[DaddysKitten]

I quoted the wrong part of the quote, lol


I have to disagree, coming from someone who was in this exact predicament myself, many years ago. We see straight couples, every day from birth, just about. We see straight couples on TV. We see straight couples at the grocery store. It's something we are surrounded with every day of our lives, especially if we step outside.

We understand how it works, we understand the underlying issues they are faced. It definitely makes it easier from that standpoint, to learn directly about the person, and not the daily struggles they find themselves facing, especially if they do not 'appear' to the basic concensus as hetero-cis-gendered-straight people. And yes, every relationship faces this.

But what a straight cis-gendered person may never see, or know they see, is a transman or transwoman, and definitely not enough to even begin to understand their day to day life. Much less the deeper fundamentals that make them the individual they are, or how they came to this understanding of themselves.

Even being raised by both my parents, til age 11, and then by my lesbian mother from then on, I had almost next to no understanding, or even knowledge of transgenders. Hell, it took me years to understand that my mother and her lover were lovers. Not everyone is worldly knowledgable of such things. Hell, I thought I could be pregnant when I was kissed at 14. So what a lot of people consider 'common knowledge' especially, as Chancie stated as well.

So we can love someone, but can you truly appreciate someone for all they are, if you lack the basic understanding, as stated with a 'trans' person. Someone who has struggled, more often than not with what is considered 'normal', even amongst their own lesbian/gay/queer brethren. I don't believe this is just 'ok, I'm trans, I love you, that's all you need to know'.

Many have been assaulted for who they are, many have even been killed for who they are. Many have been insulted and put down for their entire lives, many have fought tooth and nail for their rights, and still do. Many have spent countless nights in tears, sobbing, over the confusion, insult, looks, and whatever else they face day to day.

I couldn't say I loved someone, and truly so if I did not wish to know what the person, and others alike, have faced. I would simply lack the understanding, and with a lack of understanding comes a lack of ability to tend the one you love.

I remember, being new to my relationship. I remember the swift inhale of his breath when I would say something out of my ignorance for it all, and though he was so loving and patient, it killed me to make those innocent mistakes because it did bother him. And I never wanted to see him unhappy, or even tinged with a tightening of 'she did that thing'.

So yes, we spent countless hours talking to each other, countless hours of him lecturing me like some college professor who had a very intrigued pupil. I remember the night he told me that he had been jumped by men who had said 'wanna be a man! Fine, we'll teach you how to be a man!' I lay there in bed on the phone, hearing his story, and sobbed silently.

How could they? Why would they? I remember reading his blog post about pumping gas, and how a couple men sat by their work truck laughing and pointing at him. I was infuriated, I wanted to be there to yell at them 'what the fuck are you looking at!?' and then climb all over him and make them envy the person they saw as some freak.

Can we truly not understand these daily struggles, that our lovers face, and support them in all ways in who they are? Do we just expect them to come out and say 'oh yea, by the way, if anyone ever comes to assault me for being who I am, just run'?

I wish communication in a new relationship was that easy. But the non-fairy tale fact of it is, that it is not. Many would see shame in that, many would be afraid the person they love would run. Or be scared to be out in public with them because of these fears.

If I am with someone who has a certain disease, I research it. If I am with someone who has a special needs child, I research it. If I am with someone who has a particular kink, or fancy, I research it. It allowed me to know the questions to ask. As with my relationship, before I was educated enough to really grasp a thorough understanding of it, I didn't have a clue.

But when I went to Daddy and asked him, this and that, and everything else I had read up on, and asked him to clarify, he told me that I took more interest in understanding his issues than any of the women he had ever dealt with before who did live this life, for the majority of their time on this earth, in alternate lifestyles, and even they did not grasp the things I wanted to grasp, and sought the information for, to grasp.

So no, you don't treat someone like a freak or a lab rat because you want to understand their ideals on a variety of things. It's major major interest in knowing everything an individual faces. I know about the straight cis-world. I lived it my entire life. This was new to me, and I wanted to absorb all I could, to better serve him as my partner, my lover, someone I wanted to know every little detail of.