Strictly platonic

In the interest of full disclosure, with the purpose being to plainly state: This is who I am, and I am not ashamed, it just is.

In high school, I wondered why I never got a date. I though to myself, "Perhaps boys, like dogs, are afraid of my crutches," as if the fact that I have CP scared them off. I may not be a model, but you will not turn to stone if you look at me. Nor is my personality or IQ score hideous either. I am 21 and I have only been on one date. I still wonder what deters people from me, romantically speaking. Sure, I'm not perfect, I'm the first one to admit it, but everyone has their flaws. I know being introverted doesn't necessarily help matters, yet I know introverts who aren't single.

Have people's assumptions, conscious or not, kept everything in the strictly platonic zone? I would say yes, probably, to some extent, though it's hard to know the severity of that extent. A lack of interest from the opposite sex has led me to question my sexuality.

I definitely like men, but if I were to place myself on Kinsey's continuum of sexual orientation, a scale that runs from zero to six (zero being exclusively heterosexual and six being exclusively homosexual), I would currently place myself at two with my attraction to men accounting for 70%, and my attraction to women accounting for 30%. I know that my attraction to women, however subtle, is not some kind of experimental college fad because I first started to notice it at age twelve. It is important to note that sexuality itself, and therefore sexual orientation, is a fluid thing and will not necessarily stay stable over time.

In the last six months, I have asked two people out, one female and one male, and I've been rejected both times. Putting yourself out there on the line is never fun, especially when your affections are not returned. This is a universal truth. I don't like to be vulnerable, no one really does, but having Cerebral Palsy gives me a heightened sense of vulnerability in daily life, not just in relationships. I wonder how many people can get past the crutches, past the physical, and into the personality, the mind and the soul, that which truly makes me, me.