Inner Worlds

Kink partner coming out as trans

The above question made me think of my post elsewhere called Letting him shine. I don't know if anyone else will readily see the connection.

I suspect people in comments indicating that most likely it was a kink because it was a safe, very private way to express something and now they feel more confident in that thing are correct.

We have the concept of a muse, which is someone who inspires the work of an artist. The artist sees something in that individual that somehow speaks to them.

Similarly, in writing there is the rule of thumb to figure out who your audience is and to come up with a highly defined individual person in your mind, not merely "I'm writing for X demographic."

So for example I might write "For Genevieve, a troubled trans youth I once knew " instead of writing "For the trans community."

Trying to find some means to adequately express our inner world or inner point of view in a way that works for us out in the world can be challenging. It makes perfect sense to me that trans individuals may somewhat frequently start by relating to that private inner world as a private "sexual preference" or kink and only over time get comfortable with thinking "No, this is who I really am and need to be full time."

Many years ago, my son and I talked about his experience of me being the moderator for a list explicitly designed around his interests and how that was a safe space for him to express himself in ways he used to only do around ME. That became a stepping stone to him being able to CHOOSE to be interesting and funny in public if he felt comfortable while being generally tight lipped and antisocial and using self checkout because small talk with cashiers is too much social pressure and nothing he wants to deal with.

People online have told me it's ridiculous for me to let him use self checkout to avoid having to talk to a cashier. That's not actually our primary reason for strongly preferring self checkout. Our primary reason is germ control, so I also typically use self checkout though making small talk doesn't bother me.

He's a legal adult. I don't actually control his choices in that regard. What's ridiculous is Internet strangers being judgy about someone who likely is ASD preferring to not deal with unnecessary small talk when it's easily sidestepped without any social fallout of any kind.

He doesn't have to justify his self checkout preference to me or to Internet strangers. He's remarked on it to me because I'm his mother and he trusts me and he was willing to share that detail with me.

I share it online to cast light on other things in hopes of being helpful to other people, not to invite your criticism of his decision. Social stuff is hard for him. It comes easier for me. I served as an important bridge between his inner world and the rest of the world and it helped him figure out how to effectively navigate certain things he found challenging.

I describe it here because some people are wrestling with similar challenges. While I would like to see a world where a simple medical test tells people "You have a biological mismatch between blah blah blah and yadda yadda and should be on HRT, if only to get adequate support for what is almost certainly impaired immune function." that's not the world I live in. 

I live in a world where the current messy reality is that most people with sex hormone syndromes under the trans umbrella are finding their way primarily by trying to figure out why their inner world and outer world aren't a happy match.

I happen to know something about trying to navigate such questions. Landscape of the Mind may also be a useful read for some people trying to sort out trauma from gender identity.