I've never once doubted my sexuality. I think I knew from a very young age that I was different from all my friends. Especially when i started secondary school. While girls with lusting after the school "hotties", young, hot blooded boys, I couldn't stop thinking about how gorgeous Kate Winslet was and what it would be like to kiss her. Sure I liked boys, but only in the platonic sense. My room was decorated with pictures of Take That and Leonardo DiCaprio but i only lusted after them for their talents, singing and acting. Mainly my walls were full of pictures of Kate, her beautiful, full, wavy hair, her passionate lips. That's what took my fancy but i never dare tell anyone.
When you're a 14 year old girl, especially coming from Glasgow, the world and all your peers have expectations of you. Boy meets girl, girl loses her virginity down the local park, girl has baby and boy is never seen again. Something like that anyway. I had tried time after time to be like everyone else, kissing boys and having fun but deep down I knew it wasn't right for me. I didn't like boys and I was a bit unsure of why I felt this way and the more I thought of this, the more different I thought I was.
My first sexual experience with a girl was at a relatively young age. I guess curiosity got the better of us and we decided to experiment, only for me, my feelings towards her were very different from hers. She was my best friend, ever since we were three so who better to experiment with. It lasted 10 months and eventually fizzled out when she didn't want to do it anymore. I, of course was heartbroken. No more cuddles, no more affection...How was I to deal with this? Was it my first real love? A crush? Well, mum gave me some chocolate and that was the end of all that.
Girls, more often than not, or pressured into forming relationships with the opposite sex. There's too much pressure nowadays for young girls to have intercourse. I was no different. I'm not a "gold star" lesbian (a lesbian who has never had sex with a man). I felt the same pressures as an adolescent and eventually succumbed to the inevitable. I slept with boys. Not because I wanted to but because it was the "thing" to do. You get someone to jump in for alcohol and cigarettes, go down to the railway bridge, get messed up and have drunken sex. On the outside I'd be smiling, trying to make out that this was all great fun but inside I was screaming. I wanted to run away, cry, scrub myself clean. I felt dirty, ashamed and most of all, I didn't feel like me. No matter how much I felt this way, I continued to behave in this way until I was about 17.
I got into a lot of trouble when I was a teenager. I was caught shop lifting and cautioned by the police. I was constantly skipping school, getting drunk and wasted on whatever I could get my hands on. Taking cannabis, cocaine and Ecstasy on a Friday night was a regular weekly occurrence. I just didn't care. I'd abused myself by letting men touch me and on top of other family issues, I'd spiralled out of control.
The thought of coming out scared me. How am I going to deal with other people was the first thing that crossed my mind. People can be cruel. Name calling doesn't just happen in the playground. I was scared of being so different to everyone else and at the age of 19, That was my main concern. I was very naive and didn't know much about being gay, what it mean to be gay and I certainly didn't have any gay friends. I felt completely alone and no idea how i was going to handle this. It took me 2 years to find out.....
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