Dear Tiggy,
Being bisexual feels, for me, like I am constantly trying to hide my sexuality, pretend it doesn’t exist, and avoid getting really close to anyone. Part of this is because I simply don’t want to deal with all the negativity and self-explaining. But there’s another reason, too.
My gender identity and expression being predominantly female, when I’m with cis men, I feel the need to protect myself in the way that prey needs to protect itself from a predator (i.e. the feeling that men want to get in my pants). And when I’m with cis women, I feel the need to make myself appear to them as though I’m safe and non-threatening to be around, i.e. that I’m not going to do something pervy or that would make them uncomfortable. With transgender or genderqueer people, it’s a bit easier because I feel some camaraderie with them. Unfortunately, I don’t meet many such people in my everyday life.
The result is that I have, for years, felt isolated. I think this isolation has contributed greatly to the chronic anxiety and depression I’ve dealt with for most of my life. I can’t seem to shake this discomfort that’s preventing me from truly opening up to people, even to my friends.
This is especially pronounced for me with my female friends, as being close with other women in a sister-like way is, when I get little tastes of it, so healing and nourishing for me. I don’t want to complicate such relationships with sexual involvement because for me there’s something essential about the simplicity and depth of friendship. Yet often times I do find myself feeling sexually and/or romantically attracted to many of my female friends. This is probably because I consciously and subconsciously decide to become friends with women I feel attracted to sexually/emotionally, this being the only way that feels safe for me to get close with such women. But in the end, it leads to a lot of ongoing sexual and emotional frustration for me because it feels like I have to constantly hold back around these friends in order to keep things in the platonic realm. I’ve even tried telling the occasional friend that I’m attracted to her, but the discomfort still hasn’t gone away for me.
This sort of purgatory is so painful. I don’t know how to relieve the anxiety and deepen my bonds with other women. Thanks in advance for your thoughts.
-Lila
From the telling of it, you set up your relationships with women to be self-defeating. You seek out women you’re attracted to, form friendships with them, and then disallow yourself to be anything but purely platonic. Sure, you’re in purgatory…you ought to be, since you rented a car, filled the tank, and bought a map to it.
Are you familiar with the term “Nice Guy”? That’s capital “N” and capital “G,” and it’s not a compliment. The dreaded Nice Guy ™ is nice to pretty women ostensibly because he’s a nice guy but really because he expects to be thanked for his kindness with sex. When that doesn’t happen, he laments that women only want assholes. Now I’m not saying you’re a Nice Guy — most of the definition doesn’t apply to you at all — but you have to admit that you kinda share his romantic strategy of subterfuge. You say that you’re trying to be just friends with these women but you know that’s not true — and they can sense your insincerity, I promise you that. And what was the point of telling a few of them that you liked them? If it was to dump your feelings in their lap like a pile of Rubik’s Cubes for them to sort out while you await a catharsis…I mean, that’s not cool.
It seems that your main problem, the one from which all others stem, is that you view sex as a predatory act that one commits upon a woman. Unpacking this mindset with a trained professional will allow you to recognize how your life experiences have led to framing sex this way. After you identify where this perspective is coming from, you can practice cognitive behavioral therapy to adjust your views on sex to something more accurate and healthy. For that, you might try what’s known in the psychology world as the “cognitive behavioral bible,” Feeling Good by David Burns. I predict that Burns’s book will help immensely with your anxiety and depression as well.
Once you work out your ambivalence about sex and emotional intimacy, you can be honest with women you’re interested in and with yourself. The introspection you reveal in your letter tells me that you’ve already begun your journey to authenticity. What sweet relief you’ll feel once you believe that you can approach someone sexually without feeling like a perpetrator! You can do this, Lila. Make an appointment with a therapist today.
I think this song is about getting therapy. Or hardcore gardening. Or…grave robbing? Hmm. I hope this song is about getting therapy.
© 2014 Tiggy Upland. Tiggy Upland reserves the right to use all submitted queries anonymously, in any medium.