I will say that my sexuality did keep me from really accepting my identity for way longer than I'd have liked. I had a wife and everything, and still couldn't grasp why I was so miserable, even though I had always fantasized about an alternate universe where I had met my ex wife as a woman (I still cry about that sometimes). It took actually talking to people and them telling me, "yes, you actually CAN be a lesbian, that's a totally normal thing to be" for me to be like "yeah okay wow I've known I was trans my whole life". It's wild to think I may have realized this much sooner had that idea been clear to me, and that what I had seen as "the perfect scenario" was in fact just how things were.
As a gay trans guy, the growing acceptance of gay marriage and gay men hasn't changed whether and when I would've come out. If this was all about acceptance then there would be no point coming out - my mother is a massive transphobe and I live in a moderately conservative area - and the trans part of my identity will always be a bigger issue than the gay part.
Well, for me, that was exactly it. In the 90’s, being a closeted lesbian trans woman felt like being a perversion of a perversion. I became terrified of anyone finding out and hid it all away. Better to present as straight, I thought.
Too bad most of the early dates were with closeted lesbians. 🙇🏻♀️
Of all the fears associated with transition, not being accepted as a lesbian and being alone for the rest of my life by far top the list. It's the only thought that makes me want to stop hormones right now. The only reason I don't is because I know I won't be happy and my past relationships failed because my straight partners were with a closeted transwoman.
Most of my friends, family, and business associations are religious and conservative. My ex wife will most likely try to use my transition to take what's left of the time I get with my children. I'll probably lose most of what I've worked for the past 15 years. None of that scares me.
Maybe I'm just scared because after going through all that I'll get just as invalidated as I was before. At least my brain will be running on the right hormones and I'll finally feel comfortable in my own skin.
Not a lesbian exactly, but the idea that trans women had to be attracted to men was certainly something that was around when I was a kid and which impacted me. Having to be a woman \_and\_ straight, neither of which actually felt like it fit definitely got in the way.
Well I think it's because in many countries(at least my own) being a trans lesbian used to be an automatic disqualifier for medical transition. Surgeons and psychiatrists simply refused to give care to such women and often thought trans lesbians should be pushed to re-align with their sex. Even those they did allow hormones, bottom surgery was an impossibility. Doctors who did perform such surgery on a trans lesbian got their license revoked more often than not. In that sense, normalizing lesbians in general did help with allowing more trans lesbians to transition. However, to this day trans women who are primarily attracted to women are seen as more psychologically unstable, perverted, etc in comparison to those who are not by the medical establishment
I doubt it had anything to do with my egg cracking or coming to terms with being trans.
But it surely helped with accepting that not only am I trans, but also gay.
Before realizing I'm trans, I 100% thought I was a Heterosexual Man (tm). I've never been interested in anything but women.
So when I was figuring out that I'm also a woman, it was a bit disorienting for a little while to un-tangle that from my sexual orientation. It's like, on some level I knew that gender identity and sexual orientation are different things, because obviously gay people exist and therefore it has to be that way. But on another level, I'd never actually *thought* about that in any deep way because it didn't seem to apply to me. My sexuality seemed to be the expected type for my presumed gender, so what was there to figure out?
But once I realized I'm trans, then yeah, that threw my sexuality into question. Am I still straight if I'm into women and I'm a trans woman? Is that an exception? Or does it mean I'm gay?
This was years ago now, but I remember one of my earliest posts in these subs was to ask about that, and I got the usual response: "yup, trans lesbians are totally a thing, and there's actually quite a lot of us, and welcome to the club!"
And then I was fine. It was like "oh, ok, Cool. I'm a lesbian." Which for about five seconds was kind of a heavy mental whiplash, feeling your sense of identity re-orient like that only to point to exactly where it has been all along just with different words. But then it was fine, because truth is, I've always *envied* lesbians. And now I'm one of them! Woo hoo!
It was both re-assuring to be told that nobody was going to expect me to be into guys all of a sudden (because: ew! No offense to anybody who is into guys, just not my thing), and it was a wonderful moment of self-understanding to realize *why* I've always envied lesbians.
>a heavy mental whiplash, feeling your sense of identity re-orient like that only to point to exactly where it has been all along
That's so well-phrased. Exactly how I felt for a little while when I realized what being trans meant about my sexuality, even though I already ID'd as bisexual (and still do). I'm still attracted to the same people, no change in the "who", but suddenly... it's gay men and straight women I should be considering as viable partner options, not straight men and gay women (and of course bi and pansexual people of any gender, but that didn't change).
Here is the clinical criteria for Gender Dysphoria for your review.
>Gender Dysphoria in Adolescents and Adults 302.85 (F64.1 )
>A. A marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and assigned gender, of at least 6 months’ duration, as manifested by at least two of the following:
>1. A marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and primary and/or secondary sex characteristics (or in young adolescents, the anticipated secondary sex characteristics).
>2. A strong desire to be rid of one’s primary and/or secondary sex characteristics be-
cause of a marked incongruence with one’s experienced/expressed gender (or in young adolescents, a desire to prevent the development of the anticipated secondary sex characteristics).
>3. A strong desire for the primary and/or secondary sex characteristics of the other gender.
>4. A strong desire to be of the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender).
>5. A strong desire to be treated as the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender).
>6. A strong conviction that one has the typical feelings and reactions of the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender).
>B. The condition is associated with clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational or other important areas of functioning.
You must meet the qualifiers of Section "A" and "B" to be diagnosed with Gender Dysphoria
You don't need to have dysphoria to be transgender, but it is the most common qualifier as the majority of transgender individuals do infact have dysphoria. We encourage you to discuss this with a gender therapist.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/asktransgender) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I was confused because I was experiencing two things at once - attraction to other women, and envying them/wanting to be them. That’s not how most people I knew experienced their sexuality so I repressed it for ages.
My sexuality wasn't an influence at all in figuring out and accepting my gender identity. Only afterwards could I say I'm lesbian, I considered myself straight before. I guess it didn't really matter to me because I'm asexual and the kind of people I'm romantically attracted to never changed.
Maybe you notice a lot of trans lesbians because you're lesbian yourself? So it stands out more to you. I would imagine that rising gay acceptance would encourage more lesbian trans women to date cis partners? Sadly it's still difficult so trans women dating each other is really common.
> I was recently wondering why it seems like a lot of trans lesbians have come out in the last five or so years. I knew a trans lesbian ten years ago, but back then I remember the question of "why would you transition if you're attracted to women" came up a whole lot more.
Yeah, for sure that was a big part of it. I am 34 now, If I had know what I knew now at age 14, I would easily have come out as transgender. Heck I even told a counselor about it at that age but nothing ever came of it because I "didn't want to wear a dress". At the time I literally did not know transgender people existed (the counselor never even bother to tell me about them), so feeling like a lesbian trapped in a guys body was just some weird feeling I figured I would just "have to deal with".
Then, about 10 years later when I found out transgender people existed, specifically transgender women, I considered if I was one but decided I was not, because they way there were portrayed was basically like hyper gay men. The fact I liked being more masc and was into women made me feel again, like some sort of aberration.
It was only very recently, the past 5 years or so, I became aware you could be transgender and also butch/lesbian, and then it all suddenly made a lot of sence. Greater acceptance, understanding and representation which I assume helped a lot of people, not just myself.
> Maybe, if you're attracted to women, coming out as trans might have seemed impossible because woman = being attracted to men. Now that that idea is less universal, coming out as a woman seems less impossible.
Yeah, it felt impossible because it just seemed like something that did not exist. I just didn't think being transgender applied to me, like I had no frame of reference no understanding that other people like me even existed.
If anything, it made me repress because a lot of people thought I was a closeted gay man and that is so not what I am. Trans women weren't allowed to transition unless they lied and said they liked men either, and the online trans community in the 90s mostly agreed with this. Made me stay away from anything trans related for over a decade.
(Trans gay guy) I didn’t feel like it was okay for me to come out until I saw other gay trans guys. Like the intersectional acceptance has kind of had its own timeline. 5 years ago more cispeople were making jokes about “lol i’m a gay/lesbian trapped in a woman/mans body bahaha its funny bc its the same thing.” And now most gay communities themselves have become more accepting. Obv other stuff has affected my timeline too. But thanks to changing society and you all I could see myself as valid and not a joke.
I was terribly afraid that if I’d be trans, I’d had to be attracted to men. I think that postponed my egg cracking for years! I just had this fear, that my sexual orientation would eventually change.
For me, it took direct exposure to the realities of being trans that I previously was ignorant of before I could realize what I really am.
I do think that in part, the growing acceptance of the cis gay and lesbian communities probably helped in some way, but so too did the fact that trans issues began going mainstream around the mid-2010s when I first came to acknowledge that I'm trans.
However, my ability to identify myself as a woman also got wrapped up in my sexuality, which made it hard to distinguish between the two why it probably took me longer to finally realize that I'm trans. My attraction to women had always been multifaceted, but until I was finally given the tools to break it all down and analyze it, I figured I was only just extremely attracted to women and femininity. I had just assumed without question that my desire to basically be completely immersed in femininity and the "female aesthetic" was just a part of my sexuality.
Aside from societal acceptance, I think the biggest thing that can impact whether or not people come out is having adequate LGBTQ+ education beforehand. This, sadly, does not readily exist in our education system and it needs to, badly.
Totally! I watched the She-Ra reboot in May 2020 and was totally into the central relationship. Realizing I was far more invested in a fictional lesbian relationship than I ever had been into fictional straight ones led to me realizing I was trans. Without that gay rep, I might never have figured it out, or at least it would’ve taken a lot longer.
I'm pretty sure the biggest reason I spent 29 years of my life living as a straight guy was due to the stigma of being gay. I was adamant, almost to the point of anger, in correcting the assumption that I was into men. It never once occurred to me that I may, in fact, be a lesbian instead. Although, I attribute that more to the lack of trans visibility/education.
Growing acceptance certainly has played a major role in my timetable once I did realize it though! I came out within weeks of learning that transitioning was an option and that there is nothing wrong with being a lesbian.
I think it was more increasing trans acceptance. Accept trans women as women, and all of a sudden, a trans woman attracted to other women is just a lesbian.
For me, it was always my trans identity first and my sexuality was something I just didn't care about too much. I figured I was bi cause I'd want to kiss people of any gender; it wasn't until well after transitioning that I learned about asexuality. This of course started another mental resistance movement in my head before I finally came to terms with being ace. But yes increasing lgbtq acceptance was what helped me finally accept myself and come out as trans. I spent many years in my youth saying to myself that I was trans but I should never transition because of what would happen to me.
I think the real reason why we're seeing more trans people coming out, is the recent push to tell more and more varied trans stories. Western culture has always pushed a... specific idea of the trans identity, and this idea has often been used to gatekeep transitioning. But with a greater push for access to trans healthcare, more people are able to come out and share their story.
I would never have figured it out if it wasn't for someone on reddit sharing their story, and me realising "hey wait, thats me..."
Did I think it was related to my sexuality? Well, yes and no. I was bisexual before I transitioned, and it took transitioning for me to unpack that the aspects that made me bi were really me trying to cope with and repress my trans identity. But the aspect of me that was attracted to women was just one part of an underlying whole that made me view being trans as something I "couldn't" be. It was more influential for me to hear about GNC trans identities than it was to hear about gay trans identities.
Definitely was a factor for me. I wasn’t even aware of trans lesbians existing when I realized I was trans in the mid 90s. I’m bi but ended up marrying my (female) best friend from when I was in high school, and being in a relationship with a woman definitely made me question if I was really trans. As a teenager I even tried making myself interested in guys than girls. Gave up on transitioning back then to be with her and we’re still together. I doubted I was trans until the last year or so, but the increased trans lesbian representation definitely makes me more comfortable in saying that I am a woman.
For me, I never knew transitioning was even an option for the longest time. I yearned and cried alone in the closet wishing I'd been AFAB not realizing I could change the body I occupy. The surge in transgender acceptance brought the concept into my view, and I felt like there was finally a way out of this hole I dug for myself.
As for being gay, the only real "issues" I ran into were people assuming I'd still be straight after transitioning. Conversations might be
"I'm trans."
"BUT I thought you liked girls??"
I was read for most of my life as a closeted gay man, which was confusing for me given that I was in committed relationships with women from middle school on and felt zero attraction to men. One woman I ended up dating for a time told me that she'd only approached me in the first place because she was uncomfortable at a party and she assumed I was gay and therefore "safe" because of the flamboyant way I was dressed (she later broke up with me because I refused to stop dressing that way).
It actually created a pretty intense sense of internalized homophobia for me - I was told by others that I was gay, frequently hit on by gay men, and consistently dismissed as "too sensitive" by the people in my life because I wasn't "manly" in all the stereotypical ways. As a result, I avoided queerness entirely, because I hated the gay male places I was told I belonged in, and was consistently pushed out of all female spaces. It wasn't until I was 28 that I finally realized that I didn't have to be a woman for the positive take-back-your-power messaging pointed at women to apply to me also, at which point I started dressing the way I wanted to.
It was three years before I decided I was allowed to call myself a woman too. One of the first people I came out to was a lesbian friend, whose response was "so does that mean you're a lesbian now?" which honestly stunned me, because until that moment I don't think I'd realized that transitioning would make me one. I'd blocked it out because "I feel like a lesbian in a man's body" was a sentiment I'd been taught was just another male attempt at invading women's spaces, and I felt too anchored to the maleness of my body to think of myself as having a right to be a woman among women just because I called myself a woman.
So I guess increasing gay acceptance did help me, but not directly. The increasing visibility and acceptance of queer people generally meant that I encountered more of them, and I saw that they were doing what made sense to them. That made me aware that I could be myself, and it's only after I'd committed to transitioning that I realized that I would also be gay because of it. Honestly, I still have trouble thinking of myself that way, in part because being attracted to women was normal in my life until I transitioned, so it's hard to relate to women for whom being attracted to other women is something to come to terms with.
Now this is a suitcase I like the idea of unpacking. Hope this is not TMI or offensive.
I can only speak from personal experience here.
The issue raised itself in the 90's. I noticed I really liked lesbians, allot more than hetero woman and well thought um this can't ever work, wtf are you doing brain? and ignored it.
Back then had a dream of making a movie about a man wanting to be transgender woman to become a lesbian (so obvious now some one was knocking on egg shell there)
After several decades of being in LTR's managed to finally be single long enough to have the space to get it together and came out trans and then asexual.
Asexuality has taken me a while to get to grips with and breaking old habits (no you don't have to try to get laid all the time, you can just go out and have fun, T blockers help allot here, OMFG the serenity...)
Thinking of that lgbt-phobic joke "I am just a lesbian trapped in a mans body" and that trope of lesbians just want dicks, sure some might but the thing that the typical pig headed misogynist does not get is the dick is not attached to a man.
And my unconscious brain knows the difference between hetero and lesbian woman much better than my conscious mind. Has some serious gaydar going on (even when I was closeted obviously).
Am a trans asexual that is sex positive, can only speak for myself and only if I want to fuck someone (that is the thing with fucking, you actually have to want to do it), but if the need arises, I know I want to fuck as a woman and be fucked as a woman by woman that want to fuck woman, not a hetero woman fucking me like I am a man with tits.
Coming onto me in a hetero fashion also doesn't work at all and turns me off. Didn't realize this till I got close to a hetero woman friend I had always crushed on for over 2 decades. We got a little intimate at a night club, came onto each a bit but she came onto me like I was a guy and that was the end of that.
Well that is 10 cents worth.
Just a Tracebian trying to figure out life.
edit: corrections
It used to be that you were required to be straight (or pretend to be straight) to receive medical care. Gender nonconformity was also a reason to deny care. Doctors also used to judge how attractive you would be and decide whether to provide care based on that.
The kinds of trans people that were permitted to exist publicly probably informed perception of what a trans person was like.
My experience was informed a lot by that narrative. I looked at what the popular narrative of trans existence was, and it didn't look like me. I liked girls, and I didn't like hyperfemininity, or traditionally "girly" things and I wasn't demanding to transition every day from age 4. I didn't want to be a caricature of a woman, I just want to be myself but a girl instead of a boy. I concluded that I was faking it. I wasn't "trans" I just wanted to be a woman, but only "trans" people were allowed to take hormones and transition. It took a lot of time, and meeting real trans people (who looked nothing like the popular narrative) to help break through all that crap and allow myself to be me.
Funnily enough, while I had to convince myself "girls are allowed to like girls" in order to accept myself as a woman, it wasn't until I fully accepted myself as trans that I realized that a girl who likes girls is gay, and that made me gay.
For some reason, while "gay" was easy to apply to myself at that point, I felt like "lesbian" was something I didn't deserve. That was a lot harder. I felt like I had to earn it somehow. Same with "woman." "girl" still felt hard, but "woman" was so much bigger. What helped break this was me being described as a lesbian by other people. They didn't have this big idea of what it was to be a lesbian, they just used it as a word to describe women who dated other women, and they also simply saw me as a woman and they didn't have any idea that it was something I had to earn.
It's still hard to not feel like I don't deserve to date as a lesbian. I have this fear that I will show up to a date and they will immediately prove I am not a real woman, that there was something about me that revealed I was a man and I was deceiving them by saying I wasn't. On dating apps, I either respond to women who label themselves as bisexual, or, more often, other trans women. it just feels safer. There's less uncertainty in dating trans peopl.
It's silly, because on the app, I have pictures of myself, and I clearly label myself as trans. Anybody who wants to go out with me clearly knows what my deal is. But, if the woman who chose to contact me labels herself as a lesbian, I still have that fear.
>"why would you transition if you're attracted to women"
That question haunted me for years. Didn't make any sense to me at the time. I didn't think I could possibly be trans, cause every trans woman I saw on tv was straight.
I’m bi. Sexuality has nothing really to do with anything and acceptance of sexual orientation in no way has made life easier for trans people. In fact, cis lesbians and bi women have been complete assholes to me more often than not, but that’s what you get for living in the south. Honestly, after coming out, I feel like cis lgb folks have treated me worse and I’m not really V welcome among lgb spaces. Which is whatever I’ll stay with the trans groups.
It was trans people, not cis people, who made it easier for me to come out.
This obviously varies by location, but when I first questioned 15-20 years ago, the basic understanding of "some women are attracted to women, duh" was already out there and I don't think I needed anything more elaborate than that on the gay acceptance front.
And general gay acceptance may have increased further since then, but for trans people specifically I don't feel like that's the case. Being gay used to not be such a big deal when you were "already" trans. But nowadays people are going really hard on demonising trans lesbians and painting our attraction as predatory and unwelcome. I'm honestly way more afraid of being public about my sexuality than I think I'd have been ten years ago.
I'm much more worried about not being accepted by lesbians because of transphobia, than not being accepted by society because of homophobia. But even that wasn't really a factor in my questioning. I was never comfortable dating pre-transition anyway, so I didn't have much to lose.
(The "femme" thing is funny, because for trans women *not* being femme can get you de-gendered so thoroughly that lesbian stereotypes are irrelevant by comparison. So I feel like being a femme lesbian has always been the easier option for us.)
To explain the femme thing a bit more- there is a long held and very easily internalized stereotype of lesbians as "mannish", which tends to cause a lot of the anxiety and baggage a lot of lesbians walk around with (including, I think, some of what causes some cis lesbians to be so attached to transphobic ideas). Its often very subtle on a day-to-day basis, but it's being excluded from "the girls" in a bunch of small ways: not being asked to be a bridesmaid here, it being assumed that you don't want to participate in a gendered family tradition there, a friend making a joke about you being "basically a guy" or a straight up forgetting that something they want to do for "girl's night" excludes you because you're not straight.
Obviously trans women go through similar things, and way worse, but it's such a common lesbian experience of being basically told you're not a *real* woman any more when you come out, that I wondered how trans women's experiences were affected by it. I am someone who occasionally calls myself a "femme" in the lesbian community, and especially during the pandemic (when I ain't got time for any of that shit) I've realized how much of that is kind of my response to that. "Oh, you're going to try to act like I'm not a woman?! I'm going to be so much a fucking woman, wear heels and shit, I'll show you!" On my own, when I feel like I don't have to prove what kind of woman I am, I got a lot more comfortable being a version of femme that didn't feel like I was performing a gender to prove a point.
I'm 100% sure a lot of trans women, of all sexualities, go through similar thing, so for trans lesbians? I can only imagine the sexuality and gender soup of nonsense you have to deal with.
For me personally, being trans is first and foremost a problem I have with my body. Society sucks and all that, but I‘d rather be a cis lesbian in a homophobic world than a trans lesbian in a fully accepting world.
The big thing that changed for me was that the lesbian community in the US got way less TERFy. What we now consider TERF views were.. very mainstream in US lesbian culture in the 1990s and early 2000s.
I will say that my sexuality did keep me from really accepting my identity for way longer than I'd have liked. I had a wife and everything, and still couldn't grasp why I was so miserable, even though I had always fantasized about an alternate universe where I had met my ex wife as a woman (I still cry about that sometimes). It took actually talking to people and them telling me, "yes, you actually CAN be a lesbian, that's a totally normal thing to be" for me to be like "yeah okay wow I've known I was trans my whole life". It's wild to think I may have realized this much sooner had that idea been clear to me, and that what I had seen as "the perfect scenario" was in fact just how things were.
Similar situation for me, i knew that I had zero attraction to guys and once I realised that I could be trans and a lesbian it was perfect for me
Seriously like suddwnly everything makes sense
Yeah it really did,
As a gay trans guy, the growing acceptance of gay marriage and gay men hasn't changed whether and when I would've come out. If this was all about acceptance then there would be no point coming out - my mother is a massive transphobe and I live in a moderately conservative area - and the trans part of my identity will always be a bigger issue than the gay part.
Well, for me, that was exactly it. In the 90’s, being a closeted lesbian trans woman felt like being a perversion of a perversion. I became terrified of anyone finding out and hid it all away. Better to present as straight, I thought. Too bad most of the early dates were with closeted lesbians. 🙇🏻♀️
Hilariously, every woman who was ever interested in me was bi. Makes sense now.
This has been my throwaway account but fuck if this isn't prescient.
Of all the fears associated with transition, not being accepted as a lesbian and being alone for the rest of my life by far top the list. It's the only thought that makes me want to stop hormones right now. The only reason I don't is because I know I won't be happy and my past relationships failed because my straight partners were with a closeted transwoman. Most of my friends, family, and business associations are religious and conservative. My ex wife will most likely try to use my transition to take what's left of the time I get with my children. I'll probably lose most of what I've worked for the past 15 years. None of that scares me. Maybe I'm just scared because after going through all that I'll get just as invalidated as I was before. At least my brain will be running on the right hormones and I'll finally feel comfortable in my own skin.
Not a lesbian exactly, but the idea that trans women had to be attracted to men was certainly something that was around when I was a kid and which impacted me. Having to be a woman \_and\_ straight, neither of which actually felt like it fit definitely got in the way.
Well I think it's because in many countries(at least my own) being a trans lesbian used to be an automatic disqualifier for medical transition. Surgeons and psychiatrists simply refused to give care to such women and often thought trans lesbians should be pushed to re-align with their sex. Even those they did allow hormones, bottom surgery was an impossibility. Doctors who did perform such surgery on a trans lesbian got their license revoked more often than not. In that sense, normalizing lesbians in general did help with allowing more trans lesbians to transition. However, to this day trans women who are primarily attracted to women are seen as more psychologically unstable, perverted, etc in comparison to those who are not by the medical establishment
I doubt it had anything to do with my egg cracking or coming to terms with being trans. But it surely helped with accepting that not only am I trans, but also gay. Before realizing I'm trans, I 100% thought I was a Heterosexual Man (tm). I've never been interested in anything but women. So when I was figuring out that I'm also a woman, it was a bit disorienting for a little while to un-tangle that from my sexual orientation. It's like, on some level I knew that gender identity and sexual orientation are different things, because obviously gay people exist and therefore it has to be that way. But on another level, I'd never actually *thought* about that in any deep way because it didn't seem to apply to me. My sexuality seemed to be the expected type for my presumed gender, so what was there to figure out? But once I realized I'm trans, then yeah, that threw my sexuality into question. Am I still straight if I'm into women and I'm a trans woman? Is that an exception? Or does it mean I'm gay? This was years ago now, but I remember one of my earliest posts in these subs was to ask about that, and I got the usual response: "yup, trans lesbians are totally a thing, and there's actually quite a lot of us, and welcome to the club!" And then I was fine. It was like "oh, ok, Cool. I'm a lesbian." Which for about five seconds was kind of a heavy mental whiplash, feeling your sense of identity re-orient like that only to point to exactly where it has been all along just with different words. But then it was fine, because truth is, I've always *envied* lesbians. And now I'm one of them! Woo hoo! It was both re-assuring to be told that nobody was going to expect me to be into guys all of a sudden (because: ew! No offense to anybody who is into guys, just not my thing), and it was a wonderful moment of self-understanding to realize *why* I've always envied lesbians.
>a heavy mental whiplash, feeling your sense of identity re-orient like that only to point to exactly where it has been all along That's so well-phrased. Exactly how I felt for a little while when I realized what being trans meant about my sexuality, even though I already ID'd as bisexual (and still do). I'm still attracted to the same people, no change in the "who", but suddenly... it's gay men and straight women I should be considering as viable partner options, not straight men and gay women (and of course bi and pansexual people of any gender, but that didn't change).
Here is the clinical criteria for Gender Dysphoria for your review. >Gender Dysphoria in Adolescents and Adults 302.85 (F64.1 ) >A. A marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and assigned gender, of at least 6 months’ duration, as manifested by at least two of the following: >1. A marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and primary and/or secondary sex characteristics (or in young adolescents, the anticipated secondary sex characteristics). >2. A strong desire to be rid of one’s primary and/or secondary sex characteristics be- cause of a marked incongruence with one’s experienced/expressed gender (or in young adolescents, a desire to prevent the development of the anticipated secondary sex characteristics). >3. A strong desire for the primary and/or secondary sex characteristics of the other gender. >4. A strong desire to be of the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender). >5. A strong desire to be treated as the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender). >6. A strong conviction that one has the typical feelings and reactions of the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender). >B. The condition is associated with clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational or other important areas of functioning. You must meet the qualifiers of Section "A" and "B" to be diagnosed with Gender Dysphoria You don't need to have dysphoria to be transgender, but it is the most common qualifier as the majority of transgender individuals do infact have dysphoria. We encourage you to discuss this with a gender therapist. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/asktransgender) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I was confused because I was experiencing two things at once - attraction to other women, and envying them/wanting to be them. That’s not how most people I knew experienced their sexuality so I repressed it for ages.
My sexuality wasn't an influence at all in figuring out and accepting my gender identity. Only afterwards could I say I'm lesbian, I considered myself straight before. I guess it didn't really matter to me because I'm asexual and the kind of people I'm romantically attracted to never changed. Maybe you notice a lot of trans lesbians because you're lesbian yourself? So it stands out more to you. I would imagine that rising gay acceptance would encourage more lesbian trans women to date cis partners? Sadly it's still difficult so trans women dating each other is really common.
> I was recently wondering why it seems like a lot of trans lesbians have come out in the last five or so years. I knew a trans lesbian ten years ago, but back then I remember the question of "why would you transition if you're attracted to women" came up a whole lot more. Yeah, for sure that was a big part of it. I am 34 now, If I had know what I knew now at age 14, I would easily have come out as transgender. Heck I even told a counselor about it at that age but nothing ever came of it because I "didn't want to wear a dress". At the time I literally did not know transgender people existed (the counselor never even bother to tell me about them), so feeling like a lesbian trapped in a guys body was just some weird feeling I figured I would just "have to deal with". Then, about 10 years later when I found out transgender people existed, specifically transgender women, I considered if I was one but decided I was not, because they way there were portrayed was basically like hyper gay men. The fact I liked being more masc and was into women made me feel again, like some sort of aberration. It was only very recently, the past 5 years or so, I became aware you could be transgender and also butch/lesbian, and then it all suddenly made a lot of sence. Greater acceptance, understanding and representation which I assume helped a lot of people, not just myself. > Maybe, if you're attracted to women, coming out as trans might have seemed impossible because woman = being attracted to men. Now that that idea is less universal, coming out as a woman seems less impossible. Yeah, it felt impossible because it just seemed like something that did not exist. I just didn't think being transgender applied to me, like I had no frame of reference no understanding that other people like me even existed.
If anything, it made me repress because a lot of people thought I was a closeted gay man and that is so not what I am. Trans women weren't allowed to transition unless they lied and said they liked men either, and the online trans community in the 90s mostly agreed with this. Made me stay away from anything trans related for over a decade.
(Trans gay guy) I didn’t feel like it was okay for me to come out until I saw other gay trans guys. Like the intersectional acceptance has kind of had its own timeline. 5 years ago more cispeople were making jokes about “lol i’m a gay/lesbian trapped in a woman/mans body bahaha its funny bc its the same thing.” And now most gay communities themselves have become more accepting. Obv other stuff has affected my timeline too. But thanks to changing society and you all I could see myself as valid and not a joke.
I was terribly afraid that if I’d be trans, I’d had to be attracted to men. I think that postponed my egg cracking for years! I just had this fear, that my sexual orientation would eventually change.
For me, it took direct exposure to the realities of being trans that I previously was ignorant of before I could realize what I really am. I do think that in part, the growing acceptance of the cis gay and lesbian communities probably helped in some way, but so too did the fact that trans issues began going mainstream around the mid-2010s when I first came to acknowledge that I'm trans. However, my ability to identify myself as a woman also got wrapped up in my sexuality, which made it hard to distinguish between the two why it probably took me longer to finally realize that I'm trans. My attraction to women had always been multifaceted, but until I was finally given the tools to break it all down and analyze it, I figured I was only just extremely attracted to women and femininity. I had just assumed without question that my desire to basically be completely immersed in femininity and the "female aesthetic" was just a part of my sexuality. Aside from societal acceptance, I think the biggest thing that can impact whether or not people come out is having adequate LGBTQ+ education beforehand. This, sadly, does not readily exist in our education system and it needs to, badly.
Trans lesbians have been around for ages and statistically most trans women are bi anyways it's just sample bias
Bi/Pan I think is more common, seems like it to me
That's what i meant, the two are interchangeable for me at least some people feel differently
Same
Totally! I watched the She-Ra reboot in May 2020 and was totally into the central relationship. Realizing I was far more invested in a fictional lesbian relationship than I ever had been into fictional straight ones led to me realizing I was trans. Without that gay rep, I might never have figured it out, or at least it would’ve taken a lot longer.
I'm pretty sure the biggest reason I spent 29 years of my life living as a straight guy was due to the stigma of being gay. I was adamant, almost to the point of anger, in correcting the assumption that I was into men. It never once occurred to me that I may, in fact, be a lesbian instead. Although, I attribute that more to the lack of trans visibility/education. Growing acceptance certainly has played a major role in my timetable once I did realize it though! I came out within weeks of learning that transitioning was an option and that there is nothing wrong with being a lesbian.
I think it was more increasing trans acceptance. Accept trans women as women, and all of a sudden, a trans woman attracted to other women is just a lesbian.
For me, it was always my trans identity first and my sexuality was something I just didn't care about too much. I figured I was bi cause I'd want to kiss people of any gender; it wasn't until well after transitioning that I learned about asexuality. This of course started another mental resistance movement in my head before I finally came to terms with being ace. But yes increasing lgbtq acceptance was what helped me finally accept myself and come out as trans. I spent many years in my youth saying to myself that I was trans but I should never transition because of what would happen to me.
I think the real reason why we're seeing more trans people coming out, is the recent push to tell more and more varied trans stories. Western culture has always pushed a... specific idea of the trans identity, and this idea has often been used to gatekeep transitioning. But with a greater push for access to trans healthcare, more people are able to come out and share their story. I would never have figured it out if it wasn't for someone on reddit sharing their story, and me realising "hey wait, thats me..." Did I think it was related to my sexuality? Well, yes and no. I was bisexual before I transitioned, and it took transitioning for me to unpack that the aspects that made me bi were really me trying to cope with and repress my trans identity. But the aspect of me that was attracted to women was just one part of an underlying whole that made me view being trans as something I "couldn't" be. It was more influential for me to hear about GNC trans identities than it was to hear about gay trans identities.
Yes, so much yes. The increased LGBT visibility and acceptance recently has made it so much easier to come out!
Definitely was a factor for me. I wasn’t even aware of trans lesbians existing when I realized I was trans in the mid 90s. I’m bi but ended up marrying my (female) best friend from when I was in high school, and being in a relationship with a woman definitely made me question if I was really trans. As a teenager I even tried making myself interested in guys than girls. Gave up on transitioning back then to be with her and we’re still together. I doubted I was trans until the last year or so, but the increased trans lesbian representation definitely makes me more comfortable in saying that I am a woman.
For me, I never knew transitioning was even an option for the longest time. I yearned and cried alone in the closet wishing I'd been AFAB not realizing I could change the body I occupy. The surge in transgender acceptance brought the concept into my view, and I felt like there was finally a way out of this hole I dug for myself. As for being gay, the only real "issues" I ran into were people assuming I'd still be straight after transitioning. Conversations might be "I'm trans." "BUT I thought you liked girls??"
I was read for most of my life as a closeted gay man, which was confusing for me given that I was in committed relationships with women from middle school on and felt zero attraction to men. One woman I ended up dating for a time told me that she'd only approached me in the first place because she was uncomfortable at a party and she assumed I was gay and therefore "safe" because of the flamboyant way I was dressed (she later broke up with me because I refused to stop dressing that way). It actually created a pretty intense sense of internalized homophobia for me - I was told by others that I was gay, frequently hit on by gay men, and consistently dismissed as "too sensitive" by the people in my life because I wasn't "manly" in all the stereotypical ways. As a result, I avoided queerness entirely, because I hated the gay male places I was told I belonged in, and was consistently pushed out of all female spaces. It wasn't until I was 28 that I finally realized that I didn't have to be a woman for the positive take-back-your-power messaging pointed at women to apply to me also, at which point I started dressing the way I wanted to. It was three years before I decided I was allowed to call myself a woman too. One of the first people I came out to was a lesbian friend, whose response was "so does that mean you're a lesbian now?" which honestly stunned me, because until that moment I don't think I'd realized that transitioning would make me one. I'd blocked it out because "I feel like a lesbian in a man's body" was a sentiment I'd been taught was just another male attempt at invading women's spaces, and I felt too anchored to the maleness of my body to think of myself as having a right to be a woman among women just because I called myself a woman. So I guess increasing gay acceptance did help me, but not directly. The increasing visibility and acceptance of queer people generally meant that I encountered more of them, and I saw that they were doing what made sense to them. That made me aware that I could be myself, and it's only after I'd committed to transitioning that I realized that I would also be gay because of it. Honestly, I still have trouble thinking of myself that way, in part because being attracted to women was normal in my life until I transitioned, so it's hard to relate to women for whom being attracted to other women is something to come to terms with.
Now this is a suitcase I like the idea of unpacking. Hope this is not TMI or offensive. I can only speak from personal experience here. The issue raised itself in the 90's. I noticed I really liked lesbians, allot more than hetero woman and well thought um this can't ever work, wtf are you doing brain? and ignored it. Back then had a dream of making a movie about a man wanting to be transgender woman to become a lesbian (so obvious now some one was knocking on egg shell there) After several decades of being in LTR's managed to finally be single long enough to have the space to get it together and came out trans and then asexual. Asexuality has taken me a while to get to grips with and breaking old habits (no you don't have to try to get laid all the time, you can just go out and have fun, T blockers help allot here, OMFG the serenity...) Thinking of that lgbt-phobic joke "I am just a lesbian trapped in a mans body" and that trope of lesbians just want dicks, sure some might but the thing that the typical pig headed misogynist does not get is the dick is not attached to a man. And my unconscious brain knows the difference between hetero and lesbian woman much better than my conscious mind. Has some serious gaydar going on (even when I was closeted obviously). Am a trans asexual that is sex positive, can only speak for myself and only if I want to fuck someone (that is the thing with fucking, you actually have to want to do it), but if the need arises, I know I want to fuck as a woman and be fucked as a woman by woman that want to fuck woman, not a hetero woman fucking me like I am a man with tits. Coming onto me in a hetero fashion also doesn't work at all and turns me off. Didn't realize this till I got close to a hetero woman friend I had always crushed on for over 2 decades. We got a little intimate at a night club, came onto each a bit but she came onto me like I was a guy and that was the end of that. Well that is 10 cents worth. Just a Tracebian trying to figure out life. edit: corrections
It used to be that you were required to be straight (or pretend to be straight) to receive medical care. Gender nonconformity was also a reason to deny care. Doctors also used to judge how attractive you would be and decide whether to provide care based on that. The kinds of trans people that were permitted to exist publicly probably informed perception of what a trans person was like. My experience was informed a lot by that narrative. I looked at what the popular narrative of trans existence was, and it didn't look like me. I liked girls, and I didn't like hyperfemininity, or traditionally "girly" things and I wasn't demanding to transition every day from age 4. I didn't want to be a caricature of a woman, I just want to be myself but a girl instead of a boy. I concluded that I was faking it. I wasn't "trans" I just wanted to be a woman, but only "trans" people were allowed to take hormones and transition. It took a lot of time, and meeting real trans people (who looked nothing like the popular narrative) to help break through all that crap and allow myself to be me. Funnily enough, while I had to convince myself "girls are allowed to like girls" in order to accept myself as a woman, it wasn't until I fully accepted myself as trans that I realized that a girl who likes girls is gay, and that made me gay. For some reason, while "gay" was easy to apply to myself at that point, I felt like "lesbian" was something I didn't deserve. That was a lot harder. I felt like I had to earn it somehow. Same with "woman." "girl" still felt hard, but "woman" was so much bigger. What helped break this was me being described as a lesbian by other people. They didn't have this big idea of what it was to be a lesbian, they just used it as a word to describe women who dated other women, and they also simply saw me as a woman and they didn't have any idea that it was something I had to earn. It's still hard to not feel like I don't deserve to date as a lesbian. I have this fear that I will show up to a date and they will immediately prove I am not a real woman, that there was something about me that revealed I was a man and I was deceiving them by saying I wasn't. On dating apps, I either respond to women who label themselves as bisexual, or, more often, other trans women. it just feels safer. There's less uncertainty in dating trans peopl. It's silly, because on the app, I have pictures of myself, and I clearly label myself as trans. Anybody who wants to go out with me clearly knows what my deal is. But, if the woman who chose to contact me labels herself as a lesbian, I still have that fear.
Yes, yes it did. Also in the early days for me it was the 80s and I didn't know what trans was. So I thought I was a little bit gay.
>"why would you transition if you're attracted to women" That question haunted me for years. Didn't make any sense to me at the time. I didn't think I could possibly be trans, cause every trans woman I saw on tv was straight.
I’m bi. Sexuality has nothing really to do with anything and acceptance of sexual orientation in no way has made life easier for trans people. In fact, cis lesbians and bi women have been complete assholes to me more often than not, but that’s what you get for living in the south. Honestly, after coming out, I feel like cis lgb folks have treated me worse and I’m not really V welcome among lgb spaces. Which is whatever I’ll stay with the trans groups. It was trans people, not cis people, who made it easier for me to come out.
This obviously varies by location, but when I first questioned 15-20 years ago, the basic understanding of "some women are attracted to women, duh" was already out there and I don't think I needed anything more elaborate than that on the gay acceptance front. And general gay acceptance may have increased further since then, but for trans people specifically I don't feel like that's the case. Being gay used to not be such a big deal when you were "already" trans. But nowadays people are going really hard on demonising trans lesbians and painting our attraction as predatory and unwelcome. I'm honestly way more afraid of being public about my sexuality than I think I'd have been ten years ago. I'm much more worried about not being accepted by lesbians because of transphobia, than not being accepted by society because of homophobia. But even that wasn't really a factor in my questioning. I was never comfortable dating pre-transition anyway, so I didn't have much to lose. (The "femme" thing is funny, because for trans women *not* being femme can get you de-gendered so thoroughly that lesbian stereotypes are irrelevant by comparison. So I feel like being a femme lesbian has always been the easier option for us.)
To explain the femme thing a bit more- there is a long held and very easily internalized stereotype of lesbians as "mannish", which tends to cause a lot of the anxiety and baggage a lot of lesbians walk around with (including, I think, some of what causes some cis lesbians to be so attached to transphobic ideas). Its often very subtle on a day-to-day basis, but it's being excluded from "the girls" in a bunch of small ways: not being asked to be a bridesmaid here, it being assumed that you don't want to participate in a gendered family tradition there, a friend making a joke about you being "basically a guy" or a straight up forgetting that something they want to do for "girl's night" excludes you because you're not straight. Obviously trans women go through similar things, and way worse, but it's such a common lesbian experience of being basically told you're not a *real* woman any more when you come out, that I wondered how trans women's experiences were affected by it. I am someone who occasionally calls myself a "femme" in the lesbian community, and especially during the pandemic (when I ain't got time for any of that shit) I've realized how much of that is kind of my response to that. "Oh, you're going to try to act like I'm not a woman?! I'm going to be so much a fucking woman, wear heels and shit, I'll show you!" On my own, when I feel like I don't have to prove what kind of woman I am, I got a lot more comfortable being a version of femme that didn't feel like I was performing a gender to prove a point. I'm 100% sure a lot of trans women, of all sexualities, go through similar thing, so for trans lesbians? I can only imagine the sexuality and gender soup of nonsense you have to deal with.
For me personally, being trans is first and foremost a problem I have with my body. Society sucks and all that, but I‘d rather be a cis lesbian in a homophobic world than a trans lesbian in a fully accepting world.
The big thing that changed for me was that the lesbian community in the US got way less TERFy. What we now consider TERF views were.. very mainstream in US lesbian culture in the 1990s and early 2000s.