Changing my sexual preference

[biannne]

Growing up as male, I have always been attracted to older and matured women. I remember growing up and having crush on my mother's friend. Then in my 20s, I started to crossdress fully. Even then I was attracted to women and CDs'. Later in my life, I started to take hormones to to change my appearance to be like a real woman. And to my surprise, as I got older (i am 40+ now), I have now becomes attracted to men.

I am still attracted to other TG gurls but now I am seem to find men as attractive as TG. And over the year my attraction towards as dwindle away.

I never thought you could change your sexual preference but somehow that is exactly what is happening to me.

Has anyone gone through this kind of transition?


Anna

[Katey888]

Interesting experience Anna...

It's not happened to me.. (perhaps for everyone this phrase should always be appended with the conditional - 'yet'...) but I am reminded of François de la Rochefoucauld's universally applicable quote... (yes I am...)

"The only thing constant in life is change..."

Perhaps you're not actually changing but just revealing a part of you that was uncomfortable to accept previously...

Katey x

[alwayshave]

Later in my life, I started to take hormones to to change my appearance to be like a real woman. And to my surprise, as I got older (i am 40+ now), I have now becomes attracted to men.

Anna, my attraction to women has not waned, but you highlight the difference between us quoted above.

[Kate Simmons]

I'm thinking that would be your choice Hon.Clothes, etc. don't MAKE us think a certain way. That comes from within us.

[Mayo]

Sexual orientation/preference is fluid to a degree and can change over time. I've also heard trans people say that hormones/blockers can change the way they think, feel and perceive the world. I see no reason why the body's natural change in hormones with age, or those used to transition, might not change one's orientation. And just because it doesn't happen to everybody doesn't mean it can't happen to some people. But I'm just guessing.

[Krisi]

Many folks claim that "homosexual" is something you are born with, that your sexual orientation cannot change, yet I have known a few people who married and had children and then left their partners to be with someone of their own sex. Then of course, some people are bisexual, they will take whatever comes along, male or female.

To answer your question, no, this has not happened to me and although I am curious as to how it would feel to be the woman in a sexual situation, I don't have the plumbing for this and I don't have any sexual or romantic attraction to men. I've never met or even seen one I would feel comfortable kissing or having sex with.

If you are attracted to other men, I say go for it if it won't hurt anyone. I'm not suggesting you leave your wife and children for a man but if you are not in a serious relationship with a woman, nothing is stopping you.

[PaulaQ]

Hon, you are probably now, and most likely always have been, bisexual. Many bi people (though not all or even the majority), experience attraction to different genders that varies over time.

Your sexual orientation is likely completely unchanged here. You are simply bi, and fluid. You are not alternating between straight and gay - being bi is its own thing. If we were talking ice cream, and straight is vanilla, and gay is chocolate, everyone thinks being bi is like a chocolate/vanilla ice cream swirl. But it isn't - it is its own distinct flavor, like strawberry ice cream.

When I started my transition, I'd have told you "yup, 100% hetero guy here!" Then a few months into HRT and it was like "hello boys!"

However, I don't think the hormones caused this. Thinking back on it, I've always been attracted to both men and women - I just acted on the one that was easier, socially. As a man, that was women, and as a woman, men. In reality though, I'm attracted to both still. (BTW, it isn't as binary as I make it sound, apparently, as my attraction roves around all over the place, I can be attracted to all sorts of genders...)

My feeling is that because bisexuality is so heavily erased, many of us have these weird conversion stories that aren't any type of conversion at all.

Oh one other thing, and a great example of bi erasure, and biphobia. If two people are in a relationship, and one of them falls in love with someone else, that's a bad situation, but people understand it, provided the apparent monosexual orientation of the relationship doesn't change. If a straight person falls out of love with their spouse, and falls for another person of the opposite sex, people get that. Same deal for gay people. It sucks, and there is often anger, blame, etc. but people get it.

But if a woman in a relationship with a man leaves him for another woman, or a woman in a relationship with another woman leaves her for a man, it IS a big deal, and there is extra blame, anger, and stigma for all. (The same is true for men.)

[I Am Paula]

My therapist had an opinion that sexuality cannot change -however, during transition, be it hormones, or just waking up to our true reality, many of us realize we had a longstanding attraction to men. Not new, just realized.
I know lots of transwomen, (I would hate to say most) that swore up and down to only liking women. A year in they were doubting themselves on that.
Now, my own theory. We fall for, or are attracted to people, not their sex. I have had sexual relationships with men and women. I'm not bi. I found people to whom I was attracted, and their sex happened to be 'so and so'.

[Jenniferathome]

...perhaps for everyone this phrase should always be appended with the conditional - 'yet'...

Not for "everyone." "Some" is the better descriptor.

Many folks claim that "homosexual" is something you are born with, that your sexual orientation cannot change, yet I have known a few people who married and had children and then left their partners to be with someone of their own sex. ...

Yes, this happens. These unfortunate soles are gay people who have denied this fact due to social, family, and other pressures. They came out, not changed.

[Tracii G]

As far back as I can remember I have been attracted to both.Not realizing there was anything wrong with that at the time.
As I grew up I learned they way normal society looks at sexual behavior.
I had friends growing up and most were girls so I guess that is where I formed a lot of my attraction to boys.
I played the guy role from 16 on so got married in my 20's had kids all that stuff.Never really loved my first wife in a traditional sense.
Did I change orientation? No just adapted to what society deemed normal I guess.
I totally adore guys and for me that is what makes it difficult. Getting a GF is easy getting a boy friend isn't.

[Megan Thomas]

If we were talking ice cream, and straight is vanilla, and gay is chocolate, everyone thinks being bi is like a chocolate/vanilla ice cream swirl. But it isn't - it is its own distinct flavor, like strawberry ice cream.

In the UK that would be Neapolitan ice cream...

[AllieSF]

I am a believer that whatever one is, "it" is there from the beginning, maybe just hidden away and not a priority ... yet. Over time and maybe because of some unique and special occurrence it may trigger something inside one's brain to realize that trying something different may be enjoyable and interesting. Whether one likes and enjoys the first experimentations depends on how those experiments went.

[docrobbysherry]

There r 3 terms: Straight, gay, bi.

But, that doesn't mean u must fall solidly into one catagory. Think of it like u do crossdressers. We r not the same, but on a sliding scale from male to female. And, I believe sexual attraction to be a similar sliding scale.

[ReineD]

Perhaps you're not actually changing but just revealing a part of you that was uncomfortable to accept previously...

This. Sexual orientation doesn't change.

If you had lived in an environment that openly supported same-sex attraction and if you had experienced a significant number of people in your daily life, while growing up, who were in open same-sex relationships, I'm guessing that you would have realized your attraction to males a lot earlier.

I have an anecdote that better explains this:

A woman I was in high school with married a man and had two children with him. After 15 years of marriage, she divorced him. Some time afterwards, she moved in with another woman. She didn't know how to explain this to herself and told us that either her sexual preferences had changed, or that she had fallen in love with her new partner's inner being and not her gender. Some years later, my friend was able to realize that she had never felt passionate about her husband. She married him because she felt this was what she was supposed to do. She had sex with him because she felt this was what she was supposed to do and she also wanted children. She was fond of him as a person and she mistook her fondness for sexual attraction because she didn't really know any other way to feel. It was only after having been with her new partner that she felt real physical arousal for the first time in her life, that also grew in time, a physical attraction that was tied to her emotional attraction and for the first time she felt real love. She now knows and accepts that she is lesbian and if she and her partner were ever to separate, she would be in a relationship with another woman. It took her a long time to know this because she wasn't "disgusted" with having sex with a man, she just didn't feel much in the way of physical arousal, and she thought this was what being hetero was supposed to feel like.

[PaulaQ]

@docrobbysherry - there are way more than three sexual orientations. For example, an aromantic gray ace, just to pick one of the myriad possibilities.

You could (sort of) divide sexuality into two groups
Monosexuals - straight, gay, lesbian, etc.
Non-monosexuals - bisexuals, fluid, asexuals, pansexuals, etc.

In particular bisexuality, as used in the bi community is generally taken to mean "attraction to more than one gender, not necessarily with the same level of intensity." As such it is an umbrella term over a very wide range of sexual orientations.

@I am Paula - far be it from me to tell anyone who they are, but your description "I'm not bisexual, but I'm attracted to the person, before their gender" is almost precisely the way many bisexual identified people describe their attraction. Again, nobody says you have to choose a label at all, just an FYI that it's ok if you one day do decide that bisexual is a good description for you. It doesn't mean, as is commonly thought, that you have to bounce back and forth between men and women, just that you can be attracted to more than one gender to some degree.

edit: I am really serious about not trying to label anybody. I provide definitions for terms people commonly use. It's all about you whether or not you feel they fit. I mention the other Paula's label simply because there is a tendency to erase bisexuality in our culture. A real strong one, actually. But there are plenty of people who have had sex with people of more than one gender, and decide ultimately that they are straight, or gay, or even asexual. These things aren't clear cut and are best sorted out by the person in question over time.

[Vala]

I do believe we humans can and some will change there sexual orientation. In the past I was just a straight dude, as straight as the come. But now I changed my sexual orientation to pansexual.
I really do not think I revealed something that has always been there cause I can remember how I felt and how I do now.

I'm not a doctor or a specialist. But I do know that many things change. The fashion we wear, the taste of food and drinks we like. So why should be sexual orientation any different?

[Jenniferathome]

The really frightening thing about the notion that one can "change one's sexual orientation" is that it gives credence to those who claim they can "cure" homosexuality. "Cure" counseling does not work. It has been proven this does not work.

[Lorileah]

In particular bisexuality, as used in the bi community is generally taken to mean "attraction to more than one gender, not necessarily with the same level of intensity." As such it is an umbrella term over a very wide range of sexual orientations.

OMG Not another UMBRELLA!

in RE: the OP. You cannot make someone what they aren't So attractions to men means you probably had those feelings before but suppressed them or didn't realize and act on them. We need to clarify many misconceptions associated with the trans world (which used to be an airline but is now gone). Transgender people are born, not made. You can take a million guys and put them in a dress and they will get out of that dress ASAP. People don't wake up one morning and think "I am going gay today." either. I have known people to try and they always say the hated every minute of it until they returned to their comfort sexuality. As noted, the people who married and had children then "went" gay, were gay ( I have a myriad of friends like this, also three ex-clergy). Taking hormones may have been processed in your mind as "Now I can do that because it's what women do and I have estrogen". Years ago I was a TA for human sexuality, we always said that (like being TG) sex is a continuum not a set of set points. You will slide up and down that line as you go. (side note, that is what allowed me to know I wasn't mentally ill because I liked women AND men).

Now excuse me, these umbrellas are blocking the sun


addedum: what Jennifer said is 100% correct

[Jennifer0874]

I learned a long time ago it's a great thing to be open to the possibility of finding love with a man. I happen to be married to a woman, but all the dating in between being single and meeting my wife was a lot of fun.

[jenni_xx]

Many folks claim that "homosexual" is something you are born with, that your sexual orientation cannot change, yet I have known a few people who married and had children and then left their partners to be with someone of their own sex.

Their sexual orientation didn't change.

I have always been gay, but I had relationships with women before I accepted this. I wasn't straight while I was with previous girlfriends - I was simply in a straight relationship. At the time of these relationships, I was convinced that it was what I wanted, and I genuinely felt that I wanted to be with them. I never ever entered into a relationship just as a pretense, a cover, I genuinely wanted to be, and thought I could be, straight. All I was doing was denying my true self. Time and experience taught me that.

[biannne]

In the back of my mind, I considered what Katey said, maybe I this was something hidden in my subconscious that is now surfacing. Mayby Dr. Carl Jumg was right after all.
But I was also wondering if this was an side effect of the hormones that I have been now taking for about 6 years.


Anna

[Eryn]

We like who we like. Sometimes, due to circumstance, our perceptions of who we like might change. What once was perceived as ludicrous might become more possible.

I wouldn't worry too much about labels. Go with what you want, not with what others want of you.

[PaulaQ]

There's a good reason for umbrella terms. They give strength in numbers.

Over the past 40 years, donors have given the following in grants in the US:

Gay & Lesbian groups: $484,000,000
Transgender groups: $16,000,000
Bisexual groups: $84,000

These are pretty shocking disparities.

There are a bunch of different identities under the transgender umbrella.
There are a bunch of different orientations under bisexuality.

It's ok to identify however you feel comfortable identifying, but for political and charitable purposes, where population equals dollars, it really helps if people band together under a label - just for those purposes, even if it isn't how they might describe themselves on a day to day basis.

By the way: "gay" and "lesbian" are also umbrella terms:
There are bears
Leathermen
Drag queens
Butches
Femmes
Lipstick
...
There are a bunch of gay and lesbian identities - yet very few people I think object to being "gay" / "lesbian" plus some additionally defining label of their choosing.

[Violetgray]

Simply put, if female hormones made you attracted to men then there would be no lesbians.

[Rhonda Jean]

This happens to be something I know something about, and none of the above answers quite describe my own experience.

During my 30 year marriage, sex was very ordinary. Exactly the way I thought it should be. No experimenting, no deviation from the most usual paths. Bland. Fine, but bland. Unless of course you count that fact that I slept in nightgowns, etc.

After my divorce I was quite surprised that there was more, a lot more, out there in the sexual world than I ever even dreamed! And that's within the straight category. Some fun, some scary, some very exciting, and some revolting. All practiced by ordinary respectable folks who had ordinary respectable jobs in ordinary respectable positions in society. I began to view sex in a totally new way. Add to that the fact that I was no longer morally bound. Living alone, I was now free to crossdress at will. The women I was with varied from coolly accepting of my crossdressing to turned on by it. Quite different from my ex. My sexual role became much more feminine than it had been during my marriage.

My "gateway" was a relationship with another CD. Turned out she was TS, but that's neither here nor there at this point. Next was a man.

I don't know where I go from here. If I had to pick, I'd say I'm gay. That is by far the sex I prefer. However, and this is important, I don't think I would want to pick a life partner based on how good it felt to have sex with them!!!

I'm in no way diminishing the value of sex. I love it, and I'm glad I've been able to enjoy the variety I have (It's killing me to write this in such a subdued way!). I know that I could love someone who was not the most exciting sex partner. In fact, I almost certainly will.

Sex is great. Unbelievably great! Especially when you find that thing that "does it" for you like nothing else ever has. That being said, love trumps all. Certainly we shouldn't be so shallow as to allow sex to control our entire lives. At this point in my life I sometimes struggle with that. Gay sex is the "new toy" for me. I'll put sex (gay and straight) back in the proper order. It's just going to take a while.