I'm a sexual mystery :-( Please help!

[Wirt]

I've been really lost for a while now. I barely know how to express my feelings and thoughts, so I guess I'll start at the beginning. Just a warning, this is basically a story so if you don't feel like reading a huge "memoir" like this then escape while you still can. If you do, then I hope my writing is good enough to keep you engaged in my silly life, haha.

My first ever crush was on a girl in 3rd grade, who I would spend recess with writing stories and making comics, we were super great friends and I even remember getting jealous when a friend (a guy) in my group who I didn't like all that much danced with her at her birthday party, jealous enough to get angry.

The thing is... I was extremely afraid to kiss her. I liked her a whole lot and even wrote letters to myself saying how much I loved her. She broke her leg and I made her a basket of candy and things to do while she got better, I got mad when my friends would say she wasn't pretty, I was super nervous to ask her to the school dance (I did), and yet I was super afraid to kiss her. I was extremely naive (didn't even know what sex was), and the thought of kissing always scared/grossed me out. I was afraid to go any further, and I didn't even know what further was, but I knew that I liked her.

In 6th grade I asked her out, and she said yes but because she didn't have a cellphone, now that things had changed, I was petrified to call her house because I was afraid of her parents finding out I liked their daughter in that way. ... I don't know, I had a crazy imagination, and probably used that excuse to justify me running from my uncertainties. I didn't talk to her for the rest of the entire year. IN fact, I avoided her. We had been best friends for 3 years and I straight up stopped talking to her ( I made excuses that we had no classes together, but I didn't even try). I still don't really know why, and I still feel bad about it.

fast forward past a girl my friend made me ask out, out of pity, that I barely knew and didn't like, and we get to the next girlfriend I had, in 9th grade. I didn't like her much either, but I heard she really liked me, and by this time I knew I had little to no experience in relationships and thought that if I gave her a chance and got to know her, maybe I'd like her. So we start "dating."

We go to the library on valentine's day and she asks me to go somewhere with her. We walk down the hall and turn the corner. She starts crying about her last boyfriend calling her a 'bitch' and a 'slut' and I'm really weirded out since it all comes out of nowhere. But I try and console her and she calms down. Then she asks me: "do you want to make out?" And I'm flabbergasted. I'm in 9th grade, I've always been 'maturity-slow' --never cursed, never watched porn, never even masturbated or ANYTHING. Yeah, I'm really weird. So I don't know what to say, I barely know what making out exactly is! (I mean I'd seen it, but I didn't know whether tongue was involved, how to do it, etc.) I have no idea what'll happen or if I'll be good, but I say yes, because I kind of want to, and I feel bad.

So we start making out and I feel all hot and fuzzy and then... I get a boner.

You're probably thinking, "yeah, so?" and I don't blame you, but in my mind, I had no idea that would happen to me, and I had no idea if girls even knew what a boner was or if they liked them or ANYTHING! So I instantly start panicking and pull away, I'm trying desperately to hide it. I ask her if she wants to walk back and do some more homework like the scared nerd I was, and she agrees, probably confused. I call my mom and she picks me up. We didn't go on any dates after that, I avoided texting her and I break up with her a few months later. Her best friend yells at me and asks me: "are you gay?" and I replied "No! ... I don't think so..."

But that's the thing now. I kind of don't really know anymore. And I mean I really don't know if I'm straight, or Bi, or gay or what. There are a lot of factors and I don't know how to interpret them all. I'm 19 now, and I didn't even start masturbating until I was 16, because my gay friend showed me porn for the first time (it was straight porn). I never really had much of a sex drive until then.

then there's my most recent girlfriend, who I didn't find that attractive or even had a crush on but really grew to love her personality and would make out with a lot (because it felt really good). The furthest we got sexually was fingering because I'm really slow with relationships and didn't feel 'ready' until later, and when I did, whoopdeedoo I had a weird rash I didn't have the courage to tell my parents about and so never got any further with her for fear she'd see and freak out. Yeah that's TMI, but hey it's integral to the story as to why I'm still a virgin :yeah:

Now comes the other sides of things. Finally, yeah, I know (I'm a slow guy).

I never really had feelings for guys earlier in my life that I can remember. I remember going to a sleepover and the kid who invited me showed us his willy in like 2nd grade, and I just thought it was weird. It made me uncomfortable actually.

My best friend for a while (we've since gone separate ways) who I would always have sleepovers with from kindergarten to middleschool, wasn't sexual towards me for the most part. But I remember, that come night I would always feel uncomfortable waiting for the morning, because he'd ask me to sleep in the same bed as him, or smell my hair and say it smelled really nice. One time (i forget how it came up) he was talking about his penis and saying it was really big. I got really uncomfortable and tried to change the subject. He said he took a picture of it on his DS (yes, yes, the cringe) and left it in the bathroom if I wanted to see. I said no thanks and the conversation was dropped. We went to sleep and I woke up the next morning. It was really early so my friend was asleep, and I had to go to the bathroom. I was in there, and the DS was right there on the counter. I had convinced myself earlier that my friend had been joking, but for some reason, I checked it, and he wasn't. I snapped the DS shut, and was pretty shell-shocked for the rest of the morning, I tried to forget it.

Now, remember my gay friend who showed me my first porn? Well he came out in 9th grade, after he had been home from school for a few months with Lyme's Disease, We'll call him Bob. I was supportive (as much as I knew to be, basically just saying good for you!) and Bob was the first person I knew in person that I knew was gay. A day or so after he came out, he wanted to skype me.

--Now, I have this sense, this sense that I know[I] something's gonna happen. It sort of bubbles up. I'm not sure if the feeling comes from just observation or hidden feelings. I tend to resort to acting oblivious when I feel uncomfortable or anxious. If I fool myself and others into thinking I don't know what's going on, I can't get hurt and I won't hurt them, right?

When Bob asked me to skype him. I got that sense. Bob talked for a little bit, and then he told me He had feelings for me, that he still did. I didn't know how to react. Bob had asked me if I ever had questioned my sexuality, because he said he thought I might be gay (this part is hazy so I don't really remember exactly if he thought I [I]was or just might be). I told him I sort of had, because I was into theatre, art, and acting, because my brother would always talk about ditzy "hot girls" and I would roll my eyes at any girl on tv who was oversexualized. I had never felt connected to sex or even sexual yet, so any evidence I had was shallow and surface-level stuff.

I told him that I had questioned myself, but had concluded I was straight. "I've liked girls since the 3rd grade!" But... had I? Was my first crush a crush? Or just a best friend that I felt like I was supposed to date? I still don't really know today. I remember the butterflies. I felt them then, with her, and with another girl I asked out in 10th grade. But was it just nerves? I'm scared because I don't know.

When Bob told me he had a crush on me, there was a part of me that imagined a future with him, nothing sexual was in it, but in a way, I remember it being sort of nice, like there was a part of me that wanted it in some way. I told Bob I didn't feel the same as him (and i probably didn't, considering he was much more sexually mature than me), and he asked me if I wanted to just let the whole thing be forgotten. I felt bad. I said yes.

Fast-forward to now, present day, and I'm 19, staying home for a semester from college for medical reasons. Alone with my thoughts. My girlfriend and I broke up in may, she couldn't do a long-distance relationship. Now it's November and I've been single for awhile and really questioning where to go next in terms of relationships. I've still never had sex. Not for lack of wanting to, more for fear (and an unfortunate rash).

I look back, and I wonder... am I gay? Am I bi? As of now I haven't felt any strong attraction towards any girls. I have a friend in college, who I haven't seen for a while now, but that I might have feelings for. He and I spent a butt ton of time together working on art projects for classes, and I genuinely wanted to, I didn't think much of it and considered us good friends ( i still do).

And then one day he says to me while we're alone in the studio, smiling: "Hey, Wirt, we've been spending a lot of time together." I immediately felt myself blush and get all hot. I didn't expect to feel like that. It surprised me. I responded with a half-joking "oh yeah, we have, haven't we?" He said, "yeah... it's nice."

When we were walking outside and it came time to split to head back to our own dorms, the goodbye felt weird, almost as if there was a possibility of something happening, like a kiss or something. I don't know if it was because I felt like he might want to, or if I wanted to... I still really don't know.

I've also acknowledged that I get really nervous about impressing certain guys. Generally they inspire me but I'm wondering if it's something more.

Recently my brain keeps going back to this one afternoon out on my kayak with my older brother. He's sporty, he works out, he's crass, popular, drinks, and goes from girl to girl in a night (and yes I love him, he's my brother, and he's not all bad, he's actually really nice). I always tried to not be like him. That afternoon, we were talking, and he starts talking about this one "smoking hot" girl he hooked up with. I'm getting really thoughtful and I say to him, "John... I don't really know if I feel the [I]need[I] to be with girls like you do. I don't know if I have that 'urge.'" I was in 8th grade or so, still hadn't watched porn or anything, and I chalked up my reasoning for saying this as just not being ready. Now, I'm not so sure.


My future's a big scary mystery and I'm at home going crazy thinking about it. But, I want to have a plan. I want to have a plan for when I go back to college so I can really get on with my life. All aspects of it.

I don't know if Straight or Bi or Gay or whatever. I've always sort of hated labels but now I'm at a point where I feel like trying to find one might help me feel more stable. I found this website while trying to take a flexuality test (it wouldn't work on my browser) and I'm glad I'm still technically a teen (19, woo!). I read through the thread on how people realized they were bi or gay, and while I feel some of it applies to me, a bunch of it doesn't, and I feel like my situation is a bit unique. Am I just detached from everything? Am I just behind on things?

I've been trying to figure myself out, and every time I think I reach some sort of conclusion, other evidences pop up and I convince myself otherwise. If you've read this all, thank you so much. If you could help me work through this, I'd really appreciate it.

[Uniquemind]

I think a couple of important things are going on here.


The first thing seems to be foundational to your personality, and it's not your sexual orientation, it's your need to feel accepted; your shyness or fear of being wrong.

It manifested itself really young, and I think you did experience your first crush in 3rd grade with that first girl whom you stopped associating with in 6th grade. You feared rejection or events that would force you apart (her parents represented that here) and so you took the power to prevent that scenario from happening, finding it the lesser of two evils, if you controlled cutting the ties with her rather than fate despite the end goal being the same.

This decision has shaped you ever since and has haunted you as you wonder what could have been if you at least tried and failed.

Secondly, you've noticed what you look for in relationships is a sense of intimacy, whether that's friendship or romance with a hint of sexual-lust, you need a strong safe foundation to open up to build trust that needs to be there for you to express a sexual side Of your emotions at all, and your physical biology reacts to touch as it's machinery is designed to do, but you fail to recognize physical-arousal and the necessary joining of physical-emotional arousal together to feel safe.

Again it's related to your personality first, and you seem to favor the emotional side of romance before carnal visual displays of sexuality.

Follow the butterflies....

[Wirt]

Wow. I think you're right. Thanks for responding...

When I was friends with the first girl, I remember inviting her over to my house because I wanted to play video games with her. I was setting things up and my older brother comes in to talk to me, and he says I'm just gonna weird her out with all my nerd-stuff. He says that girls don't like that, she'll think I'm a weirdo, or a baby.

So I panic, and I hide all my pokemon games, a lot of stuff I think would make me seem 'uncool.' I think from that moment, I just felt... ashamed? Maybe ashamed.

My brother and even my dad would always make me feel bad for liking the things I like. Watching cartoons, playing nintendo games. My dad would laugh and try and pretend like he wasn't making fun of me. And my brother would outright say I was the weirdest person he knew. It always hurt, and I think it made me slowly become more and more secretive and reserved.

I told myself if I ever had a girlfriend, the moment they found out who I really was, they would up and leave, and tell everyone else about me. I kind of find it hard to see girls as genuine anymore, but maybe it's because I spent so much time convincing myself i could never be genuine with them.

I'm a lot more open with my interests now, I've realized that people who wouldn't like me for those reasons are shallow and not worth the time. But at the same time I think I still carry that fear with me, that I'll never truly be accepted, and If i am, it'll only be surface level. I feel like I barely know myself, how I can I ever feel like someone accepts me when I find it hard, if not impossible, to accept myself?

My last girlfriend was super accepting of me. She didn't care about what I liked and eventually I opened up more to her and shared with her my favorite songs, songs that most people would consider 'weird.' It meant a lot to me. And yet when we broke up, I was sad, but I didn't cry. I kind of felt like it was inevitable. And on top of that I sort of knew I didn't want to be with her forever. I feel like a sort of complacency and distance takes over me, and I don't know why.

And on top of that, why would I be more favorable to "the emotional side of romance before carnal visual displays of sexuality"? like you said? I agree with you, I always was more mellow than everyone else, but I can't help but wonder why. Is it normal?

[Uniquemind]

Wow. I think you're right. Thanks for responding...

When I was friends with the first girl, I remember inviting her over to my house because I wanted to play video games with her. I was setting things up and my older brother comes in to talk to me, and he says I'm just gonna weird her out with all my nerd-stuff. He says that girls don't like that, she'll think I'm a weirdo, or a baby.

So I panic, and I hide all my pokemon games, a lot of stuff I think would make me seem 'uncool.' I think from that moment, I just felt... ashamed? Maybe ashamed.

My brother and even my dad would always make me feel bad for liking the things I like. Watching cartoons, playing nintendo games. My dad would laugh and try and pretend like he wasn't making fun of me. And my brother would outright say I was the weirdest person he knew. It always hurt, and I think it made me slowly become more and more secretive and reserved.

I told myself if I ever had a girlfriend, the moment they found out who I really was, they would up and leave, and tell everyone else about me. I kind of find it hard to see girls as genuine anymore, but maybe it's because I spent so much time convincing myself i could never be genuine with them.

I'm a lot more open with my interests now, I've realized that people who wouldn't like me for those reasons are shallow and not worth the time. But at the same time I think I still carry that fear with me, that I'll never truly be accepted, and If i am, it'll only be surface level. I feel like I barely know myself, how I can I ever feel like someone accepts me when I find it hard, if not impossible, to accept myself?

My last girlfriend was super accepting of me. She didn't care about what I liked and eventually I opened up more to her and shared with her my favorite songs, songs that most people would consider 'weird.' It meant a lot to me. And yet when we broke up, I was sad, but I didn't cry. I kind of felt like it was inevitable. And on top of that I sort of knew I didn't want to be with her forever. I feel like a sort of complacency and distance takes over me, and I don't know why.

And on top of that, why would I be more favorable to "the emotional side of romance before carnal visual displays of sexuality"? like you said? I agree with you, I always was more mellow than everyone else, but I can't help but wonder why. Is it normal?

Why? I just think that's just one of the flavors in personality people come in. Why do you prefer one flavor of ice cream over another; it's a preference, it's your personal experience, it doesn't need further justification than that. So I wouldn't stress on the Why.

I think you should ask a different question.

I also think your dad and brother gave you that bit of advice too soon, in regards to putting childish things away. Your post implies they told you this while you were still young, how old were you when they told you this advice?

There's some truth about being judged upon how you conduct your life as a single that a girl will notice and take note off so as to reflect the seriousness of a relationship she'll embark with you on, but it's not all doom and gloom because of a "Pokemon" hobby.

At 19 and younger, I'm pretty sure most girls would just take note of if you have a clean room that smells nice...because well couples usually spend a lot of time in "the bedroom" if you get what I'm implying. If it's a stinky, messy room....mood killer.

But like I said before that last bit cleanliness is part of something you can control, and so that should give you comfort. But does it means all your hobbies are bad? No.


Any quality of independence and self-sufficiency from your parents is very attractive and I think at the older teen years that's what should be focused on developing, along with critical thinking skills which can be loosely applied in conversational flow in a type of intellectual flirtation, but I'm going off on a tangent.

[Wirt]

Why? I just think that's just one of the flavors in personality people come in. Why do you prefer one flavor of ice cream over another; it's a preference, it's your personal experience, it doesn't need further justification than that. So I wouldn't stress on the Why.

I think you should ask a different question.

I also think your dad and brother gave you that bit of advice too soon, in regards to putting childish things away. Your post implies they told you this while you were still young, how old were you when they told you this advice?

There's some truth about being judged upon how you conduct your life as a single that a girl will notice and take note off so as to reflect the seriousness of a relationship she'll embark with you on, but it's not all doom and gloom because of a "Pokemon" hobby.

At 19 and younger, I'm pretty sure most girls would just take note of if you have a clean room that smells nice...because well couples usually spend a lot of time in "the bedroom" if you get what I'm implying. If it's a stinky, messy room....mood killer.

But like I said before that last bit cleanliness is part of something you can control, and so that should give you comfort. But does it means all your hobbies are bad? No.


Any quality of independence and self-sufficiency from your parents is very attractive and I think at the older teen years that's what should be focused on developing, along with critical thinking skills which can be loosely applied in conversational flow in a type of intellectual flirtation, but I'm going off on a tangent.

Yeah, they started telling me stuff like that around 4th grade. Pretty early in my opinion. Of course I know now that having hobbies and interests is completely fine and normal, (it's not like my entire life revolves around them) but I guess the fear and feelings of potential rejection are still there.

And oh yeah don't worry about my room, I do a pretty good job of keeping it clean. haha.

I guess what concerns me is that I always act oblivious to anyone who shows any interest in me, especially when I'm not entirely sure if they do. I always have this idea in my head that I'll disappoint somehow, or that I'll be too distant, and not know how to act. It concerns me because that's why I've been broken up with in the past. Because I was too afraid to even invite girls over to my house.

Maybe the reason I would get some kinds of feelings with some guys is because my mind sees it as another escape route? It's familiar? Another way to avoid what I never entirely dealt with? I don't know, but I miss those feelings I used to get when I just really cared about someone and wanted to be with them. Now I'm filled with so many doubts and constantly thinking in the future, that everything seems kind of pointless in a way, or it feels like I'd be using someone so I'd feel more comfortable later on for someone else. It feels like everything's in my head.

Thanks for talking with me. As of yesterday I actually have an appointment with a therapist on tuesday, I've never gone before, so maybe I can work some more of this out.

[Uniquemind]

Yeah, they started telling me stuff like that around 4th grade. Pretty early in my opinion. Of course I know now that having hobbies and interests is completely fine and normal, (it's not like my entire life revolves around them) but I guess the fear and feelings of potential rejection are still there.

And oh yeah don't worry about my room, I do a pretty good job of keeping it clean. haha.

I guess what concerns me is that I always act oblivious to anyone who shows any interest in me, especially when I'm not entirely sure if they do. I always have this idea in my head that I'll disappoint somehow, or that I'll be too distant, and not know how to act. It concerns me because that's why I've been broken up with in the past. Because I was too afraid to even invite girls over to my house.

Maybe the reason I would get some kinds of feelings with some guys is because my mind sees it as another escape route? It's familiar? Another way to avoid what I never entirely dealt with? I don't know, but I miss those feelings I used to get when I just really cared about someone and wanted to be with them. Now I'm filled with so many doubts and constantly thinking in the future, that everything seems kind of pointless in a way, or it feels like I'd be using someone so I'd feel more comfortable later on for someone else. It feels like everything's in my head.

Thanks for talking with me. As of yesterday I actually have an appointment with a therapist on tuesday, I've never gone before, so maybe I can work some more of this out.

Hope you keep in touch.


It's always possible your Bi, with a preference toward girls, but from what I've seen from your post, I think your straight with a really bad case of being shy mixed with mild anxiety.

Guys don't necessarily trigger the same kind of stressors, I think you find comfort in a good friendship and your blurring it with romantic feelings. But you haven't indicated that you feel that butterfly feeling with a guy, so I don't think there's sexual attraction there for you. That's why you rejected that one guy who was wondering if he had a romantic shot with you, and you knowingly or unknowingly politely rejected him; that was your intuition talking.