Madeline Kuhns is a journalism senior and Mustang News opinion columnist. The opinions expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Mustang Media Group.
“I will like many boys and have a boyfriend by the time I’m in college,” I repeated these words to myself over and over again as a middle schooler. Silly me. My romantic fantasies of hearing an “as you wish,” promise of love from my devoted and masculine Wesley-type clouded the reality of my future (thanks, Princess Bride for giving me unrealistic expectations). To find someone who truly cared for me, I had to get something straight: I wasn’t.
The concept I didn’t understand at the time was that there is no “right” way to figure out that you may be into the same sex. Moreover, exploring your sexuality doesn’t require instant labeling.
Putting a label on yourself before you have had real-life experiences is similar to attempting to navigate your way out of a dense forest with a map that is being drawn as you walk. Sometimes it’s right, but you just don’t know the full picture until later on.
I do not agree with those who claim a single narrative to coming out as something you always know. I think that being queer is something you can discover (not decide) through experience. I believe if you’ve ever questioned your sexuality, experience may be the last step in accepting yourself.
Learning to accept that my Wesley could also be a woman took time, finding a community and experience. Though I had questioned why I often kept my eyes on the female characters of the movies and occasionally got nervous around other girls, I didn’t realize it might have something to do with my sexuality. The final straw to realizing I was bisexual was actually kissing a girl.
“You have to have experiences to truly know,” Kacie Giordano, a soil science senior, said. She had always felt different, but wasn’t aware that other people felt the same. “I realized it was gayness when I had a crush on my friend in middle school. Then we kissed, and I was like oh my god this is what I’ve been feeling all along!”
For people struggling or questioning their sexuality, she thinks that experimenting is helpful. “You don’t know until you try, and you just have to keep an open mind,” Giordano said.
In a world where she could speak to her past self, she said she would tell herself that having those feelings is okay. “I would think that it wasn’t okay and maybe the feelings I was having were wrong. It’s okay what you’re feeling,” Giordano said.
Self-acceptance is extremely difficult to grapple with when you are getting to know yourself as queer. I feel inner-homophobia is often overlooked in the struggle. If you’ve only known one kind of path in your romantic endeavors, suddenly switching up can feel terrifying.
Tayleigh Birkie, an environmental management junior, experienced the pervasive impact of homophobia even in the progressive suburb of Northern California in which she grew up.
Birkie experienced crushes and fascinations with peers growing up, but didn’t put two and two together yet. “I didn’t know at the time I didn’t know what the hell was happening,” she said.
She also noted that overcoming her inner-homophobia took time and is an ongoing presence, although it has improved. “I don’t know a queer person who doesn’t struggle with that on some level,” Birkie said. “I think that a lot of people are like ‘I knew I was gay from day one’ and that’s great if you knew. But that’s not the majority of people because of internalized and societal homophobia.”
I agree with her that discovering sexuality comes with time and having experiences. Birkie also said that the pressure to label oneself often conflicts with a naturally fluid and experimental timeline of being queer. “Being lesbian doesn’t mean that I couldn’t like a boy in the future. It just means that right now that’s the term that best fits me,” she said.
“Something I’ve always told myself and my friends would always tell me there is no rush to have a label,” Birkie said. “But like to actually believe it is different.”
To Birkie, self-understanding is often retroactive. Past feelings only began to make sense once she had the time to reflect on them in a safe space without the societal expectations of a heteronormative society.
The timeline for self-identifying one’s sexuality is not confined to a specific time, like high school or college. It is a lifelong journey that unfolds with various experiences.
As a society, separating gender identity from sexual orientation is vital to opening our arms to difference.
The best part about being queer is you don’t have to have things figured out right away. College is a great time to experiment with your sexuality and figure out what you like. My biggest aid was taking the pressure off myself to fit into one box.