Half Straight: My Secret Bisexual Life

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If you too have been grappling with your sexuality or sexual identity, here’s how the OBI model suggests thinking of it: I can imagine it was a surprised to find this out as it feels like he has lied to you. I would suggest speaking to him, finding out why he was never able to tell you and decided to use the internet to act out his fetish rather than in the bedroom with his wife? Were you worried about him cheating on you with other women before you found out that he was bi? If not, why would you be worried about him cheating on you with men? Being bisexual means that someone has the capacity to be sexually involved with both/either men and/or women. It doesn’t mean that they will be. If he’s bi, does that mean he won’t be satisfied being with me? Your frustration is very much understandable but once you got your head round things it might be worth looking for positive outcome of the whole situation. If you’ve been together for a while and he’s only telling you now, then he’s probably been struggling with this for a long time. He might have been feeling a lot of shame about his preferences and didn’t know how to tell you until now. People usually experience a lot of fear before coming out to their loved ones, especially if they know others who were rejected and discarded by close friends and family members.

Conversely you must be honest with yourself and your mate about how you feel about him getting/giving head from another man and what you can and cannot accept regarding that. Not the least of which is ground rules for hubby's playtime should you both move forward. Over the years, I’ve created and nurtured relationships in my community with other bisexual people, and women in particular. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard of this common experience, which often throws people into a spiral of invalidation: A cis woman is attracted to multiple genders, but for various reasons has only ever engaged romantically and/or sexually with cis men. Maybe she recognized her attraction to others later in life and is, at that point, in a monogamous life partnership already. Maybe she feels uncomfortable—like an imposter—in queer spaces, so she hasn’t been able to meet, let alone date, anyone except cis men. Maybe her city, family, or culture is conservative, and living her life authentically could be dangerous to her. She knows in her heart where her attractions lie, but her experience betrays that. Is she bisexual?But I’m the same person I was a minute ago, and nothing’s changed except the way this man has chosen to perceive me. Unmatch. Next. I’ve seen bisexual people represented as being hypersexual, kinky, greedy, slutty, attention-seeking, confused, or just ‘going through a phase’. In the fifth grade, when a friend of mine sneered that I was gay as an insult, I thought maybe I had landed on a name for what I felt. But I went home and asked my dad what that meant, and it still didn’t fit. I wasn’t straight like I was supposed to be, but damn it, I wasn’t this countercultural “gay” thing either. While bisexual people are the largest self-identified group within the LGBTQ community, the proportion of bisexual-focused research is small. Ream said this conglomeration of bisexual data results in skewed mental health research. Jen argued that, if anything, we're not getting the full picture.

It allowed for the freedom of a non-traditional life," Jen said. "And I think whenever we come against identities where there isn't a script for how to be, there isn't a way laid out for us, that actually gives us a lot of potential to lay our own path." Has your boyfriend just come out to you as bisexual? If so, you’re probably working through a lot of different thoughts and emotions right now.Because you are human you will seek meaning in what happened. We seek meaning in misfortune whether we get cancer or have an accident or are bombed out of our houses by unseen jets. It helps. It helps to make a story out of what happens. It’s a misconception that bisexual people are promiscuous or more likely to cheat on their partners than monogamous people. If someone’s a cheater, then they’ll be unfaithful regardless of which gender(s) they’re attracted to.

Holly says: ‘People don’t tend to want to be an “experiment” so it’s a good idea to not treat them like that. There have been times that I have told people I’m bi and they reply, “Oh, well who isn’t?” I’m sure they were trying to make the (very valid) argument that everyone falls somewhere along the sexuality spectrum, but all that turn of phrase achieves is compounding my feeling that if I “come out” people would just think I’m seeking attention. Biphobia, bi-erasure, and monosexism — the belief that people can only be straight or gay — exist in both the straight and LGBTQ communities. As I discussed in my piece on feeling "queer enough" earlier this year, bisexuals may not feel at home in either because of these factors. "Part of identity development is finding your people, and that's particularly difficult for bisexuals," said Ream. Do think about what you feel safe doing and choose the level of intimacy you feel comfortable exploring at the stage you’re at.

All my expert sources recommended that bi people find their own community, their own space, their own people. During the pandemic, making friends online can arguably be smoother than ever. If you don't know where to start, VICE made a helpful guide on how to make more LGBTQ friends. People will still assume that I am straight or gay. And that’s fine. But I can see a definite shift in the younger generation. I came out to my then 16-year-old son, Jaydn, nine years ago, as part of a general conversation. He was slightly surprised but totally accepting. A reaction that is a typical of his generation. His support and acceptance were all that mattered to me.

Go with your intuition. “Gaydar” isn’t a thing, but also, it kinda is: sometimes your intuition can tell when someone is into someone else. However, don’t bank on this, as intuition can be wrong. Unfortunately, my road to strong, assured bisexual identity was riddled with potholes, as it is for many of us. Over the course of my life, because I internalized so much stigma around bisexuality, I’ve struggled with claiming this identity that at first felt custom-made for me. Do you have a problem with the fact your DH Likes to wear your underwear or the fact he felt he was unable to tell you? Or isit because he has been going on chatrooms and performing on cam? Identity: How do you describe your internal sense of sexual self? Which words feel fitting to you and do you feel comfortable donning (even privately)? How do you see yourself as a sexual person?What’s her mood like when she sees you or other women? If she becomes giddy, extra happy, and full of smiles, that’s a good sign.