Feeling “Queer Enough”: Finding Authentic Pleasure as a Queer Person
I’m a pansexual cis-therapist with the privilege to work with many queer clients—most of whom are actively untangling the pressures, expectations, and internalized shame that surround sex.
While I don’t share all of their identities, I listen closely. What I’ve learned from sitting with queer folks in the therapy room is that sex is rarely just about sex—it’s about belonging, survival, and the subtle, often unspoken rules about what it means to be “queer enough.”
There’s so much freedom that comes with breaking heteronormative expectations around relationships and sex—and rightly so. But out of that freedom queer communities can still generate their own set of norms and expectations that don’t fit all of its members. I’ve seen so many clients wrestle with the feeling that they wretched themselves free from the oppressive mainstream culture only to feel that their sexuality isn’t “liberated enough” to count. That they’re too vanilla, too conventional, too straight-passing in some way or another.
This post is about those invisible scripts: where they come from, how they show up in queer life, and what it might look like to break free—not to conform to a better version of queerness, but to come home to your own body and truth.
What Are Sexual Scripts?
Sexual scripts are the social rules and internalized blueprints that tell us what sex is supposed to be like. They shape our expectations around:
Who initiates
What sex “should” include
What kinds of pleasure are valid
What roles we’re expected to perform (top/bottom, dom/sub, etc.)
These scripts often start in childhood—through media, religion, family systems, or early sexual experiences—and evolve as we move through our identities.
For queer people, the tension is doubled. Many queer folks grow up being told that your desire is wrong or invisible. Then, when they enter queer spaces, there’s a new set of pressures to contend with—ones that promise liberation but can quietly enforce new norms.
Queer Scripts That Keep Showing Up in Therapy
Here are a few of the cultural scripts I see queer clients carry—whether or not they actually believe them:
1. “You have to be friends with your exes.”
There’s this unspoken pressure in some queer communities to maintain emotional intimacy with former partners and to be at ease with your partners having close relationships with their exes. It’s proof that you're evolved, emotionally intelligent, or that your relationships were meaningful. But staying close to people who hurt you, confused you, or who you’re still grieving isn’t a requirement for queerness. You’re allowed to have boundaries with your exes and it doesn’t make you less evolved if you’re uncomfortable with your partner being close to an ex. What works for others does not need to work for you.
2. “You have to want lots of sex with lots of different people.”
I see this most commonly in the gay community, but it appears elsewhere as well. Conventional scripts about masculine sex-drive combined with a culture of sex-positivity can lead people to override boundaries, say yes when they want to say no, or feel shame if they require emotional intimacy to want sex. Many queer clients tell me they feel “broken” for wanting less sex than their peers—or for needing more care, slowness, and safety to access it. Desire isn’t a performance. It’s personal. And it's allowed to be tender.
3. “You have to be in an open relationship.”
Non-monogamy is beautiful—and also not for everyone. There’s sometimes a quiet judgment in queer spaces that equates monogamy with internalized heteronormativity or emotional immaturity. But relationship structure should be about fit, not status. If you’re in a closed relationship that honors your needs, that’s not a failure. It’s alignment.
4. “If you want to be affirmed, you should want sex that affirms your gender.”
This script is especially common in trans communities, but can affect anyone whose sexual preferences don’t match the expectations tied to their gender identity. For example, a trans man might feel pressure to enjoy penetrative sex or be hyper-dominant to prove masculinity. A trans woman might feel invalidated if she wants to top or enjoy genital stimulation. This script ties sexual behavior to binary gender performance, limiting freedom and complexity. True affirmation isn’t about performing your gender through sex. It’s about being met, seen, and cared for—however that looks for you.
5. “You need to know exactly who you are and what you like.”
There’s a cultural value in queer spaces on clarity—about roles, orientation, preferences, kinks. But not everyone knows. Just because they know that not all of them conforms to heteronormative expectations doesn’t mean they fit neatly into a queer category. In fact, because we are all deeply individual when it comes to sex and intimacy–none of us (queer or not) are fully expressed by any one set of norms. However, as a queer person, to explore the parts of you that are more straight-passing risks losing esteem or membership in your community.
The Cost of Chasing Queer Enoughness
These scripts don’t exist in a vacuum. They reflect a long history of survival in hostile systems—where being palatable, desirable, or “good at sex” could be a route to safety or acceptance. It makes sense.
But when you’re constantly measuring your erotic life against what it’s supposed to look like, you lose contact with your own body. You may find yourself:
Saying yes when your body says no
Feeling numb during sex but not knowing how to stop
Mistaking performance for connection
Having sex to maintain belonging, not intimacy
Sex becomes something you do, not something you feel.
Reclaiming Erotic Truth: Some Queer-Affirming Practices
Therapy is one place to explore your authentic erotic self. But you don’t need to be in therapy to start shifting. Here are some practices I’ve seen help queer clients return to themselves:
1. Get Curious About Where Your Scripts Came From
What did you learn about sex growing up?
What did you learn from your first queer experiences?
What do you assume everyone else wants or expects?
Mapping these out with curiosity—not shame—can help you start noticing where someone else’s story is living in your body.
2. Try Erotic Mapping or Somatic Awareness Practices
Instead of focusing on what you “should” like, start asking:
What actually feels good to me?
You can do this alone or with a partner by slowly exploring different kinds of touch, sensation, and rhythm—without any agenda. Sensate focus exercises (from sex therapy) can be powerful here. These help you tune into feeling rather than performing, reestablishing a connection between sensation and choice.
3. Let Go of the Need to Be “Good” at Sex
This one is especially hard for high-achievers, trauma survivors, and those from marginalized identities. Being “good” at sex can feel like a way to earn love or safety. But you don’t have to perform worthiness.
Sex doesn’t have to be dazzling. It can be slow, quiet, silly, clumsy, or full of pauses. The more space you allow for realness, the more permission you give your body to actually arrive.
4. Uncouple Sex and Belonging
This is especially important if community and intimacy are deeply entwined for you.
You are still queer enough if you:
Don’t want sex right now
Are in a monogamous relationship
Don’t stay friends with your exes
Aren’t sure what kind of sex you want
Say no without explanation
Your worth doesn’t hinge on how queer your erotic life looks. You don’t need to perform queerness to deserve your place.
A Note From a Cis Therapist
As someone who is generally straight-passing, I had my own concerns about being queer enough to write this post. I get to move in and out of marginalization depending on how ‘out’ I choose to be — so who am I to speak to anyone’s queer experience?
What I offer in the therapy room—and what I hope this piece offers—is not authority, but attunement. My intention here is to provide relief and affirmation for those who quietly feel like their not ‘queer enough’–not to criticize the queer community. We all make norms and expectations when we’re in groups–and this process is accelerated when that community is marginalized. I witness queer clients navigating these pressures with nuance, grief, and immense strength. I see the ways cultural scripts—both heteronormative and queer-normative—get lodged in the nervous system.
And I believe you deserve an erotic life that is not dictated by fear or expectation, but shaped by your own curiosity, agency, and care.
What Queer Erotic Liberation Can Look Like
True liberation isn’t about being more queer, more open, more sexual. It’s about being more you. It’s about having the freedom to say:
This is what I want.
This is what I don’t want.
I’m still figuring it out.
I want to go slower.
I want to try something new.
That’s queerness too: fluid, evolving, human.
Therapy That Honors Your Erotic Self
I offer queer-affirming, body-based sex therapy that supports clients in unlearning scripts and reclaiming their own erotic truth.
Whether you’re healing from trauma, navigating desire changes, exploring identity, or simply wanting to feel more present during intimacy—this space is for you.
