So here’s a weird thing to think about. I’m a bi trans woman, and for a large part of my life I was unaware of those things about myself. I sometimes felt sexually attracted to men but I never enjoyed seeing gay men do stuff romantically or in porn and found it uncomfortable. This was very confusing for me. The reason it was uncomfortable was because I was trying to put myself in their position in my head, but because I’m not really a man it felt wrong so I thought I didn’t really like men. I’m not saying homophobes have that experience, they probably don’t, but ones own sexuality can be very confusing when you aren’t living your own truth because you drank the coolaid of heteronormativity.
As a fellow trans woman, I can relate to at least some of those things. I still think I’m not really attracted to guys, but similarly, being gay was equated with bad or wrong in my young mind, so anything that gay men, or femenine guys, appreciated, sort of repulsed me. I don’t like guys and I got internally terrified of appearing like I did. I think that pushed back my realizing that I am trans for a bit. Plus not really even knowing that was a thing back then.
Oh same on the internalized gay is bad. Growing up I got made fun of for anything that I did that could be remotely interpreted as gay. I didn’t really accept myself being bi until my 30s because I felt this intense shame every time I felt anything towards men. I was constantly hiding my real self and so paranoid of anyone noticing something real about me in case they would start to put it together and expose me. I still haven’t really gotten over those feelings completely. A lot of that is neurodivergent masking as well. Shit’s complicated.
So here’s a weird thing to think about. I’m a bi trans woman, and for a large part of my life I was unaware of those things about myself. I sometimes felt sexually attracted to men but I never enjoyed seeing gay men do stuff romantically or in porn and found it uncomfortable. This was very confusing for me. The reason it was uncomfortable was because I was trying to put myself in their position in my head, but because I’m not really a man it felt wrong so I thought I didn’t really like men. I’m not saying homophobes have that experience, they probably don’t, but ones own sexuality can be very confusing when you aren’t living your own truth because you drank the coolaid of heteronormativity.
As a fellow trans woman, I can relate to at least some of those things. I still think I’m not really attracted to guys, but similarly, being gay was equated with bad or wrong in my young mind, so anything that gay men, or femenine guys, appreciated, sort of repulsed me. I don’t like guys and I got internally terrified of appearing like I did. I think that pushed back my realizing that I am trans for a bit. Plus not really even knowing that was a thing back then.
Oh same on the internalized gay is bad. Growing up I got made fun of for anything that I did that could be remotely interpreted as gay. I didn’t really accept myself being bi until my 30s because I felt this intense shame every time I felt anything towards men. I was constantly hiding my real self and so paranoid of anyone noticing something real about me in case they would start to put it together and expose me. I still haven’t really gotten over those feelings completely. A lot of that is neurodivergent masking as well. Shit’s complicated.