of my life I’ve been dating men, I realised I was bi in my early twenties and this moment changed my life. I’m equally atracted to men and women… but I still ended up dating almost only guys. I dated a bi girl for a brief moment, we didn’t even have sex. I also had some crushes on girls. But I always feel like ‘it doesn’t count’ in terms of identifying as bi… I’m in a happy relationship with my man and I’m going to marry him – this is great, but somehow it makes me feel like I can’t really call myself bi or queer: I’ve never had a relationship with a girl, most people think I’m straight. I have this guilt about straight priviledge… and now I realised that some of my feelings are caused by bi erasure. I hope that I will learn to stop feeling like a fake.
Thank you all for your stories!
I relate so hard to this! I recently came out as bisexual, and because I’ve only had explicit relationships with men, some of my family are skeptical about it. My partner is a man and is super accepting about it, which has helped a ton in me feeling more comfortable about who I am and voicing my feelings. So I’m lucky in that I have a supportive partner, but some close family members don’t believe me, or are asking since I’m in a committed relationship with my partner, why it matters (why I had to say anything at all.) I’m still trying to wrap my head around it, and what I can say to these family members that will feel validating to me.
just being visible and flying your freak flag, regardless of your experience, you know who you are. wear it proudly.
Yay for this! I’m currently single, but part of the reason why it took me so long to come out as bisexual (I came out as a lesbian first) is because of how radically different people treated me based on who I was dating. And I’m in an LGBT choir (which only recently started calling themselves that, before it was called Gay-Affirmative) and one time I was dating a guy and he kissed me before a show, and one of the guys in my choir said,”Ugh, straight people!” And it made me really upset because I’m not straight. My choir members ignore my identity even though I talk about it often. I’m seriously considering wearing a bisexual flag button as a reminder. Also, I got freaked out the other day and didn’t go to my great aunt’s Catholic funeral because I didn’t know who all in my family knows I’m queer and if they would say something stupid. I guess my main problem is trying to combat bi-invisibility and bi-erasure.
yeeeepppp. bi-erasure is a huge problem, and I feel like a lot of times we got told that being erased is actually a privilege. Like, people think you’re straight! Stop bitching about it! But like…I’m not straight?
YES, THIS. This is so true and I never thought of it that way.
it took me a really long time to realize it, but once I did, it shattered my internalized biphobia.
“I feel like a lot of times we got told that being erased is actually a privilege”
YES. For pretty much any article that even mentions bisexuality, the comments devolve into this.
THIS EXPLAINS SO MUCH. It’s so confusing to be told it’s a privilege to be assumed to be straight, when inside me it hurts to be assumed something I’m not.
<3 Yep.
Do you think that’s how trans women feel? I can’t presume to know how they feel, but trans women get dismissed by feminists because they’ve experienced male privilege even though that’s not their gender identity.
“we got told that being erased is actually a privilege. Like, people think you’re straight! Stop bitching about it! But like…I’m not straight?”
This this this. So many times, this!
I don’t know, sometimes I am bothered by straight PDA in gay spaces so I can relate to the gay choir member. Though I’m by no means outspoken enough to make a remark. I have no ill will towards people in straight relationships either, I guess it’s just, I could see feeling upset about straight stuff being prominent in spaces trying to normalize gayness. I’m sorry.
i can understand that as a gut reaction, but i think we have to be careful because not all male/female relationships are straight relationships. If you’re talking specifically about a gay space or a lesbian space, that’s cool and I think there are places for that, but if you’re talking about an LGBT space, or a queer space, it’s not fair to assume a guy and a girl who are kissing are straight.
Or that because you read them as guy and girl that their gender identities are guy and girl.
preach
The people might not be straight, but the relationship is. I’m a bisexual woman in a relationship with a man, and I would feel very presumptuous and uncomfortable kissing my boyfriend at an LGBT designated event. There’s no such thing as “straight-passing privilege” but our relationships are absolutely treated and perceived differently based upon who we’re dating. I never feel unsafe or disrespected when I’m out with my boyfriend; I can’t say the same of my past relationships with women. LGBT spaces are there to protect and validate same-gender attraction, and gender identity, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with acknowledging that (cis) man/woman relationships get affirmed and validated literally everywhere else. LGBT people have a right to assert boundaries, they have a right to say, hey, maybe don’t make out with your boyfriend at pride? Even if you’re both bi? Because that kind of PDA is permitted everywhere and this isn’t about that?
Honestly I don’t get why that’s controversial, esp to people who experience homophobia/biphobia/microaggressions. I don’t like being misread as straight, I don’t like having people make those assumptions, but it would be disingenuous of me to demand that no one is ever assumed to be straight. That would actually be like, really dangerous for LGBT people! Making those kind of assumptions can actually be crucial to surviving around new people/new spaces.
Erasure hurts, but being perceived as gay has literally put me in danger.
A couple of years ago, two of my friends from Australia visited me in Georgia. They’re both bi cis women, and they’re married to one another. We had brunch, and then as we were leaving the restaurant to go wander around some shops, they asked me if it was going to be a problem if they held hands. As in, would they be in danger. It was so startling, and I think a sign of a certain level of privilege I have to be so startled. I have never felt like I was in danger holding my husband’s hand. It wouldn’t occur to me to do so. So even though all three of us shared the same sexual orientation, they were the two that were checking in to make sure they were safe. That’s a big deal. I don’t think anyone here is trying to say it isn’t.
Being in a relationship with an opposite sex person is obviously going to, in most circumstances, convey a certain level of public approval that loads of same sex couples do not enjoy. But can’t both of these things be valid? Can’t bi people who are erased have their feelings accepted as valid while at the same time acknowledging that presenting as a straight couple conveys with it protections that being in a same sex presenting couple does not?
Also, with what about gender fluid people? Or bigender people? The world is so huge. It makes me sad to think about policing the spaces we ought to be making safe for one another.
Also also, erasure doesn’t just hurt. Bisexual women have a rate of depression and substance abuse equal to, and in some cases, higher than that of lesbians. That’s danger too.
This so much.
I also have an invisible disability. I don’t have able privilege because I don’t rock a chair. I don’t have able privilege because I sometimes have really good days. I don’t have able privilege because I can take a medication that reduces the severity of my disability. I don’t have able privilege because the slurring assholes don’t know I’m disabled. So why would having other people demonstrate to you, in their acceptance of your heteronormative-looking relationship, that who you are is unacceptable and that you are not safe or allowed to exist be privilege? Sure, it is less severe than actively receiving violence. But the threat is present all the same, and the violence is just around the corner.
“LGBT spaces are there to protect and validate same-gender attraction, and gender identity”
I think LGBT spaces are there for a lot more than that. I don’t go back and forth between sometimes being a person who dates men and needs spaces where dating men is okay but dating women isn’t, and sometimes being a person who dates women and needs spaces where that is okay but dating men should be discrete. I am this whole person all of the time, I need a space where that’s all okay, and I deserve for LGBT spaces to be that for me.
I acknowledge that I don’t have a risk to my personal safety when I’m affectionate with a guy, and that’s an important difference between male-female and same-sex relationships. However, if my relationships with men are safer, and more supported, it’s because straight people are better than queer people, so it’s a negative experience for me. It’s a negative experience for me to be in any space, straight or queer, where some of my relationships are more supported than others because of the gender of my partner. I am a queer person, and LGBTQ spaces should have a healthy response to my entire relationship potential. Physical safety isn’t the only thing LGBT spaces are for.
I also think, for bi people who are struggling because they don’t understand the possibilities of their attraction, it’s valuable for male-female relationships to be visible in queer spaces. That perception that you can only be one way or the other, that part of your attraction is the real part and the rest isn’t, that if you’re a woman attracted to men you can’t be interested in women – I think it’s a big part of what leaves bi kids more confused, coming out later, higher risk for mental illness and all kinds of other problems, compared to lesbian and gay kids.
Not to mention, what about a straight trans person at LGBTQ events? “You can be here, we affirm your gender, that might be a huge relief for you, but remember not to be affectionate with your partner. That part of yourself doesn’t belong here.”
I’ll never forget the first time I saw a candid pic from an LGBT group that included some apparently male-female couples. That left me very optimistic despite my really discouraging experiences in so-called LGBT spaces until then, and the group did turn out to be the positive queer space I had so badly needed.
Saying that LGBT spaces are only about “same gender” attraction erases bi people and trans people who are not attracted to the “same gender.”
I mean, this is also going off of how someone presents. I’m way more nervous about holding hands with dudes than ladies in public as a safety concern because I am hella butch and am frequently assumed to be a dude. (I mean, if I hold hands with a lady, people assume that we’re dating pretty frequently as well, so I’m read as queer with someone else most of the time, which while convenient with my feels, doesn’t feel safe all the time), and I’ve definitely had more issues doing PDA with cis dudes than ladies.
Also, it’s incredibly disconcerting when the partner doesn’t notice the glares and the change in atmosphere because that’s something he’s literally never encountered before as a straight dude, but it’s something I’m literally always thinking about in public with a partner.
I hear you on not wanting to invade others’ spaces, but there is a B in LGBT, which means LGBT spaces are supposed to be for us too, no matter whom we’re dating.
PDA is a behavior and doesn’t have a sexual orientation. Relationships are not humans and don’t have a sexual orientation. “Straight” PDA and “straight” relationships don’t exist because the only way you can come to a conclusion about strangers or people who have not disclosed their sexuality to you is by assuming things about them! This assuming leads to a lot of erasure for bisexual people, because there are not a lot of ways of behaving bisexually that don’t look like behaving gay or straight.
I get that it’s easier to divide behavior into two categories, but humans and sexuality are infinitely more complex and often defy categorization.
This is so weird and ahistorical. It’s absolutely necessary that LGBT people be allowed to make those assumptions about people around them, so they can be safe. If you’re at a bar or walking down the street with your same sex partner, you need to be able to assess your environment to determine if it’s okay to hold your date’s hand, or kiss them. PDA ABSOLUTELY has an orientation. I’m treated a *lot* differently when I kiss a woman than when I kiss a man. What’s the point in ignoring that? I may not know if a man/woman couple is straight or bi or pan, but I’m not going to *assume* they’re bi and risk saying or doing something that could put me at risk. I say this as a bisexual woman.
The assessment you’re making isn’t necessarily “are all the people in my vicinity definitely gay or straight” it’s “what is the likelihood that one of the people around is a homophobe who might do X.” If you’re at a pride parade, you probably figure most of the homophobes are far away or would be easy to spot. At a hockey game, you might be more concerned.
I feel really uncomfortable when people describe my relationship as “straight.” I’m not a straight person, I’m queer. My partner’s straightness doesn’t get to determine the label on my relationship.
I’d like to share my thoughts on “spaces trying to normalize gayness” by normalizing same-sex relationships.
In so much of the world, male-female relationships are normalized, and my other relationships, also important to me, are second-class. That means my attractions, my relationships, my story, myself, are outside the norm. It sounds like you share my understanding of how important it is, for people outside that norm, to find a place that normalizes their attractions and relationships. We both deserve that, and we deserve to find it in LGBTQ spaces.
If LGBTQ groups try to normalize same-sex relationships, if male-female relationships are outside the norm and should be more discrete, I am outside the norm in that space as well. I spent my first year “out” searching for an accepting environment that I badly need, not finding it among queer people I knew. I finally found it in an LGBTQ group whose web page photo included some apparently male-female couples. That picture was the most encouraging thing I’d seen in a long time, and the group followed through with the best experience I’d had of LGBTQ spaces.
I agree that lifting up same-sex couples is important. Lifting up bisexual people’s experiences -wholly- is also important. That doesn’t mean I need male-female relationships to keep being at the forefront – that hurts me too. Rather, I need a place that celebrates queerness and doesn’t have norms for gender in relationships. I knew I needed that, I couldn’t imagine what it would look like – and then I found that one group, which is not perfect but is soooo close to being that group I dreamed of.
I’m still queer when I’m affectionate toward my boyfriend. Any place that normalizes queerness has to have room for this queer girl and all her romantic and sexual behavior within its norms.
It has taken me two decades to even understand that I am attracted to women, and I have suffered from that confusion. Maybe this process would have been faster if I had seen queer people in male-female relationships.
This is lovely, and I’m so glad you’ve found that space. I hope it continues to be a positive place for you, and for your relationship.
I agree so hard with everything you’re saying here, and what you were saying upthread as well. I wish I could give you a million high fives!
I’ve also had some people make comments about “straight people” that are intended to include me and I’m like noooo. It’s so frustrating that just because I’m dating a man instead of a woman right now, people act like I “picked a side” and now I’m straight. Nope, just met someone I like.
The bi-erasure thing really sucks. My family does not at all understand why I insist on still identifying as queer, despite being in a relationship with an amazing (and coincidentally queer) man. I also happen to identify as non-binary, so the neither-nor-ness of my identity really sucks. It’s not too much fun feeling invisible.
I feel and get so much of this. Whenever I am dating a man, my family or friends have been known to ask, so you’re straight then? Who I’m attracted to does not change based off of who I’m dating ATM. That’s like if I was dating someone with blue hair and my family was like, so you only like blue haired people now, right? It’s tough when we don’t fit neatly into the boxes people use to make sense of the world. It always feels to me like the brother or sister comment of “it’s just a phase.”
This is my number one issue too- I hate it when people just assume that I’m straight because I’m with a man! And I hate feeling like I constantly have to prove that I’m not straight to the lgbt community! The worst is when they accuse you of intentionally passing as straight and using that to your advantage. This is particularly bad when you’re dating a man/male identifying person. I can’t help it that strangers make assumptions about my sexuality when they see me, but I feel like accusing me of cherry picking when I expose my identity to my advantage is just as bad! I love all my lgbt+ brothers, sisters, and non-genger binary siblings, and feeling like they need me to prove to them that I’m worthy really hurts.
But it helps to know that others struggle with this- we’re all in this together, and I send hugs to all my bi-sisters!
Oh wow..I didn’t expect a place like that.
I came out, dated a woman for two years, broke up in March and now I’m dating a guy. He was kind of the reason I left my girlfriend which makes me feel like that bad bisexual everyone is afraid of and the one that ruins it for all the others.
My family has been super supportive of me when I came out, but recently my mom actually said that maybe me dating my girlfriend was a phase. She really said that.
I’m kind of worried I’ll lose touch with the community, I feel a little weird to go to pride even though I know I still belong there.
I realized recently that I feel safer in public, pda is much easier because I don’t worry that others might look at us. They just don’t.
It’s weird getting used to the privilege that comes with dating a guy but also to feel less of a member of the LGBT community.
I am sorry your mom said that.
I had really mixed feelings about coming out to my mom (for the second time) and telling her I was dating a man because I dreaded how relieved she would be. She takes my relationship with my boyfriend now so much more seriously than she ever took my relationships with women. That just hurts.
Also you are not a bad bisexual! Sometimes people leave people for other people. It sucks and it is what it is, but you can’t carry the burden of negative bi stigma on your shoulders. It existed way before you. And it’s way more about other people’s biphobia than it is about you or any of us anyway.
I have had the same type of experience. My parents think I’m “straight now”, they do not understand that even though I’m married to a man, I’m still a bisexual. A lot of people actually say to me, “when you used to be a lesbian…” and that is not true either. I was never a lesbian, I am not straight. I am a bisexual always.
When I got together with my now husband, I felt so much guilt about being able to “choose” an easier life. I felt like I was turning my back on the gay community because I fell in love with a man and not another woman. I certainly did not look for a man to date, but it happened that way. I hated people thinking that being with women was a phase, too. I hated making my parents happy when I told them I had a boyfriend.
The privilege is hard to deal with, but just remember that you are who you are. If you are not taking advantage of that privilege in a way that you shouldn’t, you are okay. Losing touch with the community is sad and scary. I hold on by staying in touch with friends that I had, not letting them go because I feel left out because of a husband. My husband is very supportive and an ally of the community. He is a feminist and has never made my life or my past relationships his own–he never made jokes or asked for details or made it pornographic for himself. Being with a really open and respectful guy will always help with staying true to your identity.
Ah this!
This is something I’ve struggled with for a long time, and it’s become even more amplified lately with my own impending marriage (to a cis-het-guy).
I feel like I’m conforming to hetero expectations by getting married to a man, even though my dating history has been mostly guys. I’m sure some of it is my own nervousness about getting hitched but… I definitely know that my bisexuality will be taken less seriously or outright dismissed because I’m committing the rest of my life to a man.
My partner and I had a discussion recently where he said he didn’t like being referred to as “partner” over husband, because he feels like when I say “my partner”, it’s assumed that I mean a same-sex partner. Except I don’t like the assumption that I’m straight that automatically comes with the mention of a husband.
Like others have said, I’m trying to figure out how to hold onto my queerness. I never participated in the community much where I am, because it was very biphobic and exclusive of those who weren’t clearly on either end of the butch/femme spectrum.
I get that “bad bisexual” thing. I left my ex-boyfriend for a girl and thereby went from a toxic in-person relationship to a long-distance one that was unfortunately polluted by the echoes of the toxic one and my own horrible mental state at the time, so it lasted less than two weeks. I was a shit and she broke up with me but was considering taking me back when I went on a road trip with my ex and somehow let him goad me into hooking up with him. What followed was the most self-destructive and horrible summer of my life, and while I do think that was a specifically terrible situation and I’d never cheat on anyone again, emotionally or physically, I still hate that I fulfill the stereotype.
Hi Taylor, My story is almost exactly the same as yours – it was so weird assimilating my new identity (I was so convinced I was gay until I met my bf) and a lot of the people who’d accepted me as gay seemed to struggle a bit with bi. Now that I’ve been with my bf a while they kind of just assume I’m ‘straight now’ and erase my bi-ness the whole time casually in a thousand ways/comments/assumptions.
I even had someone tell me I’d ‘lost my badge’ etc etc. I haven’t really found a way to stay in touch with the community tbh, (apart from the content I read online) but that could be cause I moved countries and I’m pretty shy. I know I should maybe join a club or something…anyway if you figure it out I would love to know what the answer is. :)
I’ve never had anyone actually say the ‘phase’ thing which is so hurtful.
This thread is such a good idea!! :)
Your story breaks my heart… mostly because I hate for bi women to feel invalidated in their bi-ness by thinking they’re a “bad bisexual” for dating men. You may have left your girlfriend for this guy, but it seems to me that you could have left her for anyone you felt attracted to. That is to say, it seems to me like you didn’t leave her because he was a man and she was a woman, but because you felt attraction towards someone new and–for whatever reason–your relationship with her was no longer fulfilling you in some way. Is this an accurate assessment?
Now, I don’t mean to speak for you, and I hope that’s not what I’ve communicated. I also felt badly for having sex/engaging romantically with men after I dated a woman for a short time, and I often have to remind myself that that’s what it means to be bi: to be attracted to genders similar and different. It seems obvious, but I often forget that because of what society teaches me about my identity, and it’s important to me to remind myself of that.
You will never be a bad bisexual simply based off of who you date and when. Anyone who tells you you are or makes you feel like you are is a jerk who doesn’t get it.
I know exactly what you mean: I’m very conscious of my privilege, and my ability to hold hands with my boyfriend without having to worry about slurs thrown my way.
My parents don’t say anything at all; they just don’t feel comfortable talking about it for some reason… the uncle we’re closest to is gay and has been living with his partner for 10+ years now, and there’s no discomfort with that, but it seems like my parents aren’t able to believe my bisexuality… but, of course, I don’t divulge to them my sexual habits, so who are they to judge the legitimacy of my orientation. I’m lucky to have a supportive partner (who thinks about other women FAR less than I do!), but often I feel utterly erased, like a part of who I am isn’t acknowledged by others. That part may not be important in casual interactions, but it is important for those who want to understand all of what I am.
I relate to this so much. I’ve been openly out as Bisexual for over 7 years (I’m 22) and have only felt accepted/part of the LGBT community when I’ve been with a woman.
How have others on this thread, as bisexual women, found a place in the gay and lesbian community?
Every time I have tried to reach out to the lesbian community I have experienced biphobia, and it has gotten to the point where I am afraid to come out as bi to gay women because every time I have I have heard them say things like they have “rules about not dating bisexuals” or that a queer woman who happens to fall in love with a man is no longer queer, or that “my phase will be done after college” (I’m 29).
I don’t feel welcome at pride, or at the lgbt groups in my community, because I feel like the second I enter into a relationship with a man, my friendships and my belonging to the community will be severed, because in my experience, they have been. It just feels like lesbians hate us, straight men fetishize us, and no one thinks that our feelings are real, even us.
Any advice for ways to find communities of queer women who are not hostile to bisexuals? Have you experienced this too?
Thank you for this thread, by the way, Autostraddle.
I have experienced this occasionally. I remember once at a queer women’s book club, the host expressed resentment that her college friend was dating men and could use her stories of past relationships with women to turn on the men she was dating. Other than that, it’s usually general comments such as “at least us LGBT folks never have to worry about accidental pregnancy!” rather than anyone telling me specifically that there’s something wrong with bisexuality. And for me it’s mostly been in organized LGBT spaces and events, rather than social groups.
Regarding social groups of queer women, I have found that the ones that are friendly to trans women are also friendly to bi folks.
Seconding the comment about trans friendly LGBT spaces being bi friendly too – partly because surprise, a lot of trans people are also bi (liike hey, Marsha P. Johnson or Sylvia Rivera for famous examples!) and so those spaces can’t actually be created as trans friendly if they force trans people to conform to other people’s expectations of sexuality, so yeah. I’m in Melbourne which has a huge queer scene and I don’t really interact with the Gay or Lesbian scenes specifically, but even when I do there’s a lot more acceptance for bisexual people here I think due to the fact that the rest of the +BTQA side of the umbrella has such a big cultural presence.
I think. To be honest I still really feel a lot of the time like the Gay and Lesbian side of the community is seriously cut off from us. Their events are often all about drinking and partying in bars and connecting to drag culture, and a lot of queer people here have mixed levels of comfort with the drag scene partly due to the fact that it is weirdly tied into trans narratives while also full of transphobia/transmisogyny/misogyny from gay men. It’s got baggage basicallyy. Some people love it, some people hate it but we can still acknowledge the important part it’s played. Nonetheless, most of my friends avoid that scene.
Anyway though I find that there’s a weird amount of crossover between bi-friendly spaces and geek culture or creative scenes. I often find my community either at gaming conventions or roleplaying events or at events like the Melbourne Writer’s Festival.
Oh yeah, geek or hobby spaces are great! I also find good community outside of specifically queer spaces. Being open about my interest in multiple genders, I’ve discovered that a lot of my straight friends are not actually straight. I’ve also found that among queer women, we each assume that everyone is a lesbian except us! Likewise, we might all be assuming everyone else is straight unless we see them in a same-sex relationship. I definitely did.
Turns out quite a few of my friends are bi and have a history of only/mostly same-sex relationships. And bi folks are less connected to the queer scene than gay/lesbian people. So just talking openly about all your relationships, crushes, whatever, can be a great way to find your community in any space.
Hey guys! I have a train to catch, two weeks (almost) without internet in front of me and no time to add anything relevant to the discussion right now, BUT I just wanted to say how grateful I am for this post. It made my day. To me, and to all the others bisexual straddlers I think, it really means a lot. Can’t wait to read what everyone has to say.
you mean a lot alice! thank you! <3
I, too, am elated at even the acknowledgement by this thread being here on Autostraddle. I’ve identified as queer and bisexual for more than a decade and I’m in a relationship with a cis man. I am not as involved with queer community as I’d like (mostly due to traumatic experiences outside of my relationship with this guy). I’m not really out to him (other than my having told him once that lesbian erotica turns me on) and it’s all a struggle.
thank you for sharing! it’s tough not being out in your relationship, and i hope you get a lot of support and affirmation in your relationship in general. i hope also that you can get support and affirmation from this online community and this open thread, for all the struggles you’re feeling!
Thanks so much, Rachel. :-)
The links to queer community can be a tough one and I’m so sorry you’re not getting that support Victoria. Throughout a 7-yr relationship with a man, my involvement with the queer community was a keep part of reminding myself that I was still queer, I was still me. When that all blew up and I lost the partner and the community, I started another relationship with a man, but this time I didn’t have those queer links, and it really hurt. Suddenly I felt a lot straighter than I did before.
I hope you can get support and community here on Autostraddle and on other online queer spaces, and maybe IRL too, in different spaces (though the queer universe is so damn small that’s hard, I know…) xxxx
Thank you, Beth. It helps to read all the responses and know I’m not the only one. :-)
Hey, you don’t know how much you sound like me from a few years ago. I was so sure in myself about who I was, but I struggled to not feel shame in telling my male partner (he’s a sweet, patient and compassionate dude).
I saw liking girls as this almost hedonistic side of me, like everyone liked women to some extent and I was just making a big deal of it in my head.
He found out I was writing lesbian erotica and was excited but I was too embarrassed. Then he found out my porn preferences and I was still mortified. Maybe I wasn’t a very good partner, I thought.
But, we worked through it. He allowed me space to talk and over time, I started to feel more confident. I could be my full sexual self with him, liking women and all. When people say communication matters, they aren’t lying.
Anyway, sorry for the ramble. I hope for healthy relationships for you and the ability to feel like your full self, no matter who you’re with.
Thanks, ladyknightofcydonia. :-)
I understand completely and have had the same conversation with my guy. I have related my interests in women I have always had them just never went forth with it
Thank you a million times for making space for this much needed conversation! I am bisexual/queer and poly. I am finding some gender bias in unexpected places. A year ago I had a casual “sex-friends” situation going on with a woman who IDs as queer and poly. I wanted to start seeing a man we both knew. My ladyfriend still wanted to continue our relationship, and was willing to talk about my new relationship at first, but then she started making a lot of snide comments about men and maleness and eventually I stopped wanting to spend time with her. I hope this was an isolated incident, and I’ve considered that maybe her problem was about the specific man I was seeing. I just want bi/poly friends who respect each other’s healthy relationships with people of any or no gender! Is that too much to ask? That might be too much to ask…
I’m bi and poly, too!
Same here! Been forever since I’ve been able to date a woman though, bi+poly+married to a man seems to severely limit options on that front so far. :(
Likewise! Although since I’m a) single, and b) not looking for anything serious, I wouldn’t mind experimenting with a more casual relationship that was monogamous (I’ve only been in poly ones before).
Yay!! I came here to talk about being bi and poly, too! I have only dated men but have had experiences with women, and I feel extremely disconnected from the queer community. Not sure how to meet other women, and generally have the idea (clearly misinformed) that most gay/bi women are not interested in poly relationships.
Hi Jo! I also feel disconnected from the queer community in my current town because it seems like all the queer women I’ve have life partners and babies (or dog children!). But sometimes people surprise me! I may be judging these folks before I have all the information – they could have an open marriage or another poly-situation. And I do love my monogamous married queer friends, but that’s not much help when it comes to dating.
Sounds like there are many of us who feel disconnected! I joined a Facebook group for poly people in my area, and many of the members are bi. I haven’t met any of them in person yet, and I’m not sure whether they frown on developing relationships from the group (maybe it’s just for support, and not to be used as a “dating app”), but it’s a place to start! Maybe there’s a similar thing for your community?
Not too much to ask. A million times not too much to ask.
I’m bi/poly too! That sucks that she had to be gross about the gender of your other partner. There are definitely queer poly people out there who are much more mature, respectful, and encouraging to each other.
I swear, we should get shirts.
“YES I’m married to a man
NO he is not my only partner
NO it does not make me straight
YES you should come hit on me, you gorgeous femme you”
I’ve wanted a girlfriend forever and aside from a couple of awkward dates and a quasi-relationship with a friend, I’ve had no luck. -_- It’s like the minute you touch a penis you’re anathema.
Hey girl, hey ;)
Yeah. We need t-shirts. And safe cities to wear them in.
I’ve legit thought of this t-shirt concept before. Lol. It would attract the attention of queer women, and also deter the insecure ones from hitting on you.
AH! As a fellow bi/poly lady, yes. All things yes. Except, it’s super not too much to ask! My current girlfriend (!) is a gold-star (which is a term I have a lot of feelings about), but is pretty cool with my pre-existing partner who is male-bodied. Men are problematic, and she may be making points about him as a quality person who deserves to date your awesome self? But that’s one of the sticking points with compersion: if you think the person your partner is dating is legitimately bad for them, how do you do? They’re happy, yay, but this person kinda sucks, boo? Anyway. Acknowledging others viewpoints! But also expecting those who identify as poly to check their (unfounded) prejudices! Expecting better things!
I’m bi and poly too! I was rather keen on not dating men for a bit, because I need people who have shared experiences with me, not just sympathy. But my current boyfriend is bi and poly too so we’re really on the same page with identity, it definitely feels like a bi relationship, not a straight one. My girlfriend is a powerhouse of emotional intelligence and super poly and queer herself. Don’t know hoow I got so lucky! Bumbled into it a fair bit. I’m really hoping both relationships continue working for a long time. Thought I was commitment shy and the worst bi stereotype ever, but now I am so ready to be serious about both of them.,
This is so great! I came out as bisexual about 6 months ago, after identifying as lesbian and exclusively dating women from ages 15-20. It’s been a hard transition for me. I think there’s something so empowering and important about the lesbian community, so I feel like a traitor for mostly dating guys the last few months. But, it is so hard to find queer women to date, whereas there’s seemingly attractive guys everywhere. I’m also really kinky, and I’ve found that it’s much easier to get a guy to spank or hit me, or even just to have casual sex. So in a way I feel like I’m settling, just dating men because it’s easier, but I’m trying not to guilt myself too much since I am having fulfilling sexual relationships with these guys, I might just prefer that they were women.
Anyway thanks for making this thread! It’ll be interesting to read about other bi women’s experiences.
that’s really interesting about how dating men intersects with your kinky identity — i had never thought about that! i also ID’d as exclusively dating women for a while, and it definitely made the time when i started dating men/my current male partner feel intense; i think i felt a lot more guilt and shame than in retrospect i needed to. congrats on being true to yourself w/r/t your relationships!
Oh man this thread is super relevant to me. I’m not bisexual but I am super kinky (even though I never found anybody that made me feel safe enough to “act up” on it) and could we PLEASE have an open thread for kink intersecting with queer identity ?
I sometimes feel like the “born this way” narrative fits to my kink but not to my queer identity: I can remember being probably seven and fascinated by people being tied up in stories and on tv, and being 13 and watching a documentary on BDSM and realising “ooooh THAT’S why!”. And I think maybe that’s part of why it took me 25 years to understand I was a lesbian: I just thought I wasn’t enjoying sex with men because it wasn’t kinky enough :(.
Sorry sorry for hijacking this wonderful thread where I’m learning so much <3 but I would just love to have conversations about this topic. I understand this isn't the proper space so could we please make one of those ? :D
I feel the exact same way with the “born this way narrative” – it’s gross to think about, but I remember masturbating at age 4 and thinking about being helpless or used by someone. I had no idea what sex was, or any sense of attraction to anyone, and I was already having orgasms to vague ideas of BDSMy stuff. For me I’ve found that kink is more important than the sex of the person I date, though that’s still not something I love admitting. I’d love a column on the intersection between kink and queer identities, it’d be interesting to see if anyone else feels the same way.
I felt a lot of guilt when I started dating men, too: I think that’s a really common experience. At the time I felt like I was being forced to sever ties with a really biphobic queer community, but now, years later, I think a lot of that was built out of my own feelings of shame and confusion. Even now when I consider going to queer events in my city, and no one is telling me I can’t, or shouldn’t, I still have these nagging thoughts that I’m not really welcome. It means a lot to me that Autostraddle makes a space for bi/otherwise-non-monosexual folks.
This is only tangentially related to your comment, but someone should do a study on whether women who like women are less interested in casual sex, because I am, and I sometimes feel very alone in that desire.
I remember a study not precisely on interest in casual sex, but on sex drive, which probably is vaguely related, and it actually suggested that queer women have greater sex drive than straight women (and on average bisexual women had stronger sex drive than lesbians, but interestingly it varied by ethnicity – in the subgroup of Asian women lesbians had weaker sex drive than straights or bisexuals, while among Hispanic women – lesbians had the strongest sex drive, which means you probably should take those results with a grain of salt).
Um, can we talk about this “it’s easier to date guys than it is to date girls” thing? I live in a really liberal city and I still find it hard to find women that I am interested in AND can get to actually meet up with me (I date almost exclusively through the internet). Maybe I’m not trying hard enough, and the fact that I am in an open relationship with a man is probably not working in my favor, but it’s so nice to hear someone else saying that it’s harder to find women to date!
Yes! I live in a small, conservative college town (doesn’t that seem like an oxymoron? shouldn’t all college towns be liberal?) and I’ve already dated all the queer women I know and am attracted to. Even though I’m not attracted to most men, it’s still easier to find a man than a woman that I am attracted to just because there so few queer women.
SAME. (If your liberal city is in the Pacific Northwest, we should talk! >.>)
Pacific NW here! :)
I agree with pretty much all this re: kink/”born this way”/easier to find guys to date.
Woo! I’m in Seattle myself. :D
Yes. I’ve been bi forever, and more or less out for about a decade, but I am so not used to chatting up ladies. And there just aren’t as many women interested in women as there are men. And, yes, I think being in an open relationship changes things. I think women are more likely to be put off by it, for a variety of reasons. But I’ve had good luck with other women in open relationships, and with not minding being the unicorn for some couple.
Yes! I’m in exactly the same situation. I get probably less than 50 OKC results when I search for other bi poly women in relationships, and I’ve already dated a good percentage of the ones I’m attracted to. I’m about to start hitting up ex girlfriends and trying to work things out, haha.
I definitely date guys more often just because they’re everywhere. Straight men are all over the damn place, and they come up and ask you out. It’s much harder to meet women, and I am a lazy dater :-/
I had the strange experience of switching my identity on OKCupid from lesbian, no straight people, to bisexual, straight people allowed.
When I ID’d as a lesbian, I got maybe 10 to 15 views every couple of days. Literally ten minutes after I had made my profile viewable to straight men and changed it to bisexual, I had 10 profile views. By the end of the night I had 20 messages.
I did not expect that level of difference. I was open to dating both men and women at the time, but it was just so much easier to find men willing to meet up and talk. Women took days, sometimes weeks of messages before they were willing to meet up. By the time that happened, I had dates with multiple men.
Oh wow I relate to this so much. I found myself distancing myself from a lesbian who would constantly put down bisexuals, even in front of me. I’ve also noticed that men are more willing to have casual sex and work with kinks. However I find more attractive ladies and fewer men! Hahah, guess it’s just prefrences ;)
+1 re: kink, easier to find to date. So lovely to hear so many voices on this.
Aghhh it is SO hard to find queer women to date or hook up with. :(
I was in your position, only dated women from 17-21 then got into a relationship with a guy for two years immediately followed by a relationship with the man I am with now. I’m now 26. I had the same feeling, as though I was a traitor. It’s taken me a long time to be ok with the fact I am bisexual, and for a long time used to tell people that I ‘still identified as a lesbian, and I just happen to be currently dating a guy’.
I know I wont be the most popular of commentators here, but you should take some time to think about “sleeping with men because it is easier to convince them to hit you”. I understand kink and dabble in it but if that is a reason to sleep with men, it doesnt sound very healthy. Also you should think about why men are more eager to hit you. Im not tryna shame Im just concerned bc I have definitely used sex as self harm before (tho this may not be your experience you couldve just worded it in a way that made me think that)
I just know so many bi girls (myself included) who have espoused this rhetoric of “well its just easier to find men” and “it’s my only option” and “its just easier to find men to sleep with”, then just sleep w shitty men they arent as enthusiastic about.
and this isnt something i see from straight women a lot and I know bi girls experience much heavier effects of misogyny so i am worried about it.
I’m not exactly identified as a bi woman, but I “grew up” in the queer community as one. Even though I’m very out as nonbinary/kind-of-a-transman and primarily woman-/femme-attracted, I still find myself playing primarily with non-woman AMAB people and (trans)masculine FAAB people. I kind of refuse to do anything with straight men and make homoerotic jokes to ward them off, even though they’re most of who’s interested… And when they’re not straight, the queer/bi men still outnumber the women/femmes that seem to be interested. I guess because I seem femme to people? Or because femmes are taught not to approach people or be active, and I’m way too shy to approach people I’m super attracted to? Facepalm. So yeah, it really just is so much more convenient to be with men, even in spaces as queer as most of the kink scenes I’ve been part of.
But, problem: I deeply internalized the icky patriarchal expectations for women in relationships with men as a bi-identified youth trying to do the “queer girl dating a heteronormative straight dude” thing. So I’m very rarely able to play with AMAB non-women in any role but a dominant one. Any vague notion that I’m submitting to a man continues to be triggering to me, both of dysphoria and internalized misogynistic self-hatred, even if they’re super radical/queer/feminist/trans-positive/switchy/poly … And when interactions with non-women AMABs aren’t triggering, it still makes my pre-T, pre-op queer ass feel so fucking invisible. So I bro it up with them as hard as I can, which makes for an honestly pretty confusing environment where I feel like none of us know if I’m the most dudeish bro in the room (cringe – yeah, me, the once femme bi girl, experiencing fragile masculinity? Around a bunch of other queer men? Who would have ever imagined?!?!) or if I’m just That Pretty Girl hanging out in a circle of boys.
I have a hard time understanding why my brain insists that it’s an attractive idea to engage with them – even to seek them out. Is it really just because there’s such an abundance of men everywhere looking for sex/kink? Is it because of some messed up masculinity thing where I need to prove my masculinity by being more butch than a bunch of queer feminist guys (facepalm)? Or is it because I never got rid of that persistent internalized queer-phobic notion I deceloped as a bi girl that I don’t deserve relationships with women and would just have to settle for a man?
sigh. Are there any other formerly bi-girl-identified trans folk that have issues with this kind of shit?
Wow, I’m really happy that a space like this is getting an airing on the site! I really go back and forth as to whether I identify as bi. During the years when I was kind of figuring out and forming my identity, I was definitely scared away by the biphobia I saw online.
Just when I thought it was simple — I came out as queer, kissed my first woman, saw fireworks, and thought “wow, I’m never going back to guys!” — I fell in love with a trans guy and had to eat my words. :-) We just broke up after six months that were mostly wonderful. Now I’m going forward with the knowledge that I may never be able to settle on any one gender definitively. People are too complex and varied and gorgeous for that!
But I do find myself referring to my ex in genderless terms when I’m in lesbian spaces. It’s easier and shorter than explaining all the nuances of my ex’s gender that made it a the relationship fairly queer.*
Anyway, I am really excited about this forum!
*I realize there are a lot of straight trans guys whose relationships with women are not queer at all, that just wasn’t me and my ex :-)
Oy, the typos
such a good thought, thank you for articulating it! as someone who also had to at one point say “whoops, i thought i was [identity] but i guess not!” i wish there was less pressure to get it Exactly Right the instant you come out, something i suspect can be traced back to heteronormative pressure to make your identity very accessible and easily explained to others around you in order to make them more comfortable.
I have kind of internalized that kind of process anyway, in all aspects of my life — first I get all my ducks in a row, then I act.
I think that’s a huge part of why it took me until I was 30 to come out and start dating people other than just cis men, because I just had to figure out **what I WAS** first.
Turns out I was a human who likes other humans. And true, some people are never going to be comfortable with that, but at least I can work on being comfortable with it!!
Thank you, Rachel! I didn’t get it EXACTLY RIGHT either, since I first came out as lesbian, and I’m now very happy as a bisexual/queer woman. Unfortunately, , this has meant that some of the shitty stuff my parents said when I came out, like “this is just part time thing, right?” and “are you sure? you’re in college, it might just be a phase” seems to have come true in their eyes. Now they’re busy pretending I’m straight and waiting for me to ‘grow up and vote republican.’ (Never gonna fucking happen.)
I came out as a lesbian a couple years ago, but I’ve been dating a trans guy for the past year or so, and since then I’ve really come to own the word “queer”, but I still do not identify as bi because I’m not attracted to cis men (I don’t want to hijack this thread either, but I wanted to share a little bit). I tend to use gender neutral pronouns when referring to my partner primarily in straight spaces and less in gay spaces because my partner tends to actually, physically accompany me to queer spaces so there’s less explaining to do. Also, even though he’s been on t for over half a year, he tends not to pass, which means he easily gets read as queer in queer spaces, and when we’re out and about we get read as a lesbian couple (two days ago a homeless man kept leering at us and asking us if we “suck each other’s clitorises” and I’ve been feeling skeeved out and unsafe walking around my neighborhood a lot this past week because of this and other encounters just this week… this was not the visibility I was looking for!). So, what I mean to say is I have queer passing privilege when my partner is physically present, but when I’m on my own people tend to assume I’m straight regardless of my hairstyle, especially if I drop a “he” pronoun. The pronoun game can become quite a circus, and I try to navigate it in a way that respects both of our identities as much as possible. I do tend to use gender neutral pronouns when talking with straight company that I don’t want to give a quick spiel about my sexuality to because I don’t like automatically being presumed straight. I like leaving some wiggle room in there I can come back to in case I feel like having a conversation about gender and sexuality later. When I don’t leave that wiggle room, people who read me as straight from the getgo and then later have to revise their vision of me never seem to fully catch on, strangely. I worked at a company where I came out to everyone after about two months of working there, and still everyone would refer to the one gay man in our office as the only gay in the office, and try to ask me about boys/completely forget about my identity as a queer woman. It felt pretty invalidating, like I was constantly being overlooked or forgotten, or like it was too much trouble to remember to see me as I was. Sigh.
Something that I also struggle with is some of my queer friends’ attitudes towards men. I have friends who are very outspoken about their hatred of men, some of them are bi themselves, and it always makes me uncomfortable to sit there, oftentimes with my boyfriend sitting next to me, while someone goes off on an “I hate men” diatribe. Like, what? Do you hate my boyfriend to? Or do you not hate him because he’s not a “real” man? Wtf is that about? It’s not a conversation I bother getting into with other women because it makes me uncomfortable, especially when they later insist their misandry is a joke and that they don’t REALLY hate all men. I think my approach next time that happens is to take some advice I once got from a preschool teacher and just say, “hey, that hurts my feelings.”
Hello I am in the same type of queer relationship situation. I think a lot of bi folks (or at least a lot that I know of) end up dating queer/bi men (cis or trans). My spouse identifies as queer, but in more of a community/political sense. Based on attraction and behavior only, he’d probably be in the straight box, but that just feels wrong to him. Sometimes it is frustrating to me that we get more credibility in queer spaces because we pass as lesbians, though neither of us are and my spouse is genderfluid/transmasculine. It doesn’t necessarily bother him or us as a couple because we are honestly more comfortable in queer spaces and identifying as a queer couple, but it does make shit complicated and a bit problematic.
When I’ve dated cis guys, I have experience bi erasure in ways that I don’t in my marriage to my boi. But I also find myself sometimes using gender neutral language and allowing people to think we are queer lesbians, which is another kind of erasure for my partner that is really not cool for me to be complicit in (even if he is totally ok with it). Like, I never went around announcing that my cis boyfriend was cis. I don’t see why I should do it with my trans spouse, either, because it is ultimately disrespectful to trans people to assume their being trans makes them somehow more queer-passing. Even if the world sees it that way and even if my partner feels queer. I’ve started not talking about it in that way, but it’s complicated. Because let’s face it, men, in general, don’t really make any space for trans guy’s experiences and many stick to the lesbian communities that do make space for them (whether that is right or not). I could go on.
Suffice it to say, I feel you! And I’m leaning towards not outing my partner as trans unless it is absolutely necessary (which is rare) or I have his explicit permission. Even if it means people ID me as straight, initially. I focus on my sexual orientation, the same as I would if I was married to a cis man, and correct people about myself, as necessary. But I’m also true to the fact that we sometimes see ourselves as aligned with lesbian culture and that is OK, too, for us as a queer couple.
Thank you for this, Kaelyn. I am dating a cis dude, but I also struggle with terms when describing our relationship. My struggles:
1) I don’t want to use gendered terms for our relationship, like “boyfriend” or “husband” because that is not who we are. So we use partner.
2) “Partner” has the result, in queer spaces, of making people think I’m dating a female-identified person. When I disclose that my partner is male-identified, I am faced with chagrin, hostility, and erasure.
3) I can’t say I’m in a “mixed-orientation relationship,” because that’s clumsy and horrible, so I say “queer” when applicable and it has the same problems as “partner.”
Everything adds up to me having to come out as queer/bi to clarify as misunderstanding and then dealing with the shit that comes with being an out bi* person in a queer space. It sucks.
Thank you both for sharing your experiences! It’s been an interesting journey, continuing to do work on my own identity while dating my ex-boyfriend. He “passes” (although I hate that term) easily in straight spaces (in queer spaces he is very out, as he runs local support groups etc.).
And in some environments, that was honestly kind of nice — it felt safer to be presumed straight — whereas in others, it was frustrating that my queer experience wasn’t visible, especially since he was my first long-term partner after coming out. (I never shared his trans status even when I had permission, because it felt really weird to do so, but he very often shares it himself.)
When we split up a couple of weeks ago, I was surprised by the fear I experienced when I thought of dating women again and being read as queer in the general public, something I haven’t done since I dated my first girlfriend last summer. I honestly thought I had put that apprehension behind me. While I ABSOLUTELY wasn’t dating him because of this (I was dating him because he’s a lovely, kind, wonderful, sexy person who I’m still kinda hung up on TBH), it’s felt very safe to be “straight” at gas stations when we were traveling and, well, whenever we wanted…
And then there were places it was really frustrating too. We were outside a bar after a drag show once and one of the drag queens (one of the ones we didn’t know personally) rolled their eyes in disgust and said “omg, get a room.” We were too straight for them! And there were lesbian spaces in which we didn’t feel comfortable even with my ex’s previous history of identifying as a lesbian, which I get, but it was still a bummer.
Anyway. I’m not sure what my point is! I think you guys are getting a bit of my end-of-relationship processing. ;-)
One thing is, I guess that since I haven’t been out that long, and since I’m still not out to a few people, it’s easy to let people see my identity in terms of the person I’m dating. Kaelyn, like you say above, the more I can focus my identity around, well, my identity, and not just let people assume whatever they want based on who my partner is, the closer I’ll be to living the way I want to!
I relate to this whole comment thread so much, as a queer-identified woman who’d only dated cis men until my current relationship with a genderqueer/transmasculine-identified person. I have too many feelings so here are a few:
1. Feelin’ @kaelynrich on the erasure of partner’s identity. I’d wanted to be in a queer relationship most of my life and really struggled with feeling invisible and fraudulent in my relationships with cismen so when I started seeing my partner I at first was so excited, felt so seen and validated, and it was so much better than my experiences with cismen that felt I needed to clarify to people that this person was not assigned male at birth, even though I knew it was awful of me to do that. It’s been a steep learning curve that I didn’t know I’d have to climb, humbling to say the least.
2. So many things I’m experiencing for the first time that make real for me the heterosexual privilege I had on previous relationships. Basic things like feeling safe walking down the street, not worrying if we stop at a rural gas station on a road trip, not being stared at, etc. I mean intellectually I knew these things were real but DAMN do they exist for me in a hard and true way now.
3. Figuring out how to honor/not discount my previous relationships when I know people read me as a lesbian now, and I identify as a queer mostly cis androgynous femme woman…no matter what I seem to always feel like I have to downplay or hide my previous relationships with cismen.
4. Amen @queergirl on your comment about people identifying you based on your partner. I’ve always hated that. Even now when people ask me who I’m dating and I refer to my partner using “they/them,” which are my partner’s preferred pronouns, I still get this feeling like people are waiting for me to clarify…and sometimes they’ll even ask if they’re “a boy or a girl,” and when I say that my partner is genderqueer, or trans-identified, they’ll either assume a trans identity of woman or man or even ask me what gender my partner was assigned at birth! Because what they really want to know is what they think is my partner’s “real” gender, which will then help them categorize us and our sexualities. I’m challenging myself more and more to let them (and myself) rest in the uncertainty, so @kaelynrich your comment about focusing on your own identity is really helpful.
5. I (and my partner) both wish there was more AS content for nonbinary/AFAB/trans masculine folks.
I feel you so much on a lot of this. My partner is also genderfluid-ish. Like…there is just really no word to describe who he is, but he goes with trans and boi and sometimes genderfluid (but not man and not genderqueer and definitely transmasculine). And if we open that can of worms, it feels like I have to explain to people. But somewhere along the way (We’ve been together for a decade.), I realized that I don’t have to. He doesn’t need my protection and he can choose to out himself (which he does) whenever he wants. Or not. And using him for queer cred is really shitty. So I am back to focusing on me and my identity. Like you, I’ve never had a long-term relationship with a woman. My partner came out as trans shortly after we started dating and self-ID’s with lesbian culture, but that is not the same as dating a woman. At all.
In response to 5: I am a lowly contributing editor (I just write for the site. I don’t make decisions.), but I think the reason we don’t have more stuff for trans masculine folks is that we are primarily a website for women who love women. And we intentionally mean that to include all women, explicitly including trans women who are bi/queer/lesbian. Historically, women’s sites and communities haven’t been all that welcoming to trans women. But they have been welcoming to trans men a lot of the time because they didn’t see trans men as “real men” because they were FAAB. Which is super fucked up, in my personal opinion. Aaaanyway, some of our contributors and family and some of our writers have been trans men or transmasculine folks, but it’s not a regular feature because we are primarily a website for women. And it would be kind of not cool to consider trans men “queer women.”
Yes! I wish there were more Autostraddle content for genderqueer folks, both AFAB and AMAB (because dividing the enby community by assignment feels shitty and uninclusive). I have frequently been shy to engage with content here as a trans person, and I know AMAB femmes (partners, my sibling) that would benefit so much from inclusion/visibility in queer femme space.
100% feeling this as a queer cis person whose most recent partner is trans. I love your advice on focusing on yourself and not using your partner for queer cred.
For what it’s worth… As a nonbinary/bigender transmasculine person, I am super into the idea of my partners’ full disclosure of my trans identity. I’m probably more uncomfortable being thought of as straight than any of my partners have been, and highly value my queer identity. Whether people want to be used for queer cred or not probably depends on the person :P
Hi Adriaan, thanks for saying this! It’s good to hear. In my relationship with my ex I kind of always felt like I was at this intersection where he was saying “tell so-and-so, I really don’t mind, I’m out everywhere and it will help them make sense of the situation” and then the internet was screaming at me NEVER OUT A TRANS PERSON EVER and I would end up kind of paralyzed.
Hopefully there’s a difference between being “used for queer cred” and just, well, being open about the queerness of your relationship?
‘But I do find myself referring to my ex in genderless terms when I’m in lesbian spaces.’
THIS. I have a lot of queer friends and a lot of lesbian friends. When I’m queer spaces, I can be open and refer to my partner as a he. When I’m in lesbian spaces, I use ‘they’. I do it out of fear of being profiled and straight and an ‘enemy’. (i.e. NOT lesbian)
Totally! This is one reason why a friend of mine formed a social/support group for queer/bi/fluid/questioning/etc. people at our local LGBT center to compliment the other groups (where most people identified as gay or lesbian). All sorts of really interesting people have come to the group, and it feels like a really safe space to be open about the complexity of gender and attraction.
Hi I’m here listening until I have time to read though/comment! So just hi for now :)
hello! <3
good to have you here!
Well, I’ve dated nothing but men up this point but its only recently I’ve come to grips with my bisexuality when before I used to compartmentalize it or deem it “unimportant” (“Well, I’m still attracted to men so I don’t need to think about this or make it a BIG DEAL.”) and now I’m coming to grips with gender fluidity (yay for making it public, kinda) where I never really felt fully feminine or fully masculine. I’ve talked to my bf about it and we’re both kind of going through the same thing. Oddly, the first sexual talk we had was about pegging and cross-dressing, which he admitted he’d be into and I said pegging was always something I wanted to do but I was scared because of what that meant and its a matter of finding a guy who won’t think being pegged is ‘gay’ :/
I still don’t know what to do about the gender fluidity but realizing I am bisexual (or at the very least, bicurious, since I’ve never been with a woman) just gave me some solace and peace of mind and I’m not running around fretting all the time when I find a woman attractive.
i’m a big proponent of not assigning yourself a label if you don’t feel like one is exactly right, and i think it’s awesome your bf is on the same page!
Wow Amanda! Congratulations on your little public announcement!
On the topic of pegging, this was a big part of one of my relationships with a guy (and a small part of another one). I’m not sure we talked about it before we did it the first time, it just felt like the time was right, and it happened really naturally. After that, because it was awesome and those physical feelings spoke for themselves, I don’t think there was much worry about whether it was ‘too gay’ (this partner was pretty damn straight).
Yeaaah, once I typed those words out, I realized it was the first time I admitted that to anybody but my bf so yeah, it is a bit of a public announcement. ^_^;
RE: pegging, I haven’t been in too many sexual relationships anyway and the last one I was in, I was acting like a Cool Girl so much, I couldn’t admit that I had these bisexual feelings or I wanted to *experiment* a little. He would probably be one of those guys that if I did say I was attracted to women (or might be) he’d say that would be “hot” and to offer to watch me make out with a girl -_-
Yes!! This. I spent years categorizing my feelings for women as *some other thing* that had less value or was less authentic than my attraction to men. It was hard to overcome that but really freeing when I finally let myself name my feelings as valid and awesome. It sounds like you are finding ways to queer-ify your current relationship, so I hope that continues to be fulfilling and exploratory for you!
Awww, thank you! That really makes me feel happy. I started to realize I may be genderfluid (while looking it up to make sure I had the right term for it) only a couple days ago and it has been kind of an epiphany. It has been the same kind of feeling as when I FINALLY admitted I am bisexual, I was relieved but also feeling “…what do I do now?” Whatever I want to, I guess XD
I am SO GLAD you have a relationship you can have those kinds of discussions in. That is so wonderful. And if you don’t feel like assigning yourself a label, or if you’re too fluid for any one thing, don’t even feel pressured to claim one. You do you, babe.
Jesus Christ, I know how you feel. I’ve been dealing with same-sex attraction since I was 11,but I was still attracted to men and I was in a relationship with a guy for nearly 8 years.
I’ve just come to grips in accepting my bisexuality and now I feel like I’m dealing with a belated girl-crazy phase. (Repression??)
I’m still equally attracted to both,but in the last few months of coming out,I’m noticing women more and how nervous they make me. Not to mention a few weeks ago, i finally made out with a girl for the first time (So…freaking..awesome).
I don’t think it’s a phase (Phases don’t last for 15 years) but this is all new,thrilling and scary at the same time.
Ah, Amanda and Audrey, I feel so much! What you said about compartmentalising or ignoring attraction to women, and seeing it as less valid or important. This was exactly me my whole life until this year. I remember when I first told someone I had a crush on a girl in grade 7, they asked me if I was a lesbian and I said definitively no, but when they asked me if I was bi, I said I didn’t know. And I talked myself out of thinking about it by rationalising that the girl I was crushing on was really a tomboy anyway so didn’t count.
I used to struggle with calling myself bi because I realized I was while I was married to a man and thus had also never dated a lady (we had a monogamous marriage). I knew it was right, but I kept surfacing doubt because anyone I would float the idea to would say “well it doesn’t matter if you’re bi if your married to a guy” or “have you ever been with a woman? So how do you know for sure?” When I got divorced (for unrelated reasons) I came out for reals and began overcompensating by talking about things I saw as evidence of my bi-ness constantly. I even would exaggerate just to “prove” to people I was bi. It felt terrible. But I was so right; I am bi and I was even when with my ex-husband, and that skeptical response from everyone made my journey unnecessarily painful
Oh absolutely! I’ve only recently openly accepted my bi-identity. I look back in hindsight and remember the 6th grade crush I immediately mentally shut down (‘no, I’m not attracted to her, its just…friendship), the way I kept coming back mentally to the label of ‘questioning’, the girls in high school I insisted i was only aesthetically attracted to, and I think to myself “how could I believe I was straight all of these years?”
I definitely felt weird about calling myself bi before I had actually hooked up with a woman. In hindsight, I knew I was bi and if I hadn’t ever been involved with a woman romantically or sexually that would still be true. My identity is not dependent on some act to confirm it. You may be struggling with the label for many reasons or not struggling at all, but I wanted to say, know that you don’t have to prove anything or earn some bi sexuality merit badge. You can define or not define however you want (:
I’m bi/pan/queer and married to a woman, but would definetly have really needed this space during my last relationship, so just wanted to voice my appreciation!
<3<3<3
Oh man! this thread suddenly perked me up and made me feel validated. I’ve been in a relationship with a guy for 5 years and came to terms with my queerness after about two of them. He’s a sweetheart and so understands but I definitely have no idea how to exist as a queer person when to all outside people, I’m straight. I’m so not, but none of my behaviors would show otherwise.
Feels lonely and like I’m making it up, when honestly I’m insanely sure it’s who I am and what I feel.
you’re not alone and you’re not invalid and you’re not invisible. you’re a wonderful unicorn, and you are lovely just as you are.
Oh man. I absentmindendly forgot I made this post and when I opened it back up to replies like this I am getting choked up on the bus. I am feeling happy and queer and legitimized and I want to hug everyone
I can totally relate. I’ve been with my fiance since I was 19 so even though I’m attracted to women I’ve never had the opportunity to actually be with one (aside from kissing and light petting). It can be very difficult to go through a world where everyone assumes you are straight.
You are not alone and please don’t let anyone make you feel like you are “making it up.” <3
It is so incredibly validating to hear all of your stories. I finally figured out that I was bi at 19, and came out to most of my community at 21. Although in hindsight I see a bunch of female friendships, intimate moments, and sexual experiences now as bisexual experiences before I knew what that meant, I’ve only ever had one or two sexual “we’re queer and we know it” experiences with other queer ladies. Everything else has been with men, and mostly straight men at that. I’ve never dated a woman.
Right after these fledgling relationships I moved from my predominantly queer community to a rural state containing like three queer people total… and fell in love with a straight cis man. We’ve been together for three years and are crazy about each other.
I often feel like I don’t count in queer spaces because I’m straight passing- I present very femme- and I’m with a midwestern Catholic-raised straight dude. A close friend who is queer validated my initial feelings of confusion and exclusion a couple years ago by telling me that my relationship (between a cis woman and a cis man) IS queer- because I’m queer. Now my boyfriend and I both consider our relationship to be a queer relationship. Still, I have all these feelings of privilege and taking up undeserved space in queer spaces because it’s easy to assume that we are both straight, and so it’s safer for me than for many other queer people, and this is also paired with indignation for being left out of the bi-erasive queer community.
We’ve since moved to an even more conservative small town, and sometimes I feel so invisible, like I finally figured out this beautiful part of me and now it doesn’t “apply” anymore because I hope to be with my boyfriend forever. Every now and again it surfaces when I realize that my boyfriend’s Catholic family doesn’t know that I’m bi, or when some members of my family seem to treat my bisexuality as this “college phase” that thank goodness I’ve grown out of. It’s so invalidating and isolating.
I didn’t realize how much I needed to get these things off my chest. Thanks, Autostraddle, for hosting this thread.
“Still, I have all these feelings of privilege and taking up undeserved space in queer spaces because it’s easy to assume that we are both straight, and so it’s safer for me than for many other queer people, and this is also paired with indignation for being left out of the bi-erasive queer community.”
I feel the same way! On one hand, I feel like I don’t belong in queer spaces because I haven’t faced any prejudice personally. But sometimes I think other people assuming I’m straight is their problem, not something I ever wanted or asked for.
I often feel the same way!! Like in my head I’ll catch myself thinking “you’re not actually bi, are you?” even though it’s an identity I’ve felt very comfortable in for years. Bisexuality is constantly being scrutinized on the basis of sexual and relationship behavior, and it definitely shows up in my internalized biphobia too. You’re not alone!
I was involved a little bit in college with a LGBT student society, but for outside reasons stopped being involved with their programming in my later college years. Right out of college I started dating my boyfriend, and we’ve been together for 7 years. I recently realized that I need to start being more open with my pansexuality, because the erasure is too painful. My boyfriend is totally supportive, but I also have no idea how to really start with it. I completely relate to your feelings of loneliness and not knowing how to exist as a queer person, since I appear to people as straight.
i totally feel this! i’ve been dating my boyfriend since early high school, and while he’s totally supportive of my identity, i got a lot of shit from one of my close friends (who, weirdly enough, was bi and dating a guy also?). She would say things like, “you’re not enough of a lesbian to be queer”, which on one level is just like ???? but it was also pretty hurtful, and it’s made me really nervous about going to queer events and things.
It’s kind of hard, because while you can feel really secure in your identity, people trying to invalidate you and question your presence and ‘sincerity’ can make you feel like an intruder?
I came out as bi in high school, and switched to using the word queer in college. When I was in college, I was dating a trans person with a masculine name and he/him/his pronouns. I spent a summer in another country, and one of the people on my program there just couldn’t deal with me. She went around telling everyone that I was obviously a lesbian, and really confused, and that my poor “boyfriend” back home was going to have a rough time when I figured it out, but how did he not know already because I had such short hair? I confronted her about it and told her that I was perfectly aware that I was queer, that the person I was dating was also aware of this, and that he was also queer, not that it was any of her business. She was completely shocked, but backed down.
That’s one of the most annoying pieces of bi-phobia, I think: the idea that other people can look at you and know what’s up better than you do. This woman saw alternative lifestyle haircut + hiking boots + cargo pants + male-pronouned partner and thought that added up to confused lesbian, instead of happy queer person or, really, none of her business.
THIS
yes, definitely! i’m sorry you had that experience! it’s fascinating to me how people code anything that seems queer to “lesbian;” it ties in, i guess, to the idea that bi women either don’t exist or are “basically straight.” i frequently have lesbian/queer friends tell me “you’re SUCH a lesbian” even though they know my male partner when i express any queer thoughts or feelings. and while they mean it as a gesture of inclusivity, which i appreciate, it’s interesting to me that there isn’t an acknowledgement that nonstraight isn’t the same as lesbian, even though i know they know better.
I’ve even had bisexual people say this to me. Bisexual women who had seen me in committed hetero relationships, and then when I started dating a woman they asked “so you’re a lesbian now?”
I don’t blame them because that’s some internalized ish, but my point is, it’s a deeply rooted issue.
yes, this, so much! I came out to my family when I met my first girlfriend. I told them that I fall for a woman – that I was serious, it was serious, and it made me insanely happy, even if scared a bit, too. They had to process at first but then became super supportive. I never actually told them what my identity was, we just never had this discussion really. I was, and still am, struggling with the whole idea of putting labels. Anyway – I just recently realized that they assumed (and still do think so) that I was a lesbian. As if there were only two choices, as if bi people didn’t really exist at all.
I never really had a ‘coming out’ story, I have always known and accepted that I didn’t just like one gender. I recently looked through a book I had when I was a pre-teen where I wrote that my sexual preference was ‘humans’. I’m not sure where this self-awareness or self-acceptance came from, as I grew up knowing absolutely NO queer people outside of Ellen on TV.
When I got to college, I decided I needed to start meeting other like minded people. I formed a very close friendship with a gay man, and we started going out to the gay bars in our city. These bars (like a lot of cities) are all next to each other on one rainbow painted strip. I was so excited to finally be with ‘my people’. I also wanted to finally seriously date a woman. (Every woman I had experiences with up til this point was a result of the other woman experimenting, not interested in a romantic relationship with a woman.) Boy, was I in for a surprise.
Turned out lesbians hated me. They reduced me down to either A) a “fag hag” (I FUCKING HATE THAT TERM) or B) one of those aforementioned women who didn’t want a same-sex romantic relationship. After a very small amount of time, I realized I was better off not telling people my sexuality at all and would just let them think what they want. Over a period of time, I was finally accepted as a lesbian, even though I never told anyone I was a lesbian. I had a group of friends at the bars, a girlfriend and I felt SO included. But was I really?
Eventually, the girlfriend and I broke up. I started dating a man who I had been friends with for some time. I kinda stopped going out to the gay bars (I was wrapped up in a new relationship, and also I felt neither of us would feel accepted). I’ll never forget the voicemail I got one night from one of my ‘friends’ from the bar when she found out I was bisexual and dating a man. It was not nice.
There are so many privileges you can assume when you are a cis gendered woman dating a cis gendered straight man. I never wanted to feel like I was losing part of my identity. The world saw me as a perfectly “normal” hetero woman dating a man who would probably get married and have babies and the whole lot. Even friends and family would see me this way. Years went by and we continued dating. Started a business, bought a house together. I am not one much for the term ‘soul mates’ or the institution of marriage but I knew very early on that I wanted him to be my life partner.
A few years into our relationship, I met and developed feelings for a person who identified as gender fluid. This was so confusing to me – not because this person was gender fluid but because I had such deep feelings for them and at the same time maintained my feelings for my partner and did not want to loose him either. This is when I discovered polyamory and began fervently studying and reading as much as I could on the topic.
I don’t want to turn this into a post about polyamory so I won’t – but I will say that as a polyamorous polysexual (I identify as polysexual meaning multiple genders VS bisexual which implies two genders)I have a whole new set of prejudices and hate stacked against me. I have recently realized (after attending this year’s PRIDE) that the mainstream LGBT community is not my family. There are queer folks though who are intersectional and supportive and amazing – they just aren’t at corporate sponsored Pride events.
Yo girl. I get you. I totally get the “never had a coming out story,” thing. I didn’t really “come out” until I was in a long-term relationship with a man! Which is just to say I just never really made it known. I didn’t talk about it. I just fucked who i wanted to, and loved who I wanted to and avoided the queer community like the plague because I was afraid they’d out me as not-so-queer.
Autostraddle is actually the first place that made me feel like there is a real queer community that loves and acknowledges bisexual/polysexual people in all their iterations.
which isn’t to say biphobia doesn’t crop up in our comments sections! But there is always somebody who is there to shut that shit down.
I get so frustrated when I think about mainstream LGBT communities and their lack of acceptance. I’ve seen poly people bashed by members of this community because they were scared we were a slippery slope argument for ‘gay’ marriage. I feel like lately I’ve noticed the the same treatment towards transgender people.
This is my first time posting here. I need to make an account and explore!
Yay, do, explore, welcome! x
I’m with both of you ladies. It is hard to get in touch with your queer self because of the prejudice in both the heterosexual world and in the queer community. I have come to know some really amazing queer women in the past few years though that have totally accepted, loved, and supported my queer self and that has made a huge difference. This thread is making a huge difference. I think that if we keep being honest, keep putting our feelings out there, the feminist and queer communities will make space with less judgment and misunderstanding for heteropracticing bi/pan women.
Can we please step away from the “bi means two genders” shenanigans?
I ID as bi because, to me, it means “same and different” which is also two but does not reinforce the gender binary.
Yes, I totally hear that and agree. However, until mainstream society catches up I will continue to identify as polysexual because it opens the dialogue about multiple genders.
I ID as bi because I don’t want to contribute to bi erasure. I would date male identified persons, female identified persons, or gender fluid/queer/bigender persons.
I get that in the greater queer community, that might be called pansexual or polysexual. But I really want to reclaim the term bisexual and be proud of it instead of embarrassed by it.
I love that! I am definitely not ashamed of the term BI, just prefer to use poly. Acutally, I almost exclusively just say queer.
One quick note — the coverphoto, with photos of the AS writers who identify as bi, seems really brave to me.
Which is weird! Should it really have to feel like a “brave act” to reveal you’re bi on a website like this?! This is supposed to be a totally safe space!
So, I heart this.
stef.
yes?
You know what? It felt brave! When I volunteered to do this I didn’t think about a pic, but when the post went live and there it was I felt quite ‘whoa – wow – there it is, this feels like a big thing’. Which was a surprise.
Me too! I’ve already had several friends see it and ask me about it and I don’t even know why, but I got nervous about it. Everyone has been so supportive and earnest about their questions, though, and all the commenters here have been so great, I feel more excitement and pride than anything else.
Being in the cover photo for this open thread just makes me feel like I am part of the hottest squad in the world tbh. **brushes shoulders off**
SAME
I was struck by the picture too– like not only OMG I have wanted discussion of this, but also by the number of Autostraddle writers who felt this was relevant to them. I’m not sure how many of the people pictured are currently involved with men, but I guess I had figured that if this thread were relevant to that many staff then I would have seen more content in the past about how queerness affects relationships with men. <3 Thank you all for being awesome!
thank you too abbie!
this is a good point/question, and something we think about a lot! it gets into (for me at least) complicated questions of how to present oneself online/vulnerability/visibility/the constant process of coming out. i think one thing that occurs is that the bisexual people on staff don’t have a ton of overlap with people on staff who do a lot of personal writing — i’ve been with my male partner for the last four years, much of my time at AS, but i also don’t write a lot of personal essays, and when i do i don’t like to make them too revealing of the details of my life because it makes me feel very exposed. but then i also struggle with questions of bi visibility — is it my responsibility to be open about my current and past relationships to try to combat how prevalent bi invisibility is? is that my responsibility even if it’s contrary to my nature? where do we draw lines between responsibilities to community and boundaries for ourselves? it’s always hard!
it’s frustrating for me sometimes that i feel like i have to make an extra effort to make my bi identity clear; even though bi women make up a more significant portion of the population, i’m still assumed to be a lesbian in lgbt online media unless i explicitly come out as bi. hopefully someday we’ll move past that!
@abibelle as a bi writer on the site who is currently single af but very aware of how my past and future? relationships with men interlace with my queerness I really feel you. I always try to be open about my dude-dating when it’s relevant (e.g. http://www.autostraddle.com/a-guide-to-great-first-dates-for-gals-seeking-pals-293380/) but our content and mission are so focused on girl-on-girl culture that it sometimes feels like it doesn’t really fit — like, I would never write an essay specifically about my ex boyfriend on AS. But, I hope this open thread situation creates a springboard to talk more about dating men + queer identity and community!! I am really grateful to see the powerful, beautiful realness of everyone in this thread.
“I would never write an essay specifically about my ex-boyfriend on AS.” But the thing is it’s all part of the queer or bi experience right? Like your girlfriend might have thoughts on your ex-boyfriend, or that relationship might color your next relationship in some way, there are so many ways that our relationships with men and guys and transmasc. people affect and intersect with our relationships with women, so when we explicitly steer clear of writing about a major part of our experience, we should definitely look at why we’re doing that, ya know?
You know what is interesting is that I wrote a really personal essay about my partner and our sex life, but I guess I probably let everything think my partner is a woman, though I never said that. I have an A+ piece where I joke about “lesbian bed death” in the title (which is not real and which is also a joke that my partner and I would make about our relationship–both kind of IDing with lez culture). But my partner uses male pronouns and I dunno if that came through in the piece or not. I’d have to go back and look. But I imagine a lot of people assumed I was writing about a woman, though I never said that outright.
Ohhh interesting.
That reminds me of the giant sex survey you guys did I chose to interpret the “girl on girl sex” y’all were asking about as “queer vagina on vagina sex” because that was what my transmasculine partner and I had and I really wanted to be included in the survey ;-) But I remember there being a little bit of blowback around that, and the question of whether that was appropriate etc. But I was having the best sex I’d ever had and I wanted to be included!
KaeLyn, I actually assumed based on the ‘lesbian bed death’ joke that your partner was a woman! I know better now, but I’m curious about why you wrote the piece in the way you did and why I assumed, as a bi woman, that your partner must be a woman.
um. i definitely thought that this was a weird thing. i know like. one bisexual woman who is sort of dating a man but mostly not?? i live with a man and it is such a lonely feeling. does it have to be a personal essay, or can we make mention of a man/boy/whatever identified parter? or “my parter, whatstheirname”? idk. it feels good to feel like others are like you, or you are like others.
I also want to say that this is me, making myself available to talk! Hit me up on Autostraddle Social, tweet me, write me a letter, email, facebook, whatever! I want to be here for this amazing emerging community! (Where have you babes BEEN?!)
Love this. Something I’ve been thinking a lot about recently as someone who (at 24), hasn’t been in a serious relationship with anyone of any gender is how my desire to be taken “seriously” as someone who is bi/queer affects my decisions. On one hand, I tend to feel like I need to date more women to somehow prove that I’m not straight. On the other hand, I feel like when I’m talking about my sexuality, I’m constantly second guessing because I don’t want to be seen as someone who is trying ~too hard.~ Unsurprisingly, neither of these things are helping with my ability to feel comfortable dating anyone! Anyone have experience with this?
THIS IS ME. This is exactly how I feel!
I think this is so very common and you are definitely not alone. Thanks for voicing this here because I imagine a lot of people can relate.
If you took a peek at my sexual history, you’d see that I have dated almost exclusively men. There’s some variety within that word — straight men, bi men, poly men, gay men, cis men, trans men. But mostly men. At one point, I felt like I had something to prove because I haven’t been with that many women. I felt like I had to forcefully reorient myself towards women.
But if you looked at a chart of my attraction, it has been primarily to women and to people who are not on the gender binary. The fact that I’ve been with more men has more to do with heteronormative culture and how much easier it was to find and socially acceptable it has been to be with men. But I’m attracted to men, like 10% of the time or less. Most days, I’m 50% attracted to women, 10% attracted to men, and like 40% attracted to people who are gender non-conforming / non-binary / does not fit on the binary at all.
The fact that I don’t have a lot of experience with women doesn’t change who I am or how I feel about my queerness. Once I started taking my queerness seriously and stopped questioning it, everything else kind of fell into place. I don’t want to date anyone who doesn’t take my sexual orientation seriously, regardless of their gender. Why would I want to date someone like that? It can be a little harder to find folks who are not biphobic to date, but setting my standard firmly makes it so much easier to get out there.
I see myself in your story Kaelyn, and I have often felt like I had to ‘reorient’ myself to date more women. Internally I am more commonly attracted to women or non-binary and gender non-conforming folks, but my dating history is biased towards men, exactly because of the hetero-normative culture issue you describe. It was really validating to read your comment just now, and I’m all choked up, so thank you! :)
Yes, this soooo much! I only have experience with men, but that is not representative of my attraction at all.
@kaelynrich This is amazing. x
I so agree with this. It’s so hard to feel like you have to “prove” yourself in public (and to yourself, even) every single day.
Oh, my heart. I’m still trying to name and own my sexuality. For a long, long time I haven’t called myself bi, partly because I felt like I wasn’t “bi enough” – never having dated women – and partly out of my own internalized bi stigma. Queer politics has always been a cornerstone of my feminism and I’m very sex positive/sexually adventurous, but I stress over my sexual / romantic attractions not being perfectly equal in all realms. Like unless I was completely equal in my attraction and dating experience among all genders I couldn’t be bi.
I usually self describe as equal opportunity these days. I’m also super femme and because I’ve only had romantic relationships with men, it’s hard to convince people that I also like ladies. Even my dearest friend / lifemate, who could be described as rigidly straight, was really dismissive of me saying “but I WOULD date a lady.” She was just kind of like, vaginas gross. I was telling her about A Camp and she was like, but that’s for real lesbians. Even the smooching and fooling around I’d done with other girls in the past didn’t count in her opinion (probably because they were other “straight” friends of ours.)
After feeling like an old hand(job) at dating/boning men, dating ladies feels so intimidating. I wish I had some irl queer lady friends to dish with, but I’m also embarrassed at being 25 and a rookie. I know I should just own where I am but it’s still a process.
i feel this so, so hard (and i use “equal opportunity” also).
also just want to go on record saying that at a-camp we make sure to have a bisexuality workshop on the very first day to prove how many people who don’t identify strictly as homosexual we have (i’ve rewritten this sentence about ten times and i’m just leaving it like this).
i struggled with this for a REALLY LONG TIME and still struggle with it almost ten years after beginning to confront it. i don’t feel like i need to label myself or explain myself to anyone really anymore – you’re into who you’re into and that can change over time or not change at all and it really isn’t anyone else’s decision or business!
i did lol at old handjob. you’re gonna be fine.
Preach Stef.
Hi, I must say that I find a lot of myself in what you wrote.
I have a long history of dating only men, and people have always been dismissive when I talked about having had crushes on women as well. Even one of my best friends, who identifies as bi, made comments like “maybe it was just a phase” and “maybe you liked them only in a platonic way”. I made the mistake of never bringing up the topic again, as I somehow didn’t feel “entitled” to talk about my sexual orientation.
I must say that getting to know a queer friend who understands sexuality as fluid has given me a chance to open up, and I wish it for you as well. I also really understand the “25 and a rookie” feeling :) Anyway, this is my first comment ever and I hope it was helpful!
Heh, I’m 27 and a total rookie at dating women. *high five*
Woo! *high five*
31 and a rookie! No worries, you have plenty of time.
Gods, that makes me feel okay with myself, too.
Yeah, there’s this feeling that you kinda have to ‘prove you’re bi’ somehow, which is ridiculous.
Also 25 and a rookie! I vacillate between being embarrassed and mad at myself for taking to long to deal with my shit and come out, which is the worst because I beat myself up about beating myself up?? Brains are so dumb. It’s OK, we are all OK!
I’ve been on a few first dates with both men and women, never had any seconds (I’mma keep tryin’ tho). My question is, does the horrible awful feeling that you really don’t like women ever go away? Because I’ll be like “Who am I kidding I’m not bi lol I’m a joke” and then I’ll see a pretty girl and go “OH WOW HEY U SINGLE?” and then five minutes later its back to “Lol nah I’m straight right who am I kidding hahahaha” :(
It took me awhile, and sometimes I still get that feeling, like ” hey, you are just doing this to punish your parents, or probably everyone is attracted to women a little bit and you are being silly by making it a major part of your identity.” Honestly the thing that helped me, personally, the most get over that, was actually going to queer events and flirting with girls who I knew also liked girls. It felt validating to be realize that I was into women outside of my imagination.
Thank you for your reply! I would really like to go to more queer events but I feel like many involve alcohol/bars/loud music (I don’t drink but w/e if others do) and many are also in SF which is a 2+ hour drive from me. I DID go to SF PRIDE tho and that was fun, but I didn’t do much talking to other queer people. I’ll be on the lookout for queer events tho.
That is just your internalized bi repression etc etc talking! Sadly for me it still hasn’t gone away fully but I think gradually you will learn to love yourself and that will help you know who you are, which is an awesome queer/bi/whatever labels you prefer/no labels if you want/person who doesn’t have to define herself, even to herself!
I’m cheering you on for that second date!!
Thank you for your comment! It’s so hard to fight the inernalized biphobia but I will keep trying! And thank you I hope I get that second date too…I wanna kiss a girl! And a boy! I mean not at the same time but…you get it!
LOL you could do it at the same time, that would be one hell of a first date!
lmao if I was poly, sure!
It also took me a while. The main thing that’s helped is remembering every time I felt a “meh” reaction in response to a romantic or sexual interaction with a dude–I’ve had tons of those, and they never made me feel like maybe I didn’t really like men as a whole, and that’s largely because I was taught from day one that I was a girl and that meant I liked boys. I expect to like men, whether I happen to like individual men or not. An individual man not giving me All The Feels doesn’t call into question my entire capacity for attraction to men or to masculinity. I didn’t get that same conditioning around women or more feminine people, and for me that’s a lot of where the second-guessing comes from, I think.
Whoa I absolutely feel you on this.
Oh, wow. THIS. I question it ALL the time, and for me it stems from an insecurity about how much I may be affected by the media. Like, women are sexualized SO much… how do I know whether I’m actually attracted to women, or whether I just have this sick internalized subconscious need to sexualize women because it’s been so ingrained?
But then I remember I’ve had all the feels for a few women, as well as sexual attraction, and I know my sexuality is real. It’s real, dammit! :)
Huge +1. Thank you so much for voicing this. I struggle with this all the time.
That is a thing I have wondered/worried about too!
This is so real. And related to how people sometimes dismiss (or try to support) bisexuality by saying something like, “Everyone is a little bit bi.” But ya’ know what? Everyone is not. A LOT of people are. We’re the biggest sexual orientation statistically in the LGBQ rainbow, but there are people (I married such a person) who are only attracted to one gender. And for me, that drives home that I really am bi/queer, because I’m definitely attracted to many many genders.
Thank you KaeLyn! Remember the fact that there are people who are only attracted to one gender helps so much. This is who I am, and my feelings/attractions are real and valid.
Dang, seeing that so many people feel like this too feels soooo weird. Even after all this time… I kinda thought it was just me? Thank you all so much for speaking up.
This is great to have as a thread! One of my favorite Autostraddle-y spaces is actually The Speakeasy facebook group, the private space for Queer/Trans People of Color to share with each other on an on-going basis. Maybe we can also have a facebook group for this fine group of folks… it clearly looks like we’re hungry for it! I know I would love to know that I have the space to go to when the ish hits the fan and this thread is lost in time.
That would be amazing
there are at least one or two in existence! but man i love commenting on this website
I would love that too!
It exists already. Search for Autostraddle & A-Camp Bisexuals. But I would love if we could continue the convo on the website, too, because not everyone is on Facebook.
I agree – let’s make this more of a thing here on Autostraddle, this is the queerest and most bi-positive online space I know :)
Yass ❤️❤️ please
100% agree Penney! I so, so need a group like that and judging from the hundreds of comments in this thread we are not alone!
LOVE this idea. I can’t read all these comments to find out, but if you or anyone creates this, please let me know.
I am in the middle of cleaning my apartment for a big stressful move across the country, and I dropped everything when I saw this thread come up on my phone. I felt like crying when I saw the title “We See You.” I love Autostraddle so much, and it was a big part of me coming out as bi/queer, but so often I feel like because my life partner is a man I somehow am not allowed to be on here. I even skipped my town’s Autostraddle meetups because I felt like too much of a fraud to go. I feel like I have a big secret and any time I comment or try to participate actively as a member of the queer scene, including on here, I am scared someone is going to “call me out,” like say, “Hey! You’re not a lesbian! You’re dating a guy! You mostly present as femme! If someone just saw you on the street they’d think you were straight. You don’t know what it’s like. You’re a fake.”
Logically, I am sure this is just my internalized bi-invisibility talking, but it’s something I think about a lot and that hurts me. Being queer is a big part of my identity but it’s hard when I constantly feel like a fake for that part of me.
Side note: my partner is very supportive and accepting of all aspects of my personality, including my queerness, so that isn’t the issue I imagine it is for some people.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for the shout-out, and for making me feel “seen,” at least for a minute!!!
Gah this is so great. Real talk, when I first started writing here, I spent a lot of time referring to my “partner” and policing my pronouns because I wanted to be one of the cool kids. But I slowly began to realize that we have a hefty amount of bisexual or otherwise not exactly totally lez readers who are doing the same thing! And that’s not cool! We try not to talk about men a lot on this site because, well, men take up a lot of internet space already and this is a site for women who love women. But still! I think it’s so important to recognize that a lot of those women are also having sex with men which brings along with it a whole host of topics specific to bisexuals that need to be discussed: sexual health, mental health, visibility issues, love life advice etc! I’m really proud that we’re trying to make that happen here.
I still use the term ‘partner’, and I definitely started doing this to be accepted during conversations in lesbian spaces. Now I just like it. It feels official to me and maybe even implies a nuanced sexuality.
AKA KEEP ‘EM GUESSIN
Me too. I wrote a comment about it in reply to someone else, but for me using “partner” is a way of hanging onto my queerness because of what third parties immediately assume about you when they hear the word boyfriend or husband.
I love keeping them guessing! I’m just starting to think about joining queer groups, thanks to a poster I need to find and thank (when I saw her post, the site was down, bah!), but meanwhile at work and with people I’m getting to know, he’s my partner and while part of it is that we are partnered and I’m not in a rush to get married, part of it is also about challenging people.
Yeah, I totally relate. When I meet people (queer or not) I always use “partner” until it becomes awkward, because I have a NEED to be read as queer since it’s very (perhaps too) central to my identity. I’m almost always read as lesbian/queer, so I try to let people solidify that idea in their heads by using the word “partner” and then shocking them by clarifying his gender at some point. That way I don’t get read as straight but also don’t have to have a big conversation about which genders I’m attracted to and how I identify unless I want to.
Oh man, I definitely identify with the “feeling fake” thing. I felt like a “fraud” for so many years! And I felt guilty for passing as straight.
I wish so much there was some sort of magical potion I could give you to stop feeling that way! Because you’re not a fraud and you don’t need to feel guilty. You have every right to be here, and at the AS meetups, and everywhere. You deserve happiness and also to feel a sense of connection with your bi and queer community! You do!
this feeling is so present for so many people! i’m sorry you’re struggling with it! there’s obviously a lot to unpack here, which i think we’re all working on, but to start i think it’s so important to remember that none of us are alone, none of us are the only one. when you do eventually feel ready to go to that AS meetup, you’ll find other bi women there too, some of whom are also with men! we’re everywhere, i promise, there are more of us than you think, and we are ready to support each other!
I’m also in the middle of packing for a big move on Saturday and dropped everything to participate in this thread!
Me too! It’s especially appropriate, because I’m moving in with a man. And I definitely refer to him as my partner to keep ’em guessing.
Me too me too to literally everything you said (including the cleaning my apartment for impending move across the country part)!
Also, I am really happy that I am (and you are) not alone in feeling like a “fake queer” sometimes. Internalized biphobia sucks. *internet hug*
Wow, are you in my brain? <3
This post made me cry. I identify with all of this. I still have not come out to my family or friends. Aside from 2 very dear close friends, my partner who is male, and my co-worker (who idententifies as lesbian), no one else knows.
I feel almost in a way that I can’t? That no one will take me seriously. I don’t know if I ever will tell my family to be honest. They are super Catholic and would never understand. Especially since outwardly I appear straight.
I do not ever intend to leave my fiance….so there’s also this part of me that sees women I am attracted to and aches for that experience. I have never been with a woman before but the past few years I’ve come to know this side of myself and am struggling with how to identify myself as both bi and poly seem to fit the way I feel.
I don’t have anything specific to add, but I’m pumped to see that this thread exists. I’m a (gender)queer afab person who is engaged to a queer cis man. Yay AS for creating safe spaces for queers of all shades!
yay for YOU katherine! <3
Also, congratulations! <3
One thing about being bisexual is that it’s such a double-edged sword. If you’re bi and with a girl: Always knew she was a lesbian. Bi and with a guy: liar/attention-seeker. Bi and poly: Slut/whore/can’t make up her mind. So since we can’t win at it, do it however you damn well please. Don’t let anyone else tell you how to live your true self. <3 YOU DO YOU, YOU PERFECT UNICORNS.
sorry.
My first girlfriend: “I don’t date bi girls. But you’re different. I can actually tell you want me.”
Yeah, that relationship didn’t last long.
NOT SORRY
Stef, you’re killin it in here
#LITMUSTEST
Lol in the future I’m thinking any time someone tells me “I don’t date bi girls but…”, it’s gonna have to be a dealbreaker
oh man, I feel this way.
Oh, boy(s). My boyfriend is terrific but intimidated that most of my relationships have been with women. He keeps calling me a “former lesbian” and I keep correcting him to “current bi”. I guess it’s not super important that society sees me as not straight, since I am dating a guy and we look straight together. I guess I use to crave visibility, but what can you do. It’s just nice to know I’m not alone!
is your boyfriend larry?
jk jk
you are far from alone. <3
Your boyfriend is kind of a douche for not listening when you correct him on that, thats a shitty thing to say
Hi everyone! I saw a link to this on Autostraddle’s Facebook page and just about started crying. I signed up for an account immediately – it’s so nice to meet you all!
So here’s a little introduction so I can get to my big question. I didn’t know – like *really* know – that I was bisexual until a few years ago. I started dating a man two years ago who became my fiance, so I’ve never had an opportunity to date women. This doesn’t bother me in the slightest because I know that I’m with the person I want to share my life with forever and I don’t need any kind of validation of my sexuality.
However, I’m not “out” except to a few friends. Since I’ve only ever been in straight relationships, I’ve never had a necessity to explain that I’m bisexual to family and friends. But now, it’s important to me that I can be out to everyone – and yes, part of that has to do with marrying a man.
Has anyone else experienced this? I don’t know how exactly to come out. A big part of our ceremony is going to focus on our partnership as humans, not “man and woman” and I want everyone attending to know exactly why we’re leaving that out because it’s so important to me. I’m really glad I found this post. If anyone has similar experiences, please let me know! Any resources or links would be great too. Thanks!
Hi Beth! I’ve been thinking a lot about your comment. As somebody who is dating a man-person who could one day be my permanent man-person, I wonder about this too. I don’t know if I’m equipped to offer you a solution, but a friendly commenter down the way offered this great alt-wedding website you could look into for inspiration and advice:
http://offbeatbride.com/
I’m sure you’ve been doing your research so do forgive me if this isn’t news to you. I hope you have a beautiful wedding day!
Thank you so much! I actually just found Offbeat Bride last week and am seriously in love. They’ve got such a friendly and open community – just like here!
But wow, its so good to have this thread. I feel alone so often, but it’s really just because I’m still looking for and finding the right online communities.
Weddings are such a thing and they can bring up so many emotions what with all your friends and family and loved ones being in one place at one time to celebrate you but also you have to cater to them and also it is your day, dammit!
I think there is no one solution, but if it is important that your friends and family know, you could always pull them aside way before the wedding, with your fiance at your side, and tell them. You can’t control how they will react, but at least they will know and you won’t feel like an imposter on your wedding day! You could also do something very queer at your wedding, like make a donation to a bi or LGBT nonprofit in lieu of wedding favors or ask people to donate in place of gifts. You could incorporate a message about queer love into your wedding ceremony, even!
Good luck!
Those are great ideas! Thank you so much! I especially like the idea of incorporating queer love into the ceremony.
Feeling like an imposter is exactly what I don’t want happening. It matters less to me that any family or friends have qualms about my sexuality and much more that they at least know that I’m bisexual. Is that weird? I’ve hidden it for so long because it’s convenient, but that’s not what I really want.
I think I’ll talk to my fiance tonight and see what he thinks about it. I want him to know how important it is to me to be out before our big party!
I got married almost a year ago, to a man, and I totally feel you.
I figured out I was bi just about simultaneously with the marriage planning picking up speed (which, admittedly was something like a year previous since I am a compulsive planner).
As for coming out, I just made a facebook post that was “In honor of bi visibility day, I’m out bitches” and let the chips fall where they may.
I’ll be married 13 years in November to my cis-(mostly)het husband. We have two daughters. I’ll be 35 this year.
I came out as bi when I was 15 to my mom and all my friends when I lived in Miami. Then I moved in with my dad and stepmom, who live in a suburb 40 miles north of Atlanta. When I was in high school, no one was out. In my graduating class of almost 500 kids, NO. ONE. WAS. OUT. Plus, they were really involved in church. I just kinda… pushed it down.
After high school, I had a few girl crushes and experiences but never really dated women. When I was 21, I met my husband. I told him I was bi, and it was never an issue. At that point, my identity didn’t really mean anything to me. I also had that idea of “if I’m not going to do anything about it, why bother mentioning it?”
Sometimes things happen and we need transparency in our lives. For you, it’s your wedding. For me, it was my mother’s death. I won’t lie. I did lose friends along the way. The payoff has been well-worth it. I get a lot of “but you’re married” comments still. They sting a little, but overall, I’ve found acceptance. Honestly, my community of friends is mostly with other people who are a little more fluid as well, but nonetheless, I know I have a place in my local community.
If your identity is important to you, if you feel the need to make sure people understand you, then go for it.
I should add that I no longer identify solely as bisexual. As I’ve educated myself more on gender and sexuality, I now know that bisexual is too limiting of an identity and pan isn’t limiting enough. More like, I’m attracted to other queer people: mind and body and identity. It isn’t about sex or gender, but who they are and whether we connect on these things.
Still married. Husband isn’t as queer as I am. But he’s very supportive and (mostly) understanding. We are monogamous, but we respect that attractions brought to light are less likely to involve deception. :)
I’m glad to see I’m not the only one struggling with this. I don’t have too much advice to offer because I’m still figuring things out myself, but I’ve found the community at A Practical Wedding to be a good resource (apracticalwedding.com). The book written by the site’s founder is worth a read too. It’s a very queer-friendly community and focused on defining what marriage and your wedding means to you.
Awesome, thanks for the resource!
Was so excited to see this thread that I started an account, despite having been a fan of the site for a while.
I’ve known I was not mono-sexual (I prefer the term pansexual) since I was in elementary school, if not earlier. I was raised in a conservative Christian household, where that kind of thing wasn’t really allowed (neither was dating boys!), but I did attempt to come out to some friends in middle school (I think they misunderstood, or thought I was weird and never brought it up again), and to my mom in high school (she asked how I could know if I had never been with a woman, yet somehow the logic didn’t apply for being attracted to men).
In my freshman year of college, I tried to affiliated with the LGBT student org on my campus, but I was pretty shy and didn’t put myself out there too much. I decided to convert to orthodox Judaism, which doesn’t look kindly on queer people, and I figured that I could always limit myself to male partners and still be okay. (Spoiler alert: Turns out denying part of my identity actually *wasn’t* okay.) I met my current (cis, hetero) boyfriend after college, and we’ve been together for 7 years. I’ve always been open with him about my sexuality, and he’s totally supportive. I’ve also come out to (select) close friends over the years, including admitting to one the fact that I had a huge crush on her all throughout high school. (Man that was a hard wedding to attend, even with my bf.)
For other reasons, I’ve decided to no longer affiliate as an orthodox Jew. Around the same time as I decided that, I realized that I’d been hiding who I was for too long. I talked to my boyfriend about it, and he’s totally cool with me being more openly queer. Not sure where to start, or what that looks like. I’d really love to hear other people’s experiences with bisexuality and religion, or having to come out over and over again.
Hey Kate, I’m so happy for you that you’re wanting to be out more visibly now, that your partner is supportive of it. Supressing your identity sucks so much, and I’m so pleased for you!
@bethkat I had a wedding with my male life-partner – it wasn’t an official one, we did our own thing and called it a handfasting. We wrote a speech each which we read to each other, all our queer friends were there, and our families, it felt radical and a celebration of who we both were, nothing to do with our genders or the gendered traditions of marriage.
I love what you’re doing in consciously re-writing your vows and making them your own – that’s what matters. Getting married is a public statement, that’s kinda the idea of it, and it’s awesome you’re finding ways to make the right statement for you. xxx
I don’t have any suggestions for you, but I had to make an account to respond to you and say this is my situation too! <3
Awesome! Nice to meet you! :) Do you happen to have an account on OffbeatBride.com? If so, it would be awesome to chat there about all the wedding stuff! Don’t wanna take up space here, but it would be cool to connect! <3
THANK YOU, Autostraddle. I would never say that Autostraddle has ignored or rejected bi people (at ALL), but there have been times when I actually felt a bit guilty for even being a member and participating, like there was a tiny voice in my head saying “this is a space for gay ladies; you shouldn’t be here!”
Like I said, I never saw anyone express anything like that, but it existed in my head. So thanks for reminding me that I’m in good company here :)
Adding things about me: I fall into the “only ever dated men, with a few experiences with women thrown in” category. So I have straight privilege since anyone in my life can assume that I am straight, want to settle down with one man, have children, etc. (None of those applies to me). I am “out” to a few people and generally don’t care if people know I’m bi, but would have some anxiety about a formal coming-out process.
I also identify as poly and am actually currently dating two men. I’m not on okcupid right now, but when I was it was SO discouraging to read all the profiles of women-loving people who explicitly said “I DON’T DATE BI GIRLS.”
So the negative assumptions about bi people (always cheating, never serious about a relationship, etc) combined with the fact that I am interested in poly relationships right now, adds up to feeling pretty effing disheartened about the whole process of meeting women (those who aren’t in a “seeking unicorn” couple, anyway)…
honestly as a person who has been here since the beginning, there was a period of time pretty shortly after we launched when i wasn’t writing actively because i felt like there was probably nobody else on this website who identified as anything other than lesbian and probably this wasn’t my community and there was no place for me here. this was mostly my own internalized biphobia talking, but i didn’t really know how to deal with it.
it took a long time before i realized that this was ridiculous, and there are tons of us, and we all have such varied experiences! the more we talk about it, the more visible we are.
omg yes I often feel like such a poser in queer spaces.
And I love the AD ref.
I think this is a really important point about how biphobia often exists in our own heads. I haven’t experienced a lot of biphobia (lots of those low-level comments though) – the real battle – especially when I’ve been with male partners – has been my own internalised feelings about being a queer ‘fraud’.
Ugh, totally. Like you implied, it’s really not so much about outright cruel/mean-spirited biphobia; it’s way more about invisibility and erasure. When we don’t see each other represented in LGBT+ communities or in media related to LGBT+ issues (someone—maybe you!—mentioned that even in The L Word, Tina’s relationship with a man was regarded as shameful and embarrassing in the lesbian community), it’s so difficult to feel incorporated. And I guess the solution is to integrate ourselves into those spaces, but… argh. Then it feels really forceful and uncomfortable…
I have run into some really discouraging negativity towards bis in G/L spaces, but I have also been surprised so many times in groups of queer women, when I mention it wondering if they’ll try to take away my queer card, and the response is a chorus of “oh, I’m bi too, and…”
Wow. I’m so happy I found this thread, just read the entire thing. I’ve been thinking about this a whole whole lot lately. I’ve just gotten engaged to my wonderful (guy) partner of almost 5 years, and now that we’re planning a wedding, I’m struggling with all kinds of heteronormative expectations–both other people’s and ones I didn’t even realize lived in my subconscious somewhere.
And I’ve always felt sort of “in hiding” as a bi woman dating a man, but recently I find myself announcing to everyone and anyone, any chance I get, that “HEY I AM BI” (which in itself is a little weird because i don’t even love that label–multi-gender-attracted is closer/better!). So why do I feel the need to keep telling people this? Why do I feel like my hetero relationship is suddenly denying part of my sexuality and identity? Is there any way *not* to feel this way?
Congratulations on your engagement! I think it’s totally normal to feel the need to reaffirm your sexuality and identity to other people. I mostly date women, but the last time I had a thing with a guy several months ago, I caught myself telling my queer friends that I’m still queer! It felt weird. As far as the wedding goes, I highly recommend checking out Offbeat Bride http://www.offbeatbride.com . A queer acquaintance of mine got married to her trans* husband and their wedding is featured on the site along with a ton of queer and non-normative “straight” weddings. Might be a good resource for figuring out how to have a wedding that doesn’t conform to heteronormative expectations even though there’s a bride and groom.
Thank you thank you!!! I will check out that site, sounds fantastic…and I can’t tell you how much it means to read your response. I feel less alone already :)
It sounds like you’re doing a good job, actually! I think one of the most liberating experiences for me is to be able to say not only that I am bisexual, but that I am a bisexual in a relationship with a man.
It’s the scariest thing to say in queer spaces, but I’ve found that when I say it with confidence, I feel less like I’m being judged than when I choose to omit a part of that statement. When I only tell the half-truth, I’m watching my back for somebody who will discover that I’m being withholding.
Pride is such a big part of being queer! Truth is such a big part of being proud! It helps you give fewer fucks.
Thank you!!! Giving fewer fucks is an AWESOME goal. And congrats to *you* on figuring out how to feel confident, proud, liberated, etc. in these situations. I feel hugely encouraged just knowing I’m not the only one!!
I dated a lesbian for 2 years as a bisexual. She used to call me semi-straight. I met a man after that who was more feminist and got me more than anyone I had ever been with. We decided to get married and had many conversations about bisexuality and marriage and partnership. I am still integrated into the LGBTQ community where I live because many of our friends identify as lesbian.
I participated in the GAY GAMES last summer, and had a negative interaction with a fellow athlete during the half-marthon. We were talking and when I mentioned my partner things were fine. When my fellow athlete told me I needed to tell people my partner was male because it was confusing to the gays, I was irritated. I did not have time to tell him that I am a “gay” regardless of partner.
I feel you. I just got married and the wedding planning process was a big heternormative avalanche. A Practical Wedding http://apracticalwedding.com/ has some great articles about being a cisgender bi gal marrying a man. Congratulations and good luck to you!
I am at work with a lump in my throat. Thank you so, so much for this thread. I came out as bi when I was 19 and then as gay when I was 22, and until I started dating a male friend a month and a half ago (I’m now 24) I was pretty certain that that was it, that I was gay. I’m from a really conservative area and family, so it had been very difficult to make peace with that. And then, all of a sudden, the math changed.
My boyfriend is bi, and we spend a lot of time talking about queer stuff. I almost texted him as soon as I saw this on Facebook, actually. So I’m very lucky to have a safe space with him. But it’s just been really hard to figure out who I am again. So thank you thank you thank you.
So glad you are here…and queer…and proud of it!
I know a ton of different gender couples who are both bi and I really love that we can find each other. It makes it a little easier, I think. :)
This is a great open thread! I go back and forth on how I identify. On any given day I could use bi, queer, pan, fluid, or gay. I most often use queer though, because I have dated/been attracted to non-binary people in the past and that label feels most fitting and inclusive to me. I’m currently dating a really awesome woman who strongly identifies as bi.I think we’ve both been conscious about not erasing each other’s identities and trying to affirm them in queer and straight spaces. I definitely admire her as someone who fights bi erasure even when it would be easier to let people assume she is gay because of our relationship.
What Stef said earlier also resonates with me. I need my partner to be on my level. One of my requirements of a partner is that they are out as a feminist. Even if they’re at the feminist 101 level, that is totally fine. After all, we’re all constantly learning and I am still very much educating myself. I’m just not interested in having the “this is why you should be a feminist” conversation with potential romantic partners. Is that bad? I have found that it is much easier to find a feminist who is not a cis man, so as a result I have mostly date people who are not cis men. That being said, I have amazing straight male friends who are vocal feminists (and unsurprisingly, most of them are not single.) I am more often attracted to women anyway, and currently dating an amazing feminist woman, so it’s not a huge deal, but I think my high standards make it difficult to find a male feminist who has already done a good chunk of educating himself. Just curious if other people out there have trouble finding feminist men to date and end up more often dating people of other genders?
I’m with you on needing my partner to have radical feminist/queer politics, which has pretty much ruled out the majority of cishet men for anything other than casual hookups. Women and non-binary people just tend to be working a lot harder to deconstruct the cishetpatriarchy or at least wanting to learn about doing that, in my experience. I salute you for owning that aspect of your desire and relationship needs!
This is my EXACT feeling.
You are all wonderful.
100% yes. This is why I sometimes joke that I would probably not date a straight cis guy ever again. It’s not entirely true, but it’s so hard to find ones that don’t suck.
Honestly, I’m super happy that so many people in this thread are dating men who don’t suck! It’s great!
I think high standards are great! Relationships can have lots of compromise, but not compromise on whether you are at a very basic level a valid human being. Which is, to me, one way of defining feminism.
I agree, male feminists are definitely the Golden Ticket of dating dudes as a queer/bi lady. I’ve dated a few, and they’re often in poly or otherwise open relationships, which calls for deconstruction and is maybe the gateway to bolder feminism. The last guy I went out with wasn’t a self described feminist, but was very open to discussing and exploring issues. I hate to write off all the men who maybe don’t call themselves feminists yet – because I have several friends who just took time to get there. But there has to be an openness and zero male tears when it comes to feminism.
I like the “not writing off people who are open but don’t explicitly call themselves feminist” thing here.
[content warning: intimate partner violence]
Here’s been my experience- the last guy I dated vocally identified as feminist. He knew all the right words to say. He got outraged at all the right things. He was way past feminism 101. But… when things started to go downhill, he was emotionally abusive and sexually coercive. He didn’t understand things like “gendered power imbalance” or “male entitlement to sex” when they applied to his own life.
The guy I’m dating right now probably doesn’t explicitly identify as feminist (I don’t think he explicitly identifies as nearly anything, to be honest). I’ve never even asked, because the question is totally irrelevant, because I see every day through his actions and the things he supports and the way that we interact that he upholds every ideal from the best parts of feminism.
Signalling is cheap. Being able to parrot a concept is not the same as being able to live it.
yes yes i feel this so hard
I have so many thoughts about being bisexual and want to start so many threads because I want to hear everyone’s opinions about everything I argue with myself about, but I will try to stay relatively concise.
Does anyone feel internalized pressure to alternative between sexes when dating to show you are in fact bisexual? Intellectually I know it’s silly, but emotionally I feel like if I date a bunch of people of the same gender all in a row I start to feel like I’m not really bisexual enough.
I’ve also been surprised since I started being open and honest about my sexuality, how many guys have quietly come up to talk to me about their same sex experiences and their confusion because they just needed someone to talk to, all while insisting that they were “straight” it was just that one time/person but they can’t talk to any of their friend’s about it etc etc . It breaks my heart a bit.
I also don’t know if this is the appropriate place to share this, so autostraddle mods please delete if it’s not. But in February I started writing for Queereka – thanks in fact to the Autostraddle link! – and I write a column called “The B” which is a mostly funny series of things related to being bisexual, and I’d love for it to be a place where people can discuss their funny stories, their problems, and just generally be bisexual no matter where they are in their life. So if you’d like to check it out, here’s a link to the first post, http://queereka.com/2015/02/18/the-bisexuals-14-step-guide-to-being-alone-and-celibate-forever/
I don’t know how I missed this on Queereka! Thank you!!
Almost every guy I’ve ever been involved with (from long-term dating to casual hookup situations) has ended up talking to me about same-sex attractions or experiences they’ve had. It’s definitely a thing.
Ugh, yes, I also feel pressure to maintain gender parity among the people I hook up with. It’s a silly impulse – I should be able to identify as bi no matter the genders of the people I’ve dated. As many people have pointed out, someone who has only ever slept with men can be bi, but I still can’t shake the feeling that I’m not bi/queer enough because my two most recent relationships have been with cis-men.
I feel this pressure too. I think it’s because when you are bi people are quick to invalidate your identity, but having an appropriately varied dating history can seem like an easy way to shut those conversations down. But really, you shouldn’t have to prove your bisexuality with the diversity of your dating history, because the two have nothing to do with each other.
Yes!!! I have gone back and forth on dating men and women and it’s definitely, at least in part, because I feel like I have to be “bi enough.” Which is ridiculous, of course, but it’s there in my head. Like if I only dated women for a while or only dated men for a while, that would basically be “picking a gender and sticking to it,” like straight/gay/lesbian people have told me to do in the past. I feel an intense need to have an obviously bisexual dating history to pull out and show people. Ugh, internalized biphobia I didn’t even realize I had until I read this comment… :/
I have been out for about two years, although I realized I was “different” in this regard in 8th grade and had crushes on a couple girl friends in high school. I came out on celebrate bisexuality day in September (yay!) and everyone was great about it (this was to friends, not my family). Last year, I came out to my family via introducing a girl I liked to them and my mom cried and said she was disappointed in my “alternative lifestyle choice.”
Fast forward to now, where I live with my boyfriend – who is also bisexual – who I’ve been dating for about eight months. We’re doubly invisible because we appear to be heteronormative but in reality are not. I’d say I am a bit more sexually fluid than he is, but alas. We have a big bi pride flag hanging in our room, we go to LGBT clubs and bars regularly [we are monogamous currently but open to changing that structure, in true stereotypical bi fashion], I give blood for drives at the local equality center + we donate $ and time to LGBT-type causes, etc. We are also part of the kink scene, which has a decent-sized LGBT community within it.
However, because we appear heteronormative people at these events assume we’re just extra-dedicated allies, meaning we actually have to tell them we’re both bisexual (and, while we’re proud of it, it’s not something I want to always say to start a conversation because I like to think that, although it’s important to us, it shouldn’t define us). Sometimes I feel like I don’t really belong and that I would feel more included if I had a girlfriend, and I probably overcompensate by talking about my/our orientation a bit much.
My boyfriend and I are nearly exactly the same, but haven’t found the time to become more involved with our local LGBT groups. Thank you for speaking up. <3 stay strong. It's hard for us too, especially when someone says something phobic near us.
Woah… First, I would like to say thank you, you wonderful people of Autostraddle, for opening up this conversation and this space. I never expected such an opportunity within the queer community, because, well it’s hard to talk about. I’ll start with a brief description of my coming out as bi/pan to my long-term boyfriend…
I have been with my male partner for almost eight years. I met him when I was seventeen and was a closeted bi/pan young women. When I was twenty-two I met this amazing person whom I had an amazing connection with, and I just couldn’t keep myself from her. I talked to my partner about the whole thing, about being bi/pan, about wanting experience with more than just men, about how enamored I was with this one person. And he gave the most positive, supportive, and freeing response. We decided to open our relationship up a bit, so that I could explore all the aspects of my sexuality, and hopefully eventually he could too if he so desired. This has given back so much more to our relationship than either of us could have ever expected.
The reason I think it is so hard to talk about being a bi/pan woman with a male partner is because of the heterosexual privilege that we often get to enjoy. This is especially true on the surface. To the outside world, I am a heterosexual woman in a relationship with a man. I have yet to come out on social media as bi/pan, I have yet to come out to most of my family as bi/pan. This is mostly because I feel more fear of coming out as poly than I do coming out as liking all genders. Regardless, in the rest of the outside world, I get to live in heterosexual privilege.
Sometimes I resent living in that privilege, because I am queer, I love the queer community, and I think that heterosexual privilege isolates me from that world in many ways. Do any other of you straddlers feel that way?
Yes! I posted earlier and our stories are similar. I haven’t come out as poly to EVERYONE, just close friends and family, for the fear of what will happen/how it will affect my business, etc. I totally get what you mean when you say you resent living in the privilege.
I’d agree. There is definitely a privilege in appearing straight and also white (although I am Hispanic and my boyfriend is enough Native American to be statistically significant), and I simultaneously feel bad that not everyone can look ‘normal’ so to speak but also frustrated that appearing that way makes people question why I’m sort of an activist for LGBT people, particularly those who like more than one gender.
I don’t think i’ts privilege. I think it’s erasure.
What do you mean by that? That heteropracticing bi/pan women aren’t acknowledged?
Yep. I think it’s important to recognize that we do not face the same dangers and prejudices as, say, two bi girls in a relationship with each other. But a recent study from Brown showed that bisexuals are more super prone to depression and substance abuse (higher than straight peers and equal to and in some cases higher than gay peers), and I think a lot of that is down to the isolation we feel from both our gay and straight peers. Our experiences are different, but they are no less valid because of that.
Agreed and beautifully stated. Aaaa this is such a beautiful and healing forum. All the feels! It is such an honor to see so much solidarity.
Yes, this! There is evidenced that “identifying as bi” alone has profound impacts on our mental health. and that’s likely due to erasure and a total lack of resources. We come out (to ourselves), look around, and find no one.
Agreeing with Jenn (and this whole subthread, really). I think it’s also important to note the differences between actually-straight privilege and passing-privilege erasure. Being mistaken for straight comes with benefits and costs for all LGB people. Actual straight people get the benefits without the costs.
I think this distinction is especially important when so many queer people say that bis don’t need queer community support because of our straight privilege. I agree that it’s hard to talk about being bi because of this “straight privilege” idea. I’m sure someday I’ll be trying to explain to a biphobic lesbian why it’s hard to be a bi woman dating a man, and I’m very intimidated by that!
This is such an amazing story of acceptance and finding something that works for you and your partner Nicole, thank you for sharing it.
Straight passing privilege, while correct in the sense bisexual people get certain privileges from being in an opposite – sex relationship, ignores the fact that bisexuals in opposite – sex relationships aren’t seen seen as bi. It’s simple oppression of identity. I’ve also unfortunately encountered lots of lesbians who use the concept to justify their “queerer than thou,” “you don’t belong cuz you’re not oppressed enough” games. It’s sickening.
As a queer woman in a relationship with a non-binary partner who is usually read as male, navigating can be a little tricky. Usually we are seen as a straight couple, except when my partner dresses more femininely than usual. Since we go to different colleges, however, we are usually assumed to be single and so our queerness is not questioned.
It’s a little weird. I work for the Resource Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity at my university, and work within the Womxn’s Commission on a bunch of social justice issues. I think activism, though difficult sometimes, helps me feel queer and create a space for me at the table, even when I am not dating women. Though I am more on the gay end, my partner and I are experiencing both of our first long-term relationships. It is helpful that he/they is also pansexual, because neither of us acts out of biphobia.
I feel comfortable where I am. I see gender in that, if I am friends or a partner to someone, then their gender matters to me if it matters to them. At the same time, I am Kate, and I have feelings for cute, kind, and smart people. I no longer feel a need to prove myself worthy of being in queer spaces. There are spaces I should not be in, of course, because they are closed spaces for communities I do not belong to.
But I’ve worked and continue to work for queer liberation. I let my lived experience as a queer woman drive my work, and I acknowledge privileges that I have. I will not let anyone invalidate me, because I live authentically and without malice.
Gah, that didn’t work, I meant to quote:
I think activism, though difficult sometimes, helps me feel queer and create a space for me at the table, even when I am not dating women.
Thank you for sharing your experience and writing that last line in particular- I really needed to read it
I totally agree about activism and being very authentic 24/7 helps keep that connection to queer people and issues and communities strong.
“I will not let anyone invalidate me, because I live authentically and without malice.” This line brought tears to my eyes. It just makes me feel some type of relief and that I shouldn’t have to try so hard to prove to others that I am queer. What’s important is that I know it myself and, as you say, “live authentically”. Your statement (and also this whole thread) reminds me of a favorite e.e. cummings quote: “To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting”
I may or may not be holding back tears at work. This is the greatest thread, it’s just so nice to feel validated.
whitney!!!!! <3
Like some others have said, this thread being a thing at all makes a world of difference to me. I am a bisexual lady who has been dating a wonderful cis-dude for more than three years. It sucks that I feel constantly excluded from the queer scene, but I don’t feel particularly included in the straight one either. It’s like straddling (heh) a fence-post, where the owners of the houses on either side taking turns yelling at me to get off their lawn.
I know I don’t “present queer” because I have long hair, wear dresses a lot, and am in a relationship with a man. But when I’m not even allowed to participate in LGBT+ conversations it feels like I’m cheated out of a very valid part of my identity, one that I myself have taken great pains to discover/accept. At the same time, straight friends and acquaintances make it very clear to me that I’m not accepted into their fold unless I very diligently hide my queerness.
All I really want to say is that the person I am dating does not make me more or less queer. I didn’t “choose” men because I’m in a long-term relationship with a guy. And if I’m ever in one with a woman, it doesn’t mean I’ll have chosen women either. My queerness has to do with me, and me alone.
<3
"My queerness has to do with me, and me alone."
Right on!
Oh man. Yes.
“It’s like straddling (heh) a fence-post, where the owners of the houses on either side taking turns yelling at me to get off their lawn.”
Perfectly put, thank you xxxxxx
I feel constantly excluded from the queer scene, but I don’t feel particularly included in the straight one either. KT this statement rings true with me too.
I’m a bi lady that’s been married to a straight man for 14 years. We recently moved from our hometown where we had straight and LGBT friends who know and accept how I identify, to a city where we have no friends except straight married co-workers who make their not so accepting stance on the LGBT community very clear. Like you I don’t necessarily come off as “queer” so I feel like I have to come out to new folks I meet just to be accepted in the queer conversation only to have them not take me serious because of my relationship with a man. If only we could all play on each others lawn with no judgement.
Yes to all of this. I feel like my queerness is so invisible, even though I present as very masculine-of-centre, and I feel like I don’t really fit in to either the queer community or the straight community because I’m in a LTR with a man. I feel like I’m constantly inserting “HEY GUESS WHAT I LIKE GIRLS, TOO, ACTUALLY, MOSTLY GIRLS TBH” in every conversation and I’m thinking about getting one of those “Nobody knows I’m queer” shirts just to broadcast it everywhere.
It sucks that I feel constantly excluded from the queer scene, but I don’t feel particularly included in the straight one either. It’s like straddling (heh) a fence-post, where the owners of the houses on either side taking turns yelling at me to get off their lawn.
Hahaha I relate to this so much.
“A reminder: this space is primarily for bisexual women.” <–cried actual tears.
I am having so many issues right now and nobody to talk about them with. I have tried typing out paragraphs and just ended up backspacing because I don't even know where to start. I just hope that the editors know how much this meant to me, and it came at a really vital time.
TALK TO ME
amanda! this makes me feel so much. you don’t have to backspace! people are here to listen! we <3 you i hope you get to eat a really phenomenal sandwich today
*carefully makes a circle of rainbow glitter around you*
You’re safe here. Look, you get get past glitter!
Drat I wrote a comment about the history of AS and how far we’ve come and so on and then it got eaten by the internet and I didn’t even get a coupon or anything in compensation.
But I just want to say I’ve been reading this thread for the last hour or so, and your comment was the first to make me cry. Thank you for showing such gentle care.
We <3 you!
I hope you’ll share if you want to, Amanda. This is a totally safe space for you xxx
“How do you stay involved with queer community, especially when involved in relationships with men?” lol I… don’t??? It feels so insurmountable to walk into a queer space and know that the minute I mention “my boyfriend” someone’s going to jump to conclusions about whether I belong there. Or ask veiled questions to find out if he’s cis or not (bc it seems like dating a trans man = OK in queer community but dating a cis man = NOT OK). It’s always been easier to just opt out. But then of course, I feel isolated from an important part of my identity, and end up surrounded by straight people who don’t “get it” or who just don’t care about issues I care about, like trans rights and gender expression and feminism.
For the most part I have been in relationships with open-minded men who are fine with my sexuality, pit hair, alt-lifestyle haircuts, etc. But in casual dating it’s almost impossible to get away from men who ask for threesomes “as a joke,” who want to hear about my sexual experiences with ex-girlfriends bc it’s a creepy turn-on to them, or who ask “would you bang [female celebrity]? what about [woman walking past us on the street]?” Which… gross, stop.
Even the men who were “OK” with my bisexuality still had a hard time erasing their cultural training RE: how a girlfriend “should” act and sometimes asked me to “tone down” my queerness in front of their friends or family.
[TW for next graf]
If anything, biphobia within queer community seems to be getting worse, not better. I have personally noticed, in particular, a VERY virulent strand of anti-biphobia growing in the trans lesbian community on twitter/tumblr. I’ve seen many people twice-removed from what I thought was my “support” network saying things like bisexuals can’t ID as “butch” or “femme” because those are “exclusively lesbian” terms, that “bisexuals need to stop shitting on lesbians,” and that bisexuals who are dating men shouldn’t be “allowed” to ID as queer when they are in straight relationships. This despite research that shows that bisexual women consistently suffer from higher incidences of poverty, mental illness, and feelings of isolation. It’s really upsetting. It makes me question the friends I have, if they are friends with, and retweeting and reblogging, people like that. Do they secretly agree that I don’t really “count” as queer???
And it’s true, I think, that bisexual people in het relationships DO have a kind of privilege that most queer people do not. It’s the privilege of not worrying that the larger society will invalidate your entire relationship. But I don’t think that means we should be locked out of queer spaces. Nobody should be able to take away your gay card against your will.
And now I’ve started dating a woman and I’m really nervous about “coming out” as bisexual to her mostly lesbian friends, along with the added pressure of having to remind my parents that my queerness was never a convenient phase and is, in fact, here to stay.
In short: LOL AT EVERYTHING (but thanks for letting me vent!)
<3 <3 <3
I’m bad at tumblr but that sounds incredibly awful. It always seems like some subset of each oppressed group is pretty hellbent on exclusivity even as they fight for their own inclusion. I hope you’re able to find community in other spaces, because it seems like being mired in that kind of negativity can be harmful.
@hannah I’ve unfollowed most of those people now so it’s much better! But it doesn’t necessarily help with the friends-of-friends thing. Still trying to navigate that. I do understand where the hostility comes from, and it’s a complicated issue for sure.
WHOA i did not realize there was user tagging on autostraddle now! i guess i meant previous comment @scaryspice718 ? sorry @hannah !
@keyanamiyana yeah I’m just getting used to ASS (AS Social) as well. Never tagged anybody before either. First time for everything!
totally feel you, I know one of my bi friends is into it, but the men who are like “hey let’s revel in objectifying women together” just gross me out too. And also make me reconsider if I’m actually bi because I don’t think about banging women walking down the street? ugh.
I need a bumper sticker that says LOL AT EVERYTHING.
I think relationships are complicated, on and off-line: there’s this common self-actualisation thread of how to cut toxic relationships out of your life, and I think it’s generally good advice, but it assumes relatively simplified, binary relationship dynamics. Sometimes the people who give us social, financial and physical support hurt us, and there isn’t a neat solution.
If these are the kinds of friends you can have a conversation with then I’d do that: mate of mine once ended up a linking a lot of feminist posts to me from a TERF. He didn’t pick up on the subtleties in the language ofc, nothing to make him do a background check, but we had a chat and he did some research and asked a few questions and made it very clear to me how much he supports me through his actions and words.
There are friends and there are friends, and a retweet or a reblog is not always a sign of uncategorical support for a persons views. Obviously it’s a bigger issue if they are actively supporting those things you mention, but it’s no clear from your comment whether that’s the case. Plus words can exist within different contexts for different people: privilege can be blinding this way ofc. Communication *can* have the effect of simplifying complicated things, and whether it does or not, you deserve clarity on the matter.
As you acknowledge, there’s some legitimate debate to be had about opposite sex relationships within queer spaces, and including them without de-centering those spaces away from the support, visibility and safety queer people need (including those within opposite sex relationships [gestures all about]).
I’m bi, a trans-woman and pretty gender-fluid in how I present myself. Fairly sure I am far from the only one too, so it especially blows to hear about your bad experiences: I expect a slightly more nuanced take on identity from my trans-sisters. Good luck with it all!
AHHHH! Such perfect timing! I identify as bi (pan is more accurate but I grew attached to the label bi) and I got my first boyfriend really recently. I had dated women and “fooled around” with them but never had a relationship. I had never had a relationship with any gender until recently and I was pretty surprised it wasn’t with a woman considering at this stage in my life I’m more attracted to them (it varies).
I am very involved in my college campus lgbtq+ club (also for allies)and now feel a bit weird to have a male partner. All my friends in the group know I’m bi but newcomers might not and as important as allies are, I still don’t want people to think that’s all I am. I feel like I’ll have a hard time bringing him up in conversation or actually having him around.
I am so thankful this post is here!
The struggle is real. I was dating a guy for most of college, even though I was out as bi/pan/queer and folks in the feminist and queer circles knew. But most people didn’t On National Coming Out day, I’d wear and “out and proud” shirt and hold my BF’s hand and get lots of weird stares and questions from people who thought I was straight. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I have only recently come to terms with being bisexual. I have known for about 10 years that I like girls but I thought that since I generally liked more boys than girls that I must not actually be bisexual and instead a straight girl who admires other women. I think the main reason I never wanted to really fully identify as bisexual is because of the fact that everyone would decide I was confused or greedy or a big old slut when in fact I have known for 10 years, have dated very few people, and am actually a virgin still. Bisexuality comes in many flavours and doesn’t mean that you have to be 50/50 on your attractions.
I have only ever dated men so it is hard for people to accept me as part of the community vs an ally, so I have never been to pride events in the capacity of anything other than support for other friends. It’s just generally frustrating. And considering the fact that I am in a sort-of relationship (right person, bad timing, trying to work it out) with a man who I can see a long future with, I may never date a woman, which I feel like de-legitimizes my sexuality and makes me feel like it would be a lot easier to hide back in the closet. It is an overall frustrating feeling. I’m just lucky that I happen to have a lot of super supportive bisexual/pansexual friends to lean on.
UGH getting pinned as an ally to the LGB community is such an invalidating feeling. Solidarity.
It’s not that being an ally is bad, it’s wonderful. It’s just frustrating that that is all people view me as when it’s my community too. I feel like a lot of times the community forgets what the “B” stands for. Thank you for the solidarity!
oh love. you’re not invalid, and you don’t owe anyone an explanation as to your identity. i’m sorry you’ve felt and still alienated from the queer community. And being in a long-term relationship with a dude doesn’t legitimize anything. You are valid, and whatever you do or don’t do does not affect that a single bit. You’re important just as you are. You’re enough just as you are.
Thank you so much. It’s been a struggle for me and I am really grateful for this comment and the online bisexual community as a whole for helping me try to feel more valid. Internalized biphobia is quite a hurdle to overcome sometimes. Thank you.
Hi! Another bi/queer Deanna saying hello, don’t go back in the closet (I came out in high school and went right back in during college, and it took another decade to come back out again), you are not alone! Aren’t all Deannas awesome, BTW? ;-)
Deanna, your whole first paragraph felt like it came straight out of my head. It’s so awesome to know I’m not alone in these experiences! The 50/50 thing was definitely a hurdle for me to get over in coming out to myself, as was distinguishing whether I was checking girls out bc aesthetics or bc attraction.
I am grateful for this space. I am a proud bi. I am married to a man and still identify as bi. I am open in mu social network about this, but I do not have any other bi friends partnered with men.
i’m sorry that you don’t have more friends in real life that share your experience, but i’m really happy and proud that you’re out anyway! thank you for coming to get to know us here!
Hi Sandra! I’m also a married bi woman. My ex girlfriend (she broke up with me) actually introduced me to my husband. He was her brother’s best friend.
I’m so happy to see my experiences validated in this thread!
I will echo feeling excluded in gay bars or at corporate pride events or at queer student groups on campus, as my identity as a queer bisexual lady who dates hetero men. I also have felt like I have to prove something to other people to defend myself in identifying the way that I do.
I find it troublesome that seemingly in order to build community these spaces feel they have to exclude and be judgmental about bisexual women who date men or bi men who date women.
Why would we want to build a community by ostracizing? That’s how the hetero community treats us! We can do better.
We should do better. I understand that men get a lot of space in the world and queer spaces should focus on same-gender relationships sometimes and I’m ok with that as a bi person, but that isn’t the same as saying, “You can’t sit with us” to bi women.
Hey everyone. I just want to say that this is the exact reason I love Autostraddle! So many queer spaces are deliberately or passively biphobic, which is one of the biggest reasons it took me so long to come out (I came out as bisexual as a teenager, then was pretty insistently coerced into identifying as a lesbian when I began to present more masculine and identify as butch (because how could you possibly be a butch woman AND bisexual???), and now I’m a proudly bisexual trans man.) That being said, I know this thread isn’t for me so I’m going to go back to watching and listening. But you all rock and I love you and your work so much! :)
thank you kofi! i appreciate this and you! <3<3<3
<3 We see you, too! Thanks for posting this.
This whole “cannot be butch and bisexual” idea that people hear is one of the more illuminating and surprising take-aways from this thread to me: it’s as daft as saying that butch women cannot be attracted to one another.
Also: femme dudes. Aww Yisss.
Great thread: also really enjoying the discussion about the socially conformist/heteronormative pressures in opposite gender relationships, for queer people. It’s helping me unpack lot of stuff in my head.
<3
I’m so glad to see this thread! the support on autostraddle for bisexual/multiple gender attraction women is one of the reasons this is my favorite queer-oriented site.
I’m 18, bisexual, and known that i was bisexual since i was 13/14. I live in a very conservative area, so all my relationships so far have been with men*.
(*Exception: I had a LDR with a non binary person who id’d at the time more transmasc but now ids as a lesbian? which is weird to think about because are they my ex boyfriend or girlfriend? with what context do I look at our relationship? please advise, the ex says they don’t care but it hurts my brain.)
My last relationship was with a trans boy and while I cared about him deeply, he was really invested in being more of a boy and that hyper focus on masculinity made me really uncomfortable. so while that was outwardly my first “gay” relationship, I felt like I was being pushed into gender roles more in that relationship than ones i had with cis boys.
I’m really looking forward to going to college in a very LGBT-friendly city and dating women, but at the same time I look at my dating history and I think, well, ok what if i’m a fake bisexual??? or what if i’m idealizing a relationship with a woman because I was unsatisfied with the men I dated????
this sort of became a rambling mess. This is one of my first comments too, normally I lurk. If you made it this far thanks for reading <3
Hi Megan! I hope you’ll unlurk more and more, because it was great reading your post.
I have also dated primarily men and gender non-binary folks who are masculine and yeah, that has more to do with where I live and grew up and being in LTR’s with several men in a row. And I don’t think you are a fake bisexual. Nor am I. We exist, therefore we are bi.
I do think some trans guys and some cis guys (a LOT of cis guys) are really into being hypermasculine and end up pushing us into these stereotypical, binary gender roles that really make me feel yucky. And I’m just not down for that. I’ve kind of decided that I’m not going to date guys like that ever again, never ever, cis or trans or GNB. For me it’s less about trans guys, specifically, and more about just guys that are acting like that and want something from me I can’t give. No thanks.
I hope you go to the queer student group at your new college and I hope you meet other queer and bi folks and make lots of friends and go to a gay bar somewhere and make out with girls and bois and lots of attractive people. I think it’s OK to not know exactly how you ID right now or to change your mind or that your feelings, even, could change/fluctuate in time. You get to decide.
As for how to refer to your ex, my partner also doesn’t care if people use masculine or feminine pronouns/terms for him. And sometimes that can feel more confusing than just getting a concrete, “Call me THIS,” answer. A gender neutral term could just be “my ex” or “my ex-partner” or “NAME, who I used to date…”?
I think I’ll try “NAME, my ex” next time they come up. thank you for the advice! And also the post validation. And I really appreciate the well wishes, and everything you’re doing in this thread. You’re awesome :)
Megan I’m so happy you commented! Welcome to the rumble. I hope your new college, new city, new friends create an opportunity to explore your sexuality in a way that makes you feel safe, affirmed and just as queer as you want to feel. The awesome thing about a fresh start is you don’t have to bring in the baggage of what people expect you to be or who they expect you to be with because of who/how you have been in the past. Good luck, and know the AS community is absolutely always here to hold you up!
I dated a guy for 6 and a half years, only really coming to terms with my own sexuality in the last 2 or so years of our relationship. There were a lot of things that resulted in our break up, but my sexuality was one of them. That was mostly on me as it was something I had internalized for so long, and although he could detect snip-its (my serious feels for Kristen Stewart was the dead give-away), for the most part we did not talk about it. When we did, it was usually a snide comment in response to my heart eyes over a girl, celebrity or otherwise. But, then on the flip side we’d often joke and fantasize together about Mila Kunis or Eva Mendes types.
Once, in front of a friend of his, he labelled me as “bi-curious,” mostly as a joke and in context to our conversation, but I became very, very defensive about it and told him that he doesn’t get to label me and afterward told him he embarrassed me in front of his friend. It felt like my secret, and my identity, and he didn’t get to talk about it. Which, in retrospect, was wrong of me to treat my own sexuality, especially as it related to our relationship, in that way.
Now, dating a woman for the first time, I am so aware of the way that the two relationships are viewed at a macro level. I am fortunate enough to have super supportive friends (one or two of whom identity similarly to me), and to have a partner who also respects and understands my identity, and with whom I can openly talk about it. Looking back on my previous relationship, I think a lot of our communication issues would have been resolved if I had taken more ownership over my bisexuality and talked to him about it. The pressure of being in a “straight” seeming relationship can be overwhelming for someone who does not identify that way. I constantly felt overwhelmed by the path I was expected to take in my relationship – marriage, children, etc. Although that is something that tons of queer people want as well (yes! You go and live your best life, y’all!), it is something that I know a lot of my straight friends feel as well. So, having this secret inside of me on top of that pressure became overwhelmingly difficult to deal with. I was always grappling with “this isn’t how a straight girl thinks/dresses/acts” which was my own internal bullshit way of trying to play straight.
Personally, I love the freedom that bisexuality gives me in terms of potential partners. Because it’s just how I am inclined, and always have been, I love that I know I have the capacity to love men and women, to lust for both, and every day feel more comfortable expressing that in a variety of ways. Some people, queer and straight, may struggle with it but if anything, I have learned that those kinds of prejudices are their BS, not mine and all I can do is live my life, search for my own happiness, and regardless of if it’s with a man or a woman, do whatever helps me be my best self.
Oh wow. I really relate to this a lot. Thank you so much for sharing.
Thank you for sharing this @amandemic!
“Once, in front of a friend of his, he labelled me as “bi-curious,” mostly as a joke and in context to our conversation, but I became very, very defensive about it and told him that he doesn’t get to label me and afterward told him he embarrassed me in front of his friend. It felt like my secret, and my identity, and he didn’t get to talk about it. Which, in retrospect, was wrong of me to treat my own sexuality, especially as it related to our relationship, in that way.”
You know, I feel like you did the right thing. You stood up for someone taking your identity and trivialising it and or turning it into something else. I’m glad you took a stand :)
Thanks! I think my reaction could have been softened if I was willing to participate in a conversation about it with him. It’s do important to own your own sexuality in any relationship, and not doing that leaves too much room for confusion on both parts, and hurt feelings.
It’s still considered bi if one is into women and non-binary/agender/genderqueer people?
I struggle with this. Sometimes people correct me and say I’m actually “pansexual.” But I think the term “bi” has expanded in the last few years to include non-binary and agender people. So short answer: yes!
YES. At least, I sure as hell hope so, and I think it *should* be. I identify as bi, but am attracted to all genders. “Queer” and “pansexual” just doesn’t always seem to fit for me, not sure why.
as far as i’m concerned, “bisexual” = “the same and other genders” and/or “two more more genders,” so yes, if that’s how that person wants to ID!
+1 to this, Rachel.
I agree with Rachel’s definition and believe it’s the definition most actual bi people use these days. Not “attracted to men and women” or “binary sexual” but “attracted to same and to different genders.”
Personally, I default to queer more often, but I also identify as bi and I intend it to mean attracted to many genders.
The definition of bisexuality I really like is attraction to same/similar and different genders. so under that one, I think you’re good :)
YES! And plenty of genderqueer and trans and non-binary folks identify as bi. The umbrella is big enough for all of us <3
Ultimately, the label you chose to describe yourself is a personal decision, but the most common definition of bisexuality is attraction to two or more genders. Those genders could be anything! I like to think of my bisexuality as a pick and mix, I can chose a few genders all the way up to all of them and the term bisexuality still describes my attractions! If bi feels right to you, use it :)
100 percent agree with Jesy.
Per the thread, “this is a space created primarily for bi and multi-gender attracted women”
Yes, bisexual can be limiting to some in their interpretations. I myself, don’t feel it encompasses my identity. I also don’t like pan because I think it’s too broad. I find myself attracted to what I consider “queerness.” Not just as a physical concept of androgyny or masculine presentation, but it’s also mental and emotional. Thus, sex and gender don’t limit my attractions, though sex-wise, it’s stronger toward women. And yet… married for 13 years to my cis husband.
I love this, Lisa. I think I’m also attracted to “queerness.”
Yes. Most bisexuals define bisexuality as an attraction attraction to 2 or more genders.
Yes. Bisexuality is the attraction to two or more genders.
Hey guys, I’m Gaby. Bisexual poly woman, currently dating a man. I’m in here to reply and answer questions! It is so nice to not feel isolated and alone. <3
Hi Gaby! I love your work! I watch your videos about bisexuality when I have the fake bi blues, they always make me feel better about my identity + make me laugh hysterically. thank you so much for that!
Hey Gaby! I also really appreciate your work! I am really glad you shared your coming out story on Just Between Us. There are so many parts that resemble my own story and I feel less weird knowing that I am not the only one who kinda pushed off discovering their sexuality. I also have had to come out to people multiple times because they have not believed me.
hi Gaby! Made an account just to reply to you, and this lovely thread. I’m also a bi lady in an open relationship with a man, and I want to date other women casually but am SO NERVOUS about falling into that pervasive bi stereotype. It makes me really shy around other queer women because being honest and disclosing to a potential partner that I’m in a relationship is important to me. Any advice for how to get over this mentally, and present it in a good not-off-putting way?
Hey…so I, like many of the other ladies here, am always really hesitant to call myself bi. I thought I was a lesbian in high school, dated a girl for the first year and a half of college, started salsa dancing and meeting men and then kissed one while studying abroad and then entered identity crisis mode and have only dated men since. As someone else mentioned…it’s so easy to meet men! And then they pursue you, and all the steps are societally defined! And you can be lazier in sex and still please both of you! I definitely left the queer community (it was my ex’s space, and as someone else said, who can be more horrible and threatening in a queer space than the lesbian who starts dating men? In all the lesbian romcoms, the bad guy is the straight-girl-gone-gay-who-goes-back-to-straight, or the lesbian who turns straight…), and besides one night at a lesbian party to celebrate marriage equality, haven’t really gone back. It definitely doesn’t feel like my space anymore, and I feel like a fraud since my relationships and hook-ups for the last 3.5 years have been exclusively male. I remember telling a friend in high school that if I could date men, I would, because it would be so much easier. And now it looks like that’s just what I’ve done.
Lots of my friends will ask me when I’m dating a woman again, or when I’m complaining about issues with guys, they’ll say “Just date girls!” (As if relationships with women are free from problems…) But underneath my pushback to their well-intentioned suggestions is a fear that I’m not really bi, it was just a phase, and I’ll never date a woman again. I’m not actually that worried about this – I’m totally content with not really labeling myself, with meeting who I meet and if it’s only guys from now on, that’s fine – but it’s frustrating when I have to answer questions, that’s what sets me on my cycle of self-doubt. Once a well-intentioned friend oversaw my making of an Okcupid profile to get me over someone (lolz). I put that I was bi. And proceeded to get exclusively creepy messages asking if I wanted to be a third in various sorts of relationships. Recently, I made another profile (which was also soon deleted, it’s not my thing) but put I was straight and met a couple really great guys who are feminist and thoughtful and then when I mentioned I was bi on the date, didn’t care or even really comment on it at all (yessssss, this is the best reaction).
I “dated” one guy (the longest not-a-relationship-but-totally-a-relationship I’ve had) who basically admitted later that he started “dating” me because I’d mentioned my ex-girlfriend and he thought I’d want to have a threesome (and he could finally live out his threesome fantasy). Later in the relationship this became a recurrent fight/issue…he’d want a threesome, and say that if our relationship was going to continue we’d have to have one, I’d say that I’m not into them and never wanted to see him with anyone else, he’d start asking me what girls on our dance team I liked, I’d get angry and not want to engage in the conversation, he’d simultaneously be doing sexy-time things and then when I had a natural sexy-time reaction he’d be like “see you’re turned on by so-and-so” and I’d be like “No, I’m turned on by you!” and this would repeat. He’d try to get me to watch “lesbian” porn with him, but the idea of women being sexual with women for the male gaze just makes me angry (and I think because of this experience, I’m now unnecessarily hostile towards women doing sexual things with women in certain situations.) I remember telling the afore-mentioned male ex early in our relationship that I imagined myself marrying a woman. He likes to think that he changed me because now I imagine myself marrying a man. (I think it’s just my brain accessing the most recent romantic memories….) Now I’m super sensitive when I meet men to how they react when I mention my ex-girlfriend…and if they say “that’s hot”, they’re out. My identity isn’t for your sexual gratification. My past relationship isn’t for your sexual objectification.
I could go on and on…right now I’ve reached a place where I’ve hurt others (my lady ex, a lady hook-up, a male ex, another male ex…) and where I’ve been hurt too, and I feel like my sex drive has just completely gone into hibernation while I recover and wait to be ready to be vulnerable again. But this thread seriously just made my day.
“In all the lesbian romcoms, the bad guy is the straight-girl-gone-gay-who-goes-back-to-straight, or the lesbian who turns straight…”
Even in the freakin’ L Word, Tina’s time with a guy was set up to be a bad thing, something that was so obviously wrong, with lots of welcoming back when she ‘became a lesbian again’.
I am so glad to be recognized in this manner. Of course being bi I’ve dated men and women and you get treated so differently by family etc at times in the latter relationship and it is truly frustrating. Very few seem to understand what being bi means and so they have many questions, some can be insulting, but I simply answer..”It means I love everyone. I don’t see the anatomy, but who the person is. ” Maybe one day they’ll get it, but articles etc like these can help. Thanks!
I think my parents still only kind of get it. I’ve been out since I was 17, but they still get confused or think that it has to do with who I’m dating or something. Like I’m straight when I’m with a guy and lesbian when I’m with a girl? I don’t know if they’ll ever get it, but at least they finally love me and accept me the way I am…even if they don’t know exactly what I am. I feel you on how frustrating it can be.
Hello fellow bi and pansexuals! I will add in my appreciation of this space! I am a queer woman who has been with my partner for 12 years…he started transitioning last year, had top surgery a couple of months ago, and is now read as male in the world. Lots of my friends have had partners transition, I have a ton of trans male friends, so I didn’t think it would effect me/be a big deal, but I’m finding a lot of discomfort with it! I’m feeling the need to constantly out myself in really obvious ways and I HATE that people assume I’m straight now. I’m also sometimes wanting to say I’m a lesbian, even though I’m not, to somehow prove my queerness to others. Lots of internal biphobia happening over here and it sucks! Anyways, if there is anyone who can relate, I’d appreciate the convo!
I can’t relate, but I’m fascinated by the idea of “passing” so I feel you on this. Sending love and support!
I don’t have exactly the same experience but I can relate! My ex was beginning to present publicly as male when we started dating but was still being read as afab, so people pinned us as a lesbian couple. Which felt really weird – he’s a boy and I’m a girl and it was a “heterosexual” relationship, so people thinking otherwise felt like a lie, but at the same time being visibly queer was a really great feeling.
I’m married to a trans boi and I get it. He personally doesn’t care if people read him as a lesbian, which happens a lot. It’s interesting. We met in a small rural area and everyone read us as a het couple, but now we live in a city and often get read as lesbians. I think people are very proud of themselves for showing their ally coolness by calling us “ladies” and my partner doesn’t personally care, but I have a lot of friends who do care very much and are hurt when they are misgendered. I wish people would just stop guessing our genders, especially my partner’s.
Unfortunately, dating a guy, whether cis or trans, means bi erasure becomes more a part of your life again. And I’ve definitely been tempted to prove myself to others, but that’s my internalized biphobia talking. I totally relate!
I can definitely feel for you with people thinking that you are straight. My first relationship was with a girl but afterwards I started dating boys and a lot of people in my life just assumed that dating a girl was just a “phase” in my life and that since I was dating men I obviously must only be interested in men. It sucks to have your identity assumed. I also do the thing where I feel that I need to “prove” my queerness. I am engaged to a man and I too feel the need to out myself just so people do not make wrong assumptions about me. Hang in there, friend. The world is getting better for everyone in the LGBT+ family. <3
Ah! Finally!
I had been dating women for about 9 years, but never ruled out the possibility of dating a guy. 6-7 months ago I decided to explore that a bit more!
It’s been a really interesting experience and mostly pleasant.
The biggest disappointment I have had is the comments and behavior from the lesbian community. It seems as though they believe me to be “unpure” (which I know isn’t a real word but let’s move on) old friends have seen me out with a woman and then feel the need to make inappropriate gestures related to sexual acts with men or women are super interested until I share that I date both genders and find them equally attractive on all levels (not just physically). People make comments about me being “confused” or “selfish”. Women think I’d leave them for a guy or that I’m just playing around with women to test out my sexuality. In reality its all about the soul and the connection. I wish I didn’t feel like I have to lie to women in order for them to give me a chance and get to know me first.
The lesbian community can be really terrifying about bi women. I think it comes from a place of insecurity or fear, which I get. But it sucks.
It’s very similar to how closed minded straight guys may react, once they get over the “sexy girl on girl” part of it. It’s like, threatening because they can’t perform in the same ways that a woman can. Same as some lesbian women may feel threatened because they cannot perform the way a man can. Which, on bother accounts, is a coo coo bananas way of thinking about sexuality, gender etc.
Yeah. I’ve had to have the same awkward, pained conversations with the past three women I’ve dated about what it means to be bisexual / dispelling assumptions, etc. It’s frustrating, but I will say that all three listened, challenged their own thinking, and ended up being bisexual allies / calling other lesbians out when they said hurtful things. Now I use it as a good litmus test for whether this person is worth spending time with. There’s hope!
Strangely, I’ve had the opposite conversation with the men I’ve dated, which usually boiled down to “no, it’s not hot, it’s just who I am” and “nah, I don’t actually feel like ogling women with you, did you know that is a crappy thing do to to women?” But again, litmus test! There are wonderful men who get it! I suggest grasping to them for dear life.
Yeah and there’s that “gold star lesbian” thing which I only heard of recently. You get an actual [metaphorical] reward for proving your ‘purity’?! So even women who have dated men in the past but do decide they want to identify as lesbian still face biphobia.
I find the whole thing very transphobic, too, because the “gold star” thing seems to about being pure of interactions with a penis. But what if my girlfriend is MAAB? If I date a guy who is FAAB, am I still a gold star? Ick.
Autostraddle, you rock. Thank you so much for this space. As a bi woman with a primarily queer community, dating men has been a really frustrating experience. My lesbian friends dismiss most of them out of hand, because they “mansplain” or “manspread,” etc – I’m a committed feminist, and these things piss me off too. But having dated men for 3 decades, I’ve learned what should be dealbreakers, and what are merely teachable moments. I’m sick of having to defend my dates to my friends.
Also, um, all lesbians are not 100% perfect feminists. I’ve heard many a douchebag or misogynist comment come from the lips of a lesbian, too.
I’ve been dating a guy for three and a half years, we started dating when I was in 9th grade and now I’m starting college, but around a year ago I realized I was also attracted to women. My boyfriend and I are going our separate ways this fall, and I want to act on the feelings I’ve been having towards women, but it’s difficult for me both because I’ve only ever been in a relationship with a man, and mostly everyone I know thinks of me as 100% straight. I’m worried everyone will think it’s “just a phase” or won’t take me seriously because I’m bisexual and not a lesbian…
I think you have to secure and take yourself seriously. It’s tough but you can’t control other people. You can only control yourself, and you’re allowed to explore, and you’re allowed to be unsure. It’s human. Expecting perfection in someone else’s sexuality is rude, so anyone questioning you is just being terrible.
You’re starting college?!?! Fret not. The opportunities will abound. Like Gaby says, take yourself seriously and know that there are soooooo many other people out there like you, or even just sort of like you, many of whom probably want to bang you (or just smooch… sorry I always run straight to home plate). You Do You!
I am a bisexual woman dating a man. im 20, this is my first relationship and I haven’t told the guy i also like women. I want to be open and free but have no idea how to go about this
I hope you find a way to tell this guy about your desires and sexuality. Hopefully he will be cool about it and it can be something that deepens your trust and understanding of each other! Luck and love.
It’s hard! But ultimately, if this is someone you will want to know you authentically, the only way is to be genuine with them—as soon as it feels safe to do so!
I also recommend having a friend or a community (hi!) to back you up. Not necessarily while you’re talking, but to help you work through what may inevitably become a series of conversations.
Just wanted to chime in and say “You can do it!!” It can be so hard to come out, but being honest with someone can feel like such a relief–and it can feel so incredibly good and validating and awesome when you realize they still think you’re amazing, just the way you are. …That said, if this guy you’re dating has a negative reaction, know that that says something very important about him and probably means you deserve better–and the sooner you know, the less time you’ll waste!
It’s hard, but I would start slow. Coming out to your young, straight, cis male boyfriend can come across as threatening, or he may take it the wrong way. I might suggest testing the waters a little bit, and doing your best not to create your own stigma around it. If he questions you, give him the benefit of the doubt that he is asking out of curiosity and now out of a place of judgement. The more you can feel comfortable with yourself, the easier it will be to talk about it with your guy.
I love you all. I’m single now, but as a queer female-ish person who was in a long term relationship with a man shortly after coming out as bi/queer, I feel you all.
My story to add:
Two weeks ago I was at Homoclimbtastic, an LGBT rock climbing convention. Its generally the most fun ever, and its not exclusively gay, or lesbian, or anything.
However, this year, I was chatting with a woman a little older than me and mentioned my girlfriend in college. She stopped me and asked “girlfriend? or Girlfriend?”. I told her “Girlfriend as in someone I was dating”, and we kept talking. Later I mentioned that I used to climb a lot with my ex-boyfriend, and she stopped me again to ask if I was the “token bisexual”. I felt like crying. I came to the event to be with my people. There aren’t many queer climbers, and this woman was making me feel like I had to justify my very presence at the event. I told her I identify as queer, for a lot of reasons (my attractions are non-binary, I am non-binary), and she proceed to go on about “all these new terms! What’s wrong with bi?”. For me, her attitude is exactly what is wrong with the term bisexual.
My advice for others struggling to be seen: I feel like I have to come out over and over again. The easiest and best way for me to be seen as not-straight is to frequently mention exes of all genders. Even when the word “friend” might tell the story just as well. Its not a one-size fits all solution, but it works for me. Even if I get a few confused and insensitive questions from time to time.
That’s so brave! I admit I often just say “friend” because it is easier and I am tired of explaining things. This makes me want to be braver and better about it.
Also, can you imagine someone calling anyone the “token” anything else? So rude. :(
“I feel like I have to come out over and over again. ”
THIS. Not even thinking about the coming out to new friendship groups, I already came out to my parents three times! (gay, then straight, then bi/queer) If I’d felt like bisexual was a thing you could actually be, and say you were, back when I was 16 that might’a been a little easier.
Yuuup. I was talking to an activist person I have been working with a lot and mentioned my spouse using “he” pronouns and I registered the look of confusion on her face, but moved on. Because I didn’t feel the need to have a convo with her about it. Why? Five minutes later she said, “Wait. I’m sorry. That was weird… I thought you were…gay?” And I was like, yeah, it was weird because you made a weird face, but otherwise it’s kind of none of your business so really you just feel weird. I’m fine. But I explained because I’m a nice person and because she’s a nice person and because it was fine. It’s fine. I just get tired of explaining sometimes, you know?
Hope to be able to read more soon! But really appreciate this space. One thing for me that is weird is that I am not really out to my partner’s family, who is more traditional… Like if queer issues come out in that space I feel weird because well why raise a ruckus when this is my current relationship and how much do they need to know? But then I often go to my queer circles by myself and don’t talk too much about my partner – feeling it would be out of his comfort zone and that talking about an opposite gender partner wouldn’t fully respect the space. I do bring him more into mixed gender and sexuality spaces, so it’s good to question why I behave this way.
But I have great supportive friends on all sides who get me, and my partner does too. That sometimes I feel more like a boi than a girl and I can be addressed with multiple genders, that we have clear communication about sex, that we took a long time to reach an agreement of monogamy, one where issues could be brought to the table and talked through.
But there’s a deference to gender norms and such that I do feel- like for me my formal wear preference is leaning much more masculine, and he likes that, but he had a fundraiser dinner for his nonprofit and I decided that since the spotlight was on him I should dress femme to not draw undue attention to myself (and though he supports me in all attire, I know he is more attracted to the more femme version of masked). Navigating which spaces are safe or not. Feeling very queer in queer spaces but sometimes not putting my relationship obviously on the table. Feeling a little erasure in hetero spaces. But doing my best to reaffirm queerness wherever I go.
I told him its not a hetero relationship since both of us ain’t hetero- and I think of it sometimes as a queer mixed gender relationship- and how this can apply to all genders and assumptions. Lots of learning for both of us. <3 hearing from all the rest of yall keeping it real too!
Thanks for sharing this. I relate to so much of what you say, especially about considering your relationship a queer mixed gender relationship. I feel that so hard.
My boyfriend is also bi and I feel you on this mixed queer relationship thing. We need a word!
Came out as bi @ age 19 (now 37)…identified as a variety of labels and now I’m fluid. I went from dating mostly women up until four years ago, and now I date mostly men. I’m single now and totally still open to dating other ladies, the opportunity hasn’t presented itself.
For all intents and purposes, it’s like I’m straight, but not. Kind of struggling with how I should identify myself these days. I don’t feel right calling myself queer, but it doesn’t feel right saying I’m straight either.
I do get irritated,however when I think of the days of how invalidated by family and friends I felt whenever I discussed my orientation,and how out of place I felt by all the communities (including the local bi community). I usually avoid this topic because it generatesa ton of feels.
It’s so funny how much we conflate sexual behavior and romantic behavior with sexual orientation. Like, your sexual orientation is who you like and is a label you can choose (or refuse to choose). It’s so different than who you date or hook up with. I feel like bisexuals/pansexuals/sexually fluid people have all this pressure on us to define who we are by who we date or sleep with. That’s just not how it works!
i’m young, but i’ve identified as bisexual for about a year now. without any prior romantic or sexual experience i sometimes question my own sexuality, but usually i can pretty confidently label myself as bi. however, in recent months i’ve stumbled upon two different people with whom i shared somewhat romantic times with — one of them was male, and the other was female. reflecting back on both experiences, i find myself being more attracted to the male and less so towards the female, and i’ve done some serious reconsidering about what my sexuality really is. i have the feeling that i may be more of a heteroromantic bisexual rather than biromantic bisexual. however, like i said, i dont have much dating experience, so it might just be that one person attracts me more than the other, which is normal. i’m not sure what i’m looking for here… i suppose just advice about discovering one’s identity and fluidity withing sexuality. has anyone share similar happenings as me before, and how did it turn out?
I’ve questioned my own sexuality so many times…. growing up I always had crushes on girls and boys, and as an adult I’ve had romance and sex with people of various genders. Yet I’ve found myself after one experience or another playing the comparing and “maybe this means I’m ‘really’ x” game. It’s annoying and frustrating that I do that to myself. I find it stressful. After a really great time with a lady I’ll think that’s it, done with men! When I was in a years long monogamous relationship with a man I began to feel like I was straight after all until bam! I fell head over heels for a woman friend. I began to feel a few years back that I couldn’t see myself dating guys any more, then got involved with a guy. I think I’ve let go of that “what am I really” voice for the most part. I date people of multiple genders, id as queer and bisexual, and generally feel most comfortable connecting with other queer people. I think that internal questioning comes in part from how invisible poly sexuality is in our culture and stories, and the mistrust surrounding it. We’re bound to be affected by that and feel pressured to define ourselves one way or another. Also we are always still getting to know our own selves. I can’t exactly give you advice because I’m not you, but I can just say I’ve felt that too. (I’m 32 btw )
Hi Lydia! I am also young (21) and inexperienced. A few years ago when I was first coming to terms with my bisexuality, I also wondered if I might be bisexual but heteroromantic. I eventually realized that for me this was just a result of the environment I was in. It was easier for me to picture myself in relationships with men, because I had seen almost no examples of women in romantic relationships. Once I met more LBQ women, found communities like this, and had some time to get to know myself a little better it was easier for me to see where I really fit and what I wanted. I still prefer to call myself bi, and leave out any mention of whether that refers to sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or both. It also helped me to resist comparing every crush or somewhat romantic moment, and accept all my past feelings as separate and equally valid. Sometimes I’m attracted to people of the same gender, and sometimes I’m attracted to people of different genders. Sometimes I experience sexual attraction without romantic attraction, and sometimes it’s all romantic. All of these attractions are real, valid, and part of who I am.
Hi! I am a queer-identified cis gender grrl, dating/partnered to a cisgender dood for the past five years. Getting to the point where I am completely comfortable with my sexual identity took a while…
A previous partner committed suicide after I left him to date girls/transboys/anyone but him. That experience has definitely impacted me, but not necessarily in a completely negative way. I live life really hard, and am completely honest with myself about who I am, who I want to associate myself with, and what I want from my life. I’ve dated girls, gender-nonconforming people, and many people all at once: it’s been amazing. Now I’m in in a “straight” monogamous relationship – we have lived in 3 countries over the past 5 years; I guess I’m always trying to find where my place is…
I am uncomfortable with the “straight privilege” I am afforded when we walk down the street together, and at the same time I’m frustrated by my lesbian friends who call my sex “weird” because I peg my cisgender male partner.
When do I tell you I’m queer? Will you take me seriously? Do I even give a shit?
Wow, C, thank you for sharing this. And that last line? Right on.
I’ve had more “wth” reactions from friends who aren’t straight about pegging a man than from straight friends which is pretty odd but maybe I’m conflating “not-straight” with open-minded or better informed.
I had an ex commit suicide too. I just wanted to offer some sympathy there because it is really awkwardly difficult to deal with.
Yay! This is so great!
I’m not dating any men right now, but I have a lot of internalized self-loathing concerning, like, this notion that I “fail” at being a woman in the context of “woman”-as-desirable-sexual/romantic-prospective-partner-for-men. Like why would a man want me, etc., etc. And I mostly date women, so that ends up not impacting my day-to-day life so much, but then when I do meet a man I think I might be interested in I feel so much pressure to clarify that I’m bisexual because otherwise I might just be read as a lesbian? (I’m very outspoken about my misandry and about my gayness, so.)
I also feel like there are a lot of scripts that exist for hetero-esque dating (not that any of us are obligated to follow them, of course, but…) which I never learned, so after I came out I kind of just dove into dating/hanging out with queer women, which exacerbates the feeling that I don’t know how to do any of the things, etc.
I think that’s a huge part of the issue…the pressure to conform to some kind of pre-conceived notion of “straight” relationships. Just because it’s a male/female seeming relationship doesn’t mean it’s straight!
It’s tough to find a guy that gets it – for real! But they are out there!!
this is a perfect way of putting this! this is something i identify with a lot, and wish that i had better tools w/r/t overcoming it.
Totally relate to your aversion to the scripted aspect of hetero dating. The idea of using online dating sites to meet straight guys is completely unappealing to me, and it has always seemed much easier within queer social circles to just become friends with a bunch of people and maybe end up dating one of them.
Autostraddle! Thank you!
I’m not in a relationship right now, but I have dated both women and men before. It means a lot to me that the editors opened up this thread. I don’t necessarily feel unwelcome in queer spaces, but I do feel a little bit awkward in them if I’m dating a guy. I dated a straight cis man briefly recently, and I found myself wondering whether I was still welcome in the queer spaces I’d just started to explore. But it wasn’t just queer spaces that felt awkward. As a bisexual woman, I have to admit that I feel a bit awkward everywhere. I haven’t entirely figured out what this means, but I’d never quite felt comfortable in relationships with cis men. It could just be some personal issues, but every time I try it out with someone straight, something fundamental about the way we see the world clashes, and I can’t quite articulate it… except as queerness. So whenever this happens, I feel a little de-centered in my own relationship, awkward in the queer community, and awkward around my straight friends.
I’m single now, but I’m also the kind of person who eventually would like to have a serious monogamous relationship. I feel like I’m always existing in tension, then, as a blank space of possibility for people. My queer friends are hoping I’ll meet a really great woman, and my straight friends are hoping I’ll meet a really great guy. There’s a lot of pressure to become defined by the gender of my partner, and I find that frustrating.
so much of this really resonates with me! i really appreciate that you put language to feeling “de-centered;” i feel that way sometimes and it helps me to have a word for it. i also really appreciate you saying this:
i feel like the way this often works out is that bi people end up feeling like whatever choice(s) they make about romantic relationships, they’re going to end up letting down people they care about or causing their communities to think less of them, which takes a major toll on emotional wellbeing and self-image — it encourages us to think that we’re inherently disappointing. i still struggle with the residue of this feeling a lot, i think.
It does feel strange to be identified by the person your dating, rather than to be taken at your word, as many gay and lesbians are (within the queer community, I mean).
As for your relationships with straight men, it’s been my experience as well. For me, I don’t think I could ever be with somebody who aligned perfectly with all my views. I’m too much of a glutton for good debate, but they do have to be sensitive to the fact that I won’t apologize for my steadfast opinions.
But as others have voiced here, some things are dealbreakers. Some of us can’t date cis men who aren’t self-identified feminists. And if that’s the kind of thing that makes you feel safe and loved and confident and queer, then that’s just the truth!
It’s hard not to identify yourself in relation to your partner, because sexuality is so tied to who you want to partner up with.
Oh my god! Just seeing this thread makes me so so so happy.
I’m engaged to a dude, who before dating was my best friend. The girl I’d been dating before we started dating was SUPER biphobic to the point that she executively labelled me a lesbian, so in many ways I had to do the whole coming out process in reverse. “Hey guys… I’m not a lesbian! I’m actually bisexual! Always have been!” Because we’d been best friends for years, this dude knew of my struggles with my own sexuality, being labelled against my will and going along with it to keep the peace in my relationship, and was one of the first people to ‘live my truth’ as a bisexual person.
I’m super lucky. This guy is like. Wonderful. In all ways. I’ve always been more attracted to women than men and I won’t say that that isn’t still the case—but he’s definitely worth swearing off boobs for life for. And a big part of that how not-insecure he is about my bisexuality and what a big proponent of bi rights he’s become by knowing me. He consistently calls out people’s biphobia and bi erasure when I’m not around and whenever people give him leering/crappy comments about how lucky he is to have a bisexual girlfriend, he shuts them down. And more than that, he lets me be bisexual? Part of being bisexual in a ‘straight’ relationship is not hiding my attractions for other people. I am the stereotype of a flirtatious Libra and the fact that he isn’t threatened means the world. He trusts that I want him, and only him. And I think because he isn’t threatened by my wealth of “oh my god did you SEE THAT GIRL???” (I live in LA, there are a lot of beautiful people) I feel more secure in the fact that hey, dating a man doesn’t take away my queerness.
It can be hard, though. I don’t believe in the greedy bisexual stereotype but I guess for me, there is a sort of difficulty that comes along with being attracted to so many people and knowing that by dating a man, I’m robbing myself of those experiences. Of course, when I dated a woman, I felt the same way. I think it comes from a deep-seeded fear of being a ‘bad bisexual,’ because it’s like, as women dating men, we’re simultaneously shaded for “oh, greedy bisexual, you’ll end up cheating on him anyway” AND “you’re not really bi if you’ve settled down with a dude.” Bisexuals have their own Madonna/Whore complex and it gets rough. I really wish I could find other bi/pan women in relationships with men who are HAPPY in their relationships and are monogamous, but also struggle with feeling like they’ve elected to shut off part of themselves. I feel like I can’t have that conversation with people without it turning into a reductive “ugh, greedy bisexuals” thing. It’s more nuanced than that. But how can we even begin to have that conversation when so much of our existence as bi people period, much less bi women dating men, is just justifying who we are?
I’m glad I found a man who is confident in, celebrates and is comfortable with my bisexuality. Unfortunately when I came out as by bisexual, the dude I was dating (high school boyfriend) took it as a challenge. He simultaneously played the lecherous “we won’t argue about who to pick for a threesome” card while also practicing corrective rape against me. It was horrible and took a long time to heal from, and I feel like this is a refrain I hear from a lot of bi women who do want to date men, or are at least open to dating men. It can be hard to find a man that won’t feel threatened and hurt you, or won’t fetishize you, or a combination of the two. This alone made me swear off dating men—I just didn’t think I could find it. I was lucky in that I had been best friends with somebody who supported me that I ended up falling in love with, but many of us aren’t so lucky. And that’s hard. People say that the dating pool for bi/pan people is bigger than everybody else’s, but it isn’t. Sure, we can date straight/bi men and gay/bi women, but amongst those groups it’s hard to find people who will love us FOR being bi, not despite being bi.
This was a lot of rambling. But I’m just really glad this thread was here :)
“Bisexuals have their own Madonna/Whore complex and it gets rough.”
YES!!
The relationship I am in is not monogamous, but in past relationships I really struggled with loving the person I was with and feeling like I was shutting part of myself off for them. It’s a choice you make so you can’t resent them for it, but it’s definitely difficult sometimes.
“People say that the dating pool for bi/pan people is bigger than everybody else’s, but it isn’t. Sure, we can date straight/bi men and gay/bi women, but amongst those groups it’s hard to find people who will love us FOR being bi, not despite being bi.” <— Also YES!
I totally hear what you’re saying about attractions and not wanting to be the “bad bisexual” stereotype. The idea that by being in a monogamous relationship with a guy, you’re “giving up boobs” also resonated with me. When I met the woman I’m going to spend the rest of my life with, I wondered what I was giving up – I didn’t have a whole lot of dating/sex experience and I felt like I was committing to only one type of all of it forever! But then it turned out that I was poly (I already knew she was, but had asked her to be monogamous at the time). It sounds like that’s not at all your situation, but if you are truly monogamous, I don’t think you’re not giving up anything to be with the person you love. You’ve experienced boobs – and now you get a new experience. :)
thank you Autostraddle!
I’m an out bi girl in an opposite sex partnership. I knew from a very young age that I wasn’t straight, but was raised in a very oppressive religious environment and it took me a while to admit to myself and others that I was bi. I slept with girls at uni, but it wasn’t until I was in my 20s that I really figured it out.
However, like many bi women, the respective size of the pool of potential male/female partners meant that my mister turned up in my life just as I was plucking up the courage to brave the gay scene (bear in mind this was pre-internet, so it meant finding and braving an actual scene). Twelve years on, he’s still awesome and we have two amazing kids.
Becoming a parent really compounded my lack of visibility as LGBT – people tend to assume I’m straight anyway, and the addition of children just adds another layer of assumptions for people to make about you.
Now I’m past the baby stage, I’m coming out of a stage where my primary identity was ‘mother’ and I didn’t really have an outlet for any of the other aspects of my identity. It hit me quite hard recently – my sexual orientation is just one small aspect of who I am, but it’s an important aspect nonetheless, and I’ve had moments where that sense of invisibility got to me. I’m acutely aware of my passing privilege, and I know that if I was in a same-sex relationship, I’d face different (and tougher) challenges. But I don’t like feeling as though I am keeping a secret about myself and that people don’t know the real me. I’m trying to find other ways to be visible/part of the community – ways that aren’t about who I’m sleeping with. I go to Pride every year – that feels really important to me – it’s the one time in the year I’m unambiguously and publicly identifying/identified as queer. I keep in touch with my work LGBT network as well and have signed up as a mentor for LGBT staff. I try to be as out as possible at work too, it’s a gay-friendly and safe environment.
I also really value my friendships with others who are gay, even though I don’t get as much time to socialise post-kids. I find it hard to articulate just how important they are to me. It’s just such a relief to be able to be myself and not have to explain.
Sorry for the huge comment – thank you for this space. And especially thank you to the writers who have used their photos – that means so so so much. <3
I was going to write a whole new comment on this thread, but then I read this, and you essentially told my story. Especially the, “This guy is worth missing out on relationships with women… But there’s this kinda weird/sad feeling I’m losing or denying part of myself, too” thing.
And there are all the messages I’ve received in my life about how I’m lying, confused, etc. And my family wont acknowledge my identity. But I’m a very lady-loving lady who is also with the best dude ever for me, and life is rad.
M, I can relate to so much of what you say. Including the finding women generally more attractive but having found a guy worth giving up boobs for! And being happy in a monogamous relationship while still acknowledging what you’ve given up. Thank you.
I also want to chime in an say THANK YOU to Autostraddle for making a thread like this–I made an account specifically because of this thread. One of the things I struggle with most about being a female-bodied queer and dating a cis man is the overwhelming exclusion I feel from queer spaces, IRL and online.
So it’s really awesome that there is a queer space, even if it is “just” a thread on a website, that acknowledges that bisexuals even exist let alone are still queer when they are in opposite sex relationships. <3
I registered to respond, too. And I feel you! I’ve been taking leadership roles in my local activist community, and when I first started I felt very unwelcomed and out of place. I still struggle a lot to remind people that there is a B in the LGBTQ+ acronym for a reason. This thread feels like a huge step to me. :)
This thread makes me very happy. I feel like I’ve had to fight a lot for my identity and for other people to recognize multi-gendered attraction as a real thing instead of a phase or “everyone’s a little bisexual.” Seriously, my heart lept when I saw this.
I’ve had relationships with men and women, but the relationships with men seem to last much much longer even though I’m more attracted to women. Only one of the men who I’ve been with has recognized my sexuality and he’s the one I’m with right now. It makes a big difference in the relationship and I can’t imagine why I ever settled for guys who pretended I was straight just because I was with them. Never again.
NEVER AGAIN. Tattoo it across your heart.
Thank you thank you thank you for this! This was a thread I didn’t even know I needed. I only came out as bi in the last few years. (Identifying as straight before). It felt great to come out and finally date and sleep with women. Now I’m with an amazing man that I wouldn’t trade for anything, but I can’t help but feel like I’ve lost my ‘space’ in a cool group that I only just joined.
That’s really real and I’m sure a lot of folks can relate!
This thread is dope and you all are awesome!! I am currently in a long term non-monogamous dating type situation with a man but outside of that I have been mainly dating women/genderqueer folks. I remember on my first date with a lady I spent literally the entire time drunkenly freaking out that no one was going to take my identity seriously because I still enjoyed catching some D every now and again! Needless to say she never called me again, but sometimes I see her at queer parties in brooklyn, where we very obviously ignore each other, HA.
But anyway. I am taking Kevin G’s advice and trying not to let the haters stop me from doing my thing.
ugh Kevin G is so right about that
Gonna reiterate that I am also SO HAPPY TO FIND THIS LITTLE THING HERE.
I will say one of the things that’s hard for me is feeling too gay for straight people and too straight for gay people. Which, to unpack that statement a little bit, is me saying that lots of people seem to have a hard time accepting bisexuality as a legitimate sexual orientation. It seems to depend on who you are doing it with at any given moment far more than with monosexual identities.. That’s the most frustrating for me.. I feel like I have to defend my queerness.
Currently also dating a straight man, and he is very supportive (tbh anything less than enthusiasm is a no go here imo), but hanging out with his primarily straight friends can be tedious because they assume everyone in the room is straight… So I guess it’s like having “passing privilege” and experiencing bi erasure at once. There’s possibly nothing that irks me more than being labeled straight.
Ugh. Yes. I’m so much more comfortable hanging with queer people because they don’t do that: Girls and Guys thing that straight couple groups do. If you know what I mean.
Yes. I totally feel this. I don’t know why I am so sick of hanging with my boyfriend’s straight (occasionally though rarely homophobic and always heteronormative) friends, (maybe I just answered my own question), but I am so very sick of not having a group of fellow queer friends to hang out with!
This! This thread! Thank you Autostraddle! <3
Because I'm dating a man (and because of my own internalized garbage) I often feel like I don't deserve to identify as bi. I feel like I don't have a place in the queer community and this thread makes me so happy because I'm not alone.
I haven't read the whole thread yet (I'm also working) so I don't know if anyone has brought this up yet, but my experience with dating men has been that after a little while I stopped being interested in having sex. It's sort of like my desires just turn off. I don't know if it would be different with a woman because while I've been with women and fallen deeply in love with a few of them I've never had a long term relationship with one. I've had guys tell me I'm just bored but that's not how it feels. It feels like I just don't want that type of sex. It makes me wonder if maybe I'm not actually bi but that would discount so much of my past. Has anyone else experienced anything like this?
Hi! So glad you commented! You definitely a) deserve to identify as bi, and b) deserve to feel welcomed and at home in bi and queer and lgBt communities!
As for your second paragraph, one thing you might find interesting / potentially enlightening / helpful is to think about if perhaps your romantic and sexual attractions don’t overlap 100%. For example, I’m bi, and have experienced quite a bit of sexual fluidity (to some degree of chagrin from me, because my that ish is disorienting and confusing!) — and there was about a two year period where sexually/physically I was primarily attracted to women, and romantically I was primarily attracted to men. This was pretty stressful for me, and I found the online ace (asexual) community (mostly on reddit: /r/asexuals and /r/asexuality) to be a really helpful place to hang out and not feel like I was a freak, and to try work out what exactly was going on with me, and work on feeling okay about it. The ace community is generally really really chill with fluidity and I didn’t experience any pressure to adopt it as a ‘forever’ label (w/r/t men) — or even as a label at all, which was lovely.
Thank you so much @dragonsnap! <3
I've thought a lot about the asexual umbrella lately (my partner is demisexual), but it hadn't occurred to me to consider my romantic attractions differently than my sexual ones but it makes a lot of sense. I also wonder if there's something I need to examine w/r/t my internalized notions of security in relationships.
I'm also glad to hear that reddit isn't completely the scary place I think it is. :D
I’ve questioned my bi-ness a lot for reasons like what you’re describing Adriel, and dragonsnap your comment’s really helpful!
Dude I totally have that experience. I’m bi but have only ever had long term relationships with men, and some really sexy brief flings with women which sometimes make me think I wouldn’t have the same trouble getting it up with women after a few months, but I’m pretty sure that’s not the case. It also doesn’t jive well with the fact that I don’t think I (or my partner) could handle non-monogamy. I’ve become more at peace with it by realizing that most of the excitement from new encounters comes from emotional insecurity, and what I’ve lost in passion I’ve gained a million times over in intimacy and emotional security, which is totally worth it.
What you say makes so much sense, that there’s a component there that’s not solely about the sexual desire it is about the emotional security. Again something I hadn’t thought of because I was so focused on the “but maybe I am actually only interested in women” of it. It’s part of coming to accept myself as bi.
Thank you @bambiraptor! Knowing that someone has had the same experience you have is amazingly helpful. (see: this whole thread) <3
I’m not bisexual, but I have dated a man and felt that tapering off of attraction. Personally I’m investigating asexuality because after I had sex with my ex (he was my first, too) and figured out how it all worked, I stopped wanting to explore and then found out that exploration was all I’d ever wanted to do. But I also have never orgasmed or really wanted to, I rarely fantasize, and I rarely get crushes, so I have more signs pointing to asexuality than just losing interest in sexual activity with a boyfriend. Just my two cents. Best of luck working it out!
hi, everybody. :) i have been an autostraddle lurker off and on for literal ages… but this right here is the post that finally promised me that yes, i really can comment, that maybe i am not necessarily the outsider here that i’ve been guiltily imagining myself to be! and now i apologize for what will undoubtedly be an embarrassingly long post…
i’ve been in a (mostly) monogamous relationship with a cis male partner for almost seven years… and excluding a few weird, painful “this isn’t actually a relationship” things prior to this, my only other long-ish term romantic partner was my first ever—my female best friend, in high school.
although her parents were accepting, mine were most decidedly not. it was ugly. i’d always had an awesome relationship with my mother, but trying to hide this from her, because she was, at the time, staunchly and ignorantly homophobic, almost destroyed it. obviously, it was awful for my girlfriend, too—i’m sure all that was no small part of why we broke up.
i’ve never stopped having feelings for women, but outside of a few casual dalliances with “straightish” friends, often with the gent involved, i have never been with another woman. since then, i’ve thought of myself as bi-curious, bi-permissive, (jokingly “hasbian”), really, actually bisexual, and more recently and inclusively pan or queer… but i’ve always worried that, no matter how much i want to be involved with ladies or folks that are otherwise non-cis men, i shouldn’t be claiming any of those terms since i have no intention of separating from this partner.
that’s the same reason that, although i’ve never made any real attempt to hide my sexuality while in a seemingly “straight” relationship, and have actually brought my sexuality up with a lot of my friends over the years, it rarely comes up, and i’ve never been sure if there’s a real point or validity to publicly coming out.
meanwhile, my parents have come a long way since then, mostly in common-sense ways, and maybe a little by realizing with whom they align themselves if they’re on the wrong side of this conversation—my mom even turned her facebook profile rainbow after i did! but it seems like she’d rather things stay forgotten when it comes that close to home. i almost wish she’d just ask me… i wouldn’t lie, but it just doesn’t seem relevant, unless i want to talk about other people i’m casually kissing whilst in a primary relationship… which seems out of the need-to-know category for family.
i would love to hear any thoughts on coming out when your lifestyle reads so easily as straight. i worry so much about whether i have any business occupying designated queer spaces that, as much as i would love to participate more, culturally, i never want to take up valuable space that others have better claim to. i’m so excited to keep reading this thread! and maybe even post more in the future.
you’re all amazing, autostraddle. i’m so thankful for this. <3
gurrrrl. If you identify as bisexual, you are entitled to as much real estate under LGBTQ as any other sexual identity. Bisexual women face many of the same if not worse mental and sexual health issues than lesbian women. We face similar dating woes. We face similar stigma from outmoded parental units (who, I’m so glad to hear to come around eventually!) We also are women who love women. This doesn’t mean we want to take over or dominate a space that isn’t ours, we just deserve to be part of the conversation and share resources.
You’re not staking claim to something that isn’t yours, you’re entering a space that should have included you all along. You are wonderful. And please do continue participating. I think your story really resonates with a lot of bisexual women who are unsure of whether they are “queer enough.” I know it resonated with me.
“You’re not staking claim to something that isn’t yours, you’re entering a space that should have included you all along.”
Thank you.
it means the world to me to hear you say this stuff, hannah! thanks so much for replying.
This is so good! Thank you, Hannah!
this breaks my heart! your sexuality, however you decide to engage with it, is a big beautiful part of who you are, and I for one am a queer who would LOVE for you and people like you to be more involved in the community <3
aw, here, i put it back together for ya: <3
thanks so much, raquel, for the very sweet reply!
You belong here. I hope you stay and comment and start to feel fully part of our weird Autostraddle family.
My parents pretty much refused to talk about my being bi after I starting dating a cis straight guy in college. My mom would just shut the conversation down. I think she was probably hoping I’d just date straight guys forever and we’d never have to speak of it again. When that relationship ended, we had Family Coming Out 2.0. Once it became a thing that couldn’t be ignored, it was rough between us for a couple years. But it’s better now and it is worth it to know I can be 100% who I am and that my parents (mostly) get it. I still don’t know if they really get bisexuality and they aren’t, like PFLAG-level supportive, but they know I’m openly queer and they have welcomed my queer partner.
Aaaah! Thank you so much for this thread! I am a queer/bi woman dating a queer/bi male identified person for almost 8 months. Early on in our relationship I let my mom know that my monogamous partner identified as bisexual, and her first comment was “Oh, so is he not really committed to you then? Does he sleep with other people?” The assumptions are so frustrating.
As many others have mentioned I’ve encountered biphobia in spaces that are supposedly LGBT spaces. I went to SF Pride this year and was kissing my partner in the street, definitely received some dirty looks and heard someone comment “Ew..straight people”. I struggle thinking about ways to let people know we’re queer without shouting it at every person we walk past…
Somehow it hurts more when someone from the LGBT+ community says something biphobic than when just a random straight person says it. I am sorry you were disrespected a place that was supposed to be about celebrating queerness.
My mum is like this too – she just hears what she wants to hear. I am with a man now and so she assumes I am straight. When my poly brother came out as poly and I talked to her about it, she was like”oh he told me about how he and his girlfriend are not in love” and I was like “what part of saying you’re poly is the same as saying you’re not in love? YOU JUST ASSUMED THAT.” Facepalm.
Thank you Autostraddle for creating this space :) I’m a bisexual woman who has only been in serious relationships with men, dating women hasn’t panned out yet. The struggle for me is wanting a long term partner but always having it in the back of my mind that I haven’t experienced something that is pretty important to me to experience in being in a long term partnership with a woman. I try not to mind because we’re all people and if I’m meant to be with a man long term I’m not going to end a relationship over it but it’s still something I think about. Whenever I’ve been single I’ve exclusively voiced my interest in being with women but I’ve found that since I’m pretty femme I’m not approached by women and am shy about approaching them so the cycle continues where men end up in my life. I’ve been coined “the worst lesbian ever” by my friends who have known me to exclusively be interested in dating women while exclusively ending up with men.
Aww. You aren’t the worst lesbian ever. Haha. It’s easier to find men, honestly, because that follows the conventional social script. Men look for women and hit on them, following by LTR, marriage, kids. It’s just easier to find men to date because of heteronormativity and patriarchal cultural ideals. Honestly, finding women to date means putting yourself out there a little more, especially for us femmes, who are doubly invisible. I would suggest getting involved in queer activism or queer social activities in your community as a way to start finding your people. I promise you’re not the worst lesbian ever, whatever that means. :)
I’m not sure I can contribute much to this since I’m going through/have been going through the same thing! (My “adult” relationships have been with men) But I just wanted to let you know that I see you and your comment really resonated with me. thanks for sharing!!
Your whole comment really resonates with me. Especially “The struggle for me is wanting a long term partner but always having it in the back of my mind that I haven’t experienced something that is pretty important to me to experience in being in a long term partnership with a woman.” I have a wonderful boyfriend right now, but I do think about the fact that I want to have a LTR with a woman. We are non-monogamous and I have said to my boyfriend a couple times that my ideal would be to have a long-term girlfriend as well. It seems like that may be nearly impossible as we are seen as a straight couple and there is not a very big queer community where I live. I find myself feeling that I have no way of letting women know I am interested and available without leading them to believe that I strictly date women. And then they find out I have a boyfriend and it gets complicated…
I AM SO EXCITED FOR THIS THREAD Y’ALL DON’T EVEN KNOW!
My GIF prolly won’t work bc coding is hard, but I am beyond excited for all of this. As a former AS contributor and current/forever bisexual in a long-term monogamous relationship with a cis dude, I am so fucking here for this.
I found that a great way to exercise my queer identity is to write and blog about queer stuff. I also did roller derby, which is one big queer love hug of a sport.
I feel like bi peeps in cis relationships need their own moniker…like, how hard is it to google “bisexual women in monogamous relationships with cis men”? I like to call it narwhaling…we’re just as queer as unicorns, but we’re all swimming under the surface. I even wrote a blog about it, before it became yet another abandoned personal blog:
http://livingwithnarwhals.blogspot.com/2013/07/what-fuck-is-narwhal.html
I’m also in favor of calling this movement “Paquining”, as in Anna Paquin, who is bi and proud and married to a man, i.e. “Jessica and I used to date, but ever since I met Ben I’ve been hardcore Paquining with him”.
i love the idea of the narwhal so much! it’s so super delightful. definitely gonna use this in conversations.
Paq-winning…
Your narwhal analogy is srsly the best thing I’ve read about all day. Many many hearts to you. I am adopting this stance here on out.
Narwhals are a perfect analogy! Thank you!!
I also LOVE the term “Paquining”!
NARWHALS YESSSSS. So perfect. I can’t tell you how happy this makes me.
NARWHALS!!! I love it!!! Thank you thank you! :)
Or Howard-ing. Brenda Howard was the bi woman who planned the first Pride Parade, and she was a bi woman married to a man. She was also a Stonewall veteran, and did a whole slew of bi-centered liberation movements back in the 1970s.
Finding this made my day. I’m 25 and only realized I’m bi about a year and a half ago. I had never dated anyone seriously – only a handful of first dates with men when I still believed myself straight. My family (and I) just believed I was a late bloomer, that I prioritized things like school and my career over dating. I guess that was true to an extent, but I’d thought about the possibility that I wasn’t straight before and ultimately decided it wasn’t relevant unless I was dating a woman, and I don’t think I thought that would ever happen.
In hindsight, I really just didn’t want to open the can of worms that is my sexual orientation by dating anyone, ever. I just avoided it. It felt safer just being an ally for all my gay/lesbian/queer friends. But only being involved in the LGBT community in that way, and by only very occasionally going on a date with a man, felt really disingenuous and forced – not because I wasn’t attracted to men, but because I knew I was denying something else.
Bi erasure and biphobia are absolutely to blame, and I’ve become more vocal about it since I started coming out about 6 months ago. I’m actually dating a woman at the moment, but I’m not out to my family because I don’t really know how to approach the subject after being very loudly certain and even defensive about the fact that I thought I was straight for so many years. I know my parents won’t care (and I know how lucky I am for that), but the thing that’s holding me back the most is the fact that I’ve never dated anyone before. Coming out is one thing, but coming out AND announcing I’m in my first relationship, with a woman (one of my best friends, who my mother has met before!), in one fell swoop is overwhelming.
I don’t know where I was going with that, and now this is just super rambly, but I wanted to contribute because this thread is incredible. YOU’RE ALL FAB.
Overwhelmed and rambly is a completely appropriate response :) Good Luck
Ha, I swam in the “loud vocal TOTALLY STRAIGHT ally” pool for so long before coming out so I totally feel you!! Honestly I just felt kinda embarrassed – like wow, I’ve been hanging out with lgbtq folks for fifteen years and I’m only just now figuring this out?? – But hey, we can’t all be middle school queers :)
Thank you for writing this! Much of your post is so relateable it hurts. I’m still in that late bloomer, don’t dare approach romance phase. Hearing someone else talk about the fears and hesitations that go with that is very reassuring. I wish you luck and courage as you share the news about your current relationship with your family, when and how you see fit.
Thank you so much for opening this discussion. My main “issue” with being part of this category of experience is that, now that I’m dating a male-type-human again I feel that my queer identity has been completely erased and will probably remain invisible forever (assuming he becomes the life-partner I hope he will). How do others in this space honor and retain their queerness, when to society you’re pretty much just a reg’lar straight lady?
I also worry that my desire to keep some aspect of that queer identity is egotistical instead of real (although I guess the ego is real… #overthinking), and that, since I can very easily “pass” as straight I should be grateful of that privilege and just let it go.
Anyway, I’m grateful to read the words of fellow unicorns. Thank you, AS! <3
There is nothing egotistical about wanting to be sen for who you are. For me, I remain active in queer spaces, volunteer with LGBTQI organizations, and engage in activism for queer and trans rights. And I read Autostraddle and engage with the community here, where no one assumes I’m straight. :) I also spend an unholy amount of time correcting people, both those who thing I’m straight and those who think I’m a lesbian. It sucks, but it’s important to me that people know who I am, when their assumptions are wrong.
Interested to hear how other people keep it real and keep it real queer.
I have this issue as well, and though I’m still looking for answers, I don’t think it’s egotistical at all. It’s a very valid part of yourself and you wouldn’t be you without it!
Oh, sweet! I’m a bi lady who’s generally had more serious relationships with women, but now am in a really serious relationship with a man and will probably end up marrying him.
I wasn’t really prepared for how much I’d miss dating women, nor how much I’d wanted to find a woman I could build a future with and marry. I experience a lot of conflict over how to be in a relationship with someone who is, genuinely, a fantastic match for me and makes me incredibly happy, but also isn’t the gender I thought I’d end up with. I end up feeling like a traitor not just to the queer lady community, but to myself.
When I’ve reached out to friends (mostly other bi women in LTRs with men) about it, the responses have been rather lackluster. There’s a lot of suggestions to have threesomes, even though I’m not into threesomes, and they are in no way a substitute for having a relationship with a woman. Or people will go, “well, you’re queer, so any relationship you’re in is a queer relationship”, which just so totally misses the point about how my entire issue is that I’m not in a queer/same-sex relationship.
When I try to get a bunch of us together to go to the dyke bar or an lgbt event, there’s a lot of “only if I can bring my boyfriend/husband”, even though it isn’t always appropriate to bring cishet men. I’ll try to talk about my favorite lesbians on TV right now, and they’ll switch the conversation to their favorite gay male couples on TV. So it feels like there isn’t a whole lot of support for all things lezzie.
wow, i’m so glad you said this! i relate to a lot of this but always felt like i was the only one. i’ve had lots of people, including partners, either suggest open relationships or assume that i’m in one – because the assumption is usually that what i’ll miss is sex/casual dating with women. but it’s not! i feel like you; what i miss/feel sometimes like i’m missing out on is having a girlfriend, not just hooking up. (of course i realize that there are lots of open/poly relationships where that would be totally feasible, but i don’t think being poly in that regard is for me!)
thank you for articulating this; i’m sorry i don’t have more to tell you, but i feel much less alone!
I’ve been struggling with the same thing. I’m in a relationship with a man I love, and who treats me better than anyone has in a long time. But I always imagined I’d end up with a woman, and my visions in my mind of my future included a girlfriend. I’m not sure if I can get over it. I just don’t know.
I feel you about the “only if I can bring my boyfriend/husband” thing. There are times and places were it is totally appropriate and totally fine and yes, bring them. But sometimes there need to be queer-normative spaces and if your boyfriend/husband is queer, great, but if he’s not, maybe he should sit this one out. It’s hard to have that convo, though. And I also sometimes feel like my other IRL bi friends with male partners aren’t as up on queer girl pop culture as me or don’t identify as closely with having an intentionally queer lifestyle. I feel like a jerk even writing that, though, because they are probably feeling bi erasure and maybe even internalized biphobia that’s keeping them from being more out. It’s complicated!
As a bisexual activist and producer of a bisexual community podcast I want to thank Rachel and Autostraddle for providing this safe space. All to often the comment threads are a land mine of abuse for bisexual people. Thank you.
thank YOU Lynnette for your work and for being here in this space! we’re very grateful for you!
Thank you for everything you do, Lynnette!
Just subscribed to your podcast. Thank you!
Hi. I’m 18 and have had a boyfriend for about a year. I have never dated a woman, and I’m still young, so I constantly get the “You’re young! You don’t know what you want!” and it is exhausting. I constantly feel invalidated and I don’t know what to do; it gets to the point where I even feel like I’m faking it. Any advice?
As much as it sucks, i would just ignore it. Other people don’t need to validate your sexuality because it’s just that, entirely yours! A good solace for me when I was your age was LGBTQ books and the internet. Hopefully you can find at least one friend who can understand you, and that will help out a lot.
Ignore people who want to define your sexuality for you. Remember that those people are telling you “you’re young, therefore I know what you want better than you do”. Which objectively they don’t.
I also highly recommend rejecting the idea that “not knowing what you want” is a bad thing. Maybe your sexuality will change in the future, maybe you’ll identify differently down the road. None of that makes your current experiences invalid!
You’re not alone and save this thread as a reminder about how many of us are in the exact same boat! Erasure is truly horrible, especially when it leads to your own internalized bi-phobia. You are worthy of love and worthy of self-love and self-determination! We see you. Take a moment today to sit and smile at how awesome we all fucking are. Then eat some ice cream or something!
Thank you for having this thread! Thank you for all your comments!! This is exactly what I needed to read right now. I have too many feels to really chime in but I wanted to to say I see you, I appreciate you, I love all your beautiful handsome faces!
Also, I think it’s great that this is on AS instead of fb or something because here it can live on and be revisited in the archives and who knows what lovely person will stumble on it when they need it two years from now!?
RIGHT ON.
Like me! I’ve been lurking through this entire thread (actually just lurking AS in general) soaking up the advice and exalting in rare validation of my bi identity, which I still keep pretty private. Just the other day, my gay male roommate interrupted my saying that my parents don’t know I’m bi with, “Well, but you’re not really bisexual, because you’ve never been with a woman. You’re still a Kinsey zero.” I agreed with him at the time, but later that night I started seething about it because why should I have to prove myself and my sexuality to him or anyone (including myself, when I can feel it in my bones so much of the time)?!?
Anyway, probably no one will see this because it’s been a year, but your comment about someone seeing it two years later is what finally sparked me to add my voice. Thank you! And THANK YOU THANK YOU, THANK YOU, AUTOSTRADDLE, for this thread I have been so badly needing for years now. Seriously, my words will not suffice. It’s definitely still helping people by being archived. <3
Stefanie, me too! I just found AS a few days ago. Then I found this thread and stayed up into the wee hours reading it because THIS IS THE MOST VALIDATING THING I HAVE EVER READ ON THE INTERNET. It is just beautiful and wonderful and makes me feel not-alone and also grateful to have a cis het male partner who doesn’t fetishize it and also maybe now I will work up the nerve to call out the biphobic things one of my lesbian colleagues says. And also maybe come out to more of my friends? I tend to just let people assume because it is easier, and it feels like cheating but also it hurts because it feels like I’m suppressing/hiding an important part of myself. Sorry for the rambling, I’m just excited!
Here I am, lurking 2 years later! I’m a bi girl, and I just discovered I was bi a few months ago, so I’m very very glad this thread is still here :D
So happy to see people continuing to “lurk” on this thread. It’s been really important to me too. I just thought I’d share an update in case it’s encouraging to someone (Note: you can see my original post from June 2, 2016 in response to Grumpy).
Since posting last June, I’ve come out to my close friends. They’ve all been incredibly supportive and just wanted to know that my partner was being supportive too (he is 100%). When I told my best friend Katie that I had something hard to tell her, and then came out to her, she let out this huge sigh and said, “Oh, is that all! I thought you were gonna tell me you had cancer or something!” We both shared a good laugh and a hug.
As for family, I’ve come out to a brother and a sister – the ones I knew would be safe. They were also very supportive. My sister said she’d suspected it for a while. I likely won’t come out to my parents for a long time. They are very conservative, and I have younger siblings at home, and don’t want to risk being cut out of their lives – especially because I suspect one of them is queer in some way. As hard as this is, I’ve come to terms with it. A friend told me he prefers the metaphor of “letting people in” to “coming out” and I couldn’t agree more. Let in the people who will be safe and love you for who you are. You don’t have to let in those that will hurt you.
Over the past 6 months, I’ve really settled into myself. Being bi has become something I love about myself, and not something that scares me anymore. I’ve found amazing queer dance parties, gone to queer support groups and book clubs, found some very sexy queer play parties, and made some amazing new queer friends. It’s completely changed my life. I wish the process had been faster and easier, but I just want to encourage anyone who’s new to this to keep pushing, growing, opening, and looking for community. You will grow into your sexy, confident, happy self in good time.
In the meantime, if you need help or support, reach out to us. We’re all here lurking with you.
Love you sexy gals! xoxo
(Pro Tip: The Feeld app is an amazing place for bi women in relationships with men to find other bi women in relationships with men. And I can assure you, they make amazing friends/lovers. ;)
Thanks so much for this space, Autostraddle. It really feels amazing to be recognized. I read here all the time and this is the first comment I’ve ever made.
It can be hard to be seen as bisexual with a man partner, especially since I’m cis and generally have straight-passing privilege. It feels important to be seen and heard and counted, but sometimes it feels like you’re always announcing your sexuality at every turn. So again, thank you for this space!
Happy first comment! What a thread this has been! Passing privilege is just that. It can be revoked at any time, you know? Glad you joined in the comments!
OWWW I have too much I must get done this afternoon and can’t participate in this thread as much as I want to! But please pardon this quick link to the Autostraddle & A-Camp Bisexuals group on Facebook. Please join us, all you all! https://www.facebook.com/groups/609576579159933/
Done! Thanks for the link.
THIS THREAD. Autostraddle, you are the best. [praise hands emoji]
Queer lady, dating cis dude, who actually encouraged me to explore the gayer bits of myself. For a long time, I struggled with fears that people would ostracize me for being bi / having a boyfriend / the usual bollocks.
My roundabout solution for this (in addition to attending A-Camp 2014 and marinating in super-gay funtimes for a week) ended up being to start throwing queer events around my hometown. In addition to building a community and gaining a ton of event-running experience, if anyone ever gives me hell for liking dudes, now I can just say “Sorry, I can’t hear you over the QUEER CRAFT FAIR I THREW AT PRIDE”.
this is awesome.
Yes!! Defining and expressiong bisexuality and queerness in ways that have nothing to do with a partner is so so vital. I’ve been essentially single for two years and it has given me so much space to identify my queerness on my own terms. I want to go to your queer craft fair!!
This made me smile so hard!
I used to consider myself bi until I fell in love with a non binary person and discovered the term pan. I see a lot of people saying they’re both bi and pan but doesn’t pan include bi?
Many bi folks define bisexuality as attraction to two or more genders or similar and different genders to their own, so it doesn’t preclude attraction to non binary people and there can be a lot of overlap between bi and pan, so some people (like me) identify as both.
I’ve always identified as bi, but by definition am probably pan. Same with most of my friends.
It can. And pan can also include bi. Like a previous comment said, “bi” is generally defined as “attraction to people of genders similar to and different from one’s own” and/or “attraction to people of more than one gender,” so there is a lot of overlap between bi and pan. It’s not a bright line distinction; as with many aspects of identity, how one individually chooses to identify is really personal and will include a lot of history and context and individual resonance beyond just sorting people out by the genders of the other people to whom they’re attracted.
Bless this thread. I’ve read through some of these comments and it’s so amazing to see that I’m not alone.
I’m 24, and I went through the majority of my life believing I was straight. I never questioned my sexuality. I knew I was very attracted to men, and because every outside influence showed me that being attracted to men made me straight, I just assumed that was that. I had a very difficult time dating; it caused me a lot of anxiety, and sex seemed like something completely foreign. It wasn’t because I didn’t want to have sex, but in hindsight I definitely think it was at least partially because I wasn’t being completely honest with myself.
In the past few months I’ve been dating women, and I’ve come out to my parents and friends. Being out has opened me up as a person so much more than I ever thought was possible. In spite of that, I still worry about people’s perceptions and assumptions about me because there is so much biphobia/bi erasure coming from all sides. I’ve recognized my attraction to women since I was a teenager, but I genuinely thought that I was just a straight girl that liked boobs. If I had seen more people like me in any facet of my life, perhaps I would have figured out that my attraction to women was a “real” thing sooner.
I often don’t feel queer enough for queer spaces, but I’m definitely not straight. I don’t fit in anywhere, and that’s hard. Now that I’m out, I so desperately want to be a part of creating safe spaces for people like me to express themselves, and to know that they are not alone. Thank you so much for this thread, and I can’t wait to read the rest of it.
Congrats on coming out! That is huge!
I also used to think I was a mostly straight girl who liked boobs when I was in high school. Even after I came out to myself, I said things like, “I could sleep with a girl, but I could never date one.” Oh, the things we tell ourselves to deal with our internalized biphobia. I also once said I would never be attracted to femme women. I am generally most attracted to people with a masculine gender expression, but now I’m also into femme women because I stopped putting that limit on myself. Oh the things we do to deal with internalized femmephobia.
LOL. I understand about finding it hard to find your place in queer spaces. You definitely below there, though, regardless of who you’re dating!
this thread is EVERYTHING today.
here’s my story: i’m a very fluid queer lady married to a man, whom i love completely. i am also deeply, totally, madly in love with my girlfriend. i wouldn’t say my queer identity necessitates polyamory, but it has certainly my life feel more fulfilled and wonderful, and gives me spaces in which to express myself honestly and openly, to both my partners and to the rest of the world.
the hardest part about being queer and poly is that when i come out to people, i am literally coming out twice – first as not being straight, and then as not being monogamous, which people are FAR less accepting of. and the license people think they have to ask extremely rude and invasive questions about how my relationships “work” is draining. but i would do anything for the people i love, and i try to be as open and out as possible about both my sexual and relationship orientations. it’s important, because my partners mean everything to me.
coming to terms with my queerness was complicated, and i feel like my understanding of my sexuality is always evolving. i realized i was into women in college, but being a terrified virgin and recent ex-christian meant i wasn’t ready for anything with anyone. i was still interested in men, though, so i figured my feelings were a phase and i would eventually snap out of it. instead, i felt growing within me that this part of my life was essential to who i am as a person, and the more i ignored it, the more miserable i became. so i started dating women, too, and i began to feel – finally – like my best true self.
i’m at a place where i am loving and accepting of the very fluid and flexible nature of my queerness, and i often find my attractions to genders/gender presentations/non-gender binary people drifting all the time. being perceived as straight is hurtful and feels dishonest, but what is just as hurtful is when my queer friends call me a lesbian, which essentially takes one of the most important relationships in my life and rounds it down to zero. it’s hard to be in the middle of the spectrum, or anywhere along it that isn’t an end-member. there’s no one way to define us, and that makes people uncomfortable. but it’s important to be out about who we are, to keep an open dialogue, and to connect with one another so we feel less alienated.
the truth is this, though: the fact that i can love and sex up and be loved and be sexed up by literally anyone on this planet makes me feel like a superhero with a magic heart. it’s easy to get down about being excluded or misunderstood, but with time and the love of my partners, i’ve learned to embrace and cherish that which makes me so open to love in so many forms.
Oh my gosh Lucy, thank you so much for sharing! I realized (said out loud to myself) I was bi while I was attending a super Christian college. It’s part of what made realize I didn’t want to be a Christian anymore.
adriel, i feel you!! unpacking queerness as a little baby recently ex-christian was so hard, and it’s really taken a long time to work through that baggage and guilt. i went to a conservative christian high school and a catholic university, and when i realized i wasn’t straight (at 21), it felt like it came out of nowhere, and i had no one to talk to about it. and the hardest part wasn’t even realizing that i might be queer – it was that i could go so long through my life and not know who i was.
but look at us, we made it!!
ahhh I hear you so much on having to come out twice ! I hardly even talk about my non-monogamous relationships because I don’t even want to deal with all of the questions/judgments/people thinking that it is not possible to be in a committed open relationship/etc etc etc. So it’s nice to see that others are having similar struggles!!
(but I also totally feel like an awesome superhero as well)
Thank you so much for sharing your story with us, it gives me a lot of hope!!
I also get tired of people assuming they can start asking me questions about ‘how it works’. I try to educate as much as possible but it is tiring and not my job. I find it so interesting/frustrating that as soon as people find out I’m poly they are automatically allowed to know everything about my sex life.
“the truth is this, though: the fact that i can love and sex up and be loved and be sexed up by literally anyone on this planet makes me feel like a superhero with a magic heart.”
I have so much love and respect and feels about you saying this. I will try to feel this way every g.d. day if I can. Thank you!
I’m super new to polyamory and currently have two male partners (will come back to that in a minute) and I NEVER thought I’d take to it like I have. Every part of it has been glorious: the expanded honesty, the sheer amount of communication taking place, the openness in feelings and truth. Absolute +1 to feeling like a superhero. It’s so incredibly empowering to realize I’m capable of so much love, and supportive of my partners’ love, too—in whatever form that takes.
Having two cis-male partners (and currently no female/other partner) is odd. It’s not that I need to add a more feminine-ish person to my life to feel “complete”, but there is a part of me that is missing some sort of… energy? just as much as when I was single. And there’s also this idea that I’m betraying my bisexuality by only having male partners currently. And I’m sure that also stems from internalized biphobia and the need to “prove” to others that I really am bisexual. argh.
>>Cue rant about online dating and trying to meet women in this situation.
This is such a great thread! I’ve been open about being bisexual since I was 17. Now at 22 I’m in my first serious relationship (with a man). He’s a feminist and recognizes that I’m bisexual and works hard to make me feel validated. Unfortunately the LBTQA community hasn’t been as supportive. At gay bars I’ve been told “bi’s just need to make up their mind.” And since I present myself very feminine it’s been assumed I’m straight and get ignored by the staff. My friends who present more butch are greeted and get service right away while I get ignored. And in the straight community my sexuality is completely ignored. It honestly sucks because I don’t feel fully comfortable in either community. My friends are all very supportive but I wish there more spaces for bisexuals to gather.
Do you ever get hit on by straight guys at the gay bar? I feel like that used to be my life (when I was cool enough to go out a lot). And it’s not that I wouldn’t potentially be interested in a guy. It’s more like. THIS IS A GAY BAR. WHY WOULD YOU ASSUME I WAS HERE FOR YOU? GO TO ONE OF YOUR MANY NOT-GAY BARS IF YOU WANT TO GET LAID.
Anyway, it sucks to feel like your sexuality is invisible or not real. The only thing that has worked for me is NOTGIVINGAFUCK. It helps.
Oh my god KaeLyn, yes!! The place I’ve been hit on (by men) the most was a gay bar in Seattle. Usually I’m very polite about turning people down but I just started giving them a very confused look and saying ‘this is a GAY bar, I am not here for you’
I’m super glad this conversation exists. My best friend and I are both bi women who are married to men. We both had our first serious relationships with women (never each other) in high school and then throughout our 20s.
I was in a longterm relationship with a man, left him, and began dating a woman as more of a casual thing. I was offended by a lot of my friends’ responses. Unlike the community I’d grown up in, my smaller-town adult community was really rigid and wanted to pigeonhole me so badly. People said things like “no wonder you left Long Term Man, you were a lesbian! It all makes sense now!” One female acquaintance even made up stories about me trying to seduce her.
When I ended it with the lady and met the man who is now my husband, a few of these pigeonhole people tried to talk me out of it. They were so sure that they’d seen my identity flourish when they saw me as a lesbian. They didn’t understand I have always been monogamous but I have always been bisexual.
My husband and I moved to a new town and no one knows I am bisexual. My old friend and I are having a similar experience now: we are married and live in liberal, progressive places. Being bisexual, and the relationships we had when we were younger are now for all appearances erased from our visible past because we are married to men.
I did this amazing NYT 36 questions thing this winter with my husband. It’s a little game where you discuss 36 questions that supposedly really cement a loving relationship. It was really fruitful for us. One question was about a regret. I said if I died tomorrow, I’d feel really sad that the close friends I have in this community do not know I am bisexual. I feel like they would feel sad knowing I had kept this from them, and they would think I feared their judgment or disapproval. Some of them have kids, and many of them are pretty traditional. It’s a small town. I have no idea how to integrate bisexuality into my life now. I am an open LGBTQ ally. I am close friends with a lesbian couple–even THEY do not know. It feels like I have a secret all the time, but in my community, it almost feels like a secret tattoo or a secret past of painkiller abuse. *I* don’t feel it’s negative, but I worry it would be perceived as taboo.
I have no qualms about my husband or our relationship. I know he would be supportive of anything I felt about any of this, or anything I wanted or needed to do. I don’t have any need for a new relationship, or any kind of sexual identity exploration. I’m 31 and know who I am. So why am I so burdened by the sense of a secret history?
It sounds like you feel like you aren’t being honest with yourself and that is bringing on feelings of shame. Which you probably feel weird about even feeling because you’re not ashamed of who you are! But you’re ashamed that you’re not living authentically. Does that make sense? Staying in the closet to your friends in your town makes total sense. I get why you’d do it. What’s the point if you’re married and monogamous? On the other hand, it feels like an omission of truth, like a lie. And that must feel awful. I understand why some people aren’t out to everyone. Personally, I feel really strongly that I have to be or else I’m not being honest and I’m adding to bi erasure and I will feel guilty about hiding a significant piece of who I am.
On the other hand, I’m past the stage of needing to be super super declarative about being out. I don’t need to wear rainbow necklaces. I don’t not wear them…it’s just that they are usually not that cute and I like fashion jewelry better. It’s OK if not everyone knows because you can’t really tell by looking at me. But if someone asks or assumes something about me, I will tell them I’m queer/bi.
It sounds like maybe a little white lie has grown into something bigger and maybe it’s time for you to address it. Remember that you don’t owe anyone anything along the way. Do it because you want to and in the way you want to. It doesn’t have to be an elaborate production. Maybe start with a few close friends and see how it goes, and how it feels. Good luck!
I identified as a lesbian for a long time (nearly a decade), and then I fell for a man. Nothing ever ended up happening with him, but he changed me. I haven’t been attracted to any other man, so it’s hard for me to find a label (not that I need one). I don’t really feel bisexual- I’ve been using the term homoflexible. It’s so confusing. I don’t know… feelings.
I *love* homoflexible!
Hi! I am here!
I’m very happy in my relationship, but I’ve struggled for a long time with feeling erased when I’m “passing” for straight or rejected from queer spaces. It can make me lonely and afraid. I know there are people like me out there, but for some reasons it seems like we never get to talk about it.
Seeing this here lifted me so far up. Thank you so much, Autostraddle.
I know exactly how you feel! Glad to see you here <3
I’ve learned that the more outspoken I’ve been about being bi, the more people have surprised me by secretly informing me that they’re bi too, but have never felt they could say it! Especially bi boys / male-identified peeps and bi ladies in relationships with boys. It’s been beautiful.
Ok, here’s my story.
I came out as bi at 14. It was a little early, I think. Queer guys seemed relatively well accepted at my high school, but no other girls were out at the time and I experienced a lot of harassment and fetishization from classmates. Dated a girl who didn’t treat me very well. Dated another girl who treated me worse–as very young queers, we were prone to internalized homophobia, and there was this insistence that I act like a filthy secret even though all we did was kiss and hold hands behind doors.
Then I dated a guy who didn’t treat me super good or super bad, but there were comfortable gender roles to fall into (not actually remotely comfortable for either of us) and I was suddenly not getting picked on all the time, so to me it was like “wow this is the real deal huh.”
That didn’t end so well. The next guy I dated, in college, it didn’t go so great either, and in that relationship I realized that I’d been repressing my queer identity really hard for years due to my experiences as a young teen. I brought it up at a Queer-Straight Alliance meeting, where the club leader told me that I was just afraid to own up to my attraction to men, because of society. (???) I never went back.
Smaller affairs with men and women happened. Some of it was okay, some of it really wasn’t.
Now I’m 2 years into a relationship with a cis man who treats me like I’m made of magic and rainbows. It is the only truly good relationship I’ve ever had. Obviously, we don’t experience any harassment for being together. When I went to the hospital he was ushered to my bedside immediately, no questions asked, even though we aren’t at all married. That’s privilege, and I understand that. It reinforced for me how important it is that every couple have the right to be together in the darkest times. But erasure doesn’t always manifest as privilege like that.
My fear that dating a cis man will always erase my identity is the only thing I can see driving me and my partner apart. And that scares me.
I FEEL THIS SO HARD. Sending love.
So happy for the existence of this thread! I came out as a lesbian and have only recently started reconciling my attraction to men with my sexual and gender identity. I also felt kind of like a “traitor” and experienced weird/uncomfortable reactions from friends when I started dating/hooking up with guys again. Not currently seeing any guys but want to show support for/solidarity with this thread! Xoxo
<3 <3 <3 Brave of you to explore this side of you.
Wow this thread is awesome!! Thank you for being so inclusive, Autostraddle :-)
When people ask my orientation I say bisexual although tbh I’m still not sure if that’s the right fit for me. I think that one of the reasons that it took me until I actually fell for a girl in college to realize I was actually truly queer was because my romantic fantasies always starred a male. I say romantic fantasies because these aren’t sexual at all. My “general” romantic fantasies (imagining my life 10 years from now, imagining having a spouse/ child, etc.) without a person I know tend to feature a male as my partner even now, well after I realized that I’m attracted to males and females romantically and sexually. But I can imagine “specific” romantic fantasies just as vividly with my girlfriend. Maybe that’s ingrained heteronormativity. Although I have worried I’m not queer enough or something.
Another part of realizing I was attracted to girls was realizing that behavior I would’ve recognized as flirting with boys (physical contact, eye contact, always making a point to hang out with someone, sexual tension) I was also partaking in with this one girl who later became my girlfriend. Again, maybe that’s the engrained heteronormativity? Or perhaps I’m just somewhat oblivious? Like I’m still very drawn towards certain females in a way I’m also drawn to certain males and although it’s because I’m attracted to them and their personality I don’t always recognize it as such. I’ve also been drawn towards/ fascinated by queer content on the web before I realized I was queer, such as Heather Hogan’s amazing recaps.
YES. I relate to a lot of this. I was also drawn to queer things, people, books, issues, etc before I came out and started grappling with my sexuality.
I think you’re on to something re: “ingrained heteronormativity.” I don’t think there is any social script for queerlings and for bi people, that means we sometimes default to the heteronormative version. It can be a lot to let yourself recognize desire and attraction to women. It took me a while to get there, too, and giving it equal footing to how I interact with men. These days, I’m more attracted to women than men and am much more likely to flirt with women, even though I’m with a man and have mostly dated men.
You guyzzz this thread has blown the eff up I love it
Thanks for this thread!
I starting coming out to most of my friends a couple years ago. I’ve had no issues with them. I’m 22, but I still haven’t told my parents. I rationalized it by saying, “Well, I’ll just tell them when I’m in a relationship with a woman (or a non-binary person)! Until then, it isn’t necessary.” As a result, though, I avoided having romantic or sexual encounters with women aside from just kissing or flirting, because I worried it might turn into something more and I was afraid. I’ve had feelings for women, but I’ve never asked a woman out on a date.
My mom has always been of the mind that you can be straight or gay, but there’s no in-between. This has made it extremely difficult to even consider telling her the truth. Last year, my ex boyfriend dumped me and I was devastated. Since there was a possibility of me wanting to explore dating women or non-binary folks, I thought about coming out to my family at that time. However, I backed out of the decision when my mother speculated that my friend (a woman my age) was dating a woman to get over her ex boyfriend. I realized if I told my mom at that point, she’d assume the same about me.
Right now, I’m in a fulfilling and loving relationship with a man who I hope to be with long-term. However, I can’t help but feel I’ve missed out on fully experiencing my love for women because I was afraid. I found out a woman I had feelings for would have dated me if I had expressed my feelings at the time, but didn’t discover this until it was too late. Maybe we could have been together if I wasn’t so scared of what my mother and extended family would think. I’ve only ever dated men, but I am still attracted other people too. I’m feminine and people call me “straight passing,” which I know is true, but it hurts.
Even though I’m dating a man, I still want to come out to my parents. I want them to know who I am. Does anyone have advice on how to do this?
i did this! (i think linking to yourself is objectively really obnoxious but i feel like this is valid so please forgive me: i wrote about it a little bit here). i always intended to tell my parents when i was in a serious relationship with a girlfriend (if i ever was), and then the girlfriend i was preparing to do that with broke my heart so i just… told them anyway. i’m still not totally sure they understand like, the nuances of in-between sexuality, but it does open things up a bit and i don’t have to slip into vague, genderless pronouns when i’m telling stories.
it isn’t perfect, but it does feel more honest.
Not obnoxious at all — this is helpful. Thanks!
I found myself in a somewhat similar situation. Even though I had known about my own attraction to women for years, and had even discussed it with my past male partners and a couple close friends – I had decided it would be easier to tell other people by just introducing a girlfriend one day. I ended up falling head over heels for a friend who (so far) has not turned into a romantic/sexual partner. But, I found myself thinking about her constantly, wanting to always bring her up in conversations with my family, wanting to explain various things about my own life and feelings in relation to her — so at a certain point I just explained to my family and friends how I felt, and also that my attraction to women wasn’t exclusive to her. It did feel a bit awkward explaining – “I’m really into a woman and I want you to know about it, but, no, we’re not actually dating.” But, even though this relationship has still not materialized – (did that Tig Notaro documentary make anyone else build up even more hope about their straight-identifying-thus-far-friend or was it just me?!!) – I have felt so much freer in my communication with my family. And I like that they have had time to adjust their own thinking – and to be able to imagine me happy with someone other than a man — now referring to future potential partners in non-gender-specific ways.
Even though this coming out was not exactly as I would have planned it – it was perfect for me and my journey. Much love to you as you figure out your own path.
Are your parents accepting of gay rights or are they also homophobic?
BiNet USA has some good resources for coming out as bisexual. I would look into those.
With that said, I did it blindly. I told my mom, who is very pro-L/G rights, and I thought she’d just accept it no questions asked. Instead she was basically like “no, you’re either gay or straight, you can’t be both.” I was used to her being the authority so I kind of internalized that and tried to “decide” for a while.
It has been ten years since then, and now she accepts it. I figured she’d come around eventually. It was gradual.
I guess regardless of what you do, be prepared for difficult questions and statements, and try to be patient about them and address them. If there’s a Bi FAQ somewhere it might help to print that out and use it to address any of the questions encountered, haha
I told myself for the longest time that I would tell my conservative, religious parents i was bi when/if I was in a serious relationship with a woman because I wouldn’t want to hide that. But I think it definitely made me way more tentative with dating women, put way more pressure on it, and held me up from pursuing relationships. I actually came out to them while I was single, and came at it with the framework that I loved them and so wanted to be able to share with them who I fully am. It was the most freeing coming out experience I’ve had. I didn’t even realize just how much I was holding myself back until after. It was less their reaction and more that I did it that made it great.
I comment only super rarely, but this is worth coming out of the woodwork for. <3 I just want to say I'm so glad this thread exists and it's really great reading about everyone's experiences.
<3 Agreed
oh my god thank you so much for this space! It’s been a struggle for me to fit into community, this is very helpful!
I’m a bi woman in a monogamous marriage of almost 8 years. My husband has known about my bisexuality and has been my biggest support and ally since I told him. He’s my best friend and I can’t imagine doing life without him; we’re compatible in every area. In the last year or so we’ve talked more about what it looks like to embrace me being bi and weighing the pros and cons of being poly. I wouldn’t want to do anything without him, and we have no interest in something that’s just sex with someone or a couple that we only know casually. I/we feel drawn to another couple that we’re close friends with, and while we spend a lot of time with them and flirt and joke openly about being bi (both of them also identify on the bi spectrum), I don’t know if it would ever go further. We’re in a season of navigating the tension of fantasies vs what’s actually best for us as a couple.
To complicate matters, I was raised in a very conservative, purity culture Christian way. While I’m still practicing my faith, it looks very different from my upbringing, but I still have those hangups and guilt to work through with reconciling my sexuality and faith.
You’re so blessed to be in love with somebody who is so compatible with your desires. I would be really interested to know how this pans out for you. I feel like it would make a great memoir.
This is similar to my situation. My partner (male) has always been so supportive of my sexuality and identity. We discovered polyamory a few years ago and the experience has been amazing. If you haven’t already, check out https://www.morethantwo.com/
One thing that really bugs me (out of soooo many) are the spins straight, gay, and lesbian people put on my relationship history. Deciding for themselves what each relationship meant to me, based on the gender of the person I was with.
Something that’s come up a lot for me lately: admission criteria for bi women calling themselves queer, especially if/when we’re not dating women. No one would apply these same standards for L/G people to call themselves queer (internalized homophobia can’t be an issue for you, you must be aggressively out in all situations regardless of the repercussions, you can’t only do the fun stuff like Pride, if people assume you’re straight it’s your own fault…)
“admission criteria” is such a good way of putting it, and such a terrible practice!
personally I’ve been trying to be outspoken about accepting all people, asking for stories, and gently informing the occasional people who *are* invading gay spaces why that’s a terrible thing to do. we can make our spaces better and more inclusive for each other just by being present and gorgeous and smart, it’s so great!
I hope we can! I remember once when I was at a gathering of queer women, it was getting later and 4 of us remained talking. I mentioned being bi, turned out 3 of the 4 of us were bi! I had no idea because they had only talked about women before that. But even after that, they kept only talking about women, and I wonder if it was out of habit, not feeling welcome to talk about men in queer women’s spaces. I know at least one of the other two had dated men. I sure do talk about them though, hoping other people will too :)
I have found some spaces in which relationships are valued equally regardless of gender. Some are explicitly queer spaces, and some are just my social circle. Those are the only spaces I would really call “queer-normative,” and I value them highly.
How often do you guys come out to people? In what contexts? I’ve been feeling like I need to come out more in order to do my part to combat biphobia. Also since I’m dating a man I don’t like people assuming I’m straight. Usually whenever an LGBT person brings up their identification or dating life I’ll mention it, and I’ve made an effort to tell my friends and close family members. I don’t like being invisibly bi, but I also don’t want to bring it up willy-nilly. Thoughts?
That sounds like absolutely the right way to do it! I’ve been trying to come out more, mostly by not obscuring the genders of my exes when they come up, or mentioning it in context when people talk about dating. But also, a lot of it has been about when / if I feel safe doing it. Listen to your heart, don’t silence it, but don’t feel bad if you don’t think it’s the right thing to do in some contexts!
I did it by dumping my boyfriend for a summer and immediately bringing a girl home to my mothers house for like two months straight. Wouldn’t recommend it.
Thanks for bringing this up Erika! I feel a bit guilty about not being more out in re: doing my part to combat biphobia, etc., but I also really don’t think my sexual orientation is anyone’s business, I don’t owe it to anyone except my partner to explain myself, and I’d rather my sexual attractions not play any role in most of my interactions. That said, people already make assumptions about my orientation and take it into account in how they perceive and treat me, and me not talking about it doesn’t change that, it only makes me lose the opportunity to influence how they see/treat me. It’s all very frustrating.
Yeah, it is frustrating! It does feel like I shouldn’t have to tell people about my sexuality because it’s my private business, and I think that sometimes they’d wonder why I was telling them. But then I think that gay people are always under pressure to come out and they shouldn’t have to be going through that alone, and the world would be a better place if people realized just how many bi people they know. So yeah, I don’t really know the answer but I’m glad I’m not alone in that!
Wow. Thanks for this thread; please do make it a regular space! I finally feel like I really have a right to be here (and will next go join A+). If there’s anything I can do to help with this, don’t hesitate to ask. (I’m a full-time freelance editor & copywriter.)
I came out as bi over 20 years ago, feeling like a perfect split down the middle. “It’s about people, not parts,” right? As I get older, though, my Kinsey score keeps going up–only, I’m married to a man whom I’ve been with for the last five years, and we have four children between us (one of whom is my out bi teen daughter). I tell my husband not to worry, that, no matter how queer I get, he’s still “grandfathered in.”
As several others have mentioned I, too, feel like I miss out a lot on queer culture, and I tend to go to queer functions without him, or find myself inadvertently keeping something of a distance from him (which, understandably, hurts his feelings). So, it can be an awkward limbo in which we live, for sure.
Again, thanks for this chance to be seen. It means A LOT.
Thanks for sharing this comment!
Just so you know, anyone can submit work to Autostraddle. Go up to that star in the right corner over there and scroll down to submissions. Your life sure sounds full of interesting stories!
Thank you. This has made my month. Perhaps my year. I feel loved and validated and present.
we see you
but less creepy than this (maybe)
Stef. You’re KILLING it.
I’ve been with my now-husband since I was 16, which made my figuring out that I was bi slightly more traumatic and slower that it might otherwise have been.
Combined with bi-erasure, which lead me to think that of course all straight girls do the following: have crushes on girls, consider the attractive qualities of their female friends, want to run away with Eva Green, have conversations in a Taco Time with their boyfriend about how either one could run away with Eva Green on the condition they brought the other one along, want to make out with Tank Girl at a Halloween concert, etc etc etc.
The funny thing is that he knew I was bi before I did. The Tank Girl incident clued him in, which happened my freshman or sophomore year of college, but it took me about 5 more years to figure it out.
I’m fairly comfortable with my identity now, but I always feel a little out of place in queer spaces now that I’m trying to enter them. I go to a queer church (Metropolitan Community Church!) which is amazing since it’s fulfilling two of needs, and I joined the local BiNet Facebook group (which is what alerted me to this thread) and went to their picnic yesterday which was also great.
I came out to my dad recently and he was cool with it. But his sister who is married to a woman (she was married to a man before, so idk how exactly she IDs) and him are my only relatives that I know know. I did come out on Facebook back on Bi Visibility Day but I don’t know how much has filtered back to my relatives.
The funny thing is that I just got a teal undercut (MY MERMAID MOHAWK) and I’m more concerned, at 27, how my stodgy mom and grandparents are going to react to that than me being bi.
Wow, what a story! Your bravery is inspiring. Go you and go your amazing mermaid mohawk, that sounds awesome!!
Thanks! My main impetus for coming out was to make it easier for the next generation of young women to do so.
It’s pretty rad! I love it. :D There are some pictures here on my Instagram.
Your hair is *awesome* @arctowardsthesun
Thanks!
This might be my favorite bi girl in a relationship with a man story I’ve ever heard. Your confidence, and the journey it took you to get there hit me right in the feels. Also, I’m politely requesting a pic of that teal undercut.
Also, also. Tank Girl ;)
TANK GIRL!!!!
OMG this comment made my day <3333
I posted a link to my Instagram above which has a bunch of photos. :D
Can I just say that I am so glad Autostraddle exists? It’s like the only queer spuss I’ve found that really doesn’t tolerate biphobia. It feels like home. This site really helps me feel like I still have a queer identkitty even though I’m dating a guy. Though he is a bit of a lesbian Caleb :p I’ve actmewally mostly read the site since I started dating a man – I think it’s even more impawtant to me than it was befur. I actmewally keep meaning to write an article about that, but I don’t get furry fur because I’m scared of failure…
furlure?
Oh, the pussy puns.
+1 to the “super glad and weepy that this thread exists” crowd
I’m really lucky in that I have a supportive mini-community. Several folks I knew in college all moved to the same city (whoo Philly), all DFAB folks of various gender identities and sexual orientations. My roommate is a delightful non-binary femme who is also multisexual, and living in a bi-friendly queer space has been so crucial for me.
One strange thing I’ve run into is that in some ways I felt more comfortable in queer spaces when I was dating two men rather than just one. It was like being non-monogamous made folks be able to be like “ok well she’s doing SOMETHING non-normative, she’s cool.” Though I also definitely had gay friends who seemed a liiiittle to eager to be like “here’s E, she’s dating TWO MEN!! ISN’T THAT SOMETHING!” immediately upon introducing me to people, as if they needed to get across that I wasn’t gay as soon as possible. FEELS WEIRD, MAN.
One thing I’d love to have others weigh in on – how do y’all deal with helping your partners understand why you want to exclude them from certain events? Like, if I’m going to a party or event of some kind that I’m sure is going to be entirely queer women and non-binary people, I’m not going to be the one to bring in a straight man and make folks be on their guard. I know that even if he was the most awesome ally in the world, there even being a straight cis guy there is going to make some people anxious, which I totally get. I’m confident he would understand that if I had a conversation with him, but I just don’t quite know how to approach it, and I worry if I don’t spell it out he’s just going to think I’m ashamed of him. And I don’t doubt that internalized biphobia and shame are playing into how I feel about it! But separate from that, I think spaces free from straight cis men are still important, and I’d love pointers from anyone else who’s talked about that with their straight cis dude partners.
That is a such a hard conversation! But I think of it as the same as having a “girl’s night”—you’re allowed to selectively exclude your partner. Maybe invite him to a smaller group of closer queer friends, so he knows it’s not that you’re ashamed of him or rejecting him? If he is an ally / understanding / etc., you might be pleasantly surprised. If not, well, this is the perfect opportunity to talk it out (or walk away, if that’s what needs to happen).
Fortunately for me, my partner (male) doesn’t flinch when I say I’m going to some super queer event on my own. He gets it. He would, on his own, feel super weird and intrusive going to some of those things with me.
So it sounds like your partner is on the level, too, and all you’d need to do is have that brief conversation with him beforehand, like “Hey I’m going to this super queer thing with some friends and I’ll see you later.” If he pushes at all, just follow it up with you wanting to do the thing on your own, but that you’ll go with him to another thing soon.
I definitely struggled with this when I had a straight male partner. We were from different countries, so we kind of explained it to each other with relation to culture, like “You want to spend time with your people and I want to hang with people who speak my language.” But the phone-communication during the evening and when/if to meet up afterwards and how much to talk about what happened was always a challenge, defintiely.
While I recognize that male-female relationships are privileged over other relationships, I recognize that “straight privilege” goes far beyond that. It includes many privileges that I don’t get because I’M NOT STRAIGHT. I didn’t get them even when I thought I was straight! (Not understanding my own sexual orientation is an example right there. How many straight people grow up missing out on relationships because of internalized heterophobia, or bc of not understanding their own interest in people?)
It’s also an oversimplification to say my life is easier when I’m dating a man. Sure, I get that male-female relationship privilege, but that’s a backhanded compliment: I’m treated better because I’m doing what straight people do, and straight people are better than queer people. I’m frequently reminded that my past and (hopefully) future relationships with women are not considered important or worthy of the same community support that my relationships with men get. My actual self is constantly insulted in big and small ways, whether people know I’m bi or believe I’m straight or a lesbian.
Not to mention, there are so many unfortunate dynamics in the ways we learn to do male-female relationships. Some seem easy for me to avoid, but these things can be so subtle, and I’m sure people a generation or two younger will one day cringe at things in my relationships with men that I can’t even see. In the middle ground are the things that I’m aware of but that seem impossible to change, and things that I wonder if I’m imagining… I have found relationships with women to be easier in many ways. And also harder in many ways. I’m not saying women who only date women get off easy. I’m aware of the difficulties there. What frustrates me is that some lesbians assume man-dating is a picnic for me, even to the point that it erases the marginalization I experience as a queer woman. Meanwhile, so many straight people accept and even celebrate these problems in male-female relationships. In either case, it’s clear that’s not my space, not my home, and the things we have in common don’t connect us.
I think there is one advantage to being bisexual, which is that it is easier to pass as straight and enjoy straight privilege if you really want it. But doing so necessarily means denying who you are, or at least choosing not to disclose it.
I reject this privilege because the cost it comes at is too high for me; even when I am dating a man, I want the world to know who I actually am, which I cannot do in a heteronormative world without being actively being “out.”
But if someone chooses to assume this privilege, I do not blame them, and I think it is nice that we theoretically have that option.
I’m definitely with you on that – both on the cost of passing as straight, and on not blaming people who are closeted. All queer people face negatives for being out, and we all face unjust choices in deciding whether to be out.
People who can pass enjoy advantages over people who can’t. That said, I think there’s an important distinction between passing privilege and straight privilege. If you were straight, you could get all those privileges without denying who you are – that’s a part of straight privilege that you’d never get no matter how convincingly you passed. I agree with everything you’re saying on the topic, and I think it’s important to distinguish between “passing privilege” and “straight privilege” because of the attitude that bi people get straight privilege and therefore don’t deserve queer community support.
Thanks for these comments – the difference between passing privilege and straight privilege is good food for thought.
Hi Maura. I understand the distinction you are trying to make but even if you proudly proclaim your bi-identity (as you should!), live openly as a bi-woman everywhere you go, and wear an “I’m not straight” t-shirt to the marriage license office with your male partner, you will *still* be afforded “straight privilege” despite purposefully (and bravely) giving up your “passing privilege”. Make sense?
In other words, in that way (marriage) and more than a dozen others I could list off the top of my head, you would have a privilege that my wife and I do not / have not had in our native homes in the south and even up to having to get married in CT instead of our home in NY because it wasn’t legal (until last year). Doesn’t mean you don’t also struggle in a variety of ways as a queer / LGBT+ / non-straight person, but ‘straight privilege’ is very real and definitely something bi-women in ‘straight’ / opposite-sex relationships have access to (in general / often, not always) on a daily basis that gay / lesbian / women-women couples don’t. And nearly everyone here has acknowledged that and I’m not saying that anyone should feel bad about it as it’s outside of their control, but only that it is definitely a factor for those of us in wlw / lesbian relationships that we never *ever* get to forget or stop worrying about. It’s with us every single step of our lives so I’d guess that sometimes that’s where some of ‘tension’ can come from when this topic comes up between gay and bi women. Hopefully that won’t be the same too much longer! :) Though with all of these reductive laws popping up again, who knows? Anyway, hope that was clear, just really wanted to draw attention to “straight privilege” which many in bi-woman + male relationships absolutely get to take advantage of, and the concept you pointed out, as “passing privilege” which you / others are able to take advantage of OR choose to turn down for a variety of reasons (to combat discrimination, to maintain your identity irrespective of your partners’ gender/identity, etc.) and I think it’s a really great convo to have so thanks for bring it up! :) Nothing I’ve ever heard talked about before in this way.
Passing offers some immediate safety, but it’s really more complicated than “straight privilege.”
As a person with invisible disabilities, I’m not privileged because people make fun of “retards” in my presence because they don’t know I have a developmental disability. I’m simply not going to be beaten to death because of it. Being bisexual and passing because you’re in a relationship with a person of the opposite sex means you are still exposed to homophobia and sometimes from people who would otherwise remain silent about it around non-passing LGBT folk because they are “polite” in mixed company. Again. There’s immediate safety, but bisexual people in relationships with opposite sex people still experience homophobia. Just because someone doesn’t know they’re talking about you when they call you names and make threats doesn’t mean they aren’t making you aware that they’re intent on harming you and that you would be in danger if they knew.
Definitely been there, on both sides. Have definitely had people–esp when I was in the military–assume I was straight while spewing hate against gay people that made me uncomfortable to the extreme (at a point in my life / career when I literally couldn’t say anything for fear of being discharged under DADT). That sucks, I know. …Still very different than when I hold my wife’s hand and we are physically confronted or stalked. A whole different ballgame. Or when I had surgery go bad and they let straight couples (even just boyfriends and girlfriends) visit each other but made my fiancee (at the time) sit in the waiting room for hours without updating her or letting her see me… I could go on and on about the daily, lived injustices experienced by same-sex / non-“hetero” couples. But since it isn’t a competition (smile) we can agree that harassment sucks all the way around. And erasure sucks too. I’m very glad AS is giving this forum and that I’m able to read and learn more from all of you.
Did you even READ the rules of this thread?!
“This hopefully goes without saying, but this is a space created primarily for bi and multi-gender attracted women! If that does not describe you, you are welcome to be here, but please don’t make the space about you; you’re here to listen and learn and possibly support, but not necessarily to weigh in.
Thank you! ”
Way to invade a space for bisexual women just to talk about yourself. Seriously. As if you didn’t just turn harassment into a competition by coming into a space not meant for you to talk about how much worse you have it. As if you then get to turn around and tell people “it’s not a competition” with a fake smile and not have people get upset that you just deliberately violated the express rules of the safe space.
Your opinions about “straight-passing privilege” weren’t invited here. I signed up to this email thread to get support and not get flack from gold-star lesbians about how much of my experiences I never had to experience, for once. You make me sick. As if the women in poly relationships–including myself–don’t currently get this too. As if we don’t have it in our histories. As if the constant sidelining of marriage issues aren’t relevant to the poly women in this thread who can’t get married to their partners. As if my friends in poly relationships with kids don’t have to face the fear of their children being taken away from them as punishment for their queer lifestyles. As if being with a man somehow protects you from all that shit. As if I haven’t been slapped and harrassed and stalked for the exact same stuff and still feel like I’m risking homophobic backlashes every time I hold my girlfriend’s hand, and do it anyway because we love each other.
As if that harrassment hasn’t bled into making my relationship with my boyfriend, making it hard for me to engage in public displays of affection at all because some part of me still lives in fear. As if the shit I face as a bisexual woman would be less valid if I didn’t currently have a girlfriend to ‘validate’ it as a present fear. And as if I don’t get lectured on this stuff without a drop of compassion EVERY SINGLE TIME I enter a -dominated queer space.
There’s no room for my experiences to simply ~exist~ without being sidelined at queer events and there’s no room for me in het ones either, and now there’s not even room within a space created especially for bisexual women to support each other? Thanks a lot. Please explain to me again how privileged I am. Please explain to me again how the ~second~ you’re not experiencing harrassment, the fear stops and everything is okay again. I’m sure the second you stop inhabiting the same room as your girlfriend, the fear stops for you too.
I glossed over your attack filled diatribe and will only respond to say this, since I was having a very civil convo with the original commenter who brought up some excellent points I had never considered / experienced: You *really* misread my comment, and zero about it was fake, but I won’t reply further because I very much respect the space you all are building here and your rage and negativity isn’t worth engaging. I have spent *hours* reading every single comment and post on this page. All so I could learn more. And I have (though still more learning to do), and I thank everyone for it. Back to lurking / learning / not participating as this is very much ‘your’ space and I acknowledge and respect that. Good day.
I was having a very civil convo with the original commenter who brought up some excellent points I had never considered / experienced: You *really* misread my comment, and zero about it was fake, but I won’t reply further because I very much respect the space you all are building here and your negativity / type of ‘response’ isn’t worth engaging. I have spent *hours* reading every single comment and post on this page. All so I could learn more. And I have (though still more learning to do), and I thank everyone for it. Back to lurking / learning / not participating as this is very much ‘your’ space and I acknowledge and respect that. Have a good day.
Lindsay, though I might not have said it as angrily because I don’t think your intentions are all bad, I too was upset by your comments in this thread and felt they went against the stated rules. I don’t think it’s fair to assume Nardia’s anger comes from a “misreading” of your comment. You *did* come here and start making comparisons to demonstrate that you have it worse; your subsequent comment that this “isn’t a competition” came off as pretty rude or, at best, oblivious. You came into a thread you supposedly respect as not yours to correct someone because you don’t agree with the language she uses (straight vs. passing privilege) to talk about her experience — not really your place to do so, in this context. I also don’t understand putting “your” in quotations when you say you respect that this isn’t your space.
I think your analysis of “straight privilege” is pretty reductive and misses a lot. I didn’t/don’t want to get into it with you because again, this thread is supposed to be free from those arguments. But please know, again, that Nardia is not the only one upset by your comments. I imagine there are many women reading and holding their tongues. You don’t have to like the way she is talking to you, but please don’t dismiss her viewpoint because she expressed it angrily. She’s upset, and she’s not the only one. Please try to have some compassion for the people this thread is for–including the ones who disagree with you.
Hi. Thanks for responding like I’m a fellow human being. That’s appreciated. Even when rebuking. You can’t judge intent… for instance, when I said ‘your’ I was trying to make it very plain that I knew it wasn’t ‘my’ place / my thread and I very much appreciate that. For all the good intent I had, it was misconstrued / taken differently than I meant it and I should have done a better job explaining myself or just not commented at all, I guess. But I very much hear you and apologize that I might have upset you or anyone else. *Definitely* not my intention (though we see how intentions have not aligned to outcomes here). Genuine apologies, again.
I believe it is only through dialogue that we learn, and that learning rarely takes a perfectly straight path and sometimes people (me, in this case) stumble along the way. Before this sub-thread, I had never before considered that I might have “gay privilege” in that I can go to Pride, gay bars, etc. and fit right in and feel “at home” in a way that my bisexual friends (esp. those in relationships with men) can’t. Very eye-opening for me and that (and other things I learned here) will hopefully make me a better friend and ally. I hate when I hear the bi-phobia in the wider LGBT community, hence my decision to dedicate hours to reading this thread, to try to learn. In all those hours of reading, this was the one comment I made (in other words, I just ‘lurked’ and tried to learn and leave the space to others). I apologize if that learning wasn’t perfect or fast enough or if my comment, however well-meaning, was hurtful.
I won’t comment to anyone again and won’t be lurking / reading anymore here either — so if anyone responds further, it’ll be to silence / hear yourself talk. Have a great day, all.
Really, dude? Really? That entire last response was so off (the ones you did before it were pretty messed up but this went downhill pretty quick). Every bit of it was wrong. Folks told you how and you didn’t listen. Now you’re just going to end your whole butt-hurt teen bit by sticking your fingers in your ears and walking off with a “Nya Nya I can’t hear you”? I really hope you are still on this mailing list for a bit. Please please wait a bit and then go back and read Nardia’s post again later. You came here and took in a lot of pain and joy and magic with your “lurking” (ugh that term), and I hope you can go back later and remember the feeling you must’ve had then and hold onto that while you re-read the responses to your posts. It will help you keep your eyes on what they are saying instead of how it feels to you personally. That conversation was a whirlwind of emotion and information and I understand why you got to that point, but I really hope you can go back and regain that feeling that everyone must get from reading this message board (because how is it even possible for anyone to not be moved by this message board?) because that feeling was important and may lead to a more compassionate exchange sometime later (in some future real life situation).
Hi Lindsey D. Since you have shown an interest in learning about Bi-phobia I thought I’d share this link with you of the San Francisco Human Rights Commission report on Bisexual Invisibility: http://sf-hrc.org/sites/sf-hrc.org/files/migrated/FileCenter/Documents/HRC_Publications/Articles/Bisexual_Invisiblity_Impacts_and_Recommendations_March_2011.pdf
Hi Lindsey! I don’t mind that you opened this conversation here. But I’d like to throw out there that passing (as straight) is not a privilege. It is just a different form of the oppression endemic to heteronormative societies. It might be safer, sometimes, but it is no less stressful/harmful.
Also, this is not the oppression olympics, so I don’t know why we need to argue who has it worse. All LGBTQI+ people suffer under patriarchy, in ways unique to our individual and collective experiences.
Lindsey, I agree that male-female couples (and couples perceived as such) have privileges that same-sex couples don’t get. Still, that’s not straight privilege, it’s male-female couple privilege. It sounds like you’re aware of things straight privilege includes, things like: people’s assumptions being in line with your orientation; being aware of and affirmed in your potential attraction; not having people talk shit about your sexual orientation in your presence; not having your orientation be a barrier to complete and respectful medical care. I don’t get straight privilege because I’m not straight. Generally, if a privilege is available to people who are not straight – that privilege may be very real and very painful, but it’s not straight privilege.
It sounds like you’re aware that being queer brings struggles that aren’t all specific to being in a same-sex relationship, so I hope you’ll get what I’m saying – those other queer issues, the ones I experience even if I’m dating a man, if I really had straight privilege I wouldn’t have those problems.
And I’m very sensitive to anyone saying that I have straight privilege because I’m so tired of people saying that my life is like a straight woman’s life, with all the perks. I know you didn’t say that, but many people do, and it’s a dangerous idea that forms a barrier between bisexual people and the resources we need. So the difference between male-female couple privilege and straight privilege is very important to me.
There’s a more subtle distinction I’d like to make. I experience male-female couple privilege but it doesn’t hit me the same way it hits straight people, because I know it comes from the idea that straight people are better than queer people like me. I still get the practical perks you talked about, and that matters a lot, but there’s always an insult buried in it.
I’d also like to ask that you call couples and relationships “male-female” and “same-sex” instead of “straight relationships,” “lesbian couples,” etc. First, because I’m not straight, so none of my relationships are straight. Second, because I think phrases like “lesbian couple” reinforce the assumption that people are straight or lesbian/gay based on their current partner, which contributes to bi erasure. I get that proclaiming one’s own oppressed orientation is empowering, so I usually don’t mind when lesbians refer to their own relationships as lesbian relationships, but I wish people didn’t talk about other people’s relationships this way.
Thanks for listening. This conversation is hard for me to have, but worth it to me right now.
I saw your other comment, about how great it was that there were no negative comments on this article. I wish that were true :/ There were some, but I guess they’ve all been deleted by mods.
I mean, I remember being at Pride as a volunteer during a time of serious emotional struggle around my orientation and relationships. Thinking “I wish there were a community to support and celebrate me like this. But looking for that in queer spaces would be inappropriate, because I’ve always dated men and I haven’t suffered Queer Problems.” This despite a relationship with a woman that had just ended a few weeks prior. I basically still thought I didn’t deserve a supportive queer community because of my “straight” life experience! And from what I’ve heard over the years, I know lots of people at that Pride fest would have agreed with me.
And not just at Pride, but people working on physical and mental health resources, youth homelessness, STI risk, parental denial, peer bullying… I think bi women generally are aware of the oppression of same-sex couples, even if they’ve never dated women. But in queer communities, there seems to be a major lack of awareness of the other issues facing bisexual people, so there’s a lack of badly needed resources and community support.
This is an enormously useful addition to the conversation. I didn’t identify as bi until I was 28 and then was floored as I looked back to my childhood and teen years and thought “DUH”. On the one hand for a long time I felt shut out of the LGBT community because I had identified as straight for so long and that utilizing that privilege made it unfair for me to ask to join “the club” but eventually I needed to be out for my own sanity. This is exactly the explanation why to me, it didn’t feel like a privilege to be wrong about my orientation for almost three decades, even if it meant I didn’t experience a certain kind of discrimination or bullying. Thank you.
Thank YOU! It’s so good to hear other bi people’s stories. Last year I was desperately searching for experiences that were anything like mine.
What you said about harmful male-female dynamics we learn is something I worry about so often! I’m really glad that my life partner, who is a man, and I are able to discuss those things. If we couldn’t then we certainly wouldn’t be life partmers! It’s something that’s made me wary of dating men sometimes and like you said the subtle stuff can slip by.
I’m single now (not because of this), but I want to share an experience in case it helps at all.
In college, I dated a guy from my hometown. It was a long-distance relationship. The relationship was really good, very healthy in pretty much every way.
His policy was basically “it’s OK to kiss other girls, but if it’s another guy, it’s cheating.” Nowadays I’m strictly monogamous but in college, especially during a long-distance relationship, that was kind of a nice idea to me.
At a party one day, a cute girl made a move on me and I obliged. I’d had way too many drinks. I didn’t notice, but at some point, the girl moved away and her boyfriend moved in, and I was somehow making out with her then-boyfriend. I didn’t want to, but it happened. Apparently they had pulled this bait-and-switch several times before; it was basically a routine.
Obviously, it was my fault for being drunk and making out with other people, although I really intended for it to still not be cheating by my then-boyfriend’s standards. So I called him the next morning and immediately explained what happened. He sounded mildly annoyed but understood and essentially told me to be careful. The relationship was strained after that and we broke up soon after.
I think we would have broken up eventually anyways, since long-distance relationships rarely make it through freshman year of college, but since then I have tried really hard to make sure that with all of my future partners, we don’t have any exceptions for one gender. The idea of having an exception for a gender is kind of weird to begin with. I feel like if you’re going to be in an open relationship, it’s much less complex if it’s totally open, not just partially open.
I supposed another takeaway could be not to engage when you’re drunk at parties, but I don’t really get into those situations anymore anyways now that I’m old and boring (just kidding, I’m 25, but I have stopped partying to that extent).
My last boyfriend’s response to “I’m bisexual” wasn’t “that hot,” but was rather “OK,” which is the best response I have ever gotten. I still prefer to date other queer people since being queer is important to me and I like when people I date can understand things that are important to me, although I suppose I could still date strong allies.
i find the whole idea that hooking up with girls doesn’t count as cheating on a male partner completely infuriating? anyone else?
Confession: I thought this for aaaages. I figured, if I were dating a bisexual man I would want him to be able to hook up with/date other men, because it was simply an experience that couldn’t be equated with me (I mean, yeah, strap-ons, whatever, but it’s not the same). So as a bi woman, I would want the freedom to see other women. It’s just an incomparable experience that I would like the freedom to seek above and beyond any relationship with a man.
(At the time I don’t think I was as gender-inclusive as I am now, so I’m speaking in cis terms here. Not how I currently operate.)
Anyway, ultimately this whole concept contributed to my identification as poly/non-monogamous, so I’m not sure it applies anymore. In the context of a strictly monogamous relationship, I agree with you–I resent the idea that hooking up with other girls isn’t cheating because I think it contributes to the assumption/stereotype that bisexuals are incapable of being faithful; that we will always be looking for something “on the side.” All those are super harmful ideas that I don’t want to contribute to.
I guess I just don’t seem them as incomparable. I don’t think about woman-sex and man-sex, I just think about who I’m attracted to, which is more often than not a woman but sometimes a man (and sometimes someone who is genderqueer or non-binary).
Definitely! I would say I agree with that, and am still evolving and working to internalize it.
Past me: “I really like this dude I’m seeing, but there’s just something so *different and special* about girls, and I want there to be a perpetual exception in our relationship for exploring that.” (Note: I never did actually have a relationship in which I acted on seeing other women.)
Current me: “I really like this person I’m seeing, and there’s something so *different and special* about ALL people, and I want my partner(s) and myself to be able to explore that with those other special people.”
I do think it’s a thing every couple can talk about in the context of their own relationship. Some [cis, in this example] couple might discover that what they find most fulfilling is for her to see other women, while he is monogamous and faithful. I generally think that relationships that thrive have as much equality as possible, but… who knows.
YES. Back in middle/high school, I was occasionally hooking up with a close friend, who always had a boyfriend (she was often single, but never for long). The rules with these boyfriends were always, “with other guys it’s cheating, but girls don’t count.” I went along with it because I got to be with her, even if it wasn’t ideal (I was also 11-15 at the time). She was having fun with someone she loved as a friend and had feelings for. I was wishing I could really be with her. It would never have worked out for us to date for real, because we lived too far away, and also she was into a lot of risky stuff I had no interest in (drugs, etc.). But the idea that because I was a girl, it “didn’t count” the same way, that stung.
She was my first. She always counted to me.
Thank you for this thread. I came into relationships only recently at 21. I had had attractions to multiple genders since 14, but hoped for years things would settle into a pattern. Nope, bisexual for sure. I finally decided to say “fuck it” to waiting for a change that would never come and put myself out there in the dating world. My first date (and eventual first love) was a man. We were together for a year and a half, mostly long distance, before breaking up a few weeks ago. It was extremely depressing to end our romantic relationship, but we remain each other’s closest friend. I’ve had time to reflect on it all. One thing that made me uneasy was my own tendency to get caught up in a particular “life script” when dating a man. There’s so much well-wishing pushing you in one direction- marriage and children. Even if you see yourself wanting that it’s hard not to second guess how much of it is yourself and how much of it is the influence of everything around you. And people did treat me differently when I was dating. My mom got me a hope chest as a sign of her approval (side note: anyone else had this experience? I genuinely do not know a single soul who also owns a marriage chest stuffed with tablecloths and towels). My straight friends were aflutter with happiness, but my queer friends seemed more disappointed. I think they thought I really was just a closeted lesbian in the beginning, and my dating sort of ruined that thought. It was like I had chosen the wrong side. Currently I’m not sure what my dating life will look like in the future or if it will exist at all. I have given myself a year to fully get over the loss of my last relationship and to decide whether to continue to pursue such things. I anticipate a lot of growth.
Good luck! Sounds like you’ve got a really interesting journey ahead of you! I’m sorry your queer friends can be jerks. It might be because a lot of people are just jerks. I can see at least three people who are jerks from where I’m sitting right now, but I still hang out with them ;)
(p.s. only just realizing the etymology of “jerk,” and wondering if it’s totally inappropriate for AS or really appropriate for this particular thread)
“I anticipate a lot of growth.” This makes me so happy to hear!
Hi, I’m bisexual woman married to a man. I’ve been on a few dates with women, but honestly almost every romantic or sexual experience I’ve had was with my husband. He knows I’m bi because we were friends first, and he knew me when I was experiencing my first major heartbreak over a woman. I probably would have told him either way, but a large part of my bi identity stems from that incident, so it’s hard to say. My husband and I started out as friends with benefits, and there were a few times in which other women were involved, but that never developed into anything overly sexual especially for me and the other woman. I am still interested in exploring those missed opportunities, and I think he is open to bringing another woman home, but we haven’t talked about it since before the wedding, and I’m worried to bring it up because I do feel a lot of pressure not from him but from myself and from society to not perpetuate the greedy bisexual stereotype. It’s slightly more complicated than all of that, but that is some stress that I feel as a bi person.
I say fuck the greedy bisexual stereotype if it keeps you from having a completely consensual and fulfilling sex life. You don’t have to live up to anyone’s standards but your own (and maybe your partner’s).
I’m so happy this thread exists!
My longest relationships have been with straight cis men (and I’m currently in a relationship with one). In college I had romantic/sexual encounters with a few women, including one I dated for about six months. I loved her very deeply and I still think about her often, seven years later.
Now, being in a serious relationship with a man, everybody assumes I’m straight, and there’s no reason for any person to ask if I’m anything BUT straight, so I never feel like I have the opportunity to correct the assumption. If I were to tell people that I’m bi, I worry that it would come across as a random, odd, egocentric, unprompted “announcement.” So I just keep my trap shut.
Close friends know, and they support me. My boyfriend knows, and he supports me. Sometimes I try to tell myself that those people knowing is what really matters–but if I search within for even just a few moments, I can easily unearth my dissatisfaction with the fact that an important part of my identity is invisible to most of the people around me.
I’m so happy to see so much support here!! I’m 26 and I only publicly came out as bi about a year ago. It’s kinda sad but one reason it took me so long is that one of my good friends for the last several years is bi and had dated and slept with multiple women and made me feel like I wasn’t queer enough because I hadn’t. I had those worries of, am I not bi until I’ve slept with a woman? Am I not bi until I’ve dated a woman? And it did take me finally sleeping with a woman to come out publicly because it was such an affirmation for me of yes, what I’ve known for a decade is true, but I shouldn’t have to prove anything to anyone. I think there were some weird jealousy issues with my friend, and she felt like I was “taking” her identity or something, and I’m glad to see that in general, the bi community is actually wonderfully inviting and accepting and I am finally feeling part of the LGBT community like I’ve always wanted.
What a shame that your friend wasn’t more supportive @erika00177 – she could’a welcomed you with open arms rather than making you feel like you had to prove yourself.
@erika00177
It’s kinda sad but one reason it took me so long is that one of my good friends for the last several years is bi and had dated and slept with multiple women and made me feel like I wasn’t queer enough because I hadn’t.
I can relate to this so much! A girl I was friends with (and at one point had been massively crushing on whilst stupidly assuming she was straight) came out as bi in the context of announcing how she made out with girls while drunk, and to me it felt kind of implied that if I hadn’t kissed or dated girls then in her eyes I wouldn’t count as bi and would think I was somehow “copying her.”
Nooo I messed up HTML
Hi Autostraddle peeps :) I’m Scylla, and I’m a bisexual woman married to a man. I have never dated/had sexual experience with women (unless you count cybersex…) and only recently came out as bisexual in certain spaces. I have, however, been aware of my attraction to women as well as men since my late high school years. I don’t believe I “became” bisexual (which is a silly thing to say anyway, but I hear it from people sometimes) so much as that my bisexuality became increasingly apparent to me as I’ve grown older and continued to educate myself about LGBT issues and causes.
Recently I read a post about how to define bisexuality and I like the “attraction to two or more genders” definition best. I’m sure I’m attracted to men and women, as I’ve felt and experienced both, but I’m leaving my horizons open for people of non-binary gender because that just feels right for me. What I’ve come to understand about myself is that gender is a negligible part of the equation when it comes to love and attraction. I’m interested in the whole picture: physical, emotional, mental. In fact, as I’ve gotten older (in my late 30’s here) and my libido has cooled, I find the latter two–an emotional connection, and mentally stimulating interactions–to be of greater importance in keeping my interest in a relationship (though sexual attraction is definitely still part of it). If my husband ever admitted to me “I’m a transgender woman” or “I’m a genderqueer person” one day, I would be completely on board and supportive, because those identities do not change what I love and find attractive about the person I married. If I were single, I’d be looking not for a man or a woman or any other specific gender, but for someone who brings out the best in me, someone who accepts the worst of me, someone who shares my interests, someone I can have amazing conversations with, someone I feel comfortable with in my personal space, someone who I feel the same way about as they feel about me.
The first time it really struck me that I’m capable of loving and desiring multiple genders was actually through anime. Yes, Sailor Moon was one of them (I’m a HUGE Haruka/Michiru fan <3) but the anime that really drove that point home for me was Shoujo Kakumei/Revolutionary Girl Utena. The one thing I found extremely appealing about Revolutionary Girl Utena is that it never focused on the gender of character pairings in the show. Admittedly, many of the relationships turn out to be harmful and damaging to said characters–but nonetheless, when Juri admitted attraction to Shiori, the issue was not that they're both girls, but the interplay of jealousy and desire between them. The show centers around duels between individuals bearing the Rose Signet, and the winner of the duel is ritually engaged to the Rose Bride, Anthy, regardless of whether the winner is male or female. Utena herself is a young woman who aspires to be a Prince and save the Rose Bride from being passed around from duelist to duelist without any care for her feelings. Both the Utena TV show and the movie strongly allude to a bond between Utena and Anthy that transcends friendship. But Utena also expresses attraction to men–the original Prince, Dios, for example, as well as Touga and Akio at various points in the show. One could thus argue Utena is bisexual, though in Revolutionary Girl Utena, no one uses 'lesbian' 'gay' 'bisexual' or any label related to sexual orientation, which makes the show feel truly like gender plays a distant role in what moves the characters to love, hate or desire one another.
Following that revelation, I've gradually found an avenue to express my desire for multiple genders, despite going through monosexual relationships with men. My interest in tabletop roleplaying was pivotal in this, as I'm able to take on the role of characters that express varying gender identities and sexual orientations. Why didn't I seek out non-male partners while single? I could sum that up in many ways: I wasn't entirely sure back then whether I was truly bisexual or just bi-curious, and didn't want to hurt anyone. I was working through issues with depression and anxiety which made me very asocial and afraid to "stick out" as a bisexual person in both straight and gay communities. I thought that a relationship would grant me safety and security, which at the time I associated with male figures (this is a rather old-school Freudian sort of view, but I had a difficult relationship with my father, so I feel I was looking for a stable relationship with a man who could make me feel safe instead of terrified.)
My coming out happened within the past couple months, and I would say it's almost entirely because I have broadened my social circle to include more LGBT people, and have seen first hand what they struggle through just to be accepted as who they are. It's through listening to and reading about these struggles that I decided I wanted to speak out in favor of my own sexual orientation. Bi-erasure and bi-shaming are real things, and one of the best ways I can think of to combat these is by showing people that bisexual people exist. We're your friends, your family, your co-workers, your neighbors, your lovers, your spouses, your employees, your public service workers, and everywhere. And now that you see us, we can work on stamping out the harmful assumptions people make about us: that we're invariably promiscuous or destined to cheat, that we "have" to settle on one gender or "prove" to anyone we're really bisexual. None of those things are true and we should be proud to be who we are!
I’m another one of those bi ladies who saw the title of this thread and teared up a little bit. Thank you so much Autostraddle for letting me know that you see me. I honestly can’t thank you enough.
In high school I had somewhat of a reputation of being a slut, and I think to most people my bisexuality was less a part of my identity and more a part of what made me a slut. The rest of what made me a slut was going through different boyfriends at a more accelerated speed, which when added to a general culture of slut-shaming and misogyny created this reputation for me. A lot of my internalized biphobia comes from a thought of mine that, no matter what I do, this perception from others that I’m a slut is going to continue following me throughout my life.
I identify really strongly with other comments about how bi ladies in relationships with men can sometimes start to overcompensate by shouting our identity to the high heavens in an attempt to be seen. I notice myself doing it a lot but am not sure how to avoid it. I so desperately want my identity to be validated, but every time I mention my boyfriend, I know I’ll be pushed into the straight or ally corner again.
I’ve been dating my current boyfriend for two years and it’s the healthiest, most stable relationship I’ve ever had. But at the same time, I often worry that if he ends up being my life partner, I’ll never get the visibility that I want so badly. I’ve been in a relationship with a woman before, but since she’s trans, transphobia and transmisogyny come in. Sometimes it gets bad enough that, when I talk about having dated a girl, even other queer people will say awful things about how she doesn’t really “count”. I feel really stuck in that I’m definitely most comfortable in a monogamous relationship, and that I’m very happy with my boyfriend, but at the same time my internalized biphobia and transphobia tells me that if I never date someone who will be read in public as a woman, I’ll never know what it truly means to be bi or queer at all.
I know I’m not the only one who feels this way sometimes, and that’s what’s so powerful about this thread. Thank you all for being vulnerable and sharing your stories.
That really sucks that even other queer people said your ex girlfriend doesn’t count. Boo to that!
Boo to in-community discrimination!! I agree so much :)
Reading the slut-shaming part of this was like reading about myself. Thank you for sharing it.
Thank you! I figured a lot of people could relate to that – slut-shaming seems to be a way in which a lot of people bully and discriminate against bi women. I’ve always wondered how the perception came to be that, because we date people with various different gender identities, we somehow have sex more often than anyone else.
I feel like a bright light just shined on me/we/us. So y’all also exist? And you’ve also been made to feel out of place, not queer enough, too queer, and the butt of jokes told by lesbian characters and performers on every platform of entertainment and media? Huh.
I have a lot of feelings. I’m just gonna scroll through and indulge in this rare representation and moment.
<3 <3 <3
I just started crying a little. I have often felt guilty and lonely because I pass, but it’s so true: passing is erasure, not privilege. I wish more than anything that I didn’t pass as well as I do. I feel like some sort of lunatic, desperately trying to insist to people that I’m not straight, even though I’m engaged to a dude.
Just last week I had an upsetting experience with a co-worker which left me feeling empty, and because this post is all about feelings, I finally get to deal with it. One of my co-workers, a gay man, was talking to me about his boyfriend, and how he was debating breaking up with him because his boyfriend had just tearfully admitted that he was pansexual, and my co-worker felt “betrayed” and like he “couldn’t trust him not to change his mind and pick a woman” over him. He was going on and on and on about it, asking my opinion, so I told him that as a fellow pansexual, I understood where his boyfriend was coming from, and he probably lied about it early in the relationship because he feared this EXACT reaction.
Long story short, the discussion turned from my co-worker’s boyfriend to my sexual identity, and my co-worker proceeded to tell me that I just “don’t seem bi.” He went on at length about how he “just couldn’t believe it” and I “seem so straight.” If you know me well, you’d know that I am, essentially, a low-femme gay woman who happens to be in love with a man. I was left having to defend my queerness to a fellow queer person, and felt even more invisible than I do on a daily basis. I spent the next five minutes telling him when I came out, how I came out, who I am, and after all that he just shook his head and said, “Wow, you just seem so straight!”
My queerness has not been accepted by much of my extended family, as they just don’t see it as relevant, since in their eyes, I’m lucky to be engaged to a man and passing. I even was told I don’t have a place in my extended family by an aunt and cousin, just because I identify as bi/pan and “won’t let it go.” So to hear from a queer person that I don’t fit in, and I’m not gay enough, and it’s so shocking that I’m queer was really upsetting and I felt so empty and useless.
I feel like my sexual identity is one big failure sometimes: I’m too straight to be gay, but too gay to be straight, and my experiences with bi-erasure are made fun of and undermined by so many binary people who see me as “lucky” for passing.
I don’t feel lucky for passing. I feel invisible. And I’m desperately trying to be seen for who I am.
this just brought tears to my eyes. I’m so sorry you had to have this experience! thank you for your words <3
Thank you for hearing my words! Just having the opportunity to share and be understood means everything to me. <3
Oh, girl, I feel you <3 Sometimes it feels like being bi is the opposite of being "greedy" and getting "both sides" because really it just feels like you don't belong anywhere. Passing is definitely erasure and denying your identity hurts. It's sad that many people in the LGBT community are still behind on this.
I’m so sorry he said those things and made you feel that way. I’ve had lesbians and gay men say similar things to me.
As a straight male, it’s hard to believe how different your world is from my own, or that of most men. As I read your post, you are bi and unable to find a stable and accurate sexual identity that you can be in comfortably. You seem kind of adrift along gay-bi-straight – too many choices, too few roles.
Think how that looks from here: My wife basically lost interest in sex after our last child, now 18, was born – sort of never returned from the hit sex inevitably takes with a new arrival. That was the culmination of what I had sensed already with the births of the other two – her interest in sex was primarily to have kids, something she kept from me. So with the last child, she no longer had any interest and sex faded away into mediocrity, then nothing. She does not think about it any more, and I stay away because I really don’t want to be with someone that isn’t into it. The choices are (pardon me) cheat, beat the meat or hit the street — at best unfulfilling, at worst a nightmare that destroys multiple lives, including those of children. So, sitting here at the opposite extreme, having too many choices looks like a kid in the candy store. Being married to a bi woman looks like crazy fun fantasy from here.
Since of course you need my advice, what I would suggest is basically tell your fiance that your gay side can’t be disowned and the two of you need to figure out how to accommodate it. Presumably this leads to some sort of acceptable outlet for yourself, with/out him involved. The one thing I thnk you should not do is try to disown or shut down part of your sexuality. I have dealt with just that for years and it is no way to live. Put succinctly – be glad you have so many choices and find the ones that work for you.
Ray, did you not read the line at the top that says “this is a space created primarily for bi and multi-gender attracted women! If that does not describe you, you are welcome to be here, but please don’t make the space about you”??
I’m taking your “Since you need my advice” line as ironic, but still–responding to someone who has just said “I don’t feel lucky for passing, I feel invisible” by telling her she should see her life as the fulfillment of YOUR “crazy fun fantasy”–in a forum that is supposed to be a safe space!–is fetishizing and objectifying. Not OK.
Since you seem to think it’s your role to dole out advice (even with your ironic caveat, that’s what you’re doing), here’s some: Your options in your situation are not “beat, cheat, or hit the street.” Go to marriage counseling. Have an honest conversation with your wife about your relationship. Consider whether an open relationship would work for you. Find a therapist or friend to talk to, not a forum that is explicitly not a place for you to project your fantasies. Or: get a fucking divorce.
Thank you for your post! After reading Ray’s post I felt uneasy and almost cancelled my email notifications for this thread. I couldn’t put a finger on it, but I felt uncomfortable and like the tone of this space had changed from something I was really excited about to something I felt a little icky about. You got right to the root of it and called him out intelligently and bravely. Thank you for making me feel good about being a bi woman in this thread again. I just started feeling weird that there are straight men with no connection to bi women whatsoever posting and mansplaining here. Why are they here? Is this because of the fetization of bi women? It’s inappropriate. This is one of the few little safe spaces where bi women can be themselves. I specifically never tell casual acquaintances or co-workers anything that would lead them to my sexual orientation because I’m so uncomfortable with the fetization of bi women. Ray and other dudes without a connection to bi women: please let us have this space.
No problem, Jasmine! We are here for each other!!! :)
<3
Your clearly malfunctioning and non-communicative relationship is not helpful to the conversation.
Your assertion that this woman speaking in a space designed for women needs, wants, or solicited your advice is presumptive and insulting.
Your point of view is part of the problem. You see this woman as some fetishized perversion from your view. Your world view is part of the problem we bisexual women face.
she does not have a “Gay Side”. She is a bi/pan person who is BI or PAN not Straight and Gay. She is not Straight some days and GAY when it suits your pornographic purposes. This is not something she switches sides for. Her identity is continual, not a light switch.
She was not expressing the want or need to go out and have sex with women. She was expressing the need to be accepted and recognized as bi/pan WITHOUT any demonstration or proof. she does not need to adhere to you or her gay male coworker’s rules on HOW TO BE BI/PAN.
Your comments are harmful. Your presence is not welcome. You do not have the right to tell anyone they have it lucky because YOU do not understand their struggle.
And you didn’t even understand what she was venting about.
…sigh. Yet another close minded ‘progressive, anti-sexism equal rights for all (unless I don’t agree with them)’ SEXIST BIGOT. Worse yet, a believer that ‘women are little girls who need protection from the opinions of others’ – who infantilize adult women.
I have a daughter that just graduated college, where she was spectacularly successful at the path SHE chose. The only thing I ever said to her about sex roles or gender – and believe me I meant it – was to focus on what she wants out of life and how to get there – NOT on the unfairness and sexism of the world ahead of her, which is the public obsession of ‘feminists’ who could focus on how women can deal with the obstacles that are unique to them. More succinctly, in this country feminists are consumed with ‘outing’ rather than ‘overcoming’ and she is better than that – REAL feminism.
______________________________
If you made it this far… I am a woman. My name is Raysa, the name of my Israeli grandmother. My tribute to her is my windmill quest against contemporary feminism – I lurk in drag in feminist blogs and come out (so to speak) to scorn the brand of destructive faux feminism described above. I am a longtime feminist, from its start in the sixties, and was briefly bi (2 yrs in college), gave it up for Lent (yes, that’s a joke) and never went back, though we stay in touch (did even before Facebook). I’m personally familiar with the confusion and untethered identity, though I don’t think they disoriented me as much as some of the others here.
The previous post that bent your nose was an accurate description of my marriage, regendered (t-marriage?); I am a sexual being with no acceptable choices to express it. I endure rather than take a chance on destroying what matters most to me.
I write in drag deliberately to elicit what I see as contemporary feminist bigotry and lockstep dysfunction, the poison that invaded the original feminism I did and do support – and taught all my children, m and f. It was and is a source of strength in my life, which has included raising three kids, none waylaid by the sloughs of helplessness, especially that of gender. I’m now retired, but am also an authority in my academic field (wrote a paper with over a thousand citations), made the key breakthrough that enabled a startup company to get to the big time and made a fortune in the ’90’s on Wall St. Believe what you want, nmp – but you might want to consider words from a woman who has a history of accomplishment in a difficult, sexist world. I also survived, barely, breast cancer in my forties. That is REAL feminism I am very proud of, especially when young women see in me a role model.
If you will put aside your own bigotry that causes you to be offended by the ‘maleness’ of my post, perhaps you will see the actual message (see your own prejudices, probably not).
That is: You are not the only one with painful gender role issues. I live with one for which there is precious little validation or even recognition. You have many choices for how you choose to deal with it – I have none, and can only daydream of those with creative and fulfilling sex lives. My own response would be to connect with my fiance, and together find the right choices – disowning your sexuality is a very bad thing.
Maybe some of you will hear me, though from experience I know the ones who repost will be the ones who do not. You don’t need to reply and try to attack me – it’s not you I’m trying to reach. I’ve heard it all anyway. God only knows what damage you are wreaking on capable young women. At least hear someone tell you the truth — you have a long road to adulthood so open your mind and get started.
tl;dr “Surprise, I was trolling to make a point! Also, I think young feminists shouldn’t complain so much and pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, like I did!”
Raysa,
There are a lot of assumptions in your posts (as a “man” and as a woman). You have made it clear that if anyone disagrees with you or “attacks” what you have said, that they are not hearing or listening to you and somehow not as evolved or as much of a feminist as you. But here it goes anyway.
For one, you’re tone is very patronizing. You assume that the women in this group are all young, and even if they were, there is no reason to approach them as if they’re feelings and experiences aren’t as valid as your own. In addition, I question your choice to infiltrate a thread such as this where many many women have expressed relief out of finding for the first time a space that they feel reflects they’re own experiences. I have to question why you feel so threatened by women expressing their emotions, and expressing their experiences of being silenced and invalidated based on their sexuality. Why you see this “weak” and as some kind of anti-feminist onslaught I do not understand. Second Wave Feminism partially came about through consciousness raising groups where women talked about and shared their feelings for the first time in women only spaces. How is that different than this?
In addition, you seem to be confusing your problem of being in a sexless relationship and not being able to express your self sexually with sexual orientation. Your situation with your partner would be upsetting and difficult for anyone. However, having a sexless long term relationship/marriage etc. is not based on the sexual orientation of the people in it. There are many gay/lesbian, bi and straight people in unhappy relationships. My being bi means I am emotionally and or attracted to more than one gender. It does not mean I am wanting to be with multiple partners any more than you or any other straight or gay/lesbian person. The idea that bi people have more “choices” than gay/lesbian and straight people is problematic at best and enforces bi-phobia. I can not choose who I fall in love with and decide to marry any more than you. Being attracted to more than one gender only means I am open to falling in love with more than one gender. Not more than one person. And if someone defines as polyamorous that also does not mean they can control or choose who they fall in love with and when, it only means they are open to having an open relationship with multiple loving partners. But being poly has nothing to do with orientation either. There are many gay/lesbian and straight poly people out there.
So your words and assumptions that 1) everyone here is young 2) young people’s experiences are not as valid as your own 3) that women sharing emotions in a mostly women’s space is enforces weakness and “destructive faux feminism” 4) that bi/pan people have more “choices” in relationships and that those “choices” include being with multiple partners at once are all extremely alienating and harmful.
I have to be honest hear, I question your intentions. You do not identify as bi. You say yourself that you were “briefly bi” in college for 2 years. You seem to be saying this not as a way to claim you identify as bi but as a way to contribute to the false idea that being bi is just a phase that young women go through while “experimenting” in college. So you are not someone who is coming from a place of understanding what someone who is bi is going through. You say you are here to be heard, to reach some of these young women. Yet your delivery simply railroads the legitimate experiences of every woman here, whether you understand where she is coming from or not. If you are who you really say you are, it seems you have fallen into the pattern of wanting things to not change, of wanting the feminism of the 70’s, romanticizing it even, and now feeling threatened by the natural progression of every movement. Second wave feminism was a strong, powerful important movement but it was rife with racism and homophobia. Every movement starts with people coming together and speaking in a safe space about their shared experiences of discrimination. A space where people can build confidence and pride. That is what is happening here.
You have not approached what you say your goals are in a manner that I trust. You piggy backed on someones heart felt post and attacked her. You then attacked the women who responded with some legitimate examples of how bi-phobic your comments are. I even question if you are a troll and should be reported. But I don’t see an option under your name to do that. Thankfully there have been some positive posts from some actual men. And this thread has been full of heartwarming positive, honest, risktaking sharing.
*report troll button*?
No one was offended by the maleness of your post. We were offended by you being a huge asshole.
your advice is presumptive and insulting
No, you’re a bigot.
“a low-femme gay woman who happens to be in love with a man” – Thank you for your phrasing of this. It’s similar to how I feel and makes perfect sense to me. But when I tell people I am a queer woman who happens to be in love with a man it feels like the queer community thinks “I’m too straight to be gay”. I certainly identify with the sentiment of being too straight to be gay, but too gay to be straight. Frustrating…
Getting linked to this thread was one of the best & brightest things to happen to me today / this week / this month. Thank you so much, delightful people. <3
I could make this comment a thousand times longer and rehash all the points brought up above–is there a queerness cutoff I'm failing to reach? If I'm the only person on my block cheering at the bi group walking in the Pride parade, how dirty are the looks I'll receive? Has anybody ever proven that "straight-passing" is a legitimate complaint leveled against bi/pan folk or is it the LGBT community's version of welfare queens?–but I think the number one "THIS" response I had was people automatically assuming I'm straight and how much it makes me want to screech at them like a flock of bats.
The dude I'm currently dating: great! His friends: very straight! It's the first time I've dated in a social group where I'm the only LGBT person and I feel like I need some kind of banner of visibility, like a rainbow mohawk or a necklace that says "BISEXUAL" in big plastic letters, to remind them that I'm not straight and I don't want to hear casual prejudices & the occasional slurs (you know the ones) because they think it's cute.
So, really, the major downside to my current relationship is that he comes with other straight people, and they are e x h a u s t i n g. I did a lot of work with my own friendships to basically excise the people in my life whose microaggressions weren't worth dealing with, but romantic relationships are about compromise, right? Compromising and deciding whether minor comments are worth putting down my beer and becoming a rage monster at an otherwise lovely barbecue.
Yes! One huge issue I’ve found is that since moving back to Austin and dating a few guys, the pool of queer friends around me has gone from 90% to 25% at best, and it’s breaking my heart.
I feel this on so many levels! There are times where I’ve wanted to have big neon letters above me in dazzling colors proclaiming “queer!!!” and able to accurately reflect my multi-gender attractions. Microagressions can tend to be a deal breaker for me, especially as a person who doesn’t identify with any gender but presents very feminine, I sometimes feel like a a fly on the wall thats infiltrated a conversation that can perpetuate homophobic and transphobic vibes and none to pleasant to the ear to hear. I tend to pick and choose my battles. Sometimes its worth calling them out on it, but other times it isn’t or I really consider putting myself out there and risking possible aggression or hostility- it takes a bit to read whether a person is open minded enough to listen, but for the most part some of the best things you can do is continue to claim your space and identity as bi and refuse to let it become invisible. Your identity is legitimate and still exists no matter who your with, what you eat and where you go, and it keeps folks who may not know better from “forgetting” or not validating it.Owning it takes courage, ( I wish I could always live by my own words) but its empowering and helps create the space your bi identity rightfully deserves. :)
Ok, here’s my problem with dating a dude with mostly-straight friends. When I get sexual/flirtatious vibes from women I assume to be straight, I am super confused. Are they flirting with me? Or that just not part of their world? If I was doing/saying what they are saying to ANYBODY, I would consider it flirting, but because they are part of this straight friend group, dating men, etc, I’m just super unsure of how to read it.
“Compromising and deciding whether minor comments are worth putting down my beer and becoming a rage monster at an otherwise lovely barbecue.” Amen! I’ve been that girl quite a few times.
Autostraddle, thank you. Straddlers, thank you for your stories. They are my story.
What I see here is that so many of us have struggled with our identities for years and years, struggled with confusion and fear and feeling outcast and fake. This is a real thing. Research shows that bisexual people struggle with their identities more and for longer than gay people. Heck, this thread shows it!
I see that the experience of many bi straddlers is that they came out the other side of their confusion and feel out and proud and strong in their identities. This is true for me. I actually went back in the closet (it was the worst) and it took a lot of soul-searching and self-validation to come back out. I’m staying out now. The air is much fresher out here.
What is coming up for me in reading this thread is that it is vitally important we bisexuals claim our space. I believe that if we claim our space, eventually others will accept that we are here and deserve that space. So the question that I keep asking myself is, how can I claim my space? What can I do to affirm bisexuality? I am out and proud on social media, I talk with friends and family about it, and I’m going to be a primary care provider who really gets it. That feels good. Folks, what else?
This is so great and honestly made me tear up a little bit. Thanks for claiming space in the world and encouraging the rest of us to do so!
One thing this thread has validated for me is that it’s okay that I have struggled (and continue to struggle) for so long about my identity. That I’m not the only queer bisexual who has taken longer to start dating or questioning my attractions or felt confused because our identities as queer bisexuals are not affirmed anywhere around us. I am happy that there are many more gay and lesbian characters in the media nowadays but it would have helped me a lot (would still help me now) to see queer bisexual women like us in movies, books, etc.
I was so excited to see this thread! I am a pan cis-woman dating a bi cis-man. I only discovered my pansexuality about 4 years ago when I was in a relationship with a woman. The relationship didn’t end well unfortunately, but I’m really grateful it happened. I was amazed at how one girl turned my idea of who I was on its head.
I think many of my family members consider it a phase, but it made me feel whole. Finding my label after I fell in love with her was like coming home.
I appreciate this thread so much! I feel seen and I think so many of us in this fringe position really need to hear that sometimes.
“feeling whole” and “coming home” – these feelings are so real, and the fact that I feel them and other people feel them about claiming identities, with or without labels, is what gets me past the worst self-doubt.
Hooray for this thread! I am joining the folks who finally signed up for an account because of it.
I id as queer, though I’m trying to get better about claiming the bi label as a way to combat bi erasure and my own internalized biphobia. The latter has been rough for me, because I have been attracted to/involved with more men than women over time, and constantly struggled with not feeling queer enough. Most of the time I’m open to multiple genders – and the longest and best relationship of my life with a woman – but sometimes I’m just interested in men. And at those times, I’ve had trouble: if I were really queer, shouldn’t I *always* be open to dating women?
I’ve gotten better at relaxing about this over time, and focusing on patterns in my attraction that have less to do with people’s gender identity. Like: I am most attracted to people with a dry, sarcastic sense of humor, radical politics, and queerness of one kind or another.
This preference for a partner’s queerness has killed an otherwise great relationship with a straight cis dude. For all his other wonderful qualities, he just couldn’t ever connect to my queerness on a personal level, and I couldn’t stick with that. I’m currently dating a cis queer/bi man, which is so much better, as we can talk through our mutual bi erasure in being together while combatting it by saying things like “you’re such a cute little queer” in public.
That’s adorable. :)
Thanks for adding this @professorqueermo – it’s interesting what you say about your sexual preferences changing at different times.
I really hear you on the difference it makes being with folks – men especially – who are queer-thinking themselves. I’ve had two significant relationships with men, the longer – and better – being with a guy who I knew ‘got it’, I never felt like I had to explain myself or reinforce my identity with him (though I had some internal insecurity/biphobia and ‘fraud’ feelings.) The other was a much straighter relationship with a much straighter guy, and though he was great, ultimately I knew deep down he wasn’t queer enough for me and ended it.
I just breathed a sigh of utter relief.
I have always seen myself as queer-loving-lesbian (bisexual for my parents) and had yet to feel any kind of feels for a man.
Which means that I am currently freaking out because there is a guy. And I like him. And it looks it might be more than just sex.
So far I have been in love, in relationships and in lust with women, and have only ever been in lust with guys. I have had my fair share of fluid sharing with men but it has never gone beyond the whole friends with benefit thing.
And enter that guy, and … how do you do with guys? I have the vague feeling it is like with ladies but guys, they thing differently and oh my emotions, how do you share those? (do I sound panicky? maybe it’s because I am and I feel like a 13 years old with a crush who likes her as well)
I am slightly scared of scarying him away with my fluidity and “I have never been monogamous before” vibes, which I never thought about before because more often than not partners found my bisexuality as a ‘hot thing’ and as a reason to ask me if I’d be down for a m/f/f threesome one of those days. And they were just partners for the sexy times and not … potential boyfriend material.
(this is becoming very aunt agony territory)
Anyway. I’m having a mild freak out and this thread, the existence of it, to be able to talk about it : so. much. win.
(my ex paramour of awesome was a bisexual lady and I didn’t have any trouble with her persuing manly interest and falling in and out of love with them. She taught me to be more open and fluid in life)
Thank you for sharing this! And I really feel like everything is gonna go *just fine* with your guy :)
I mean, some people might disagree with me, but there really isn’t a whole lot of difference when it comes to sharing your feelings with a man than with a woman. i mean, some men are the biggest “girls” I’ve ever met. They are fragile and emotional and sometimes jealous, but often quite funny and gentle and creative. There’s the whole patriarchy thing, and the bisexual fetishization thing which I would totally totally watch out for and take as a red flag if you see it, but there really are some gems out there and chances are if you been getting down with hip ladies, this guy is a pretty hip dude. So go forth! It might work out! It might not! One way to find out though…
Let me know how this goes.
Have any of you had experiences with your male partner feeling insecure/inadequate/unattractive to you because you also like women? I think part of the trouble my partner has had with it is that he’s so fucking straight he doesn’t understand how anyone who was into women would ever date a dude. It’s gotten better after multiple conversations about how we both feel oppressed by presumed gender roles in our hetero relationship (he’s somehow also almost as insecure about not being masculine enough??) but I still wish I could do a better job explaining to him that his maleness is part of what makes him beautiful to me, if not a prominent part, and I don’t feel the lack of sleeping with women any more acutely than most people feel the lack of sleeping with other people generally in monogamous relationships.
in all seriousness though i really think the idea of considering your partner’s gender as like, the be-all-end-all of your relationship is part of the problem – it’s no more intimidating to me if my partner is into multiple genders than it is to consider the fact that they might be attracted to … anyone?
I don’t feel the lack of sleeping with women any more acutely than most people feel the lack of sleeping with other people generally in monogamous relationships.
exactly.
Definitely. My only committed, long-term relationship was with a cis male for 6 years. He knew about my bisexual orientation; he asked questions on occasion but only to understand me and not for any ulterior motive i.e. “omg, we could have threesomes?!” (we were monogamous, so that was never relevant). I appreciated that he didn’t equate bisexuality with “slutty sorority girls” porn, and aside from When we talked about my attraction to women, he seemed secure enough in his masculinity or maleness that it did not cause a problem—and our discussions about it never involved jealousy or objectification. I would suggest voicing your feeling re: his maleness is part of what makes him beautiful to you.
If my comment seems out of context, I meant to write as a reply to a comment. I’ll re-post it there. I very much appreciate the inclusion of this thread in general, however. Thanks, Autostraddle.
I just realized that I am bi, myself. I’ve been in a relationship with a man for almost nine straight years so my queerness was always apparent in the way I spoke with him, but it has always been somewhat of a secret. I’ve had crushes on women, but I never knew what to do with it. After all, I’m in a monogamous relationship.
When I realized that I was bi-/pan-sexual… Things made sense. It felt freeing, but I also realized that I feel into another trap. How do I tell my parents? How will it affect my conversations with coworkers? How can I ever express it while in this relationship?
I talked to him at length about it. He’s a heterosexual cisgendered man. I was always confused about him never having any interest in any men… I never realized how weird it was to be bi. The conversation between us made it clear that I can start exploring my bisexuality and try to pursue other women. I guess we’re now monogam-ish? Poly? I’m not sure… I’ve been working on it since then.
I still feel weird about it all because I’m trying to figure out what to do with this new identity. I’ve been telling my closest friends when it made sense, but it’s an odd transition. I still feel weird about how long it took for me to admit it. I’m trying to figure this stuff out right now.
I don’t think I’ll ever tell my family about it.
I have another friend who is navigating that too from the other end, so to speak.
I want to stay connected with all of you beautiful people:
twofingertouch.tumblr.com
Feel free to reply with your tumblr so we can have a big bi babes dating dudes sleepover or something.
erikaheidewald.tumblr.com ! :)
Sorunwithmebaby.tumblr.com (very much a n00b with tumblr!).
Yay! forestine.tumblr.com
Yessss! I don’t post as much as I’d like, but:
eleventomidnight.tumblr.com/
anti-thesis.tumblr.com!
Yay! reindeerbee.tumblr.com
Suddenly wishing I had a Tumblr.
yesssss.
onehalfwandering.tumblr.com
Fleet-of-pugs.tumblr.com
Thanks for the thread Autostraddle!
I have read a few comments on here, and have heard many times throughout my life, stories of bi women often being with men for a long time and then coming to the realization that they are also attracted to women.
For me, I have always seen myself as a lesbian, but have over time realized that I am also attracted to men. It is an odd thing to come to terms with. I am in a relationship with a woman right now, but I wonder if in the future I could even date a man. Would I know how? I wouldn’t want anyone thinking they “turned me straight”.
Sometimes, when I find a man attractive I will ignore it as to not compromise the identify I have built for myself. Other times, if I do comment about an attractive man, my friends and family – both LGBT and straight – get very confused.
This is why I like to mainly think of myself as a queer person – fluid in both gender and sexuality. Looking for others in a similar mindset. Being somewhat genderqueer makes me wonder if “bi” is even the right term for me. I find myself wondering if “bi” even exists within the genderqueer space.
This is such a great thing! Thanks Autostraddle! I feel like up until this point I’ve never had a space where my attraction to multiple genders were completely validated or given the opportunity to be spoken about, I really appreciate this! <3 <3 <3
I have to say that being a person who identifies as queer and presents most of the time feminine it's a bit tricky to navigate dating and feeling comfortable and safe enough to disclose to the person I'm dating my orientation. I recently found this to be a case of consideration when I went out to dance some swing in Chicago and ended up spending the majority of the time with a cis-guy that I found to be attractive and a fun dance partner. I go to a pretty liberal and inclusive college, so it came as a surprise to me that outside of that bubble my queer identity if often invisible. What was more surprising was when my dance partner started saying things that were subtly homophobic in nature and assuming I was straight, I'd play it off as nothing, but it was the first time I felt nervous and a bit scared as to what would happen if he found out I dated women in the past, and even more so with the thought that I didn't identify completely as a woman myself either. I'm not one to disclose my dating history or how I identify– in fact if I were to use words it would usually be "queer" and to a queer person themselves, as often times I felt that using "bi", especially to folks who were straight and not involved in the LGBTQ+ community they'd often misread it or write it off as straight or not as legitimate as being completely gay. I think right now when it comes to dating, particularly men, there is a real lack of advise as to how to go about it as a person who does identify as queer and accounted as such. I relate to many of these commenters and the feelings of being a bit of a traitor when I have been with men briefly because even if they did recognize and knew of my queer identity, it would often not be read or recognized by others or I'd feel paranoid that it wasn't being read as such, especially when doing specific LGBTQ+ work that i found important. I think the same can be said for the women I've dated- I'd feel worried about disclosing my identity and multi-gender attractions for fear of not being taken seriously or being read as promiscuous or a potentially "poisonous bi-girlfriend that leaves them for a dude"… Lol. I'm single at the moment, but I think I may also find a bit trickier with the more recent self-discovery of not identifying with any gender as something that's an actual thing, and while its very exciting to know that what I do feel is not confusing at all, my decision to keep a mostly feminine appearance makes it very nerve racking to disclose it to anyone for risk of negative or unsafe reactions, and I'd rather just be out to myself than to risk having one more aspect of my being becoming a target for harassment, negative reaction or harm done to me. You never know how someone is going to react, and its only recently I realized that when dating someone, my safety and well-being have to be taken with much more priority and I have to really consider what I chose to disclose to someone. It's not worth being with a person if you live in fear that they may reject or even become hostile about revealing an intimate part of yourself, I feel like now I must be more careful and mindful as to what the person is like in order to really be sure I trust them enough to be with me so intimately… on an internal and physical level.
THANK YOU SO MUCH AGAIN FOR THIS THREAD GUYS!!!!!!! <3 <3 <3
I wanted to add my name to the list. I am a bisexual woman that is married to a cis man, but continues to have attractions to cis men and women, trans men and women. I came out as a lesbian when I was 17 and a bisexual woman when I was 24. I always thought I suffered from internalized homophobia, as I really struggled to define myself as a lesbian. I kept wanting guys to hit on me. :) Turns out, it was not internalized homophobia, but I was a bisexual woman that sought and pursued the attention of men and women. Go figure.
I’ve been involved in the BGLTQ community since I was 17, but I really stepped away from it for a bit after I had two children. I would get subtle (and not-so-subtle) indications that there was really no place for me there. I was married, I had children, and what was if again? Oh yes, I was dripping with straight privilege. Never mind that I am publicly and vocally out and discuss my bisexuality at every turn. Never mind that community-based bi erasure masquerades as “straight privilege” to some. I stepped away from the community for about 5-8 years. Give or take. I am back now, though, reclaiming my space.
The question I most often get is, “If you are married and have kids, why even bother disclosing your bisexuality?” Oh, so many reasons. One – it’s a numbers game. You will have to start counting us when we demand to be counted. Two – it’s an essential part of who I am , like my identification as a cis woman, a mother, a wife, an avid reader. It’s me, and it has shaped me, my experiences and who I have loved. Three – because I refuse to be told my self-identification is irrelevant or indulgent. How about fuck you?
So, I’ll follow this with interest. I look forward to the conversation.
Ugh, why disclose? Because it’s part of who you are!! <3
Another huge thank you. I’ve been aching for visibility and community lately. Reading the comments and seeing myself reflected has been a bright spot!
Hi everybody! What a great thread!
I prefer to go without a label, but for practical purposes multi-gender attracted is about right.
I’m a couple of months into something new with a dude, and it’s the first ‘relationship’ type thing I’ve done after coming to terms with my unlabeled self. In addition to thinking about a lot of the issues that you all have brought up, I’ve begun to notice some odd personal quirks (that maybe go right to the heart of my discomfort with labels).
For example. There’s no question that I like and am attracted to him, but he has a very masculine face and the way I feel about that is…. confused. Conversations? Fantastic! Sex? Hell yes! But sometimes I look over and feel like, ‘who is this man-face’?
Does this happen to anybody else?
This is interesting. I can’t say I relate to the face thing, but I do find there is a wide diversity in what kind of “look” I go for. Like, I sometimes look at my boo and am like, How did I end up with someone like you? That’s more about my boi being really clean-cut looking and bro-looking, while I usually go for more grungy, hippy types.
You like his face, though, right? It’s a good face? That’s what really matters.
Oh yeah, totally a good face; it’s just disorienting at times. After posting, I got to thinking and realized that I had a similar reaction to a guy I dated several years ago. Got used to it eventually.
I wonder if part of it is that when the sex and gender of the other person aren’t dealbreakers, that blurs the line between ‘orientation’ and ‘type’? I know that whenever I try to think about it anyway, I always end up confusing myself.
I am so so so grateful to you and this thread! I can’t wait to read everyone’s comments and know that I AM NOT ALONE!!
I am a 38 yr old woman (who is frequently mistaken for 27), very femme presenting; I have predominantly dated men but have always known I was attracted to women too. Growing up, there were NO resources for me – nobody to talk to about my feelings towards my little girlfriends, nobody to help me understand that the enjoyable sexual feelings I had when we engaged in exploration of ourselves and each other was normal and healthy. So I grew up and pushed those feelings away. I liked boys a lot too and that was NORMAL in my community so best to just do what’s normal.
At 38 years old (after the requisite “5 minutes of lesbian in college” phase), I am formally coming out as bisexual. I am focusing on exploring my identity in terms I never had the courage to even think about, let alone act upon. I am making out with women, I am engaging in interesting and beautiful body exploration with women and I COULD NOT be happier.
It’s very difficult to find your place in the LGBTQ community when still so many of the community thinks that bi people are just fakers, or just do it for fun, or any of the other judgey shade I feel thrown at me regularly. There are no meet ups, resource groups, or any way to connect up with others in the community. I feel like especially as a pretty femme (although funky) woman, I am constantly justifying my existence in lesbian bars – I know I’m being stared at with the look of “why are you here?”. It makes the coming out process that much harder.
Solidarity with my fellow bi-identified females!! We are out here ladies, and I’m no longer going to be afraid to stand firm in my place and connect with all the rest of you!
WOOHOO! Congrats on formally coming out! It is hard to find community, but partially because we don’t talk about it and we don’t see each other, a lot of the time. The majority of folks in the LGBT community are non-monosexual, but we are treated like a minority in our communities. Partially because we don’t see each other!
Wow, thank you so much for this open thread! As a queer person who has not yet dated anyone, I feel so many of the pressures and judgments from all sides very strongly. I have internalized so much negative junk and it makes me question and second-guess myself to a maddening extent. Aside from ‘queer’, I still haven’t really found a label that resonates. For a variety of reasons, I do tend to be more attracted to women and nonbinary individuals than cis men.
I think what I’m really trying to say is thank you, autostraddle community, for once again validating my intense feelings and helping me to unpack a lot of stuff. It’s nice to not feel alone in this. <3
I feel what you’re saying. I personally am attracted to lots of people of many genders. I find it much harder to find men who are not jerkfaces. Otherwise, I might be more attracted to them. But they are hard to find. Apparently many of them are dating some of the fine bi/queer/pan folks in this thread. When I meet a guy who is not a dillweed, however, I am much more likely to develop a crush on him.
I am so glad that this thread went up today. Yesterday I was in the middle of one of my crises, panicking over my closeted bi self, and worrying if I was even bisexual at all.
I was raised very religiously and married an awesome guy at age 22. After a couple years, I started to notice my attraction to people that were not men, but I buried it because 1. I was very religious 2. My family would be disgusted, and 3. I was already married to a man, so why did it matter? I was still attracted to him, so it wasn’t an issue.
Fast forward a few years, and my secret became quite painful, more than I thought it would be. People always talk about straight-passing privilege, which may exist, but it doesn’t come without its twin, bi-erasure, which just sucks so bad.
I’ve tried to tell a few people, but most people dismiss it as not legitimate because I’ve only had sex with a man. At times I question that myself, although it seems pretty shitty to dismiss someone’s sexual attraction if they haven’t “sealed the deal.”
My husband is very supportive and has encouraged me to date other people, but it’s terrifying and it seems like most queer folks don’t want to date someone in my position, which I understand. Ugh.
On a positive note, I am so glad to see you all here. I feel an awesome sense of community for the first time, and I am glad to hear your stories. I have read Autostraddle for a while, but I always felt a bit outside. I made an account just to comment on this thread, and I hope Autostraddle keeps making space for Bi/Pan/Poly+ folks!
ohhh, honey! we are here for you! <3
Glad you commented. You are so welcome here! As you can see, many of the writers are bi and committed to or open to dating men.
I was profoundly annoyed by the questions people asked when I began dating a man, and want to share then.
1-“So the lesbianism was just a phase?”
2-“Are you going to grow your hair out again and stop pretending to be all butch?”
3-“Looks like you finally figured out you’re straight.”
1-Way to invalidate all of my previous relationships. It wasn’t a phase, it was a valid and real connection I had with someone I loved.
2-For me, being butch has nothing to do with liking women, it has to do with liking me. And I swear, I’m going to freaking shave my head next time someone asks if I’m going to grow my hair out.
3-Still bi. That will never change. If you are given a choice to choose cake or cookies for dessert, and like both cake and cookies, you still like cookies if you chose the cake. My husband cake just happened to be my favorite flavor. If he’d been a cookie of the same flavor, then that’s what I’d choose.
this is the cutest / yummiest metaphor! and now I want cookies. ;)
Cake and cookies – nice :D
Another one for your list – male partner’s friends/family to him: “aren’t you worried she’ll run off with a woman?” Blleeeugh.
(Though, erm, I kinda did in the end ;)
Wow! So surprised this thread is here, and so overjoyed! I grew up so preoccupied about homophobia and so determined to pretend to be straight that I totally ignored or didn’t believe my own crushes on boys. It took a lot of soul searching to realize that crushing on boys wasn’t (always) a facade I constructed, it was part of my authentic self.
I identify as bisexual/fluid but I’ve dated and slept with so many more men/masculine presenting people than feminine people that sometimes I wonder if that means I’m straight but then I’m like NO I am what I am, and I’m working to not care as much about labels.
While I present super femme, I definitely have super strong masculine energy (I loooove science, critical thinking, logic, being direct, spreading my legs on public transit) and maybe that’s why I’m mostly attracted to men? Which is super weird because I identified as a lesbian for a few years and go to a woman’s college and then things seemed to flip. I find women gorgeous and attractive and I’d really love to date more women but I have a pattern of ending up with men, even in mostly female spaces.
Also the privilege thing is so weird. I dated a gender fluid person for a while who later identified as a trans man at the end of our relationship, so while we were dating I never called him my boyfriend but he’s my ex-boyfriend and then coworkers and family and people assume I’m straight when I talk about him.
I studied abroad in Buenos Aires and I while I would never walk alone or with a woman at 2am through the city, I didn’t think twice about doing that with a man.
Also, if I kiss a boy in public, I still worry that someone’s going to be nasty to us until I remember that the person I’m kissing is a man and we look straight.
Such a good point! It’s so sobering to continue to discover ways that homophobia and biphobia have interfered with us really knowing ourselves or living live authentically.
Thank you for creating this space! I’ve been very lonely and honestly, a little ashamed. I’ve dated both men and women, but whenever I’m with a man I feel like a) I worked so hard to accept my attraction to women and JFC, now I’m with a man and b) like I don’t have the right to be in queer spaces. More than once people have told me I can’t be bisexual if I have a partner who identifies as a man. Or that I’ve had too many partners who were men.
Apparently, queerness is a numbers game and I need to have an equal ratio of men/women partners if I want to be a “real” bisexual.
I’m always reassuring friends who identify as both ace and lesbian that they still count even if they aren’t into sex. But my self doubt originates from the same “rules of being an actual queer” I tell them don’t matter.
Just a reminder, y’all — there’s a lot of talk here about setting up/joining Facebook groups, which is awesome, but there’s also already a group on Autostraddle Social for bi/pan/queer women! It’s really extra nice for us when the conversation stays on Autostraddle, because it allows our community to grow here on the site and it keeps our number of page impressions higher, which helps us make a few more cents off of advertisers (instead of Mark Zuckerberg making money off advertisers on Facebook).
Yes! And we have @-mentions! And some of us really hate Facebook! But we all freakin love Autostraddle so!
<3 <3 <3 So much agree! And it is open to everyone–not just folks who use Facebook. I’ve heard some readers say that the FB groups seem like they are for the “cool kids,” the “insiders” or only for people who have been to camp. I know that’s not the case, but it can feel more inclusive to have these communities on the actual AS page vs FB, IMO.
As someone not on Facebook I love that this conversation is happening here – thank you!
The discussions about privilege vs erasure are interesting. The way I see it, what’s happening when you’re a woman with a guy and the world assumes you’re straight is both privilege (ou’re not going to that encounter abuse from a passer-by that is a very real threat to so many people in visibly queer relationships, this is surely a privileged position?) and erasure (see a gazillion comments above!)
Thank you Autostraddle!
I have identified as bisexual (pan technically) forever, but have only dated girls so far. I have always been worried about the feelings & external bullshit that I might encounter if/when I do start dating a guy. Its rough to see that these fears are legitimate and real for so many of us, but I’m mostly grateful to have these stories on-hand for when I am experiencing erasure and need a bit of a pick-me-up.
So much love to everyone!
Does anyone ID as butch/MOC/etc and bi? I’m a masculine-leaning person who has never ruled out attraction to men, but never experienced it or felt any desire to be with a cis man til recently. While I feel open to exploring, I’m also really nervous about navigating that experience as someone who is more used to identifying with men than being in a hetero interaction with them and all the expectations that I imagine would be involved.
Yeah! I don’t really have advice to offer, but I love when butch/MOC/etc bi-ness is visible; it almost never is (in my experience), and I think that’s contributed to some of my uncertainty at various points about ID’ing as bi.
I would identify as soft butch/MOC, and I’m married to a guy. He actually prefers women with short hair, so that worked well for me. ;) But yeah, I steal his boxer briefs, he doesn’t care at all. In the 11 years we’ve been together I’ve actually gotten more and more comfortable in my MOC/dapper presentation, and he’s never been anything but supportive. We’ve grown and changed together, and I’m incredibly grateful for it.
There are some bits and pieces of weirdness for me that pop up from time to time, in terms of wanting to be the Big Spoon, etc. but that’s mostly on me, since he never has an issue with it if I actually work up the nerve to say something/do it. I also benefit from ours being a monogomish relationship, so I see other women sometimes, and I get my wide spectrum of needs and wants met in different ways with different people.
Anyway, what I’m trying to say is, there are dudes out there, unicorns though they may be, who are comfortable enough with themselves and the world that they will be nothing but supportive and loving toward you, if you are into them and true to yourself. I’ve found that those types of guys are often all the more appreciative of finding someone who can meet them on equal terms, too, since they are often also erased and/or denigrated by popular culture and representations of “masculinity.”
Yeah, though I’m trans too, so that adds a further complication to dating. My gender presentation is fairly fluid, if MOC leaning, so it’s mostly a no labels thing; but on some days? For sure.
There are guys out there, who I am sure will be completely into you and supportive of you, but the subtle microaggressions can make life hard (love all the talk on this thread about that). Like any relationship, it takes good communication, and the further apart your life experiences are, the more work it takes.
I’d say don’t be nervous, but be cautious. Attraction can be pretty spontaneous, but facts are that I’m going to screen men a lot more carefully than women, especially if they are not queer themselves.
There are plenty of positive, well intentioned men who will be completely into you, but microagressions are still going to impact your relationship; and they need to be able to listen and be open to their own identity evolving as part of a relationship with you. Even if they are not queer, the relationship *is* with you as a part of it, and they need to figure that as a living breathing person and not just a history.
As for the broader social expectations…Well, there’s no getting around the fact we live in a heteronormative society; so you need a partner who’s going to pull alongside you and push back against that for you and with you too, just like a queer one would.
I had to call it off with a guy I was head over heels for, and am still close friends with, because he was unwilling to change and evolve with our relationship: there was a point we’d reach where he could no longer listen. Perhaps it’s simply a trust or intimacy issue, or boils down to privilege, but it’s always been far more of a struggle with cis-dudes, in my experience: and that’s even with those I trust enough to be close to, for reasons I don’t need to state.
Also, you have the option of exploring it without involving yourself in a committed relationship too ofc.
Yep, I was butch long before I realized I was bi. It’s been my experience that cis guys attracted to me are mostly comfortable with my gender performance and happy to share stereotypically masculine and feminine interests.
My problems have been less with heteronormative behavior expectations within the relationship and more with encountering surprise MRAs who thought I’d be like a broski with benefits or something because I’m “not like most girls.” It’s a huge, HUUUGE red flag if they show signs of thinking femmes inferior or holding stereotyped negative views of what they think are typical women. Even the ones who self identify as liberal/progressive/feminist/ally can still turn out to be sexist or biphobic, in which case I strongly recommend you run like hell because they’ll eventually remember you’re female and treat you like shit. You can’t educate the ones who react poorly to any criticism and they will only get more abusive over time.
I’ve had a great relationship with a cisbi man for close to a decade, so it does work out sometimes. Our arrangement is unconventional but suits us. Passing for het is hit or miss, we’re bad enough at it that we’ve both inspired viewer gender confusion in public and have gotten gay or les slurs with eggs/fruit thrown at us from cars while walking on more than a few occasions. I don’t really consider us a hetero couple.
Good luck, if/when you go exploring.
Thank you Autostraddle and all the commenters! This is getting to be the length of a book and hopefully someday I will read you all.
I am bi/pan but have only dated girls so far. I have always been worried about the feelings & external bullshit that I might encounter if/when I do start dating a guy. Its rough to see that these fears are legitimate and real for so many of us, but I’m mostly grateful to have these stories on hand for when I am experiencing erasure and need a community/pick-me-up.
So much love to everyone!
I’m so glad AS is making this space! I definitely have a relevant dilemma I’d love people’s thoughts on. I’ve been dating a very great bi guy for a while now, and we’re getting to the point where we’d really like to start meeting each other’s families. I’m friends with his mom on FB already, and she is a very sweet woman who likes to talk about crafts and things with me. She (as well as her husband) is also a pretty conservative Christian. I really want to meet this family and be my authentic self with them, but I feel like being out to them would out my sweetie as well bc of the nature of our relationship and my queerness. How can I make it clear that I need queerness to be respected around me (at the very least) without pulling someone I love out of the closet?
Have you shared all your concerns with your sweetie, and discussed them and his closet status? You don’t want to pressure or out him without his consent of course, but his thoughts on the situation and level of dependence on his family might give you some direction. It could be that the closet is mission critical for him, or he accepts the risk, or he intends to come out at some point in the future. He probably knows best as to how his family will behave and should be invested in keeping things as pleasant and safe as possible for you and himself, so talk it out with him.
Would being out orientation wise but not gender wise around them be workable or any less unpleasant for you than entirely closeted, in the event there isn’t a better option?
If being out is a no go and you need to avoid being a captive audience to bigoted drivel over Sunday dinner, you could try playing the ally card, if that situation even comes up in the first place. If I don’t want to listen to someone’s bs or argue over it, my usual tactic is to request we agree to disagree and drop the subject. If bigoted rants are expected, he could just say he’s bringing a liberal to dinner and let’s please not go there. With the power of heteronormative assumptions and denial, they’ll probably just suspect you of being hippie scum.
Good luck to you and your guy, hope everything works out.
I may not sleep tonight because I want to read each and every comment. This is no TL:DR, it’s So Long and Awesome: Who Can Sleep?
I am a pansexual woman-identified female. I’m currently with a man in a mostly-closed relationship of over three years. The year before we got together was the most concentrated time of sexuality-exploring and experimenting time that I think I’ve had. And then I met this guy. I wasn’t going to date men for awhile, I said, I was going to do the women and genderfukt thing until I found someone amazing. I DEFINITELY wasn’t going to date this guy, because I was furious at him for allowing a performer at the stage shows he ran to do anti-trans performances. He was a jerk, I decided, and there’s only one thing to do with jerks: educate them and/or walk away. He turned out to be a very good student. And a good teacher. And most of the things I was thinking would be great to find in a person. But he’s a straight white guy! Of all the people, really?! I hadn’t dated a straight white guy in I don’t know how long. I felt like I was betraying the pansexual identity I’d been exploring. But, since pansexual does in fact include straight white men, I couldn’t just dismiss him out of hand. That and I really do love him.
Before he and I got together, a lot of people in my life who knew me decently well thought I was a lesbian. Those who had just met me at work could be forgiven for thinking I was straight because I complied with the work dress code. There are times when I choose not to correct someone because I’m exhausted at the thought of explaining pansexuality yet another time to someone who more than likely will decide that I am wrong about myself and can’t possibly know more than them on this subject.
As far as staying connected with the queer community, I’ve got a pretty good “in” at my church, where it’s about half-and-half queer and not queer. Also the poetry community in the area tends to attract the queer ones. Both of those groups are pretty good about including even those queer people in what might look like straight relationships.
1st off: beautiful thread. ;*
I am a bisexual woman dating a man. In love and currently building a family with him.
He knows my sexuality and history of dating women. He loves me for who I am exactly as I am. Though in the past, male partners that I’ve had have been threatened by my sexuality, feeling uncomfortable when I hang out with *any* gender given my lack of preference for either. It took a long time for me to find someone who didn’t experience these insecurities about my sexual preferences.
As far as my sexuality goes, it doesn’t really affect our relationship. We are monogamous (shout out to my poly babes though) and secure in our love for ourselves and each other.
I am happy to have found such a great partner, regardless of gender. :)
I needed this. I needed this thread, and I needed all of you wonderful people. Thank you so much, Autostraddlers.
I love my cis hetero boyfriend, and I want us to be each other’s family, to build our adult lives together, to have children. I love that he asked if he could take me to Pride events. I love that he asks me about bi erasure/visibility. I love every centimetre of his face and my heart rips open when I see him smile and laugh. He is not without fault, but he is always trying to be a better human, and he encourages me to do the same.
But I want to be with women. I have never met a woman who I love like I love my boyfriend, but that is exactly what I want. I feel a deep need to love and be with another woman–other PEOPLE.
My boyfriend has known that I’m bisexual since before we became a couple. He’s always looking to learn more about feminism and about being a better ally. He tries, and he engages my mind. I love that. He also knows that I fully believe that polyamory is 100% legit and awesome, but… A couple months ago (shortly after moving in together for the first time), I told him that I was interested in having a vaguely open relationship of *some kind,* but I wanted us to take our time to figure out our boundaries and decide what would work for each of us as individuals. It broke his heart. And then it also broke *MY* heart, because the truth was that I just wanted to be with women, but I didn’t even verbalize this to him. My boyfriend has promised that he won’t leave me because of this, but he’s not ready to even talk about it. I don’t want to choose between the love of this wonderful person, and the need to be with women and non-men people, but I’m still scared that this is exactly what will happen.
I’ve read so many posts from bisexual women who, like me, love their male/male-identifying partners, and are perfectly content not having anyone else, or have no regrets about not being with more women. I am super happy for you, but I do have regret. I do have self-doubt. I do have unmet needs. Maybe the regret and the needs come partly from the biphobia/self-doubt that festers in the back of my mind, but… I don’t have any more words.
Thank you so much for letting me say this.
Oh my goodness. This is so brave and powerful and heartbreaking. Thank you for sharing this here with us – I wish I had advice for you xxxx
I don’t have advice, because I’m in a somewhat-similar situation, but I just want to say I HEAR YOU. And I’m feeling some of the things you’re feeling, and I think there is a way for everyone’s needs to be met, but it’s so hard to figure out/imagine what that way is.
I don’t have advice either but I hear you too, and wish you the best. I have had the experience of being scared that my future would involve either the enormous loss of a person, or the enormous loss of never being with women. I agree with Lou, I do believe there are ways to be found through this stuff – best of luck <3
So much love supportive thoughts for you. That’s a really hard, heartbreaking place to be. Thank you for sharing.
I am in SUCH a similar situation; reading your words made my heart ache. I got engaged two years ago to the most wonderful, kind, accepting, loving person on the planet, but it’s becoming clear to me that seeing a future without ever having been in a relationship with a woman is heartbreaking to me. I have no advice, because reading your words actually felt like I was reading my own inner dialogue, but I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for showing me that I am not alone in this.
Thank you for being brave and sharing this. I was sorta kinda in your position back when – married to a man I adore with all my heart, but also deeply yearning to be with a woman (my partner was my first serious relationship so I’d never even been with one), and unsure how to broach the subject. I was immensely fortunate in that he was the one who put it to me that it would be OK if I sometimes wanted to see other people. And I’ve been even more fortunate to have had several very gratifying relationships with women since then.
I’ve discovered that I need both to feel fulfilled, and that’s OK. There’s zero wrong with that need. Different people play different roles in our lives. It does nothing to diminish any of them. I put it like this – our hearts are vast things, with infinite capacity to love and care for others. Adding one person, even someone you want to spend your life and build a family with, does not push out any others. They can all live there, together. We have to be respectful, and honest, and communicative, of course–as we do with everyone we care about, romantic or otherwise.
It sounds like your guy needs some time to process whatever feelings he’s having about the idea, and that’s also OK. But definitely keep talking to him about it, tell him how you feel, too. Try to meet in the middle. Maybe it works out better than you ever imagined. Maybe he gives a firm ‘no’ (and you go from there). Better to know than to spend your life wondering, though, right?
I wish you all the best!
holy shit, are you me? i could have written every word of your post. this past year, i even tried to meet people and went on a date or two but as much as my partner was (and is) intellectually on board, he just couldn’t deal when it was happening… he was really distraught, which makes me feel like the worst person in the world. we’re just kind of still at a stalemate at the moment. i still think it’s going to be important to me to keep exploring, especially because he was one of my first sexual partners and i was actually his—i just feel like we need to know more about the world, but i also know i want to keep him as my mate, and i could never cash that in just for curiosity. i honestly have no idea how this turns out, but i hope all of us can get our needs met with patience and compromise and compassion, sometime some way. lots and lots of love!
oh man! i wish i had advice here. i’ve been maneuvering this for a year or so myself and just wanted to send love your way.
I feel you. I really loved this guy and we were living together and had all these plans…and I just broke up with him about a month ago because I knew I had to have sexual/romantic experiences with women, and he knew that he wasn’t going to be ok with that. It sucks, I am really sad about loosing this amazing love and relationship. I hope it’s for the best.
Hi – I have felt this way before. And I needed to leave in order to spend a long time learning how to put myself and my needs at the center of my life. This both had to do and didn’t have to do with my feelings about wanting to date women. But I will never forget how it felt to watch “The L Word” next to him (and then privately, secretly, by myself, when he wasn’t home), and feeling my heart clutch with what I wanted so much and thought I could never have.
Flash forward a decade and I’m at peace with myself and my relationship to love. Anonymous, I wish the same for you. I think you’re going to be ok. <3
I feel the same way.
I have been attracted to many different types of people from a young age, but never had a word for it, or true understanding of it until very recently.
My problem is I have children, and am pretty fem (but also a lil rough around the edges) so I pass as straight. I have had a intense urge to have a real relationship with a woman (not just hook ups), but here I am dating a man that I care deeply for. He knows I’m bi, but didn’t take it well at first. On one hand I feel like I could spend many happy years with him, but on the other I feel like I’m cheating myself out of an intense desire and an undeniable part of who I am.
Even if I made the choice to branch out and date women it feels impossible to be accepted, children and all
I feel the same. You’re incredibly brave and lovely for sharing your experience, I hope with time you’ll be able to start talking through everything and working it out! I’ve been with my straight cis husband monogamously for 15 years, he’s known I was bisexual from the start. I love him so much, and have always been very focused on keeping our relationship healthy and happy. We have children too which adds to my determination to stay together. Although I was out to friends and family, I had never really accepted it myself, I felt like it was an embarrassing anomaly. About 8 years ago I started to really feel like I needed to explore my feelings towards women, rather than just fantasising. What has followed has been a slow discussion with my patient but often terrified husband about the idea of dating others to meet our differing needs (we got together young so both feel that we have some exploring to do). We’re both wanting long term relationships, we need depth of connection rather than a series of brief exchanges. But although he’s OK to talk about it, he often losses sleep over the thought of us going out and doing it, and I feel so guilty for opening up what seems like a Pandora box of confusion. I feel as though at this stage of life, as a mother – I ‘should’ be settled, but what I seem to be doing is breaking every rule in the book of how to not mess things up. Then I think that that’s not who I am, I always do things differently and would hate to follow ‘the rules’ (I just occasionally appear to, due to lack of confidence!). It’s only been the last year where I’ve been able to fully embrace and accept being bisexual (pan). I think in part this is because of the amazing explosion of positive articles about it. This thread is amazing, it feels so good to know I’m not alone, and can speak freely. Up until recently, I’ve only ever known 1 other bi person (in reality there were more, but I’ve only recently known!), I never felt like I qualified to be part of the queer community, to know that I do and can join in means all the world to me – thank you Autostraddle! (I’m also another one who just joined as a member due to this thread!).
As a poly, kinky, pansexual woman who also happens to have a tiny tyrant of her own: NO, you do NOT have to feel like you should be “done” just because you have children. Yes, it absolutely will complicate things, you will have to think about logistics most parents and poly people will never even imagine, but don’t you dare hide part of yourself “for the children”! Think about it: what kind of message does that send to your children? “I hid something about me that really matters because I felt society would think it was wrong/out might inconvenience someone else.” Not not NOT what you want to teach your children. Not gonna lie, you’re going to do a huge amount of talking: to your husband, to any future partners, to your kids. However, my husband and I have been poly just about from the start, and we’ve been together roughly half my life now, and as long as we’re good about communicating with each other, we’ve done okay. It’s been rocky sometimes, but we’ve gotten through the military, severe depression, being stuck in my parents’ house for 4 years, cancer, and now a child, and you know what? We’re still poly, I’m still pansexual and kinky, and I think we’re stronger because we never denied part of our identities, we got what needs the other couldn’t satisfy met elsewhere and with permission, and because we kept talking to each other. It *can* be done. *hugs* If you like, you can poke at me anytime with questions, and I’ll give you whatever advice I might have, or just listen if you need an ear.
Thank you for posting Kethry, that’s just what I needed to hear! *hugs* My main frustration is that I can see it working in practice, but can’t seem to lose the inner critic..! My children know I’m Bi, and I totally want to approach things in a positive way, it’s just taking a lot of courage to get there mentally(!). I’ve only recently felt able to be myself (as opposed to the self I thought was expected of me), it’s taken quite a bit of determination to not waver from being unapologetic about who I am, despite it being the best choice I’ve ever made. I just wish that inner critic would go away!
If you’re bisexual with no history of female relationships, people often assume you’re angling for attention. Male partners might be wary of your gender expression; people might generally assume you’d down for a polygamous relationship; others will reject the idea that you don’t have a physical ‘type’ because your interests are based on gender expression, not bodily nature.
These are all predictable reactions, but the LGBTQI community’s disdain for you as greedy is perhaps the worst — especially when you really care about commitment and tend towards serious relationships.
What do you think we could do to change this perception?
“How do you stay involved in the queer community, especially while dating a man?”
I don’t.
Varies by community, but most LGBTQ+ communities per se have made it abundantly clear that women like me are not welcome. Or if we are welcome, it’s this sort of uneasy detente where we’re only welcome if we promise to keep quiet about major important parts of our lives.
No thanks. I’ve actively opted out of the official LGBTQ+ scene in my area and spend time in the burner scene instead, which is highly bi/poly/queer-in-a bunch-of-nonstandard-ways and super welcoming. I highly recommend people check out other alternative-y communities in their areas; they might find them similarly genial. They may have their own set of faults, but I’ve never felt any kind of awkwardness about my sexuality.
Autostraddle is the exception rather than the rule when it comes to LGBTQ communities being welcoming of bisexual women currently dating men- and why would I waste time trying to ingratiate myself with a community that doesn’t want me there?
(This thread is way long and I am way late and probably no one will read this far down, but answering because I don’t know that anyone else gave this specific answer.)
That is so fucking sad. I’ve definitely felt this way too. Or like everyone is looking at me as an impostor. It’s been important for me to find other bi/queer/pan women to hang out with. They exist! Bring them all together and have a party and love each other.
I remember feeling exactly this, the last time I was with a dude. It was really isolating.
I’m so sorry you had that experience of your local queer scene. Personally, during the 7 years I was in a committed monogamous partnership with a man my entire circle of friends (and his) was the queer scene local to us. I didn’t experience biphobia there or feel I had to prove anything, we were just accepted with the rest. In the mainstream ‘gay scene’ I’ve encountered more biphobia. But I don’t want new-bis to read this and automatically assume they won’t be accepted in queer spaces – by my definition of ‘queer’, they should be!
I’m glad you had a better experience than I have! I realize in my last paragraph I didn’t make the “varies by community” exception I made in my first, and I should have done that- I’m sure there are a goodly handful of nice, accepting LGBTQ+ -centered communities out there somewhere.
I’m sorry that the LGBTQ+ community excluded you. Your head is screwed on and we should all dig that.
Have you done anything to stand up to people’s perception? I ask because I think it might be up to us confident ones to make the change.
Yess to other alternative communities! I have also had good experiences with burners and geeks.
I had three books I intended to read on this megabus ride before I found this thread. =p This is great!
Some experiences I’ve had that I was wondering if anyone else can relate to. ..
Progressive supposedly lgb allied friends being completely unsupportive when I talked about coming out to my parents. Even aghast, like “why would you do such a thing?” I’m pretty sure they would have told a gay or lesbian friend they were brave.
A family member theorizing that I am bi because our society puts so much pressure on women to be sexy and it’s seen as a sexy trend. (What? !)
A good friend who’s got radical politics, is an activist with tons of queer friends consistently telling me that she thinks I’m actually really gay.
My brother in law informing me that it would be really hard on the family if I ended up with a woman.
An acquaintance, upon finding out I was bi through seeing me make it with someone, ask me “so is it just a sexual thing for you worth women? ”
When I told someone who knew me mostly from queer spaces that i was going to visit a sweetheart in California and used male pronouns she asked if he was trans and when I said no she raised her eyebrows and said “so you’re. …open. ” which. A).if he was trans that still makes me bi and b) why would you treat me differently for being non monosexual?
I have had a few longer relationships with men and understand that feeling like you have to downplay them to keep your queer cred. I also sometimes hesitate to talk about being poly and being bi together because of those mean bi stereotypes.
I’m curious too about people’s feelings on labels. I have an emotional attachment to “bi” because when I first heard it I felt suddenly possible as a real person. I was very sheltered and raised conservative. I knew I was attracted to girls and boys, thought I was wrong to be attracted to girls and fought it and wondered if I was a lesbian. I found out about bisexuality as a thing when I was told the boy who had a crush on me was bi and when my friend told me what that meant it was like this huge light shone down on me and suddenly i was a possible human being! I also identify as queer, which I like for its subversiveness, it’s politics, it’s inclusiveness, and how it doesn’t refer at all to the binary. Pansexual is probably accurate for me, but I just don’t feel connected to it. It’s interesting to me how it’s not just the dictionary definition that matters, but my personal emotive history with these words. Thoughts?
<3 to you all! I'm grateful for this space to discuss!
I think it’s so real to identify with a label based on the way it makes you feel. The terms are so ephemeral and constantly changing anyways. If you ever start to cozy up to another term then take it! I also like to identify as bi as a political statement because visibility is important.
Sexy trends: the “sexy trend” of kissing girls at high school parties is actually what kept me in the closet as a middle schooler. I didn’t want to be labelled an attention whore, or a slut like the other girls were. But it looked like they were having fun to me.
confused strangers: somebody once said to me (okay, wait I’m gonna name drop here because it’s just too good for the story: this person was Steve Coogan) said “so do you have a boyfriend or are you a lesbian?” and I was all like “both.”
Other people have said this above but I identify with bi meaning attracted to one’s own gender and others/attracted to two or more genders. I sometimes feel weird using it because so many people understand it as implying a binary, but I also like using it, like Hannah said, for visibility and because I feel connected to it.
I feel you on having a gut response to labels. Queer just feels right to me. Interestingly, I’ve come to think of bi as more political for reasons of challenging bi erasure. Unfortunately, when I say “queer” people often hear “lesbian.”
Thanks for sharing all those stories and experiences. I’m sure a lot of people can relate. I know I can!
There are so many comments here that I want to respond to, but mostly I just want to add another voice saying that I’m grateful for this thread and for everyone who’s shared on it.
I’m not with a man right now, but my relationship with my sexuality and myself is still shaped by the experience of being a queer woman with a man. I had never been with a woman and was out to my boyfriend as bi but to no one else. Over the course of our six years together I felt really tortured by things that weren’t directly related to the relationship, and it ultimately seemed like my sexuality was what was torturing me, and that was so upsetting. I’d gotten to the point, as a teenager, before this boy, of feeling sort of excited about my bisexuality and eventually claiming that identity, but it became something so fraught, like it embodied this big loss – either I’d never be with a woman, or I’d have to leave this person I loved. I avoided queer spaces, and women in general. I felt physical pain when I saw queer couples. I read autostraddle obsessively and never commented. I had so much trouble with sex, and so much anxiety about it.
I eventually left my boyfriend in part because of my sexuality. I had a wonderful girlfriend. I came out to a lot of people. And I’m still navigating so much of this. I find that I don’t like to refer to my ex-boyfriend to new acquaintances, because it was so exhausting for so long to be perceived as straight and I hate the feeling. I found, when I was part of a queer community for the first time, that even then I shied away from using “bi” and letting it be known that I’d been with guys. I wonder about my gender identity sometimes, and my gender presentation a lot of the time. I was afraid of femininity for so long because it seemed to reinforce the invisibility. When I feel drawn toward masculine presentation I wonder if it’s still partly fear of being seen in the wrong way, or not being seen. I still question myself and struggle with accepting that I don’t need to prove anything to anyone.
It’s powerful to hear how many of us are so deeply effected by this stuff. And it’s really helpful to hear wonderful perspectives from amazing, strong people. <3
I really empathise with that feeling of ‘loss’ you mention, when you’d fought so hard to identify your identity and then began a relationship with a man.
I’m a bisexual woman who has only really dated men, but I’ve had sex with women. I married young, and when I divorced, I finally was able to express my sexuality. I am again in a serious relationship with a man. But there’s a wrinkle. We’re open. Which means I’m having sex with other partners (of all varieties), but am still not able to shake the bi-erasure because of the additional stigma around plural relationships and arrangements. We live in a small city, and there could be professional consequences for me.
Being able to finally have sex with women has reassured me of my identity. It’s also led to a whole other layer of insecurity. It’s hard to swipe right when you’re pretty sure that you don’t have enough experience to offer anything to that super cute lady who calls herself “super gay.” I don’t want to waste anyone’s time with my learning curve.
Awww <3 Just be honest with them. Let the "super gay" cutie decide what she can or can't handle.
YEP. Pretty much my experience exactly, complete with open/poly current relationship, and ALL THE ANXIETY about thinking I’m “gay enough” to pretend like I deserve sex (let alone love) with a woman who is experienced at being with other women.
Just jumping in to say that I’ve been on the other side of that equation before, and I absolutely didn’t find it a problem. Would recommend being upfront about it, so things aren’t mysteriously awkward. But other than that, I know there are lots of people who just wouldn’t find it a problem.
Thanks for the support, ladies. I’m working on talking with women more, so it helps to know that there are so many other women looking for or open to just what I have to give. And I’m definitely upfront about my status with potential partners. Actually, the biggest reason is because it helps fend off the possessive and potentially dangerous men. Which is a whole other thing.
i’ve always just imagined the massive eyeroll from lady-loving ladies when they come across a profile or whatnot from girls like us: “oh, you’ve got a boyfriend? but you’re still interested? but not experienced? that’s adorable. good luck with all that.” it’s awesome to hear that the situation is not always a 100% immediate write-off… :)
I know this feel.
I’d like to talk a bit about the “greedy bisexual” stereotype. For a long while, I suppressed being polyamorous because I felt it made me a bad queer woman. I felt I had to prove I was “good enough” for a romantic relationship by being offended by the idea that I’d be into a threesome. How dare someone think that just because I like men and women, that I’m immediately down to have both at once!!! Being bisexual doesn’t mean I can’t be monogamous! It’s this weird respectability politics, right? I felt I had to be a “model bisexual” or I had no right to be happy. But you know what? I like threesomes. I like having multiple male and female partners. I’m a greedy bisexual. Sorry I’m having more fun than you?
I’d say I definitely identify more as a slutty bisexual. Nonmonogamy forever and ever.
(a thought I just had is that I will get a nameplate necklace that says slutty bisexual)
+1 slutty bisexual!
I’m pretty sure you just had a million dollar idea #justsayin
YOU ARE MY HERO <3
I always try to clarify this with people! I am definitely monogamous, but some bi people are and some aren’t. Just like some straight people are and some aren’t.
Gaby,I think you are my spirit animal..lol.
“Oh you’re dating a man, you must now be straight or seen the error of your ways” is the worst thing anybody can tell me SOLELY based on the fact that I date men too. Nobody seems to really understand the basis of bisexuality and they try to tell me I should be more gay if I am /really/ bisexual. Ugh.
Oh my god, I’m seeing so much of my story in these posts! I have a final tomorrow so I’ve only read part of the comments. Tomorrow afternoon I will be reading all of them! So excited for this thread – and so many feelings already.
I grew up thinking I was straight because my mom always said women were attractive – without differentiating attractive from attracted to – so I thought being attracted to girls didn’t mean I wasn’t straight. I was even in the Gay-Straight Alliance and didn’t figure it out, hah. I realized it in my early 20s. But I never dated much – 2 boyfriends, and I married the second. It wasn’t that I was never interested in dating someone other than a man (otherwise I wouldn’t identify as queer…), it just didn’t happen. When I first told my now-husband, his reaction was the typical “how do you know if you’ve never dated a woman?” He realized that’s silly very quickly, and is incredibly supportive.
But in queer spaces, including here a lot of the time, I feel like I don’t/shouldn’t count as pan/queer. A lot of my family doesn’t know because my mom thinks I shouldn’t tell them – not because they’d be angry or upset, but because “you’re married to a man, what’s wrong with them thinking you’re straight? You’d just be confusing them and oversharing.” :( I know they’d be totally fine with it (I’ve seen how other queer and trans family members have been treated, so I’m not concerned), but I still don’t bring it up. And my mom has no (apparent) problem with it, either, but her issue is that she very much dislikes sexuality labels and doesn’t want anybody to use them. So she thinks telling people is bad because none of us should be labeling ourselves. At the same time, I HAVE heard my mom say disparaging things about bi people (not other LGBTQ, though), though she brushes it off as a joke…
I don’t know, though, have I avoided telling family members outside my immediate family because of my mom or because I just don’t think it’s relevant? I don’t like being seen as straight because I’m not, and I do correct friends so they know, but it doesn’t come up with family members much so I just don’t say anything. Is that internalized biphobia? I have no idea.
firstly, YAAASSS at the whole freaking idea about this. secondly, I’m only 19 and I found out that I was in love with my best friend when I was 15. I didn’t know it was more than just physical attraction after I actually dated another one of my best friends when I was 17. (I dated guys here and there in the meanwhile) I then concluded that I was legit bi. I knew I wasn’t gay because I did like guys. ANYWAY, I’m dating a really great guy now and the first thing I told him before we started dating is that I was bi. he literally “okaaay, so?” I was like “wait what? you’re not weirded out or disgusted?” yes, the guys I dated before felt all awkward the moment I told them I was bi. I mean, these are the guys that watch lesbian porn and get off to it but can’t accept it when the girl they apparently “love” is bi? it’s also sad that people don’t get the whole definition of being bi. long story short, I’m happy with where I am now in my life and I’ve never been happier being who I am!
p/s: I need help with family though. I recently opened up to my dad and he’s totally fine about it. my aunt shot me down like a criminal convincing me that I wasn’t bi. mum? forget about it. she’d flip if I told her! I don’t know what to do. :(
Oh my god thank you so much. I’ve been reading autostraddle for four years and this is the first time I’ve ever felt like I could be a part of the conversation. That’s not a dig at the site, it’s always inclusive, but I can’t tell you how nice it feels to be explicitly recognized. I know everyone has said that but +1.
Thanks for all your stories, everyone. For me, the problem is that I want to come out as bi but I feel like my feelings for women aren’t worthy of discussion because I love my boyfriend. But then I feel like I’m lying all the time and it sucks. Also, I don’t know how to publicly discuss the topic without making my boyfriend feel shitty. I’m sure there’s already a ton of wonderful advice on this topic in the comments, so let me just say I love you all and I’m so grateful for this.
I know how that feels and I think it’s important to acknowledge that it does suck. When I was in a similar place I told myself for a long time that it shouldn’t be such a big deal, my sexuality didn’t need to be a thing in my life if I had a boyfriend. But like you said it feels like lying and not being known and it’s shitty. I found a bisexual support group in my area and the feeling of walking into a room and for the first time being assumed to be queer, regardless of appearance or who my partner might be, was amazing. I hope you find good support/community/other stuff to remind you that your feelings really ARE worthy <3
Lira can I ask you about the bisexual support group? I’ve considered them before but it always seems like they have like 4 members and I’m always worried it’ll be weird and awkward. What has your experience been like?
Hey! I definitely get those concerns. I was lucky to be living in Boston where the Bisexual Resource Center is, so there may have been more people involved than typically would be. But even when it was a very small group I found it helpful. I wasn’t able to go all that many times and didn’t get super involved, but it was so validating to be immediately understood as welcome in the space. It drove home for me how many different kinds of bi narratives there are, how big the umbrella is, and made me feel much more comfortable identifying with the term. It helped to air some things that had been living in my head, and I think even more it helped to see things about my experience reflected in other people, in real life, in one room. Good luck if you end up checking one out!
Oh wow, thanks so much for sharing that resource!
Personally, I think there is nothing wrong, even in a monogamous relationship, with finding other people attractive. Developing harmless crushes, even. If your boyfriend is not jealous when you are ogling Magic Mike XXL, why would he be more jealous of you being attracted to women? I guess he might be worried that you want something he can’t give you. That might be true for you. But if it’s not, and you are only interested in actually being with him, it shouldn’t be a threat. Even if it is, there are ways to talk about and deal with that. Either way, if you feel like you have to edit yourself to be with someone, that is not a great feeling and it can mess up a relationship in the long run. Coming out as bi doesn’t invalidate your relationship with your boyfriend. I hope he’ll feel the same way!
Side note: Yes to ogling Magic Mike XXL.
Thank you for doing this. It came at an especially helpful time.
Thank you thank you thank you for this thread, and also for all y’all commenting today. I went from knowing one (count ONE) other queer woman in a relationship with a man to knowing… well…. lots. That’s really affirming.
Especially because my first quasi-relationship (and only relationship with a woman) was with a woman who would later say that she was just confused and it didn’t mean anything to her after all… We were not on the same page about that. But I’ve only been in one relationship since then (my current one, with a man), so I really feel you all about the ways we find to invalidate our own bisexualities.
I have been with my current (male) partner for four years, and it’s so so different than what I had imagined for myself. I had just come out as gay when I met him and was looking to date women. So that was a surprise. I feel really lucky to have a partner who wants to process feelings all the time and who is so kind and who sees me so well for who I am.
We are planning to get married eventually and though I find penises gross (my partner’s mostly included) I love building our life together and feel my needs very well met most of the time.
However, there are experiences (romantic, sexual, etc.) that I always expected and envisioned having with women that I haven’t had. And expecting to have those formed part of my sense of self. The tricky thing now is that they still form part of that sense of self, but it’s much more tricky to imagine how to have them. I don’t feel like I need to make out with women to be validated in being queer, but I still WANT to. My partner and I have talked a lot about it, and he’s up for thinking of creative ways to meet both of our needs in the relationship. I know exploring polyamory would be one way to do that, and I like the idea of being able to explore some experiences with women while still having the relationship I have with my partner. However, I certainly don’t feel (like many of my poly friends do) that I’m “wired for” polyamory, or even very interested in it.
I dunno. Just wanted to share, and am interested in hearing if anyone else has been in a similar spot.
Does your partner know that you think penises are gross? How do you guys cope with that?
Yes, he does know, and it doesn’t bother him much. I think it helps that he also thinks penises are gross, so we can laugh about it. Neither of us have a particularly high sex drive, so sex wouldn’t be a big part of our relationship anyways, and as it is we compromise, and I’m fine with that.
I am a 19 year-old panromantic homosexual cis female dating a cis male. I’ve been with him for almost two years and I don’t expect to leave him anytime soon. However, I label myself as a panromantic homosexual. I don’t find penis attractive. I didn’t really find my boyfriend that attractive physically. I was attracted to him romantically so from there I have been able to weigh the important factors and find him sexually romantic but I still find women sexually arousing. I feel that I will not be with my boyfriend all my life although it is not limited to only him. I don’t think I want to spend my entire life with only one person, whoever it may be. People change, I don’t feel like forcing each other to stay living as you are is the best way to go about things if times get rough. I’m not saying just quit as soon as it gets hard, I’m saying give up when it becomes unbearable. But anyways, I am with this man and I love him very much but I just feel like I cannot possibly be with him my whole life. Not exclusively, anyways.
I relate to this so much. I id as bi and did so before meeting my now partner. He is a cis straight male and respects/understands my queer identity so much (even though I have zero experience with anyone besides cis men). He’s so understanding. I really relate to what you say about penis though lol. I thought I was alone in this or that something was wrong with me for not particularly or always finding penis very attractive or arousing, but I guess I’m not alone. I often feel that I am mostly into women and that if I hadn’t met him, I probably wouldn’t be with a guy. It sounds weird, but I feel like sometimes it just happens that way. I
I guess I hold onto the relationship because I love him and he taught me how to love. He is also my best friend, which is something I value immensely in a partner. I have a low sex drive and intimacy can be difficult for me regardless because of trauma I have in my childhood that I carried into adulthood. I am YEARS late to this discussion, but just finding your comment made me feel less alone. If you see this, I’d love to discuss. <3
WOULD YOU JUST LOOK AT ALL THIS AMAZING BI PRIDE.
This post might have just become my favourite Autostraddle post off all time, and I’ve been here since 2010.
Here are some of my bisexual thoughts and grievances:
First, some history. Was pretty interested in LGBT issues as a pre-teen and young teen. Got my first crush on a girl when I was 15 and I was pretty stoked that I got to be in the cool queer kids club (please note that there was no such actual club at my school, nor a GSA, and I didn’t have a single non-straight friend until I went to university). I guess maybe a part of me knew I might be bi before then but I needed some evidence of actual attraction to feel like I could consciously claim the label. I came out to my parents when I was 18, and came out in general (like, would be happy outing myself to most people / in most circumstances) when I was 19. I don’t have very much romantic or sexual experience (it hasn’t really been a priority until recently), but pretty much all of it has been with men. The men I’ve dated I met at my campus’s LGBTQ+ centre (and they were poly dating situations as well), so luckily there wasn’t any feeling of being less welcome. Of course, that did mean that after we broke up, hanging out and volunteering at the centre were more fraught, because one of my exes was bound to be around. So I guess it was a pretty queer relationship in that way too : p
I’ve experienced my share of fluidity. For a while (the entire year I was 20), I felt very little sexual attraction to anyone, and then just very little to men (but I was still quite romantically attracted to them). This was one of the most bewildering and distressing situations I’ve been in. I eventually figured out that I am attracted to more feminine men, and that I’m generally most comfortable being a “top” in the bedroom with men. Let me tell you, this is not a preference or activity configuration that gets a lot of play in mainstream or countercultural or even marginalized narratives. I have an interest in some bdsm things, but the “man=top and woman=bottom when they are having vanilla sex with each other” idea is so deeply ingrained in everything ever, that even wanting to be the one taking the lead, setting the pace, and focusing on doing things to the other person and how they’re experiencing what you’re doing when you’re a woman and your hypothetical partner is a man, once you’ve figured out that it’s even possible / a real thing, feels kinky. Thanks patriarchy.
Although it’s possible I haven’t had enough romantic or sexual experience with women (been on a date or two is pretty much it) to uncover hidden depths of insecurity and internalized homophobia and biphobia, right now the thought of dating or having sex with a woman feels *delightfully* free of all the symbolic and personal baggage that dating/sexing men comes with for me, especially as boys/men have attempted or succeeded at molesting/sexually assaulting me (while no woman has done that to me so far). Figuring out how to enjoy and feel safe having sex with men in the wake of these events has definitely been its own nearly decade-long journey.
Interestingly, as far as top/bottom roles go for sexual activities with women, I’m pretty sure I’m label-free. And I’m attracted to a much wider range of personalities, body types, gender expressions, etc in women than I am in men.
I’m very lucky that my two closest friends are a woman who ID’s as queer and is exclusively interested in women, and a woman who ID’s as bi, and they are both very supportive of me and involved with the queer identity/community at large. So I never have to feel alone in my queerness or bisexuality.
Okay, here are some pet peeves. If I never have to hear about a “gold star” lesbian woman or gay man or non-binary person who only dates other non-binary people again in my lifetime, it will still be too darn soon. It is straight-up biphobic (it’s sometimes also used in a transphobic way, but even if it’s not that doesn’t make it any less biphobic). I am not some B-grade, second best, level of queer for a) being attracted to men at some point in my life, and/or b) experiencing some confusion about my sexuality and deciding to explore it. The idea that someone could be tainted or contaminated or rendered less pure by virtue of consensual genital contact with a man is super messed up! And really alarmingly close all sorts of patriarchal and puritanical ideas about purity, virginity, and women as property, btw.
Relatedly, I am so done with people being snide about people who are questioning their sexuality and who being proactive about their confusion and ambivalence and exploring it. It’s fine if you don’t have any interested in dating or having sex with someone who is figuring themselves out. But one’s sexuality can be a complicated tricky thing to work out, and that journey is not any less valid if the person ends up figuring out they ID as straight or heteroflexible at the end of it. It’s not retroactively exploitative if someone says “I don’t really know what’s going on with me right now but I want to find out” and then at the end they conclude that they are not attracted (romantically and/or sexually) to women. When you are in the middle of questioning your sexuality, you don’t know where you’ll end up. Otherwise you’d already be there. And there’s no way to tell someone who’s questioning and will eventually ID as gay, or bi, or queer, from someone who’s questioning and will eventually ID as straight or heteroflexible. We have to work hard to give everyone room to figure themselves out, while encouraging everyone to be upfront about their needs/intentions/whathaveyou to the whatever extent possible.
All right, I will add more later in a reply if I think of it, but I think this is everything for now. Thank you Autostraddle staff and commentors for making this thread and this day so beautiful.
:snaps:
“gold star” is not about you
Bisexual girl here, currently single. And I wanna talk about the thing that has been on my mind since I started talking about my sexuality with people. Keep in mind that I’ve been in relationships with both guys and girls before. The thing that I always get told is that I’m experimenting. Straight people say that I was just experimenting when I was dating girls, lesbians say that I was just experimenting when I was dating guys. It seems like no one can accept the fact that I’m bisexual. It’s like bisexuality is non-existent to them. And I’m fucking SICK of hearing that. I just wanna find a way to make everyone around me understand that I like people! No matter if they are female or male. If I like their personality and they like mine I’ll develop a crush on them and eventually date them (well not always :P )and that makes me BISEXUAL! Basically my question is… Does anyone else go through this? And is there a way to stop them from saying that I’m experimenting and make them understand that I’m just fuking bisexual?
Ummmmm…..well…… real deal is that some people are always going to be jerks. If these are your real, actual, close friends, you should consider sitting down with them and having a heart-to-heart about how their comments are hurting you. Chances are they don’t realize how mean they are being. If these are not your friends….f*ck them. I mean, not literally. But like, just walk away from them. You don’t need that negativity. Unfortunately, some people are always going to say or think offensive things about bisexuals and we can’t change that. We can change how much we react to it, though, and we can choose to be in communities and with friends who are bi-inclusive.
I saw this thread come up on twitter, started to read it, and I feel so many of you!! I immediately made an account. Hello everyone!
I’ve identified as bisexual since I was about 15 or 16. I initially thought I was a lesbian when I started getting crushes on girls, but then realized I was bi when I was attracted to men as well.
I’ve been in one relationship with the same person since I was 18, coming up on 10 years. We’re not married, for a variety of reasons. That person is amab, and we’re both bisexual. While it’s great to be in a relationship with a fellow bisexual who understands, the world still doesn’t get it. And I’ve spent 10 years feeling like a fake queer because I’ve been in a relationship that appears straight to the outside world. I was actively trying to date women as soon as I got to college, but I met my partner and here we are 10 years later. I’ve had many crushes on women, including a few of those super intense high school infatuations. But yeah, even though I regularly find women attractive, I still felt like a fake. I’m still in the closet to family (except my sister) and at work. My partner’s also mostly still in the closet.
But recently my partner realized they were a transgender woman (still using they pronouns for the time being). So I guess I don’t really fit into this category anymore, as they are going to start transitioning soon, so essentially, we’re both going to have to come out (although doubly so for my partner, it will be much more difficult for them).
I just wanted to post my experience in case it helps someone. It’s so nice to see so many of you out there. Thanks for validating me. :)
Thanks for sharing all of this, Liz! And good luck to your partner and to you as your relationship continues to change and grow deeper and you come out in the ways that are right for you. It’s great that you have each other to lean on!
Hi Liz! I understand what you mean about your relationship appearing straight to the outside world and how that can feel like you are not actually being a part of the queer world. My first serious relationship is with my current boyfriend. We’ve been together for almost 7 years and I met him when I was 18. He is straight/cis, and other than a couple of drunken talks, we haven’t really addressed the fact that I’m a bisexual woman. Also, I haven’t come out to my family yet because my long term relationship has been with a man… so there is no explaining to do. Still, there is that part of me that has been silent for so long, because to everyone else… we are the straight normal couple.
So I have a beautiful wife, but I am SOOOOO HAPPPPPPPPPPPY this is a thing! Much love to my multi-gender-attracted sibs! <3
I really like Autostraddle, and I pass through most days (and signed up to be an A+ member!) even though I often feel a bit like an interloper as a bi woman married to a man. For you guys to say that you see me even in while in that relationship (because my spouse isn’t going anywhere!) is a big deal. I try to be present and visible as a queer woman (because I read “femme” and stand beside a man so oooooooobbbbbviously straight right?!?!?!) in a world that just does not understand me as queer and to be understood and accepted as part of this queer community makes those day to day struggles lighter. I would love to see bi-inclusive language more often and bi-focused articles too (like you’ve done such a lovely job – at least from my cis-perspective- incorporating trans-inclusive language and articles. Keep doing your great stuff and keep aiming to greater stuff!
“I would love to see bi-inclusive language more often and bi-focused articles too (like you’ve done such a lovely job – at least from my cis-perspective- incorporating trans-inclusive language and articles. Keep doing your great stuff and keep aiming to greater stuff!”
So say we all!
Agreed! I absolutely love AS, but there have been many times they default to “lesbians” when they mean “women who are attracted to women.” This thread is a HUGE step in the right direction though.
This thread is awesome and so desperately needed in the community!
Though I have never had a hesitation to call myself bisexual once I figured out I was indeed bi, I have always kept it very quiet unless specifically asked. The subtle yet incredibly obvious judgmental opinions of other queer peers over the year have always made me want to avoid mentioning it, even though I have always been adamant I’ve been bi and have never wavered on this.
A lot of that judgment does come when I reveal I’ve never had a relationship with a woman. I have had quite a few women come and go that I have had both physical and emotional feelings for, have even been in love with a woman before, but because I never officially went into any relationship with her/any of these women it doesn’t seem to “count” to other people in the community. I am now married to a man that I love, but I do feel like being married to a man means my identity is further erased in other people’s eyes. I always feel like I have to constantly qualify myself to be included in a community that preaches a lot of acceptance but has a lot of hidden stipulations. I don’t know many bi people, either, and I wish I did because I would love to have a sense of community for this part of me.
This post is amazing and validating as fuck.
Well said.
This has been an amazing thread to read through, and like many other folks, I’ve been sitting here with tears in my eyes. So many of you have articulated so many parts of my experience, and I feel grateful for this space.
(I hope that this isn’t weird or against Autostraddle rules): do any of you live in Chicago? Would anyone be interested in meeting up sometime? It would make me super happy to know more bi and pan people.
And thank you everyone for being your awesome unicorn selves!
If you aren’t already a part of it, you might consider joining the Chicago Straddlers! http://https//www.facebook.com/groups/chicagostraddle/
Thank you! I just posted about this thread there and already heard from ten people.
I love this! I feel very welcomed so thank you for that. I’d like to share a bit of my experience and possibly have some advice.
I’m dating my bff who is a guy and also bisexual (almost 2 years together!) and everything is awesome with one exception, sometimes I feel like a jerk because:
– I’m a very jealous person :((
– I’m usually more jealous of guys :/ (I know, I know)
To me this is a very shitty thing to feel and my bf calls me out on it which is fair tbh. So what I’d like to know is if there’s someone out there that can relate to this and maybe give me some advice on how to NOT feel like that. does this make sense? thanks :) (sorry for my english, I’m not american)
That’s a really honest thing to reveal about yourself. Thank you for sharing it with us!
I think jealousy, in general, comes from a place of either internalized fear or from mistrust. If your BF isn’t breaking any rules of your relationship and has given you no reason not to trust him, maybe you are feeling a little bit of internalized biphobia. I mean, I think you know that it is silly to be more jealous of guys, as much as it would be for him to be more jealous of girls. Why do you think you feel this way? Deep deep down inside are you worried he’ll leave you for a guy because you “can’t compete” with a guy? Are you worried because you feel that way about yourself, too? I don’t know. Only you know.
Getting to the root of why you feel jealous can help and then talking about it with your BF and, ultimately, unlearning the behavior. There may be certain things that trigger your jealousy and figuring our what those are can help you notice the behavior. Of course you can’t stop being jealous overnight, but you can stop the behaviors that come with jealousy and you can fake it until you make it. Say to yourself, “I have no reason to be jealous right now” until you really believe it.
Good luck!
Thank you for this Kaelyn! it resonated with me. Unlearning behaviors is hard but doable.
I’m so glad this exists. I wish I had time to read it today!
I’m bisexual and dating a man I he totally supports me liking women and being bi its challenging I’m in a committed relationship with my boyfriend and I can’t interact with women in the same way as I do with him overall its pretty awesome :)
I’m pleased to see that Autostraddle took this initiative. For a while, I’ve unfollowed websites like Autostraddle, HuffPostGay etc because I sensed hints of biphobia on multiple occasions. I decided to focus my energy on organizations/groups that focus solely on Bisexual people. Bi-net https://www.facebook.com/groups/binetusa/, Bisexual History https://www.facebook.com/groups/BiHistory/, Global Bisexual Netowork https://www.facebook.com/groups/12391992191/ and it’s feels pretty awesome and affirming.
Generally, LGBTQIA organizations/media outlets can do more to be inclusive of the BTQIA. I’ve been out bisexual for 3 years, I’m 23 years old. I’ve dated men, women, and folks in between. I’ve volunteered on mental health chat lines where I speak on LGBTQ issues & I’m surprised by the amount of people of all genders who express attraction towards multiple genders yet are scared to admit to themselves & others the truth. Something about multiple gender attraction scares society. I often find that folks want me to quantify, qualify, pathologize my sexuality. I tired of it!! I am who I am.
#bipride
xoxo
Hi, I’m Cass and I’ve finally came out as bisexual/queer two months after being in the closet for 15 years. I was in a relationship with a man for 8 years and I was married to him for a time, even though was deeply in love with him,it was also my way to prove my “heterosexuality” because I was happy being with a man,sure surely I was not gay. I even prided myself on being a super staunch “straight ally” for the LGBT community. So surely since I was not a homophobe and I was with a man with plenty of gay friends,I was totally straight.
But at the same time this pull was also inside of me,it started when I was 11 years old when I had a crush on on a lady teacher,and then two years later,another lady teacher.
But I repressed it,very deeply,I mean, I like guys!
Then,freshman year in HS I got a killer girl crush on the lead singer of Evanescence and my first sexual fantasies of women started happening,which scared the crap out of me. I brushed this off and convinced myself that “every straight girl has that one girl they would go gay for”
Junior year, I met my future ex-husband and feel for him,hard. This was the validation I needed. I was with in sexually and romantically,so I knew I was ” straight” and a lot of the “bi girls” in high school were attention whores (so I thought being bi was not a real thing).
Not to mention the small,southern town I grew up in is VERY homophobic and uses religion as a means to hate,which scared the crap out of me.
I gradated high school and went into military school,then I got ANOTHER girl crush in military school and did not tell a soul. ( I chalked it up to missing boyfriend and repressed it.)
Years later, I star ed a job and started crushing on my boss….(Same pattern,denial…repression).
Then it happened with a co-worker(same pattern..repression…then I learned she was gay and her being flirtatious did not help.
Of course during all this I’m still fancying guys. I’m trying to explain to my self I’m straight.
Then nine months ago, it happened face on.I was very intoxicated and I made out with a girl.The instant my lips touched hers,my first thought was, “Fuck I did not want to be right,this confirms everything was afraid of.”
But I chalked that up to being drunk and I dismissed it to drunken antics.
But it kept digging at me.
I was not even digging the girl, what would happen it I was around I girl I was into?
And then it hit me like a ton of bricks.I was closeted.
I felt the weight over me,it was heavy and torturous. But I could not be like that. My parents could not have ANOTHER queer kid(who is now back in the closet),not to mention having a gay father. No! I needed to be straight.
I finally came out to my best friend extremely drunk two months ago.
And then pride happened.
I made out with a girl,sober as a judge and it confirmed it was NOT drunken antics,she was hot and I wanted to kiss her.
I’m not totally out,due to the fact that I don’t want to do a big coming out because it is not thing that defines me.
Granted,if I start dating a chick that,would have to be the big coming out.
Especially with my dad’s side of the family,they already think he is burning in hell.
But I’ve started to notice how bi girls get treated differently.
My younger brother and now subjected me to the butt of every lesbian joke and my mother thinks I’m going to only now date women.
I mean don’t get me wrong, I would love to find a great girl,if that is what it is in the cards,but I’m just as open to a great guy.
My lesbian friends find it disgusting if I’m flirting with a guy and they trying to encourage my “gay side”.
But I’m not gay,I’m also not straight.
I’m about to move to another small town for college and I’m afraid that sexuality will affect my career as a classical musician( does anybody know any BI opera singers?),especially one trying to make an online following though social media and YouTube.
I would love to reach out to other bi-girls,and find common ground.
Like a good queer girl,I have a tumblr.
http://cassiekutev.tumblr.com/
I would love to get to know you guys! Thanks for this,it lets me know I’m not alone.
Oh my god, I am so loving this thread! Thank you to the editors for opening up this forum, and also thanks to everyone for posting. I read many comments on my way home from work, and plan to delve in much more, but I’m really enjoying the discussions of bisexuality and intersections with kink, trauma, and/or ability, as well as the ugly two-headed coin of “passing privilege” and erasure. It’s totally vindicating.
I had my first crush ever on a girl named Christine when I was 5, and also discovered a thing for boys about a year later. Even as a kid I rode the butch/femme spectrum pretty hard; my fashion sense has always been an uneasy mix of late-90s thrift store prep Carrie Brownstein and mid-10s high femme CB. I wasn’t super conscious of it until middle school, when an older girl started spreading a rumor that I was a lesbian on my bus route and got the entire bus to start bullying me. Seventh grade was a nightmare, but it made me reckon with my misconceptions of LGBT folks AND forced me to grapple with my own complicated sexuality. (That girl, Sylvia, came out as a freshman in high school the following year and had to transfer schools because of the bullying and death threats she received. I found out a few years later from some older friends, and it made me have so much more empathy for her.) I formally came out to my peers in high school, and aside from one open lesbian I was the only out kid in my school. Everyone else was in glass closets and basically came out after graduating. (The only family member who knew was my older brother, who advised me against coming out.) But I still dated guys because there was really no other option.
During my first month of college, I was raped. It drove me back in the closet, and my attractions to women only manifested themselves in borderline predatory ways when I was drunk at parties, and other girls would be open to making out and minor sexual exploration/titillation. I feel pretty awful about how I behaved in retrospect. The tiny college I attended also had slim pickings for queer women, though a couple of girls who I thought were straight came out long after college. In fact, one of my biggest college lady crushes outed herself on FB last week! I finally had sex with a woman about six months after finishing college, and it was a horrible sloppy drunken experience that I have not yet had the pleasure of repeating, haha. Spent most of my twenties in the closet, getting into another abusive relationship with a dude that resulted in repeatedly being raped.
I met my husband in the aftermath of that relationship, and he is extremely comfortable with my sexuality. I’m at the point in life that if something GOD FORBID should happen to him, I would probably just date women exclusively for a very very very long time. Even though he’s a straight dude, he’s also a feminist ally and incredibly supportive. I’m much more open now than I ever have been, and while I haven’t properly come out to family, I don’t necessarily hide it either. (I linked to this page on FB, perhaps my mom will read this.) I have never really felt QUEER ENOUGH to embrace it due to lack of opportunity to date/fuck other female-identifying people, but this whole thing is making me rethink that stance.
tl;dr: I’m queer, I’m here, my husband is used to it.
Oh, to the admins: I realized after typing this longass rambling thing that I should have put content warnings (even though it’s not graphic), and I don’t want to risk triggering anyone. If you feel the need to remove my comment, I completely understand. Smooches.
hey, i wish i could hug you through the internet <3
Just a hi! I’m here! And a thank you. I’ll comment more when I’ve got a head on my shoulders!
<3!
What’s on your shoulders now?
I am a bi woman engaged to a straight man and I really stressed about who to invite to our wedding. I only want people there that would support me even if I was marrying a woman. I don’t want people in my life that are “accepting” me just because I am in a relationship with a man. Telling people this scares me because I grew up in a Christian household and a lot of my family “friends” are doing the whole, “Jesus still loves you even if you are a sinner for liking the same gender” thing. It’s hard trying to cut the negativity out of my life.
Yeah, I feel this when thinking about getting married. I’m like, how can I make the ceremony “alternative” enough so it’s just as alienating to homophobes? Lol (not quite the same as what you said but still)
I have also given that dilemma a lot of thought, and I’m nowhere near planning a wedding! One thing I really appreciate about being with a woman, not wondering who’s supportive of the relationship and my queerness.
That sounds like a really rough family situation. I hope you have the support you need, even if you can’t find it in your family circle.
I feel you so much on this. I know that my mom would see me dating a guy as an answer to her prayers, a sign that I was finally cured. It’s hard feeling like you can’t share your joy with people, because they will use it to invalidate your identity.
Some people invite family that annoys them because they’d rather do it the easy way and that’s ok if that’s what you want. Some people have their wedding two states away so Aunt Linda and her homophobia who doesn’t want to sit in a car for 16 hours won’t feel so inclined to come even though TECHNICALLY you invited her. Or just absolutely only send rainbow colored invites to your queer-friendly family and friends. You can always tell the photographer to leave Aunt Linda out of the pictures too so while she’s there that day she’s not there in the memories.
I hear you. One thing that helped me – not on the invitation front, there was no way getting around inviting some folks – but on the wedding front was getting as much queer and gender non-conformity into the wedding ceremony and reception as possible. Quotes from queer folks and a statement on acknowledging those past and present who are not able to access the legal and social protections of marriage, etc.
Did it help that there was a double rainbow that day? YES.
Congratulations and good luck! I’ve found apracticalwedding.com and offbeatbride.com to be great resources for the whole spectrum of weddinging, including the Guest List. Just know that the stress you are feeling is very very valid and you are not alone.
Yayayay great thread, I’m loving reading everyone’s comments.
I’ve been grappling more and more with my sexuality recently. I’ve dated folks of many genders, and I’m currently in an open/poly relationship with a man (though, since moving cities recently I haven’t really been doing much with the “open/poly” part!).
Because of my “queer style” (read: short haircut, masculine-of-center dress), I was recently targeted by an anti-gay street preacher downtown. He looked me in the eye and pointed at me and said I was “living in sin” and that “it’s not a choice”. It was super scary but I also stared him down and since then I’ve been thinking about how my presentation and sexuality are intertwined (and also not intertwined?). I wasn’t walking with boyfriend when the street preacher called me out, and when I’m not walking with my boyfriend I guess I look pretty “gay” (I probably look “gay” with him sometimes too ha). But I could be straight, looks have nothing to do with it. But I’m not straight. Gah!
So essentially, I’ve been thinking a lot about the privilege/erasure conversation and I’ve basically come to the conclusion that saying it’s one or the other is pretty impossible. I mean, we’ve rejected the binary in so many other situations, let’s do so with this! It’s just too complicated, and it doesn’t serve anyone to simplify it.
Thanks again for the thread. <3
WOW I am so delighted there are so many comments on this thread!
I came out as bi at 15, and I was super confident in that until the past few years and fucked up relationships. Usually if asked, I say I’m queer. I love the word and the connotations, but it’s also partially because of the stigma around bisexuality/internalized biphobia, and partially because I feel like bisexual doesn’t fit me as well as it used to, since I’m less into men than I used to be, even though I know that bisexuality is an umbrella. I stress about the whole thing a lot–every time anything about my orientation comes up, if I don’t give a five-minute monologue, I feel like a liar.
A Camp was pretty much the best thing. I was terrified that I wouldn’t be considered “gay enough,” and then everyone was SO AWESOME. (Thank you, Stef, for babysitting me through that revelation.) The other thing that’s been helping me understand my bisexuality is pretty messed up. I knew that bisexual women have high rates of drug/alcohol use, poverty, domestic violence, and poor access to health services, but it took me forever to connect my experiences with all of those things to my bisexuality. Turns out they’re actually inextricable.
I love you so much, Emma. Our convos about bi identity in the beehive were so affirming for me! Grateful for you always #bzzbzz
Queer woman married to a man, have dated women, out to spouse and close friends/randos. I suppose technically I’m bi, but I enjoy the identity of queer because I feel like it incorporates gender-fluidity as well. It’s super hard to explain to people why an identity that isn’t a sexuality I intend to act on is still a big part of who I am. My partner is very cool with everything, but I do think he’s uncomfortable when I make a special effort to present as queer. But I’m with a man, if I don’t make a special effort that part of myself is invisible. We are in a straight relationship and that is our sexual identity so he doesn’t see why I need to emphasize a separate sexual identity. It’s just because I… want to be seen for who I am, want to fight bi invisibility, want to advocate, want to help normalize LGBTQ identities. I also struggle with when lesbians tell me I can’t use certain words or take ownership of LGBTQ causes. I feel like I can’t argue, they’re the experts, they certainly own their minority group…but I feel marginalized. And then feel guilty for feeling marginalized by my privilege.
So complicated, guys!
Thank you for doing this. Visibility is so important to bi women. As a woman who has dated both men and women, I’ve struggled with LGBT friends admitting they think of me as less of a queer woman because I am in a relationship with a man or because I have less experience with women than men. The LGBT community is important to me and my identity as a queer woman is very important to me. So thank you for acknowledging that I have a place in it.
I’ve never dated anyone of any gender and am stressed out at the thought that I’ll have to come out (as not straight / not gay) no matter who I end up dating someday. I’m pretty guarded about being queer offline, and part of that is just that I’m a shy and very private person, and part of that is maybe just out of habit (being closeted sucks but at least I know how, whereas I don’t know how to exist in the world as generally and casually out), and a large part of it is because I’ve met so many people who were completely fine with gay people but completely disparaging of bi people. For maybe the past year I’ve been wrestling with whether I want to come out at work, and I really think I would be ready to do so if I were gay, but instead there’s just this…complication. When my coworkers ask me about guys I feel like I’m lying when I don’t tell them I like girls, but I actually WOULD be lying if I let them think that I ONLY like girls.
I have a hard time imagining dating most straight cis men (not because I see trans men as “honorary women” or any transphobic bullshit like that, but because they are part of the LGBTQetc. umbrella and know what it’s like to come out). Most straight cis people I know, no matter how much I love them, I feel a bit like we live on different planets sometimes. But there is the occasional guy for whom I totally feel like “For you, I so would,” and I suppose that’s the point — a personal relationship isn’t about how you feel in general, it’s about how you feel about that specific individual human, and that doesn’t change who you are. Or what do I know, I’m totally relationshipless. Anyway this is a lot of rambling but, Autostraddle, I can’t tell you how much this post means to me. “You belong here, you are one of us, you get a seat at the table too” — that’s what you’re saying to us with this post.
I am 24 years old and I have viewed myself as heterosexual for a large portion of my life. I recently have given respect to the fact that I have been attracted to women as well. I have still never been with a woman. I realize through reading some of these posts that a large part of my current struggle is that I can easily remain in the safe zone of male/female relationships. I am scared to leave that privilege and I am scared to explore myself at 24 in a way that is completely foreign to me. Only like two people even know this but I can say thank you and it is empowering to see this space and to feel the desire to contribute.
I can identify with this so hard–I was also a “late bloomer” in that I convinced myself to deny my attraction to women for a really long time. Hooray exploring! Hooray empowering! Welcome welcome welcome…you are not alone :)
I’m thankful to see this thread! I was always attracted to females since I remember being attracted to males. I started dating males in high school, but given I went to a private Catholic school, no one was “out” and I was severely underexposed to the lgbt community. At the age of 29 I, for the first time, acknowledged that I was attractive to females, too, and had my first sexual experience with a woman. Until a year ago, I hadn’t had a relationship with anyone except cis-men. Then a transgender man caught my eye. I dated him for a bit and then another transgender guy caught my eye. It’s been frustrating that cis-women haven’t seemed to want to give me a chance for anything more than sex. I’m polyamorous and engaged to a cis-man, so that could play a part now, but even before my fiance came in to the picture, I never found a girl who wanted to date me. It’s been an odd adventure, to say the least!
I’m glad to be a woman of color on this thread who can start sharing experiences of complicated experienced of dating only people of color, of all genders.
I’m in a polyamorous partnership with a beautiful cis Native Chicano man. I date femmes as well, and I have committed loving relationships with a few femmes. I’m extremely communicative about sex and intimacy, and have emotional commitments that manifest in many ways: dating, emotional support, creative support and just plain partying/spending queer brilliant times together.
I’m in love with my bisexuality. I always felt affirmed with the cis men I’ve chosen to date, especially since my last two partnerships with beautiful men of color have been so liberating and expansive in their visions of what liberatory love can look like. It’s really hard, since I don’t always have the language and time to be as intimate as I’d like to with some femmes I’m crushing on, but I also recognize this is a growing period for me to explore love with folks in ways that are cultivating and truly genuine. Being poly + queer takes a lot of time and attentiveness, so I want to always show up for my lovers. Sometimes that looks like dating for a summer, taking a break, being monogamous with a lover, switching it up and figuring out my needs.
My queer friends are hella loving. They recognize masculinity sucks sometimes, and I keep my hetero relationship out of my queer spaces so I have the autonomy to practice love without the hetero energies, but it varies in what that looks like. I love dating men. I don’t think that negates my queerness.
thank you so much for sharing this! <3
Hi!
I’m a bi lady dating a man and was wondering for others in similar situations – I always feel a tiny bit weird when people refer to us as a ‘straight couple’ because I am not a straight human. I totally understand people saying this and I don’t think it’s malicious in any way but it doesn’t seem to fit. Has anyone else felt like this??? Any solutions you’ve come across?
:(
This has not happened to me, but I’m sorry it has happened to you! People labeling other people and making assumptions is the worst. I think if it did happen, I’d probably say something like, “That’s not the label we use,” or “Actually, I don’t identify as straight,” or something like that.
…Then again, I never think of the right thing to say in these kinds of situations until like two days later, so probably I’d just gape and go “um, um, um…that’s…um…” ;)
I think if there is a way you prefer for your relationship to be identified, definitely share that with your close friends and whatnot. And, if it makes you more comfortable to refer to your bf as your partner, that tends to clue people in to some queerness in the midst! As a queer lady who refuses to think of myself having straight sex or relationships, I had had mixed success getting other people on board, but you know your life and deserve to own it!
I definitely understand where you’re coming from. I’m an ace-spectrum woman of uncertain romantic orientation in a relationship with a straight man, and I feel weird when people assume that me/my relationship is straight – because I’M not.
I don’t have any solutions that don’t involve outing myself, though, which I don’t usually want to do. :/ Good luck figuring something out that works for you!
Thank you, Autostraddle, so much!
I’m a bisexual cislady, and, though I’ve had very serious crushes on women–and have actively sought out lady-to-lady dates online–I tend to be approached by men more than women (partly because I present as pretty femme usually). As a result, I’ve only ever been romantically and physically involved with men. Now, I have a wonderful male partner, who I love SO much–our relationship is wonderful! He knows I’m bisexual and is very supportive of my identity. But I’m worried that if we stay together forever (hurray!), then I won’t get to explore my feelings towards women, and that somehow I will never evolve, Pokemon-like, into a true Queerchu. I don’t want to bring this up to my partner, because I’m worried that he’ll think I’m not interested in him, or fulfilled by our relationship (which I am, to both!). Has anyone else ever had this situation?
Yes yes! I have been there. Have you and your partner ever discussed opening your relationship, or perhaps dating someone together? There are lots of non-monogamous structures out there you could try that would let you stay with your partner AND keep exploring your sexuality :)
I am in my late 30s & have always identified as bisexual or non-gender specific and it seems as the years go by, I find more and more resistance and less acceptance- from both men and women, regardless of whether they are straight or gay. Just wanted to thank you for this thread. I needed this today, and it is comforting to see echoes of the same issues & conflicts that I have experienced over the years. I will be back to read the rest of the comments later, but I am truly grateful to have stumbled upon this. Thanks, ladies, for making my world seem a little less lonely this evening.
As a person in my 20s, I find that people my age are very accepting, while older folks in my circle are less so. I wonder if it’s generational, or that as people get older they fall more in step with traditional roles and give themselves less room, so have less room to give others. Thanks for sharing, I’m glad this could be a space where you felt comfort and community!!
I did post something similar to this in the comments of another section, but I’m really curious how many other people feel this way.
I’m seeing a fair bit of ‘when I date a woman, I feel equal in our relationship (which I like). When I date a man, I feel like I am expected by him/family/friends/society to conform to heteronormative gender rolls and to submit to him in some ways (which I do not like).’. Is this true for many of the people here?
And then there’s the thing I have difficulty with – I need/want to have a relationship with ‘traditional’ gender rolls (in which I am the stereotypical female), even when dating women. I really can’t handle the idea of my partner not taking the lead in decisions, sex, dates, etc. I’m not really sure where this comes from – everyone here has grown up in a society which has imposed gender rolls, and yet most people seem to be unhappy with them in a romantic relationship (I should specify that I am NOT happy with gender rolls outside of a romantic/sexual relationship). Since this is the case, it doesn’t make sense that I feel this way because society and nothing else. To be perfectly honest, I feel a bit embarassed by this, like I’m not a proper queer because I have internalized sexism or something (which, for the record, I don’t think I actually have a lot of).
I don’t know, maybe I’ll grow out of this and maybe I’m being stupid but I feel really confused and out of place, even within the bisexual community. I’m heteronormal, but not hetero, and therefore not normal either :/
I’m femme and bi and also prefer “traditional gender roles” in my own relationships. I’m also a staunch feminist. To me, feminism is about choice and supporting other women’s choices (which is to say, if you like having someone take the lead, then I think that’s awesome!). I also enjoy doing traditionally feminine things like cooking and taking care of my house – I don’t think think that’s internalised sexism – it would be more fucked up to do things I don’t like just for the sake of not being traditional (although in my case it might be because I am quite kinky and submissive also). It’s only problematic if you make someone else take the lead/be traditionally “masculine” when they don’t want to, imo.
It’s very hard to extricate internalized societal expectation from what you might personally want! And honestly, I think sometimes you don’t even need to. It’s totally legit that you may be a passive/submissive femme, and that’s completely okay, and doesn’t need to be mapped to heteronormative expectation.
Sexuality and interest is fluid, and you might change, but I don’t think it’s something you should feel you need to “grow out” of! And maybe it is societal pressure telling you this, and as you work to disinternalize toxic beliefs you might lose this interest, but you also might not. It definitely won’t make you happier to change because you feel you should, or to castigate yourself for something that you think is too expected! The best thing is to 1. be okay where you are! I promise it’s okay to do that!! and 2. when you do work to change something, for that thing to be to be true to what makes you feel right, and when you want to, to seek that out with people who feel right doing so. <3
It sounds like you know what works for you in relationships, and I think that’s great. It’s not like you’re saying “this works for me, so it’s the destiny of all women! Feminism is a lie!” haha.
I think there are lots of people in the world who have a relationship style like yours, and it’s possible for a someone-takes-the-lead relationship to be healthy or unhealthy. Some people do it because of social conditioning, but some people do it because it’s honestly what works best for them. For some of those folks, society is also pushing this real hard on their entire gender in unhealthy ways.
That’s true of any stereotype, and it doesn’t mean you have anything to be ashamed of! If butch lesbians ain’t ashamed to fall within a lesbian stereotype, why should you be ashamed of what you want, what works best for you? You do you.
Oh man, this is so great.
I struggled with trying to figure out if I was queer or not in late high school and college, and somewhere along the way I heard lesbian women lament about women who were “just experimenting,” women they’d hooked up with who turned out not to be interested in a more serious relationship (and therefore not gay, somehow?) So I was already very shy about approaching men, so now there was no way I could approach women, because could I really be ONE HUNDRED PERCENT SURE that I was gay enough for her?
After I started dating my boyfriend (and had gained more sexual confidence) I was still interested in women and he was open to me having relationships with women. But I didn’t really know where to go to meet women, being in an open relationship. Tinder didn’t exist yet, and I assumed OkCupid would be women looking for more serious relationships. (I was was corrected on this later, but again, didn’t want to be one of those Awful Experimental Girls.)
So my first lesbian experience occurred through Craigslist. That is kind of its own story, but the conclusion was definitely “I am not a Fake Gay, I definitely like women!”
Since then it’s been hard to meet women other than online (through OkCupid now), and online dating has been kind of rough (I’d met my boyfriend interpersonally, and had no experience with online dating previously.) I put a lot of pressure on myself to be attracted to the women I meet (again, don’t want to be the Fake Gay!) which stresses me out, and obviously chemistry doesn’t work that way. I don’t have to be attracted to every other bisexual woman. I’ve actually been on a hiatus from dating women for about a year, since breaking up with my girlfriend and some health issues I had. But I might try Tinder next.
THIS RIGHT HERE
Also wanted to add that when I came out to my mom (my parents aren’t homophobic) she was like “Okay, I love you of course but I don’t know why you’re telling me this?” (Presumably because I was with my boyfriend…) It hurt.
ughh, I hate that feeling. it’s awful to be dismissed. I’m sorry this happened to you and I’m so happy for you that you’re bi and out to your mom and ready to take on the beautiful world!
Man, this is something I deal with so much, with both men and women actually. Sometimes you cool on someone! Sometimes, you’re not necessarily looking for a relationship! Sometimes, you’re letting other people police your truth, and you know what? I finally told myself: hey! it’s okay to experiment! No one knows the inside of your head and your heart but you, and if they’re making you feel NOT GAY ENOUGH, that’s rude and, honestly? Not really about you.
Go forth, do you, and if anyone makes you feel Not Enough (for any reason!), well. That’s on them.
<3
Wow, okay, first of all, I was overjoyed to the point where I teared up when I saw that this was a thing, thank you for providing bi women with a space to be open about who they are, Autostraddle.
I was wondering, does anyone else feel slightly more anxious when coming out or even hinting at your bisexuality when you’re in some kind of a romantic relationship with a guy than with a woman or a nonbinary person? I’ve casually and seriously dated different folks of different genders, and typically the women and nonbinary folks I’ve been with so far have been accepting and receptive, but something about opening up about my bisexuality to straight cis guys I’m involved with always makes my stomach twist just slightly. I’ve had some adverse and biphobic reactions from men–even ones I wasn’t super involved with romantically–about my bisexuality which ran the gamut from seemingly innocuous but still harmful stuff like “Oh, I guess everyone’s a little bit bi” to “I’m not sure how I feel about being with you then, it feels too much like a competition” to the ever-present threesome stereotype. I dunno if it’s a product of the age group I’m in (I’m relatively young, I just turned 22 and I’ve only dated folks around the same age), stereotypes, or what, but even when I feel like I’m comfortable with a guy, am I really comfortable with him if I feel like he doesn’t understand an important part of my identity? Now I start to worry about this whenever any guy and I start forming a relationship, and I feel like I shouldn’t have to. Does anyone else experience this in some form or am I just overthinking things?
When I met my boyfriend I was super “I’m gonna be out and also bring up the possibility that I might want to be with girls in the future” and there were definitely some teething issues. He freaked out that I was thinking about potential open relationship so early on and also made the “hot bi girlfriend” assumption. But I persevered because he is really smart and open-minded and just had not had any exposure to different kinds of thinking and as soon as he did, he got it. It was sort of like a litmus test!
I’ve experienced this too in some degree. When I think about it the most of the guys I had dated seriously in the past were bisexual themselves, so it was something we both had a common understanding about. But with guys that I would be getting to know that were straight and debating whether or not I’d want to go out with them I only recently began to feel nervous about disclosing it, especially when they’d early on would make subtle homophobic comments and seemed like the kind of person who had more aggressive or negative opinions regarding LGBTQ+ matters. It recently also became a concern when I realized I didn’t have/identify with any gender but still choosing to present feminine. Just recently in an encounter I had with a straight cis-guy outside of my art school bubble it hit me that some of what he was saying made me feel nervous or a bit scared about disclosing my multi-gender attraction and past relationships with women, and even more so about not having a gender, which probably would have gone over his head and at worst made me feel very vulnerable and unsafe if I told him. I think it may have to do with it being something that disrupts the continuity of what they some think are their assumptions being accurate and enough to know a person. At the moment I present mostly feminine and for the most part probably will in the future too, though I think it also is something in my experience that would cause for a shock or surprise or uncalled for commentary when I’d come out- because I don’t “look queer”or don’t want to acknowledge that people can have multi-gender attractions and dating a guy does not erase that from my being. I haven’t dated a straight guy since freshmen year in high school, but I’ve definitely felt that nervousness or “I’d-rather-not” feeling just hanging around straight guy friends that I knew didn’t completely get it or wouldn’t want to make the effort to be supportive.
Wow, I feel so lucky right now. I’ve never hesitated to tell anyone I was dating that I was bi… except my first partner, I suppose, because I was still trying to figure it out when I was with him. In retrospect, I think he knew before I was able to articulate it (helped that my first threesome was with him). He’s still my best friend and so has been able to witness me being more open, accepting, and vocal about my own identity. Anyone else I’ve dated has been aware and equally accepting. Everyone should be so lucky.
This thread is the first I’ve heard of partners not being supportive, and it’s SO discouraging! I will admit that part of the reason I think I felt so open about letting male partners know I am bi was because I expected the typical male caveman response of “hurr, HOTTT, let me watch u make out with a chik now plzzz”. Luckily, none of the men I’ve dated have said anything remotely like that (though everyone gets excited about the door opening for threesomes!), and I now feel ashamed that I was apparently more willing/excited to voice my identity for THEIR pleasure. I’m confident now that when I come out to people it is because I am reaffirming my pride. And if they’re not supportive, it’s a dealbreaker for me.
I’ve never had to come out to a woman, and hadn’t really thought about that process since I’ve always assumed if (WHEN?!) I manage to snag a date with a woman-identifying person it would be through online dating, where my bisexuality is already prominently announced. It’s probably a great thing that online dating cuts down so much on the coming-out process. Everything is already on the table!
I’m not sure if it’s because I’m seeking it out or because bi erasure is slowly being eroded (hopefully the latter!) but it’s so great to feel more part of a bi community (I mean things like this thread, and also things like the #StillBisexual videos). So hi other awesome bi ladies!
I am 34 and remember being very into other girls even as a child. I also knew even then that I never wanted children so maybe I was just super aware of my feels even back then. I had several (secret) girlfriends as a young teenager (though I didn’t think of them as such at the time) and then had my first boyfriend when I was 14. I think I came out to my (gay) sister around then. She has never brought it up but I sort of feel she disapproves or doesn’t believe me. To be honest, I can understand why a person could find it hard to believe – I find it impossible to imagine what it must be like to really be mono-sexual.
Since then I’ve had a string of long-term opposite sex relationships, interspersed with a few one-night stands with women. I used to feel like I wasn’t bi enough to come out as bi but after I broke up with my last boyfriend about 5 years ago, I was on my own for about a year and a half and went through a lot. I started spending a lot of time with a group of very open-minded gay men and came out to my straight friends. I learned a lot about what I want and what I don’t want from a relationship.
When I met my current boyfriend, I was in a really good place and things have only got better and better. He’s also been able to admit his own same sex attraction because our relationship has been a safe space for him to do so – he’s had same-sex sex before but always identified as straight, probably for similar reasons to me (bi-attracted but mostly hetero-romantic). We are in a monogamous relationship (mostly, he knows that I have a very strong attraction to a girlfriend and knows we kiss sometimes) but that might change some time in the future.
I’ve always been a feminist but I’ve read a lot more feminist and bi literature recently and it’s helped me unpack internalised biphobia and also internal struggles about presenting as femme. I’m all about lifting up traditionally feminine traits.
My dad asked me recently, after I wrote a blog post about how annoying it is to be called a fag hag when hanging out with other queer people, whether I like women and I said yes, so I guess I came out to him too.
I used to care more about whether people (particularly other queer people) were aware I’m not straight by using “partner” etc. but now I’m more like “I feel sad for you that you just assume things based on what they seem like on the outside” and don’t care…Although I do tend to get quite riled up when people make comments about bisexual stereotypes. It doesn’t happen very often though, because I tend to live in a bit of a bubble of awesome people ;P
I am also going to chime in and say that this thread is amazing! I’ve been reading Autostraddle for ages, but this is the thread that finally made me go “I need to respond to this!”
I have so many feelings similar to what a lot of you have been expressing. I’m 26; I’ve never been in a serious relationship with someone of any gender, but I present as very femme and most people don’t know that I’m bi. I actually had a conversation with my mom last year where a bunch of friends and I were playing the game Slash while she was in the room. I guess our answers were fluid enough that the next morning, she flat-out asked me what my sexuality was, and my heart was pounding so hard when I answered “Bisexual.” I come from a super religious family, and the fact that she was okay with it felt so amazing.
I think due to my presentation and general shyness, I’ve had many opportunities to date men, but I’ve never really gotten involved in queer communities to have the same opportunities with women. And I’ve always pushed away chances to date men – not necessarily because I don’t like them, but because I don’t want to erase my identity by presenting as straight. Not to mention the fact that a lot of guys think bisexuality is synonymous with threesomes, particularly (from what I understand) when you’re meeting them in non-queer environments. Plus I have this inner voice that really wants to come out to all of my religious family, but I know that few of them would take it seriously unless I actually date a woman. Is it weird to be so worried about a future invisible identity when I’m already invisible by not speaking out?
I actually had a chance to work in a remote place that I opted not to go for, because I feel like exploring my sexuality is more of a priority for me right now. Unfortunately, despite being back in a big city, I have no idea how to go about it. I only have male gay friends, not female, and whenever I’ve gone to a gay bar I think I’ve just been taken for a “fag hag.” That said, I love the fact that you’ve created a safe space for all of us to talk about our identities. Thank you so much!
“Is it weird to be so worried about a future invisible identity when I’m already invisible by not speaking out?” No! I worry about this too with my family especially, which is why I choose to come out to them. I also really relate to you saying you don’t want to date men because you “don’t want to erase my identity by presenting as straight.” This is exactly why I didn’t date during high school. I looked around and thought “Well, I don’t fit with the straight women and I don’t fit with the lesbian women and I don’t want to pick a side so I guess I won’t date”. Even now though I still feel pressure to “present” as queer which is nearly impossible unless I walk around with a girlfriend on one arm and a boyfriend on the other. Funny thought!
My last girlfriend was hesitant to date me knowing I’m bisexual. She said that all her bisexual (female) friends ended up with men. I tried to protest that I am seriously equal opportunity and have no opinion or way of knowing whether I’ll end up with a man or a woman.. (SO many people ask me that, by the way!) and then I realized.. of all my bisexual (female) friends, they really have all ended up with men :P ! So… are there stats on this? Was it just a coincidence, or do a big majority of us end up in hetero relationships? It would make me a little sad if so, like an invalidation of my identity. I’d love to hear your thoughts, especially if you’re 30+ and have a ton of married friends.
I worry about that too. It goes along with the worry of people saying you dating women was a phase. It’s not a phase. I’m still bi even when I’m in a relationship. I’m still attracted to more than one gender. That’s never gone away. I’ve been like this my whole life. I am bi and with a man and plan on marrying him. I have several friends that say they are bi, but who have never dated women. I, of course, still believe them, when they say they are bi. But I do wonder in some cases if they were just too scared to actually try dating women. It’s really intimidating! I don’t blame them. Or maybe they just never found one they liked that was also into women. Totally possible. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t make them any less bisexual. And ending up with a guy isn’t really an end at all. Marriage is not an endgame. You can still work out with your partner ways that work for both of you to enjoy sex with not just them. Whether that means threesomes or swinging with other couples or having and open marriage or a poly marriage – w/e works for you two! So just because you may marry a man, it doesn’t necessarily end your bisexual experience as an adult if you don’t want it to and your partner is into it too.
I think it often boils down to simple maths, compounded with all the obstacles that already face same sex relationships: there are a lot more men attracted to women than there are women attracted to women, and they have a lot more social support going about it too!
Plenty of bi-people also tend to lean one way or the other, in terms of experiencing attraction: nothing wrong with that either, nor does it render any of their relationships less meaningful. Your identity is your identity and struggling with self worth and trust is, unfortunately a part of many relationships: in the end you get to decide for you.
I havent really read all the comments but I really appreciate this post.
I’ve been married for almost 11 years and because we married so young I didn’t know I was pan (although I did have some girl on girl relationships before him I always thought I just was exploring) until we separated for some time and I dated a girl as an adult. She was gay and made me feel so bad when she told me she had to be careful and try not to fall for me because bi girls always broke gay girls hearts. She always made me feel like I was faking it and made me feel guilty. I couldn’t handle it.
My husband and I ended back together and we are happy but I feel invisible at times and I know it comes from the erasure of being pan dating a dude, and he acknowledges my pansexuality in a really mature and feminist way. He has never made it sexual or not important.
I struggle understanding my sexuality as the only two relationships I had prior to my current were very unhealthy (one with a woman and one with a man). They were both fairly long at 2 and 4 years consecutively, but the outcome was a very unhealthy relationship with sexual contact. It took me a long time to confront my identity as a bi catholic woman. I still wrestle with theological and social questions regarding bisexuality. During my second year of college I was in a happily monogamous relationship with my boyfriend. He tries to understand the struggles I have with my identity. He truly is a kind soul and has done a lot to help me through my past. I told nobody of my identity as bi and was running from it. Then, I began to have deep emotional talks with a female friend of a friend. It never went beyond mild flirting, but recently it had made me realize that I no longer want to feel ashamed of myself. I feel a strong desire to be physical with a woman without sexual contact. I feel terrible as my feelings for my boyfriend haven’t changed. Does anyone have any experience they would kindly share about any experience with being with both genders in similar context? Pardon my ignorance. I’m very new to the community.
Until recently, I dated men and only occasionally slept with women. Now I exclusively sleep with women and identify as lesbian.
I never know how to feel about using the label bisexual. Am I ignoring my past by choosing not to call myself bi?
I’m a bi woman dating a man, and I have mostly dated men. Because of this, I often find it hard to be accepted into the lgbt+ communities around me, because I feel like I’m “not gay enough” for them, and like the only way I’ll be accepted is if I constantly talk about my attraction to women. This may be due to the fact that I don’t have a “coming out story”- I simply just started dating a woman and made that I formation public. No one really ever talked to be about it, not friends, not family. Maybe that was how they were showing their support of me, by not making a big deal about it, but instead I’ve mostly felt like they all just decided to ignore it-either that or they’re not ok with it and just didn’t want to tell me. I don’t really know how to react to that, or how to react to the fact that I feel like I constantly have to prove the fact that I’m interested in women to be accepted by others who are part of a community that I consider myself to be a part of.
I would love some advice on how to better integrate myself or on how to better respond to this from some other ladies out there who’ve dealt with the same thing.
Much love and thanks in advance!
How do you all feel about using the term “partner” for your boyfriend/husband? I really like it because 1. his gender is almost always irrelevant when I refer to him, 2. people take “partner” more seriously than “boyfriend,” and this is the person I want to spend my life with, not pass notes with in middle school, and 3. people who don’t know my partner are less likely to assume I’m straight, which I’m not. That said, I worry that I’m contributing to bi erasure by giving myself a cheap way to fit in to queer spaces.
I like partner for long term relationships for basically all the reasons you mentioned. I also really dislike husband and wife, fiance, other more traditional terms. I tend to associate them with gross 1950’s gender roles that I don’t want to have in my relationship.
I personally wouldn’t really worry about if it’s bi erasure because if I’m talking about my partner, it’s pretty likely that I’ll either use a pronoun or his name at some point.
Since I’m not married I totally forgot to mention how uncomfortable I am with husband/wife because of like, how that would make me property and stuff.
Hi! My name’s Ella, and I haven’t really found a label that feels right other than queer. I identified as a lesbian for 3 years before finally admitting that I was attracted to men. It’s great to see other commenters saying the same thing! I felt kind of paranoid about it, I feel like people judge me as being one of those “fake” lesbians popping back into the closet, but I still am just as attracted to women as I was before I started being with men. Although I’m still attracted to women, I feel so isolated from the queer community. I used to feel so secure in my identity. Now that the way I view myself has changed, I’m worried I’m losing touch with my roots.
Oh thank you so much for all of this. I know I’m probably too far down in the comments for this to be read, but ever since I signed up for an account two years ago I’ve been waiting for a thread/post like this. I don’t know that I have anything important to add except that I’m glad to be acknowledged. It was actually this website which kept me from taking really drastic action- I couldn’t previously reconcile the idea of being bi with the idea of otherwise being very decisive, organized, and ambitious in my life (I guess I bought into the idea that it was greedy? or something?). Options I was considering included divorce, suicide, or coming out as something I wasn’t for the sake of looking like I had ‘picked a team’. But I’m extremely happy in my life now, I’m out, I don’t have to lie about ex-girlfriends- I don’t have to lie about anybody’s gender or anybody’s orientation. I don’t give a shit anymore. My mental health has improved so fucking much that I can’t believe I was where I was two years ago. I owe a lot of that to Autostraddle, so this post in particular means a lot to me.
This doesn’t mean that I feel confident enough in my queerness (even though I’ve known what I am my whole life) to go to something like A Camp or even a meetup. But maybe someday. Still not 100% clear on how welcome people like me are.
“Still not 100% clear on how welcome people like me are.”
I’ve been both disappointed and pleasantly surprised in queer women’s spaces. There have been disapproving comments about male-female relationships, but then there are those times when I mention a boyfriend, wondering if I’ll get a negative reaction, and suddenly everyone else is saying “yeah, I’m bi too, and…”
and of course the times when no one else is bi, but no one cares whether I’m a lesbian or bisexual. But finding out that all those intimidating, potentially disapproving lesbians are actually bi? That’s pretty great.
You’re welcome here: I promise you that.
Take it at your own speed. Look at all the Pride!
It filled my heart to the BRIM to see that this thread exists, and that it had over 700 comments! OH my goddess! I’m so filled with Auto-love!
I struggled at what to say when I saw this. I have identified as bisexual for the entire time I have been openly not-straight, even to myself. I dated men all of high school, and in some way, I really did love them (and enjoy sex with them). But since admitting that I like women, I just can’t imagine going back. I can imagine maybe having flings with men, but as far as the grand scheme of my life goes, all I see is women– in relationships, friendships, just in my life, I love women so much. But I still can’t shake the past, and the occasional non-serious crushes on guys. Even more so, I can’t shake the *fear* that I might end up with a man despite my current feelings, and I will never be able to escape the hushed conversation about how I “used to be” gay.
My cousin came out as a lesbian in college. Since grad school, she’s been living with the same man for years. Everyone says she just wanted attention, and she did it to piss off her mom and grandma. I don’t want them to talk about me like that, despite the fact that I cannot currently imagine a future with a man.
So where does that leave me? Lesbian does not totally honor who I am, but it feels so right in comparison to how much I love women, and how much I love the queer lady community. Riese’e writing on this topic has done a lot for me– bisexual honors who I was, gay honors who I am right now, and who knows who I’ll be tomorrow or 20 years from now, but all of those things are still true.
I choose to feel bi pride, because it makes me feel nonmonosexual pride, which feels very close to my heart.
I don’t think I was as excited about this forum as I would have been a year ago, when I was feeling truly bisexual in the way many people define it. But writing on it here, even feeling gay as I do now, feels so therapeutic. I just said a lot of things I have not managed to articulate in any other way.
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I wish I had gotten in on this before there were over 700 comments so that I could comment back at everyone. This has just been so wonderful.
I relate to a lot of what you said – thanks for sharing all of that! <3
Going to echo almost everyone here and say A) I almost cried when I saw this and B) I wish this was a permanent thing. Its own Facebook group or something. There’s so, so much I want to say, like enough stuff that I’ve often thought about writing to You Need Help about it, but it’s really late so I’ll just say, thank you guys, so many fucking thank yous, for this. It is such a relief to feel validated. ❤️❤️❤️
I want a Facebook group too! I feel like it would be so amazing
y’all we have an autostraddle group for this right here! get into it!
Hi hi hi all the bi peeps!
I just…I haven’t read every comment but I see so many stories that I identify with…and that’s really new for me. I love Autostraddle but I don’t always feel like I have a right to be here – not because of Autostraddle or the wonderful community here, but because its all tied up in my feelings of not being a “real” bisexual.
I currently identify as bi but am only out to my long-term male partner and a few close friends. For much of my life, I’ve identified as straight. I’ve only every dated men, only ever kissed men. I didn’t realize or consciously acknowledge that I was bi until a few years ago – even though my parents are loving and supportive people, I don’t think I ever felt they would understand or support me being anything other than straight and I think that subconsciously affected the way I saw myself and felt safe identifying. Also, I never knew where to find the queer community and I don’t think I understood what being bi or pansexual or queer meant when I was growing up. Like in my head, I thought that obviously I liked guys so I wasn’t a lesbian and I didn’t realize there was anything else.
I remember very clearly having a conversation with myself after I realized I kept staring at other girls being like, do you like girls? or are you just admiring their clothes? or is this part of your people-watching tendencies? Which sounds silly now, but it was a terrifying conversation to have with my young teenage self and I promptly squashed the thought of liking girls and decided I was just an introvert that was fascinated by people because I had a hard time talking to people without being incredibly awkward.
But even when I got to college and in theory had more freedom and actually met and befriended queer people, I still didn’t allow myself to think anymore about it. Even when I ran away from girls who tried to kiss me because I was terrified of what it might mean. Even when I had all kinds of thoughts and feelings about women – but that couldn’t possibly mean anything right? *sigh*
BUT BUT a few years ago, after spending lots of time on this beautiful site and just generally educating myself more about feminism and sexuality, I realized I was bi and that I really was attracted to women and that it felt real and true and brave to admit that to myself.
I held onto that secret for weeks. I was terrified of what that might mean for my relationship with my male partner – a person I love more than I can properly express and who I see my life with – but it was on the tip of my tongue every day. What I realized though as I was keeping this revelation to myself was that I didn’t want it to change our relationship and I didn’t want to leave the relationship and I didn’t feel like it was limiting me or preventing me from being my truest self. So I told him and it turned out to be completely fine. And now we’ve been together for 6.5 years.
But the feeling of being a fraud and not being a “true” bisexual are still there. Like, I’m a cis gendered, femme woman in a relationship with a man – PRIVILEGE. Like, isn’t it convenient that I realized I was bi while in a relationship that society sees as conventional so what do I have to lose? Like, I’ve never even kissed a women so I can’t possibly be bi? Like, I’m not really part of a queer community (nor do I really know how to seek that out) so what do I even know? Like, shouldn’t I come out to the people in my life or my parents and if I don’t aren’t I just hiding in a “straight” bubble? Like, I’ve only come out to people who are “safe” (bi and lesbian friends/people who have LGBTQ people already in their life) and isn’t that convenient?
Some days, I’m like fuck that noise. I know that I’m bi and who I’m attracted to and that’s what matters. Other days, I constantly question myself.
This turned out to be a longer and more ramble-y story than I meant. But I feel safe here and Autostraddle is a huge part of why I can even say out loud that I’m bi. Thank you for that.
Also, thank you everyone for your stories – this has been an emotional and reaffirming night for me. I no longer feel like I’m the only one who feels this way. <3
I can relate to those questions you ask yourself, second-guessing your bisexual identity. After the first time I dated a woman, I insisted that I didn’t deserve to call myself bi, or do any community stuff, because I hadn’t suffered! Like, I can’t live in a queer housing co-op, maybe I’d deserve that if I were struggling with homelessness because of my parents kicking me out for liking girls, or something. (If I were a lesbian, would I check myself against the Suffering Index? Um, NO.)
I remember being at Pride, miserable because my first girlfriend had just broken up with me, thinking it’s too bad I’m straight, because being part of this community would feel really good at a time like this. When “a time like this” is “just ended a relationship with another woman,” how ridiculous is it to deny myself that community because I’m STRAIGHT? Biphobia vs. Logic. Sigh.
I think it’s so brave that you got to the place with yourself that you’re at, and are open with your partner, and congrats on your 6.5 years! I mentioned somewhere upthread that I was involved at one point (when I was in a long-term relationship with a guy) in a bisexual support group, and it definitely helped me see my experience as real and valid, and also feel like I was carving out some space in my life for an important part of me. Anyway, thanks so much for sharing <3
Anyone have any tips on starting to date women after only dating men? And particularly, on overcoming any mental obstacles to dating women?
In my early thirties, for the first time, I got a huge crush on a woman, and we dated for a while. After that, I realized that something was happening in my brain to keep me from being aware of my attraction to women. Say, I’d have some unexpected physical contact, feel a zing, and then a mental door would just slam down and I’d feel nothing. I am very lucky that this didn’t happen with my first girlfriend, due to some unique and complicated circumstances I won’t get into here. I am also very awkward and self-conscious talking to women, so I don’t form friendly connections with them very well.
All that internalized homophobia I built up in my teens, still getting in my way, and I don’t know how to change it! I really want to, though, because it’s important to me to understand my attraction to women, and I know I’m missing out by only dating men these days.
yes maura! feel free to message me directly since i’d love to talk to you about this and it feels like there is so much to say about it, but this thread is already so huge that it might get lost. but i resonate so much with what you described (unfortunately). i have so much internalized homophobia and (un)conscious fear of being seen as not-straight, and am also super shy, which can make interacting with women i’d maybe want to date feel really funny and awkward sometimes!
and also there is the whole issue of information and resources being so widely available for women who date men, but not for women who date women. i think that feeling unsure, unprepared, and inexperienced can be huge factors in accepting your own attraction to women because it can feel like there are so many question marks surrounding it– we know what we’re supposed to do in any kind of interaction with men but there is no social-interaction script for women who aren’t 100% platonic.
so… here are some things that have helped me:
1. focusing on radical self love and acceptance of my own body, of my own issues and processes, of my identity. like i know this sounds corny and cliche but it is the most important thing i have ever done for myself. i read somewhere that a good way to start going about this is to ask yourself with any decision, at any time, “what would someone who loves themself do?” and then do the thing that you intuitively know is the answer.
2. focus on doing whatever it takes to dismantle the harmful stuff you have been taught about queerness and bodies and gender and power and relationships. i think that having a greater awareness of how those dynamics function in our society can help you see where they start to manifest in your internal dialogue. body positive, intersectional feminist, and queer blogs / books / materials can be super helpful, tumblr is great for this. in high school a book called “cunt” that (while sorta problematic in various ways) really helped me work through my internalized misogyny and body hated, so that might be a good starting point.
3. having more queer friends, and also hanging out with fewer people who aren’t helping you grow. seriously okcupid is a great place to make friends if you are really open about stating that that’s what you are looking for. finding/making queer friends and community and support systems might take some time but is the greatest blessing you can find.
4. also, everything on autostraddle tagged with “how to be gay.”
Thank you Autostraddle for opening this thread and thank you every one who shared their story here. I’ve been in a relationship with my boyfriend for 8 years and have recently come to the realization that yes, in fact, I am bi. <- that's me testing it out. It feels good. I am bi. I have always found girls attractive, have kissed a few, but have never thought I'd be bi because I've always liked men as well, and have been in relationships only with men. But looking back it makes a lot of sense. I've always felt some kind of dismissive jealousy towards girls (in high school) who said they were bi, but I realize now that I envied them. I felt, and still kind of feel, that I am not 'bi enough'. I have not officially come out yet. On one hand because I've only just started coming to terms with it, on the other because I'm scared people won't believe me and what would be the point of coming out? I'm very happy with my SO. I feel no need to experiment. Okay, sorry for the kind of incoherent rant and the English, it's early morning where I'm from and I found this thread last night and just wanted to contribute. Will be reading all the other comments during this week. Again, thank you all for sharing. And if you have any tips on coming out or want to share something else with me, please do so.
I’m pretty new to AS, having only found out about this site a couple months ago. I had only commented like once before this, so I mostly lurk. I really appreciate this thread. Things previous posters have said mirror things that I’ve felt: questioning my sexuality and wondering if I’m “really bi”, worries about being rejected as “not sufficiently queer” if I were to come out, etc. Also the thought, “can I really be bi if it’s taken me this long to really embrace it?” (I’m almost 36. I didn’t figure it out when I was 12 or whatever.)
I mean, I’ve known for a long time, on some level or another. I think I first realized I had an interest in women in college. I was in a relationship with a guy person at the time, my first long-term partner. I was with him just shy of four years. I was pretty open about sexual things with him, and he was usually pretty game, so I told him how I was feeling. I don’t know what I expected, but he basically said that as long as I was with him, that feeling would have to remain unexplored. So I guess I just compartmentalized it or tried to “turn it off” or whatever. I don’t remember how far along that was in the relationship, but it didn’t end because of that. I actually left him for another guy, which I felt really guilty about for a long time. The next guy lasted for about a year or so (and then we reconnected later as friends/friends with benefits). It was disastrous for a host of other reasons that had nothing to do with my sexuality. He (at least sort of) knew and was cool with it.
After that ended, I realized that I was now free to explore that part of my sexuality that I had ignored for a long time. I’m shy, so I really didn’t know how to go about meeting women (I still don’t). In my club-going days, I had LGBTQ+ friends, but they were pretty much all gay men. I went online, and I tried to meet women that way, but it didn’t work out so well. I just ended up meeting a string of guys, none of whom lasted more than a date or two.
I did manage to have a sexual experience with a woman, and I discovered that I liked it very much indeed. But that was over 10 years ago.
I got into another long relationship with a guy, someone I worked with (we didn’t get together until after I left for a different job, and he went off to grad school). He was a few years younger than me, and much less experienced. I was the first person he’d really dated. At first he said he was cool with my history, and I told him I had been with a woman before. I discovered later that he was a raging ball of insecurity who really wasn’t as ok with my history as he said he was. He would bring things up just to pick fights about them (I couldn’t so much as look at a picture of a guy without him getting upset). Why I didn’t dump his ass I don’t know. In one of those oh-so-delightful times, he brought up the woman I’d been with (I don’t remember the context or what the argument was), but I basically decided it would just be easier to lie and tell him it was a one-off thing, that I didn’t feel a need to do again. And while I was with him, I was monogamous, so I figured it was basically true. That relationship also lasted just shy of four years. It ended four years ago.
I haven’t dated anyone since then. Sometimes it was that I didn’t want to, other times I was afraid to put myself out there. My interest in/attraction to women has been much stronger for several years now, like I’m gradually getting queerer as I get older..lol. But I haven’t acted on it. I went back online, and thus far it’s only been couples looking for threesomes, which at first I thought I might be open to, but seems less appealing upon further consideration.
When I first realized that I was attracted to women, I thought it was only sexual. I didn’t have the terminology at the time, but in retrospect I might call it “heteroflexible” or bisexual but hetero-romantic. Over time my feeling about the “bisexual” part hasn’t changed but I’m less certain about the “hetero-romantic” part. Now I’m feeling more like I’m bi on both counts.
And as for the labels, I guess bisexual is just the one I feel comfortable with, though I’ve recently started using queer as well. Pan is probably theoretically accurate, but for some reason that I can’t quite articulate, it doesn’t really resonate with me.
Anyway.. I guess I’ve practically written a book here. Forgive me if I’ve been a bit rambly and semi-coherent. So yeah.. lots of feels and stuff. :)
Also..I learned something. Another poster mentioned the term “low femme”, and I looked it up and realized that pretty much describes me. I had pretty much contented myself with “femme-ish” up to this point.
Yay I love this thread!
I agree with so many of the comments made already in this thread…
One thing I haven’t seen anyone making a comment about yet though (although I could have just missed it – this thread is super long!), is feeling a pressure to be a ‘good’ bisexual by not being slutty. Like, there’s such a stigma/stereotype about bisexuals being promiscuous that for ages I would try not to be / pretend not to be….. when actually I am just a big ole slutty, promiscuous bisexual at heart (and love it).
Even among the bi community I know, they are so often at pains to point out that bisexuals aren’t “slutty”, that it makes me feel bad for being quite happily promiscuous. I *do* really enjoy sleeping with all genders and multiple partners (when I’m not dating monogamously). Idk, it’s like this bisexual respectability thing, which I feel both internal and external pressure to live up to.
Has anyone else thought about this or experienced this?
Ergh, I totally have seen this! It doesn’t really make me feel pressured to behave differently, but I definitely resent the weird slut-shaming, like there’s only one good attitude to have towards sex.
Slut shaming is ridiculous in general. I definitely have a certain level of slutiness and I don’t think it has anything to do with my bisexuality but more in general being a super openminded/very sexual person, which I already was when I was dating men only. Also the thing with me (sounds like it might be similar with you?) is when I’m single I love to go on lots of dates and play with multiple people, but when I really fall for someone I want a monogamous relationship; so I don’t consider myself poly; just like to be promiscuous when single and monogamous when in a relationship; so I find it especially ridiculous if people think oh I’m gonna cheat on them with someone of the opposite sex or something. I’ve never cheated and am super loyal, just like to have fun when single and there’s nothing wrong with that and it’s stupid to think that that makes you a bad bisexual.
YUP, that’s totally a thing.I feel like being a “good”bisexual in the eyes of non bisexuals ultimately boils down to them trying to exercise some weird control over people’s sex lives.
I can relate to this! I’ve been in both poly and monogamous relationships (is there such a thing as fluidity in both? I seem to be happy doing either depending on the type of relationship and situation!). Most recently I’ve been in a monogamous relationship for 15 years, and we are now both considering becoming poly. I’m horrified to be finding myself feeling apologetic for being ‘that sort of bisexual’! It sucks, and it’s wrong in so many ways!
y’all, thank you for this, the sheer volume of comments and the fact that all of them are so relatable makes this thread the best thing to happen in my whole week (tearing up while reading some of your thoughts and experiences)
when i started coming out gradually as bi, then as queer, i was only dating men because i honestly felt scared not to. i felt like my attraction to women wasn’t valid or ok, especially when the boys i dated either got jealous or turned on by my bisexuality (and i still don’t know which is worse). i guess coming from a super homophobic background contributed to how hard it was to accept that part of myself. for a long time i just wanted to be straight, so i could just be a good hetero girlfriend and not have any shame or suppressed feelings.
but a couple of years went by and i worked really hard on self acceptance and read a lot of queer and feminist literature and found autostraddle and started tentatively going on dates with women. and it’s funny to feel met in so many ways but also somehow lacking in small but vital ways! my relationships with women and non-binary folks have often had this common thread of my feeling or being made to feel “not queer enough,” “not experienced enough,” to the point where i’ve gotten really paranoid that maybe i am just faking being queer to look like a cool feminist or something. i know this sounds crazy, but it has happened. and on the flip side i have had such phenomenal experiences with women that it has made me question if i ever was *actually* attracted to the men i once dated, or if i just didn’t know any better at the time. (i should make a video series called “things that lesbians have asked about my ex-boyfriends.”)
and honestly sometimes i just have to step back from trying to analyze (what even is attraction? what kind of bodies and genders am i attracted to, anyway? why am i perceived SO differently in different types of relationships?) …….and just take a breath and remind myself that it’s ok, that i can be fluid, that attraction and romance are big nebulous grey areas that most people don’t know how to define anyway, and as long as i am honest with myself and explore any connection that feels genuinely good for me, i can just be open to whatever happens, and it’s ok for my identity to be fluid and undefined because ultimately i am not ever gonna be any one exact thing.
Totally relate to a lot of these questions, especially the what even is attraction.
Love the last paragraph you wrote. totally feel that
YES!!! 🤩 Please start that video series called “things that lesbians have asked about my ex-boyfriends.”!! Totally relate to that. 🤣😂It can be so hilarious once you overcome the hurting and the double standards of the questions.
Thank you so much for this. I feel so validated! To celebrate, I have emerged from my lurking to leave my first comment :D
Looking forward to reading, and to more of these spaces.
welcome lauren, thank you for commenting!
Thank you autostraddle for such an awesome thread!
I have known I was Bi since I was in my early teens and have had long term, committed relationships with both men and women.
I experienced a lot of biphobia from both lgbt and straight people and try and be as out as I can to try and challenge people’s perceptions of what a bisexual person is and can be. I have found both gay female partners and straight male partners struggle with it at times, vocalising the insecurity at ‘more competition’ – a ridiculous notion Im sure all bisexual women have encountered at somepoint in their lives.
Often it can feel like you don’t belong to either the lgbt of straight community, especially when you’re with a man, and so I cannot be more grateful to autostraddle for creating a thread which I know is going to really help us Bisexuals feel a bit more included!
I am also bilingual and am looking at writing a study on the concept of assumed ‘dual identities’ in relation to bilingualism and bisexuality.
I would be interested to read that; I’m bilingual as well.
Me too! :)
I would/will read the hell out of that study.
Also bilingual, fascinated! Please make a thread if you do the study ^_^
So glad of this post! What I want to share with other bisexual women, especially those who date straight cis men, is that for me, getting braver about identifying as bisexual instead of queer was a huge and helpful transition. I feel like queer invisiblizes bisexuality, and that supposedly what makes me queer is my attraction to and relationships with women, trans and genderqueer people. When I date cis men, my queer identity feels like it often gets put on hold, or into question. Like, how many straight cis men am I allowed to date in a row before queer friends start to wonder if I really still need my “queer” card? But identifying as bisexual, every relationship I have, every attraction I feel, they all validate my identity. For me, Bisexuality is a borderlands identity. It’s about having meaningful investment and home-ness in both the straight community and the queer community, and being seen as or sometimes feeling like an imposter/outsider in both. Queer doesn’t get at that. I am honestly and sincerely so proud to be bisexual, and because of that, feel very part of the LGBTQ community indeed. I didn’t feel those ways when I identified as primarily queer, when I felt like my ticket into LGBTQ was the Q. Also, I make fun bisexual pride shirts for pride so go to my website and get one!
https://proudlybisexual.wordpress.com/
This is a great way to look at it – I read this on another comment as well and I very much agree. I’ve called myself queer in the past but I’m much more attracted to the term bisexual recently.
I signed up just for this!
I am so incredibly happy and blown away to read all these comments! This is what the Internet is for damnit! :)
I am bi and getting married to a man I’ve been with 8 years in September!
I lost my virginity to a guy and then girl very close together and fell in love with both at the same time in high school.
I always thought once I got to collage I would have more girlfriends but found My Man pretty quick and never even had a chance ( hard to pick up girls anyways…)
I’m pretty poly amorous but he really isn’t and has lots of trust issues from previous girlfriends cheating so I didn’t even explore options.
I had one more lady sex experience a few years into relationship and since he knew i was bi and was trying to be supportive about it, was “ok” with it. It was a one night stand sorta random encounter that never went anywhere after that night (super unusual for me, I fall in love easy). And it made him pretty uncomfortable.
Now he’s trying to get a threesome together for both our benefit (we have a semi open relationship that he mostly uses to my utter happiness) but it’s hard cuz I think the girls he finds only really want him. And I’m rubbish at trying to find a girl.
Cuz we need a bi girl haha.
Overall though, I’ve always felt that I was never splitting my heart when loving two people but having multiple whole hearts to give. And that I fell in love with people, not genders.
Just happened to find a straight guy.
I do feel so validated by all your comments about feeling like a bad bi girl and like people think you are over it. It’s nice to be in a group you didn’t realize existed ❤️
Wow, this thread is so awesome and important and necessary!
Thank you so much autostraddle for creating a non judgmental space where I feel like I can be myself!
I am also definitely hoping this will be an ongoing thread/discussion although it’s already starting to get a little long scrolling through the comments haha, I haven’t gotten the chance to respond to a lot but I’ve been reading a good part of these comments… Just wanted to introduce myself for now for those who don’t know me yet. I’m Sam and I’ve recently started feeling more comfortable with bisexual being an appropriate label for me, although I despise labels in general.
With “bisexual” I’ve struggled with fear of adding to bi erasure if I don’t use it and reinforcing the gender binary if I do use it; although I tend to only personally be attracted to cis men or cis women (so far), this is a personal preference and I don’t want my saying I’m bisexual to erase genderqueer, genderfluid, trans,etc folks.. But someone commented bisexual as in same gender than you as well as other genders and I really like this definition.
As for being in relationships with a cis man, I am not currently but the 2 serious relationships I’ve had were with cis men, and I didn’t start dating women until a year ago. So I relate to all these talks a lot and the struggle of not feeling queer enough when out with a man. Right now I am single and happily going on various dates with both men and women until I find someone I want to get more serious with.
Looking forward to discussions about all this with you lovelies!
I’m kind of late to the party but I wanted to comment anyway because I’m so, so happy to see this whole thing existing. At some point I stopped using the term bisexual so often as just “queer” because I felt like there were too many additional things to explain, like my gender and the genders I’m attracted to and possibly asexual stuff and whatever. But I’ve always struggled so much with the idea that bisexual or anything like it isn’t queer enough. Usually I’ll go through long periods of only really liking/interacting with women/other gendered people who are not men. But on the occasions that I do actually like men or masculine-identified people, I usually wind up in that gross awful spiral of questioning myself and my identity and my queerness. I haven’t dated any boys since high school and I don’t know if I will again, but I wish I could feel free to do so without the added worry of “people are going to assume we are straight people in a straight relationship and I really don’t want that”. I also spent so long in high school dealing with shitty stereotypes and bad feelings about how I was a bad bisexual or slutty or would eventually “admit I was straight” or that I wasn’t gay enough to fit into the few gay spaces I knew of or whatever that I just…stopped dating men at all. (That also has to do with me not really feeling comfortable dating anyone not queer-identified because I feel like they won’t get my life/respect my gender/etc. but that’s sort of another issue.) Anyway, I don’t know if this comment is making any coherent sense anymore or if anyone will see it, but I’m so so happy to see this space opened up and conversation started, because I so rarely see spaces specifically for bi/queer/multi-gender-attracted people so seeing this was a thing made my night.
Shout out from a fellow queer person who finds all the identity explanations difficult & cumbersome! I’m bi-ish, ace, on the aromantic spectrum, and some flavor of nonbinary that I haven’t quite pinned down yet. Sometimes it’s just easier to say “I’m queer” and let people take that how they want. I dream of a world where people don’t assume all these default things about gender and sexuality and they can come up organically in conversation, rather than me practically having to draw up charts and graphs to explain where I’m coming from.
Seeing this discussion and reading through the comments is making me feel so much bi straddler love!
My one long term relationship (~6 years, somewhat on-and-off) was with a straight, cis man and lasted from when I was 18 until the beginning of this year. When I got involved with him I was just starting to acknowledge that I was not straight and was into girls, but then I kinda pushed that to the side for a bit and assumed I was only going to date guys.
Over the next few years I started to identify as bi and come out to a few people, but I never saw it as a huge part of my identity. I don’t think it ever occurred to me during college that I might belong in an LGBT space. I think a lot of this had to do with not feeling like I was “out” enough or sufficiently into labels to possibly be accepted in an LGBT community, and I sort of assumed the B was only for bisexuals in different gendered relationships. Then, around three years ago I started to seek out and find more in the way of online queer community, including Autostraddle. I realized that even if I continued to be with a man forever, my bisexuality was an important part of who I am.
While this as certainly not the main reason things did not work out with my ex, I think there are some unique challenges to being a queer lady in a relationship with a straight, cis dude. Even though he was generally ok with me identifying as bi, there were times that he just didn’t quite get it when it came to sexuality and gender issues.
Things with him were somewhat on-and-off and not entirely monogamous (and we rarely saw each other in person), so I did go on dates with/ was somewhat physical with other people, but only ever with other guys. I think a lot of this has to do with being read as straight and also being fairly passive when it comes to seeking out relationships (especially when I was already involved with one person I was really into). I also though that straight girls would be super uncomfortable if I flirted with them and assumed other women wouldn’t be ok with my involvement with a man.
Now that I am totally single, I sort of feel like I should date women in part because I worry that otherwise the disparity between my experience with men and my experience with women will just widen and that will decrease my chances of ever being able to experience anything with a woman. I also feel like that is an incredibly ridiculous thing to worry about, so fuck that.
God. I feel so conflicted with bisexuality. I’ve only talked about this with two other people, but reading this (amazing) thread has left me with so many mixed feelings, I need to process.
I don’t really know how to label myself, it’s not really important to me anyway (although my label seems to be important to people around me ¬¬). I guess I’m somewhere near pans or bisexual or queer or something.
Sexually speaking I’m equally attracted to men and women, but romantically speaking I’m so much more attracted to women.
I’ve been in relationships with both men and women (all of them identified as queer) and my identity was never a problem for me or my friends.
But then I started dating my ex-girlfriend and I had this weird experience. Her family was supposedly really liberal and open minded, and they did accept me. But I started noticing that they treated her sister’s boyfriends differently. Like they were magnificent and shinny anytime they did something moderately nice for her sister, while I was just barely-adequate-me. That double-standard was also applied to any male friend my ex or her sister had. Then my ex left me for a man, and suddenly she went from a closeted relationship with me to a “straight” relationship, PDA, a magnificent boyfriend her mother obviously loves.
And that has just left me feeling SO conflicted about my bisexuality. I don’t know if this is normal or I’m the only one, but I feel so guilty and ashamed for liking guys as well. I’m so terrified of falling into any cliches, gender roles or double standards…
God, that was too long and irrelevant, sorry. I’m just trying to keep that “my comments and opinion matter” feeling going…
Also, after my last relationship the issue of visibility in bisexuality became extremely important for me. I just want to throw this question out there: are you as outspoken and open about your relationships with women as you are with your relationships with men?
I am, and it hurts so much when your partner “erases” you from their list of relationships…
Ahhh, I wanted to be more visible when I had a girlfriend, the problem is I’m more closeted about being in an open relationship than I am about being bisexual!! I feel like it’s less acceptable. In addition, I live in Florida, where I can be fired for being gay. :(
I know what you mean – my sister is gay and she has said that our parents treat her relationships/partners differently from my (male) partners and it makes me feel shitty for her.
I saw this last night and I nearly cried. Fell asleep with my phone in my hand reading all the comments. Woke up, remember this post, ninja cutting onions in my vicinity again.
Seriously now, I love you Autostraddle. I’ve been reading AS for 4 months now and it has fully changed the way I look at many things, including my self and my queerness.
I am not an out bisexual to anyone, although I did tell my male partner that I would love him if he was a girl too and other small things (like playing lady-loving protagonists in Mass Effect and Dragon Age, my favorite video games). I might tell him directly at some point, but for now, I am not doing anything to hide my attraction for both sexes without making an announcement.
For a long time I felt guilty that I am passing. I loved a girl throughout my highschool years (in secret and unrequited of course; I come from Eastern Europe and we were both in the Catholic church, not much of a chance for anything there…). In my university years I had various crushes, on girls mostly, but on one or two boys as well, but as I left my country for grad school I was looking forward to falling in love with a girl in a country that was completely new, gay-friendly and where nobody knew me. And guess what, I fell in love with a boy and we’ve been together for 4 years and I am pretty sure he is my soul mate. And I felt so guilty when my parents breathed a sigh of relief that I finally found a boy (I am sure they weren’t considering the possibility that I like girls, but they were quite insecure about my not having a boyfriend until I was 23) because now I am ‘normal’ and I felt like a fraud.
Throughout the years I’ve come to terms with myself and accepted who I am (thanks also to AS, books and TV shows), although I still don’t feel like I deserve to be part of the LGBTQ community because I pass as straight, which is why I generally only lurk around on lesbian websites.
Anyways, this has been a long, ramble-y post (the first time I wrote these things about myself) and it probably makes no sense, but I had to put it out there.
Again, thank you AS for existing. You really make a difference.
Hi all :-)
First of all, this thread is awesome! I’d love to respond to so many of the comments here but right now, I’d just like to add my own two-penneth. I first “came out” to my family as bisexual about seven or so years ago; only a few months down the line, I verified that I was in fact a lesbian & I have adopted (shall we say?) *that* identify ever since. It’s one hell of a big deal for women; to come out of the closet, especially if their families’ are homophobic. I can’t help but feel I’m now betraying myself (& this community) for, effectively, turning my back on it yet again.
I’ve always dated women in the past; I love women for companionship & certainly, I’m capable of feeling “romantic” towards women but, and here’s the real clincher, I’m not sexually attracted towards women either. The thought of having sex has always terrified me & I’ve always said that I fear I’ll push somebody away, because I have done so in the past with women. Having said that, I’m not asexual either, because to be honest, I have no real quarms over sleeping with a man either. Confusing, eh?
It makes more sense, to me, to “come out” as bisexual, rather than “homo-romantic” but I’m still incredibly confused as to where I sit on the spectrum. On the other hand, it’s brilliant seeing so many (bisexual) women who are comfortable in their own skin and who are either in happy heterosexual or homosexual relationships :) ultimately, it shouldn’t matter who we love or which gender; I guess I’m just afraid that if I do say I’m bi, I’ll inevitably receive the “told you so” from my family.
But you know what, fuck it. Labels should be for cans, not people! Thank you, lovely people, for your stories. Let’s keep them coming! :-D
Thank you Autostraddle ! I’ve been waiting for this for so long on this website.
Whereas in mainstream media, representations of bi women dating men, and only having casual or not frivolous relationships with women are hegemonous, in gay media such as Autostraddle, there seems to be no voice for us bi ladies in committed relationships with men.
I love my progressive minded, and understanding boyfriend very much, our poly committed relationship is working fine for now, and I see a future with him. However I still am and will always be bi/pan, and I want full participation in the queer world.
ALso, I am amazed at the number of women telling the story of first coming out as lesbian before realizing they were bi. I’m glad to hear I’m not the only one.
I really wish I’d been online when this was going on! I feel like even though I’m currently not dating a dude I’d still like to talk about FEELINGS.
Does anyone else find that other people define your sexuality for you based on who you’re currently dating? I’m currently with a genderqueer partner but I get so much bi erasure all the time – weirdly more from straight friends who want me to be a lesbian.
I know for some people that is their truth, but I still define myself as being attracted to people of many different genders. And I don’t understand why people need to be like “oh you’re a lesbian now”
Oh my god! You can see me! You can actually see me! Hello everyone!! :3
I am so glad that this thread exist! Finally I can say proudly that I am Bisexual and well I have a boyfriend for almost 4 and half years. I found out that I also liked women an half a year ago and I never feel any validated, because well, I never dated a woman before, because I already am in a relationship. Everyone and their mom thinks I am straight, but nope. And sometimes that leads to awkward situations.
My boyfriend helped me coming out so I am so proud of him. We have our ups and downs, because let’s be honest, coming out is not what you do on an average basis, but we figured things out and I see a future with him. I don’t feel validated yet in the LGBT community because people judge me for having a boyfriend, and thus think I’m straight. And in the media its all fine and dandy if the woman comes out and dates a woman, but if she chooses a man, oh lord get your pitchforks. And that’s really sad. I am really happy that that are a lot of women like me here telling their story.
Greets from the Netherlands!!
I came out when I was 15. Two years prior I confirmed myself as a Witch. On top of that I parent two girls who are not biological to me (they are my boyfriend’s kids). Add into that the fact that I’m a survivor of childhood trauma which came from abuse. Otherwise I’m cis and white, and currently approaching upper-middle class although that’s not at all how I grew up. You might be able to imagine the issues with erasure and ‘passing’ I encounter on a regular basis in more than a few ways.
Being able to find a space that is inclusive of me in all ways is really impossible. I’ve come pretty close with a group I’m a part of, dedicated to Attachment Parenting- I feel very at ease there, and they work to collaborate with all members to be inclusive. The challenge is that I’m into social justice, and support a Black Feminist and Womanist perspective which I work to create in a feminism that is intersectional (wholly supportive of ability, race, class, etc). And even that group, while easily a very supportive place in the forum online that it has created, in person is not as enthusiastically accepting.
Specifically from the standpoint of being bisexual/pansexual (I don’t mind using those terms interchangeably although I understand some people really like to utilize one or the other), I’ve experienced a lot of erasure. When I came out to my primary caregivers at the time (my grandparents), they laughed loudly and then went into great detail about what ‘lesbians do’ sexually. I think their perspective was that I didn’t know what I was talking about and as soon as I understood the ‘disgusting’ sex acts that went with being gay I would never want to identify that way. Once I pushed back, there was anger. Especially from my grandfather. I got a little flack over the years for not ‘picking a side’, but not as much flack as I got from the males I dated. It was a cycle: first they would sexualize my identity (“you’re bi? that’s hot, I wanna watch”), and then as we got more serious, they would use it as a point of insecurity…somehow because I was also attracted to women, I was not a ‘sure thing’ in our relationship. That didn’t fly with me, and it’s one of the reasons I’m not with any of those schmucks!
The thing about my bisexuality is that it is complicated. My relationships with men follow the traditional understanding of a relationship- we date, we get serious, we are monogamous, there is talk of marriage…in fact I’m going to propose to my boyfriend now, this summer. And I’m very happy about that!
My relationships with women have always been something else entirely, when it comes to attraction and romance. I had what I understand now as an on-again, off-again romance with a woman for years, from middle school until after I graduated with my undergrad, through other boyfriends (and one girlfriend). It was emotionally intense, and on some other level than I have investigated with men. I had another relationship that I classified at the time as being my best friend, but looking back on it now (we no longer speak), I was absolutely in love with her. It was also emotionally intense although in a different way, and I just think I was always scared to jeopardize the friendship by telling her how I felt. I guess the best way to put it is that the line of friendship vs. romantic is pretty solid and traditional in regard to men but totally blurs when it has ever come to women I have feelings for. I also have continued to be questioning when it comes to identifying as polyamorous/polysexual. While I’ve never been in a poly relationship, the way I feel and how I invest my emotions is certainly poly. I tend to be actively in love with more than one person at a time, for long periods of time, regardless of where we are geographically or in life. It just happens.
Recently, like in the past two years, I’ve come to a place in life where I feel far more accepted and affirmed than I ever have before. I realize that part of that is my socioeconomic situation has vastly improved. I feel more secure monetarily, and live in probably the safest city in America (no joke, we don’t lock our doors, or cars, we just don’t worry about that). Part of it is also that I am able to surround myself with people who mostly get it, especially my boyfriend.
However, it’s still difficult. Again, solely from the perspective of being bisexual, in particular the last two weeks have included some moments of erasure and denial from the LGBTQPIA+ community. I went to a mixer that was for LGBT and Allies last week, and twice I was mistaken for a straight person. One man told me that because I was cute and skinny I came across as straight. The lesbian couple next to me were extremely offended and I felt pretty upset. Another instance involved a professional therapist who was seeing someone close to me. It was relayed to me that this therapist, when told that I was bisexual (it came up during the course of the visit), asked if immediately if I was a ‘swinger’. The assumption there is that because I’m bisexual, I must be having sex with multiple people currently. Another instance involved someone I’m working with on a board. They volunteered to be head of a task force for the LGBTQPIA+ community. I was talking to them about the ‘alphabet soup’ of it all, and they dismissively relayed that it was too hard to remember all of the identities and that they were just going to gear their action toward lesbians and gays. I wonder if this person assumed I was straight, and furthermore that a comment like that was ok. In that instance, I understand if this person didn’t mean it at all and it was just a way to joke, but I felt extremely marginalized and let down in that moment.
To close out this essay (lol), I definitely encounter a pressure, whether internal or external, to ‘prove’ my bisexuality. It makes things even more difficult, because while I may be poly that doesn’t mean that the best way to move forward with this relationship I have now is toward polyamory. It might be, but the pressure I feel also makes me feel pressured to choose polyamory just so I can prove to myself and the world that I am still bi, that I am a valid bi, and that I have the right to identify as bi. And that makes me sad and angry. It makes me sangry. My boyfriend has been endlessly affirming in all of this. We’ve talked a lot about the possibilities in our relationship, and he reminds me that I don’t have to prove anything to anyone. It’s why we work- he gets that!
There’s a lot more to my story, but that’s a snippet of what it’s like living as a bisexual woman who is in a relationship with a man.
I also realize that my experience has not included people of all genders, and yet I identify as pansexual. I just wanted to mention that just because I haven’t included those experiences here, doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Maybe I’m being defensive, but again, that’s that “I have to prove myself” mentality.
Anyway, I appreciate this thread immensely. Thanks for having an outlet available to us, to me. It’s easy for me to feel like I have to make myself smaller in order to let others have the spotlight, but I need to remember that my experience is important too. Thanks for that.
This thread makes me really happy! :)
I feel a lot of pressure, especially as a young queer who has only dated boy (singular intended), to validate my identity somehow? I’ve been accused of ‘not being enough of a lesbian’ and adopting a queer identity to seem ‘cool/edgy’, and this has made me quite nervous entering queer spaces, both online and irl. A lot of online biphobia has made me hesitant to engage in conversations, and as someone said earlier, I felt like I wasn’t like, ‘allowed’ to read Autostraddle because of my f/m relationship and my lack of experience.
It annoys me that I am automatically classified as a ‘cishet poser’ by some people, either because of my visible relationship or my lack of sexual experience/inclination, and then in the same breath, accused of leading my boyfriend on/employing him as a beard or whatever, because I sometimes ‘look like a lesbian’ – which is itself often employed as an insult, and that also really pisses me off.
It’s quite frustrating that this makes me really nervous be an active participant in queer communities – because while I really just want to be all ‘fuck you, this is who i am, etc.’ I’m also really quite afraid to do that because of the potential repercussions, and it makes me sad that I need to be careful with that in spaces that logically should actually be accepting?
I think that this internalised/externalised pressure was partially why it took me so long to realise that I was pan; only in hindsight have I realised all of my (really obvious) queer crushes – although part of that was in realising that you could like someone without imagining them sexually.
Idk. I’m really happy to be reading everyone’s stories, and I’m really grateful that this thread exists.
Hi, I’m bisexual. I’ve mostly dated men. I’m currently dating a man. I haven’t had the opportunity to date a woman, but I would. I’m sexually attracted to men and women. I like having sex with men and women.
To me, it’s never felt complicated. I at least can see where the confusion comes from with cis, hetero people, but they actually don’t give me many problems that make me uncomfortable. Most of my discomfort and hurt has come from other queer women. The queer and LGBT community should never make me qualify “I’m bisexual” with “Yes, I like going down on women.”
There has been thinkpiece after Buzzfeed list after Tumblr post dedicated to how much queer people aren’t obligated to share details of their sex lives with ANYONE. Ever. And yet, sharing those intimate details seems to be the only way people respect my identity as a queer woman, *especially* according to other queer women.
What if I hated oral sex in general? People don’t seem to think that men are any less attracted to women when they refuse to go down on them (which is practically commonplace), and yet I feel pressured to constantly and emphatically declare my love for cunnilingus every single time I get asked about my identity.
Does no one else see how fucked up that is? It’s not just identity policing, it’s identity policing by using actual *sexual* policing.
It’s my sex life. Get your own.
I see a lot of exclusion of bisexual women from queer spaces, and this whole piece is something that makes my heart warm. Quality content, AS, this is the stuff I’m here for.
I’ve read so many posts about bi women who are currently in relationships with cis men that are supportive of their sexuality. What about those of us that are struggling with partners that are homophobic/biphobic?
I was forced out of the closet by my husband ten years into our relationship.
He reacted badly. Not violently, but super controlling to the point of stalking. I had no privacy or anywhere to turn. It resulted in me having a complete emotional breakdown to the point of being suicidal.
I went to camp once, but deliberately kept my distance from other campers due to my situation being so messed up. So I don’t really have any friends in the community.
While all of this was going on, I was also betrayed by a close friend that I had previously confided in. This friend made up a pack of lies in an attempt to make my life worse.
I’m finding it very difficult that the few people I thought were the closest people in my life used my bisexuality as a stick to beat me with the first chance they got.
I know that if I leave my current relationship for any reason, husband will see it as a direct result of me being a deceitful lesbian (because I must be gay right? Bisexuals don’t exist) and will attempt to ruin my life. I go through stages of feeling very trapped.
I am being punished despite having done literally nothing. I was outed against my will.
To most queer people I feel completely invisible and invalidated.
It’s literally the worst of both worlds.
I’m sorry to add this to a mostly positive thread and I know I missed the busiest time anyway.
I really appreciate the opportunity to been seen. Thanks Rachel and everyone else.
I’m so sorry this is happening to you Al! I want you to know that you’re not alone in having this experience, and while it’s great that there are bi women on this thread who have supportive male partners, there are a lot of people in your position. One reason why bi women have such high rates of intimate partner violence is that partners do often use someone’s bi identity as leverage against them — not that this makes your situation better, but at least you’re not totally alone. Are you able to have internet contact with others in privacy from your husband? If so, it may be possible to find other bi women who have had similar experiences who can provide support!
My ex-husband was emotionally (and sometimes physically) abusive. When we first started dating, my bisexuality was fetishized. But soon every aspect of my sexuality was a weapon against me. It was horrible.
You deserve to be treated better. Who cares WHY you leave someone who is emotionally abusive? When I left, finally, I made peace with the what ifs. What if I’m actually selfish and cruel and heartless? Well. So what.
You are being abused. You deserve better. You deserve to be celebrated, embraced, and loved. He doesn’t love you. He wants to own you.
I want you to know that I hear you, and this is so real, and it’s terrible that it is so very common.
If you want support around this, The Network/La Red has a partner abuse hotline (9am-midnight weekdays, 1pm-6pm Saturdays, 1pm-midnight Sundays) for LGBTQ, poly, and kinky people. I am a volunteer, and I can tell you, biphobia and the high rates of abuse experienced by bi people are specifically covered in training and people in situations like yours are absolutely welcomed and encouraged to call (I’ve talked to a few myself). The number is 617-742-4911 (voice), 617-227-4911 (tty). There is also a phone-based support group for people who don’t live near the Boston area. You don’t need to leave or want to leave your partner to access these services, though if you want to we can try to help with that.
Al, I’m so sorry to hear that this is happening to you. And yes, it’s happening TO you–it’s not because of you. You in no way deserve any of what your husband is putting you through. You DO deserve to get support and help in getting yourself out of this situation, in any way that you can. And you’re not alone or invisible anymore! :)
Thank you for opening up about this. That means a lot, that you trust us in the safe space of this thread. I can’t tell you what to do in this situation. Only you can decide when and if you leave an unhealthy relationship. I know you did not use the words “abuse” or “partner violence.” You may or may not feel like those words describe what is going on. I am guessing there are probably good days and there were good times with your husband before–or else you wouldn’t have married him! It can be hard to give a name to our experiences. What you are describing sounds like more than an unsupportive spouse. It sound like emotional manipulation and emotional abuse. Biphobia, if it is just having outdated views about bisexuals or making jokes that are inappropriate, is one thing. You could talk about that, help someone grow and learn. But when biphobia manifests in the controlling and deeply hurtful behavior you describe, it is totally fair to call that emotional abuse.
HOWEVER, you may not feel like that word fits. And don’t have to decide whether those words are right. What I want you to know is that there are plenty of people who are here to support you, including the resources other folks offered here. I also want you to know that you have the right to leave and to put your happiness first, above your husband’s feelings and needs. You deserve a partner who not only respects your sexuality, but respects you as a person. I am not telling you to leave right now or that you even have to, ever. That’s your decision. I just want to say that it doesn’t have to be like this and that you are allowed to prioritize your own safety and wellbeing.
XOXO
Thank you everyone for your advice and kindness.
It helps a lot to hear from others that have experienced this.
Sometimes I wish he would leave me, as if that would somehow prevent or limit his actions at the relationship ending. But I know that he is likely to retaliate anyway.
It would always be my fault, regardless of his actions. I am in a monogamous relationship and have never cheated. He has. But I am treated as the one that is inherantly untrustworthy.
He has said more than once that if he had known I was bisexual when he met me, he would never have started dating me and certainly would never have married me.
The number of people on this thread that just wanted to stand up and be counted and tell us a little about themselves is incredible. It is astounding how many of us there are – a great deal of us completely invisible to both the lgbt and heteronormative communities.
I am very glad that Autostraddle is here and that I got the opportunity to hear about everyone.
I want to join the Facebook group, but don’t know how to hide my group activity/membership from most of my Fb friends. Does anyone know if it’s possible to do that?
Can I just say how hurtful of a thing to say, in so many words, I never should have/would have married you? That is mean. As far as joining a group on Facebook without anyone seeing, this is only possible if it is a secret group. Even a closed group will show up. Sorry.
https://m.facebook.com/help/220336891328465
Umm, if you’re still with your husband, that sounds like a pretty unhappy situation. If he’s controlling and overbearing and loudly anti a large part of what makes you who you are (obviously nobody is characterised solely by their sexual orientation, but in adult life, your sexuality is a very important part of you) – it just doesn’t sound like you’re with someone who is good for you.
I like, many here, am so happy to simply have the validation. I am married to a cis-gendered male and while my my bi-sexual identity is supported and validated in my relationship, I find outside of my relationship that identity is invisible. For those who do know my orientation I find that I am having to defend just how queer I am.
It means so much to see this thread.
I’ve known since I was in elementary school that I was attracted to girls. They came before boys, honestly! I’m 28 now and all of my serious relationships have been with cis men. I did come out to my mom in hs, she is VERY religious and VERY conservative. She thought it was a phase and I was just confused, because obviously just because I’m friends with a girl doesn’t mean I have to have sex with them! -_-
Fast forward to now where I’m in a relationship with a guy. I’m 100% sure she thinks it was just a rebellious high school phase, but more and more lately, as I become involved in the community online, I want to be out and be myself.
I’m more pan- than bi, but most of the time I don’t even bring that up because of the bi hate that goes on. I’m also masculine of center/genderqueer and have been trying to hide that also as to not upset family but I’m done. I finally cut my hair how I want, no more wearing dresses to formal events, as I feel wildly uncomfortable doing so.
And even though my partner is cis male he supports me 100% going so far as to say if people end up thinking we look like a gay couple, he doesn’t care.
But anyway I’m off topic now. I’m just having my own reawakening lately that I don’t need or want to hide my sexuality anymore, just because I can in a “straight” relationship, when I’m anything but. You’re all awesome, let’s continue to speak up and show that bi pride!
It’s a strange realm to be in. Until last year, I didn’t really understand that I was bisexual, and when I got a middle school level head over heels crush on a woman it sort of all came together and made sense. But even though I knew that I liked her and was attracted to women, it almost felt like I had to prove it, that I couldn’t be sure I was actually bisexual until I had acted on it. I still haven’t come out to anyone but my sister and a close friend, I don’t know why but it almost feels like it would be easier to come out as gay because at least that’s definitive. Not that it’s easy to come out as gay either, I don’t want to diminish the difficulties of that experience, but since I’m not dating anyone right now it sort of seems like it would be bringing up the issue unnecessarily?
Hola,
thanks for that AS! Biphobia is still a big thing and bi-awareness ist one of the things media mostly just covers stereotyped.
I am a queer/bi woman in my early thirties and I’ve been in a wonderful relationship with my boyfriend for nearly 15 years. The first ten years monogamous, since last years more open and poly, which can be hard/frustrating, but also changes things in a positive way.
I am very glad that I can read and experience the stories of other bi-identified folks here and I hope this gives me the courage to finally come out to my mother. So that is one thing I have never really did (I think she knows). So, I am only partial ‘out’ to friends and some colleagues and I totally panicked the last time I wanted to tell my mother.
Cheeers!
I can’t thank you lovely humans at AS for this thread. As you know, it is to meaningful and touching to be seen and to be given a space, especially on a queer site! As many of the great bisexual women in this thread have said, it is challenging to navigate these two worlds and often we’re made to feel like we’re unwanted in both of them – that is, when we’re not forced to choose one or the other, or worse, when we’re erased.
It always hurts me more to be erased or dismissed in a queer space, and so I thank AS from the bottom of my heart for this thread and this chance to share in others’ similar experiences. Please let it be the first of many!
Enough! I meant to say I can’t thank AS ENOUGH for this thread. Not that I can’t thank you. Lots of thanks! ALL THE THANKS! :)
I am just comming to terms with my sexuality. I have been dating a man for a little over a year now, but recently I have had the courage to face what I have always felt to be true. I have always known that I was attracted to both men and women, and it feels amazing to say it out loud (or at least type it out). I cannot begin to describe the emotions I felt when I found this thread. Thank you thank you thank you!
I’m SO happy to see this forum here and to see this community flourishing, especially as someone newly grappling with “going back to men” after years of dating and one marriage to women.
I actually just wrote a story about my “bisexual freakout” the day marriage equality passed and would love to share it with you if that’s not against comment policy: https://medium.com/@the_valleyvspot/don-t-wanna-be-straight-forever-4d15be816e64
:)
I loved your article!
thanks for this thread and all of your thoughts!
i’m bi and i find it utterly confusing.
do i have a preference for men? for women? romantically? sexually? why do i sometimes feel like i only like women, why sometimes only men? where is this going? what am i?
i’ve been thinking about these questions for +10 years and empirically trying to find answers. yet, i still don’t have a clue.
Hey, totally on the same page. I feel like I go through phases where my preferences change or I’m just totally confused about how I’m feeling. Nice to know someone else is too!
I think sometimes you have to let go of those questions a little bit, surround yourself with people who inspire you (when possible – def. easier said than done) and just tell people when you think they’re cute! They might think you’re cute too. :-)
thank you so much for creating this space and making it a safe space. you are so right that any time bisexuality is brought up online, it just bring out hoards of trolls, ironically making the point the articles are usually citing- we are not accepting in the supposed LGBTQ community. It is perverse the way I read those trolls comments- it makes me feel validated that I am not imagining that I am not accepted in the community while at the same time reinforcing the feeling that it’s not safe for me to be out. I do think it’s getting better, in large part because of Autostraddle and similar sites. But what I hear over and over from gay identified people, is that bi people are riding on the coattails of our gay predecessors, not having contributed anything the the glbtq rights movement. I also hear that most bi people chose to be with the opposite gender. Of course, bi people have ALWAYS been fighting alongside our lgbtq brothers and sisters even if it wasn’t safe for us to come out as bi- we are often assumed in those circles to be gay. And further, it’s easy to conclude that bi people are always with the opposite gender because what happens is this. Bi people make up the majority by far of the community- more than the LG and T combined. But because, thank you, bi erasure, we are almost always assumed to be straight if with opposite or gay if with the same gender, the ones who are visible and bi are those who fight against that- usually they are with the opposite gender and I have a theory for why that is. I have been monogamous with my husband for 24 years. I am still me. How I identify has not changed in all of that time. But most bi women don’t feel safe coming out because there is not much understanding in straight culture (“you aren’t bi now, right? you are with a man….”) and we are not accepted in gay culture. So those of us in same sex relationships often just let people assume we are gay rather than thwart the support of the community by making a point of declaring our bisexuality- partners feel the same pressure for us to not be out as bi. So look around- most of those people you assume are gay are actually bi. It just isn’t safe for them to say so. Or maybe they have and you aren’t getting it. Women like me in relationships with men sometimes just get so sick of being invisible and not having the support of either community, we speak up. thank you!
I didn’t realize I was bi until I was already married to a man, so I never got a chance to be with a woman romantically/sexually, and unless my marriage ends (which I hope it doesn’t, I’m very happy), I probably never will.
I still consider myself bisexual though, I experience attraction to women, I just can’t/won’t act on it. The thing is, I’ve *always* experienced attraction to women, I just didn’t recognize it as such. I thought, well, all girls must feel this way and it didn’t really mean I was into women in THAT way…I’m attracted to men, after all. And the ways I was attracted to men, am attracted to men, are different than the ways I’m attracted to women, no doubt because of the way I was socialized to interact with different genders.
It’s so confusing, and without listening to other bi women as an LGBT ally, I never would have figured out that my feelings for women were valid and were real. I’m very grateful to have this more complete understanding of myself, even if it doesn’t have a huge impact on my life. I still don’t feel like I actually belong in LGBT spaces as anything more than an ally. Because I’m with a cishet partner, and am not really ‘out’ as bi to anyone I know in real life, I don’t really feel like I fit in. I’m happy to see this thread though. It’s nice just to get to talk about it with other people who might understand.
What a great thread! I’ve been out as bi for going on a decade, and dating/married to the same (cis straight) man for most of those years. He is ultra supportive of me and my identity both as a bisexual and as a woman (woo intersectional feminism) but it is so frustrating to feel like I don’t ‘count’ as queer. It took me so long to find any queer community because I was made to feel like I was invading someone else’s safe space, or ignoring the privilege I get from appearing straight (I can promise you, conditional privilege is hard to ignore). I finally have some awesome friends and queer community, but it took so long. Hang in there other bi ladies, there are people who wont be terrible people about your orientation.
Oh hi, how convenient that I visited Autostraddle today while waiting for my code to run! It’s so nice to see this space, even if I’m a day late.
I am bi, some sort of FAAB genderqueer/woman (demifemale maybe? still figuring that one out), and married to a straight cis man for five years. I’m pretty involved in my local queer communities.
Has anyone else had the experience that in the queer GEEK community, the sci-fi/fantasy/techie world, you see more bi women dating men, more femmes, and more transfeminine people, than in typical urban queer communities? And, unsurprisingly, way less messed up attitudes toward all these groups? In my geeky techie fandomy social circle it’s very common and not stigmatized to be a bi woman dating or married to a man. I step into the urban activist-y hipsterqueer community and suddenly it becomes really fraught, and there’s a lot of queer women bonding around how glad they are to not be dating cis men, that makes me feel very awkward. And even non-monosexual people in that community don’t like the term “bi” or “bisexual,” where in my queer-geek community that’s what the huge majority of non-monosexual people use to describe themselves.
I know that some people don’t like “bi” because they interpret it as implying a gender binary (a concern that is strangely absent from discussion of labels like “straight” or “gay” that are commonly understood to mean that you’re attracted to “the same” or “the opposite” gender). I see it as meaning that I’m attracted to people of both similar genders to and dissimilar genders from myself.
One thing I’ve seen a few times even in this thread, that I want more of us to question, is the idea that we have straight privilege when we’re with men and only men at a given time. We have certain privileges around how people (and until all the implementations of marriage equality get ironed out, US government agencies) treat our relationships, yes. However, we (bi women/female-presenting people in general) have drastically elevated rape and sexual assault rates, domestic violence rates, sexual hate crime rates, and PTSD rates, compared to either straight OR gay/lesbian women/female-presenting people. Someone explain to me how it’s straight privilege to be so much more likely to get sexually violated and attacked by partners and end up traumatized? We’re also more likely to be poor than either straight or L/G people, and have certain health disparities.
We need a better understanding of our own issues, because it seems clear that the rest of the LGBTQ community isn’t going to bring them up or educate people about them. The number of bi women who know any of the things I just said in the previous paragraph is distressingly small – our issues are as invisibilized as we are.
“a concern that is strangely absent from discussion of labels like “straight” or “gay” that are commonly understood to mean that you’re attracted to “the same” or “the opposite” gender”
So much this!
I agree,I have personally found that geek/tech groups of any size have been much more accepting of bisexual members of any gender-and markedly more accepting than similar lgbt groups.
I agree! Nerd cultures are the best for acceptance! We are so used to being unaccepted that we take in everyone. My nerdy groups include loads of other NBs, gay, trans, bi, it is so happy making! Plus we are all united by our common love of SciFi, Fantasy, movies, tech and geekery.
It gets so close that sometimes I forget what it is like out in the world, then I am reminded and it’s like oh. I’m at uni again and my class is very cis and largely straight and it is complicated being with them. I feel a little like an outsider sometimes. I am the queer, nerdy, ASD one in class. It’s exhausting.
I’ve been married to a wonderful man for a very long time and about 8 years ago i admitted to myself and my partner that i had had a long standing attraction to women as well. i now find myself in a great situation where i date women outside of our marriage. it is a tricky situation sometimes and there have been hurt feelings on all sides, but i try to navigate it all in a respectful and honest way. it took awhile but i feel fairly accepted by my queer community, and most of my straight friends know too. and this acceptance, and seeing threads like this, really help me finally feel comfortable with who i am.
Does it still feel like you relationship with your husband is special and precious? My boyfriend has told me I can go explore my sexuality with women but I am nervous about our bond being weakened or having sex feel less special or something like that.
In my current relationship, we were casual and seeing other people when we fell in love. Then we decided not to become exclusive when we affirmed the seriousness of our relationship. Sex together is still special. It’s not always romantic and squishy, but no sex is always romantic and squishy. But he’s my partner and I am his and we have a dynamic committed to making sure that we care for each other. Our sex is about mutual enjoyment, building our connection, coming together (heh) after a rough day, comfort, that oxytocin, and so on. The rest of our interactions are FWB or just plain casual, and they’re about pleasure and adventure.
Sex in our relationship is an expression of our relationship. The other sex is different.
Wow, this is already up for a day and I’m only seeing it now. And it already has more than 800 commments!!! What can I even say to this and will I ever make it through all these comments?
I’m bi/pan with a higher sexual attraction to women (but sexual attraction is not everything in life). Since pretty much forever.
It took me quite a while to notice it as a teenager and again a while to accept it and still some more time until I was ready to be open about it. When I was, I was so ready to start a new queer life. I came out to a couple of friends, moved to a new town, started college. So everything could have been great and queer. But then I met HIM.
And it just stopped the whole process. We have been together for 7 years now and will probably be for the rest of our lifes and I’m very happy about it. But I feel like there is this big part of my identity missing and I would never know how to talk to people who perceive me as straight about it because I’ve never even dated a woman before (completely ignoring the fact that before my boyfriend I did not really date many people at all, but no one ever asks about that).
So yeah, that’s me. Thank you for doing this here, for making a place where I fit in too!!!
That’s precisely what happened to me too! Moved to a “gay-friendly” country where nobody knew me to start a queer life and bam, dude happens.
But I never was open about my sexuality, so the ‘straight’ assumption is let’s say more ‘deserved’ in my case :( ugh, i hate labels!!
Reading about all of the ways in which you guys have explained away the evidence of your attractions to women has really made it clear to me how I’ve been doing the same thing my whole life, which I pretty much realized a few years ago but I’ve still had a thread of doubt about until now. Like, I spent years seeking out queer spaces and fixating on images of women’s bodies and being way too invested in “friend crushes” but like, I was dating dudes, so probably that was just a thing that all straight people did, and insofar as I thought I might be bi, well, that was probably just because all of my friends were gay and I wanted to fit in or something? And when I hooked up with women and enjoyed it, that’s probably just because touching people and being touched feels good? It seemed like until I actually dated a women, all the evidence could be explained away somehow, and now that I’m life partnered with a dude that’ll never happen, so I’ll never really *know* I’m bisexual.
“and now that I’m life partnered with a dude that’ll never happen, so I’ll never really *know* I’m bisexual.”
I dunno, I’ve never had a bf or a gf and I know I’m bi! Unless this bit was meant to be sarcastic?
It’s more to do with the fact that being with a dude makes me feel, like, de facto straight, no matter how much evidence there is that I’m not actually straight.
This is wonderful. I just broke up with my boyfriend of over a year, and I have a lot of mixed feelings about dating another man after this experience. It was weird to pass as a straight couple (he is queer as well), and I felt like it allowed my family to forget that I wasn’t straight. My brother straight up (ha!) said that he kept forgetting that I was queer because I was dating a man. It’s been a bit of personal battle with my parents (my dad is supportive but doesn’t really ‘get it’ and my mom has told me she ‘doesn’t understand and doesn’t want to’), so being in what appeared to be a ‘normal’ straight relationship as a mostly fem-presenting woman felt like a step backwards in ‘proving’ that I was queer. Ugh.
Anyway, love to all the bi/pan people on here, and I am so happy we can share our stories here.
I feel you! I currently have a bf who is queer also and I find myself reminding people that I am queer wayyy too often. I’m happy with my bf but I find myself thinking about wanting to date a woman because I want to be read as queer so badly. Do you have this feeling as well?
Thank you so much for this, I´ve been in this struggle for a long time. I belong to a society who is still way homophobic. An the GLBTI context is very biphobic and seems so small sometimes. I had a girlfriend a few years ago who was all the time hesitating about me being bi. In my experience, I´ve had some relationships with girls even more machistas than with guys.. so sad.. and still I am so certain about myself..
I don´t like labeling but I could define myself as a pansexual person.
I live with my boyfriend almost a year, but with comes and goes we´ve been almost five years together. He knows about me, but we don´t talk about it. Its like my secret pain and unhappiness…
In the pride parade of this year I kept myself busy, I wanted to go so much, but I felt like… why would I go?… everytime I feel inside the comunity is when I feel closer to girls.. but that may be absurd, because I know I am not lesbian..
I remember me and my bf going together a few years ago, but it was like, i kept him away while we were walking, my big excuse was that I was taking pictures (I was, I´m a photographer..)… I feel so bad about it, I mean, he was there with me, supporting me… and that is still wierd for me..
It´s really dificult, the problem for me may not be identifying myself as I am but thinking about me, him, our future… my future, my desires, my sexuality… I feel overwhelmed with this.. My psichologist says I will never feel sexually satisfied because my sexual inclination is so wide..
Sorry for my english, and thank you so much for this space, so necessary
I hear a lot of unhappiness in what you’re saying, and I’m sorry. I know it must be really hard to hold this as a painful secret. Do you want to talk to your boyfriend about it? How do you think he would respond?
“My psichologist says I will never feel sexually satisfied because my sexual inclination is so wide.” That’s a stereotype I’ve heard a lot. It’s true of some people, not all people. What do you think about yourself? How will you feel if you never date a woman again? If you need women and men to be happy, do you want to date more than one person at the same time?
This thread makes me so happy! Thank you Autostraddle for granting us some visibility.
I realized I was bi in high school, but never really gave it space until the last 3 years (I’m in my late twenties) – which is really tough! I’ve only ever dated men long-term, and I am still feeling so awkward in my skin when it comes to even trying to date women. I want to! Like, a lot! I just don’t know where to go or how to be or whether those questions make me sound essentialist. :X It just feels like I’m a hormonal teenager when I meet a lady I could have a chance with – which is, again, such a testament to bi invisibility in our culture.
I currently ID as bi and poly, and am in a primary relationship with a man who also IDs as pansexual, so I have lots of intimate support and validation. Sometimes, though, I really struggle to feel as validated by the dating pool/community in my attraction to women. As an introvert and very socially anxious person, I stick to online dating primarily to find new dates, but so many women who seem okay with poly either are in it for the satisfaction of their partner, or they’re so busy or cool I don’t have a chance! Can anyone here relate? How have you navigated these new feelings later in life, and in such a fraught ID community?
I was late to the game too! I realized around age 15 I was bi but didn’t date a lady until age 33. Oooof. And yes I absolutely felt like an awkward teenager trying to get dates with girls! But I’m a pretty quick learner ;)
Yes! I just posted about this. I am super shy and find it easier to meet men than women. I’ve done tons of online dating as well but women online are either fake, or never want to meet up, or are gay and not cool with me having a boyfriend. What’s a girl to do?
I am a bisexual woman (first time officially writing that!) who is just figuring this whole wonderful world out. I’ve actually only been in relationships with men, and I have fooled around with women only in a college makeout sort of way. I’m with a great guy right now that I am seriously considering marrying, and he has given me the go ahead to fool around with girls (however I want – with or without him) to figure this out for myself since I am inexperienced with women (A+ boyfriend). I’m not sure if that is a recipe for disaster though…anyone with a similar experience or advice? Help a baby bird bisexual out!
Oh my goodness! I was so shocked to see this this morning! THANK YOU GUYS SO MUCH! I’ve been trying to get involved with our lgbt community but I always get scared that I won’t be noticed much because I am not “queer enough”. I have a lot of fear and anxiousness in my heart about what happen in my life as a bisexual woman because I don’t have many bisexual friends who I can relate with! The few friends that I have are either lesbian, gay, or straight. I have really resonated with the comments in here and it has driven me to tears. Despite all that I have read online, I have never felt whole like how I am feeling right now. Thank you guys so much, this really has made me feel just great. AUTOSTRADDLE ROCKS.
I’ve identified as bi/pan my entire teenage and adult life, and never really had any qualms with it. However, I’ve consistently had a hard time finding women to date who also want to date me! Men and boys have always just happened to appear first and so, up until this point, I’ve only dated males. As a result, I have been CONSTANTLY invalidated by both my straight and gay friends. It’s usually comments like “But you just like boys more, right?” or “you guys must have a lot of threesomes” (plz stop). I’ve even had friends put percentages on my attraction to men versus women (i.e. 70% of me likes males, and 30% females) WHICH IS RIDICULOUS. The discussion of pansexuality and the possibility that I might like someone who doesn’t fit into the gender binary is overlooked completely. It’s been so frustrating that it’s moved me to tears many times, and comments like this come from even the people closest to me who just refuse to understand. Now, I have my first girlfriend, and I feel like I need to hang onto her at all costs just to prove my gayness to people, which is not a great feeling because she is a person and not a piece of evidence. Maybe it’s my own insecurity at the root of all of this, but has anyone else had a similar experience? I, like everyone else, just want to be free to love whoever I want!
I just recently came out as Bi to my mom and immediate family members a month or so ago. I’ve been in relationships with men my whole life and i’m currently in one, so I’ve never gotten to date a woman, so my mom is adamant that I’m not bisexual, because I’ve never been with a woman. She even went so far as to say ‘You know, you can think a women is sexy or attractive without being bi’ My question is, how are you supposed to make it known to others that you are bisexual without a doubt without dating a woman? I know I am, but how do I explain it to others?
I would suggest trying to find other bi people in your area, either by finding or creating a safe space. There will always be straight and gay people who won’t ever believe you, but when you have a community it’s a lot easier to stop caring about those who refuse to validate your identity.
This… Just all of this. I’m so excited and moved that you all are out there. I don’t have anything significant to contribute except that I identify as Bi, am engaged to a wonderful man and struggle with a desire to stay part of the queer community while ‘appearing’ to be straight.
It’s hard not to feel like my choosing a man as my life partner means that I won’t have a place in another group with whom I identify so strongly.
Hugs to all,
Thank you for opening up this space! In the past 13 years that I’ve been in the dating world, I’ve had a few life-altering relationships with women and men (one being a bi trans-man). I’ve found it difficult to feel accepted into the queer community while I was dating men and was treated differently by people when dating women. I’ve always felt as though I had to switch between two masks to appease the public, depending on who I was dating, rather then just be “me”. Dating a bi trans-man really brought this into focus for me – he was always read as male during the time we were dating and therefore we looked like a generally “straight” couple. There is a very large “LGBT” community nearby, but he wasn’t comfortable holding hands there as he didn’t want to come off as “that straight couple invading our queer space”, which I completely understood.
It’s very difficult, I find, to be accepting and inclusive, yet still have defined queer spaces. Lucky for me, I am currently head-over-heels for a woman with whom I share a long-term relationship and I don’t feel blatantly outcasted by the queer community as much these days.
Although it’s likely that we’ll be spending the rest of our lives together, I still make it known that I am bi, simply to remind people that bisexuality does exist – we deserve not to be painted over and dismissed. Down with bi-erasure!
I’m too late to join the party, and my primary partner is a woman, but I just wanted to jump in and add to the chorus of ‘thank you’s for creating this space! I’m bi and poly and while I’m not primarily dating men right now, I know how valuable and rare it is to have a space like this available to us. Much appreciated. <3
I am currently 25 and engaged to a man, after previously dating women and identifying as a lesbian. Its taken me a long time to be OK with the fact I’m bisexual, mainly because I felt like I was being ‘forced’ to leave something I loved behind. When I first starting dating a man, I used to tell people I was still a lesbian that just happened to be dating a guy.
The lesbian and gay community is something so strong, and beautiful and gave me an enormous amount of strength. Admitting to myself that I was bisexual made me feel like I didn’t have ‘the right credentials’ to be part of that group anymore – which is of course rubbish. For a long time I felt invisible, like people would look at me an assume I was straight because I was dating a guy and automatically dismiss me from the LGBT tag I so desperately felt drawn to.
Its taken me less time to be ok with the fact I’m now dating a man, than the time its taken me to be ok with the fact I’m not a lesbian anymore and that being bisexual is ok.
I am still LGBT, I just happen to be dating a guy.
I’m a queer identified woman who is actually full-on married to a cisgender man, so it’s really pretty awesome to see this thread and this space for recognizing folks like me. Thanks, as always, AS.
I’ve done a lot of work over the years to stay super involved in and engaged with the LGBTQ community. It’s where I feel the most at home, frankly. I’m extremely out about being queer. My now-partner knew I was queer before we even started dating (um, hard not to know, frankly). It’s never been an issue between us, thankfully. He celebrates it with me. He has no issues with me sometimes seeing other women/humans.
But there are definitely times when I feel, rightly or wrongly, that I have to sort of mute the fact that I’m with a guy. I do a lot of code switching in terms of how I refer to my partner (“husband” when I’m in super straight scenarios where I know it would involve a longer conversation and potential harassment if I used the term “partner” and vice versa in super queer environments).
I’m not particularly proud of it, and I’m trying to be more consistent, but there are very real fears and consequences around the issue–both when I’m mixing in very straight and very queer environments. I’ve been full-on yelled at, walked away from, derided by other queer women when I mentioned being married to a man. I’ve been accused of all sorts of nonsense by people on all ends of the spectrum. It’s weird, it’s complicated. Mostly I just want people to celebrate all types of consensual relationships, regardless of the gender identity or expression of those involved. Basically, if you’re not directly involved in that relationship, and it doesn’t involve harm to one of the parties, then maybe just STFU?
Anyway, yeah. I suspect it’s always going to be surprising to both some straight people and some queer people when they meet someone who doesn’t fit neatly into a preconceived notion. That’s fine. It happens to me, too! Just please don’t be a jerk about it. That’s all I ask, and what I try very hard to give in return.
I think it’s often a bit strange for the men I date. I’m used to being in queer relationships. They generally aren’t. And just because I’m dating a man doesn’t mean I’m willing to play by all the pre-programmed heterosexual scripts. When I’m with a woman or genderqueer person, we have to start from scratch with defining (or not) the roles in the relationship, and guys who are serious about dating me need to understand that the rules don’t change just because they’re a dude & I’m some kind of lady-ish creature. So relationships with dudes still seem pretty queer to me, with the added challenge of having to kinda teach him what it’s like to be in a queer relationship, and test whether that’s something he can get used to and be happy with in the long term.
Also I inevitably have to explain to dudes that sometimes him being affecionate in public kinda pisses me off & it’s not his fault; I’m just remembering times I’ve been harassed for doing similar things with girls, which is kind of a buzzkill, amirite ladies?
I enjoyed that there’s a place to speak about this. I personally have been up and down with where I sit on the spectrum of sexuality. I can’t say I identify as straight or gay. Bi or pan gets me closer to what I am attracted to. I have never dated a cis-women and have most recently been seeing men. I really don’t explain in detail my past other than I’ve dated females, that I am bisexual. I find it hard be completely open, something that I save when there’s more of a rooted connection.
next can we get a thread for bi women dating women? it feels like theres so few of us :(
Yes please!! I feel like I’m reading a lot of, “finding men to date is just easier,” and it’s great that that’s others’ experience, but it hasn’t been mine. I’d love to have a place to talk about the unique experience of being a bi woman who primarily dates other women but is still attracted to guys/something maybe less specific but along those lines.
I’m married to a bi-man but neither of us are really “out.” It’s hard for me to imagine that anyone even cares that I’m Bi when I’m in a long term, healthy, happy hetero marriage. But it’s still part of me.
I’ve recently started to think of being Bi as part of my identity and I recently attended my first Bi-community event. It felt great. :)
I once came across a term I really identified with. It was bisexual-hetero-romantic. I felt this term described me well because I’ve primarily dated men and have mostly only had sexual encounters or flings with women. I’ve only dated one woman I called my girlfriend. The relationship moved very quickly but only lasted one month. I broke up with her because she was falling in love with me and I didn’t feel the same way. After that experience I felt that maybe I never would fall in love with a woman and am only sexually attracted to women. I’m currently in a long term relationship with a wonderful feminist cis man. He knows about my sexuality and is supportive. We’ve even talked about adding another woman to the mix. Whether it would only be sexual or whether she would be part of our relationship I don’t know. However I have a really hard time meeting women. I am really shy. I’ve found that it’s way easier to meet men than women. Men are accustomed to making the first move so I don’t have to. And I find it difficult to find out whether a woman is straight/gay/bi. I’ve done a lot of online dating but many of the women I’ve talked to online end up being men posing as women to collect pics/have sexy chats with women. The one day of the year I tend to meet women is at Pride which is this week in Vancouver so I’m really excited for that!
This thread is so important and so lovely to come across! I’ve been openly out as Bisexual for over 7 years (I’m 22) and have dated more men than women. The only time I’ve ever felt part of/accepted by the LGBT community has been when I’ve been dating a woman.
Bi-invsibility and Bi-phobia are really challenging issues – being rejected or seen as not ‘gay’ enough for the LGBT community, and being completely misunderstood or not recognised by everybody else. Lesbians often don’t want to date bisexual women because we’re obviously just experimenting, greedy or more likely to cheat on them and ‘go back to men’. Men think it’s hot and assume that we’d obviously love to have a threesome with them.
I am currently in a relationship with a man after being with a woman for a long time, and am keen not to lose my connection to the LGBT community who I currently feel invisible to. I love that this thread is here – being Bi and the different aspects of dating both sexes is never discussed and it feels so comforting to know that other people have struggled with it, too!
I have been bisexual actively labeled as such by myself since I was about 14. I happily remained snuggled in the label that seemed to fit just right and have not varied from it. I’m now 29.
I have had male and female lovers, sometimes in the same moments.
My longest/deepest and most influential relationships have been rife with problems. M. a bisexual man was for 4 years. D. was a “straight/lesbian/bisexual/just call me queer” woman I was with for about 6 months. E. was a self biphobic bisexual I dated for 1 year. K. was a heterosexual man I was with for 6 years.
With M. We both had to be straight for the world and while in the bedroom fantasies could fly nothing could ever be spoken beyond. I was not allowed to have female friends because he was terrified and controlling assuming I would cheat on him at every given opportunity. He however had all the male friends he wanted.
D. was painful, she hurt me in so many ways lying to herself about us not meaning anything, picking up labels and shoving them onto me trying to make me adhere to whatever she thought would be the best way to stay in the closet.
E. thought dating a woman would cure his sexual interest in women. I could not be bisexual around him or it would set him into a rage demanding I pick a side.
K was loving, accepting, open and supportive. His family knew I was bi and was supportive… and yet I felt completely disconnected. I had never been to pride, never been to a gay bar, had not kissed a woman in 10 years at that point. I felt like I was still in the closet, this male lover of mind both a shield against a homophobic world and a ball and chain tethering me forever to the invisibility of assumed heterosexual identity. I could not explore LBGT community because with him I was shoved away, just a breeder, just a fake.
Now single I look back and wonder at myself. Did I choose men because it was easier to find them? Yes. I never found myself around other women who were lesbian bi or fluid. In fact I was 26 before I met another girl who I knew identified as Bi. I did not speak to her and kept my distance because I was afraid of falling for her and becoming one of ‘those selfish bisexuals’ who wanted the opposite gender while they were already with another.
I came to love myself, to realize that the limitations on bisexuals are external. who the hell says I can’t have a man and a woman at the same time? Why must I remain monogamous if I don’t want to? Nothing is holding me back but society’s messages that I took to heart.
After spending most of my dating years with men, isolated from any kind of community of people like me, I am broken free and demanding to be seen as a bisexual woman.
Definitely on board with getting rid of the ‘selfish bisexual’ stigma! Especially with all of this recent data about the growth and visibility of all types of non-monogamy, it seems strange that there’s still this fear or feeling that attraction to more than one gender somehow means you’ll always want the one you don’t have. Although I have also been with women and men at the same time, sometimes for prolonged periods. And I find that’s not uncommon for people who label themselves bisexual. Maybe there’s some truth to it, I haven’t worked it out for myself yet.
I have found being with both and being poly has allowed myself to accept embrace and love my bisexual identity. Society erases so much of that identity no matter which gender I am with that it seems to me to be the only free place. Poly is a wonderful option for visibility and I think it is reflective of the cultural erasure that people who are bi lean toward it for acceptance.
“selfish bisexual” = I am uncomfortable with you being in possession of your sexual desires and must attempt to control them.
Like many others, I think I am just in shock that my identity and experience is being recognized. It is really tough to feel like part of the LBGTQ community, being BQ, when others perceive that I am just a hetero person based on my partner’s gender. It is a privilege to be able to connect with the hetero community, and I recognize that not all people have that privilege, but I also know that it is exhausting to prove to all communities that my queerness/pan sexuality is legit. that’s all for now.
This is going to be a mess but I’m just going to lay it all out. I’ve been really struggling with how to talk about my identity, or even how to unpack it for myself and this is the first time I’ve ever felt compelled to join in on a conversation about queer identity. I’ve been dating a cis man for almost three years now and have generally just gone along with other people’s assumptions that I am straight.
Background: I went through the seemingly obligatory boy crazy years as a preteen before having a terrible experience with a fuckboy who played with my poor ninth grader heart. After that I really avoided acknowledging any sort of attraction to other people until falling for my current man. But along the way, I’ve noticed a strong pull that I couldn’t identify to some wonderful girls (2-3). And then there was this one girl who I was obsessed with, but the attraction felt different and def not explicitly sexual or about her appearance. Fast forward, and I’m friends with her in college, the attraction sort of gone until one night of partying that involved some suggestive dancing together. The next morning, my attraction was back (it faded over time but I’d still totally make out with her).
The past few months I’ve been seriously considering whether I am bi or not. I’m legitimately attracted to people so infrequently now (maybe because I’ve actively practiced avoiding attraction for a large part of my life due to emotional issues/monogamy?) that it’s hard to tell. I’m starting to think that I’ve had trouble recognizing my attraction to women because it’s so different from the male-driven, objectifying portrayal of het desire normalized in society. In any case, I suspect I’m just attracted more to men than women, which makes me feel unwelcome in the bi community. I actually felt huge relief when I discovered the Kinsey scale, as extremely limiting wrt gender identity as it is. Another thing that makes me feel unwelcome is that I am a white cis female who is just interested in experimenting with woman but not dating bc monogamy (my partner is totally okay with this. his last gf was bi & mostly out) and I see my kind shit on all the time as just “white college girl desperate for attention.”
I’m just very frustrated because I’ve never really seen anyone with an experience to which I can relate. Thanks for listening.
Nine hundred positive comments on an article about bisexuality. Autostraddle: Miracle Workers.
*dances around in a spray of heart-shaped glitter confetti*
I’m late to the game but as a gay woman who is really just here (on this thread) to learn more and be supportive, I have do say that one of my ‘draws’ to reading all of the posts and replies–hundreds and hundreds of them!–was to see if my eyes were deceiving me. Really? NO negative comments? None? Don’t want to jinx it and I’m obviously late to the game but wow. Super cool, AS community!
I feel like I have a pretty unique history/experience of being bi, in that a) I knew I was bi/came out when I was 11 (in the late 90s), and b) I am autistic, so a lot of the more subtle biphobia that may have been directly aimed at me has gone completely over my head and I don’t feel like I’ve experienced a lot of it, at least after middle school. I’m sure I’ve experienced more than I’m aware of, but it’s not part of how I feel in the world, if that makes sense. Also, c) I have mostly dated women and have always thought that women and girls who were actually attracted to me were easier to find (I suspect this has a lot to do with me being perceived as “weird,” but that’s a whole other topic.)
In any case, I feel like it’s hard to tell if my current dating situation fits with the topic of this post! I’m poly and dating four people who fall all over the gender spectrum: My primary partner of four and a half years is a trans woman, and I’m also dating a genderqueer/nonbinary person and a couple made up of a cis man and cis woman. Because the couple have known each other and been dating for significantly longer than I have known/been dating them, I think of them kind of as a unit, so while I could say I’m dating a man right now, I don’t feel like that comes with any of the gender norms or societal expectations of a straight relationship in this particular situation (not to mention that the three of us don’t get read as romantic partners in public – or, I should say, they do, but I don’t read as being part of it).
I’m not really sure why I’m saying any of this, tbh, but I guess I just wanted to add an alternative voice and feel heard here, too. Sorry for the ramble. I’m in a bit of a strange head-space right now and probably not articulating myself in quite the way I’d like to.
Hi- it is wonderful to see that a space like this exists, that the conversation has started, and that so many of you are speaking up!
As many of you I had two coming out’s: as a lesbian when I was a teen, and as bi when I was in college. Unfortunately the second one was much harder. The women I dated were understanding, mostly because they were all bisexual too. The men, on the other hand,have had all kinds of reactions, from being turned on, to feeling threatened, from telling me that I was lying, to just ignoring it all together. This meant that usually, after coming out to them I would drop the subject.
All this left me feeling more confused, and somewhat guilty. For some time I felt like I was betraying the lgbt community, that I had to prove that I was bi, that dating a man was making me straight. How can I answer questions like: when was the last time you even dated a woman? can you be monogamous? so you like women, but you’re going to end up with a guy? are you still bi now that you’re dating a guy?
I spent my college years avoiding the subject of my sexual orientation. Now, I flaunt it. I want to make sure everybody knows I’m bi. And it’s been fascinating. My feelings and attraction to men and women are not complicated, they are effortless, a natural part of me. And by projecting this I ended up having some amazingly honest and interesting conversations with friends, colleagues and acquaintances (though my boyfriends still seem to have trouble wrapping their head around it).
I know unfortunately that this is largely possible because I live and work in a liberal international environment and that I am privileged to be able to flaunt my bisexuality.
I dream of a world where everyone can feel at ease with their own and other people’s sexuality!
Little by little we are doing this together :)
I would just like to thank you from the bottom of my heart! I shared this thread on my FB page and group called Bisexual Visibility. Thank you for making us a little more visible and for all your support! Much love!
I identify as gay but I can relate to this – I identified as bi/pan previously and the vast majority of my dating experience (which is, in total, incredibly small) is with guys. Add to that after coming out as gay my first and only girlfriend was trans but not out as trans with most people, so on the outside it looked like I was just in another relationship with a “guy”. I often feel less connected to the queer community because of this, and at times it really hurts.
I didn’t know how much I needed this space until it popped up on a friend’s feed earlier today. Thank you, thank, you, thank you!
Queer cis lady here, happily married to a cis male with two kids and more on the way. My husband is amazingly supportive and we’ve had long talks about my identity and how we will discuss sexuality and gender with our children.
I think I’ve known I was queer since my early adolescence but never really confronted that part of myself until my early 20s (yay 12 years of Catholic school!). I have dated exactly one person in my life, whom I went on to marry. I’ve often felt odd about identifying as queer/bi since I never had a relationship with a woman. Even when attending a prestigious women’s college and I often felt ashamed of exploring my sexuality for fear of being dubbed a LUG “Lesbian Until Graduation” and sort of pushed it aside; I was very content in my very un-queer hetero relationship so what did it really matter?
It wasn’t until my husband’s best friend (also married to a cis female without ever having date a man) came out as bisexual that all of those feelings I’d pushed down came up. My husband mentioned to him my own queer identity and his friend pretty much dismissed me and claimed my “alleged” attraction to women was a coping mechanism due to a sexual assault I experienced near the end of college. I wasn’t really bisexual. All this while going on and on about how he wanted to be a positive LBGT role model for his own son. I was devastated. And angry. So, so, so angry. How was his bisexuality/queerness any more authentic than mine? Rawr. I still get worked up over it and it’s been a couple years now since this all went down.
It’s still a sore point for me whenever we visit the aforementioned best friend though I doubt he has an inkling of my feelings, perhaps I should fix that.
And now I’m tearing up hearing all these stories and experiences. Feeling a little less invisible and lot more validated this evening. Love and light to you all!
I posted a comment yesterday to vent my bi feelings, but I wanted to say thank you again to Autostraddle, and to all the lovely bisexual people who contributed their stories here. It is amazing to be seen and heard, and to see and hear all of you!
This was very nice to see. I am a queer woman who has been in a handful of serious relationships, half with women half with men. I am currently dating a cis-man and all is going well, but I have this sadness and miss my lgbtqia community. It sometimes makes me very depressed and question whether I want to really commit to a man longterm (even if we are good together). When I am with men, I feel less a part of that community, even if the exclusion is just in my head.
Thankyou Autostraddle for this thread! I am moved beyond words to see so many of us uniting!
I’m bisexual and recently discovered that I am genderfluid. I have been with my awesome cisdood of a husband for nearly 20 years and we love each other to bits, he even identified my gender before I did and waited patiently for me to realize and embrace it! He has always been very supportive. And is open to me dating a woman which is lovely (and without fetishizing!)
I am lucky because I do have bi and queer friends, but I still struggle with internalized bi erasure and feeling on the outside of the straight and queer communities. it’s hard to find a place to belong. I would like to meet a nice woman, but I am awkward and shy and not great at flirting.
Disclaimer: currently dating a woman.
In any case, I have been all kinds of infatuated and involved with people of various genders in the past seven (!!) years since I realized I was bi. And the only time I don’t feel like I have to defend myself to my partner is when I’m also dating a non-monosexual or fluid-identified person. Honestly, I might even go so far as to say I’m not super into dating monosexual people at this point. I just always get so defensive and weird and invisible-feeling about my sexuality when my partner can’t relate to my mode of attraction. Conversely, I feel lovely and validated in my relationship when we can ogle attractive humans of any gender together. What’s up with that?
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS. <3 <3 <3 <3 <3.
And wow I have a lot of reading to do!
Am I the only person not put off by their male partner being turned on? It’s not like he was immature about it, he’s wonderful and super supportive. But like. It turns him on to think about me having sex with a woman. And I have fun with that. Thinking about me sleeping with another man is more complicated for him because his ex cheated on him with a man, so he’s somehow turned on and really upset at the same time by that thought, so we don’t do that.
I’m not put off by a partner being turned on by it. My boyfriend is turned on by me enjoying myself with other people, and I love it. There’s a difference between being turned on and fetishizing. I don’t have sex with women as a performance for other people’s pleasure (except when that’s exactly what we’ve all agreed to). Plenty of men treat women having sex together, like everything about women, as existing for their entertainment.
But, I would invite him to explore why he doesn’t find women threatening. That’s a thing that deserves unpacking. And it might help him with why he does find men threatening.
I completely agree. There is a difference between a partner who fetishizes/objectifies your identity, and a partner who sees your bisexuality a beautiful and sexy trait that happens to be part of your identity. I mean, it’s an important part of you! So I think it makes total sense that it’s also an important part of what your partner loves about you.
I was SO happy when I saw this!!! Super late, but better late than never? It’s nice to read about other’s experiences and be like, “I KNOW THE FEEL.” Currently not dating anyone, but I’ve been with a lot more men than women (due to location/availability, I could not find queer ladies FOR YEARS) and often felt like I wasn’t gay enough to be part of the community. The off handed remarks, and bi-negativity online didn’t help either.
The only woman I’ve been in a serious relationship pretty much made fun of my bisexuality, like it was a past mistake. She was a lesbian, and made fun of my ex boyfriends. All. The. Time. She was always bringing them up and making comments about how she was certain she could fix, cook, fuck, ect. better than (dude name here). It felt like she was invalidating my experiences with men. It would be one thing if I was venting about them and she chimed in, but I avoid bringing up exes when I’m in a relationship. I never said anything about her exes, why did she always have to attack mine, and my past decisions?
This has been a very thoughtful and important thread/forum/conversation.
I’m late to the party, but I’d like to contribute my thoughts.
Like many others in this thread, I never had a distinct coming out or “when I knew” moment. Being attracted to every gender even before you have the tools to analyze your feelings or understand yourself as a sexual being meant (in my case) that while I intuited since early childhood that I was somehow different, my queer awakening was gradual and incremental. Nonetheless, I sporadically started acknowledging my attraction to “both” genders sometime in middle school and by high school graduation was openly identifying as queer, bisexual, and attracted to ALL genders.
Now, despite being out to my friends even at my conservative high school, joining queer organizations in college, a few casual hook ups with women, and nearing exclusivity with one girl my junior year, people mostly labeled me as straight until my senior year of undergrad. That was when I started seeing my current partner, who was very visible and (not to toot my own horn, or theirs, lol) desirable on my school’s queer women’s scene.
Having friends you’ve known for years be surprised that you’re dating a “girl”– more on the scare quotes in a moment– is baffling and surreal when you think you’ve been out in some fashion or other since age 13. Suddenly receiving invitations to the “Dyke Party” and going on double dates with other queer couples and otherwise having this whole world open to you is intoxicating. Sure, I still sometimes had negative experiences at LG(bt) spaces since I’m a not-very-alt-looking femme, but all I had to do was reach for “her” hand and my attraction to women was plain.
Nearly 5 years, 4 apartments, 3 cities, 2 graduate school admissions processes, and 1 cat later, my partner has transitioned. He started T just about a year ago and “passes” as a man 100% of the time. I’d say it’s even rare that other trans men clock him unless we’re at a queer event.
He’d confided some of his gender trouble to me near the beginning of our relationship, so I wasn’t exactly blindsided by the whole thing. Over time I became convinced that he would be happier living as a man. I even gently (and rightfully, I’d argue) encouraged him to take the plunge when he had a flare up of nerves before publicly coming out. I love seeing him become progressively more comfortable in his skin. Beyond that, he still is queer and genderqueer. He is still active in the community. He has no hang ups about his masculinity and is also unselfconscious about expressing himself in traditionally feminine ways when he wants. Our relationship and our sex life is still queer. He is male, but he is different from the other men I’ve dated. Not because he is trans necessarily, but because we understand each other’s fluidity.
Yet his transition has been bittersweet for me. It’s a lot of little things, mostly. My heart sinks each time a waiter automatically hands him the check at the end of a meal instead of placing it neutrally between us. I resent the pleasantries of old women at antique stores who say how nice it is that my boyfriend goes shopping with me (’cause men are never equally into that stuff, apparently, ya know). As I begin graduate school and meet new people, I can’t come out with an easy, casual reference to “my girlfriend.”
I’ve realized, mostly in the last few weeks, however, that as distressing as these “passing for straight” moments are, I would be wrong to mourn them as the loss of my queer visibility. You can’t lose something you never had. If my queerness appeared to others only as a reflection in my partner’s eyes, then they misapprehended me all along. When they saw him as a woman, they understood no more of my internal life than they do now seeing him as a man. Where monosexuality is privileged and seen as default, my kind of sexuality (fluid, unmoored from anatomy, decidedly multisexual) is just as i”same sex” couple than they
<3
Beautifully written. Thank you. <3
I’m late to the party too, but I want to thank AutoStraddle for hosting this and everyone for posting. I’m slowly working my way through the comments.
This is timely. This year I started actively looking for IRL queer community and I’m finding that my biggest internal roadblock is figuring out how to (casually) reveal that I’m bi and married to a man. So far, everyone has been very supportive – I think it may help that I’m married and monogamous so people seem to respect me for even showing up in queer spaces instead of hanging out in straight privilege land. Which is odd, but better than the reception I’d imagined.
I’ve been with my (cis male) husband for 15 years and a couple/few years ago I realized that I’d unintentionally allowed my bi identity to become completely invisible and that I’ve known people for 10 or 15 years who assume I’m straight and have no idea that I dated men and women back in my dating days. Finding online spaces where I could be queer and figure out what I wanted that to mean for me really helped – AutoStraddle (and The Toast and also some book blogs) gave me space to reconnect with my queer identity.
I feel like I need to / want to come out again, for a second time, and I have to say that doing this in my mid-40s feels more daunting than it did in my early-20s. I’m slowly realizing that maybe I don’t need to have a lot of coming out conversations this time around, maybe I can just queer up my life a little bit and let the rest flow from that.
Wow. YES.
I wrote an article for AS in the family/parenting section about three months ago. I have since tried to stay positive about the experience (despite a torrent of criticism and negativity in response) but mostly I walked away feeling not queer enough to be here.
I asked to have photos of me and my daughter (included with the article) to be removed… they were treasured moments in my family reduced to whether I could pass as cis/hetero and the “privelege” that accompanies this.
My children’s father/cis/hetero co-parent was being referred to as a donor… it was presumed that I had conceived non-sexually.
I could handle being mocked for coming off crunchy or blind to my own privelege, the apparent finger wagging weapon of choice… but being written off as a questionable queer still stings.
This new bi-supportive thread is great. But it is really unfortunate that a space like this has to be created to prevent readers from abusing others.
I was really excited to share my experiences as a queer parent at AS (I had about five more articles submitted before I birthed my second child in May). I pulled out after the unwelcome reception. PAINFUL to be here. My article was criticized for not being queer… which felt like erasure for sure.
In my day, I have also been called a “fag hag”, “bi-curious” and intentionally, repeatedly misgendered (I am an agender, demisexual, polysexual person) as a woman by alternative birth workers while I was pregnant.
I came to AS feeling as though I had a valuable voice to share and was slapped down hard and fast. No wonder the bi/poly/gender fluid folk have felt silenced and are grateful for a ripe archived moment to speak with a promise that they will not be bullied.
I have to run to a med appointment with my infant but I just wanted to pop into vent safely.
I am both pleased and very sad about this thread.
I am so sorry that happened. :(
Thank-you.
I’m bisexual polyamorous. Mother of three children. Not much I can say but I support you.
Thank-you.
I’ve been reading this wonderful thread for the past couple of days, with amazement and joy, and like many others I’ve shed a few tears. Thank you for this space and thank you all for your comments, it helps so much to know that I’m not alone!
I’ve never known how to label myself as I don’t like labels. I’m attracted to men and women. I fell deeply in love with a woman when I was in my 20s and we had a brief relationship which sadly ended when I moved interstate. Until I met her I had no idea that I was attracted to other women! And in the 18 or so years since her I’ve pretty much been in short to medium term relationships with men (including getting engaged once) except for a fling with a female friend. I guess it’s just been easier to meet guys and to block out my feelings for women and explain it away to myself as “a fantasy”. But it’s become increasingly more difficult for me to delude myself that I’m not into women.
I’ve been single for a few years now, by choice because I like my independence. But last year, although it was really really REALLY scary for me, I joined a queer online dating site. I had some nice dates, all with lesbian women who knew that I identified as bi, but ultimately the friendships fizzled out and I got the feeling that they thought “she’s experimenting” and I felt that I’m “not gay enough” so I gave up :-( I don’t feel that I fit into the queer community, even though I’m most definitely not straight.
This thread has been so inspiring and I’ve loved hearing everyone’s stories. I’ve had a bold bold thought since I started writing this post – I think that I *might* try going to a lesbian night at a bar on the weekend!
xoxo
Your bold thought (and congratulations,go for it) … just led to my bold thought, I might start writing online again. I’m going to need the practice in advocating… for this 1000+ comment community, myself and my exceptional new bebe rocking an extra chromosome!
I really wish there were more things like this out there. Like so many others on this thread, I’ve spent a lot of my life having my sexuality be silenced by others both inside and outside of the queer community. Having been with my husband for 6 years, there are many people in my life who never even question my “straightness,” and others who knew me before, who seem to have simply forgotten.
It’s definitely something I have had to come to terms with. I feel that my relationship with my husband is worth being invisible to the queer community, and I wouldn’t trade him for the world, but it means so much to me to be recognized, even if just anonymously on the internet.
I am a bisexual woman dating a man and it is a strange experience because sometimes it feels like, unless I’m really noisy and mention it a lot, my sexual identity could just be slowly erased. It seems weird that your identity has to come with its own set of credentials, such as ‘I dated loads of women before I met this person who happens to be a good fit for me and also happens to be male’.
Mostly what I find strange though is how odd bisexuality is for people who don’t identify that way, it feels like it’s treated as more ‘other’ than being gay or lesbian in some ways, and how often bisexual voices are not given a space to be heard or deliberately excluded. Thank you for this thread, on that note!
I was talking with a bisexual friend who is also a woman and dating a man in a ltr and she said that she felt she couldn’t go to Pride or talk about her bisexuality and the women she dated or her place in the LGBTQ rainbow and this made me really sad. I hope we are moving towards a place where bisexuality isn’t seen as the ‘pretend’ or ‘attention-seeking’ or ‘greedy’ identity and where it is just a valid and accepted way to be. I’m sure that Autostraddle is helping to make this happen.
as I said in another reply. you are who you are. fly your freak flag with pride. don’t let other people tell you who you are. I am a proud, visible, vocal Bi Activist who has had two marriages, 50 male lovers and 2 female ones.
that’s cos I was born in the 60s. Had I been born in the 80s or 90s I am sure I would have possibly even been gay, I have no idea to be perfectly honest…I took the path of least resistance – but all sexual acts are an acquired taste. people get too caught up in the SEX part of sexuality and not enough in the attraction and love part. Bisexuals have a capacity to fall for people. Percentages don’t matter.
I march, I mix in the LGBTIA community. One lesbian said to me once “wow you’re brave for admitting to a table of lesbians that you’re bi”
I said, “I’m not brave, I’m naive – why should anyone judge me?”
fuck them if they do.
I’m queer, I’m here. Fuck off if you don’t beleive me.
I am so thankful that this is a thing. Autostraddle, you are da bomb. I personally have not dated anyone yet, but I identify as bi/queer and have been struggling with “coming out” for a while now. I am a first generation African-Canadian who has grown up in a relatively white hetero-normative community. Though I have not encounter much hate or bigotry the “othering” that comes with being black has always made me feel like I didn’t belong; and now, as I come to terms with my sexual identity I worry that these feelings of exclusion will be magnified. Before I accepted my queerness I became heavily involved with my schools queer community, and I constantly felt the need to fit in to a mono-sexual identity, because I wanted to find a space where I felt I belonged. Though I am no longer trying to force myself into a false identity, I still worry that “coming out” as multisexual will isolate me even more. does anyone else feel this way?
Hey Jan! I can’t relate in the same way, since I have a hell of a lot of white privilege and don’t and will never experience racism. But I did want to send some love your way–I’m out-and-about queer/bi (but not, binary. i believe in a constellation of genders) and polyamorous. I also live in a pretty damn small town in one of the most conservative states in the u.s. My family knows I’m queer, but they don’t know I’m poly and their religiousness is pretty strict about purity/sex before marriage/heterosexuality/etc.
I’ve found that many people are more comfortable with my sexuality than my polyamory and it’s sometimes more difficult to talk about the latter than the former (and, of course, the two are inseparable for me). I have to say, though I’ve significantly narrowed down potential dating partners and, to some extent, truly nonjudgmental friends, since I’ve talked about polyamory, I have developed more meaningful relationships (both romantic and platonic). It’s all about finding the right people and, when one feels safe, being vulnerable and sharing who you are with folks.
I think “coming out” can be this thing that gets pushed and pushed and pushed on people and packaged as the ultimate expression of one’s confidence in themselves. But safety is super important. And sometimes maintaining imperfect relationships with family or friends instead of losing them altogether is important too. The trick is deciding who’s worth that risk and who’s not.
Good luck, lovely!
So I am presently trying to recover from this horrible break up I have had with my ex, a woman I pretty much adored for a year and a half.
Things had turned less perfect after a while, we were living quite far away from each other, me the anxious, unresolved, jealous type, she quite the opposite, balanced, confident, self-centered, ambitious. We were both thinking she was a better person than me in the end, which was not a good thing. It had been clear for a good while we were heading towards a break-up, and then our love was destroyed completely after she cheated on me with a man.
This was the weirdest thing that could have happened as my ex was (is?)the gayest person I have ever met.
It’s still not clear why she did it… but I have stopped looking for answers now and I am just trying to accept that we are over.
A few months on now and I guess I am still a bit in a shock from how things turned out but trying to move on, getting a lot of support from friends who are inviting me out a lot and encouraging me to meet new people. It goes without saying that this whole new socializing thing is largely fueled by alcohol but I can’t say I’m not enjoying it a bit. It does keep me from obsessing over her for a while at least.
So here I am last night at this dinner party of 10 or so people, and I have this guy sitting next to me. This quiet shy, guy with blondish hair. And I am aware he is there and I also remember meeting him once before and also being aware back then. I try talking to him a bit, I am super curious and want to know everything, but then get sucked into the others conversations and there I am trying to be extra funny and loud and editing myself a bit too just hoping for this silent guy with his sweet smile to like me. Went home thinking maybe we can be friends me and this guy.
Because I am gay obviously.
I have been dating women only for the past 5 years. I have only truly liked women for the past 10 years-
This morning at work, my friend, the one who invited me to the party, texts me “my guy friend from last night is saying he totally fancies you lol”
Me, my little silly heart racing a bit,: “which one?”
It was not him :-/
I feel you. I ended up having a relationship with a guy after like…6? 7? years of being really really gay. Like, I would get curious and try to make out with guys sometimes and be like “ewwwww no”. So gay. Then when I had lost interest in experimenting, was obviously hella gay, I started to develop feelings for a guy and ended up in a 4 year hetero relationship…
It feels good to read about someone else having a guy-crush, even a passing one, coming from a place of being hella gay. :) That contradiction was what was hard for me… like, IDing as bisexual doesn’t feel like it really captures my experience and history. So now I kind of identify with both lesbian and bi, which some people, of course have a problem with. :\ It’s been tough.
Anyway yeah that’s me that’s my ramble thanks for sharing your story I’m really excited about this thread :)
I describe to the idea that sexuality is fluid, and it sounds to me like yours is from your “silly racing heart” thinking this guy might like you! I would say if you find yourself having feelings for a guy, go for it! It doesn’t invalidate you liking or having liked women at all :)
I am a bisexual woman who hasn’t dated a woman in over a decade. I’m interested in dating women again but feel so very intimidated that I honestly don’t know where to begin. It’s like I’m closeted all over again.
I truly love being with both men and women but feel there isn’t a place for me in the dating world as I don’t want to subscribe to the societal “rules” set up for either group.
More often than not I end up feeling like I’m missing something.
Any advice out there?
When I’ve re-entered the dating scene recently, like through dating websites or queer events, I mainly stick to people of all genders who ID as bi/multisexual. There are soooo many lovely bi ladies out there who understand this exactly! I find it easier to relax and clarify what I’m after physically with people who are familiar with the idea of sexuality as fluid and changing, too, so my sex life has been a hell of a lot more satisfying as a result.
Also, if it’s rules that are stifling you, I highly recommend relationship anarchy :P Even if you agree to be exclusive, you’re still trying to ensure that you don’t fall into automatic roles, but instead question the idea of roles in a relationship and whether they’re actually good for you or not.
@internrachel Would it be possible for this to be a semi-regular thing? From the amount of comments, it seems like this is a much-needed space for a lot of people, and having Autostraddle make that space for us is amazing. It feels to me like it might be helpful to have it be more than a one-time thing. I know there’s an ASS group, but having it front and center on the main page really helps to feel like this is a space where bi women who date men belong in a whole different way.
Seconded!
So I’ve seen a few comments on here about people having partners who are also bi/pan/what have you, and I have this idea in my head that dating a bi/pan person would be really cool because you would both understand each other a little bit more and be more supportive of each other’s sexuality.
Has this been the case? What are your positive/negative experiences with a bi/pan partner?
My girlfriend is also bi, and I’ve found it to be an incredibly positive thing for me. We talk about men and women together! We’re also poly, so it’s a bit different anyway.
For a while I was feeling very threatened when she would talk about other women, but much less so when she talked about men, which I know is counter to what a lot of other people have said in this thread. But for me, it was like, I can’t give her the same thing a man can, so if she wants to have men in her life, that’s not a threat to me – we’re giving her different things. With other women, it felt more like I might potentially be replaceable. Thankfully, we’re both really good at communication and these issues are finally behind us. We talk a lot about the other people we’re dating and are very supportive of each other.
I was also briefly dating a bi guy I really liked at the end of last year. That was new for me, but made me really happy. He opened up a lot about what it was like for him to date men, though he wasn’t dating any at that moment, and we commiserated about OKCupid dudes.
I’m also poly (yay Zoey, too!) and in two relationships: with a bi boyfriend and a couple (straight man and bi woman). My experience has been overwhelmingly positive with all relationships, particularly since open communication is such an integral component. With each person, I’ve had a lot of open-minded conversations about gender roles, gender identity and presentation, romantic and sexual attraction, and experiences and relationships with multiple genders.
Of the men I’ve dated in the last few years, I’ve predominantly dated b-isexual/curious/fluid men and I think there’s a reason: they are absolutely less judgmental towards me, are more likely to relate to my experience of having feelings towards multiple genders, and are more open-minded about my gender expression.
Ella, what a happy situation! Your relationships sound lovely, congrats :) :) Can I ask how you met the couple you’re dating? My partner and I are interested in finding people to date together but have recently moved to a new city and we’re not sure how people go about doing that these days…probably the internet?
I think OKC now has an explicit option for couples profiles.
Oh and btw I forgot to say, I used to have a bi boyfriend, and yes! It was incredibly validating in a lot of ways. On the other hand, I got to see first-hand the difference between how our culture sexualizes and fetishes bi women, vs. tends to treat bi men as oddballs/not “real men.” For all the bi erasure I’ve experienced, I think he might have experienced even more. And that’s not to say that being fetishized feels better or safer than being negated/erased…just an observation.
I have found this to be the MOST true thing ever. Dating bisexual people is so so much easier and it is such a relief. (I wish we weren’t all so well hidden).
When I’ve dated lesbians, I’ve felt pressure to somehow perform my sexuality and queerness, to PROVE that I am really queer. When I’ve dated cis men, the gender roles and expectations are so prominent and they have to be navigated, and it is a lot of work (I’ve seen a couple of other people mention this issue)
When I dated a bisexual man, he had already worked through his issues with gender roles and being in same gender relationships, so it was easier to just be a person with him. Likewise, when I dated a bisexual woman, she understood and had the same self-doubts about the validity of her queerness, and I didn’t feel like I had anything to prove on that score.
Mutual bisexuality simplified or removed a lot of the gender and queerness issues that normally plague my relationships with gay/straight people.
I’M SO HAPPY YOU MADE THIS ARTICLE. THANK YOU VERY MUCH. SO VERY MUCH. After having read a lot of biphobic trash over the week, this is such a relief. I feel accepted and validated!
Hi! I’m a woman who considers her sexuality to be fluid, but who is also very passionate about lesbian activism. I am sometimes at odds between the fact that I love my boyfriend very much and want to make a life with him, and the fact that I am a politically active artist who wants to create theater from the part of me who is sexually fluid. I don’t want to have to let go of a part of myself that fuels my work. Where’s the line between being myself in my wonderful relationship and being myself as a woman who’s sexuality is fluid.
I’m a cis, queer identifying woman who is also polyamorous. I have historically mostly had relationships with men, but have grown to be attracted (romantically and sexually) to multiple genders in the last few years. I am openly queer with my family, friends, and coworkers, but only one person in my family knows that I am polyamorous.
I feel the erasing of my experience in a lot of ways, particularly considering the oppression of being poly in an extremely conservative community. Right now, I’m in a long-distance, serious relationship with a non-monosexual, poly man. My family knows about our relationship, the most significant one I’ve had, and believes that we are exclusive. My family is very conservative and religious and, given the complexities of coming out to them as queer, it doesn’t feel safe to be open about our relationship structure at this time. It’s extremely important for me to be genuine with my family about my identity; this feels very complicated and I have had to remind them that although I’m (openly) in a relationship with a man, I am still queer.
Oppression of non-monogamous relationships is very real and I know that I have to be very careful about my relationships, which often are erased when people make assumptions about both my sexuality and the type of relationships I have. I am also seeing a couple (half of whom is a bi/queer woman), but it’s not possible for that relationship to be open where I live. So, the only public relationship I have at this time is one with a man. People within the local LGBTQ group and outside of it regularly assume I am straight, unless I feel comfortable and bold enough to correct them or tell them otherwise. This isn’t always the case.
I would LOVE to publicly proclaim my love for the woman I’m seeing to anyone who would listen! But I’ve been asked to hold a boundary based on very real fear of repercussions and discrimination. I also have thought a lot about passing privilege, as someone who has dated mostly cis men, and feel conflicted on the subject, but I do know this: hiding your very real relationships because of fear of violence or discrimination does not seem like privilege. This is true of many folks who are poly AND many folks who are queer. The intersection of both of those experiences is really complicated and is very often erased from narratives. (That doesn’t even touch on the impacts of racism, ableism, classism, etc.)
Even if my long-distance partner was straight and we were monogamous, we still wouldn’t be in a “straight” relationship. I’m queer no matter what. He is too. Two queer, differently gendered folks in a relationship does NOT make a straight relationship! Similarly, I wish the world would stop assuming that everyone is exclusive/monogamous, when there are many other choices and experiences. Sometimes I feel like bi/pan/non-monosexual folks try to distance themselves from the stereotype that they are slutty/greedy/cheaters at the expense of others who are respectful, communicative, and consensual when they negotiate multiple relationships.
Thank you wonderful women for your stories. This is mine http://insiderose.com/post/9032703790/all-bi-myself
Hi, I am a sexually fluid, bisexual, queer woman… who’s only been with men. I feel so validated by this thread, it is often very painful to find other people invalidate how I identify because of whom I’ve dated so far. I went to pride with a lesbian friend and her friends and all her lesbian friends kept asking her why was I there if I was straight… I felt so offended. Anyways, just know that by dating whomever does not deny how you choose to identify/feel. I am still trying to accept it for what it is – I am no less queer than anybody else – just because I am with men. I hate invisibility, but depending on your safety, speak up!
Ugh, I am so bothered by what those girls said to you. Even if you were straight, what’s wrong with straight people being at a pride parade showing their support? Can we just take over the world with pride parades being the entire country or what? I’m sorry that happened to you and if you ever came to a pride parade in my city we would welcome you with open arms :)
Eee! Thank you for posting. Your experiences are awful, but it makes me feel so great to know that someone else has had these same experiences. I’ve also never gotten to date another woman and have a hard time at pride meetings (stopped going a long time ago). Thank you again.
You guys…1000 comments. 1000! I never expected there were so many of us on autostraddle or any other queer Website. I guess bi-erasure is more powerful than i ever expected because I never expected there to be so many of us here…so so many <3
It’s amazing just to be recognised. Honestly. I am shunned by lesbians ex friends because I have a child with a man. So thank you for not being like them. Every bi woman i know in similar situation has experience variants of shunning. Thank you.
Where was this 4 years ago (when I was last dating a guy)?
And where was this when I was foolishly going out with my incredibly biphobic ex? (Don’t worry, it didn’t last.)
I’m so glad this post is here. A lot of bi girls (myself included) feel invisible to society, like we’re stuck in a blind spot regarding gender norms.
One of my main issues as a bi woman in a relationship with a straight man is dealing with the “white knight syndrome”. My boyfriend, along with many other men, have an impulse to be very chivalrous – often to the point where it annoys me. It makes me feel less empowered when a male tries to assume the standard gender role that obligates him to “take care of me”. It comes down to everything – holding doors open, jumping to fix technology, lifting things, paying for everything, and wanting to protect me from harm. While these are all polite things to do for someone, courteous actions can feel very limiting when insisted upon. I have experience in IT, I weight lift for strength, and I enjoy contributing my own hard earned cash to dates and outings. I also have a decent sense of my surroundings and am aware of possible threats of danger. I’m tired of men trying to validate their masculinity by reinforcing gender roles on me, an independent female. When I reject their notions, they get disappointed or frustrated… However, I can’t help but feel that too much ‘chivalry’ imposes upon my personal space and undermines my ability to problem solve. Basically, stop trying to solve all of my problems for me and let me think for myself. I have so much to contribute but it’s difficult when men insist on doing it all for me.
I’m sexually attracted to both genders and everything in between. Although I’ve had queer sexual encounters, I’ve never dated someone who wasn’t male. I like the idea of partners breaking gender boundaries, but I also understand that some people prefer traditional gender roles within their relationships (and that’s totally okay).
I think personal relationships will be affected by the lack of gender equality in our society, so long as that inequality exists. Women are oppressed through slut shaming, lower wages in the workforce, and stereotypes about their cognitive abilities (“oh she’s too emotional/crazy to make a valid point; don’t listen to her”). While we are still progressing as a society, these factors inevitably affect the power women have in relationships with men – even if those men are feminists. Those men still have to deal with scrutiny about their masculinity from other men, and fully realize their privilege over women. Since privilege is largely blind, there are constantly new challenges and learning opportunities popping up in straight relationships.
As a bi woman in a relationship with a cis straight male (an open minded feminist one), I find myself struggling to deal with the societal male-female power play and figuring out how to maintain an equal partnership, despite my disposition.
Sometimes I desire a relationship with another woman simply for the sake of having no gender boundaries, but that wouldn’t be for the right reason. I’ve fallen in love with a man and I can’t really help that, so I accept the challenges that come with the relationship. I’m just really glad there’s a space I can share my thoughts on. If you’re still reading this, thank you for taking the time to listen and/or participating in this much needed discussion. <3
This is such a great thread – so good to see this being discussed. I’m a bi woman, I’ve dated women but married (and later divorced) a man, and ended up having to come out all over again to everyone when I dated a woman after my divorce. And now I’m with a man again. Frustrating to feel like every time I date a man it “negates” my bisexuality, even to people who know me. I assume that strangers will think I’m straight if they see me with my boyfriend, but people who know me also seem to just think “Oh, she’s picked sides.” which is just… weird. I’m in my 30s, you’d think people would someday stop thinking that you’re still “trying to decide” between the two and just accept that you like PEOPLE and think what’s between their legs isn’t so important. Which means sometimes I’ll fall in love with a man, and sometimes I’ll fall in love with a woman, or someone that’s somewhere in between, and that’s life.
I am so excited about this post! I’m going to be reading these comments all weekend :). I’m bisexual and came out as such to my friends and family about two years ago. Most people said things along those familiar and hurtful yet well-intentioned lines of “all women are a little bi”, or the hints that this is more a product of my age than my actual romantic interests and identity. Anyway, because of this, when I see my family or talk to my friends there’s this smug little monster sitting on their shoulders as they ask if I have a girlfriend yet (like I need to prove my identity and prove it now (it’s in the tone)). I’m shy and have trouble telling if other women are interested in being romantically involved with a person of the same gender, and have Always been the chasee and not the chaser when it comes to courtship, so this is new to me and tricky and I am still figuring out how to date people by starting it myself instead of just screening applicants. Long story short, I met an fantastic man who asked me out and we’ve been dating for a little more than a year. I love him and I know that my family likes him, but I hate that my relationship is being seen as proof that everyone was right when I came out and that I’m not actually bi. What if we got married? Would everyone laugh about “my little bi phase” years later because I “never got the chance to prove myself”? I hate that I have these thoughts, but it makes me so mad that I can’t get the people I love to take my identity seriously. I came out so I wouldn’t have to screen my conversations, so I could do things like tell my friend about the cute girl I helped at work today instead of only the cute guys, and so my parents wouldn’t be confused or surprised if I tried to introduce them to a girlfriend. I didn’t know this would lead to me having to establish credibility or explain my relationships. I’m attracted to and interested in people, why does this have to be an issue? Even my boyfriend doesn’t get jealous if I talk to other women but does get jealous about guy friends, so even he doesn’t take me seriously on this matter. I hope there’s other people in this boat here so I can stop feeling completely alone on this issue.
I’m only 19, and I ID’d as gay for a long time before I came to grips with bisexuality. And the amount of patronization I got from adult monosexuals, queer and straight, was just sickening. Everybody just seemed to totally lose their boundaries. Someone from my work, which was even at a specifically queer organization, would always make cracks about me being in contact with a penis (cissexist too) and poor me!
I’m in a relationship with a cis bi guy and it’s really fantastic. But my new insecurity in my place in the queer community is really hurting him. That is to say, I’m hurting him. I’m really ashamed that I let go of his hand when people walk towards us. I’m really ashamed that I hate introducing him as my boyfriend, especially to monosexual queer people. I hate that I cut my hair in a way I despise just so I could read as more queer. It didn’t even work.
I just hate that my entire self image is mocked, and I can’t stand that I can’t seem to stop hurting someone I love because I can’t stand up to a bunch of biphobic bullies.
So yeah, I’m a bisexual woman and so far I’ve only dated one girl, who was flat-chested and didn’t dress reall feminine. I was dating her when I came out to my mother… whose reaction wasn’t good. She told me she didn’t expect me to be like that. Then she yelled at me, because “I didn’t know anything about myself yet” and my gf “might have looked like a boy but wasn’t one” and I was just left feeling really hurt. I didn’t date her because she wasn’t feminine, for god’s sake! I certainly wasn’t dating my gf because she had small boobs! So yeah, then my mom stopped talking to me for two weeks until I broke up with my ex-gf. Then some more unrelated stuff happened, and I was diagnosed with depression.
So yeah, fast forward to now and I’ve only been dating guys since then. Not really because my mother doesn’t like me being bisexual, I’ve just kept falling for guys.
Oh, and by the way, I’m single now. Guess why? Me and my ex-bf had been together for almost a year, he knew I was bi, he never said anything about it until recently. I went out with my female best friend, who’s really like a younger sister to me and we know each other since we were toddlers. THAT evening the guy decided he’d just… “share his opinion”, as he phrased it. Turns out he doesn’t like that I’m bisexual! After the experience with my mother, this really hurt. I’ve spent the whole night crying, because there I was, in a happy relationship with a guy who respected me as I am… and suddenly all of that fell apart.
The worst thing was he wasn’t sorry. I felt like a piece of shit, like I was broken, like I didn’t deserve happiness. And he didn’t apologize for hurting me.
And now there’s this another guy I kinda like, maybe we’ll end up together, maybe not, but I’m scared, because if we do end up dating, what will my mother think? That me being bi was just a phase?
I feel like I can’t win. I want to be myself but everyone is against me.
And of course there were some other precious things people did or said to me because of my orientation:
“Well, if you can have a girlfriend, then I can smoke.” – my brother after he found out I was dating a girl
My mom was comforting me when I was crying after my ex-bf told me he didn’t like my sexuality. When I told her WHY exactly am I crying, she immediately stopped hugging me.
Me and this other bi girl were kissing at a pub, we were really into it, because damn she was attractive, and a drunk guy started groping my ass, because “it was really hot”. wow. just… wow.
I have never dated a woman but when I tried to come out to my mother when I was 13, she acted so disgusted by the idea that I got scared and decided to pretend I didn’t understand what I was saying or what “bi” meant. She explained it to me by saying “it means you want to have sex with both genders” and I was like “Oh!” and tried to pretend I was grossed out, but it hurt me a lot that it was so simple to her. I have dropped hints since then over the years, but I’m 25 now and I still can’t bring myself to come out to my mother, even though I’m financially independent now (especially since we’re finally starting to get along). The next person I came out to was my best friend, who was a guy and a year younger than me (I was 17, he was 16), and he accepted me but also convinced me to date him like I was some rare animal he had to capture. It was really weird (we’re no longer friends). The two girls I met in high school that were bi like me were both very open about it and everyone I was friends with at the time avoided them like the plague. Our friendships didn’t end well, so I never really had good role-models for how to be comfortable with yourself and your identity as a bi woman until I dated a bi guy when I was 20. He convinced me that it was okay to be bi, but I had to leave him behind when I went to college and he moved on and has a family now. We still talk sometimes, which helps, but it’s awkward because our relationship was so intimate before and now I feel like a burden so I don’t talk about being bi or the girls I’m attracted to and whatnot. I dated a hetero, cis-guy in college and fell in love with him but when I told him I was bi, he said some really weird things about how mad he’d be if I fell in love with a woman (while we were dating?! As if I wouldn’t be as loyal now that I was bi to him?). The relationship ended after 3 years and now I’m honestly afraid to date a woman because of how my family would perceive it and afraid to date a man because of how shockingly weird and judgmental they’ve been in the past when I came out (especially when they called themselves feminists and whatnot). I’m so glad to read that other people have dealt with similar things and while I’m not involved in any LGBT communities except online, I’m always grateful for the support (and try to avoid the erasure). Thank you so much for this space and for sharing your stories!
Sarah Beth, I’m so sorry to hear you’ve had these icky and awful experiences with people you loved…I also have had bi-phobic and hurtful comments from family, and I don’t have a solution for you, I just wanted you to know you’re not alone! I hope you find a community and nonjudgmental, healthy people to date. <3
Thanks Zoe! I am so sorry about your struggles with your family too, but I am so, so glad someone else understands. I wish you all the best and hopefully we both find safe places to be ourselves (like this one) and can share our lives with people that love every part of us. Take care of you! <3
Hi Sarah Beth, I was wondering, do you have an LGBTQ center in your town? When I was really struggling, I was able to get free therapy though the one we have here, and I also started volunteering with them and made some great bi and queer friends that way. It can really help to have peers to process through some of this stuff with!! :-)
I love this idea and it’s a great idea which I will pursue in the (near) future, but right now, unfortunately, I don’t have spaces like that available where I live. Hopefully, when I can save enough money to move to a bigger city, I’ll be in a better place with more options like that–it sounds incredible! So happy for you that you’ve been able to find such a nice place to feel welcome and help others! I hope I can be like you some day! Thank you! <3
Oh darn! I actually live in a very small city, but yeah, we are lucky as to the resources available!
In the meantime, there’s always Autostraddle! :-D
Yes! And it’s been the best, honestly! :D Thank you!
I’m so happy someone brought this up! I have been dating my amazing boyfriend for almost three years, and I came out to him as bi right before our second anniversary. My sexuality was something that confused me for a long time, and he seemed a little concerned when I told him – probably due to the stigma that bisexuals are promiscuous and whatnot.
Often times, when I hear someone talk about the LGBT community, it takes me a moment before I remember, “oh wait, that includes me too,” because I sometimes feel like I don’t belong due to my heterosexual relationship. I’ve even had homosexual women tell me I’m “not gay enough” because I’ve never been with a woman.
The most complicated part is that being in the Deep South, I’m very selective of who I come out to. In fact, my parents will probably never know. ?
I don’t know where in the Deep South you are, but according to this map, it looks like there are bi groups in South Carolina, Georgia, South Texas (if you’re counting that as South, which I know is one of those topics that can start a giant flamewar), and Florida. It could be a way to find other bi people for a sense of community.
I have yet another musing, because people still appear to be posting in this thread, and I have pregnancy/parenting stuff on the brain today for some reason.
I’m hoping to become pregnant soon-ish. And damn but so much of the TTC/pregnancy/parenting material out there is heteronormative, cisnormative, and hyperfeminine. But when I look for material about LGBTQ families, in the hope that it will be less of all three of those things, it’s unsurprisingly very heavily oriented toward same-sex, similar-gender couples (nearly always female couples, for the TTC/pregnancy stuff). Which is fantastic but not applicable for me.
Our future child will grow up with one straight cis parent who is within the limits of what society considers visually gender-conforming, and one queer bisexual butch nonbinary parent. That seems to me neither entirely a “straight family” (put in quotes because I don’t believe that the “family” label should be restricted to a household with parents and child[ren], even if that’s common usage), nor entirely an “LGBTQ family”, it’s a mixed family. Just as some families are mixed in terms of (among other possibilities) race, immigration/citizenship status, disability, class, or [ethno]religious background or practice (my own parents were mixed on the last two of those).
But I’ve never seen any resources, forums, etc – or even individual articles – aimed at mixed-orientation parents or parents-to-be. Has anyone else? It’s not as though there would be nothing to talk about – parents and children interacting with both straight and LGBTQ cultures, biphobic people reading pregnancy as a sign that you really are straight, explaining bisexuality to the kids in a society that still doesn’t really understand it, building community with other people in similar circumstances…
I am one of these families. I am agender, demi&polysexual, my two daughter’s father is cis/hetero. I’ve known him since I was 14. We are not partners but we happily co-parent.
I wrote an article for AS about 3 months ago in the family section (and I have many more essays about our little non-conventional family) but I must admit I was a bit spooked by a very poor reception here.
This current thread is opening my eyes to a community that I would love to contribute to making more visible and supported… in general.
Thank-you for voicing this. I may try writing here again.
Timid and appreciative.
Hey, I feel you. I couldn’t find anything either and went into a deep depression after I had my child because I thought I had turned cis and straight and that I was completely invalid. I was not yet aware that I was genderfluid and I was still struggling with being bisexual in a married relationship so I was already feeling a little negated. (None of this was my husband’s doing, just me erasing myself and my own identity, he has been nothing but supportive)
I came back out to myself recently, I opened my eyes and breathed and now I am completely open about it. My little one is 5 and she is a joy. Being pregnant was wonderful, with the exception of the dysphoria and the horribad sickness. Having a child (surgery for me, no option there) and breastfeeding and watching her grow into an amazing little person, all brilliant. It was hard at times, but it was always worth it.
My little girl knows that gender is different to sex, that some boys have vaginas and some girls have penises and that gender can be fluid. She knows mommy is sometimes a boy. We haven’t gone into same gender relationships but she has been exposed to men kissing men and women kissing women and she has probably seen me kiss girls at parties. I haven’t hidden it, but she isn’t interested in talking about relationships either. When we do, it will be all open and without stigma.
So, um. Sorry, there really isn’t much out there for couples who are a combination of things, communities like this can help, and I can reach out as a NB Bi parent who has been through this! My best advice is don’t erase yourself, be strong in who you are and your kid will turn out great :)
I am so happy and beyond relieved to see this being brought up and have so much response!! I have been single for about three years, dates on and off, but have always been afraid of following what I feel. There’s plenty of dates I have gone on with men I feel deeply attracted to and yet still feel an incredible emotional attraction to a women out in town – conversations you wish would last for days because the person is so interesting, like you “just click”. The few women that I’ve felt this way with I’ve continued to keep a friendship of some sorts, however, I never know how to approach the subject.
I’ve continued to remain neutral in all aspects of relationships, not feeling comfortable identifying with any sector of the LGBT community. As of recently, I have not been dating to focus more on what makes me happy and I have found a lot of comfort and community in the bi-social areas of my city.
I just found this and oh my, I’d this an amazing community! I have spent years looking for a place to connect with other queer and bisexual women in relationships with men. I’ve been with my partner for three years, and am planning to stay together for the long run, and I have felt more and more distant over time from the queer community. Having been an out lesbian from age 14-25, it was quite the transition to come out again as queer. And I lost so many of my queer friends because suddenly my partner was not welcome to come with me to social events. Almost all of my friends now are straight, just due to my relationship not being seen as acceptable in the spaces I used to love. It frequently feels very lonely. And even though my partner is amazing, he cannot connect on being out in the world. And it’s been a struggle, as my relationships with women were, obviously, always with someone who had experienced what it felt like to be outside the court also norm. Not connecting with my partner in that way continues to be difficult.
Also, I haven’t had a chance to read all of the posts yet, so this may have been brought up, but I have been considering trying to create a forum specific to queer women in relationships with men. I’ve looked online for years but never found one. Perhaps a blog, or tumblr. Does anyone know of spaces like that on the web? Something like this thread, but more regular. Would love to hear thoughts.
Thank you all for being incredible people, and for being so brave to live your truth. This is amazing.
I want to suggest something to the author of this article, the whole “you are not welcome” bullet point is extremely off putting for many people, and detracts from what you’re trying to do. For example, men are a part of these relationships (of course) so their input and feelings should be valued, excluding men from the conversation is counter-productive to your goal. Similarly I myself identify as a woman sometimes, myself being bi-gender. Am I welcome to comment, or should I not? One might think that this is a purpose built echo chamber, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt that you just didn’t think this through.
“This space is primarily for bisexual women” =/= “NO MEN ALLOWED”
“counter-productive to your goal” — ?? I think the goal of this particular thread is for bi women to have a place to talk with each other about their experiences and feel explicitly welcome on Autostraddle? Not for everyone involved in bi women’s relationships to talk it out?
My reading of it is if you identify as a bi/pan/queer/questioning woman some of the time then this is totally for you!
Saying “this is primarily for bi women, if you’re not a bi woman you can post but please don’t make it about you” is not saying anyone is not welcome, it’s saying people are not welcome to derail. I was so relieved to see that, and I think a lot of us were, because bi women have to deal quite a lot with other people’s (often negative) feelings about them. What’s wrong with having a support-group type space that’s primarily for us?
I want you to feel welcome here. I just…you stating that the author must not have thought this through, because she designed this space to be something different than what you want it to be honestly feels pretty hurtful to me, as someone who desperately needed a space like this to exist. “This space is primarily for bi women” = “you obviously didn’t think this through”?? Just, ouch. :(
Hey Alex! I think the author did think it through. :-) She said “this is a space created primarily for bi and multi-gender attracted women! If that does not describe you, you are welcome to be here, but please don’t make the space about you.”
To me, that says that all are welcome, but people who do not identify/have never identified as a bisexual woman should take on more of a listening role. (I sometimes identify as bi, but not always. I’m conflicted about that. Despite my ambiguity, I felt comfortable commenting here).
If you’re bigender, and sometimes identify as a bi woman, comment away! And if you’d like to throw in a comment as the male partner of a bi woman, you’re still welcome — just proceed more carefully. At least that is how I would interpret what the author said!
As I’m sure you know, it’s important to have protected spaces we can feel safe to express ourselves in. There are many, many spaces that are more open to the general public — and also less protected — and bi women get a lot of flack and abuse and erasure in those spaces. This is just one space we’re claiming that we’re trying to keep free from that. It’s not about exclusion, it’s about creating space for healthy dialogue.
Oh thank God for this space!
disclaimer: Oh this is going to sound whiny, but here goes…
I always felt like I was on a fence between straight spaces and lgbtq spaces because of who I dated and still am dating. It was only around 2-3 years ago that I came to terms that I am bisexual (I had always declared myself to be heterosexual until then). It wasn’t easy to come to terms with my sexual orientation because I never found a girl that liked me back. I would always just dismiss my own feelings as “nah, I don’t feel that way”. And I only ever attracted men. And as if that wasn’t enough, I’m not even bisexual in the “traditional” sense of the word, I am more specifically polysexual (which falls under the bi umbrella). I can feel immediate sexual attraction towards some men, but with women, I noticed it only ever happens if I develop romantic feelings for them first.
I dated my current fiancé, who is a man, for nine years now. As embarrassing as it to say, HE questioned my own orientation before I did. (Yup, I’m the last one to find out about stuff, even my own sexual orientation.) He had suspicions that I was bisexual long before I even started to question myself. I thought it was normal for straight women to notice other girls the same way I did. But he knew better and questioned me. At that time I took it as an offense. “Me? Queer? PFFF. Nah, I can’t be.” Then after falling in love twice secretly with two (very straight) female best friends I just had to accept the fact that my feelings weren’t restricted to guys as I thought. His response, “I called it!”
So I have tried to become an active member of lgbtq communities online, mostly in Tumblr, as I literally am still too scared to come out (I live with my religious, “hate the sin, love the sinner” anti-lgbtq parents and I have nowhere else to stay), much less seek out physical local lgbtq groups. However, much to my dismay, my experiences with Tumblr’s lgbtq community as a bisexual woman have proven to be overall rather negative.
I feel like I’m not queer enough, but still not straight.
It feels suffocating at times. I’m reaching a point where I may just explode… but I’m proving to be resilient even to my own inconvenience. My self-made closet’s made of titanium steel, and my torch can’t even melt through gold.
I know it sounds silly. I even constantly tell myself everyday that I’m just being a coward, and that I should not have expected any sort of positive reception as a bisexual in most spaces. That I should just suck it up, the world is bad and unfair, you’re an adult, deal with it, blah, blah, blah.
And then I found this. Do I dare hope? Yes. Yes, I do. I’m so glad this space exists. Finally, I space where I won’t feel off. It gives me a bit of hope.
Thank you so much for this.
PS: Sorry if this turned out too whiny. I did warn you. >.<
Ohhhh Nynuwe, you don’t sound silly, you don’t sound whiny, you don’t sound like a coward, and you are so definitely not alone.
“I feel like I’m not queer enough, but still not straight.” –> This is me too.
“And as if that wasn’t enough, I’m not even bisexual in the ‘traditional’ sense of the word, I am more specifically polysexual (which falls under the bi umbrella).” –> ALSO me too, and one of the best things about this thread for me has been seeing how many women find “bisexual” a limiting or inaccurate label in some sense.
I know we as women are conditioned to apologize for ourselves and everything we say, but this is a space where you don’t have to do that! :) <3
“I can feel immediate sexual attraction towards some men, but with women, I noticed it only ever happens if I develop romantic feelings for them first.” It’s interesting to hear you say that because I am just the opposite :) I prefer the term queer to bisexual, but either way it’s interesting to see that we could be so opposite and still both fall under the “bisexual” or “poly” umbrella. Just goes to show you how big and welcoming that umbrella is. Welcome!
I’m really so glad there is a space finally for what can easily be one of THE most overlooked, invisible, and ignored groups of the lgbtq community. We are afforded so few chances to even feel like a part of it. So again, thanks!
I’m really happy to see this thread. I have read through a good chunk but there’s so much more!
I typically think of myself as queer before bi/pan but I have used them all depending on setting.
This past November I agreed to be life partners with an awesome man and our wedding is in 14 days! At this point I’m feeling less awkward about being in this type of relationship at 20. I had seen myself settling down with a woman sometime in my 30s and instead ended up doing something much different. I think the fact that our partnership is non-monogamous and has been from the start is a huge help in that departmemt. At the same time I’m about to move to a rather conservative area in utah after attending a MA school dripping with queer/LGBT folk. I’m struggling with the idea of being partially closeted all the time even though it may be for the best. I’m not sire how I’d find queer folk in the area or how people in generally would react to the poly aspect of my life. It will be interesting for sure. I imagine at se point I Wil find who I’m looking for there and the rest won’t matter ao much.
Reading through these posts as a male (some of us are good for more than changing tires) (ok, a few of us), I’m struck by two things that really make me kind of sad. One is that many of the bi women here find it so difficult to accept themselves and have a stable, ‘valid’ identity that doesn’t feel fragmented or otherwise awkward and ill-fitting.
The other is that it appears to be very common for lesbian women not just to reject bi-women but to do so in such a venomous and bigoted way – to others with which they have something fundamental in common. I can understand lesbians becoming alienated and rejecting a world that does (or did) not accept them, but it seems like they are expanding the ugliness by marginalizing others.
Bi/pan/queer women get a lot of flack from people who aren’t bi. That includes some lesbians and some guys. Sometimes it comes in different forms — I might experience marginalization from a lesbian but then fetishization from a straight guy. So I wouldn’t point fingers at the lesbians too much here, Ray. :-) Everyone is capable of being dumb to people who aren’t just like them.
QG,
I hear you. I do.
The thing that really upsets me is that I have spent my entire adult life (so has hub, btw) being a visible advocate for feminism, I hope in a positive way – doing my part to clear the way for gay women (males too) I knew personally or being an advocate for feminist ideals. I can remember newspaper classifieds (yes, there was something before CL) with columns headed employment-male and employment-female. I don’t think feminism should be static, but there was much since then that I felt was destructive to women. Maybe I’m a fossil… I still see feminism as two things. One is the support and advice of women in overcoming the obstacles in a difficult world. The other is public advocacy regarding feminist issues, or gendered issues. The main things that emerged which I could never accept are: First, the communal victim-plus-entitlement attitude that is so destructive to anyone, not just women. Second, the invasion of the hard left academic ideologues, most of whom would not survive for ten minutes outside women’s studies departments and who continue to increase the distance between themselves and real life. This is so destructive for young women. The final one is perhaps the extension, the extent of venom, bigotry and hatred by gay women toward others. I did not spend so many years promoting women’s causes to empower people who act like this – quite the opposite. It disturbs me so deeply seeing how the women on this forum have been treated by women so antithetical to what I wanted to promote.
Your history as a feminist isn’t relevant to this thread. Coming in here as a male voice and then focusing specifically on the ways that women fail to support other women is what I was reacting to.
I think a vital part of being an ally in spaces in which you hold the privilege is not trying to steer or direct the narrative of the conversation that you’re listening to. You run the risk of derailing it or making it about what you, the ally, thinks is important.
This isn’t about you, or what you have done, or who you have tried to empower, or what conclusions you have come to about lesbians. It’s not about you at all.
My understanding is that this is a place for bi women dating men to talk to each other, without people who don’t fit that description weighing in.
It seems unfair for a guy to come on here, point fingers and imply that marginalization against lesbians is in the past tense, when we’re not allowed on here to defend ourselves.
If bi women want to talk to each other about their own experiences, great. But no one asked you to weigh in, Ray. If fact you were told not to.
No one told you to read, understand or accept what I wrote. If you feel it is necessary to exclude material that may offend others also free to ignore it… well, I hope no one else has such a demeaning view of women.
I’m so glad to see this page on AS. As a bisexual woman I’ve always struggled with not feeling “bi enough.” Honestly, I feel my sexuality changes from year to year (or month to month, or hell, day to day), and I tend to swing from strong interest in men to strong interest in women. Like many of you have noted, I too feel like I have to validate my bisexuality by dating one gender or another depending on who I’ve been interested in the past. It’s so hard to explain to monosexuals!
I’m currently single and have primarily seeking out other women, and one of my biggest issues is feeling like every time I notice/go out with/am attracted to a man, I’m somehow betraying the “gayer” side of me. As if dating a man somehow invalidates my identity as a queer woman and I’m turning my back on the queer community. Anyone else feel like a traitor?
This seems like it’s really common. I keep reading/hearing about this feeling of “being a traitor” to the LGBTQ community and it’s just a really strange concept to me because I haven’t experienced it yet, but I guess that’s because I’ve always just dated men (so far) so I guess I’ve always been a “traitor” lol. But I always think back to Erika Moen, the creator of the DAR comic, and how she started out thinking she was a lesbian and how it was her whole identity and then she ended up marrying a man and went through an entire identity crisis (with people from the lesbian community telling her she was a fraud basically because she “lied” about being a lesbian and how could she betray the community like that, etc.) until she realized that it was just as normal as falling in love with a woman. It is really not a betrayal to fall in love with anyone–I sincerely believe that–and whether or not you fall in love with someone of the same gender has nothing to do with the actual relationship you’re in. The person you love, man or woman, cis or trans, etc., is still going to be a whole person, complete, with their own likes and dislikes, their own hopes and dreams and interests. Their gender does not honestly matter–your attraction, their attraction, mutually, is what matters. I don’t get anyone who tries to destroy that. I don’t get it. And the feeling of “betrayal” is real, I’m not trying to invalidate that, but it is a worry. Nothing more. Worries are hard to get rid of, but you’re not betraying anyone by being who you are. People place assumptions on you–that is not your fault. People assume things all the time about way more things than just sexual orientation, so it’s not all that shocking they’d do it about that too. Please don’t let it get to you. Assumptions are never going away, but your self-worth, your enjoyment in being who you are, shouldn’t go away either! (Sorry this is so long/kinda preachy but I hope it makes sense!) All the good luck to you in finding someone to share your love with!
I’ve been following this thread for almost a week now and it has been one of the most validating and community building weeks I’ve had in a longgg time! What a wonderful thread and how awesome to see it grow so naturally into such a supportive environment. I had never even heard of AutoStraddle before I saw this thread posted on fb, where I promptly shared it!
I am a cis, queer woman who exclusively dated women for 15 years. I have been out about dating men for the past 8 years. However, I only started proudly using the term bi recently and am looking more into pan. Coming out as bi has been much more of an isolating experience for me than coming out as gay/lesbian/dykey femme was 23 years ago. But AS and this thread has alleviated some of that isolation. I honestly don’t even always feel connected to the bi community because, until this thread, I literally never came across other people who primarily dated the same gender and then started dating the opposite gender. It feels like it is mostly the opposite. But this thread has also shown me, regardless of each individuals path to coming out as bi, that many of us experience similar isolation, invalidation, invisibility. And have a great need for community around these shared experiences.
The Queer community was always a place of comfort for me. Anywhere I moved I would seek it out and have instant community. But since I decided to acknowledge my full sexuality of being attracted to more than one gender, it is almost like I lost a family. When I first came out as bi I was told by a lesbian cis friend “well, isn’t that just a phase?!” I was also told by a lesbian trans friend that her ex had tried that (dating men) and it didn’t work out that well for her. I wanted to say back that 15 years of dating women hadn’t worked out yet for me! But I was just taken aback. It is probably not fair, since people are people and we are all fallible, but I think I falsely assume those who have experienced isolation and discrimination will be more aware!!
It is like by coming out as bi I entered a foreign island floating around all by itself. And when I actually dated a cis straight man it brought up even more issues for me. It is extremely weird for me to be seen as straight when walking down the street hand in hand with a man. And I definitely felt weird going to pride with him. I think that those things would have been easier if I felt he had any awareness of his privilege as a straight, cis man. If he had any understanding that as people looked at us he was getting complete validation for his straight maleness. Whereas I was just fading into the background. This feeling is how I know that “privilege” is not what I am gaining or experiencing when with a man. He didn’t have any issue with me being bi but he also showed no interest in understanding. It also brought up a lot of challenges for me regarding those typical gender role expectations. I am a feminist that actually likes some chivalry, but it has a different feel when from a man vs. a woman. I think that genuine chivalry comes from a place of wanting to care for someone simply because you care about them, not from a place of thinking the other person is not capable of taking care of themselves. With men, it is just more likely to be the latter. Though, I have certainly run into issues of, I’m not sure what to call it, a kind of internalized sexism maybe, that more “butch” women will project onto more “femme” women in the Queer community.
In retrospect, I learned a lot from that relationship about what I would need from anyone I am to be with in the future and specifically a man in terms of being bi. I really need there to be some awareness of privilege. Both male and straight privilege but also the privilege that exists in the LG part of the LGBT. There is very little discussion within the LGBT community that the people of power within that community, as in the people who dictate where funding goes, what kinds of events will take place, who is welcomed at those events, what political campaigns get funding etc. That those people are the gay and lesbian people in the community.
I never really want to put limitations on who I’m open to being attracted to, it is one of the things I love about being bi! But lately I’ve been seriously thinking of putting the intention out to the universe for a bi/pan, feminist, queer person to come my way. Be them male, female, non-binary, trans, cis etc.
This thread has really opened my eyes to the breath and depth of our community of wonderful bi/pan/queer folks. It has helped me learn even more about myself and the experiences of others.
I have seen other posts of people suggesting this thread be continued in a more permanent way and I think that is a great idea! With over 1,000 posts there surely is a need!! So happy to have found Auto Straddle, so happy to be here :)
Hello!
I’m really glad this forum exists. I’ve identified as a straight ally most of my life, I only recently realized and started identifying as bi, I’m in a long term relationship with a guy, and therefore I haven’t really faced a lot of homophobia or biphobia. All of these factors make me feel like I’m not ‘bi enough’ or don’t have a place in the lgbtqaip/mogai community.
Coming at this really late – but I wanted to assure you that if you respect women or non-males as legitimate possible romantic partners, even if you never date them due to life circumstances, you are definitely “bi enough.”
I spent years identifying as a straight ally and avoided “intruding” on spaces meant for LBGT folks until I realized that I had been deceiving myself the whole time and cutting myself off from a vital support system. It took a relocation to another area before I was brave enough to join an LGBT organization as an out bisexual woman, and two years later, I live with some of the wonderful people I met through my work in the community, I am in the leadership of said LGBT organization, and I feel happier, freer, and more supported than I ever have before.
You don’t need to experience “oppression” to identify as bisexual or a member of the LGBT community. I hope there will be a day when none of us ever experience it. And, because homophobia and biphobia are often systemic and subtle rather than blatant, if you think about it, you probably have experienced them. In fact, it may be fear of biphobia that is keeping you from feeling as through you have a place in the LGBT community.
This whole ramble is basically to say that it makes me really sad when I think about all the bisexuals-in-hiding feeling as though they don’t belong when they have so much to add to the LGBT community. We’re stronger with you.
So, I’ve seen a lot of people online use fantasy animals (especially unicorns) to metaphorically/symbolically talk about/represent/make points about identities that are made invisible or called “not real” (ace, bi, pan people, etc)
Personally, as a bi person, I really like metaphorically aligning myself with dragons.
1) Bi people are “greedy”
2) Bi people “aren’t real”
Conclusion: Bi people are dragons.
Rawr.
For me, it’s a way to take harmful stereotypes and turn them into something funny/better. Plus, I really like dragons.
What about you, fellow amazing, magical people?
Amusingly enough, I just claimed “Queen of Dragons” as my title at the last ritual I attended. Came as a bit of a surprise, for all that I’ve felt draconian an awful lot the last several years. I identify as pan, though, so…am I a dire dragon because I’m extra greedy? :D
Also, to continue the dragon thing, dragons are also notoriously picky about what goes into their hoard. Some dragons only hoard specific things, some dragons hoard things of a certain quality, etc. So it’s not that us fencewalkers will sleep with/date *anybody*; there are definitely still standards, even if we don’t particularly care which tin you come in.
All that being said, I’m going to go ahead and confess that Captain Jack Harkness is also my spirit animal. 0.0 Can I have two?
You can have whatever you want! :)
In my head, I’d like to create a whole pantheon of invisible-identity-mythical beings.
(For example, in my head, Ace->unicorn, because unicorns are associated with virginity). But I stick with just me and dragons, because it’s not my place to tell anyone else what they should use to represent themselves.
Ahhh this is awesome! I’m a bi girl who’s just started dating a bi guy (they’ve just started identifying as nb and using they/them pronouns but still feel closer to male than anything else and is happy to be referred to as my boyfriend so I figure I’m ok to leave a comment here! ) Anyway, since they’re bi too it’s actually really great, bc we have such a mutual understanding of what it means to be bi and difficulties we face etc, which would definitely not be the same if I was dating a straight guy. The only negative thing about being a female dating someone perceived to be male is that I feel like I’m going to be perceived as het and in a het relationship (even tho neither of those things are true) even by people who know I’m bi. I also have a preference for girls but I’ve never dated any so I hope that I may get that opportunity sometime in the future (although I think maybe part of that is also internalised biphobia that I’m not really bi unless I’ve dated a woman. But also bc women are really great). Anyway this is a fantastic forum and yeah I’d l to talk about this more. (Also if you happen to be on tumblr and want to talk to/follow me there, my url is buildarocketboys)
I’ve known I was attracted to women for a long time now, and I’ve had encounters, but I didn’t actually date a female until this last year. It felt so right that I thought I may never go back to men, and I questioned whether I was attracted to them at all. I recently told my parents about this woman I was dating, but we stopped seeing each other soon after, so it seemed like bad timing. My family is very open and supportive, but I can tell that they’re struggling to understand because I’ve had many boyfriends since high school. It’s difficult because I’m still sorting out my feelings and how I want to label myself. What I know is that I am absolutely into females, and sometimes males, but I think I may go back to guys out of habit/laziness.
Now – I’ve met an amazing guy and I love the person that he is. However, he is against polyamory and I just don’t think I’m done exploring my sexuality.
I also have no idea how to explain bisexuality to my parents. They seem to understand the concept of lesbian-ness, but I feel like it would be too much to tell them I’m into both. My mom is very traditional about male and female roles, and never let me share a room with a guy, etc. I don’t want her to feel that way about me and women now too. I’m very picky with the people I like, so it’s not like all of a sudden I want to be with every single woman, just like I don’t want to be with every single man. Why does that always seem to be an assumption when ladies admit they’re not hetero?
I am a 19-year old panromantic homosexual cisgender female dating a straight cisgender male. We’ve been together almost two years now. About a month in, I told him I was bisexual and he responded better than I ever imagined. He told me how he used to date a bisexual girl and that one of his best friends is bisexual. He was completely comfortable with it. I felt the need to say bisexual rather than panromantic homosexual because I didn’t know if he would understand how my lack of physical sexual attraction to him isn’t important. I can be sexually aroused by both his sexual arousal and the fact that I love who he is. Just because penis revolts me doesn’t mean I wont get over it to show him how much I love him. The only weak spot in our relationship is his doubt in how much I want to be with him. He knows I like women primarily over men and that I have even had crushes on women while being with him. I am open to polyamory; however, I know that if the crushes aren’t acted on, then nothing will grow. He has my promise that I won’t act on any crushes because we are both satisfied with our monoamorous relationship. He still has doubt, though. This is my first ever relationship. It is not his. He has quite a few more relationships including a one-night stand, a hookup at a party, a year-long relationship, and some friends with benefits. He is afraid that since I have never been with a woman that eventually I will want to know what I don’t have so badly that I will either be unfaithful to him or break up. This is partly true. I know I want to be with a woman in my lifetime. I think it will happen. The reason I say that, though, is my belief that any relationship I have will not last my whole life. When people live with each other for too long, they eventually can’t stand living together anymore. I don’t think you should fight through this hard stage because of love that used to be much stronger. People do change. So should relationships. I’m not saying give up when it gets hard, I’m saying leave when it becomes unbearable. If it never becomes unbearable, so be it. Congratulations. You were meant to be. But in this way, I cannot say the promise “I will love you until I die” because I can’t say that’s true. We should never promise the future. I can only say that I love him now and have no intention of leaving him. He can’t make himself fully believe me, though. He has done things that show he’s trying to push back the part of me that loves women. He has told me, “Since you’re dating a man, you can’t label yourself as bisexual. You’re straight” and “Put something else on. That looks too lesbian”. He has also looked through my phone a couple times, although he ended up telling me when he did. He is constantly scared that I’m looking for something else even though he wants to believe I’m telling him the truth. My sexuality is something we’ve actually talked through quite a bit, so I don’t know how else I can prove to him what I feel.
That sounds like a really hard place for you both to be in.
It may be that you can’t prove to him what you feel, and that he can’t bring himself to trust without proof. I’m not sure it’s possible to prove things like this in any relationship – to some extent, a person has to choose to trust.
That said, I have some experience feeling insecure in relationships, and trying to restore my own sense of security in unhealthy ways. I recognize some of my own patterns in your guy’s behavior. So this is my possible explanation for how he’s treating you: He wants you to prove to him that he’s safe from being left or cheated on. If you’re feeling insecure, or worried about the relationship, you will try to convince him that you’ll be faithful. Your effort to “fix” the problem will help him feel secure that the relationship matters to you. But that only lasts as long as you’re trying anxiously to prove that you will stay in the relationship. The way he’s talking to you is his attempt to keep you worried about him and about the relationship, so you keep reassuring him.
He may not actually want to hurt you. He’s trying to find a way to be less afraid of being hurt. He’s using unhealthy methods to get that need met. I don’t know if you can change this by talking it over with him. You could set hard limits (“if you talk down my sexual orientation again, I’m leaving” or “I’ve done everything I can do. You have to decide if you trust me or not. If not, we can’t continue this relationship.”) You have to be prepared for the possibility that you’ll see the same concerns arise in a new way. I can tell this relationship is important to you, so I hope he will treat you better, but it’s possible that this will only stop if the relationship ends.
I hope you see my comment. This isn’t happening because of your orientation. It’s happening because he’s insecure and because he resorts to emotional manipulation to feel more secure.
This does sound really hard.
“He has told me, ‘Since you’re dating a man, you can’t label yourself as bisexual. You’re straight’ and ‘Put something else on. That looks too lesbian'”
To me, this is completely 100% not okay. I’m sorry that he feels insecure, and I’m not saying it’s never okay to try to help a partner with their insecurity. But his insecurity cannot justify this behavior.
He’s telling you how to label your sexual orientation? He’s telling you what NOT TO WEAR? What makes him think he has any right to expect you not to look “too lesbian”? Looking “too lesbian” makes him think you want to cheat on him with women? Hmm. What if he said, “Put something else on. That looks too slutty. It makes me think you’re going to cheat on me with another man”? That’s not okay…right? Your sexual orientation – the fact that he’s specifically worried about you leaving him for a woman – does not in any way justify him controlling what you wear.
I know you love him and probably don’t want to see him as doing things that aren’t okay. But this isn’t about whether or not he’s a good person. It’s about what you deserve. You shouldn’t have to be this worried about proving yourself, you know? <3
I hope you'll keep talking to us. We're here for you!
Hi! I discovered this autostraddle thread long after it got all this action, but have found so much comfort in it nonetheless. I’m not sure if you’ll see my comment this many years later, but I wanted to comment because I resonated with the relationship setup you described. I have often struggled with labels and knowing how to describe myself. But, I, like you am a woman dating a cisgender man (mine is straight) and while I have identified as bisexual for several years now, I really resonated with the label you had used – panromantic homosexual.
My attraction to men has always been more emotionally and romantically driven, while my attraction to other genders feels more sexually obvious. As time has gone on and my relatio ship with my boyfriend has become more long term and permanent feeling (almost 3 years now) I have started to realize how sexually I feel more homosexual than anything. Perhaps I am sexually fluid, because I spent the bulk of the beginning of my relationship with him surprised at just how sexually attracted I could be to a guy, and now it feels like that has faded away once again. I often have struggled with knowing what to call myself or whether it’s fair of me to call him my boyfriend when what I do with him sexually is more because of my love for him than innate sexual attraction.
I have struggled so hard with this because I also don’t find much interest in penis or PiV sex. And in general, I find intimacy all together a bit difficult for me. I have thought at times that it means I can’t be with him, that our relationship is doomed, or that we must breakup, but reading your comment made me feel better.
My boyfriend is well aware of my feelings and the nuances of them, and he’s accepting, so I am happy for that. But it often hurts to both have my true self unseen by those in my life and to wonder if I’m allowed to remain with the person I fell so hard in love with when my sexual interests have shifted and become more clear to me.
If you see this somehow, just know you identifying yourself the way you did means a lot to me.
I am so thankful for this thread, I was brought up in an incredibly intense christian church so it wasn’t until long after I left there that I realised I even liked other women. Looking back on it now I was definitely in love with my teenage best friend and I had no idea because I was taught to suppress those feeling. Although i’ve dated women i’ve only ever had relationships with men and it sucks being bundled into this straight category like this whole part of me either doesn’t exist, is ignored or just dumpted in the “straight” pile. I feel at home reading these comments and knowing other women have felt the same as I do, let’s work together so that less and less women have to!
I’m bi/fluid and sometimes a woman, but I’ve never dated. I’m eighteen.
Here are some examples of biphobia I’ve gotten:
“I feel like they’re just going to pick a gender eventually”
“You can freely access straight privilege”
“You’re pan if you’re attracted to all genders, bi means two”
“You’re sexually available to men”
“Bi women can’t call themselves butch or femme or dykes or they’re appropriating lesbian culture”
“Het(erosexual) relationship”
“Straight passing privilege”
“Het-partnered bisexuals”
“Bi pussy is for straight men”
“Stop saying the word sapphobia, it’s appropriative of lesbian culture”
“Bi women are just straight girls who thought a celebrity was hot once”
“Bi people don’t experience homophobia”
“You will never experience the true brunt of homophobia”
“Bi teenage girls aren’t valid if they’re in a het relationship”
“Lesbophobic bisluts”
“You can’t be a baby dyke, you’re not a lesbian”
“Stop saying monosexism, it’s homophobic”
And last but not least:
“When have gay people ever hated bi people??????”
Most of the above biphobia was said to me by gay people.
I’m a little late to the party, but I’d like to contribute anyway. I’m so glad this forum exists.
This is probably going to be a bit of a ramble.
I’m a bisexual woman in a long-term relationship with a straight man who I plan to stay with. He’s very loving and supportive – he was the very first person I came out to as bisexual. I’ve never been in a relationship with a woman, but over the course of my life, I’ve had crushes on and fallen in love with more women than I have with men. I spent most of my life keeping that a secret, unfortunately, and never having the courage to flirt or pursue something more with a woman because of it.
I’m still not out to most people because I’m worried about what they might say or think. Mostly, I’m worried that they won’t think I’m *really* bisexual. I don’t care as much about what straight people think, but it would be easier if I knew for certain that I could find support in the queer community… and so I find myself caring way more about what the queer community thinks.
My mentor and one of my closest friends is a lesbian, and I’m still not out to her because I’m worried she won’t understand or that she won’t believe me. Or that she’ll believe me but expect some kind of disclaimer about the privilege I experience because I’m bisexual. We’ve known each other for about seven years, and she has played a huge role in helping me accept my sexuality, even though she has no idea. I’d like to tell her, if only so that I could thank her, but I’m still so afraid. I feel like there is this huge gulf between us because I am just too afraid to come out to her. I plan to work on it. Squad goals, or whatever. If anyone has any tips on how to do this, input is much appreciated.
I love my current man-partner, but I know he will never 100% understand my struggles with my bisexual identity. He says I shouldn’t care what other people think, that it doesn’t matter if they don’t know I’m bisexual and just assume I’m straight. He’s just trying to be supportive and convince me that I shouldn’t be concerned about other people’s perceptions of me, but he doesn’t understand the erasure part. So that’s one awk part of being bisexual but being in a relationship with a straight man.
Uhm, hello, are we the same person or what?!
Jokes aside, this thread has changed my life. It has given me the courage to come out to my partner (explicitly, using the word BISEXUAL, and offering additional explanations), who sounds very much like yours. Seriously, your story sounds so much like mine, the only difference being the lesbian friend. One of my oldest friends is lesbian, but she wasn’t a factor in my sexuality finding quest. But just like you, I feel wary of coming out to her because I’m certain she’d throw the hetero privilege back in my face. While I don’t deny my privilege, it also erases me.
Do you plan on coming out to close friends/family? I thought of coming out to a very close friend of mine and maaaaaybe to my mother, but I’m not sure how it will pan out. I’m still unsure of how to proceed.
I’ve come out to two people – my partner and my best friend. My best friend recently moved far away, so we’ve been writing letters to each other. I wrote her a long letter about my sexuality and erasure and all that, and she responded favorably. I haven’t really “come out” to anyone else.
I’m “out” on social media, in that my Facebook lists that I’m interested in men and women (but I doubt anyone has ever bothered to look at that), and I often post articles about bisexuality (although I’ve never posted about MY sexuality). I occasionally tweet about my sexuality since coming out to my best friends, but the majority of those people are acquaintances at best. That’s been helpful for me – being “out” mostly to people who I wouldn’t care about losing if my sexuality was an issue for them.
I’m not out to my family, and I don’t plan on coming out to them unless the opportunity arises. I don’t see them very often, nor do I have a very close relationship with any of them, so it isn’t currently causing me A LOT of grief, although I do occasionally endure slightly homophobic remarks from them that aren’t intentionally directed at me. (Yay, holidays.)
I’m not out at work, either, in part because I’m afraid the woman I share my office with is going to find a way to no-homo herself out of getting lunch with me on the daily. The other reason I’m not out at work is because that’s how I know my lesbian mentor, and if I’m going to start being super open about my bisexuality at work, I’d want her to be the very first person to know.
The rule that I recently made for myself, though, is that when I do meet new people from new social groups, that I be open about my bisexuality if the opportunity arises. If a conversation comes up relating to sexuality or hot ladies, I try my best to make sure I comment on it so that they know or at least can guess.
I’m sorry you also feel afraid to come out to your lesbian friend, but I’m glad knowing I’m not the only person who feels that way. I wish I could give you more advice about coming out! I’m still working on it, too. :)
Kate, I can’t thank you enough for sharing your story! Like Grumpy, I feel like you told my story too, in many ways. I’m married to an incredible man who has been nothing but supportive since I came out to him two years ago. I too have an incredible lesbian mentor (a close friend of his from high school) whom I haven’t talked to about my orientation. I’m also terrified about coming out to my closest girlfriends because I’m worried they’ll think I’m sexually attracted to them and that our relationship will change because of it. I’ve come out almost entirely to strangers, while most of those closest to me, aside from those I’ve met recently, don’t know. All of this has made me feel incredibly lonely and isolated. I have no idea where to start looking for queer companionship, whether I’ll be accepted by the greater queer community, and how important it is to come out to my family and friends.
Have you (or Grumpy) found any answers since December? Does anyone else have any meaningful advice they can share for navigating this complicated process?
Hi Audrey!
Since December lots of things have changed with me. Apart from my partner, I came out to my mother a few months ago. She cried a lot and asked me why I didn’t trust her to tell her earlier, but she told me she loved me, so I guess it didn’t go too bad. We haven’t really talked about it since then, but nothing has changed in the way we interact. I’m still wary of telling my dad cause he is the more close-minded of them, but I might do it at some point in my life.
I also came out to my lesbian friend and it went fine. It feels like we have a more honest relationship now, so I’m glad I told her, but we don’t live in the same country so we don’t see each other too often. I haven’t told my other friends yet and I’m not sure I will ever make an official announcement, but I am done hiding, so I will keep going to LGBTQ events and if they show up on my FB feed and people get confused, I don’t care.
So I guess you could try sniffing out which friend is the most open-minded? If you are not in danger of bodily harm or anything more serious than losing a friend (which I’m not saying isn’t serious! it’s just less dangerous than idk getting assaulted or something), I think you should take a chance on them. If you are close to them and care about them and want to keep being close, I think you should do it. What about the lesbian mentor? Do you think she’s a potential person you could come out to?
I don’t have any close friends that I really wanted to share this with, all of my friends are so painfully straight and heteronormative that I really feel you on that isolation part. What I did was to go to an AS meetup, where I met some really cool and like-minded people and I am gradually making friends. If you have an AS group nearby, I highly recommend that you try it out. I am very shy and quiet and at first it was so intimidating to go by myself, but it was worth it. I felt so weird when I mentioned my boyfriend (and I still try to keep talk about him to a minimum, at least when I meet the people the first time), but I think I’m being paranoid, as I didn’t feel any judgement coming from anyone. Queer community is priceless, it has brought me a lot of inner peace and a sense of belonging that I hadn’t felt before. I mean, don’t imagine that I have a BFFs and we hang out/chat all the time or anything like that. Just going to random events with “my” people has felt so liberating and amazing.
And if you need support or someone to talk to, you can always message me :)
This is such an amazing thread! I feel like this might be a safe place to share my story and I would love to hear thoughts from anyone who feels like they can help.
I am a cis woman who identified as heterosexual growing up. I was very clearly interested in boys, still am, and never really felt romantic attraction to girls/never really thought about it. I was introduced to “gay” as a concept when I was younger and I did take a step back to consider if I might be gay but I liked boys too much and the thought of kissing a girl at the time freaked me out (whether that was because I genuinely wasn’t attracted to women at the time or because I had a lot of internalized biphobia, I don’t know). When I first heard about bisexuality, the opinions associated with it were that it was people who couldn’t make up their mind yet, which thankfully I came to realize was not true. I wondered if I might be bisexual but I thought that since I was certainly attracted to boys and maybe only slightly attracted to some girls that I didn’t qualify as being bi-enough so I continued to identify as “mostly heterosexual.”
I became involved with the GSA in my high school and following high school I worked as a counsellor at a camp for queer youth for three summers. Spending time in queer communities like camp was really confusing to me because on the one hand I felt so much more comfortable being in spaces where queerness was being recognized and where the oppressive forces of patriarchy/heteronormativity/cisnormativity were being actively questioned and resisted but I also remained quiet and felt a little outside of things in these communities because I regarded these spaces as designated for people who really needed them and not for people like me who could survive without being oppressed in the cisnormative/heteronormative outside world.
During this time and ever since I have continued to question whether or not I truly am heterosexual. First I realized that I was not just attracted to cis men but also trans men and transmasculine people. Then I started noticing an attraction to butch/masculine women. I even noticed that I sometimes found femme women to be attractive, both romantically and physically! Recently I have been noticing a strong sexual attraction to some women that I haven’t really felt before either. This is all super confusing for me because I’d never had any of these feelings growing up and I always wonder if I’m actually attracted to these people or if I am just appreciative of their good looks or fetishizing queerness. I do understand that sexuality is fluid and that you can have different attractions to different kinds of people at different times in your life, but because my attraction to men has always been so lazer clear to me and mostly unwavering it seems strange to me that the rest of it would be so unclear? Is this all just internalized biphobia or do these feelings of hesitancy about dating and having sex with people other than men have value and mean that I’m actually not attracted to them?
I find my love and sex life a little hard to navigate sometimes because while I know the heterosexual script and can play it out quite well I am also trying to navigate a new polyamorous identity that distances me from the mainstream monogamous heterosexual dating scene. I’m also very much a feminist and I find it difficult to find men who are genuinely dedicated to equity in bed and in the rest of the relationship. When it comes to queer dating spaces I feel REALLY out of place because they tend to cater to gay people and I think I would feel like I was taking up space or that I was not queer enough because of how unfamiliar I am with queer dating and also because of how femme and unassertive I am.
Does anyone share any of these experiences or have any thoughts to offer?
I, too, identified as heterosexual for a long time. In large part, this was because I was attracted to men (this was laser clear to me, especially since everyone EXPECTED me to ONLY be attracted to men), and that made it easier for me to misinterpret and sometimes outright ignore the feelings I had for women. Although dating exclusively men when I was younger conferred the benefit of not being the target of homophobia (in other words, passing privilege), it did over time cause lots of damage to my mental health because I was unwilling to accept who I was. Eventually, though, I started to acknowledge my attraction to women (romantically and physically), and now its a part of my identity that I do not doubt at all (although others might). When I identified so forcefully as straight, my feelings for women confused me. I always questioned what they meant. But once I began to identify myself as bisexual, all of those confusing feelings became crystal clear. I’d say try on the label for a while, explore your feelings for women, and see if things become a little less murky. And remember that the only person who can define your sexuality is YOU — not anyone else.
“During this time and ever since I have continued to question whether or not I truly am heterosexual.” I could make this exact same statement except with one change: “I have continued to question whether or not I truly am queer/lesbian/bisexual”. I think for me the older I have gotten (I am 30 now) the more in some ways I question my sexuality. And I think part of this has to do with being in a relationship for 3 years now with a cis-straight man. When we have problems sometimes I think “I wouldn’t have this same problem if I was dating a woman” but then I also question whether it’s just that the two of us aren’t good together regardless of our genders.
I think the older I get the more I also find how much internalized biphobia/homophobia I have. For example, there was a woman I had a pretty big crush on and I kept asking myself if I should do something about it. So one day at the gym I made myself run a really hard workout and I told myself “I can’t say anything to her if I can’t do this workout”. But when I was able to do it, I found myself almost being disappointed. Not because I didn’t want to talk to her, but because I think I still have a lot of internalized oppression going on.
Or even recently when I signed up for A camp, I am excited to go, but I find myself being embarrassed when I tell other people about it. Or feeling kind of ashamed and wondering if I will even fit in at all with the queer community. Will I always feel like an outsider?
Anyway, I wanted to write this to you because reading your post reminded me of myself in some ways. There is always this question for me about whether I am really queer, but more and more I think that I have this question NOT because I am confused about my sexuality but because I still have a lot of internalized homophobia to work through. Good luck to you!
Hi Emma,
Let us know how A Camp went :)
Amazing. It was amazing. I felt affirmed, accepted, included. The first full day began with a workshop titled “There’s Never Been a Better Time to be Bisexual on a Mountaintop”. It was great to share space and stories with other queer women and gender-non-conforming people who fall into the bisexual spectrum. Made me feel like this space is my space too. I came back home feeling refreshed and renewed and my boyfriend has been very happy for my experience. I talked to many people who have in the past or currently are dating men and we could be open about it. It’s the first time I haven’t felt anxiety about that in a queer space. The first time I haven’t felt like I had to prove my queerness. It felt really damn good.
Bisexual women dating men online at http://www.top10bidatigsites.com. You should not be shy as a bisexual. The society has accepted us. Reading said reviews, it will not be that complicated to make a decision regarding this aspect of your life. The truth is that online dating is much more fun because you can talk to more people at the same time, without actually needing to commit to anyone. You can decide to meet with one or more of these online companions when you feel ready to make this step.
This thread is fantastic. It’s so helpful to see what others think and feel – and to know I’m not crazy or alone :) I’m also thrilled to see that there are (at least one :) non-bi identifiers on here trying to learn more. Wonderful.
Hello, I (an estrogen-based organism) have dug up this 1yo open thread apparently to say into the ether that I have just left a marriage with a woman and have acquired a part-time-live-in, casual, male companion. The biggest struggle so far has been his “this is like sleeping with a virgin” accusations, but really, they didn’t teach het foreplay in sex ed. It’s not accurate in porn (duh). Guys don’t get wet?! Of course, but wut? So high maintenance.
I’m probably not the only one who still has notification emails on for this thread. Your message made me laugh and smile. Good luck with your new relationship!
Not sure if folks are still following this, but I thought I’d post cause there’s not many other spaces where I can get advice or even share about this! I’m queer/pansexual and currently dating a cisman. When we first started dating I had just ended my first relationship with a woman and actually had decided I was only going to be looking to date women at that time. Attraction showed up where it did & I made it very clear to him that it was a big priority for me to be able to continue to date women because prior to that relationship that had just ended, I had never dated women before (though had wanted to for years). He was very understanding and suggested we try non-monogamy. I’ve never been interested in non-monogamy before though in order to meet my needs I thought I’d consider trying it. Four months later neither of us has done anything with others except go on a date or two. I’m becoming very uncomfortable with the idea of him sleeping with other people or giving others the affection he’s giving me and also don’t feel like I have the time or energy to date more than one person even though when I think about never dating a woman again I freak out a bit. I love him and want to deepen with him and I also am a bit afraid to fully step into a monogamous relationship with a man, for fear that it would last forever or I’d never be able to date a woman again (my mind has drastic inclinations). I’m basically a ball of confusion and trying to access what I’m really needing or wanting. Is anyone else in a similar situation? Advice/thoughts much appreciated!
I’m in kind of a similar situation. I’ve been out as queer for 10 years, mostly (like, almost exclusively) dating women, then fell for this guy who I’ve been dating now for almost a year. At the beginning of our relationship I wanted to keep things open because I was feeling those feelings of…but what if I am never with a woman again! I still have those thoughts from time to time but I just like this guy so much! I decided for me, I don’t want to give up what I have with him out of the fear of missing out on other things in the future. So do what makes you happy, y’know? And never let anyone tell you you’re not queer enough.
I relate to your situation very much. I am married to my soulmate, a cis het man who is wonderful. I want to be with him forever and grow old together and we are already middle aged and we’ve been together for 24 years and we have two amazing teenagers. I sometimes feel sad that I may never again be with a woman in any capacity, sexually or romantically. My husbian (get it? I made that up to make myself feel more at home in this relationship) would feel so betrayed if I wanted to be non-monogamous and so it is just not an option.
Because of the new League of Their Own series featuring such gorgeous butches, and a masc hottie moving in next door, my lesbian feelings are waking up and rattling in their cages! It’s frustrating and like watching a party without an invitation.
I started dressing more dykey at work and even went out to dinner w my husbian in Chelsea and I was dressed very masc. and I got an undercut with my long hair, and I am very excited about it. I’m looking for some LBGTQAI+ jewelry I could wear. I want to come out as bi in a more public way at work. I feel so invisible at work. Before I became a social worker 7 years ago, I was very out at work but then I started working in orgs that were conservative about LBGTQAI+ issues and people, and so I made the difficult choice to let people think I was straight. Then for 4 years I worked in a school in Staten Island, full of Trump supporters , so I was very closeted there. I now have tenure and work in a much more liberal school and my principal is somewhat out, with wedding pics on their desk w their same-sex partner. So I wouldn’t get fired, but I might make some enemies among the staff and with my social work role I really need to be able to work with everyone in the staff in order to do my work.
I don’t really go anywhere besides work, home, and yoga class, so where would I even come out and to whom? And when would it even come up? Yet it’s like a volcanic eruption of joyous lusty lesbian energy!
My straight friend’s response to my expression of lust for my new hot neighbor was, “you guys are gonna make out” but that is not an option because of my husbian’s tender heart and past betrayals.
A straight woman I was chatting with asked me why it was even important to come out as bisexual if I’m in a marriage to a man. I was like, “wow, straights people really do not get it!”
The other thing is that I came out as a lesbian at age 18 in 1988 (when almost no one came out as bi because so many lesbians were not welcoming to bi women out of fear that bi women would inevitably leave them for a man). I was so so so out as a lesbian. It was my whole identity along with being a feminist activist. Then I started writing songs about my life and many of them were about liking other girls when I was a teen. They were funny and joyous. I had a developing music career and I dated and had relationships with women for 10 years. Then BAM! I met this cute guy and started sleeping with him just for fun and then I realized he was my actual soulmate and that I was in loooooove!
Now it’s been 24 years and I’ve been living a life that appears like a straight woman’s American Dream. That was not my plan! But I am grateful for all that I have.
I’m starting to get back into my music now, and I feel so awkward trying to put myself back out there as a queer singer songwriter after so long while living a straight life! This feeling is mixing in with the existing imposter syndrome thing of, “who even wants to hear me sing these songs anyway?”
Etc.
Well, I’ll sign off now. It feels so good to write all this and read what other people have written! Thanks everyone!
Hello. I found this on bi visibility day :-)
I had a few snogs / fumbles with women at university (among a load of men), but went back to dating and have now been married to a man for a long time, and went back to seeing myself as straight. However after a couple of pregnancies I started feeling much more strongly attracted to women again. I’m into ff erotica, but haven’t and won’t see any women as I’m married.
Question is this – has anyone else felt subtle shifts in their sexuality related to pregnancy or any other factor?
I’ve now comfortably settled on the bi label, but it is terribly difficult to come out in a positive way. Fortunately my husband is 100% committed to me and understanding about my sexuality, and I’m still totally into him.
Help! I have identified as a lesbian for the last 7 years and dated exclusively women and now I’m dating a man, which is shocking to me. I’ve been living completely out and openly as a lesbian all this time, so now I’m feeling like I need to come out again…?! Because my facebook says “interested in women” and that’s going to become confusing when me and this man go facebook official. Basically, I’ve lived so openly and proudly as a lesbian that when my facebook says i’m in a relationship with a man, people are going to think it’s a joke. What to do?!?!?!?! Why am I so nervous about doing this???
Hey girl. I’m with you. And I just found this thread, so I hope by now you have found some peace with the situation. I have the same story, and it’s so confusing and you feel like there is no support for you. But here is the important thing to remember: own your own truth. People who love you, will listen and support you even if they don’t personally understand and relate. I have had so many struggles with the ways other people see me now (both straights and gays) but what is important to remember is that it’s your life, your happiness, and your identity. And sexuality is fluid, and anyone who judges you is not worthy of your time. Good luck out there.
I stumbled on this old thread and scrolled all the way down and saw your comment and I’m so glad I did! I don’t know if you’ll even see this, or if your situation is still at all like it was when you wrote this or if anything I have to say will be helpful. But I was just so relieved to see other people who have had such a similar experience to mine, and maybe you or someone else who finds this will be too.
A year and a bit ago I was in pretty much exactly the same situation you described. I was out to everyone as a lesbian, and only dating women. And then I fell in love with my best friend, a man. I was so worried about what it implied for my own identity and how my friends would react that it kind of put a damper on the early part of our relationship. But as it turns out, after the initial surprise, no one really cared? We all went on with our lives (except an ex of mine who was also a fwb to both of us who flipped out when we got together, but it had nothing to do with his gender).
We’ve been together since November of 2015, and he affirms my queerness and our relationship is wonderful and I wouldn’t change it for anything. I’m still attracted to women, and not interested in men in general. I also still struggle a bit with how to identify, and I usually say something like “gay with an exception” but then I worry about internalized biphobia and then I usually give up for a while. Basically, the point I’m trying to make here is that nearly all of the things I’ve struggled with because of this whole thing have come from myself and not from other people. Friends just want you to be happy! If your friends are anywhere near as rad as mine, I think the same will be true for you too.
Rachael, I know so many women in my own bi community who have your same experience; a lot of people talk about the experience of “coming out twice.” Some research on bisexual women shows that about a third of us identify as lesbian before coming out as bisexual, so you have a lot of company. It might help to get connected to your local bi community offline, if you can find one.
I also recommend Bi Women Quarterly (http://biwomenboston.org/newsletter), which is a fantastic publication entirely created by bi women and including all kinds of stories. I browse their archives online myself when I am feeling alone.
Finally, I haven’t read it, but there’s a new YA novel by the out bi author Julie Murphy about a young women who identifies as a lesbian and then starts to date a man. I’ve heard it’s good!
That’s so awesome about the book! I’m going to check out both of your resources. Thanks for sharing :)
Rachael, I completely relate. I was out as a lesbian for 16 years before I came out as bi. I definitely have had to come out twice. When I came out as being attracted to women my attitude was very much that if anyone had a problem with it it was their problem. I pretty much have the same attitude now. Though, I will admit, biphobia from lesbians and gay men is much more difficult for me to deal with than from straight people. I’m still working through that and it has caused me to put some distance between myself and the queer community at large. Meanwhile, however, I keep finding a greater and greater bi community.
Just wanted to say I feel ya. I used the word ‘gay’ to self-describe even though I’m more fluid than that. But if dating women for so long and coming out has taught me anything, it’s that other people’s opinions don’t matter. Don’t put yourself in a box to meet other people’s expectations. Help other people expand their understandings of sexuality. I found it helpful to post about sexual fluidity and to let my friends know that even though I was dating a dude, I was still hella queer. I definitely did need to come out ‘again’ to some people but mostly people who are open and accepting get that bisexuality is a thing and that people fall for people.
I identify as bisexual, and while I have had sexual experiences with women, and find myself attracted to women in a way that is plain and undeniable to me, I have never dated/ been in a relationship with a woman. I am married to a man, and deeply committed to him, and I’m monogamous. I am out to him and a few queer friends, and feel satisfied with that level of openness, but there are times when I feel I am “playing a part” to make things easier for myself when people assume I’m straight. I also feel like I’m ignoring a sense of responsibility to present myself as I really am to the world… I generally don’t like people knowing my personal affairs, and I almost feel like coming out more fully would leave me vulnerable and feeling like I’ve opened myself up to an invasion of privacy. If anyone can relate, I would love to hear your thoughts.
Hi laurel! I can definitely relate, but o think ultimately your responsibility is primarily to yourself here. If being out to your husband and a few close friends is what feels right, then you’re right where you need to be! But if that starts to feel stifling or you start to feel like you’re hiding from people you don’t want to hide yourself from, then maybe it will be time to reassess?
Y’all, I got tears in my eyes just seeing the headline… then I read all the comments! I’ve identified as queer/bisexual since I was 15 and have NEVER seen a space like this. The people I am closest to are either straight or gay, so these conversations are often challenging. Just to feel this visible and understood means so much. The number of times I have been told that I’m not “really” queer because I am dating a man… or I am simply “seeking attention,” trying to be “sexy,” etc. Grateful for all of you for sharing your experiences!
I know women in the past couple of years have said this but I will say it…..thank you for creating this thread. I recently turned 30 and I’m in a long-distance relationship with a man (I’m in a PhD program). I came out to him that I thought I was bi and he has been the most supportive person. We’ve been open enough to the point that him supporting me having sex with a woman (in fact he was ridiculously excited for me me and said “isn’t going down on women great….it’s the best”).
Before I met my boyfriend, I tried telling my lesbian friends, I was just told, “don’t break a lesbians heart because of me wanting to experiment”.
I could at the time see why (this particular friend) said this, but it did scare me from wanting me to come out to really any one else since I didn’t feel like I could call myself “bi” for not ever being with a woman.
I haven’t even came out to my family since I never dated a woman. Though I have a gay brother and my mom is supportive, weirdly enough I feel like she wouldn’t quite understand being bisexual (I sort of tried telling her and that was her reaction). I tried dating women and it was actually quite difficult, heck I even tried just finding one night stands and that was diffcult (actually impossible). Nothing ever panned out to anything more then some light flirting and drinks.
I think the most important is to have a partner that loves you for your strengths, weakenesses, heart mind and soul. I just happened to find it and my partner happens to be a man.
Question for other bisexuals… or just anyone…
I just had an unfortunate interaction with a professor and I’m not sure how to react. I’m a bisexual woman and my prof. found out I’m engaged to a man and basically said “so you’ve been straight all along.” This really upsets me because straight people never had the experience of internalized guilt and shame for their sexual identity or the process of coming out to family and it just feels like he’s erasing my experiences… I guess this will be happening from now on? I don’t know. Not sure if this is an okay forum for this… I just had a lot of feelings and I’m looking for advice.
He absolutely was erasing your experiences and identity, and you have every right to be upset (and to talk about it here). I’m sure it was especially frustrating because there’s a power imbalance between an instructor and a student, so you may not have felt safe to stand up for yourself. I’m sorry that happened to you.
I don’t know if this would be helpful for you, but you could try to think of a statement that feels right (something like “No, I’m still bisexual, I just happen to be marrying a man”) and practice saying it to yourself so that if something like this happens again, and you feel comfortable speaking up, you have a response ready. Other than that, the only advice I can offer is to remember that you are the ONLY person who gets to define you – people may say and think inaccurate things, but you know who you are and that’s what matters most.
I just want to echo everything Chandra said. Ditto!
Hi VL,
Unfortunately, that is a common form of bi erasure which is a common form of biphobia. Something many of us have experienced from both straight and gay/lesbian people. You have every right to feel upset about what this professor said. It shows his ignorance. This is the perfect forum to share this experience. If you haven’t already, check out the Bisexual Resource Center website and Bisexual.org Facebook page. I also like this graphic on pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/pin/137500594850891381/.
Also, look up a great interview between Anna Paquin and Larry King back in 2014. He challenges her bisexuality because she is married to a man. She has a great response.
Here’s link to the Anna Paquin interview: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/31/anna-paquin-larry-king_n_5638081.html
Also, I would contact your Title IX office and speak to one of their staff. It is inappropriate for your professor to comment on your sexuality, much less in a way that erases your identity.
So, tonight I came to the Internet because I had trouble spleeping. Mostly, I’m struggling with the fact that I’m a bi woman (previouslsy identifying as a lesbian) in a LTR with a cisman for the past 4 years.
Every couple of months I have an internal crisis, because I fear I’m not being true to myself, I guess it’s the erasure experience most of other women commented in the thread. I live a “straight live” on the outside, and feel I don’t have space to express my queerness, since I don’t have a lot of friends, or a community.
Sometimes I have vivid dreams about having sex with other women, and I’m never sure if I should pursue some arrangement of open relationship, because we tried that before, and it caused me more anxiety, because it seems easier for my boyfriend to find other women to date, but I’m not really good at dating (we’re both sort of weirdos and bad at dating in general). I end up feeling more insecure, because he (may) have sex with other women and I don’t.
So, I found this article (https://www.autostraddle.com/you-need-help-youre-gay-but-oh-no-youre-falling-for-a-man-what-the-fck-415159/) and ended up here.
I’m really happy to find this thread, though. It seems the universe is on my side, after all.
If anybody has thoughts on this issue of mine, I appreciate it.
But thanks anyway for the article, and the website in general. It’s my go-to place to feel good. =D
So, open or other kinds of plural relationships can be great, but I would caution you that dating isn’t necessarily the best way to experience your queerness. Only you can determine that, obviously, but you’ve said that when you tried it before, it only added to your anxiety. Plural relationships are a solution for people who aren’t monogamous, not for people who aren’t monosexual. If you genuinely want to pursue that, there may be some ways that you can help each other make that more positive for you, but you may benefit more from making some new friends who are also queer and seeing if that improves your experience. Having sex with ladies is fun, but plural relationships aren’t always accepted by people and you might, if you find yourself in something really important to you, it might make you feel equally bad if you feel you can’t be open about all of your relationships.
I think part of the problem that a lot of us in this thread have experienced is that bisexuals are commonly excluded from queer spaces unless we’re /properly/ performing queer rather than living the lives we want to live.
I’m really fortunate that I’ve found a bunch of new friends who are bi and several are poly and we’re all very open about our experiences and troubles. It’s been really helpful for me. I still get to be exactly who I am and I get to be my kind of queer. That’s what really matters, feeling comfortable in your skin and respected and valued in your relationships. We’re not just queer when we’re eating muff. We’re queer regardless of our sexual activities. Having the people we love most acknowledge that and treat it as present and an indelible part of us instead of something that might be relevant if our situations changed is what provides that feeling of being valued and allows us to feel like we’re living the identities we hold.
Hello lovelies!
So I recently accepted my sexuality and came out bisexual while in a hetero relationship. I absolutely love him and hope we stay together, however… it is increasingly difficult not to crave what I’ve always known and recently accepted. I’ve never been with a woman (very conservative up bringing) and I hate that it feels I’ll never be able to explore and enjoy that side of myself. Any ladies have any words of advice or encouragement?
Thank you and all