I really think this isn’t OCD. I haven’t gotten into relationships because I found them stressful, even though I wanted them, it’s always been easier for me to make close connections with female friends, whom I love a lot, and I’m very comfortable with them. I was extremely jealous at how they were able to talk to guys so easily whereas I always had an anxiety attack over it, or felt like I was forcing myself to be attracted to random people. I didn’t want to get married and found the thought of living alone, maybe with friends, a lot more enjoyable. I can’t imagine myself in a long term relationship with men at all. I had crushes on guys. I wasn’t boy crazy but I did notice them all the time. I had butterflies around 1 girl I thought was cool in middle school, and have admired women for being pretty, but I’ve never wanted to date them, and I never thought about them after. There was one girl in high school that I thought was super smart and I wanted to be her friend but I got this thought of ‘omg what if I have a crush on her?’ in high school and for a while I thought I did but I was honestly uncomfortable at the thought. I never thought I was a lesbian, for a while I thought I was bi, but I never wanted a relationship with women, and honestly I’ve doubted how attracted to them I was, because I just didn’t feel comfortable at the thought of doing anything with them. I could admire them but that’s about it. The thought made me uncomfortable. I’ve never fantasized about relationships with women, always about men. I’ve never even watched lesbian porn. What if I’m just a lesbian and I can’t admit it??

Okay so I have been struggling with HOCD for so fucking long. I never felt like I had crushes on boys growing up but I wasn’t attracted to girls either (this was through 5th grade). Until 6th grade hit. I remember it like it was yesterday. I had the thought walking up the stairs and it was “You’re lesbian.” And ever since that thought was there and I fought it I have been dealing with all types of OCD ever since (been going on for 7 years). And only this year I found it was OCD. But it’s hard because I don’t know if I’m actually gay or I convinced myself I’m gay because I gave up and gave in. Now whenever I see I pretty girl I feel tingling. And I wanted to prove to myself that I wasn’t a lesbian so I look up pretty pictures of girls with their boobs out and I loved it. And I wanna make out with a girl so intensely. But then at the same I don’t wanna be in a relationship with a girl and I wanna marry a guy and I just desperately wanted to be like by a guy. But I get so horny whenever girls are in bikinis and stuff. But I have OCD and I’m so confused.

Thinking about relationships makes me feel so bad. At this point both men and women trigger this obsession with trying to figure out what my sexuality is. I don’t really want to date anyone, I’ve been okay with this for over a year, and it’s not like I’ve been completely detached from the lgtbqia community. Like, I know lesbians and other wlw and for a long time I thought I was like bi (I think I’m honestly more aro than I realized), and I haven’t thought much, but ever since I realized I don’t want to share my future with anyone it’s like my brain is screeeeaming that this just means I’m a lesbian, when that’s never been a thought that crossed my mind. It’s definitely been better for me lately when I started cutting out compulsions and all that, but I’m still undiagnosed and I don’t know for sure what exactly is happening to me. If I was a lesbian I’d accept myself, but it’s the fact that it feels SO BAD when I think about it that makes me feel like I need to figure it out even more. Like is it anxiety because I don’t like it or anxiety because it’s like internalized homophobia? And it’s like omg I need to figure it out otherwise I’m just living a lie and I won’t ever be happy. I’ll get flashes of anxiety when I’m just watching a movie or a YouTube video about a boy band I like... and it throws things from the lesbian masterdoc in my face about how I had crushes on fictional characters and celebrities and how that’s something that lesbians do because it’s ‘safer’ to crush on unobtainable men. And it just feels bad bc I know I’ve had crushes on guys that were my friends too but I also have a lot of trauma and I wasn’t allowed to date growing up so that’s what I did to actually explore romance. When the anxiety spikes it makes me feel as if it was all a sign. What’s worse is that I started looking to aromanticism before I read the doc and there’s this bit about how some lesbians think they’re aro bc they don’t like men but never explore their attraction to women either and it’s like ahhhh what’s the truth. I don’t know anymore. Not thinking about it makes me antsy, & the second my anxiety spikes it’s hard to do anything during the rest of the day. I don’t want to think about falling in love and having relationships, I miss when I was just living life in the moment. I miss not thinking twice about when I found a guy attractive, or even a girl. Like it just makes my brain hurt so bad.

I feel like a lesbian. I feel bisexual. I feel like that’s what I want. It feels like I like the thoughts. I feel like I have to leave my boyfriend. I don’t want to lose him, but it feels like I need to leave him. I feel sick. I feel like I’m hiding it from myself and using ocd as a coverup. I don’t want to be one of those woman who find out they’re lesbians later than life. I’m afraid of being one of those woman who convince themselves they can be into men when they can’t. What if that’s me? What if I never enjoy sex with my boyfriend? I don’t enjoy it now, because every time I try to enjoy I get thoughts like, “you want him to be a woman. You’re not attracted to him. You’re not attracted to men. You need to leave him for a woman. You would enjoy sex with a woman.” I don’t want that to be true, but it feels like it secretly is. Am I denying my true sexuality? Is me thinking I have ocd just a coverup?? There’s a lot of proof for me being a lesbian that constantly haunts me. For example, I used to watch lesbian porn. But the thing that really bothers me is that I (TMI) masturbated to a picture of two cartoon characters as lesbians, videos of woman twerking, and music videos of woman. I don’t know why I did those things. It makes me feel like I would like having sex with a woman, because I liked seeing their bodies in porn and masturbated to it. I want to be with my boyfriend. I don’t want to leave, I don’t want to lead him on. But I can’t be happy around him, because sometimes he will cause these thoughts and memories to arise. I keep seeing lesbians on tik tok and i feel like I want to be with them. I keep thing about my boyfriend and marrying him, then I get the thought, “you don’t want to be with him, you want a wife when you’re older.” I also don’t want to be homophobic. I’m afraid of that. I’m supportive of the lgbtq community, but it doesn’t feel natural for me. The thought of ME specifically being lesbian or bi doesn’t make sense to me. Or at least didn’t. Now I feel like I want it :(