When I was a kid, my best friend in the whole world was a boy who’d come over to do my hair and play dress-up. My brother would sit in the corner and refuse to play along as the boy tried on all the dresses in my closet. It never seemed strange to me; after all, they were just clothes. But sometimes when he was braiding my hair, he’d sigh a little and whisper, “I wish I was a girl.” I never responded, though, because I had never felt lucky to be a girl. I’d always just felt uncomfortable with femininity in a way I couldn’t quite define. More on that later.

Some people just know, even as kids, but I missed all the early signs. I’d always be a guy when I played pretend, I desperately shipped Kim Possible and Shego, cargo pants were my first fashion obsession, and all my friends were male for a while. I would even sometimes lean a little precariously over other girls’s desks, fluttering my eyelashes and showing what little cleavage my bra granted me. My friends called me a tomboy and that was what made the most sense to me, so I stuck with it. It wasn’t until Junior High that I started to question it.

I figured out that I was bisexual in seventh grade when my favorite Harry Potter role-playing website added an LGBTQ forum. Besides that my mother didn’t like them, I didn’t know anything about the ‘gays’, so I decided on a whim to check it out. I started with an FAQ board, then I moved over to a thread of coming out stories. I was up all night, heart pounding, mind racing, identifying with all of the posts too much for my own comfort. When the sun finally came up, I came to a conclusion; I like girls and guys, so I must be bisexual.

I called my best friend to excitedly tell her and she replied, “gross.”

I secretly watched coming-out videos every night on our family computer for the next few months. I would have tabs up in the back that I could switch to in case someone came in. In the end, though, hiding things is difficult for a loud mouth like me, so I told my mother. She responded that I was going to hell. When she told my dad that night, I fervently denied everything. I just wanted it to go away, at that point, I would rather have hidden it than be criticized for it. Still he shuffled his feet and awkwardly said, “At least I won't have to buy you a prom dress” (Ironically enough, I ended up going to prom three times). My mom got into a fight with her sister a week later, during which she outed me to our entire Jewish family while bragging about not kicking me out for being gay. She came up to my room that night, crying, and apologized — but the damage had been done. I was out now, and that was what I wanted, right?

As I came out to more and more people I began to date and noticed what would become an anxiety-inducing pattern. I would begin dating someone — usually girls, at this point — and panic because I felt like I couldn’t be truly interested in her. When I was finally able to make a relationship stick, I fell in love with her infectious energy immediately. She had beautiful dark hair and a great figure and was just my type. I’d spend nearly every day with her, even withstanding her youth group meetings just to be around her. Surprisingly, I never panicked. But she quickly became neglectful and possessive, so we broke up. Three girls came and went after that, each as beautiful and kind as the last, but no matter how hard I tried I just couldn’t make myself love them. By then, on my newly supportive mom’s prompting, I began identifying as a lesbian. Boy, did I not know what was in store.

Crushing on High School Hotties

I almost made it through high school like that — clumsily crushing on all of my female friends and panicking at any sign of actual relationship potential. Until, one day, I sat with my male best friend on a school trip and we spent the whole time sharing music, talking, and cuddling. I was euphoric. I didn’t feel panic at all. I did feel confused though, and I left that bus with the intention of ignoring the feelings. As fate would have it, A good friend of mine noticed the interaction and eventually convinced me to ask him out. I was nervous, especially since I was known across the school for being gay. I’d even run an LGBTQ-themed homecoming court campaign the year before. But I knew she was right, so, I swallowed my pride and asked him out. Just as I had expected, everyone thought I had faked being gay. We dated for a while, but ultimately went our separate ways.

I was single for a few months until another beautiful, dark haired girl asked me to dance at an orientation party. She was sweet, wore leather, and smelled like English tea. Her smile was infectious and she could hold it for hours. We would hang out regularly in the college kitchens, watch cute movies together, and talk about the far-off places we wanted to see. But when her hand slid suggestively up my thigh in the isolation of her dorm the panic came back. We didn’t last long after that. 

I wanted so badly to know what the panic was that I began researching fervently. It was only in reflection that I realized the panic only ever washed over me when I was worried about sex, but would completely drain away for people I loved. In my research, I came across the term demisexual and I felt puzzle pieces start to click into place. Demisexuals feel sexually attracted to someone only when they have formed a strong emotional bond with the person. It fit me like a glove. All this time I had thought that I was somehow…broken.

But I wasn’t damaged, and I wasn’t weird either; I was just “demi.”

Enter: an average tall skinny gamer guy. We dated for three years in total. He was a Christian, so there was no rush to have sex, and I never panicked. His family was super religious, though, so I had to hide that I was queer when we were around them. It turned out that we were with them nearly all the time. During that time of repression, I looked at myself in the mirror and wondered why that person never looked like me. Then, all at once, It just sort of clicked. The person I saw myself as, in my head, had never been a girl. I had always been uncomfortable when my father would call me “girly,” despite the harmless nickname. I’d always gotten unusually excited when someone would accidentally misgender me. I looked up what I could about it and came, once again, to a conclusion about myself; I wasn’t a girl. I called up my boyfriend to tell him. He cried that it was against his religion and experienced a panic attack so severe that he ended up in the hospital.

I decided I couldn’t be with someone who didn’t accept me, and so we broke up.

Things were looking pretty grim at first, but then something great happened. I told my friends and they were supportive! They changed my pronouns, called me by my chosen name, and even helped me experiment with binders. My other trans friends and I had long conversations about how we felt over glasses of cheap wine. A weight lifted itself from my chest and I could finally hold my head up again. I met a boy who liked me anyway, for who I really was, and who was also demisexual. We’re still together— he calls me his boyfriend and tells me I’m handsome every day. I’ve never felt luckier. Now I can go into jobs with my chosen name, I can use pronouns I’m comfortable with in public, and I can be candid on the internet in a way I could never be at the beginning of this journey.

The point is, sexuality can be complicated.

We’re always growing, learning, and evolving our view of ourselves and our sexuality. It can take a long time to come to terms with who you are and an even longer time to receive acceptance from others, but when you’re do you can finally be free. You can dress and act and feel however you want. Then, one day, you’ll look in the mirror and see someone you recognize.

I know I do.