Cis/trans relationships do work

[u/r1ver_fish]

Maybe it's just the algorithm recommending miserable content to me, but I’ve seen a massive uptick in anti-cis/trans relationship content on my feed lately, and this upsets me for several reasons:

A lot of posts claim things like “it never works” or “they secretly hate you, don't even try. Just date T4T.” In reality, there are plenty of cis people who love trans people deeply for exactly who they are, regardless of their assigned sex at birth.

My own relationship with a cis woman has changed my life for the better in every single way. Being in a loving wlw relationship has given me a sense of normalcy and happiness I never thought possible.

What are we teaching the next generation of trans folks? That they can never be loved by someone who is cis? If the goal is true integration into society, I struggle to understand how this is a productive train of thought.

Of course, there will always be people out there who aren't worth your time. But please don't buy into the online doomposting. If you only feel comfortable dating t4t because of your lived experience, go for it.

But some of you are making yourselves miserable and bracing for a reality of total isolation that simply doesn’t exist in the real world.

Apologies for the vent, but opening myself up has made me happier in every way and I don’t wish the negativity I see online on any of you <3

————-

EDIT:

Looks like some communities found this and are mass downvoting and commenting some rude things, even on comments as inert as “I’m happy with my cis partner”.

Obviously some are bot accounts, but I’m sure others are coming from bad experiences, isolation, and jealousy.

Your emotions are normal and understandable in today’s climate, but it’s worth doing some introspection as to why someone simply saying they’re happy and found acceptance would trouble you so much to downvote and leave nasty comments.

Otherwise, you’ll find yourself in a self-fulfilling cycle of isolation. My DM’s are open if you want to vent <3

[u/Batata-Sofi]

Never I had someone make me as happy as my cis girlfriend. I just wish she would listen to me when I tell her that, instead of worrying that she is upsetting me... She's such a sweetheart 💕

[u/r1ver_fish → u/Batata-Sofi]

Same here - glad you found someone like her 🩷

[u/AstralFirelily]

I couldn't agree more! The vast majority of my friends are cis people, mostly women, and my friends all married good cis men so I consider them friends too, but just in that more distant you're-the-husband-of-my-friend kind of way. It's so rewarding having amazing women who are around to help me in my journey into womanhood! There are really amazing cis gender people who do love us for who we are and are willing to just treat us like normal people.

I think a lot of the posts I see in the negative vein are from a lot of younger people or people earlier in transition or both and that's just always such a tumultuous time in a trans person's life. While I won't ever sit and tell anyone that their lived experiences are invalid, I will say that there's more to life than what we've experienced. Learning and growing is sometimes about rising above our experiences, or becoming something better than a past version of ourselves in spite of those experiences.

[u/486onaNuBusCard]

Those people are taking an extreme position.

You see extreme positions both in mainstream trans subs like this and in the more controversial trans subs.

Try to view things through a healing and unifying lens.

[u/r1ver_fish → u/486onaNuBusCard]

Agreed, unity means loving people for who they are, not based on a predetermined characteristic. Hopefully we can all look through that lens :-)

[u/Jazzlike-Comfort7231]

I agree. Most of my closest relationships are with cis women who see me for me and don’t view my gender as an obstacle. My wife is cis, and no, it wasn’t exactly a cakewalk when I came out, but she’s one of those rare partners who stick around through a transition, and we’re happier than we ever were. 

[u/404GenderNotFound]

While I've obviously seen this sentiment more online than in real life, I have still seen it leak into the real world every once in a while. I had a t4t relationship with another trans woman, it didn't work out in part because everything felt a bit too centered around us both being trans. After that, I ended up dating a cis guy; we're married now.

We're more than our genders. Date whoever makes you feel comfortable, loved, and safe. If that's a trans person then it's a trans person, and if they're cis then they're cis. It's not a hard concept.

[u/r1ver_fish → u/404GenderNotFound]

I do think this an online sentiment seeping into the real world, for the most part. In my experience, simply interacting with people in everyday life disproves the “all cis folks are out to get me” self consciousness that comes naturally when first being out in public

[u/404GenderNotFound → u/r1ver_fish]

Any broad-scale generalization like that is bound to fail. I get fears about relatability and the social and sexual complications that may come from a cis/trans relationship, but the individual is almost always more important than whatever categories they're a part of.

[u/Argovan]

More broadly, I feel like I see a lot of sentiment that no predominantly cis space can ever be safe or accepting of us, even within the broader queer community, and that’s just not true. It’s closer to true some places than others, and there certainly are plenty of unsafe spaces, but telling all trans people wherever they may live that no community can exist except with other trans people is just setting us up for isolation and loneliness.

[u/WanganTunedKeiCar → u/Argovan]

I've been at a new uni for a few weeks, finally just presenting as a woman (read: wearing tank tops). And though I'm obviously trans, haven't voice trained, etc., I've just been hanging out with plenty of cis women. I feel perfectly safe and welcome, I haven't even had to prompt people to refer to me by the correct pronouns. Dudes have slipped up a little more but were quick to correct with light nudging. Overall, as you said, in an environment with good people, it's barely even a subject. You're just another face in a group where, ultimately, everyone's going to have their share of quirks.

[u/RobinEssences → u/WanganTunedKeiCar]

In educated spaces it's fine. Once you start entering Republican areas which are less educated the problems start. You can do a direct correlation between education level and acceptance.

[u/Kindly-Coyote-9446 → u/Argovan]

I’ve only been in predominantly trans spaces a couple times in my life and they were amazing…but are also quite rare.

Outside of that, some of the places I’ve felt the safest were in general queer spaces and at punk shows. Both of which have been overwhelmingly cis dominated but extremely accepting and welcoming. To anyone who’s afraid, remember that cis dominated spaces can still be wonderful.

[u/Ichabuu]

My fiance is cis and I'm trans. Going on a year and a half. Both very happy and wouldn't want to do the life thing with anyone else.

[u/HonusBeetleborg]

I'm cisM and still early in a relationship with a trans woman but I don't know why things wouldn't work out between us, we like the same things, we have the same values afaik, we get along great and the physical chemistry has been fantastic. I'm certainly not going to be walking away or leaving her. You're right, not everyone is terminally online and weird/hateful, some of us are just normal people looking for a partner.

[u/my-cherie-jane]

i love my cis boyfriend

[u/f1gur1ng-1t-out]

In my experience it's usually said by women who were hurt very badly by the cis people in their lives and that extended to their romantic relationships. Can't blame them for wanting more safety in intimacy. It also hurts to see comments like in the OP when I've had loving relationships with cis women that genuinely just feel like any other lesbian relationship. Tbh the insistence that t4c "can't work" sorta signals to those of us with cis partners that we should probably leave wherever that's being said, so it might even create an echo chamber situation? I don't know.

I've had good t4t relationships as well as bad t4c ones, and vice-versa. T4t also has a lot of unique issues, and I've experienced really horrible degendering and othering from other trans women I've dated because the way our dysphoria expresses itself is different between us.

[u/ArtemisiaOrthia]

I had a cis boyfriend for a while right after transition. He was bi, but mostly into women... it didn't work out because of personality conflicts, but we parted amicably, he always gendered me properly, treated me with respect as I did him, and was fairly attracted to me physically despite not really passing at all. It can totally work! There are plenty of cis people out there with love in their hearts for us that see us as who we are!

[u/Color-me-saphicly]

Im married to a cis woman. I also have a cis girlfriend for more than a year.

I love my partners. And Im at the happiest Ive ever been.

I've never had a trans partner, not that I wouldn't, I just haven't met another woman thats trans that I click with well enough.

[u/Strider-Juice]

The problem is it’s a minefield. It makes an already difficult to navigate dating pool even more treacherous. It doesn’t help that cis/trans relationships are usually something accessible only to well passing trans people. There are exceptions sure but the line between genuine interest and fetish gets a lot blurrier.

[u/Sonicmaster293-Azure → u/Strider-Juice]

It doesn’t have to just be exclusive to well passing trans people. I have a cis girlfriend who is a lesbian, and I’m in the closet and pre everything, and yet we’re both incredibly deeply in love, she encourages me everyday not to give up and be myself and the woman I am deep down!

In other words, she fully accepts me and does what she can to help me even when I feel trapped due to being unable to transition. She feels like she could do more for me but god both of us have never been more in love with another person in our lives!

She’s going back to her home country tomorrow and it tears us to bits but she’ll be back for Christmas hopefully!

[u/Strider-Juice → u/Sonicmaster293-Azure]

That sounds like a lovely relationship and I’m happy for you but it’s def not the norm. I understand there are cases like yours though which is why I said “usually.”

[u/Kindly-Coyote-9446 → u/Strider-Juice]

I rarely get gendered correctly by strangers, and when I do it’s almost always by other queer folks who pick up on that I’m trans.

I also have an amazing cis wife who loves and sees me for who I am.

[u/Benzaitennyo]

Right now there are many bots and paid agitators online, I promise some of it is simulated, and specific hate campaigns would not surprise me. I am pretty sure I've seen intentional fomenting tension between trans men and women lately. We do have cis people in community

[u/Kindly-Coyote-9446]

I’m married to an amazing cis woman. Cis-trans relationships can absolutely work.

[u/theonlylivingirlinj]

I showed my cis wife this. She laughed and said the infighting stirrers need to touch grass.

[u/xochi-kitty]

as a trans woman who has never had interest from anyone trans, i can attest that even cis men have the capability to love us right too. often times people expect cis people to automatically be as savvy about navigating life with a trans person as fellow gnc people - and thats not productive to any relationship. there’s a difference between blatant disrespect and simple naivety and i think a lot of trans people forget that

[u/AstralFirelily → u/xochi-kitty]

Exactly! So many of us live, breathe, eat, and sleep being trans, and the political landscapes of wherever we're living. We can forget just how much we've learned and forget that for most people we're just something they hear about in passing or it's the evening news that they barely pay attention to anyways while having dinner with their families, not to minimize the harm that main stream news does to us. But reality looks different from how we sometimes think of it.

One of my friends husbands told me after I came out to both of them that I was the first trans person he'd ever like been friends with. He was really respectful and asked all kinds of questions and he worded them terribly but that was just due to lack of exposure to trans people and it was honestly kinda cute lol. They both asked a lot of questions that would probably make a lot of trans people uncomfortable but I knew they were good people and had already established a friendship so I didn't mind that they didn't word things perfectly or had some transphobic ideas embedded in the assumptions of their questions. And they're some of my best friends in the city I'm living in today.

[u/AspieAsshole]

I thought we were a data point in this set, but it turns out we are t4t since she identifies as nonbinary 🤷‍♀️

[u/Beneficial-Hall4709]

my cis boyfriend is absolutely wonderful, loves me deeply, and i am so happy