What Do You Actually Want? Queering Relationships and Sexual Scripts

Most of us spend years figuring out who we are. Coming out, naming our identities, finding language for the parts of ourselves that the dominant culture never had words for. That work is real and it is hard and it matters. But there is a whole other layer of work that does not always get the same attention: figuring out what we actually want.Not what we are supposed to want. Not what the script says. What we, in our actual bodies, actually want.

The Script Nobody Told You About

We absorb relationship and sexual scripts early, and most of us absorb them without realizing it. It is the Hallmark movie. The health class that taught sex as risk management. The porn that shows up in your browser before you have any framework for what is real versus performed. The message, direct or implied, that sex ends a certain way, relationships look a certain way, and desire is supposed to flow in a particular direction.Even in queer spaces, there are scripts. Expectations about who should initiate, what your gender presentation says about your role, what kind of sex you are supposed to enjoy based on how you identify. We reject one set of norms and sometimes just pick up a different set without stopping to ask whether these fit either.Reflection: Where did you learn what sex and relationships were supposed to look like? What sources shaped that picture, and how much of it actually fits who you are?

What Queering Actually Means

Queering your sex life and your relationships is not about doing it differently for the sake of being different. It is about getting genuinely curious. It is asking: where does this feel off? Where am I going through the motions? Where am I following a rule I never consciously agreed to?And then, just as importantly, it is asking: where does this feel like a real yes?That distinction matters. A lot of us are very practiced at performing okayness, going along with things that feel neutral or slightly uncomfortable because we have been taught that our comfort is not the priority. Unlearning that takes time. It also takes a body, and your body has been trying to tell you something.Reflection: Think about something in your relationship or sex life that you do because you feel like you should. What would it feel like to get curious about that instead of just continuing it?

Your Body Is The Compass

This is where embodied consent comes in. Not consent as a checklist, but consent as a moment-to-moment awareness of what a yes, a no, and a maybe actually feel like in your body.The full spectrum is not just yes or no. It includes the enthusiastic yes, the hard no, and all the territory in between: the "maybe if it went slower," the "I think I might be interested in that," the "I feel like I should want this but something is off." That middle territory is where so much of the real work happens.Your body knows. When you are bracing instead of opening, that is information. When you feel numb or checked out, that is information. When something makes you lean in even a little, that is information worth paying attention to.Reflection: Think of something that recently gave you a moment of genuine pleasure, big or small. Where did you feel it in your body? Can you locate that sensation and stay with it for a moment?

There Is No Right Way

This is the part that tends to land differently when you actually let it in: there is no correct version of queer sex or queer relationship. There is just what actually works for you, negotiated honestly with the people you are in relationship with.That might look traditional in some ways. It might look nothing like what anyone around you is doing. It might shift over time. The goal is not to arrive at the right answer. The goal is to stay curious enough to keep asking the question, and grounded enough in your own body to actually hear the answer.Accessing your authentic pleasure is not frivolous. It is not a bonus you earn after you have handled everything else. For people who have been told their bodies do not matter, their desires are shameful, or their way of loving is wrong, choosing pleasure is a form of liberation.Reflection: What is one thing you have been curious about in your relationship or your sexuality that you have not given yourself permission to explore? What would it mean to give yourself that permission?

This Work Is Worth Doing

At Open Space Therapy Collective, our therapists work with queer folks navigating all of this: the scripts, the shame, the slow process of figuring out what you actually want, and the work of building relationships where you can ask for it. If you’re ready to go deeper, our sex therapy services can help you explore these questions with more honesty, care, and support. Book a free 15-minute intro call and let’s figure out what’s possible.

Written by Renae Johnson, LPCC, ATR-BC (they/them)