Stating the Obvious: Conversion Therapy Does Not Work

If it did, I would be straight. But I’m still asexual, and I always will be.

For no other reason than because you exist. You’re worthy exactly as you are. | Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

Being straight and cisgender is the default setting for society. It’s been that way for as long as I can remember, and far before I was born.

From the moment I was old enough to grasp what that meant, I was inundated from all sides by the assumption and expectation that I would grow up to be a straight woman. I was constantly asked if I had a crush on any of the boys at school.

I was teased throughout my childhood about not having a boyfriend yet.

My mother’s adult friends would occasionally joke about it, one woman even telling my mother she should lock me away before the boys caught sight of my developing 14-year-old body.

It made me very uncomfortable to be sexualized by adults.

From the very first comment in my pre-teen years, all the way up to today, they were holding their breath for something that simply would never happen. Boyfriends? Yes. Romance? Sure! Marriage? Quite happily.

But being straight? Sorry.

Despite all the pressure, I am still not straight. I remain firmly, resolutely, and unwaveringly asexual. That rush of attraction and the boy-crazy phase of teenagerdom simply never happened to me, no matter how many times my parents insisted it would.

You can’t change somebody’s sexuality through pressure or therapy. You can’t groom somebody into becoming straight, gay, bi, or anything else.

Attraction is an involuntary bodily reaction, and we don’t get to choose how it affects us and when.

I’ve been surrounded on all sides with imagery and media surrounding straight sexuality, from heterosexual relationships in all of the movies and shows I watched, the songs I listened to, and most of the people around me.

I’m still asexual. And I always will be.

There are a lot of labels. That’s because human sexuality is ridiculously complex! | Photo by Alexander Grey on Unsplash

For a chunk of my life, I genuinely tried to be straight. I thought something was wrong with me, and I was desperate to fix it.

This is because nobody ever told me that asexuality existed, much less that it might apply to me and my lived experience. I was taught that everybody experiences sexual attraction and that it is entirely normal. When puberty struck, I would suddenly want to date boys.

My mother helpfully added that it would also be okay if I liked girls, which was sweet of her but didn’t solve my issue.

At no point did somebody explain to me that it was also normal, and perfectly fine if I never felt attraction at all. I doubt that the idea even occurred to anyone in my life.

Asexual people make up around 1% of the total human population, and since we’re such a small minority it’s no surprise that general awareness is severely lacking.

The ignorance can be funny sometimes, such as when my spouse’s friend bluntly told him, “You hear about people being asexual, but you never see them in real life!”

He was so adorably confused when he relayed the story to me later. It’s about par for the course.

On the other hand, the lack of awareness can cause serious problems for people like me; I had no frame of reference to understand what was different about me, and my mental health suffered as a result.

I spent years trying to force myself to feel the attraction that wasn’t there.

I even went so far as to pretend to have crushes on male celebrities, and I got into a toxic relationship because I thought dating someone might trigger those feelings. I ignored red flags in favor of trying to ‘fix’ something that wasn’t broken in the first place.

If sexuality is a choice, I made it over and over again. I chose ‘straight.’

I’m still asexual. And I always will be.

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Therapy is fantastic. Conversion therapy is a torturous scam. | Photo by Mitch on Unsplash

So, what does all of this have to do with conversion therapy? Well, like I said; I chose to be straight. It didn’t work.

And it isn’t just my own story, either. I wasn’t personally sent into a dedicated program for conversion therapy with the stated goal of changing my orientation, but other people certainly have been.

Anecdotally, I know a transgender woman who was forced into conversion therapy as a child. It didn’t work on her, either. It just made it harder for her to come out later in life.

Her story is a common one. For various reasons, many people struggle with coming to terms with LGBTQ+ identities — especially as parents of LGBTQ+ youth.

Some religious teachings preach that gay people are sinful, or even demonic. Being anything other than straight and cisgender is a choice they’re making in defiance of God.

Some people just don’t understand that sexual orientations aren’t black and white and that human psychology and physiology is complex.

Some people are just confused and disgusted by anything different from their own life experiences.

And some heavily misguided, misinformed, and toxic people believe that LGBTQ+ people are mentally ill, or that we’re more likely to be child predators and a threat to their safety.

I’ve run into a few of these myself. I’ve been told that identifying as an asexual person is just a cry for attention. I’ve been told by family that they are sad for me, and want me to get my hormones checked because I’m probably just sick.

I’ve been accused of being a child predator online for being publicly LGBTQ+. I’ve been told by another follower of my religion that our gods are ashamed of me.

I’ve been told I’m a misandrist, cold-hearted ice queen. I’ve been harassed, talked down to, and mistreated for my sexuality. I’ve even had someone argue with me and insist that I’m heterosexual, raising their voice when I refused to agree.

I’m still asexual. And I always will be.

It’s a meaty topic. | Photo by Marcel Strauß on Unsplash

I’ve spent a little time talking about how conversion therapy can’t work because sexuality is involuntary. What I haven’t done is explain what exactly conversion therapy is.

In short, conversion therapy is defined as a systematic attempt to change someone’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or expression using pressure and coercion.

Typically, conversion therapy relies on pseudoscience and misinformation. It begins with the idea that being LGBTQ+ is a mental illness that can be cured and uses mechanisms of shame and repression to try and change the person’s identity.

It doesn’t work. As I’ve already explained, sexual attraction is involuntary.

Gender identity, as well, is not something that one can simply change on a whim. It doesn’t matter how much pressure you apply; conscious choice is not involved. You can choose to hide it from others, but that doesn’t change how you feel.

All conversion therapy realistically does is create a sense of shame and stigma in the mind of the individual.

It tells them that they are wrong, sick, and need to change. Much like any other form of harassment and prejudice, it only succeeds in driving people back into the closet in self-defense.

As any mental health professional will tell you, filling a person with shame and rejection over a fundamental aspect of their identity does not improve their mental health.

Rates of depression, anxiety, and even suicide are heightened in survivors of conversion therapy, and most individuals experience symptoms of severe trauma in the aftermath. Many countries have outright banned the practice as a human rights violation.

In some cases, conversion therapy tactics have been described as torture.

I’m very glad that I was personally never sent for conversion therapy. Given the level of denial and worry I implanted in my mind, I can imagine that I would have been very heavily influenced into self-loathing.

But even with all of the stress and pressure I put on myself to change, the same thing is true for me as it is for everyone else. I remain the same.

I’m still asexual. And I always will be.

A little self-portrait to end the show. | Photo by Esteban López on Unsplash

I did choose to be straight, but in the end, I had to accept that it just wasn’t going to work.

I had to learn, through a lot of effort and research, that there was never anything wrong with me. I’m a normal, healthy woman who just so happens to have been born asexual. That’s fine. I’m not missing out.

Throughout this piece, I’ve hammered home the fact that I will always be asexual. To date, that’s been my lived experience.

But as fluid as human sexuality can be, it’s entirely possible that there may come a time in my life when the label of asexuality no longer fits.

There are people who have lived their entire lives attracted to the opposite sex and gender, only to suddenly feel a rush of desire towards a person of the same sex. This is perfectly normal, and it can happen at any point in your life.

Stories like this often provide a twisted justification for believers in conversion therapy; it gives them license to insist that if you just try hard enough, you can be ‘fixed.’

But while this does occasionally happen, it is, once again, involuntary. It’s a natural, spontaneous thing just like any other kind of attraction, not something that one can trigger on demand.

Nobody can alter your identity on demand. Not anybody else, not even you. And all of this is quite apart from the fact that there’s no reason for you to change, even if it were possible.

There isn’t anything that anybody can do to change who I am and what I feel. It is intrinsic to my brain, my body, and my sense of self. I am who I am, and so far it has remained pretty solid.

Conversion therapy doesn’t work. If you could force somebody to change their sexuality through exposure and pressure, damn near everybody would be straight.

Those parents who worry about their kids ‘turning gay’ after reading a book with gay characters can rest easy. I’ve been reading books with straight romances my entire life, and here I am.

I’m still asexual. And as far as I know, I always will be.

Solidarity wins.

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