Usually when I tell people I’m pansexual, their first reaction is “You’re a what??” And not surprisingly; pansexuals aren’t really represented in mainstream media or generally talked about. If you’re one of the people who don’t know what pansexuality means, that’s okay though, I’m here to tell you about it.
At this point I should probably mention, that I’m only capable of talking about pansexuality from my point of view. Every pansexual is an individual and as such experiences their sexuality in a unique way. There aren’t really any universal definitions that would fit all.
As you’ve probably guessed by now, I define myself as a pansexual. I’ve known that I wasn’t straight since I was something like 12 years old, but then again, I also knew that I wasn’t gay, which caused me to be pretty confused about my sexuality for a while. Defining myself as bisexual didn’t feel quite right either, which led to even more confusion since I thought that those three were the only sexualities there were. That’s obviously not true, which I found out a few years later as a result of some serious googling. Of course, spreading awareness about different sexual and gender minorities would’ve spared me from all that confusion, which is why I believe having an extensive sex education program is super important for schools.
So, what is a pansexual then? For me it means the ability to be attracted to anyone regardless of their gender. It definitely does not mean that I am attracted to everyone I meet, but when I find someone attractive, they could be a man, a woman or something totally different. It doesn’t really matter at all. You might think that this sounds an awful lot like bisexuality and of course that depends on how bisexuality is defined. Like pansexuals, bisexuals are individuals who all feel a bit differently about their sexuality, so no universal definition applies for everyone. However, bisexuality is often associated with attraction to two genders, hence the prefix bi, whereas pan means everyone. For me pansexuality also contains an element of gender blindness, meaning that someone’s gender has so little significance to me that in a way I don’t see it at all. I really only care about their personality and that’s what makes them attractive in my eyes. But as I said, some bisexuals may feel this way as well and there might often be quite a lot of overlapping in the definitions of pansexual and bisexual. The most important thing is that everyone gets to identify with whichever label they feel the most comfortable with. Not labelling yourself is also totally okay.
Right now I’m in a relationship with a guy. I’m a girl, so people usually assume that I’m straight. It’s good to remember, however, that no matter who I’m dating I’m still a pansexual. Pansexuality also doesn’t make me more likely to cheat, contrary to what some people believe. So please, do treat us respectfully and don’t assume stuff that may be kind of harmful. Also, feel free to spread awareness about pansexuality – and maybe next time I tell someone I’m pansexual, they’ll answer with “Oh, I know what that means!”