Can we talk about bisexuality?

Bisexual / Pensexual here - I struggle to be involved in any sort of LGBTQ+ events as I feel I'm not valid enough to do so. I have been with both men and women and I have friends from every background but because I'm not with a woman and have to then explain I'm Bi / Pan I feel like an intruder.

My workplace is actually doing a bit of a deep dive into bisexuals in the company as they did a piece of work recently involving the whole community and the bisexual staff were marked the lowest supported and had the worst mental health so they are trying to find out why and what is needed to be done to help said staff.

I think a woman who has a long term relationship with a man, gets married, has kids, buys a house etc and then announces at 50yo actually I'm a lesbian." Bye." is very narcissistic.

It may be in individual cases, but I think that many women reassess their lives when children are becoming more independent and they are in perimenopause, and discover their lives aren't all they want.

Going to get flamed but I think a woman who has a long term relationship with a man, gets married, has kids, buys a house etc and then announces at 50yo actually I'm a lesbian." Bye." is very narcissistic. This exact thing happened to a friend of my family. They had a shared business, house and children.All blown up. I know every divorce is bad but it's the extra level of I was only with you because it was appropriate and now they are teenagers I'm off. It doesn't sit well with me.
The DH tried to kill himself. Sounds pathetic but it made him feel that the last 20 years of his life had been a sham. She didn't leave him for another man, she left because she preferred women and always had. Her adult DS won't speak to her and the DD has just abandoned them and moved away. House had to be sold. Business kaput. She declares herself bi.
A sad story of a lovely family ruined really. If she had said she was a lesbian when she was young ( I know it was harder but nobody put a gun to her head to marry this man - it was voluntary) I'm sure she'd be happily married to the love of her life now, finally..
I know of 3 other women who have done this, and it the sexes were reversed people would think it was outrageous ( and that's 4 in a little suburb)

I actually think it would be a good idea to set up our own groups. I also think that if the B felt more welcome in the LGB spaces they're supposedly welcome in to begin with and weren't treated with suspicion they might be able to attend meetings and contribute on behalf of the B, I certainly don't want the gay community doing all the work for me that would defeat the point. The two aren't mutually exclusive. Again, we're not asking to be accepted into LG only spaces, we're asking to be fully accepted into the spaces we're already supposed to be welcome and currently aren't.

Not everyone is going to accept everyone else that's normal and human but equally if you're going to advertise yourselves as being welcoming to the B, then actually make sure how you treat them reflects that. (I'm using 'you' generally, not specifically aimed at anyone)

The irony of a post to talk about bisexuality and those who are actually bi talking about their experiences being told to shut up and stop complaining is not lost on me.

What makes you say that? That's exactly how I saw my DP - a bisexual man in a heterosexual relationship. A person can be bisexual but a relationship can't, well not unless you're doing polyamory and ain't nobody got time for that.

@JoyousGreyOrca

"Use whatever label you want. But at least be brave enough to not be in the closet"

Speaking as a lesbian who has been out for 47yrs, that's a rather unfair and unkind thing to say.

No has to come out if they don't want to - isn't a requirement. There are also a multitude of reasons why someone might choose to remain under the radar that have absolutely nothing to do with 'not being brave enough'.

The LGB Alliance have made clear several times that they don’t particularly want to support Bi people.

The "B" didnt appear out of nowhere, lots of people have fought for visibility and "done something positive" to achieve this
Its a bit disingenuous to suggest that biphobia doesnt exist within the community, it definitely does. From talking to my lesbian friends, a lot of it stems from the horrendous idea that women can be "turned" by the right man, so i get it (i dont agree, obvs as a bisexual woman!) But i can empathise that it must be interminably frustrating to meet this trope constantly and see that bisexual women who have relationships with men seem to validate it in the eyes of n*bheads who have no capacity for nuance or understanding

I am making zero assumptions. But I am older, and women in same sex couples my age very rarely had children unless it was in a previous relationship with a man.
I accept it may be very different for younger women.

Well in the nineties there were plenty of places where there were lesbians not doing butch and femme.

I'm not pissed off at the way I've been treated by lesbians. Far from it.

I simply don't care. You, on the other hand, were the one eager to talk about the bisexuality you so obviously resent and concerned enough to post a thread about it.

Sounds like a 'you' issue to me.

I've watched this thread without commenting until I came to this post.

Given your response, I wonder what place you think the 'B' (largely invisible) has under the rainbow/alphabet soup mascot in the first place. For me - personally only I would add - it has none. I've not felt part of 'The Community', no matter who I happened to be in a relationship with. I've been dismayed by the recent onslaughts against the rights of lesbians and would always support you to the hilt with that. I fully respect that many lesbians don't want to include bisexuals in their dating pool. Fine. I wouldn't want to date anyone on that pretext and I respect others' boundaries totally. I also respect that, when in a relationship with a man, I do not experience anywhere near the same prejudice and bias as I experienced when I lived with a woman.

But the prejudice against bisexual women on this thread has been illuminating - and accords with a lot of the attitudes I've long been familiar with. Biphobia, it seems, is still eminently acceptable.

Fine by me. I have no Pride. I've never belonged in The Community anyway, and this thread illustrates precisely why.

Thats not reflective of my experience @JoyousGreyOrca. Since having children with my wife we’ve both been joining LGB parent groups and seeking out other two mum and two dad families when we encounter them, partly because we think it’s great for our kids to have some other examples of families like theirs in their lives. We’ve mainly come across female female couples (about 20 couples living in and around London and with young kids so probably mainly in their 30s or early 40s) and I’d say about 80% of those have been made up of one lesbian and one bisexual woman.

Perhaps you’ve encountered more bisexuals who are with women than you think and you’re just assuming they are lesbians. Some bisexual women who are with women just let others make the assumption they are lesbians unless specifically asked because it’s less hassle and you’re less likely to encounter possible biphobia (from all sides) in addition to the homophobia!

I was lucky enough to be in Stoke Newington in the 90s where there were three women only bars not too far away @JoyousGreyOrca, not sure whether it's still a lesbian hotspot!

@KnutsfordCityLimits Yes most lesbians and gay men in the past moved to cities because in a market town, the number of out lesbians used to be absolutely tiny. So your chance of meeting anyone you got on with was fairly small.