It’s the first day of school, and you walk into class. To your delight, there’s a seat open next to a cute girl. She has bright eyes and a warm smile that beams at you when you sit next to her and introduce yourself. She tells you her name in return, and when the two of you talk each day, you feel yourself becoming increasingly drawn to her. She’s not only cute—she seems intelligent and kind. You begin to work up the nerves to ask her out, and then she says it.
“Yeah, my boyfriend…”
Your heart drops. Oh no. It’s happening again.
The dreaded straight girl crush.
According to a study done by UCLA in 2011, only about 1.7% of American adults identify as lesbian; an even smaller percentage identify as bisexual. If you are a woman loving woman in today’s society, you have to accept that this scenario is going to happen to you. It’s even more likely to happen if you are attracted to feminine girls.
I grew up in a small right-wing leaning town. Justin Bieber always used to refer to his hometown of Stratford as a “small town,” when it actually has a population of around 30,000. When I say small town, I mean it—less than 10,000 live there, and my high school was only comprised of about 1,000 kids. To add onto all of that, I’m solely attracted to feminine girls.
For me, the straight girl crush is not just another burden of being a woman loving woman. It’s the only thing I've known ever since I realized my sexuality in 7th grade.
The burden of living in such a small town was that that dating pool was already fairly small. Add an LGBTQ minority tag onto that and you’ve got yourself a handful of ten candidates at best. As a result, every single girl that I crushed on throughout high school was unbearably straight.
I caught feelings for a total of four girls throughout my high school career, and looking back, each one was straight without a question. However, while I was crushing on them, I found myself doing something that I can only describe with a Cards Against Humanity card:
Girl #1 made eye contact with me every time that I had an encounter with her in the hall. Girl #2 was a tomboy who played basketball and soccer and had never had a boyfriend. Girl #3 always seemed to talk more about female celebrities than male celebrities, and she was extremely liberal. (Unfortunately, Girl #4 was painfully straight to the extent where even my biased gay perspective couldn’t twist anything into a possibility for homosexuality.)
Looking back, I now realize that the extent to which I would interpret their actions as possible signs of homosexuality was ridiculous. I won’t go as far as calling my past-self delusional, though. My infatuation with each girl lasted for a year each. I used to cry myself to sleep because, at the end of the day, I knew that they would never fall in love with me. Because I spent four years falling for girls who could never love me back, I was petrified that I was stuck in a cycle of unrequited love that would never end. My irrational speculation of their sexualities being anything but straight, when they obviously loved boys and only boys, was my way of coping. It was my way of holding onto the tiniest shred of hope.
I allowed myself to fall in love with straight girls for four years because it was my only option. However, I have grown as a person and realized that this type of crush is the farthest thing from healthy. If you find yourself falling for a straight girl, I recommend that you take a step back and attempt to view it as logically and objectively as possible.
She’s never going to love you back in the way that you want her to, and you’re going to have to get over that unless you want to break your heart further.
If you still notice yourself struggling to fight your feelings for a straight girl, try keeping your mind occupied on something else, whether that is a new hobby, school, work, binge watching a TV show, or reading. If that still doesn’t work, try to distance yourself from her until the crush fades away, if possible. If none of these suggestions work and you still find yourself creating imaginary impossible futures with this girl, you may have to end the friendship with her.
I still occasionally develop the straight girl crush every so often, but it dies as quickly as it’s formed. It’s okay to find straight girls attractive—girls are beautiful, regardless of their sexuality. However, realizing that it wasn’t healthy to chase after girls who could never love me back was an integral step to a healthier and happier me.
