We are all in the same boat. I really struggled accepting that I'm gay because everyone just assumed I was a butch lesbian. I didn't struggle half as much accepting that I'm trans as how I struggled accepting that a man can like and fall in love with men without him being less manly for that. It took me more than a year and I'm still going trough a lot of insecurities, but step by step I'm getting to accept myself.
For me, I don't think the guilt and shame will disappear completely but I hope I can at least learn to live with who I am and be comfortable with that. It's a long process but eventually you will get there.
Oh God there's *more* of us than just me? It's like I *knew* I was gay. My butch ass dated girls for a long time but I couldn't understand why I related so hard to the gay men we knew. Then Uncle Testosterone taps me on the shoulder and my whole life made sense lol
I found that spending time in gay, male spaces has helped me a lot, as one who also did the Butch-to-Gay-Guy pipeline. Not just clubs- I joined an outdoor group, go to board game things, just spend time around other gay (well, and bi) guys. Aside from being really good for helping me work through my own feelings around my gayness, I've also learned a lot about my own masculinity and what kind of man I want to be from those guys.
Thank you. This sounds like it would really help, being around more men like myself. I'm so scared of becoming a guy who's ashamed/embarrassed to be seen with his own partner or for others to know that I'm gay. IRL gay spaces could help.
Depending on where you are, you can find gay spaces that are vocally trans affirming. And even ones that aren't explicitly so sometimes are, if you ask around. I've been really pleasantly surprised by my experiences in that regard. Sometimes there's a lot of pessimism in this sub around how we fit into the gay community (or if we can fit into it at all), and it had me primed for a lot of rejection and unpleasantness, but I haven't really had that happen. Others' mileage may vary, obviously, but it's not all doom and gloom out here.
No dude me fucking too. I literally didn’t realize for so long cause it just didn’t ever occur to me as an option?? (Conservative up bring - gay was barely an option) I literally went through the entire alphabet soup before figuring it out. For me my dysphoria first reared its head as social dysphoria, I felt attracted to guys but wanted to crawl out of my skin anytime we tried to be intimate. I thought girls were pretty (turns out in a gay male way) so I figured I must be a lesbian. Dated women for about 7 years but never felt excited by the prospect of any kind of sexual activity. But the dysphoria was relieved by not having such a direct way to compare myself with men so it worked well enough. My partners always were more excited about me than I was about them though which made me feel really bad cause they were all lovely. So then I figured I must be ace, so I did that for a while but something was missing.. I still craved intimacy but couldn’t figure out why when it came down to it I couldn’t make it happen. Turns out my first instinct was right. I’m attracted to guys I just also was one and needed to be seen as one to be myself in a relationship. But yeah, glad someone made this post. I feel like I haven’t encountered many people with the same journey as me and it can be lonely.
Cheers yall! If anyone wants a friend to chat with hit me up in the DMs
Always felt like a real minority though and the transition from lesbian dating to gay dating was pretty wild.
Same. After I figured it out I felt like I’d misrepresented the lesbian community by making people think “it’s just a phase”. It’s a relief to know it’s a thing a lot of trans guys go through, not just me
yeah like since im kinda emo if i see an emo girl im like she is pretty but id never see me dating her. whereas when i see an emo dude im like yeah id date him.
My dysphoria first showed itself when i was 12 and i had no idea what it was and i only realised when i was 14/15 what it was
You know how it is: either you die the hero or live long enough to become the villain.
In all seriousness, it is kind of wild how many people this happens to.
Hi man I've been in the exact same boat. My first post on Reddit (if you want you can read it) was about when I finally came to terms with myself. I'm going to copy one of my replies from there on how I personally got to that point and hopefully something in it will be of use to you. For me personally it was breaking down the feelings of shame towards sexuality in general. It didn't matter who I was attracted to I felt shame anyway because I'd been programmed/abused to by others.
I had to focus on remembering that sexuality is a very normal experience to have as a human being and when I think about what I want most in life it is to be a good human and connected to myself and be one with others too. In order to feel connected to the world I would need to learn to accept basic human functions and feelings go with that.
Whenever I started getting uncomfortable I'd try and remind myself that feeling attraction or anything sexual would be the same as feeling hungry or needing to have a good sleep, it's something that happens naturally and you literally cannot stop it. (I'm acespec so for me specifically it's complicated to explain how I feel and why) I don't really see it as a big grand scary thing anymore because I've shifted the focus towards it being something that happens occasionally and that's fine!
It certainly took A LOT of effort and time because I quite literally had to unlearn all the psychological abuse I'd faced. Thinking about how deeply I care about the LGBTQ community also helped tremendously. Another thing I'd do when I started feeling bad was thinking about all my LGBTQ friends and how not accepting myself inevitably meant that I might not be accepting them wholeheartedly. (I know this doesn't always work because a lot of people tend to feel the *everyone else is valid but me feeling*) I had that a lot in the beginning but like I said I have put effort into constantly challenging those thoughts and redirecting them towards acceptance.
I think a big part of that journey is also accepting that some days you'll feel crap even though your strong feelings of self acceptance are present most the time. Just knowing that bad days pass eventually and you will feel joy and relief again another day.
As for validity I would say it is a similar process really! When I felt crushed by invalidity I discovered that it was mostly because I had tied my manhood to what others want or expect. I tried to remove everyone's expectations from me and work on securing what being a man means to ONLY ME and nobody else's ideas. It's really hard but through doing that nobody can take anything away from you because you are secure in yourself, you are not binding yourself to the ideas of others. Of course it still hurts facing transphobia/homophobia but when you reach that security in yourself it becomes something you can get through.
Having supportive friends or some form of community online or irl is very helpful too if that is a possibility. You can have each others backs and lift eachother up when you are having a rough time. Trying to be your own friend is valuable too of course but it is nice to have others.
On a more comedic note I also like talking to my dog and he wouldn't give a literal fuck about my gender or sexuality. Trying to see the world in a neutral way like that is great. Sex isn't something shameful and people that are uncomfortable with it haven't worked through their problems (which are quite deeply rooted into most societies so understandable many people struggle)
The only purity that exists to me is if someone wishes not to cause harm and hurt others. Causing harm is traumatising people into not accepting themselves which is grotesquely wrong to do. Nobody deserves to feel like that about themselves so I refuse to listen to anyone that behaves like this. Even if I'm around it all day as long as I know that there is nothing wrong with me and I'm being the best man I can be then I will keep going until I feel peace and joy again.
I still have bad days but my friends and dog are there when I need them and I still have myself who I have started to want to look after better. I know this all sounds rather cliché and maybe even too easy but this has taken me at least 8 years. I hope it is faster for others but please be kind and patient with yourself cause these things feel so big and tremendous, you need to go at your own pace.
I hope this is helpful in any way! Sending lots of good vibes to all my mlm siblings <3
It really does, for me these last six months have been incredibly life changing. I'm accepting and realising so many things about myself that I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the whole process.
We are all in the same boat. I really struggled accepting that I'm gay because everyone just assumed I was a butch lesbian. I didn't struggle half as much accepting that I'm trans as how I struggled accepting that a man can like and fall in love with men without him being less manly for that. It took me more than a year and I'm still going trough a lot of insecurities, but step by step I'm getting to accept myself. For me, I don't think the guilt and shame will disappear completely but I hope I can at least learn to live with who I am and be comfortable with that. It's a long process but eventually you will get there.
Oh God there's *more* of us than just me? It's like I *knew* I was gay. My butch ass dated girls for a long time but I couldn't understand why I related so hard to the gay men we knew. Then Uncle Testosterone taps me on the shoulder and my whole life made sense lol
I found that spending time in gay, male spaces has helped me a lot, as one who also did the Butch-to-Gay-Guy pipeline. Not just clubs- I joined an outdoor group, go to board game things, just spend time around other gay (well, and bi) guys. Aside from being really good for helping me work through my own feelings around my gayness, I've also learned a lot about my own masculinity and what kind of man I want to be from those guys.
Thank you. This sounds like it would really help, being around more men like myself. I'm so scared of becoming a guy who's ashamed/embarrassed to be seen with his own partner or for others to know that I'm gay. IRL gay spaces could help.
Depending on where you are, you can find gay spaces that are vocally trans affirming. And even ones that aren't explicitly so sometimes are, if you ask around. I've been really pleasantly surprised by my experiences in that regard. Sometimes there's a lot of pessimism in this sub around how we fit into the gay community (or if we can fit into it at all), and it had me primed for a lot of rejection and unpleasantness, but I haven't really had that happen. Others' mileage may vary, obviously, but it's not all doom and gloom out here.
this makes me feel so much better that im not the only one who went through this, i thought i was a lesbian before i realised i was a gay trans guy.
No dude me fucking too. I literally didn’t realize for so long cause it just didn’t ever occur to me as an option?? (Conservative up bring - gay was barely an option) I literally went through the entire alphabet soup before figuring it out. For me my dysphoria first reared its head as social dysphoria, I felt attracted to guys but wanted to crawl out of my skin anytime we tried to be intimate. I thought girls were pretty (turns out in a gay male way) so I figured I must be a lesbian. Dated women for about 7 years but never felt excited by the prospect of any kind of sexual activity. But the dysphoria was relieved by not having such a direct way to compare myself with men so it worked well enough. My partners always were more excited about me than I was about them though which made me feel really bad cause they were all lovely. So then I figured I must be ace, so I did that for a while but something was missing.. I still craved intimacy but couldn’t figure out why when it came down to it I couldn’t make it happen. Turns out my first instinct was right. I’m attracted to guys I just also was one and needed to be seen as one to be myself in a relationship. But yeah, glad someone made this post. I feel like I haven’t encountered many people with the same journey as me and it can be lonely. Cheers yall! If anyone wants a friend to chat with hit me up in the DMs Always felt like a real minority though and the transition from lesbian dating to gay dating was pretty wild.
Same. After I figured it out I felt like I’d misrepresented the lesbian community by making people think “it’s just a phase”. It’s a relief to know it’s a thing a lot of trans guys go through, not just me
yeah like since im kinda emo if i see an emo girl im like she is pretty but id never see me dating her. whereas when i see an emo dude im like yeah id date him. My dysphoria first showed itself when i was 12 and i had no idea what it was and i only realised when i was 14/15 what it was
There are dozens of us! Dozens! In all seriousness, I swore that T wasn't gonna turn *me* gay, and yet.
I'm not even on T yet and it's already happened. And I was *so* sure I was a butch lesbian..
You know how it is: either you die the hero or live long enough to become the villain. In all seriousness, it is kind of wild how many people this happens to.
Hi man I've been in the exact same boat. My first post on Reddit (if you want you can read it) was about when I finally came to terms with myself. I'm going to copy one of my replies from there on how I personally got to that point and hopefully something in it will be of use to you. For me personally it was breaking down the feelings of shame towards sexuality in general. It didn't matter who I was attracted to I felt shame anyway because I'd been programmed/abused to by others. I had to focus on remembering that sexuality is a very normal experience to have as a human being and when I think about what I want most in life it is to be a good human and connected to myself and be one with others too. In order to feel connected to the world I would need to learn to accept basic human functions and feelings go with that. Whenever I started getting uncomfortable I'd try and remind myself that feeling attraction or anything sexual would be the same as feeling hungry or needing to have a good sleep, it's something that happens naturally and you literally cannot stop it. (I'm acespec so for me specifically it's complicated to explain how I feel and why) I don't really see it as a big grand scary thing anymore because I've shifted the focus towards it being something that happens occasionally and that's fine! It certainly took A LOT of effort and time because I quite literally had to unlearn all the psychological abuse I'd faced. Thinking about how deeply I care about the LGBTQ community also helped tremendously. Another thing I'd do when I started feeling bad was thinking about all my LGBTQ friends and how not accepting myself inevitably meant that I might not be accepting them wholeheartedly. (I know this doesn't always work because a lot of people tend to feel the *everyone else is valid but me feeling*) I had that a lot in the beginning but like I said I have put effort into constantly challenging those thoughts and redirecting them towards acceptance. I think a big part of that journey is also accepting that some days you'll feel crap even though your strong feelings of self acceptance are present most the time. Just knowing that bad days pass eventually and you will feel joy and relief again another day. As for validity I would say it is a similar process really! When I felt crushed by invalidity I discovered that it was mostly because I had tied my manhood to what others want or expect. I tried to remove everyone's expectations from me and work on securing what being a man means to ONLY ME and nobody else's ideas. It's really hard but through doing that nobody can take anything away from you because you are secure in yourself, you are not binding yourself to the ideas of others. Of course it still hurts facing transphobia/homophobia but when you reach that security in yourself it becomes something you can get through. Having supportive friends or some form of community online or irl is very helpful too if that is a possibility. You can have each others backs and lift eachother up when you are having a rough time. Trying to be your own friend is valuable too of course but it is nice to have others. On a more comedic note I also like talking to my dog and he wouldn't give a literal fuck about my gender or sexuality. Trying to see the world in a neutral way like that is great. Sex isn't something shameful and people that are uncomfortable with it haven't worked through their problems (which are quite deeply rooted into most societies so understandable many people struggle) The only purity that exists to me is if someone wishes not to cause harm and hurt others. Causing harm is traumatising people into not accepting themselves which is grotesquely wrong to do. Nobody deserves to feel like that about themselves so I refuse to listen to anyone that behaves like this. Even if I'm around it all day as long as I know that there is nothing wrong with me and I'm being the best man I can be then I will keep going until I feel peace and joy again. I still have bad days but my friends and dog are there when I need them and I still have myself who I have started to want to look after better. I know this all sounds rather cliché and maybe even too easy but this has taken me at least 8 years. I hope it is faster for others but please be kind and patient with yourself cause these things feel so big and tremendous, you need to go at your own pace. I hope this is helpful in any way! Sending lots of good vibes to all my mlm siblings <3
if it’s an option for you, therapy helps
It really does, for me these last six months have been incredibly life changing. I'm accepting and realising so many things about myself that I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the whole process.
i’ve been in therapy for a decade and i don’t know what i’d do without it. life would be much harder for sure