Sometimes in the midst of having bouts with our dysphoria, our SO's can become unwitting victims of our self-focus.  Our SO's can also at times seem to work more against us than for us.  We all suck sometimes, but our SO's are our SO's for a reason - even if at times we forget what that is.

I made this thread to help us reflect on the things that made us fall in love with our SO's, to remember a time when things felt different.  I've found, that when I am most upset with my SO, I only have to remember times we had when we first met to be reminded of how much I dearly would miss having her in my life - and remind me how it is when I am head over heels for her and she for me.

For all of us with happy relationships with our SO's, you are more than willing to participate too - I'd love to hear how you met and fell in love.

****

I met the girl who would become my best friend in a rather unlikely place - the internet.  No, not a dating service or chat room.  I had just de-transitioned and was studying some Jungian stuff for fun.  In my studies it lead me to look for others who were studying the same thing.  I actually ran across my SO's website which had an essay with regard to the MBTI.  I was really impressed.  I dropped her a quick email telling her I liked her point of view.

So the next day at work, I decided to look at her site again to see if there was anything else interesting on it.  Turns out that most of the site was devoted to anime.  I found her personal page and found a girl who seemed incredibly lonely from the few comments she made about herself.  I saw that she had an AIM and so resolved to contact her that night when I got home; I figured, what the heck, I could use another internet friend.

I apparently interrupted her carefully crafted reply to my first email when I IMed her.  She seemed almost put out about it - she had gone to a lot of trouble to write a thoughtful reply only to have me bound into her life unexpectedly.

Well, that is how it started.  We talked all night that night.  I've done that with other internet friends before, but normally the newness of it dies off within a month or so.  With her though, I found myself discussing dang near everything with her and it continued for months.

We found out we couldn't be MORE different.  Despite our similar interests, we both had extremely different personalities.  She was rough and coarse like the rocks she loved (geology major) and I was super outgoing and friendly - normally traits she despised in others.  She always felt people were disingenuous when they acted nice, but she felt I might be different - though it took her a while to decide that.  She originally referred to me as Mr. Wickham - a smooth talking manipulator from the book Pride and Prejudice.

We slowly let one another into each other's world.  I found her fascination with natural life and evolution to be contagious.  Once opening up to me, she found me very amusing - much like a parrot (her words) always running around vaunting my unique plumage in my own incredibly social world.

We remained internet/phone friends for almost a year when things really changed.  I was at a renaissance festival with some friends.  I was really enjoying myself but my mind was distracted.  I remember looking at this sword with a bright purple blade and thought, dang, I wish she were here, she would love that sword.  That day I realized I was in love with her.

I'd love to hear your stories.

I met my last girlfriend at a volunteer job. We were both working in this peer-education program through the San Mateo county public health department. If it weren't for that program, we'd never have met as she lived in Half Moon Bay and went to HMB High School and I lived in South San Fransisco and went to Serra High School, an all-boys Catholic school in San Mateo. HMB and SSF are about 30 minutes apart by car, and I wasn't driving yet when I met her. But, I regularly took the bus from SSF to San Mateo, though it was a 1-hour ride involving at least 2 bus routes.

The Peer Resource Project, as it was called, would have an annual trip to an SF Giants game in the summer. It was there that, while being ignored by the folks I'd gotten a ride from (one of whom I had the hots for), V______ came over to talk to me on the pretense that she'd never seen me with a beard.

We began to talk by phone on Thursday nights; as I recall this started because the Giants game was also on a Thursday. I could misremember, that was overs 22 years ago. These weekly calls soon turned into nearly nightly calls, and then into dates.

On 9 November 1987, we decided that we were engaged. We were married on 18 September 1988, three months after graduating high school.

An interesting thing that she noticed about me but only mentioned within the last 2 years or so was that when she was first getting to know me, I seemed a bit feminine to her. Then, during the first 10 to 15 years of our marriage she said I seemed more masculine. Since then, she'd noticed that I seemed to be regaining that feminine aspect I'd had in the past. This would be at about the same time I began to understand my gender identity as androgyne.

This November will be the 22nd anniversary of our engagement. Our 21st wedding anniversary was last month. While she's not always been perfectly understand of my seemingly incessant identity crisis, she usually just needs a little time and then all is well.

We met on the internet.
First time we met, my SO had a little crush on me, but being shy, and a little intimidated, he didn't say a word.
He used to date another friend from the same chat and she'd shown me a picture of him and I would go "yeah, he's cute, but he's blond, I never go for blonds".

Almost two whole years later, we ran into each other in a chatroom a mutual friend of ours had set up on a bdsm irc server.
There was a moment of "you?... here?... into this?... too?" combined with "OMG! I'M RECOGNIZED! WHAT DO I DO!" induced awkwardness after which we started talking.
First we talked kinks, then we moved into PMs and talked life.
We stopped going to that IRC server and just talked to each other over the usual irc channel, and through msnm and Y!messenger and even skype.

We had both had relationships that ended poorly to put it mildly and so we both decided to simply enjoy it while it lasted, no strings attached, and just, choose not to get too attached to the idea of being together, nor each other, and just realize that if we don't last more than a year, that's cool.
And still, we found ourselves caring more and more for each other. I was brutally honest with him, told him everything, even more than I had intended to. Coming out of closet after closet to him, almost intentionally trying to scare him off, but he wasn't bothered.
He simply smiled and accepted me with all, ALL, of my issues.
Soon enough there were "love you"s at the ends of messages.

18 months later, he came over for a visit around new years eve.
He had a flight back two years later, but he didn't take it.
A year after that we got married, that was this last january. jan.13.2009

We still feel that if something happens and we break up for any reason, we'll be okay, we'll just be friends instead.
But we're "partners" 'till that day comes and we love each other a lot.

Quote from: Miniar on October 21, 2009, 12:07:01 PM
We met on the internet.
First time we met, my SO had a little crush on me, but being shy, and a little intimidated, he didn't say a word.
He used to date another friend from the same chat and she'd shown me a picture of him and I would go "yeah, he's cute, but he's blond, I never go for blonds".

Almost two whole years later, we ran into each other in a chatroom a mutual friend of ours had set up on a bdsm irc server.
There was a moment of "you?... here?... into this?... too?" combined with "OMG! I'M RECOGNIZED! WHAT DO I DO!" induced awkwardness after which we started talking.
First we talked kinks, then we moved into PMs and talked life.
We stopped going to that IRC server and just talked to each other over the usual irc channel, and through msnm and Y!messenger and even skype.

We had both had relationships that ended poorly to put it mildly and so we both decided to simply enjoy it while it lasted, no strings attached, and just, choose not to get too attached to the idea of being together, nor each other, and just realize that if we don't last more than a year, that's cool.
And still, we found ourselves caring more and more for each other. I was brutally honest with him, told him everything, even more than I had intended to. Coming out of closet after closet to him, almost intentionally trying to scare him off, but he wasn't bothered.
He simply smiled and accepted me with all, ALL, of my issues.
Soon enough there were "love you"s at the ends of messages.

18 months later, he came over for a visit around new years eve.
He had a flight back two years later, but he didn't take it.
A year after that we got married, that was this last january. jan.13.2009

We still feel that if something happens and we break up for any reason, we'll be okay, we'll just be friends instead.
But we're "partners" 'till that day comes and we love each other a lot.

Rofl that is an awesome story, Min.

I've known my SO for 7 years, started through chat. But, since we've grown a lot(OK, maybe just me, she's a bit older and still much more immature than me) and I'm not sure if it's going to last.

OK, I feel old now. I met my SO before there was a public Internet.

OK shades I will join you so you won't be alone. I met my SO about 17 years ago or so, before the Internet stuff. We were working at the same place, she was several levels up from me, one of those my bosses, bosses boss.  Now let me back up a moment about three months before we met our SO's dumped us to be with each other, so we were the ones left. So when we first met she would not date me for a few reasons, one we could not get together as it would be too weird because of our whole ex situation, two I wore a leather jacket had a motorcycle and a red 69 Mustang, three I was a bit of a slut at that time. After a while she agreed to go out with me but in order to confirm it was for real she did not kiss me for THREE months yes THREE months!  I am also a bit younger than she is so she was a bit concerned about that but in the end here we are having been together 16ish years. She has been great about the transition thing, she is bisexual so she does not care what I am just loves me and that is all that matters to her.
Cheers,
Myles

Great story, Myles. And thanks for being old, too. 

We meet at a roller rink in Chicago (The Hub), been married 43 years.  We still have the skates.

Sarah L.

My ex was my best friend when I tried to transition before.  I took up driving truck and would see her when I came into town.  She and her husband at the time were having money troubles, so I thought I would help them out with some work.  I drove bed bugger and could use the extra hand when loading.  First he came out with me, but he got home sick quick.  So she came out with me.  We were together even since then.  About 20 years all told.  But when I brought up this GID, she could not take it, even though she had been there before.  We are divorced now and she lives in another city.

We are still friends but nothing more.


Janet

My wife was one of my little sisters friends. My grandfather said to me when I was a kid that I needed to be nice to my sisters friends as one day I would marry one. How prophetic is that!

My wife and I met on the job. It was love at first sight for me. Took her a little while. But it's been 30 years now and still going strong.

I was a hippie/surfer hanging out at a beach in So. Maine. I lived in a tent and cut seaweed for a living. I used to hang out at a coke machine near a icecream parlor every night to hook up with friends and get a party going. She started hanging out with us and soon sitting next to me by the camp fire. We became friends. Then I went back to college in the fall and 3 weeks later she showed up at my door saying she wanted to be with me. It was cool. we wore the same size clothes and we spent the semester together. Then I got accepted to a experimental college in Vermont and she followed me there. We stayed together for @ a year when she went to Arizona with friends, I missed her. She came back and we hooked up permanently except for a year here and there. We finally moved back to the coast of maine and began to grow together, had 2 kids and went through all that. We still are together but live apart for @ 5-6 months out of the year.
She tried to change me a few times without success so finally accepted me and we are still together and love one another.

We were introduced to each other on Facebook by a mutual friend who thought we were a lot alike.  We basically then found out that we were basically sharing the same brain.  She was everything I ever wanted in someone to spend my life with.  And vice versa.  She makes me feel really cool.  A month later she flew up to stay with me for awhile.  Then I flew down to see her.  And in two months she's moving in up here, and we'll start our life together.  I honestly didn't think someone like her existed.  She's like dating some sort of combination of Bunuel and Liv Ullman.

I met my fiance in a social gathering.  He's one my cousin's best friends.

I was asked to play guitar in amateur theatre, providing 'mood' music.

I was introduced to the group, and warned not to get involved with the women I couldn't take my eyes off. She had just gotten engaged the week before. We were living together within weeks. I told her all about Cindy. Love is awesome. 27 years ago. What's the internet

Cindy

Whilst I was in college.  At first I thought he wasn't going to be accepting of my transsexuality, but it didn't turn out to be that way.  Now that I can marry him, we've been engaged for sometime, but he's got to finish his masters program before we can afford a wedding.  I want the whole fairytale, the white dress & everything that comes with that!

Bachelor and plan to remain that way.  (meaning, never again )

Quote from: interalia on October 21, 2009, 10:21:05 AMFor all of us with happy relationships with our SO's, you are more than willing to participate too - I'd love to hear how you met and fell in love.

****

I'd love to hear your stories.

lol Nobody is really going to want to hear my story, I feel totally *left out* and alone in this thread, I'm starting to think my SO deliberately targeted me as a good potential victim of abuse and I 'ave yet to BE RID OF HER! Our divorce is just getting underway this week as I prepare to lock first swords over Full Custody this Thursday; if the eventual ending for I and kids is HAPPY I'll most certainly tell ya's all about it later but then again keep in mind I do indeed plan on "keeping my vows" . . .

THIS WILL BE A FIGHT 'TIL DEATH DO ONE OF US PART!!

I met my other half just under a year ago on the internet. We spoke on MSN and for the first few weeks he had no idea if I was a boy or a girl even with me showing photos. He was the first person I spoke to about my GID and he helped me through coming out to everyone else. Shortly after I came out we met up in person, and were a couple from then on...ish...Had a few rocky moments, broken up twice and gotten back together, because of stupid stuff I did mainly, I can never do anything without creating drama He's an awesome person, just as weird as I am and I love him more than anything <3

Quote from: interalia on October 21, 2009, 10:21:05 AM
Despite our similar interests, we both had extremely different personalities.  She was rough and coarse like the rocks she loved (geology major) and I was super outgoing and friendly - normally traits she despised in others.  She always felt people were disingenuous when they acted nice, but she felt I might be different - though it took her a while to decide that. 

This is how I was...still am XD  My personality is like your wifes

I met my hubby online in a fantasy RP chat I was an admin for around 8yrs ago. I knew of him from seeing him there but I was involved with one of the other Rp'ers at the time. He and I didn't start start talking beyond RP untill I was raped by my then BF and I was getting drunk every night. Apparently I said a lot to him while I was drunk, but I don't remember any of it. It wasn't long before we were saying I love you and then talking on the phone hours a day with phonecards. I was in Cali and he was in RI, several months later he flew out to spend a week or two with me and proposed. He went home to RI for 2wks, transferred from his job and moved in with me.

Had many a rough time being as years later we both came out to each other about being gay (and me transmale). We still have rough times but they generally get worked out. A lot of it is due to my self hate and loathing coupled by severe depression and anxiety.

My hubby and I's SO we met online in Feb of this year in a furry forum. He and I became online RP mates and it just steamrolled from there. He's come to visit us twice since then and he's moving in within the next couple months.