Is it jealousy, insecurity or what?

submitted by paleolithicat from self.Lesbians

Hello fellow lesbians,

I will be more personal with that one. I will try to keep short.

I've been seeing a girl. I knew she has been dating guys till about two years ago when she "opened herself for the female world" (she is by chance in pretty gay friend circles). She is almost in her 30s so I was a bit surprised that it took her so long but it was also her "realization story", if I may call it that way, that felt a bit void to me. Anyway, it didn't interest me a lot as we were just starting to get to know each other and I had no serious intentions about it (yeah, I like no strings attached dating, I know it is not a shared feeling in this sub). We got along very well and things were developing very easy between us so we quickly became something like a couple.

When getting to know each other, I heard stories about her ex boyfriends, as well as her only and fairly unsuccessful romance with a closeted bisexual woman who basically encorporated all negative stereotypes about bisexuality. All of those stories didn't make me feel any sort of jealousy - or anything at all, to be exact.

We grew closer and I found out she wrote a book. Autobiographical book about one year of her teenage life. While reading it, I was pretty surprised to follow her first falling madly in love. With a boy. In all detail. I will be honest - it made me sick. And I couldn't really tell why. I even knew who the ex was from her stories. But it was so different how she portrayed it to me (negatively and sort of as he was a joke) and the way she put it on paper (the way he made her feel back then and all). So in a way, I somehow didn't expect she harbored such strong romantic and sexual feelings for men. But then again, I knew these relationships existed, yet I seemingly undervalued them. The strong feeling of repulse when reading about it made me stop in my tracks and think about it.

I was sure: if it was the same story but with a girl, I would take it with a certain excitement and a positive feeling, even if there would be a little bit of jealousy or something.

So is it jealousy? I believe it isn't. I didn't feel any jealousy about it before.

Am I just insecure? Is it my disliking of bisexual women coming on the surface? I have that unfortunately. To be with a lesbian is something I find quite important. For a multitude of reasons. Probably the strongest of which is that I find bisexuality unattractive.

I actually can't remember whether she ever labeled herself. But she came out to her parents quite fast after she realized it (which I still don't know how exactly happened) and her mother told her she always knew or something like that.

Sooo.... That was not that short. Sorry. Any thoughts? How would you feel? Why could I be feeling that put off by all this?

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[–]soundsituation 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I think there are two perfectly normal reasons:

1) You got closer to her and developed feelings. That's part of the reason none of this

When getting to know each other, I heard stories about her ex boyfriends, as well as her only and fairly unsuccessful romance with a closeted bisexual woman who basically encorporated all negative stereotypes about bisexuality. All of those stories didn't make me feel any sort of jealousy - or anything at all, to be exact.

bothered you initially.

2) Learning about something in detail makes an abstraction seem real. It's one thing to know that your partner has a past and a very, very different experience to learn about their exes in excruciating detail. It puts specific images into your mind that are hard to ignore. This is just how humans are, and it's not confined to this type of situation. It's the reason that you can know there's a war going on halfway around the world and not be emotionally affected by that knowledge, but find yourself breaking down in tears and making a donation to Oxfam when you're confronted with gruesome images of it.

I was sure: if it was the same story but with a girl, I would take it with a certain excitement and a positive feeling, even if there would be a little bit of jealousy or something.

As for this, I have a few more thoughts. It could be that you are underestimating how upset you'd actually be if her story was about a girl. Or, perhaps you do have an insecurity about not being "enough", and that's why you feel more threatened by/jealous of men than of other women. Or, it could just be that if this person's first love had been female it would be pretty easy to mentally insert yourself into the story in a way that you really can't when the character is a man.

In short, this all seems pretty normal. Maybe you can talk to her about it. But if you do so, I would stick to how it makes you feel and avoid making judgements about bisexuals. There's a good template for this from a book called Nonviolent Communication that goes like this: state your feelings using "I feel" language (example: "I feel intimidated by your relationship history with men", NOT "I don't trust bisexuals"), express your needs ("I think I need some clarification on how serious you are about me/women"), and make a request ("Could we have an honest conversation about that?"). Obviously you don't have to use those reasons and requests; use whatever feels truest to you.

Good luck OP.

[–]paleolithicat[S] 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Thank you for the wholesome answer!

I'd say in my case we are talking about number 2, you gave a very good example with the war situation thing.

I'd add that part of what upset me was the contradiction between what I had Perceived from her talk ("oh no I hope you aren't like that guy" to mean he wasn't any good) vs her book (where he is the perfect man).

Another reason in this regard is that I never gave it a lot of thought whether she is bi or lesbian. I often assume (my problem, I know) that women who came to the conclusion to date women (and have been seeing only girls since XY time) are lesbians, no matter their relationship history. So my shock probably came from the realization she is bisexual, after all.

I am sure about not being so bothered by love stories with other females because as you said, I can relate. "Love stories" between females are still not the same as heterosexual ones - factors like not knowing whether the person is homosexual and likes you, the flirting, the "chase" - they all happen differently albeit being the same thing in its core. So I think the easiness in heterosexual romance often irritates and frustrates me. I am just angry I was stripped of that by being born in a tiny minority I guess.

[–]here 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I definitely relate with the finding bisexual women unattractive. Women with a history of dating men I could be ok if nothing physical happened. It's really rare though. I'm currently trying to maintain stability in not caring. I also don't think it's jealousy because I don't feel weird about other women. For me it's related with ethics because I think being physical with men in most cases is unequal and it just perpetuates the problems with the way men view women in a physical sense. So having different values in that way is weird. to date someone okay with being viewed in an unequal way is very difficult. And if she was like "wow I realize that was unequal how horrible never again I feel so weird" then I'd be like ok cool you realized and I wouldn't feel weird, but if she has a positive or neutral opinion of those physical encounters to this day then no that's weird and confusing. If it was a dude who she was never physical with or like only ever pegged that would be different since it's not just this automatic norm perpetuating unequal views of women thing.

Also how could they date men for so long while being lesbian? If they care that much about the norm and fitting in, it's just a turn off. Being true to yourself is the most attractive despite the norm or outside pressure. And I know when we're younger it can be different, but like that has boundaries. It just shows no backbone or self respect and in that sense would be hard to really know someone's true self if they're just so easily pressured by the norm and others. I'm not dissing because I know everyone is different and some not as strong, I'm just saying in the attraction world and world of dating I personally find it unattractive while others may not. Anyway, those are just some reasons why I find it difficult to date women with a physical history with men.

[–]totallyathrowaway87 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Seems like jealousy or at least insecurity. I also don't see, from what you said here, how what she told you and what she wrote in the book are necessarily mutually exclusive.

At least I've never had such a one sided romance that I could only say one or the other.

What you've said here sounds, if not jealous, territorial but insecure. Seems pretty normal for a relationship that's gone beyond "no strings attached". So it's probably just outside of your basis of experience if you aren't given to close steady relationships. That alone can make someone insecure.