pikestaff:

pikestaff:

So I don’t intend this to be an exhaustive, definitive list, nor do I intend this to be representative of everyone – but since coming out as a lesbian I’ve had some people ask me questions like “didn’t you think you were bi for a long time? how did you figure out you were actually gay?” and I thought I would write up a short list of the most helpful realizations I had personally.  (Do note that some of this is very personal, so I would prefer if reblogs were kept to a minimum):

• Realizing that “I don’t like sex and I’m not turned on by it, I think I might be ace or something” actually just came down to the fact that I’d only ever tried with men – this was a big spark for me when it came to realizing I might not actually be bi.  Surprise!  Turns out I’m actually definitely interested in sex when there’s a girl involved.
• Never fantasizing about men, not even men I was dating/”attracted” to.  Never ever.  There was one exception for a fictional man (uhhh you have three guesses as to who and the first two don’t count) and the rest were always shadowy featureless figures.  Now that I’ve started allowing myself to fantasize about girls, it’s been such a huge 180, I feel like I’m almost a completely different person with completely different fantasies.
• Feeling odd, weird, and slightly disgusted when a man expressed interest/desire in me, but feeling excited and thrilled when a girl did the same.  Pretty much self-explanatory.  Even the kindest and most pleasant men!  Even ones I cared for!  Even ones I was in relationships with!  I couldn’t scrub away the feelings of discomfort when they tried to give me, you know, normal and mundane relationship compliments like “you’re so beautiful”.  Girls, though!! Again, a complete 180, I feel so thrilled and warm and scintillated by their compliments.
• Feeling super dysphoric about my gender/body until realizing that I could just share my body with women, and that was okay.  I wanted to be a boy throughout most of my childhood, this turned into id’ing as nonbinary for a while and hell I even considered binding because I felt weird about having breasts.  That all went away completely upon realizing that I was a lesbian.  (Do note that this doesn’t affect things like personality, obviously, I’m still very tomboyish, but no longer dysphoric.)  I really think it wasn’t true “gender dysphoria”, on my part, so much as, well… sexuality dysphoria, if that makes sense.

Again, I hope no one takes this as a definitive list or a list of things that happens to everyone, and since I am cis I can’t talk about what it is like for trans folk.  But these are some of the major personal takeaways I had, combined with all the familiar ones (like “admiring” girls growing up, etc.)  I hope it’s helpful to someone!

I deleted this in a moment of panic earlier but afterwards I found out that people liked it so thank god someone reblogged it even though I said not to hahaha.  Also yes you can reblog this now, I’ve changed my mind!

P.S. when I talk about “men” here I am not talking about trans women, so pre-emptive warning, terfs stay off my post