A little background on my situation: I’m a female in my early 20’s (still in school). I grew up having crushes on boys, but when I got old enough to masturbate I would do so with Playboys I found in the basement. Ever since then I’ve been masturbating to the thought of women/lesbians (with a few exceptions). I progressed through middle and high school not really understanding the significance of these feelings. I surely wasn’t a lesbian because I liked boys, I wanted to date boys I had crushes on, I even fell so deep in “love” with one boy that I cut myself when he broke up me (I’ve since been to therapy for this and healed from it/rid myself of my cutting habit), I would form deep emotional attachments to men or male celebrities and fantasize during class about having sex with them. I started having sex (with boys) in high school around age 16 and always enjoyed being sexual with men (with a few exceptions…) but it never seemed to push me over the edge the way it would if I were thinking about girls. I’ve been sexually active for 5 years and no man has been able to make me orgasm despite NUMEROUS efforts of all sorts, I even tried masturbating with my boyfriend during sex and I just couldn’t orgasm. I try to masturbate to the thought of men but it never stimulates me the way thinking about girls does. I’ve maybe orgasmed 5 or 10 times while thinking about men but have done so more times than I could even count to the thought of women.

I have a boyfriend who knows that I’m attracted to women but thinks I’m bisexual. I love him very much and he’s perfect for me and I want to be able to stop faking and actually orgasm with him. I don’t want to be a lesbian because I’ve finally found someone who is right for me and who loves me and I have enough problems in my life (smoking, depression, self-esteem, eating, I could go on…) and enough trouble meeting people who understand me that I don’t want to have to start my life all over again. Also the chances of me finding a woman are ridiculously low because there are so few lesbians in the world and I don’t fit the lesbian stereotype. I have a friend who is a lesbian and she told me that no one would ever think I was a lesbian because of how I did my nails and how I dressed and acted so feminine. But I ENJOY being feminine and I don’t want to change that, but apparently if I wanted to be gay I would have to. But this is beside the point because I don’t WANT to be gay. I want to be straight. I have nothing against gay people. I come from a very liberal and accepting household and was brought up to respect homosexuals. Both of my parents (probably because they found my porn when I was younger) have told me they would not care if I were gay. This isn’t a religious thing either. We practice no religion because my parents think religion leads to intolerance. I have gay friends who I love and The L World is one of my favorite shows. I’m not a homophobic person I just have a plan for my life and this plan is going well except for these lesbian thoughts that I can’t control or make go away. I’ve never been with a woman but sometimes it’s all I think about. Can’t I do something to stop it??

As it is now I’m fine faking orgasms (though I’d ideally like to be having them) in bed and just having this secret and keeping it to myself. I’m just worried that I'm going to one day have a nervous breakdown, and I wont be able to take it anymore and that thought really scares me. I think about how I want to get married to my boyfriend and have children with him but I wonder if its wrong to lie to him and keep these things from him. He knows about my attraction to women, but he doesn’t know all the details. Can someone be more sexually attracted to women than men but emotionally attracted to men than women? If so, is that person gay or straight?? And if they are gay, what do they do with their emotional attachment to men? In other words, can I change my sexual feelings to match my emotional feelings?

I’m somewhat familiar with all the negative research about conversion therapy. I’ve always thought this kind of therapy was wrong and attributed it to homophobic Christian cults. I did however find some research about conversion therapists who were not associated with Religion. Even though I see this as wrong I still want to undergo conversion therapy in a non-religious setting. I’ve read that therapists can hypnotize you or use psychotherapy to alleviate a homosexual patient's own homophobic feelings so that they can accept themselves. Well if this can be done with homophobic feelings can’t it be done with homosexual feelings? Is there any way I can change myself, or am I going to have to live with this forever? If moral conversion therapists do exist, then how would I even find one?

What a great set of questions--I'm so glad you found the courage to ask, rather than suffering with this alone!

First of all, many people have sexual feelings for one gender and in-love feelings with the other. Many, many lesbians have told me that they are sexually attracted to men, or both men and women, but only fall in love with women. I have also heard the reverse from women who usually call themselves bisexual, or sometimes heterosexual, that they are sexually attracted to women, or both women and men, but only fall in love with men. Sexual attraction and falling in love are related and interact, but are also separate entities to some extent. Personally, I find all those labels are confusing and restrictive, because people are every different kind of combination imaginable, and don't neatly fall into three categories of hetero, bi, or homo. I prefer to call anyone who is at all flexible or mixed in their gender or sexual or love preferences "queer," and then let each individual describe their own version of queer.

The simplest solution to your conflict is to allow yourself to get turned on by women when you are having sex with your boyfriend. People get aroused by all kinds of things that aren't just their partner stimulating their genitals. Love partners often learn to supply what the other needs for satisfying sex, even if it's not a shared need. If you could only get turned on if your boyfriend ate chocolate syrup off of your belly, I hope you would tell him, and he would do it. He, in turn might need you to spank him with the New York Times to get turned on, and I imagine you would do it. This is part of building a loving sexual relationship. When partners can't be flexible to accommodate each other sexually, they may find that to be a deal breaker.

So maybe you've tried bringing what turns you on into bed, and if so, please tell me what kept it from working. But if you haven't, I believe it is very important that you do. This could be your own silent fantasy, or one you and he verbalize/create together in imagination, or an actual other woman in your bed, or erotica/porn with women who turn you on, or your boyfriend dressing like a woman, or probably many other possibilities. Have you, or could you find some way that works for you to bring in what turns you on to the sexual scene? If you talk with him about it, and he is willing, and you genuinely orgasm this way, then you may never have to tell him you faked orgasms. Having to continue to fake it, though, puts you at more risk for not being able to sustain this relationship for the long term.

Of course this is not what you asked--you asked about converting to heterosexual attraction. I agree with you that most of what has been attempted in this area has been infuriating and sad, but I understand that the situation is very different for you than the traditional homophobic scenario. I have not found anything that convinces me that one can become attracted to a gender they are not attracted to, which I think is the more important issue. But I also haven't found anything convincing that one can stop being attracted to the gender they are attracted to (unless they shut down their sexuality to the extent that they are no longer attracted to anyone, or feel any sexual feelings, which I would strongly not recommend as a goal).

If you (and your boyfriend) can find ways for you to feel comfortable getting aroused by what arouses you, you may be able to be blissfully content being with the man you love. That is gold, and I certainly understand why you wouldn’t want to throw that away. Please let me know how all this goes.

To set the record straight (no pun intended), if, for whatever reason, you decide that you want to try having sexual relationships with women at some point, please rest assured that having feminine ways is very, very attractive to some lesbians, and there is no reason you would have to change anything you like about yourself to be attractive to women. It is true that women who wear make up and nail polish and feminine clothes sometimes don’t get recognized by other lesbians as available to them. This doesn’t mean you have to change anything except working a little harder to let people know you’re attracted to women. For example, if you were to put a profile on the butchfemme website, or any other dating website, you will be announcing to prospective dates that you are looking for a woman to date, and there will be no confusion. If you went to a lesbian dance or bar, or wore lesbian symbols, or went to a bisexual support group—you would be recognized as someone who is attracted to women. Just because you may not be immediately recognized in heterosexual contexts (like at the grocery store) does not mean you can’t be attractive to women. If you haven’t already seen it, take a look at the movie Bound—it might help with some of this.

So let me know if you have any other questions, concerns, ideas, disagreements, feelings, needs or information you want to share—I welcome it all.