So. This is something I've never talked to anyone in my real life about, but for whatever reason I'm more comfortable asking a bunch of strangers on the internet for advice. Deep breath.
I am coming up on 40yo, and since I was 16 I've mostly been in dedicated heterosexual relationships. I have always considered myself a cis male and maybe a little bi but things are... changing rapidly, I guess. I am single for the first time in years all this freedom and time means I'm doing some long overdue introspection. I don't think I've ever been particularly happy with my body or my gender. I am finding myself much more attracted to people with penises, and more importantly, I am finding myself wanting to play a different, more submissive maybe, role in the bedroom. I finally have an opportunity to try new and different things with all sorts of different people, and that's sort of exciting, but I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing or even what I'm feeling.
I see a lot of trans folks self-actualizing and I'm super happy for them. I envy them for knowing what they want. I don't know what I want and it's driving me a little crazy lately. I would kill to have that level of knowledge of who I wanted to be. I am not a particularly masculine man, but I don't think I feel like I would be more comfortable being more traditionally feminine, though that doesn't necessarily repulse me, either. I would certainly be happier with less body hair. When I was I kid I wanted to be a robot. Now as an adult I maybe just want to be a robot who fucks occasionally, gender irrelevant. Fully functional, you might say. I don't really know what to do with that feeling, though.
Any advice on how to navigate literally any of this would be awesome. I feel like a teenager again, no idea how any of this works or where to even begin. I don't have the knowledge or the language to talk coherently about any of this stuff, and certainly no experience. I am doing my best you guys but all of this is confusing as fuck.
Being trans and/or nonbinary can lead to sexual confusion before transition (it did for me), so it’s possible to start your trans discovery through sexual discovery.
Best advice I can give is to just do the things that you’d like. If you have a desire to dress more feminine/find a dom partner/shave your body do that. They might lead more desires and you might experience gender euphoria, but it’s not necessary. It’s also not harmful to try.
Also Fyi: saying you’re mostly attracted to ‘people with penises’ is a bit derogatory. Penis does not imply dominance and penises are also not needed for dominance in the bedroom. Some people do not like having/using their penis and other people exclusively have sex with a strap on because that’s what they like.
If there is an attraction to the penis itself, shouldn't that be not any more derogatory than liking long or short people, breasts, brown hair etc?
I'm seriously curious because I have felt that vibe in some trans circles, like if you do like the penis of a mtf then you are some bad person.
I obviously mean liking in a normal way, not hyper sexualize or being a perv etc etc etc. That is always wrong be it over penises or brown hair color or whatever IMO.
Sorry if I come off wrong here, I'm just trying to learn.
It’s a very slippery slope and most people who say that are either fetishising trans women, being transphobic or both. There was no reason for OP to add that part because it has nothing to do with their own self discovery. A lot of conversation about trans people eventually leads to talk about our genitalia, and I think that part of me is just not anyone’s business and it’s creepy how many people are obsessed about it.
Also, a lot of the time when people say they prefer penises they would be just as happy with a partner with a good a strap on or a prosthetic and they’re needlessly excluding people without a penis.
I appreciate the feedback, and I apologize if that's how it came across. The phrasing was poor and I did not intend to conflate the attraction to penises with either the sexual role performed or my own gender expression. The expression "people with penises" was used to include trans women and gay men, not to exclude anyone. I, as you say, would be fine with a prosthetic or strap on, and I am definitely not ruling people out on their genitals, but I understand how that could come across based on my phrasing. I'm actually talking to a trans guy right now and we've been talking a lot about exactly that. I kept trying to get my previous SO to peg me but she wasn't into it. I super appreciate the feedback though and will keep it in mind going forward.
I’m sorry but grouping trans women and gay men together like that is transphobic. It goes under the assumption that these two groups have anything in common which they don’t. Trans women don’t all have a penis and if they do they don’t all use them the way men do. You can just say you like being pegged. You’d probably find more cis women willing to do that than trans women. Also nothing is stopping you from editing the op.
You’re in the trans community replying to a trans person who explained why something is transphobic, and you’re still defending it. Contemplate on that.