What does this say about ME? And shedding the gay stigma.

I had a long period of wondering what this new development meant for me.  In general, labels SO don’t matter anymore.  But people will ask, and I like to have an answer … and to be honest I asked about myself anyway.  So it was worth thinking through.

So most of my life until recently I have identified as gay/lesbian.  Turns out, the person I am in love with and am spending my life is is actually male.  So … does that make me straight?  My answer:  Kind of (but it still doesn’t matter).

I have always been attracted to only a very small specific group of androgynous women.  I’m not the type who can go people watch and say heeey that person is gorgeous every few seconds.  In my regular life, a person I find attractive crosses my path a few times a year. 

So I wonder … have I always been attracted to FTM people but never knew, or never labeled it as such?  Is that really a niche of attraction that I fall into?  It is so specific, in my head it rings closer to “fetish” than “normal level of attraction”.  Fetish is a term that comes with all kinds of connotations  -- and I don’t think it applies here.

So what I need is a word for: attracted-to-girls-so-androgynous-they-are-actually-boys.

Speaking of my girl actually being a boy, I have to say that I am really looking forward to shedding the gay stigma.  With Katie as Kaden and as a BOY, then we are in a BOY GIRL relationship.  I don’t have to come out to people over and over and over again (what does your boyfriend do?  Oh well SHE …).  I don’t have to worry that beyond being a couple in public, we will be a “normal” couple in public.  No one has to have an extra reaction (vocalized or not) to our being together.  No one will refuse to bake us a wedding cake (yes, that happened). 

I don’t understand people who say being gay is a choice.  I would never choose a life that goes at odds with my culture in so many ways.  My culture is getting better, but if it had been a *choice*?  I would have saved myself a lot of grief and heartache. 

It will be very nice indeed, to leave all of that behind.