Heterotypicality, Queer Dating and Trans Romance

"Compulsive heterosexuality" was how a friend described her recent dates' behaviour to me. The idea being that her date, despite being bi, tended towards behaviour, wants, words and actions engendered by heteronormativity. It's captured under the umbrella of compulsive heterosexuality when we imagine that the upstream belief that "heterosexuality is the norm, and other sexual preferences and expressions of romance are deviant" becomes internalized, and that then how we see ourselves and so act is cast within the bubble of deviance. I'm going to refrain from pushing to hard on the walls—where does the heterosexuality end and capitalism begin? what does it mean when we say, and how do you meaningfully demarcate, expressions of love internalized in a straight manner?—but I think it's a pertinent idea that I struggle with now, not for my friend or the lesbian dating scene but Not all readers will be, understandably, 100% confident when they see these words what I mean. I am a transwoman who prefers to date masculine presenting and male genitalia having, people. I.e. a straight but not-cis woman.for myself as a "straight" transwoman. Where does compulsive heterosexuality end and living an authentic affirmed life begin?

And even more recently, I was visiting with my old gay fairy-godmother, a 5-6 year gap since the last time we could see one another and their first opportunity to talk about my being trans with me while I'm actually transitioning. This was first & foremost a catch-up—an opportunity to share stories, laugh at life, have coffee, cherish the precious time together you get with people you trust—but, as I hope other queer people have the pleasure of knowing, it was also a 'gay check-up', the kind of "how are you doing?" that your doctor says while poking around on your intenstines in the examination room. We talked a lot about my transition, the highs and lows, the medical process, and facets of my identity that intersect with politics: my gay well-being.

• Name changed, Elizabeth ✓ Oliver
• Pronouns she/her ✓ something about no hard lines, not important
• Fit and exercising ✓
• Relatively mentally healthy ✓ anorexia depression
• Not in poverty ✓
• Maternal family is good ✓ paternal working on it
• Personal politics are progressive and exhibit solidarity ✓
• Dating: straight?!

Explicitly calling myself straight is in a sense queer treason. Yes, I'm trans; yes, I've been the young twink in a bar flirting with older men; yes, I've had people question my name, voice, hair, body, and identity for decades; yes, I've been assaulted physically and sexually; yes, I've faced both family and social-communal rejection—by all metrics I'm well equipped, qualified, to lay some claim to the LGBT experience. And yet, because I like men, I pursue a dating style that engenders a sense of heterosexual structure, my behaviour becomes an implicit rejection of, a turn away from, the community. To simultaneously claim an identity of womanhood and then to express a dating preference for men is akin to an aspirational heterosexuality. So how do we reconcile this? Emotionally, sexually and obviously, trans people are not monolithic. Some of us are ace, bi, lesbian, gay, pan, kinky, poly, and every bit as sexually diverse and deserving of a spot in the LGB+ umbrella. It's sad times when this needs to be said explicitly but as I flirt with a line of reasoning here, I can't give credence to those who want to disown trans people from the queer community. A space is needed to understand that not all gay men are drag queens and crossdressers, that not all transvestites are transgender, and that issues about "gay people" are semantically not about lesbians, trans people, and so on. There are differences in our group but our group is stronger together and I'm not one to care about definitions when I see my siblings treated poorly by the systems we live in—issues about "gay people" raised in society are rarely actually about their semantic target. This is an essay about my not being gay and also fuck it, I am gay if we're talking about protecting each other's rights, abuse, and societal systems. Fight together.With or without the T in the acronym, we are nonetheless a part of the community. Some of us however, don't as clearly fall under this way of categorizing—the gender, but explicitly not, sexual minorities; who face as much trauma, marginalization, hate, as anyone else, but who do not have the shared cornerstone of a non-heterosexual relationship or desire. Only partly different and partly similar, in thinking about dating and romance: are our relationships fundamentally heterosexual? trans? queer? somewhere in between?

I hear often from other trans people that they don't like dating outside of the queer community due to the gap in experience and understanding—that they face what the feel is so much dogshit everyday from straight cis people that they don't want to come home to someone else who might not get it; who can comfort in the shared experience but only ever from an arm's reach. Or worse, to come home to someone that does not make their private shared space with their partner a welcoming place, i.e. one free from heteronormative expectations and structure. That preference is as valid as any other, as is the preference to not solely date within the queer community; but that gap, that 'never quite understanding', poses a practical problem: how can trans people authentically date in the "straight" community when their very identity separates them from their partners—breaks the unwritten and written expectations—foregrounding both how the relationship will simultaneously never be heteronormative or queer? I pign, love, crush, reject, lust, and feel (almost) all the same emotional struggle towards men (queer or not) that any other straight woman does; but the love I get back is categorically different.

Growing up trans in a rural area, at a highschool with only 100 other students in my grade, and with a family ever so slightly more conservative than they realized, I had all the sexual feelings and angst that any teenager does but with no outlet. There was no potential partner to have fumbling emotional intimacy with; there was no conversation about connecting me with other queer children available (let alone a conversation about my being queer). And so, like anyone, I felt love (unrequited), spent nights dreaming of others and crying, the heart flutter when you're around that person; but doomed also to feel the unbridled anger, the imprint of straight prejudice, the deep loneliness that came to surround my experiences. I'm sure like many other queer and gender non-conforming youth, I 'played the part' of a straight cis-man (terribly) and numbed myself to all the signals it was wrong. Whatever the causal direction, I ended up learning, practicing, all the most shallow and toxic elements of masculine identity in cis-straight dating; and I spent the next 13 years in a deep depression.

This half baked identity, right for no one, and uncomfortable for everyone became my life. For as much pain as I'm describing, I was actually so lucky to meet the women I did during this time. Women who met my secret proclomation of trans-ness with "you're not there yet, but let's work towards it"; who drew me homemade CD covers with not-so-hidden messages (Shut up and Kiss Me, Pony Up!) while their 2" patent kitten heels were left in my closet; who took me to banana republic to shop for dresses and still wanted an intimate relationship; who lived with me in university, sleeping in my den of depression, and thought it was cute that I wanted to 'steal' their clothes the way they stole my hoody; who helped me get ready for the opera (corset, gown, heels and all) and still wanted to talk, to hug. I had some of the best partners and friends that any young queer person could ask for, and my struggle still got the better of me. Fighting your heart is futile.

For a number of years between youth and transition my outlet was the kink community—do you want people to treat you "like a woman"?, recognize your masculinity (the difference) directly and still have sex with you "as feminine object of desire"?, to be called "babygirl", encouraged to wear feminine clothing, feel a calloused hand stroke your thigh and thumb your garter belt?, to be told to twirl by a bigger rougher man? Then girl, the kink community is for you. It is entirely too easy to have all these experiences and more: keep your weight down, spend that last $100 on a pair of Aldo stilettos, make a fetlife account, and head to a munch. Hell, if safety's not a priority, then skip the munch—a lonely cop will be glad to tie you up in his basement.

The problem with these experiences is that they are fundamentally fetish. I can't speak for everyone, but in my time, I was treated as kinky crossdressing slut, slave, sexual partner, walking skirt to smack and oggle, first, and romantic interest, emotional partner, person to develop alongside, second. There were genuinely great and meaningful relationships to be had too—I can't be unfair—but even these were kink first, kink founded, and relationship second. As in, the foundation of the partnership was the kink, without the kink there was no partnership—all other romance, passion, was contingent; held hostage by the desire to coat skin with wax, bind arms with rope, and so on. The relationship could not flourish beyond the sexual practice, to a point where the person qua life-partner was more important than the fun things you got to do in bed with them, the person qua bed-partner.

So now today I date, repeatedly, caught in the vortex of 'matches' and 10 apps that all have the same format and mechanisms with varying degrees of 'buy-in' to make a profile.

• You might get more matches if you do try to pass incognito but it's not worth the danger. Respect your partners, respect yourself, protect yourself from bigots.Make a profile, as best you can, and don't hide that you're trans.
  
• Reach out to every normal looking guy you can or that likes you, be authentic and charismatic.
• Match! Time to try and have a genuine conversation over a for profit social media app.
• Get ghosted in 60% of your conversations within the first few exchanges.
• Lose another 20% to creeps who try to ask you about your genitals before they know what you do for work.
• Get a date!
• Go back to step 2

This list is, not surprisingly, extremely similar to what all people go through with dating apps. They're programs designed to bait interaction and drive matches, not actually find people love. And yet, somewhere between "lose 20% to creeps" and "go back to step 2", there's a drop of uniqueness to the trans experience. Having someone ask about your breasts or make comments about 'fucking you' while you're just trying to ride the metro is practically a rite of passage to womanhood, but when its backed up with 'you're a naughty "girl" hey?', 'Though the men who send messages like this rarely know how to use English contractions correctly.this is why you're trans isn't it?', and (my favourite) 'do you think your dick's bigger than mine?' it's hard to walk away feeling like you belong in the space the same way that cis people do. Add on the fact that by the time you do get to a date, it's a dice roll on whether or not that person actually is as comfortable with dating a trans person as they originally thought—or, more earnestly, whether they find you as attractive in real life as they thought they might—and you have a recipe for feeling unwelcome.

It is not bigoted, transphobic, conservative, etc., to not find a trans person attractive. That's just life, sometime's you like someone and sometimes you don't. What I have found so hard to untangle in the experience is the overlap between 'I just don't think it will work' (i.e. any regular rejection for any number of reasons) and 'is your dick bigger than mine?'. No judgment passed to any of the every day people looking for love, as mature adults, willing to go on a date with a trans person, and then are simply just not interested. The total experience from step 1 to date and back again to step 2, over and over, is what makes it so dangerously difficult to try and decouple the feeling of not being "enough" of your gender from the feeling of regular old rejection when you do get to that date. Everyone questions their self after a rejection; the emotional chaos of 'going through puberty a second time' when you're 30, makes you ask all the same questions as anyone else along with "am I not passing?", "will I ever be able to have a relationship with someone who prefers my gender?", "am I not woman enough?". There is a cloud of doubt that brews and brews when you can have an amazing date, full of smiles and laughs, a cheeky flirty look, and by the end of it you're hugging goodnight and hearing that "I think we could be really great friends!" Totally normal to have happen? 100%. Totally dejecting and making you feel like you aren't seen as a potential partner for your gender? 100%.

This is fundamentally a desire for heteronormativity; and when the process of dating itself becomes a pathway to simultaneous affirmation and marking of other-ness, it brings out internalized self hatred.My writing will always unapologetically blend between my voice literally and a broadly trans-femme voice on issues; but here, I use the first person intentionally. The issue at play is internalized hatred and that can only ever be addressed head on and personally. Is having a straight guy be attracted to me actually any more affirming than an explicitly queer ascribed generally masc presenting person being attracted to me? And for that matter what about a femme presenting lesbian? Is the affirmation actually the actions and desires of another person or the internal expression and projection onto others interacting with your identity in a romantic context? The fetish community is quick to 'affirm' transgender identities and yet the result is often a reduction of experience from real partnership to 'just' sexual gratification and especially "idol-ism". When approaching dating with both a queer body and with a desire for heteronormativity, can it ever actually be a genuinely heteronormative relationship that is wanted (let alone possible to be manifested)?

There is a distinction worth teasing apart here. Previously I mentioned the common attitude that dating non-queer cis people is often unpopular with trans people and it would be all too easy to point to this proclomation of self hatred as both (1) part of the cause; and (2) the "problem". But it can obviously be true that someone had the preference to date within the queer community exclusively, even for the aforementioned reason of a gap in understanding, without that resting on any kind of dating experience or desire for heteronormativity. In everyday life it's made apparent that non-queer people usually don't "get it" and the dataset is not so small to prevent a genuine preference for relationships with people who understand you more clearly from forming on that basis alone. And even if someone were to shed their desire for heteronormative partnership, seek out fundamentally queer dating, can one be sure that they're not carrying around the same issues anyway? Put plainly, Thanks to Finntastic Mr. Fox for sharing their thoughts on their experience of their sexuality through transition. Though my thoughts here do not echo his completely, his insightfulness helped me to tease out my own.it is not the desire for any specific kind of relationship itself that is the problem, and here for me a 'heterosexual' one, it is the latent homophobia and transphobia that is internal and merely highlighted, brought out of the closet, by the failed pursuit of heterotypical partnership.

Internalized transphobia can mean so many things and is sadly often thrown around without much explanation, with equivocation to self-loathing qua depression, without context, cause, or positive next steps—it is a fragmented thought in need of a conceptual stool. When a trans person pigns for change to the size of their breasts (too large or too small) is that internalized transphobia, dysphoria, good old fashioned body image issues, received social concepts of power and capital? Of course it depends; all of the listed concepts, including internalized transphobia, can explain the phenomena but it actually depends on the person, time, context, and so on. So, yes, internalized transphobia can explain things but it can also be an unwarranted jump—sometimes people just don't like their bodies and it doesn't have to be attached to internalized messages to be justified. This appears tangential on the surface but is so crucial to understanding trans "heterotypical" dating: having an authentic "hetero-like" sexual preference (say as a "straight" trans woman) does not necessitate heteronormative practices, nor does it imply that your sexuality is informed by self-hatred or phobias, but if it turns one away from the queer community, if it manifests in heteronormativity, then one should really investigate the possibility of it coming from transphobia. We've strayed from the original definition but I can't help but call this out as another instance of "compulsive heteronormativity", where the heteronormative acts are not intentional but shielding deeper negative emotion. And while it's easy to see the parallel in the case of my preferences, I'd encourage the reader to see the broader argument: is it not as much a self agrandizing, self labeling and reveling, in the sense of "deviant" that could (not would, never always) provoke someone to only date within the explicitly queer community? The call here is simply for all of us to be aware of our motivations.

I've tried to develop, and hinted at, the use of the word "hetero-typical" here to help show the difference between sexual preferences played out in a healthy way and participation in the broader cultural forces which perpetuate themes of queer hate. It is not 'compulsive heteronormativity' to have a sexual preference coded 'straight'—that is, to have a heterotypical relationship—but participating in your sexuality within the heteronormative box, projecting desire for heteronormality onto partners, begs the question: why are you doing that? Is this a genuine want? How does that want interplay with the broader structures we live in and is playing out that want perpetuating harmful norms?

For myself, I know that my desires are inextricably linked to the need to grieve. To grieve the loss of a childhood free of physical assault and emotional pain linked to being labeled gay. To grieve the loss of good people in my life because my own dumb ass pushed them away and hurt them. To grieve the loss of development with my family at crucial stages of life. To grieve the loss from rejection from those I trust in a time of need. To grieve the loss of my own decisions and how my actions manifested, masking and delaying real progress with my gender. To grieve the loss of being normal, the loss that a heteronormative relationship is not possible for me, that a 'heterotypical' sexual preference will likely never become a normal relationship in our society. My partnerships will always be a degree off center—my relationships will never be typical—and fuck if wanting to be 'typical', invisible, isn't at the heart of so many people's trans experience. This is all fundamentally the same grief: that we live in an oppressive heterosexual set of cultural norms which make many trans and broadly queer people see themselves as other, broken, irregular, wrong.

I've found solace personally in making sure that when I date men I find a natural point to say outloud that I'm queer. Not to throw it in their face but when chatting about something where it's relevant to make that casual mention. When that person is not queer themselves it can be hard: "wait queer? But if I'm on a date with you and I'm not queer then how does this work?" Those subtle moments foreground all the ideas of 'heteronormality', heterosexuality, queer identity, and what it means to date a trans person in a flash. Sometimes it ends dates; not because it causes conflict but because the mental barrier is so great that I can no longer be seen as potential partner and am instead only now friendly trans person, maybe 'friend', and later, even hours later, that date will call me "bro" or "dude" while we happily chat about wherever our conversation went. And so we have another grief. We can shed the desire for heterotypicalness, to be invisible and 'same' in our culture, but that is not without consquence, new insecurities, that ever-growing cloud of doubt.

The tension between gender affirmation and how a romantic partner sees you, speaks to you, is a heavy weight for both parties. The poem we've been reading throughout this essay was written to capture a recent moment of frustration—a moment where I felt horny, happy, deeply sad, overwhelmed, like my gut was in knots and my head was spinning, a moment of catharsis, sobbing and smiling. Months of dating, of feeling more feminine than ever before, closer to a heterotypical experience than ever, feeling more lustful and happy with my body and who I am; and also months of 'not enoughs', of feeling romance and rejection, feeling like no matter how much I've changed I will never fit in some made-up box that I'm not even sure I want to fit into but feel I have to. There is so much emotional work that most trans people need to face and there's no single antidote to work for all of us. The truth is that all dating will continue to give me these emotions, no matter how I slice it; but the positive aim is to understand that not having a 'typical' relationship is not a negative thing, it's not a thing that reduces the dating pool or makes dating harder (no matter how easy that lie is to slip into), it's not a thing to train away, not a thing to avoid, not a thing to overcome. I focus on the trans femme here because it is my experience, but something tells me the thesis might apply to trans men as well. I leave it to them to sort out if it's worth anythingBeing trans femme means having atypical romantic relationships even if you have heterotypical sexual preference—maybe the word I wanted all along was, hetero-atypical. That doesn't mean you can't date straight cis het men, it doesn't mean that only non-binary or trans masculine people can be your partner, it doesn't mean your partner will never understand you or provide comfort for you, it doesn't mean you are wrong.

Hence, catharsis. I can only laugh and cry at the same time over the emotions I feel. I won't learn to play the role of someone who grew up cisgender to appease some dating and relationship standard, I'll continue to, happily, talk about being queer even when dating cis straight men, I'll continue to feel gender euphoria, the proverbial 'oats' that is my ever more affirming trans femme life, and I'll continue to feel inadequate and hurt after masculine people make it so clear that I'm not a potential partner... bro, hurt by what feels like an uphill battle to get someone on the same page that we even can work towards love together, that a trans person is an okay person to love. And who knows, like so many other trans people, maybe one day I'll get over the insecurities enough to face my bisexual romantic feelings head on without feeling like I'm giving up the part of my identity that I've spent the last decade struggling towards...