By Caitlin Mellor
@LivingLifeWithoutLimits
When I first heard about pansexuality, I was 21 sitting on a couch opposite my counsellor. It was the first time I heard something that explained how I felt my whole life. Someone who can love anyone but tends to identify more with one gender. Suddenly all these ways that I felt I wasn’t “normal” opened up to a community of individuals like me. It helped me to realize how many others were probably sitting on a couch with their counsellor, or their friend, or reading an article realizing all those confusing feelings had a name.
I had dated men my whole life but had always found women attractive. I think it had been staring me in the face my whole life but I wrote off my attraction to women. As a kid, girls kissing each other was excused as “experimentation.” As a teenager, it was just a “best friend” thing. Getting older, I wrote it off as a woman just appreciating another woman’s beauty. And as repressed memories of trauma resurfaced, I was confused as to whether that had played a part in tying women having sexual relations in my mind.
The further I dove into self-growth work, looking at my core suspicions of self, and the weight of the traumas I had endured, I began to realize that my attraction to women was real and part of who I am. It still took me years to become comfortable with the idea of trying to date women and even longer to push past the worry of not being good at it.
I always kept a nonchalant attitude towards being pansexual. To me it was “no big deal” and also no ones business. But I found that in not allowing that part of myself to be seen, I was holding back a piece of my identity. I never want, and still don’t want, my sexuality to be my entire identity. However, I began to notice in pushing my pansexuality to the side I wasn’t honouring part of who I am. I wasn’t allowing myself to be whole. I prevented myself from being deeply seen by those around me. In doing this I closed myself off from real connections and communities that would not only accept me but love me.
It took me a long time to embrace that part of myself. Not because I was ashamed of it – I would never apologize for who I am – but because experiences with women, for me, are so closely related to sexual abuse. I found even as I began to branch out and want to discover and learn more within my sexuality, when it came down to actually meeting up with a woman I would always come up with an excuse as to why I couldn’t.
I’ve spent a lot of time afraid. I was afraid that LGBTQIA2+ community would ridicule me or deem me not “queer enough.” I was afraid that my father would stop talking to me or my mother wouldn’t understand. I was afraid I could never romantically be with a woman without it triggering me back to my past traumas. But mainly, above all else, I was afraid I wasn’t worthy or enough to be loved by anyone.
Despite these deeply engrained core wounds of not being enough I still have a huge heart so ready to love. Which ironically very much encompasses my own definition of Pansexuality and how I explain it to others. To me being Pansexual means that you can fall in love with absolutely anyone. Pan people fall in love with a soul not sexual organs or defined gender. I think because of that we tend to be more accepting and compassionate people, ready to take others as they are.
Most confuse bisexuality and pansexuality and for a long time I suspected I was bisexual. It wasn’t until I discovered that pansexuality existed that I realized I was a step beyond bisexual.
Instead of being attracted to just men and women, I found that I am attracted to anyone; anyone being folks that are gender fluid and non-conforming, trans people, etc.
For a long time I didn’t know anyone else who identified as pan so I felt quite isolated and misunderstood. My only experience with someone talking to me about pansexuality was a church group stopping cars coming off the highway telling people that pansexuals will go to hell and that all gay people need to be removed. The fury I felt in that moment made me realize I needed to do better and to stop living in my fear.
Like a domino effect things kept evolving for me within standing loud and proud within being queer. I ended up seeing a post by a writer and workshop producer that explained how people fit the term “queer.” It was the first time someone validated for me that I was allowed to called myself queer and that I was part of that community. It allowed me the courage to stay in the LGBTQIA2+ dorm at a recent conference, formally, and publicly announcing out loud that I am queer.
Standing in my power unapologetically helped me to let the rest of the fear fall away and to begin the process of actually looking to date other queer folks and to explore that part of myself. I knew that I wouldn’t evolve into my understanding if I didn’t step into my sexuality fully. So while I decided to start putting myself out there and seeking out real life connections I also began to find opportunities where I could tell it to friends.
Most would ask me what pansexuality was. As I explained what it meant to me and how its usually defined I found that most times people would reply with “Oh, I think that’s likely what I am as well.” I have found expressing my own sexual identification has inspired others to dive deep into their own. I even helped a friend gain confidence to start trying to date women and she ended up realizing she was a lesbian and finally understood why things never felt right with men.
I found that the more I began to talk about it the less afraid I became. That being said, I was also extremely fortunate that after coming out, no one in my life abandoned me. I don’t fail to notice the place of privilege that makes me stand in.
I got lucky with my friends and family. But I also got lucky this last year with the first woman I worked up the courage to meet in person. It was my first official dinner date with a woman, my first kiss in public with a woman. I was nervous but meeting her was like breathing in fresh air. She put me at ease as we both found we were in very similar situations. She was just beginning to realize and explore her bisexuality and we found in discussing our processes we had experienced many of the same things. Suddenly, I wasn’t alone. Instead, I was sitting across from a gorgeous down to earth girl and feeling excited and proud of the steps I was taking in my own learning.
I am definitely not a poster child of what it means to be queer or to be pan. But I found that in others having expecations of what being queer “should be” it lead to me feeling disconnected with a community I was within. I don’t have to be anything to prove to other people that I am queer or that I am pansexual. I do not have to look a certain way, act a certain way, or mold myself to a stereotype. I have never let anyone put me into a box. To me telling someone how to be queer is oppressing a group of people who’ve already been oppressed. Which can be even more devastating from those thought to be your community. It’s important to have term definitions, but life doesn’t fit into one sentence, know that you don’t need to either.
For me, my expression is often subtle, while for others it’s important for them to be able to be loud about it, we all have our own journeys to take. For me, I have found in my journey that by talking about pansexuality, by opening up to those around me about my experiences, it has helped to invite others into that vulnerability, into exploring their own sexuality, and into deeper understanding of the world beyond themselves.
While vulnerability is scary, it’s also what leads to the deepest and truest connections. I’ve learned the hard way that the only way to be truly accepted is to arrive truly as you are. I don’t regret the years of fear, I believe things happen in their own time. But going forward I wont ever hide who I am again. I deserve to be able to express myself openly and I work hard to create a world where all queer people can speak openly about who they are and to be accepted. But until then, it’s only in taking courage and speaking up, that we invite others to know they too can step into who they are.
I am Caitlin, I am pansexual (among many things!), and I think that makes me damn beautiful.
Caitlin is fiery unapologetic wild woman who can be found in the mountains, swimming in wild waters, and travelling to new places. She chooses to step into her vulnerability by connecting with others through her art in photography, writing, wellness coaching, teaching yoga, conservation, and public speaking. At the core of who she is and what she stands for exists the simple ideology that we all make an impact on the world, she chooses to make hers a loving one.
