I began on my transitioning journey about 10 months ago, that was when I realized I was transgendered. I am transitioning mtf. I have told everyone I am transitioning, including my wife and daughter (5 years old). I dress in women's clothes full time and everywhere. I have adopted a female given name. I have been taking hormones since November 2015. My wife and I separated for about 6 months last year, and decided to give it another try for the sake of keeping the family together. So we three are living together again. We've been getting along pretty well, but I have zero sexual attraction to my wife now. I don't want to caress, kiss, nothing. I can hug her in a platonic way, but I don't see her as a romantic partner any more.
This has been bothering her a lot. She has been very sexually frustrated, watching tv in a separate room and masturbating. I suppose I could fake it to make her happy. But it would be a chore, with no feeling of arousal, desire, or romantic love on my part. Or at least I'm scared that's how it would be. That's how it's been the last 3 times we've had sex.
What scares me most is losing my family again. I desperately wanted to fulfill my daughter's wish to make the family whole again. Just the other day she told me she is happy because we're all together again. We all sleep in the same bed, and my daughter feels so safe snuggled between us. I want to be able to give her that feeling of security, of being loved in a happy, loving home, by both her parents. A childhood I didn't have.
But I find myself being more and more attracted to men. At night I have elaborate sexual fantasies of being with a man. And yet I don't know if the loss of my sexual attraction to my wife is because of my gender transition (I'm becoming a woman so I'm getting more attracted to men), or the fact my wife and I have been together for eight years and the novelty has faded, or because the hormones I'm taking are suppressing my testosterone level.
Sometimes it seems that separating again and giving both of us the opportunity to start a new life with a new man is the most humane thing to do, even if it causes pain for our daughter and breaks up the family again. But the grief associated with losing my family again is not the only thing that gives me pause. I have to admit that at almost 46 years old, I am terrified of becoming a woman and trying to find a man at this point in my life. How am I going to find a heterosexual man to love me when I'm competing with women who were assigned female at birth? When I was a man, I never found the prospect of being with a trans woman as appealing as the idea of being with a cisgendered woman, and I never dated a trans woman. And, it's hard enough for single xx-chromosome women in their forties to find a man these days.
I would love to hear from all of you out there struggling with similar family issues, and anyone else who wants to weigh in.
