My bisexual story part 1

This post is sort of my bisexuality story.

I realised I was bi in April 2006 when I was 14 years old. It's not very clear in my memory, but then again, for me it wasn't a single moment of realisation. When I look back with hindsight, I see now that there were incidents before then that were because of my sexuality that I didn't realise at the time, such as at primary school, finding I was okay with kissing a girl's cheek, and sometimes wanting to, but the girls I tried to kiss were not okay with it, and drawing pictures of women with accentuated features and skimpy outfits, when my friends gave them big dresses and big make-up.

What brought my attention to not being straight, as I had assumed I was up til then, was a particular girl. When talking to my friend on the phone about her, I would refer to her as 'Richard' so my parents wouldn't cotton on if they overheard, but on here, I'll use the pseudonym Marigold. She was a girl in my year who I was vaguely friends with. And I sought out her attention more frequently, and tried very hard to make her laugh, and when I noticed my behaviour I found that I felt the same warm feeling that I associated with my crushes on boys. This was in April, and I spent the weeks until July and the summer working out what it meant. My first thought was that I was gay, but I knew I liked boys too, so I started to research it, and when I came across bisexuality, it just clicked. At a basic level anyway. I spent until January 07 realigning my sense of self identity. I also spent that time falling in love with Marigold from afar, and getting closer to her as a friend.

Now, I was under the impression that all the girls in the year were straight, naive as I was, and it was only when I identified with being non-hetero that I gave it any thought, and eventually understood that, as in most averages, about 10% were gay or bi. I dreamed of Marigold being bi, but I saw it as just a lying-in-bed-at-night fantasy, especially with her record of sleeping with men, even at 14. So when I went to the cinema alone with Marigold, I just enjoyed being with her and expected nothing.

What happened, I did not expect. I was high on feelings from being close in the dark to the girl I loved, leading to the bold move of taking her hand. We leant in closer and closer until our cheeks were touching. I don't think I realised what was happening, I wasn't thinking at all really. So I just instinctively turned my head and we kissed. My brain jammed with the single thought "I'm kissing her, I'm kissing her!" She was an experimenting teenager, and I was only just coming to terms with my sexual identity. A few weeks later, Marigold 'asked me out' and we began a three month fling. I didn't realise at the time what a nonsense relationship it was, and how Marigold used me to express her sexual confusion and frustration.

But it did teach me a few things about who I was, and some things about my bisexuality. I noticed I felt protective of her in the way I wanted to be protected by a man, and that I was highly sexually attracted to her body, much more than to men's. That was my first same-sex relations experience. I drew self-confidence from it, and it led me to come to terms with who I was. I spent the time up to my GCSEs not talking about it except to one friend (who had the unfortunate task of being on the other end of the phone the night I first kissed her. Wow, was I loud).

Then I truely came out to friends when I moved to a new college for my A levels. I met a new group, and simply mentioned it casually if it came up - and it felt good. They totally accepted me no questions, and I flourished, even asking out a girl in my drama class. My next important relationship was with a boy I'll call Colt. He introduced me to sexual relations with men, and how someone else can love my bisexuality. He enjoyed comparing notes on our tastes in women, and I completed my initiation into being sexual.

So I come to my current relationship. After months of crushing on a girl I met at the start of the academic year who became a part of our social group, I asked her out, and here we are eight weeks later. I am learning every day how to be a strong girl without a prescribed role in my relationship, doing what I can for her and myself to make us happy. I am learning some of the differences between having a girlfriend and a boyfriend, from the roughness of men's kisses in relation to the softeness of women's, to the almost opposite needs of them, as well as the similarities.

So that's part of my story (up to the point of writing in June 2010).