I’ve wanted to write this post for a long time. I don’t really know how long, but I know that I had wanted to write it last Saturday as I was getting home, that I thought about writing it on Sunday after Orlando, and that I wanted to write it today. This is not a coming out post, or maybe it is, I don’t really know. I don’t usually talk about my personal life in here, but I have previously mentioned I am pansexual/bisexual.
Why am I writing this, then? It’s more of a coming to terms with myself. It’s an exercise of self-understanding. And because I read some stupid news on a stupid newspaper that made me furious because Bi erasure is a real thing and it happens every single fucking time. Yes, it made me furious. Bi erasure is real and needs to stop.
And at the same time it is kind of a coming out post. Some of my friends and labmates are aware of me being bi. And none of them were surprised at all when I told them or when I casually make any mention of it. My family doesn’t know it, but I doubt anyone from my close family would be too surprised. I mean, many times when they tease me asking whether I have a significant other they always say “Do you have a boyfriend? Or girlfriend?”. That being said, I don’t know how shocked they would be if I ever brought a girl home with me (very shocked, but probably because of me bringing anyone home than about anything else (more about this in a while)). The point is that there are lots of people who don’t know, but wouldn’t probably be too surprised about it.
One of the things that I have encountered the most when disclosing my sexuality, however, is erasure. I have been asked a thousand times whether I have been with a girl as if that would give it any legitimacy. I’m tired of hearing that question. They knew they were straight before they had been with someone of the opposite gender, didn’t they? Anyway, in my case that doesn’t really mean much. No, I have not been with a girl, but to be fair I have never had a real relationship with a boy either, not the kind of relationship that makes you bring them at home and meet your parents, at least (*wink wink*). The truth is that I’m extremely awkward and terrible at relationships, I also don’t fall in love as easily as some other people seem to. For me it is a traumatic experience, it’s letting someone in my life in a way I’m not even ready to do it myself.
I’m sure most of you can remember the first time you fell in love, the first time that you confessed to your friends that you had a crush. I remember that, too. I remember having everyone asking me whether I liked someone, insisting that there had to be someone I liked, implying that I HAD to like someone. I remember liking the most popular guy in school, doing all those things that all the girls did, obsessing over him. I didn’t question it then, but was I being forced into liking him? Looking back in time allows you to understand the breaking points in being who you are, the times when you were too blind to realize the truth. At that time I didn’t even know you could love people from both genders, and my only reference about gay people was that people took it as an insult. Gosh, homophobia runs deep in this culture.
Anyway, the thing is that I really need to be invested to love someone. I might have been in love five or six times in my whole life, and I’m almost 29. However, how many of my friendships with girls were not such but crushes that I was too young to identify? How long have I repressed from being who I really am because I didn’t know it was an option? How many times have I lied to myself? No more. Here’s the truth, I like boys, I like girls, and I truly believe you can fall in love with anyone regardless of the gender they identify with. My experience or lack of thereof doesn’t invalidate my sexuality. Just because I’ve mainly been with men, doesn’t mean you can erase my sexuality claiming it’s just curiosity, it’s not. And even if I end up dating a boy or a girl that doesn’t make me straight or gay, I will still be bi.
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