A Personal Story About Sexual Orientation, Romance, Identity, and Sexuality (Probably NSFW)
Hello Steemit!
To be honest, I wasn't planning my first non-introduction post on Steemit to be something like this. I wanted to write something lighthearted, like what I think about forum role play and how it can help people. Or my favorite type of horror. Or to simply gush about a web serial I've been reading. Those have to be posts for another time though, this particular subject has wormed its way into my mind and if I don't really write about it now, I doubt I ever will.
(This is bound to be deeply personal writing, so if you've gotten to this point this is your warning. If you read this you may learn some things about me you may rather not know. I will also be shifting from subject to subject in a way that may not make sense. That's how my brain works and they're all associated in a way. Even if it seems like they're not at first.)
I've always been a sucker for love. I never really experienced that cliche "Ewww, girls are gross and have cooties!" phase. My Mom and my Dad loved each other, so it was only natural for boys and girls to do so too. I once asked a girl to marry me when I was in preschool. Not as a joke, but as an honest-to-god request. She rejected me of course, because "Ewww, boys are gross and have cooties!". I spent my entire Kindergarten, Elementary, and Middle School career flitting from one crush to the other. I even developed a rivalry of sorts with one of the other boys in my class, because he got the girl I asked to marry in preschool, and I didn't. He wasn't too gross for her apparently.
Now I've always been a sucker for love, sex though never really entered the equation until I was 14 or 15. Not until my first actual genuine romantic relationship. I'd never really felt desire for someone sexually as much as I did her. Sure I had crushes, and they were god damn adorable, but it wasn't until my first love that sex was even considered. I was too nervous and self-conscious to approach her about it, even when we were dating. Then eventually the relationship ended as catastrophically as any teenage romance can, and we both moved on in life.
This became a regular theme in my life. Sure I have sexual desire, but I didn't really want to ever express it until I was in a relationship with someone. I had been offered casual sex before, and I turned it down because I felt no emotional investment in the person. Now I'm saying "person" instead of "girl" even though the person I'm referring to is a girl, and that is something I will get into here in a bit.
You see, over time in my online gaming I had shifted from using male characters to using exclusively female characters whenever I had the opportunity. I started this at first because I had a far easier time coming up with feminine names than masculine ones, a problem I still have. Then I'd joke that it was because "If I was gonna be staring at a butt the whole time, it might as well be a nice one", a joke I took from my Stepdad. Over time though, I found it easier to associate with female characters than male ones. I empathized with them more. It's why my username on here, and most places end with "-chan", a feminine suffix. I even pronounce my username with the feminine "El-lee" than the masculine "Ee-lie".
Even with this happening in the background, I'd considered myself Straight for a long, long time. My sexual orientation wasn't really ever called into question until I watched a show called "White Collar". It's a crime drama about a detective and a former criminal working together to solve white collar crimes. I was fascinated with the character Neal Caffrey. He was smart, confident, had a style that I just wanted to emulate so badly, and I found him drop dead gorgeous. This was something I found odd. I mean, I had always considered myself straight after all. I never really had been attracted to guys before this moment. I was okay with it. But even with role models like my older sisters, who were Lesbian and Bisexual respectively, I didn't really accept the fact that I may not be quite as Straight as I thought I was.
I've never really talked about my sexual orientation publicly until now, but I'll tell you, I'm not Straight. I had to come to terms with this fact after the second incident of me becoming incredibly attracted to a guy. This one was a guy in the gaming clan I had come to join and have a part of my daily life. We'll call him "B". B is another guy with a really strong personality. He's confident, funny, an absolute joy to spend time with, and really, really attractive. I actually considered asking him out a long time ago, but decided it would be a terrible idea. I decided I'd rather preserve the friendship I have with B. I'm still friends with B to this day. This whole ordeal though made me question my identity. What was I?
I couldn't possibly be Straight, I mean I've gotten really strong crushes for guys twice at this point. Girls though were still very much in my ballpark. Bisexual maybe? I had friends though and knew people that were Trans, and I could see myself loving a Trans person. And spending time on the Internet as much as I have you do run across people of different genders entirely, Intersex. Even thinking on that I saw myself loving an Intersex person. I ultimately came to the conclusion that I just really like People. It doesn't matter what gender they are, if any. If I have a strong enough emotional connection to a person, I can totally love them and be just fine.
So with that, I decided I must be Pansexual. I mean, gender doesn't really matter to me. But even with that revelation, something felt off. Like I hadn't really ever hit the root of who I am when it comes to love and sex. I haven't found myself. It wouldn't be until just weeks ago that I would find out why.
You see, my friends and roommates have said often that they need to get me to meet people and hook up with them. That I need to get laid. But, as with the girl I turned down when I was a super hormonal teenager, the idea of casual sex is just not appealing to me in the slightest. I want love, I want romance, I want to just know that the person I'm sharing that experience with is just as much into me as I am into them! Not just going at it to fulfill a base need that is programmed into our monkey brains and for no other purpose. Sure that doesn't make me conventionally "Manly", but I have come to accept that I'm not masculine a long time ago. I don't want to be "Manly", I emphasize better with feminine things to begin with. Yes, I have a libido. But without an emotional attachment, without romance, I'd just rather satisfy it myself than to indulge in casual sex.
There's also the things that happen at my work. I work in a Jimmy Johns on a university campus. That means a lot of attractive people come into my work all the time. It's a rather common occurrence for an attractive woman to come into the store. Then after I deal with her professionally and normally like any other customer all the other guys treat it like it's a cardinal sin I didn't hit on her, try to get her number, or anything like that. The fact of the matter was, while I understood she is attractive, and can see how people would be into her, I just wasn't attracted to her. I knew nothing about her, the emotional connection wasn't there. All I knew is she was hungry, and wanted a sandwich. She was just another customer to me. I don't get sexually attracted to someone without romance it seems.
With all this in mind, calling myself Pansexual always felt odd. I mean, I could love anyone. But I wasn't sexually attracted to just anyone.
Then about a week ago I was creating a character for someone on my Forum Role Play. When you make a character, you're always asked what the character's Sexual Orientation is. So that the obvious shipping of characters can happen at some point. I decided to mess with the person and find a sexual orientation that would make it difficult for them to ship their character with mine. I looked up a list of Orientations, and looking over it I found one that resonated with me. That fit me much better than Pansexual ever did.
So this is it, my super long winded, rambling post to come out as Demisexual and try to explain how I came to discover this.
You gotta date me, before you lay me.
If you read all of this and made it here, you are a god damn trooper. Thank you so much for reading me ramble about myself for probably far too long.
Next post should hopefully be something on the more casual side of things.
I'll see you then Steemit!
Steem On!
This is a great post from the inside! It took me 20 years before I accepted myself, and It is a small step at the time. Now I live part time as a man, part time as a woman... And still learning about me. It is a long process, kind of a transition at a slow pace. I'm feeling better about me and appreciate my life a little bit more. Take care, take your time and be in peace with yourself. Something I've learned over the years, no matter how hard I tried to hide it, it always try to poke out. I'm glad to finally accept myself and express myself as a woman.
Nikky xx
I am happy for you and my son here. As long as you guys don't expect me to learn some crazy new pronouns. ;)
Damn straight! I'm super happy for you that you've found yourself too! I always had a mantra that I told myself over the years. "I am who I am, if you don't like it, you can move out of my way." It's helped me a lot whenever I've felt unsure about myself as a person. I hope that it would be able to help you too!
Well done for accepting yourself just the way you are and dare to be open about it!
I believe you confuse 2 different things here though. For example, what if a man is straight but still doesn't enjoy casual sex? That would lead him to have no sex during his single years but when he is in a relationship with a woman he would express his high sex drive by having sex much more often than casual-sex people. Is he a demisexual then? Same thing with a woman. Is she a demisexual because i.e she is too scared of STDs or because she is strongly religious and supports monogamy? I'd say they are just monogamous.
You don't really need to find a label that fits all the aspects of your sexual preferences. At most I'd say you are bisexual, and obviously a bisexual person will likely not mind it if a man became a woman and vice versa. (Unless one doesnt like "fake", which is an entirely different subject).
Also, apparenly one can't be 100% gay or 100% straight and there are levels, according to the Kinsey Scale: "It is a fundamental of taxonomy that nature rarely deals with discrete categories."
Well yeah, there's always shades of grey when it comes to orientation. Or really ANY facet of human existence. There is simply way too many unique personalities and way too many factors for their to be a strict 100% certainty.
From what my friend explained to me about my post, after I posted this. You can be both Demisexual and another orientation. Demisexual just means that you don't get sexually attracted to someone unless you have romantic ties to them. So one can say, be both Demisexual and Straight. Demisexual just a middle ground between sexual and asexual. It doesn't have anything to do with monogamy though. Someone can be demisexual, bisexual, and polyamorous at the same time.
So in my case, I guess the proper thing for me to say is. I'm Panromantic, which means I can get romantically and emotionally invested in anyone, gender doesn't matter, and I'm also Demisexual.
Thanks for sharing! This demonstrates exactly the kind of genuine honesty that this community values!
I generally find it easier to empathize with female characters too! I've come to understand this as a higher personal value of strengths traditionally associated with females. There are masculine and feminine qualities, but we all have both to different degrees. I've always valued dexterity, wisdom, and intelligence over strength, constitution, and charisma.
I also find emotional connection to be what makes sex worthwhile. Although I've never had a desire for sex with another male. I've considered it many times, just to be honest with myself, but it seems I am "straight." The idea of my intimacy with another man does not appeal to me.
I never tried to choose a label for myself regarding these things, though. I guess I wasn't aware there were so many to choose from. Lately, though, I've felt less and less the value in naming and measuring everything. I feel much closer to truth when I understand things holistically and intuitively rather than by separating and quantifying. Of course, terms are great for communication and conceptualization.
But is my sexual orientation an expression of my nature, or is my nature determined by what desires I invest in? I don't know, but I feel that if I chose to, I could think my way into a different "sexual orientation." But I don't have any desire to do that at the moment. And so I just don't go there in my mind, and my hypothesis remains untested. But I have no judgment for any identity, and I recognize that many people feel they have no choice in such matters.
I can appreciate the beauty of males just as easily as I can that of females. I feel that I can empathize with the attraction gay men have for each other even though I don't find that attraction within myself.
This all makes more sense when I consider the many lives I've lived on this planet, as male, female, straight, gay, etc. I've been a brother and a sister, a mother and a father. I've found value in every perspective.
If I had to choose a label for myself, I suppose it would be "empath."
Why am I rambling about myself on your post? Good question. I guess I relate to a lot of what you said, and I don't want your dad to be the only one commenting on your first non-intro post =D (jk, others have already commented before I finished writing this).
Writing about yourself is great actually! I agree with you though, it seems like your line of thinking is incredibly similar to my own. I probably did think and rationalize myself into the sexual orientation I am now to be honest.
You should never feel like you have to label yourself. I didn't for a long time. (Until today actually) This was just something that crawled into my brain and screamed at me to be let out. So I let it out.
Thank you for reading my brain worms! I actually really appreciate the fact that it's being received as well as it is.
Well written son, I think people will like it. Steemit tends to like people that are honest and open. I've never really seen anyone get lashed out at here, and if someone did then they'd likely face the wrath of the steemit community.
Thank you Dad, I'm not really afraid of people lashing out anyways. I am who I am, and I discover new things about myself all the time. This is the first time I've talked about my sexuality in an open context like this though, so it was a bit nerve-wracking.
I think steemit will surprise you. It is unlike any online community I have ever encountered. If we can keep it like this and spread it like the plague then there is hope that we can change the world.
I am resteeming this because you are new to the community and I'd like you to stick around and stay engaged. I won't be resteeming all of your works as that is not fair to my followers. I do like to help with the initial introductions of my family members if I can. This was actually likely an even more revealing introduction than your introduction posts.
Also a tip for new people... if you go to your profile and click on HOME on the left side to get to your feed on the right side of the screen that comes up are some lists of popular tags. There is also a MORE tags button to show even more. LIFE would have been a good tag here since you are essentially talking about your life. The tags you used are suitable too. Yet, some people look at things by tags because we don't have working communities yet. So finding tags that other people are using that work is kind of our PSEUDO-COMMUNITIES at the moment. If there is not a suitable tag though, do what you did and make one up. :)
I know you won't Dad, I don't expect you to. I agree it wouldn't be fair to them and I read your post on that topic the other day. I pretty much agree that you shouldn't feel obligated to resteem my things. If it fits with something you wanna say or show your community, then great! If not and you don't, that's okay too!
And I didn't think of using Life, I knew it would be a story, so that's why it's under story. But I had no idea what to have the other tags as >.<
My followers may actually appreciate the discussion I have here with you as many of them are also new like you, so some of the things I told you here in the comments may actually help them as well.
Yup, you better listen to this man people! He's one of the wisest people I know.
Oh and this is not really NSFW, as you didn't say anything too bad. When in doubt though one of your tags should be NSFW. That will tell steemit to by default hide it and give the players a dialog where they can opt into reading it. If you didn't actually get graphic or explicit in imagery or words, or let's say exceedingly graphic in description of violence then I don't think an NSFW is needed, but that is just me. If you're ever in doubt side on caution and use that as one of your tags.
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