Sex and Relationships: What is Sexual Fluidity?

In today’s article, I thought was the right time to bring to the Ouso Escrever stage, one of the most controversial subjects about sexuality, called Sexual Fluidity.
Why people mistake sexual fluidity with sexual orientation? Your partner is gay or lesbian because he or she felt attraction and had sex with someone of the same gender? Are they gay because they don’t show a strong libido or a high sex drive?

The truth is sexual orientation is stable and unlikely to change, and it isn’t a choice, but at some point in their lives, men or women might feel attraction for same-gender folks and even have sex with them.
These men or women identify themselves as straight or heterosexual people, but there are casual exceptions along the way where sexual and romantically responses are with someone outside of their sexual identity.

Males are discouraged from sharing their feelings or displaying any so-called feminine affectations such as tenderness or touching, which stops around the age of eight.
For that reason, if they have one thought or an erotic dream about gay sex, they will be terrified to admit it because they will be labeled as gay or bisexual. It’s frightening and confusing.

To make things even worst, usually, women are reluctant to have a relationship with a man if they discover that their man has erotic thoughts about being intimate with another man. They will leave without having a serious conversation and explore what’s going on.
Here we can see how powerful are the boxes we use every day to label people and the choices we do in our romantic lives.

While men are stigmatized for having one non-straight thought, women are fetishized for it. What should we think about it? What are we doing with our men?

Citizens and therapists community needs to be aware of this important point, erotic interests outside the label box, don’t mean you are gay lesbian or bisexual. We have to identify what is sexual orientation and erotic orientation. They are different things.

Sexual orientation, as you must know, is defined by to whom you are attracted, erotic orientation is what makes up your turns-on and erotic interests leading you to one orgasm. Erotic orientation is all about your fantasies, and in those fantasies, you can be whoever you want.

Before going further, I will leave four questions that you can use to identify your personal sexual identity:

1. Do you have youth memories of same-sex people attraction? Did you were excited to see your naked colleagues in the locker room?
   
2. Are you Homophobic? Homophobic people usually are homosexual people in the closet. They repress their feelings, and research has shown straight people don’t feel threatened by homosexual folks or their behaviors.
   
3. When you go to the beach, who do you notice first? Where your eyes go?
   
4. With who you see yourself waking up every morning and go home?

These experiences, when well addressed, can increase the intimacy between the couple, and this reminds me, my first boyfriend. At the time, I had 23 years old, and he had 34. I can tell you he was the most attentive man I’ve ever met, but there wasn’t something quite right till one day he said he wanted to share one personal thing. He said: Alexandra, I don’t know how you will deal or process this information, but I want to be transparent with you. I want to tell you that I had sex with men in the past. It only happened twice and was with close friends.
He explained that he has only romantic and physical interests in women, but there was a curiosity about sex with men and their bodies, not to have a relationship with them.

I held his hand, and I said, let’s have dinner, and enjoy our evening.
The only question I made was how was he feeling, and his answer was I can be myself with you. We were together for two years and a half, ended not because of a lack of love but because he left the country, and wanted me to go with him. But I was studying. He got married later and had kids.

When we love someone, for real, we don’t jump in conclusions. We let our partners express themselves and let them be who they are. Listen, just because your man isn’t macho and don’t rip off your clothes doesn’t mean he doesn’t love you. He may not have much experience with intimate relationships, or your libidos don’t match properly. He may have sexual fluidity, and what? Is that the end of the world?

The idea of male sexual fluidity isn’t scary or shameful.

Don’t let boxes rule your life, help your partners during their sexual struggles, and help them not only to express but find their true identity.

With love,

Alexandra