What follows is an excerpt from my journal today as I began thinking about Coming Out Day and if I should celebrate and come out as pansexual, which I have been identifying as for a few months now.
I don’t think the people who know already expected me to, but I also didn’t think many of my friends would care or mind. Thanks, friends! You’re cool 🙂 Also, this is just a general reminder that no one should make anyone Come Out. It’s a personal decision and should be completely in the hands of the individual.
It surprised me tonight when something got into me and I journaled about my journey I’ve been going through the past 2 years pretty much since beginning to question if I was bi, then pan, and then finally realizing (through writing this, in fact) that I am in fact Omnisexual!
Omni Flag
So, what is Omnisexuality?
From lgbta.wikia.org:
Omnisexuality (often shortened to omni) is a multisexual orientation defined as the sexual attraction to all genders, where gender often still plays a role in one's attraction. Some omnisexuals have a gender preference and some do not.
So what does that mean for me?
It means I have been (and still am) attracted to men, women, and trans, gender fluid and non-binary folks.
If it takes a while to wrap your head around, trust me, 😂 it took a while to even get to this conclusion, but now that I have, it feels really good to write it. In fact, I’m so new to the concept of Omnisexuality that I haven’t said it out loud yet.
But, in the spirit of Coming Out Day (and the spirit of my procrastination and doing things after the fact, since it’s after midnight October 12th), here it is:
I am omnisexual!
Oh, but in the fun and devious way writing works, I’ll give you some behind-the-scenes of writing this post. For the majority of it, I was still under the impression I’m pan. I actually don’t realize omnisexuality is a thing until most of the way through. Enjoy!
Journal excerpt:
When did it start?
Just like any young Pan, my letter came when I was 11 via owl. I just, you know, didn’t get around to reading it until I was 38. I just assumed it said I was straight because boys were the culturally accepted “default” at the time. And I liked them! No need to dig any further, I thought.
The first time I questioned it was when I was about 21 in college I took a Human Sexuality class, no joke. I was so convinced I was straight that even learning about the different sexual orientations in that class wasn’t something I spent a lot of time on because I didn’t think it applied to me.
At the time it was something I needed to learn for a test and nothing more. What’s funny was when they brought in some speakers for the class, I found myself instantly attracted to the trans man! I even wondered what that meant for a hot second, but never really again until I began to get curious about myself and I remembered that particular class and remembered how attracted to him I was.
I was still in “default mode” where liking guys came naturally and I didn’t think of any reason to think of women as anything more since liking guys was what felt expected of me.
I had a few instances of making out with a friend at parties, partially for the attention but also, she was fun to kiss. I honestly felt like it was a fun friendship thing we did.
There was also the time a friend of my roommate’s was over and she and I were having a great conversation in the kitchen and she leaned in a bit and I backed up. She realized I wasn’t into the moment and she apologized. It was very nice and I chalked it up to being drunk and having a good conversation. I never saw her again and didn’t think of her much.
Fast forward to about 2 years ago. I was 36 and scrolling Instagram when I got to a picture of a beautiful woman, and I felt an instant hatred that made me almost turn off social media because I was worried I was comparing myself to her and it would make me feel bad.
Until I realized I wasn’t.
At the time, I felt a lot of inner hatred toward women, including myself, so I never saw myself with one, to be honest. A lot of it had to do with my self-esteem, some of it had to do with having difficult relationships with women in my life, and I suspect society’s general need to tear down women was also unconciously ingrained in me.
But I realized I no longer found it fun. In fact, why was I doing this? To a woman who probably didn’t give a shit if some mom from Connecticut doesn’t like her.
Somehow, this unfounded hatred made it so when I was looking at a beautiful woman, I found myself mentally putting her down in as many different ways as I could. It was something I didn’t even realize I was doing, but the thoughts were racing.
“Look at her tan, probably airbrushed, and it’s too orange. Her fucking perfect teeth and hip curves. She’s somehow skinny but her hips and thighs are curvy and so smooth looking. I bet she’s a bitch and she’s uppity about her lotions and shit.”
I’m not saying everyone who does this is secretly attracted to women. But something made me realize what I was saying to myself and stop and wonder, “wait, why am I putting this woman down?”
Maybe I wanted to be like her, I wondered.
I didn’t, to be honest. I was in the middle of my weight loss journey and finding that I needed to learn how to love myself at any weight and body size if I truly wanted to get healthy and show my daughter what it’s like to be a woman who loves the way she looks.
Did I hate her for being skinny?
Why would I do such a thing when that would make me a hypocrite for trying to convince myself that I was worthy of being loved no matter what my size? So I needed to quit that shit right then, right there.
OK, so, I don’t want to be her, I’m not jealous of her, I bet she’s actually nice, oh she might be funny like me and we might have things in common, her eyes are kind and she is beautiful, I wouldn’t mind hugging her actually. Maybe snuggling on the couch? I bet she’d be down to watch Netflix … and chill? Is that where I was going with that thought?
But also, why am I staring at her and running my eyes over her hips and thinking of how they feel? That thought was somehow also there. Wait, before I shut it off, as I was instinctively going to do, what if I get curious instead? Am I … attracted to her?
I won’t elaborate and this isn’t even a saucy hint at things. I literally just sat with that thought for a long long time.
Then I became curious if I felt that way about other women. I was open to this idea, actually. Maybe I do have the capacity to like more than one gender identity.
Thinking back to the college experiences and then realizing all the women I found attractive over the years— oh, and holy crap, many of them were gay: Hi, Meredith Baxter and Hannah Hart from the My Drunk Kitchen YouTube series!
I told my husband the next day and I don’t actually remember a lot of the conversation, to be honest, it was so long ago (feels like it in pandemic years). He was also instantly cool with it and if you know Mark, casual and nonchalant.
He probably said, “Cool! We’re not breaking up, right?”
I may have laughed at him because aside from the obvious love and loyalty and commitment to my darling husband, I can say with 1000 percent certainty that I definitely do NOT have the time for another relationship.
I have no intention of breaking up or divorcing or separating from Mark in the slightest. I am in a committed relationship with the person I fell in love with years ago and, even though now I realize there were more “options” out there I may have found fun relationships with, I’m very much in love with Mark and I would never want to do anything to jeopardize the relationship we have.
I didn’t think much of it until more recently. Specifically when I started roller skating, actually.
Back in March of 2021 when I started, I followed a lot of skaters at my level and in my age group. It was inspiring and many of us are daily-ish skaters who post when we skate. It’s a fun way of staying accountable to our skating goals and also it encourages one another. I probably followed at least 50 within the first month. Turns out, roller skating is big in the LGTBQ+ community and I began seeing more sexual identity diversity in my Instagram feed.
Seeing the openness and support in the skating world was a big turning point, I would say. It made me curious if Bi was even the right label. Seeing folks start adding pronouns to their profiles actually pushed that curiosity.
When I found myself attracted to some folks whose pronouns were “they/them,” I realized I was not only attracted to men and women but also nonbinary and trans folks, as well as non-gender conforming and gender-fluid folks!
After connecting with so many people through podcasting and now roller skating, I saw more representation of different sexualities and gender expressions, it made me realize that the feelings I had for people I found attractive wasn’t just an objective “oh, they’re good looking” thought — there was true attraction and curiosity.
I was familiar with pansexuality at this point from watching “Schitt’s Creek,” which I really do believe was a huge milestone for pan representation. When Daniel Levy’s character, David Rose, uses wine as an analogy for who he’s attracted to, he says very poignantly, “I’m into the wine, not the label.” It’s pretty perfect. It summed up how I felt.
Levy, who’s the show’s creator, wrote the character as pansexual and says he wanted to see pansexual representation he hadn’t seen before. I read an interview a few months back with Emily Hampshire, who plays David’s friend Stevie on the show. She had her own realization about liking folks of many different gender identities and wondered what it might mean. She said when talking to Levy about it, he replied, “You’re pansexual. Do you even watch our show?!”
But even when I heard that label, I didn’t quite feel it. I know they’re not related, but I can’t stop thinking about a half goat-half man Greek god or a boy flying around Neverland. Or simply a cast-iron skillet most of the time, since my mind usually goes to food right away.
In fact, writing this and thinking back to my college etymology class in college makes me wonder if Omnisexual is a thing.
Turns out, it is! And the distinction between pansexuality and omnisexuality is interesting.
Those who identify as pansexual feel attraction to people without noticing their gender, while omnisexual people recognize the gender of potential partners.
Some people put it this way: Pansexual people are gender-blind, while omnisexual people are not. Even though omnisexual individuals recognize the gender of those to whom they feel a romantic attraction, it doesn’t play a huge factor in their choice of partner.
So, that’s it! This feels right! I read this and it makes sense to me. Omni is actually the name of the summer camp I went to growing up. OMNI stood for Open Minds, New Ideas and it always stuck with me as a good way of thinking.
Haha, this is why I’m glad I went with the soft launch of coming out instead of doing it all in one day and putting all my eggs in the pan basket. (Still thinking of a frying pan here!) I’m super glad to have remained curious and even discovered something new while writing this. I’m proud to be omnisexual and I hope one day maybe my story will help someone else on their journey.
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