My Best Friend Found Out I Am Pansexual

This time last year, my best friend L was moving to Australia. She was going over there for one year, broadening her career as a teacher whilst getting some travelling in at the same time. She's a bit of a Wild Child, always ready and raring to go, always up for the next adventure... That doesn't necessarily mean travelling either. Just a night out with her can be a crazy adventure! With that in mind, I knew that when she returned two weeks ago, our first night out was going to be nothing short of epic.

I didn't expect, however, that I would miss it.

It started out like any other night. L and I, along with my housemate B, were all pre-drinking in our house; those two hitting the vodka, me having a cheeky glass of wine before switching to join them. In hindsight, this was a bad move, but I’ve done this many times before and, naively, I thought I would be okay.

Whilst in the house, L had a call from her Dad, who was having a drink in a pub not too far away. After a brief conversation, it was decided that we would join him before heading out into the city; she hadn’t seen him properly since she returned, and we hadn’t seen him in the year she had been away. Once together, he bought us drinks, we returned the favour, and before I knew it we were all necking jaegerbombs like we’d been starved of liquids for weeks.

For me, this is when it all goes black.

Not literally. I didn’t pass out or anything, but my memory is definitely hazy.

I remember being in a taxi and telling it to pull over so I could throw up. I then remember being in my house and, needing to throw up again, running to the kitchen and vomiting in the bin, as the stairs to the bathroom were not something I was emotionally ready to face. On the plus side, I have a habit of being a bit of a "drunk cleaner," and so I took the bin out before stumbling up to pass out in bed.

Side Note: this must have all gone down by about 23:30. Which is pathetic.

The next day consisted in heading out for a hangover carvery—the absolute King of hangover food—watching Naked Attraction whilst slobbing on the sofa and ordering chicken kebabs before calling it a day. L stayed over for a second night, the end to a successfully unproductive hangover day.

B was going away the following week, leaving on the Sunday. As she finished packing for the week, L and I stayed in bed, catching up on what I had missed from the night out (the girls had both gone to town after dropping me off, and were very open to reminding me of what happened before I went over the edge), and Googling the nearest Chinese restaurant we could hit for lunch. Once B left, we followed through with this plan, taking quick showers before heading out on our Epic Quest for the Chinese Luncheon Wonder.

Our meal was pretty standard; we gorged on prawn crackers, talked about nothing, and all was content with the world right then. It wasn’t until the waiter handed us our bill that L suddenly hit my arm (affectionately, I might add, trying to get my attention), looked at me with a nervous smile, and said:

"You’re Bisexual."

I mean…

I’d just finished eating.

We were about to leave.

"What?"

I can only think shock took over at this point, hence my lack of an articulate response.

She said it again.

"You’re Bisexual."

I can’t really describe how I felt at this point. Numb, but more out of the aforementioned shock at such a blunt statement; nervous, but because I genuinely couldn’t remember telling her, and if I told her this, was there anything else I had said?

So, I responded in the most natural way I could:

"Fuck, I told you?"

It was at this point an abundance of questions was thrown my way:

"How long have you known?"

"Why didn’t you tell me?"

"Does anyone else know?"

"Have you ever been with a girl?"

"Oh my God, can we change your Tinder profile to like both?!?!"

The fact that she was most excited about that last question says a lot about our friendship.

Anyway, I did start to feel guilty. I’ve known for a few years, some other friends do know, and I had always avoided telling her because, simply, I didn’t know how she would react.

L and I are both pretty chilled individuals; however, we are both very opinionated and we don’t always see eye to eye, which has sparked numerous debates throughout the years. Of course, we never allowed this to affect our friendship. We have a mutual respect for each other’s views and perspectives and, if things started to get too heated, we would stop and call it quits.

One big, recurring topic of interest we discuss (particularly in our University years) is the subject of sexuality, more specifically, Bisexuality. In our younger days, L would struggle to understand how an individual can like both boys and girls, implying that they could just be confused, and they are just experimenting before figuring out their preferred sex.

And I would always disagree.

So, as we were sat there in the Chinese restaurant, and L asked me why I had never told her, I was completely honest, maybe for the first time in years. I told her I knew her views, and that I genuinely didn’t know what she would say, how she would react, if she would still love me the same, or if her perspective of me would change, and suddenly she would judge everything I say, start treating me differently, and lose her respect of me…

Just a small anxiety flare up, not a big deal.

It was freeing to finally open up to her about this and, knowing she was listening (this wasn’t another drunken debate where I was trying to drop hints, and open up her mind a bit more), I explained to her that I actually identify more with Pansexuality, falling for an individual based on their personality over everything else.

Again, the fact that her first question was "Is that the one where you can fall in love with a dog?" also explains our friendship clearly. It also led to a brief discussion into the difference between Pansexuality and Bestiality, which she found hilarious.

Now would be a good time to point out that the restaurant was having a slow day, and the nearest people to us were about five tables away.

I then explained to her about coming to terms with being Pansexual. I am still attracted to people physically, but I don’t feel the need to approach them sexually until I get to know them on a personal level. I have been figuring this out since we were at University, and have only truly accepted myself in the past two years. I haven’t been with another girl in a sexual way; however, I have been attracted to some girls and have been too scared to try and develop a relationship with them.

As another example, I told L about an old co-worker I briefly dated; she was surprised when this occurred at the time, as I had expressed no interest in him, and telling her about him confused her. When I first met him, he had a girlfriend, which instantly stopped any attraction. I also found him cocky, overconfident, and generally just annoying.

A few months later, he was now single, and we ended up working together a lot more of the time. I started to see how funny he was, and how much he protected the people he cared about. The more I got to know him, the more attractive I found him, which is how we ended up going on that date. It only stayed a one-time thing, with us choosing to remain friends instead of possibly damaging what we had, and we remained close whilst working together.

As I explained this, more things seemed to fall into place for L: why I struggled to meet people through dating apps, such as Tinder (you don’t know someone properly before talking to them in depth for a while); why I don’t date often (a first date is about getting to know someone, but I’m not attracted to someone by looks alone); and why I fell for my sleazy dick of an ex-boyfriend (we were friends first, and I fell for his personality; when it changed, I stopped loving him).

I have been dropping hints about my sexuality to L for years. I’ve tested the waters by pointing out both guys and girls on TV that I find attractive, and seeing how she would react: it went right over her head. Every time. I told her this, and even she agreed that she has been completely oblivious in the 10+ years we’ve known each other.

So yes, my best friend now knows that I am Pansexual, and she loves me exactly the same as she did before. Was she confused? Yes. Was she upset? Yes, but only because I kept something so personal to me from her for so long (she hit me again to reiterate this point). I don’t necessarily regret not telling her earlier; as I said, it has taken me a long time to finally accept myself this way, and telling her earlier may have led to the two of us learning to accept it, which is stressful to think about even now. I know as my best friend she would accept me for who I was, but I simply wasn’t ready to accept myself; how could I possibly think anyone else would accept me before this?

Now L knows, I feel stronger, and I think our friendship will be stronger because of this. I feel I can be my usual, direct self with her again, which is relieving. I also feel I can finally be myself generally, after years of trying to cover up a side of me that I can now truthfully say I fully accept.

I do, however, regret that I can’t remember telling her. Her face would have been an absolute picture.

C x