Navigating Masculinity and Femininity as a Bisexual Woman
Sexual confusion, bi-erasure, and self-denial
As we all know, the gender identity and sexual exploration journey is such a complex experience.
In a society that craves smooth edges, straight lines, and a binary existence, pushing against those boundaries and coloring outside the lines can be frightening yet liberating.
It’s a big world out there, and we all want to belong somewhere, preferably among those who will make us feel safe and be who we are.
Between societal expectations, private Catholic school teaching, and equally confused fellow teenagers and young adults, it wasn’t any easier to understand my truth.
Was I straight? Gay? Bi? Some mish-mash of something in between?
Before I fully understood what bi-erasure was, as my fellow bi or pan folk have no doubt experienced, these phrases struck a deep nerve:
“You’re just confused.”
“You’ll pick a side someday.”
“Come on, you’re just gay.”
“It’s a phase, you’ll grow out of it.”
Even my godmother, who is, in fact, a lesbian, used one of these phrases against me. She said she always “had a feeling I was gay” when I…
