It’s adolescence all over again.
Dating as a girl has been much better than it was for me as any other gender. I’m able to grab attention with my looks as well as my personality and talents, my appearance actually expresses my personality and interests, and nobody expects me to be a “man” anymore. I’ve had many great experiences - even sexual fantasies fullfilled - that I can attribute to switching to a more natural gender and expression of myself. However, things get predictably confusing at points.
Like many girls, I’m finding it somewhat difficult to build friendships with guys. Kindness and good intentions quickly turn into unwanted sexual advances. I’m a pseudo-lesbian, an anatomically atypical girl who likes other girls. In my male adolescence many years ago, I always found it completely baffling that girls couldn’t just say “no, I don’t want to go out with you.” Now in my female “adolescence,” I’m starting to understand the other side. It’s hard to reject people! I’m not mean, and it’s not easy telling someone who thinks I’m great that I essentially don’t want anything to do with them. I do it, since I neither have sexual interest in men nor dishonesty, but I always feel so bad doing it. It’s another thing to get used to, just like how I have to get used to being in male-dominated social spaces and not feeling like a lamb in the middle of a wolfpack.
While many people enjoy the idea of having sex with a trans girl, establishing relationships has proven much more difficult. Even very open-minded individuals tend towards mostly traditional, mostly monogamous, heterosexual (or homosexual) relationships. Where would I fit in? Would I be a girlfriend or boyfriend? What partner can really deal with the fact that I’ve only begun transition, haven’t started taking hormones, and work my day job as a male? I have no interest in a “heterosexual” relationship, yet my state of gender purgatory seems to preclude me from entering lesbian relationships. I hope it’s possible to find a niche here, lest I be prematurely be forced to pick a gender and stick to it. I’m not unhappy with my male half and somewhat like being a mixed-gender person, but can I fight the pressure to pick one or the other forever?
-Erin
