Episode 68: HA HA I HAVE A HUGE DICK with the very thoughtful Blake

Sexplanations Podcast

Let's talk about gender and biosex and sex assigned at birth and anatomy and surgery and language. In this episode Blake, FTM, and I a ciswoman pull apart what we experience on a day to day basis to develop a better world for the future. For part of the episode I go through the criteria of gender dysphoria as outlined in the DSM 5. Here there are if you'd like to follow along: In adolescents and adults gender dysphoria diagnosis involves a difference between one’s experienced/expressed gender and assigned gender, and significant distress or problems functioning. It lasts at least six months and is shown by at least two of the following: 1. A marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and primary and/or secondary sex characteristics 2. A strong desire to be rid of one’s primary and/or secondary sex characteristics 3. A strong desire for the primary and/or secondary sex characteristics of the other gender 4. A strong desire to be of the other gender 5. A strong desire to be treated as the other gender 6. A strong conviction that one has the typical feelings and reactions of the other gender Why does Blake identify as FTM rather than a transman? "While I’m not offended if someone refers to me as a transman, I prefer to say I’m FTM, or a female-to-male trans person. The main reason is that the term FTM just feels correct. It sounds right when I say it. It feels authentic. I don’t get that “it fits” feeling with transman, non-binary, or any other gendery word. However, it’s okay if my experience seems familiar to you and you do use a different term than I do. Or if you’re FTm and your experience is nothing like mine. We’re equally valid. I just know what fits for me. I don’t feel that my gender is particularly “man”, and I struggle to relate to most men, cis or trans. I know that I get the “it fits” feeling with my current name, Blake, but not with my birth name. He/him/his pronouns fit too. They/them doesn’t bother me, but doesn’t feel as correct as he/him. Being called she/her causes me pain. When I had breasts, I knew that I’d feel more correct without them, so I removed them, and I do indeed feel more at home in my own body now. I was similarly confident about not wanting my uterus and ovaries. I have mixed feelings about the idea of having/obtaining a penis. I rarely feel pain/dysphoria when I see my own genitalia, but I do wish that I didn’t have to worry about having this genitalia - I wish men’s bathrooms had more stalls, I wish my genitals weren’t remarkable or confusing to doctors or potential sexual partners, but I don’t hate having a vulva. I’m not always comfortable with other people interacting with it, though I often am, but I find that the most emotionally fulfilling sex for me involves me penetrating another person with a “realistic” phallus. It’s how I feel most sexually fulfilled, even if that means my genitals aren’t stimulated by another person and/or I don’t have an orgasm. But having a penis 24/7 seems really inconvenient, honestly, and I don’t like the feeling of wearing a packer. I like the look of a bulge on me, but not enough to wear a packer. I like that I was “born female” and I wouldn’t change it. I like using a term that has female in it. I am thankful to have been raised as a girl. I didn’t feel like anything but a girl, until I realized that I’d never thought about it. But by then, I’d spent 18 years avoiding boys. Boys were mean to me. Men scare me. So using a term with “man” in it feels less authentic, and I don’t want to be them or be like them. Manhood isn’t appealing to me, even though much of “male”-ness feels essential to me."