ADOLESCENTS AND FLUID SEXUALITY

BY ROSANNA MAZZITELLI

Untila few years before, everything was easier, the parents decided on everything and in spite of that the moment you might not like the adult authority that ran your life, at least you didn't have to respond to questions, dilemmas and internal conflicts that society and life put before us becoming teenagers.

It is important for teens to learn to experience sexuality as a conscious choice in that this represents an important step towards one's autonomy and towards the construction of one's own identity. Compared to this, however, the boys often find themselves facing an internal conflict doubts about their sexual orientation. They ask themselves many questions about what they like, to love people of the opposite sex or their own sex, or both.

It is not easy for one adolescent being able to immediately have clear ideas about this and often this creates strong ones discomfort both with respect to perceived confusion, which could lead to a block in the relationship with the other, but also of the big fears related to the expectations that society has towards them.

Yes, he often questions what is right for himself but also acceptable to the world around him. If you think that already the very first observation of the external genital organs of a child at his birth determines his belonging to the male or female gender, it is easy to realize how much this it will convey a series of expectations and beliefs deemed appropriate to its gender.

Itis important to underline that one of the fundamental aspects that defines who we are is “identity sexual ”, that is the subjective dimension of one's being sexed. This identity consists of four elements: biological sex (being born male or female); gender identity (the selfawareness and the experience of belonging to the male, female or ambivalent gender); the gender role (everything an individual does to show himself his status as a man or woman, for example through clothing or attitudes); sexual orientation (i.e. emotional and sexual attraction towards the opposite sex, the same sex or both).

Although the construction of identity is a process that accom panies the human being throughout his life, adolescence is the acute phase in which one needs to define oneself, becomes urgent.

In fact, in this period the adolescent, being in a transition phase, needs to experiment to understand what most belongs to him in the various spheres of life, and instead he often finds himself clashing with a society that recognizes two gender roles, male and female, and individuals are expected to behave in a manner consistent with biological sex. This assumption can only be close to a adolescent who is in search of himself and who lives a period of sexual non-definition in which homosexual behaviors and / or fantasies are part of the growth process. This goes with it one of the typical characteristics of adolescence which is the transgression that was experienced in the past through opposition to politics and a break with cultural and social aspects, today instead it seems to have moved into the sexual sphere. This leads today's teens to experiment sexual behaviors often without a real and deep awareness, but with the main purpose of attention and exhibitionism.

Accomplices the media, an excess of virtual life compared to the real one and always a sexualization earlier, today’s teens reject any standard sexual definition that makes them feel limited and often referred to as “Fluids”.

The term “Sexual Fluidity” was coined in 2008 by the American psychologist Luisa Diamond for highlight how sexual orientation (heterosexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality, asexuality, pansexuality) can be flexible and therefore undergo modifications in the course of life. The concept is then also extended to sexual identity itself which is an ever-changing process.

Experimental sexual fluidity allows adolescents, as well as adults, to be flexible in the sexual response, according to the contingent situation, allowing to experience the changes in one’s sexuality. Researchers have highlighted numerous cases in which individual report unexpected changes, both transient and lasting, in their sexual attractions, for that matter which pertains to sexual identity and behaviors. Sexual fluidity allows the teenager to experience that sexual orientation does not provide a rigidity in the choices and desires that you can try, and it is up to the individual to understand whether or not the sexual experience experienced is something isolated or that can instead describe one’s identity.

Therefore, considering that adolescence is the phase of life in which exploration is king, it is important that an individual can experiment and express their preferences, tastes, entering into conflict with those of the other and managing to integrate the differences in a functional way to the own well-being.

In this framework, as mentioned, the experimentation of sexuality is part of it integral, so teenagers can be pushed to try new experiences in all verses sexual orientation before being better defined in one of them.

Certainly the risk for a teenager, perhaps more fragile than the others and in particular a conflict with himself itself, being "fluid" could be to get bogged down in a situation of indeterminacy, failing to understand what he really feels and what the experiences are that more nourish it and are functional to itself.

In this case it can be very useful the support of the adult that helps him to orient himself towards choices of wellbeing not only of the sexual type but in all spheres of life.

An important lesson that an adult can pass on to today's teenagers is that they don't exist "better or normal" sexual orientations, but, as psychology has long decreed,any way of experiencing emotional and / or sexual attraction towards others is equally healthy.

Sexuality can be experienced as open and changeable and does not necessarily have to be reduced to a word, the important thing is to live it in a conscious and consensual way in order to be able to represent a real source of psychological well-being.