I have a question. When I was younger (like, maybe 10, 11, 12) I remember one night looking at a video of lesbians kissing (I mean y’all I spelled it lezbian that’s how young I was) i remember having a groinal response. I’m pretty sure that that day in school, someone mentioned gay and lesbian people and I had no clue what that was. So I think that’s why I looked it up. I never watched it again after that night, had never had any sexual questioning, and knew I was heterosexual. I was in LOVE with so many fictional male characters and have been in a serious relationship with my boyfriend for almost 6 years next month. Fast forward to now, I am suffering with HOCD. And my mind is telling me that me watching that video forever ago was actually me being a lesbian and I just didn’t realize it. Does anyone know the correlation between these two things? Not really reassurance seeking, mostly seeking information because I genuinely do not know if watching lesbians making out once as a kid means I was a lesbian, just didn’t know it. Thanks.

As I’ve posted before, my friends has developed TOUGH hocd and has hit rock bottom :// She told me to ask y’all here if any of you have had a similar experience NOT reassurance (she doesn’t have NOCD). “Hi NOCD community. When I was like 5 I had this distant female cousin whom I played with and grew up. She had super short hair like a boy, but we low key had same interests in toys/tv series etc. and then at THAT age I got a very weird though which said: do you like her? And I remember getting a lot of anxiety and my stomach hurting cause why tf would I have that kind of thought about my female cousin? I remember ruminating about it the whole day, and the next day that thought disappeared and I never had that thought again. We grew up and obviously she’s my family like my sister. But now that I have HOCD, I keep thinking about that memory and I have so much anxiety about it and cry often about it. While growing up I’ve only had crushes on tons of boys at school etc. has anyone had a similar experience?” Thanks for reading if u did! We need support 😭🙏🏻

Hey, I am a 19 year old girl, who have since February 2024 begun questioning if I am a lesbian. I have always LOVED boys, and have always known that I do not like women sexually, but I remember one night I got the thought “what if you like women” and I have not been able to not think about it since then. I remember I began questioning this during Covid when I was home alone in 2020, but has since then been able to be 100% that it was just a fase where I was curious, but had since then been able to talk openly about me not liking women without it triggering something. But since February I have thought about it EVERY day and every single minute of the day. I have a boyfriend of 3,5 years who I love so much, but since I began having these thoughts I cannot feel attracted to him. I need to ask him for reassurance 10+ times a day “pinky promise I’m not into women but only men” and have to ask him a certain way. I also think “oh I feel the need to look at women’s private parts and get a tangly feeling 3 or more times before I can look away cause it has to feel right. I also feel like I can’t listen to eg “I kissed a girl” or “born this way” because if I do I will feel attracted to it. Another example is that I constantly seek reassurance from Google, ChatGPT or TikTok and it is so draining because in the end I keep thinking “I don’t have a OCD diagnosis what If im in denial and is just a lesbian who is lying to me bf” I feel as im in denial just writing this. I have lived with it for a year now and is starting to question “what if I have just changed and must accept that I don’t like boys and is masculine e.g.” but the thing is, I have ALWAYS loved makeup, and loves girl stuff, but when I have these thought I can’t feel as I am in control of who I am. It makes me question myself to the point where I feel as I have to go out and be with a women because it is what my brain tells me to do. During a 5 month period in between this year the topic changed to “what if I have cheated on my bf without him knowing because I don’t remember” and I went down another dark hole. I have thrown all my clothe from that period of time out because I felt guilty and as it held “bad memories” and now I regret it because the topic has changed. But during that time I had to seek reassurance from friends “have I flirted - do u think I talked flirty or looked at them, have I done anything” and I had to have it IN writing, otherwise it wasn’t valid. I even promised God that I would not go out clubbing until New Year’s Eve at 12 am, because then he would forgive me and it would make me a not lesbian person. But it did not help a bit, the topic just changed and my “am I a leabjan” spiral started again. And it makes me so sad because why can it not just think “okay you are bisexual” NOT JUST “oh you are either heterosexual or ONLY into women” it is like my mind is afraid. So I guess my hope and question is, is there anyone who can tell if this sounds like OCD, and if I am into women. Before gaining these thoughts I was certain, and I know i don’t ONLY like women, but I can’t even be sexually active with my bf because if I think of women during it, I must get turned on by it and be a lesbian. I am so exhausted. Sorry for the long question, I am just so drained. Backstory: my family has a lot of mental illnesses on my dads side, and when I was a child I dealt a lot with having to wash my hands until they bled and crying because i did not know why I lived. I was never diagnosed.

hi everyone just wanted to share what i’ve been going through lately. i’m a 24f and im a masc lesbian. i’ve been lesbian for as long as i can remember. i’ve had crushes on girls since i was very young, my first kiss was even with a girl in pre school. growing up i was told it was wrong and didn’t even know what the lgbt community was or anything like that and as an adolescent i wanted to fit in with all the other girls and have a boyfriend or like a boy but it felt forced and unnatural. middle school was when i really discovered my sexuality. i had a crush on a girl and it felt so real and different. from then on i knew i was lesbian. since then ive been very comfortable in my sexuality and i should mention that i can admit when a man is attractive and have always been secure in that there was no other meaning behind it, that’s how secure i was. as of late ive had small triggers that made me question if i secretly liked men but id shut it down quick. i often get gender envy and if i were to find a man attractive it’d be because i wish i could look like them but then the fixation started where my brain started asking if this meant i liked them and it completely derailed me. ive also seen so many tiktoks of lesbians who are suddenly straight which added to my fear. it got really bad this last month where i started going on chat gpt for reassurance. my mind started imaging scenarios with men and asking if i was aroused or if i would enjoy doing things with men. it got so bad i would dread going to the gym. these last couple days have been okay ive been letting the thoughts pass but now that ive been more passive my brain tells me that it must be true that i actually like men because now my brain doesn’t feel anxious. i’m ts a continuous loop does anyone have any advice ?