Things I never realized until I was grown up

[Jake25]

Here are all the things I never realized until I was grown up

Most women are not ashamed of or fear childbirth.

Most women are not ashamed of their body, it doesn't feel like they're stuck in a woman suit that they think they should take off and be male under it.

Most young girls didn't start withdrawing from peers because they started puberty. Most of the others didn't want to die because they started female puberty.

Most teenage girls didn't dream of becoming a gay male.

Most women didn't get sad when men gave them catcalls and flirted with them.

Most women accept that they are women and actually enjoy it.

[Algernon]

Ditto. Though still not quite grown up (I'm 17), I only realised the things on your list when realising that I was trans. I might add 'most women don't mind being physically less strong than most men'.

[Mosaic dude]

 

Most women are not ashamed of or fear childbirth.

Most women are not ashamed of their body, it doesn't feel like they're stuck in a woman suit that they think they should take off and be male under it.

Most young girls didn't start withdrawing from peers because they started puberty.

Most of the others didn't want to die because they started female puberty.

Most teenage girls didn't dream of becoming a gay male.

Most women didn't get sad when men gave them catcalls and flirted with them.

Most women accept that they are women and actually enjoy it.

All of the above.   I still don't get why women put up with having periods, now that we have the technology to make them go away without even compromising the woman's fertility.

For me though,  the number one biggie that I didn't realize until I was an adult was that my mum isn't a woman.   She doesn't identify as male as such,  I don't think,  but she certainly doesn't identify as female.  In retrospect it is pretty obvious,  but we never talked about those sorts of things and she belongs to a generation that didn't generally understand gender identity the way we do.

[Jake25]

All of the above.   I still don't get why women put up with having periods, now that we have the technology to make them go away without even compromising the woman's fertility.

For me though,  the number one biggie that I didn't realize until I was an adult was that my mum isn't a woman.   She doesn't identify as male as such,  I don't think,  but she certainly doesn't identify as female.  In retrospect it is pretty obvious,  but we never talked about those sorts of things and she belongs to a generation that didn't generally understand gender identity the way we do.

Not everyone on this site is young though. I'm glad that people are now starting to accept all this as time goes on. I'm glad we have all these describing labels for gender identity.

[Mosaic dude]

Not everyone on this site is young though. I'm glad that people are now starting to accept all this as time goes on. I'm glad we have all these describing labels for gender identity.

Me too.  Having labels to use makes it much easier.  It's harder to figure out where you stand if you don't have a vocabulary to work with.   I really like the fact that there are older people on here too.  They've got experience and perspectives that I don't have.  In mum's case it's not just that she's nearly 65, it's that she grew up in a small town too, and of course identifying as male would have meant being gay as well as trans.  To me it's weird to think that even when I was a kid, gay sex was illegal here. We're definitely making progress as a society.

[GnomeKid]

Hah... yea its still kind of astounding to me when people want to be the girl in a situation just because I had assumed no one really wanted to be for so long.. (particularly in bed)

[Jake25]

Hah... yea its still kind of astounding to me when people want to be the girl in a situation just because I had assumed no one really wanted to be for so long.. (particularly in bed)

That's why I'm not a straight man..I feel sorry for the girls in bed.

[Atypical]

Most teenage girls didn't dream of becoming a gay male.

Most women didn't get sad when men gave them catcalls and flirted with them.

These two are actually incredibly common. But I get you with the rest.

[Jake25]

Most teenage girls didn't dream of becoming a gay male.

Most women didn't get sad when men gave them catcalls and flirted with them.

These two are actually incredibly common. But I get you with the rest.

How do you know that cis teenage girls or women dream about becoming a gay male? That would make them trans gay men, right?

[dentistsandthedark]

A lot of women are uncomfortable with catcalls and unwanted male attention actually, and puberty is a traumatic time for a lot of people, cis OR trans, especially if you're female and the world tells you your body is wrong regardless of what you do with it.

[wheat thins are delicious]

How do you know that cis teenage girls or women dream about becoming a gay male? That would make them trans gay men, right?

Not really.  Dreaming about something doesn't make someone that thing. 

A lot of women are uncomfortable with catcalls and unwanted male attention actually, and puberty is a traumatic time for a lot of people, cis OR trans, especially if you're female and the world tells you your body is wrong regardless of what you do with it.

Yep.

[Jake25]

Not really.  Dreaming about something doesn't make someone that thing. 

Yep.

So the difference is, I was serious and they were just thinking about it.

[Atypical]

It's so common for women to dream of or fantasize being a gay male that there are psychology studies around the phenomenon, and entire subsets of media aimed at just that-- look at yaoi.

I'm in a really big roleplay community and about half (if not more) of the girls in the community roleplay gay male characters.

That doesn't make them trans, though. Being a man isn't about your desires or whether the grass looks greener on the other side of the fence. It's about having this innate knowledge that you should be male in all aspects; physically and socially.

My genitals are slightly more tolerable since T (I'm fairly big for a T-guy) but I still cannot even stand looking at them or having them touched. The concept of them being used in a female manner (penetrated) absolutely disgusts me. It has nothing to do with sexual desires and everything to do with, "my brain is telling me there should be a dick there". That's pretty much what dysphoria is.

Three of my exes wanted to be gay men and had the misfortune of assuming they were trans, only to detransition later when they realized it wasn't the case and they figured out it was just an aspect of their sexual fantasies.