A Trans Lesbian Quarantine Romance, by Mila Wren (Twitter thread edition)

For the first ~16 months of transition, I said I could never be with another trans girl. This is the story of the incredible woman who shattered that immediately, and what I’ve learned since.

Fuck, this is about to be the gayest series of tweets I've ever committed to digital paper for public consumption. Also, super long. So maybe it’s just for me, but that’s honestly fine.

I'm ashamed to admit it, but I always thought that dating another trans woman would cause a feedback loop of dysphoria that would simply be too overwhelming for me to handle. Thus, early in my transition I only sought relationships with cis women.

An experience some months back with a nonbinary individual was the first thing to make me question this, and quarantine thirst ultimately proved to be the catalyst necessary for developing a more "open" mindset.

Now, I had matched with other girls like me before, but I never made a huge effort to message with them afterwards. But when I saw that this story's protagonist had sent me the most adorable little "Hii! ", that finally changed.

Our first date was on Zoom at 7:00 PM. I didn't know what to expect, not least of all because I had never had an online date before. Oh, and her willingness to call it a "date" is noteworthy. Cis women rarely used that word with me.

That first date went until about 4 AM.

I don't know what I expected. Honestly, probably not much. My dating life since transitioning has been unremarkable (read: emotionally distant and secretive, mostly).

I left that Zoom meeting with the most enormous crush I had had in *ages*.

The chemistry was immediate, and frankly, a little frightening. To quote a recent message from her:

"We’re both gorgeous curly-haired trans women creative writers and gamers with English degrees with basically the same taste in anime and trash-tier humor."

I've been reeling in the gay to this point, but holy God she was incredible. Beautiful, charming, hilarious, and oh-so creatively talented (she sings and plays guitar in a punk band--I know! ). Oh, and smart as hell: our conversation was so effortless and engaging.

Just look at us. Aren’t we freaking adorable?

We've had near-constant communication (also a rarity in my dating life) and several dates since, and each time is somehow better than the last. And they have all lasted ‘til the early AM.

She made me feel, and act, so incredibly gay. Which was honestly weird for me:

Though I'm an openly gay trans person who makes openly gay trans content on YouTube, I never saw myself as a person who really acted especially "gay."

Two things: one, most of my friends would probably strongly and immediately contest that; and two, what even is "acting gay"?

That second part is the point of this entire thread.

I've come to realize after subsequent dates with this gorgeous woman that what makes our relationship so special is that I don't have to hold *any* part of myself back from her.

Lord help me, because I'm about to quote Contra on Twitter. In her (very relevant) last video, "Shame," she stated:

"There's a kind of an intuitive understanding (and a sense of humor) that I can share with another trans woman that I can't really have with anyone else."

I never realized it, but in order to better integrate within cishet society, there are aspects of myself that I subconsciously restrain so as not to draw too much attention to myself.

On my dates with the hot trans chick, it was like we were completely naked. She saw me entirely for who I am, and I saw her entirely for who she is. We were free to operate entirely as ourselves.

Such emotional vulnerability is *incredible* when the person you are sharing it with is already so amazing. And seriously, don't we make just the *cutest* pair? The Marceline-Bubblegum aesthetic is never intentional, yet we always seem to embody it.

What was really driving my negative attitude towards dating other trans women was my own internalized transphobia. Again, to indirectly cite Natalie: as a trans person, it can feel like being in a relationship with a cis person affirms the legitimacy of one's own gender identity.

But if trans women are women, and cis women are women, what is the difference in being with one or another?

Exactly, there isn't one (except for, in my case, the shared experience that comes with being trans).

A healthy relationship can never come from basing one's own worth on another person, and I think realizing how that relates to my own gender has been the final test of my being okay with being trans.

All this happening during quarantine is excessively cruel, as the yearning is just overwhelming. I mean, just look at this absurd thread. It is positively dripping with it. I have, once again, become a cliché.

But, as should be obvious by now, I'm okay with that. That is what being in a healthy place looks like, and it took just one massive crush on an incredible trans woman to get me there.

Oh, and since you made it this far, here's one steamy pic of the two of us. The dialogue was her idea: just a small taste of her hilarity.

Who knows what the future might have in store for us, but for now, I'm really enjoying the present. Until our next marathon Zoom date.