Love and the Trans Person
This is a tough one because how can you love someone else if they or you don't love who you fully are?
My views on this subject have evolved significantly over the years to the point where I believe strongly you must be truly yourself before being able to accept or give love which necessarily means you shouldn't be merely tolerated but instead fully embraced by your partner. In absence of that, it is my opinion that it is infinitely superior to be alone and proud of one's identity to being halfheartedly accompanied by another who doesn't really get you or is in any way perturbed by who you really are.
Settling for anything less, is selling yourself short and trying to fit yourself into a box to please someone else may feel right, but I believe it to ultimately be a recipe for long term dissatisfaction. Them telling you they are fine with you being trans as long as they don't see it is not really acceptance, it's more like avoidance. Of course that is their right, but then so is your right to look elsewhere or, better still, to not look at all.
Your acceptance of conditional love provided you fit into the right template may be understandable because the partner may desire someone "normal". However this arrangement usually means the trans person gets the short end of the stick. If conventional is what they are looking for then that is what they should seek as there is a veritable plethora of choice in that department equating to roughly 99% of the male born population.
Also remember that it is not you who finds true love; it finds you. But even if it never does, then at least love yourself as you were made because that is a prerequisite to a truly honest and happy existence.
My views on this subject have evolved significantly over the years to the point where I believe strongly you must be truly yourself before being able to accept or give love which necessarily means you shouldn't be merely tolerated but instead fully embraced by your partner. In absence of that, it is my opinion that it is infinitely superior to be alone and proud of one's identity to being halfheartedly accompanied by another who doesn't really get you or is in any way perturbed by who you really are.
Settling for anything less, is selling yourself short and trying to fit yourself into a box to please someone else may feel right, but I believe it to ultimately be a recipe for long term dissatisfaction. Them telling you they are fine with you being trans as long as they don't see it is not really acceptance, it's more like avoidance. Of course that is their right, but then so is your right to look elsewhere or, better still, to not look at all.
Your acceptance of conditional love provided you fit into the right template may be understandable because the partner may desire someone "normal". However this arrangement usually means the trans person gets the short end of the stick. If conventional is what they are looking for then that is what they should seek as there is a veritable plethora of choice in that department equating to roughly 99% of the male born population.
Also remember that it is not you who finds true love; it finds you. But even if it never does, then at least love yourself as you were made because that is a prerequisite to a truly honest and happy existence.
