Our Shameful Cotton Ceiling: Lesbian TS/TG Women Rejecting Other TS/TG Women as Partners

I’ll confess something that many consider to be something icky.  I have always been kiki.

That is to say I have always been sexually attracted to other TS/TG women. While I am at it I confess to being attracted to quite a few brothers too.

Over the years I’ve watched a number of my sisters deny any element of attraction to other sister yet they have formed their closest and most intimate bonds with one another.

Why do so many of us have such a hard time to admitting this?

Tina and I are rather open about loving each other.  Yet we have known other sisters who have lived together, including the same bed for years, yet they deny being lovers.

Why do we act as though a loving relationship with another TS/TG person is somehow a second class relationship? An inauthentic version of a lesbian relationship…

I was pre-op when I had my first relationship with a sister.  She identified more as a queen than as transsexual. She taught me how to negotiate my way through sexual relations as a pre-op, how to say what I was or wasn’t okay with doing.

Shortly after my SRS I fell in love with another sister, also a pre-op. She was very strung out on downers and kept over dosing. She was also incredibly wild and I was fortunate enough to be able to photograph her and document part of her tragic life. When she died her parents buried her as a boy.

I realized I didn’t fall in love with people’s genitals, that indeed their genitals rarely played a part in why I was attracted to them.

I like quirkiness, wit, intelligence and a lust for life.

I found myself looking for those traits in others.  I was also attracted to people who were physically like myself in some way.

My sisters found this weird.

But sex is sex… only delusional people believe they have discovered a new or novel way of doing it.

Affection, love… Now that is a much deeper topic.

I’ve had relationships with cis-sex/gender people.  I hate the routine of having to explain.  I hate having to feel defensive of my authenticity, as though my realness can be canceled at any moment.

I believe it is only ethical to realize other TS/TG people have the same sorts of feelings I have, therefore I shouldn’t go around playing HBS Troll games of “I’m real and you are not.”

One thing I learned over the years is that self-esteem comes from within.  So does authenticity.  It isn’t gained by challenging the authenticity of others.

I also learned there are homogender relationships that some might consider heterosexual due to the genitals involved.  As well as heterogender relationships that might be considered homosexual for the same reason.

So what is it that makes lesbian TS/TG women uncomfortable about partnering with another sister?

Why do we feel more valid partnering with a cis-person than another trans-person?

What does that say about us?

Further if we see other trans-people as somehow undesirable or unattractive how can we expect others to find us attractive?

3 Responses to “Our Shameful Cotton Ceiling: Lesbian TS/TG Women Rejecting Other TS/TG Women as Partners”

  1. Jessica Sideways Says:

    Personally, I have no issues with dating other transsexual women and I have certainly been attracted to my fair share of sisters. In fact, my ex-spouse was trans*. In fact, I would also argue that it’s better to date another trans person because of the fact that you don’t need to explain being trans*.

    I just don’t date trans* people right now because most trans* people in the Denver area are either woodworked or fucking insane. I just hope it isn’t that way when I move to Montréal. 😉

    • Suzan Says:

      Ah yes the fucking insane or totally strung out issue. Fortunately both my partner and I are in recovery and have been so for many years. As for the fucking insane part… Let’s not be judgmental. At least we are as the song goes “The same kind of crazy.”

  2. Dee Du Shane Says:

    “It isn’t gained […self esteem…] by challenging the authenticity of others.” Boy did that strike home. Although it really is none of my business what others think of me, I’m sometimes caught up in that whole authenticity issue thing. Since I’m past my child bearing years (that’s a joke, son /Foghorn Leghorn mode off/) I tend to be a little more forgiving of myself when I slip into the whole “HBS Troll games” thing.

    Let each give according to her (or his) needs. Took me a while too, to realize there are ‘just as many bro’s as there be ho’s’ finding themselves in the same situation/thoughts as I find myself. It’s true we each have our ‘uniqueness’ but it’s also true we each have our similarities. Discovering our sameness and our differentness is what really keeps me going.

    It is through the process of sharing our stories that we are able to really open channels of communication with our kindred spirits. I like the way you expressed this thought and wish to pass it along.

    namaste


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