Thoughts I had as a "straight cis woman" who was really bi, ace, and genderfluid

[sqbr]

I've seen a few posts along these lines for being a lesbian/binary trans etc (see for example this post) and found it really interesting to compare and contrast. So here's my own experiences, both for understanding myself and for anyone struggling with similar thoughts who might find it useful.

Note: just because I had these thoughts and later realised I was bi etc doesn't mean anyone having similar thoughts necessarily has the same orientation/gender as me. In the other direction, if you're bi/ace/genderfluid and haven't had these thoughts that doesn't make either of us wrong. Human experience is varied and complex.



I've added explanations/extra info for some of them, but in some cases I don't really know why things happened that way, or explaining it would require a novel on gender theory.

Things I thought meant I had to be straight:

• "Gay" and "lesbian" felt wrong. (Because I'm bi)
  
• I knew what a relationship with men would look like, but had no mental model of me with a woman.
  
• My attractions to men were more unambiguous than those towards women, especially when I was younger.
  
• I'm ambivalent about sex with women. (because I'm asexual)
  
• I fall in love with and have big unambiguous crushes on men.
  
• I didn't feel cool or confident enough to be queer, especially since I am often very uncomfortable with sexual conversations and behaviour.
  
• Not only did I not ping other people as queer, multiple people told me, unprompted, how very straight I came across. (I think they meant "neurotic and asexual")
  
• Even once I started recognising my attraction to women I wasn't sure if it was as significant as my attraction to men, and there were times when the only attraction I felt was to men. (That's still bi!)
  
• I hadn't figured everything out by my 30s.
  
• I was monogamously married to a man, so didn't think there was any point identifying as bi. (There was)

Things I thought meant I had to be allosexual (I didn't have as much self doubt about this, and don't feel like going into the details of my sexuality):

• I have sometimes enjoyed some aspects of sex, and experienced sexual attraction. (I'm grey asexual)

Things I thought meant I had to be cis:

• I was really into Girls Are Awesome Boys Are Gross as a child. (If I'm on this team it's going to WIN, also gender roles for boys are pretty bad)
  
• Being teased for looking boyish upset me, as did being flat chested as a teen. (If I'm a woman I want to be good at it!)
  
• It didn't occur to me that I might be anything but cis until I was an adult.
  
• I don't always feel like a woman, but I also don't always feel like a man. (because I'm genderfluid)
  
• I sometimes feel like and enjoy being a woman, and I feel a lot of solidarity with women as a group. (because I'm genderfluid and also non binary people have a lot in common with women)
  
• I hate toxic masculinity and sometimes get really pissed off at men as a group.
  
• I'm attracted to men but don't feel much connection to gay men.
  
• I worried that ID-ing as anything but a woman would damage my marriage. (It didn't)
  
• Thinking about the possibility of being transmasculine reminded me I'll never look like my masculine ideal, which made me feel bad. (Turned out I felt better once I let myself pursue that presentation even if it could never be perfect)
  
• I sometimes like having and emphasising my conventional female attractiveness. (Genderfluid, also since I can't escape those expectations it feels good to succeed at them)
  
• Although I daydream about being able to change my body to a different, often gendered shape, there's no one shape that feels right all the time, and traditionally male bodies sometimes feel wrong.
  
• I never want to be hairy and buff. (There is more than one way to be masculine)
  
• Hardly anyone knows about non binary genders, so I would be treated like a woman anyway. (Sadly true but it still feels better than not even trying)
  
• I didn't feel very similar to the- mostly young and genderqueer- non binary people I'd encountered. (there are lots of ways to be non binary)
  
• None of the specific non binary genders I had encountered felt right. (And then one did! Also I could still be non binary even if I didn't know exactly what sort)

False justifications for things that seemed to suggest I wasn't straight or cis:

• Everyone's a little bisexual, right? (No)
  
• Resenting f/f friendships being broken up for boys is feminism. (Not the way I did it)
  
• I feel weird about being "straight"/"cis" but that's just feeling defensive about my privilege.
  
• Transphobia/homophobia make me really miserable...I must just be a really empathetic ally!
  
• All girls think other girls are pretty. The odd attraction to other girls is normal. (There's pretty and then there's pretty)
  
• I'm ambivalent about sex with men because all women are. (Nope, asexual)
  
• I would be more into sex if it wasn't for all this trauma/internalised sexism. (True but I'd still be not-very-into-sex)
  
• Sometimes I wish I was a lesbian(*)...but that's probably just because I'm sick of men being sexist. (Sexism is only part of it)
  
• Men treating me like The Girl makes me feel bad because it's sexist. (Again, not JUST sexism)
  
• If I identify with an aspect of What Women Are Expected To Be, that's because I'm a woman. If I don't identify with one, that's because those expectations are too narrow and noone fits them all.
  
• If I identify with an aspect of What Men Are Expected To Be, that's because people are varied and Women Are As Good As Men. If I don't identify with one, that's because I'm not a man.
  
• When I feel alienated from women talking about their strong experience of female/feminine identity, that's internalised sexism: or, if they're trans women, transphobia. (I feel much less alienated now I can accept that they are experiencing something I don't)
  
• I like femslash for the strong female friendships. (lol)
  
• Boy, canon queer characters sure make me happy. I really am SUCH a good ally.
  
• I love crossdressing heroines because it shows women are as good as men. (it shows afab people can be indistinguishable from men)
  
• I love crossdressing heroines because of all the f/f potential.
  
• Gender essentialism makes me feel awful because it's sexist. (It's important for me to feel like I can be any gender, regardless of my body/personality etc)
  
• "Women are strictly distinct from, and much better than, men"-style gender essentialism in lesbian romances makes me feel awful because...I have some internalised lesbophobia?
  
• That bad feeling I get when someone describes me as a lesbian is either lesbophobia or a reaction against biphobia(**).
  
• I prefer the idea of dating bi, preferably gnc (gender non conforming) men because we'll have more in common and they won't be homophobic, also gnc men are cute.(***)
  
• I like the idea of dating bi, preferably gnc women because we'll have more in common and they won't be biphobic, also gnc women are cute.(***)
  
• Women making sweeping, unfair generalisations about men makes me feel bad because I care about nuance and fairness. (No, because I am identifying with those men to some extent)
  
• Sometimes feeling like I connect with and understand men better than women is internalised sexism.
  
• Me identifying with stories about trans/queer people/men, or about magical genderswaps etc, is either Normal (Queer) Woman Feelings or appropriation/fetishisation. See also: Me sometimes super enjoying masculine or genderqueer presentation. (this would not be true even if I was straight and cis)
  
• I have to be 100% certain before I commit to any queer identity, because changing back again would be THE MOST OFFENSIVE AND EMBARRASSING THING EVER. (It wouldn't)

(*)When I was growing up the only options for women were "straight" or "lesbian".
(**)Even though I respect other definitions that might cover people with my sort of gender identity, for me to feel right identifying as a lesbian I'd have to see myself as a woman who is only into women. Since I'm I am bi and not a woman, "lesbian" feels wrong in both directions.
(***) I don't like the idea of dating people who are only into women because I'm not a woman. A lot of lesbians and straight men are fine dating nonbinary people and respectful of our gender identity, but it makes me feel bad to think I can't be 100% a man if I want, even though I don't actually want to be 100% a man? It's weird. I would similarly feel weird dating straight women and gay men, but by the time that came up as a possibility I understood why it felt wrong. And gnc cis people are more appealing because their feelings about gender are more likely to resemble mine. (Also they're cute)

I feel like the lessons are:

1. don't treat cis/straight as the default. You can be queer even if you don't 100% fit your mental model of What Queerness Looks Like, or know the exact details or your sexuality or orientation.
   
2. It's not appropriative to explore queer identities even if you're not 100% sure if you're really queer.
   
3. Gender, sexuality and romantic orientation all combine in complicated ways that can make it harder to recognise what's going on with any of them.
   
4. Because we tend to see straight and cis as the default, exclusions compound each other. For example, because the only alternative I was offered to being straight was " a lesbian who wants to have sex with women and has no interest in men", as a biromantic asexual I thought I had to be straight.
   
5. The lines between The Lesbian Experience and the Bi Non Binary Ace experience (and the Straight Cis Woman experience and the Trans Man Experience and the Trans Woman Experience...) are fuzzy, varied, and context dependent. For example, a lot of what I thought was part of the (Bi) Woman Experience turns out to be have been part of the Non Binary Experience. So now I have to accept I don't actually know what it's like being a (bi) woman, even though I seemed to fit that box pretty neatly for a long time. At the same time, I still relate to a lot of what women (especially bi ones) experience.
   
6. There is no single The [Identity X] Experience.
   
7. Accept and explore messy, "problematic" emotional reactions and preferences instead of pushing them away in fear or anger. At least in your own head, obviously you have to step carefully around saying hurtful things.
   

And again: A lot of people who aren't any/all of bi/ace/genderfluid have had similar experiences, and a lot of people who are bi/ace/genderfluid will have had different ones. My aim is to help people work through their confusion and self doubt not make it worse!

Also sorry this ended looking like some sort of maths algorithm /o\ And I hope talking about my bad experiences trying to fit myself into the lesbian/trans man etc box isn't hurtful to people who are those things, especially since I know a lot of you have had equivalent bad experiences trying to be bi/non binary etc. The villain here is heteropatriarchy, not people who fit under a different part of the queer umbrella to me.

I'm fine discussing things/comparing notes etc but not up for, like, "maybe you really ARE just a straight woman who likes female friendship" :P

Comments

[ursula]

(Personally, I like the mathy effect!)

[sqbr]

Hee, I'm glad someone does :)

[bunny_m]

The mathy-ness comes with most of your posts, because you are Mathy, being a Mathematician and all. (In my head, at least. How you think of yourself is entirely up to you.)

Personally, I find it insightful/thoughtful, and adorkably/awkwardly charming. Because you. <3

[wychwood]

I think it's also a lot more complicated for ace/aro/etc people, because they don't have - or at least I don't have - a lot of the obvious responses that allosexual people are supposed to have. Like, I found (and still find, I guess) it hard to tell romantic or sexual crushes from, like, friend-crushes, the intense "YOU ARE AN AWESOME PERSON" new-friend feeling, because there wasn't all that clear a distinction between them for me? So it took me longer to work out that I was bi because of that, I think.

[sqbr]

There's a moderate distinction for me, but I think being ace still made things harder because my attraction didn't look the way it was
supposed" to.

[hebethen]

I like femslash for the strong female friendships.(lol)

Haha, you too?

[sqbr]

I actually had someone reply to a post I made about it at the time with "ha this sounds like what I used to say when I thought I was straight" and was very "Well! That's...uh....ANYWAY LET'S NOT THINK ABOUT IT".

[sonia]

Thank you for sharing this! Lots of food for thought here, although not anything specific in words (yet). I very much appreciate seeing that identity can be confusing, complex, and take a long time to sort out, since that has been my experience too.

[sqbr]

I'm glad you got something from it! And yeah that seems to be the way.

[nixwilliams]

Oh yes, some of these are very familiar!

[sqbr]

nods

[jesse_the_k]

Very informative, thank you!

[sqbr]

Thank you, I'm glad!

[wickedlittletown]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. It was interesting to read.
A long time I didn't knew that there is something you call non-binary and discovering that was great, because finally I could find something to identify with.

I might do a similair entry one day in the future. It's really a great way to deal with a confusing topic. Especially when you thought you had found the pne true label for you and suddenly you find out that it's not really fitting anymore.

[sqbr]

If you do, link it here, I'd love to read it!

[anghraine]

This was super interesting, because about 3/4 was YES, EXACTLY for my lesbian/ace/wtf is gender experience, and the other was "you do you." But "eh, what's the point, nothing is going to make me look like anything but a woman" and "I must just be a really empathetic ally!!!" and "it's normal to find girls attractive, it's just an objective fact" and "gender essentialism upsets me as a feminist" and "identifying with men over women is internalized sexism" are all peak #relatable.

[sqbr]

*nods* I've had a similar response to similar posts I've seen from other people. *not actually a straight woman despite our brain's rationalisations fistbump*