(Trigger Warning: Some questions could make you feel agitated. Reader discretion is advised.)
Sexolve is equal rights activist Harish Iyer’s Q&A space on FIT.
If you have any queries regarding sex, sexuality, or your relationship, and need some advice, answers, or just someone to hear you out – write to Harish Iyer, and he’ll try and ‘sexolve’ it for you. Drop-in a mail to sexolve@thequint.com.
This week’s Q&As are below:
The Love That Fades Away
Dear RainbowMan,
Thank you for your column. I am someone who has been a great advocate of love. I am perpetually in love. I love my boyfriend. I love him so much that I dont want things to change I just want to continue in the cloud of love, touching his soul and feeling his heart. But more love calls for more expectations I believe. He now wants me to go with him in his journey towards matrimony. And all I am doing is wondering how I could stay put in the current state that we are in. How do I not take this towards another challenging stage of our life and relationship. I dont know how to refuse him. So I end up acting that I am also a game to the ploy of marriage. I end up acting. And thats the fucking problem, Rainbowman. I am not myself. I am acting all the time when I am in love. I dont want to act. I think I am in love with the act of falling in love rather than being in love myself. I dont know but it is really really challenging. Please help me.
Shona
Dear Shona,
Thank you for writing in.
Love is strange. It teaches us the power of being honest to one of your most cherished emotions.
And also on the other hand, makes us so fearful and change resistant that we end up being dishonest in the same relationship that was build on the foundation of honesty.
By your own admission, your boyfriend loves you. By your own admission, you love your boyfriend.
The best gift you can give someone you love is the courage and trust to be vulnerable with them.
Tell him your fears, your dreams, your aspirations. Tell him what you think. Dont expect him to read it all the time.
Tell him what you think of marriage. Tell him what are the changes that you think marriage will bring to the relationship.
You opened your heart to him, now open your mind. After you have done speaking, listen to him. Listen patiently and listen intently. Keep an open mind, an open heart and let words flow - discuss, debate, agree and disagree.
Chalk out a charter for the relationship. Give yourself the chance to listen to him. Give him the chance to listen to you.
Love deserves honesty. Love deserves disagreements and debates.
Two people are never the same. True love is not when two people try to become one person, but when they acknowledge that each of them have distinct views and ideas and despite the differences that exist, they choose to love.
I would suggest that you have a hearty conversation with your boyfriend. and do it soon.
Smiles
RainbowMan
P.S. Let love be led by truth, not by fear of the truth.
I Am a Mother, I Want to Transition
Dear RainbowMan,
I am a 32 year year old man. It took some courage to type that because I was not a man before. I was a woman. I had the body of a woman and inside that resides a man. I dont know how to say this, but I have always known. I am happily married to a man. I am incredibly feminine I am told in the external ways and means, but inside I am a Man. I always knew I was a man. I dont know where to go from here. You are the first person I am telling this to. Maybe the fact that this is anonymous helps me speak out without the fear of anything. I am married to a man and have a lovely 6 year old daughter. My relationship with my husband is good - sexual too. I have told my husband about this feeling and he tells me that I should read more about it and ask people. He in fact encouraged me to write to you. I dont know much about this - or what is happenning with me. Can you help me figure out. I have always imagined myself having a penis and being a man. I hate my vagina and my breasts though I have had admirers of them in my teenage where I had quite an active sex life. My husband tells me he is okay if I become a man and that he will always love me. I dont know what to do. I dont know if I am thinking right or what it is called. Can you please help me figure. Is there something wrong with me?
Mother Man
Dear Friend,
Thank you for sharing such a personal part of your life with me. Thanks to your husband who urged you to make this connection with me.
I understand from your mail that you didnt become a man, and were not a woman. You were always a man. Here are somethings that I have learnt from my transgender friends and my own tryst with my gender.
Sex : Sex is assigned at birth. The nurse/midwife looks at a penis or a vagina or ambiguous genetelia and assigns a sex to the child. Sex could be male, female or intersex.
Gender: Gender is what you know you are. This is independent of what your sex assigned at birth is. The nurse might have said that you are a woman, but you know that you are a boy. This realisation of the fact that you are a man can come at any stage and any age of your life. You came out about it now. Some people do when they are 18.
Gender Expression: We tend to box gender expression in a binary construct of male and female. Sometimes, in my opinion, these are just words. You could call yourself maternal/paternal/parental towards your child. The fact remains that you love your child no matter what the name of you give that expression of love.
To understand better, please watch some inspiring videos.
Here's my friend Gazal's story. Gazal's sex assigned at birth is male, and she is a woman.
You could also read up about Elliot Page, he had a very public life and has starred in many films before his transition. In the fim Juno, he plays the role of a teenage pregnant woman.
Your gender is what you define your gender is. Your gender is not the public perception of your gender. It is not your loved one's interpretation of your gender. It is what you are and what you know you are.
I very strongly suggest that you speak to a queer affirmative mental health counsellor who can share ways to navigate through this.
You could also speak to someone from Humsafar Trust. You will get their details on www.humsafar.org.
Please take good care of yourself. I gather from your mail that you have an understanding partner and a loving child.
But more than receiving support from anyone, you need to find support from your own self. Prioritise yourself too.
Give yourself time and space.
Love
RainbowMan
P.S. You are just wanting to align yourself with what you know you are - you want to be authentic. And thats not wrong. Theres nothing wrong with you in this context.
Can I Get a Bigger Breasts
Dear RainbowMan,
How can I get bigger boobs? Can I just massage it to make it bigger? Can you help me?
Loveleen
Dear Loveleen,
You would need to visit a doctor to check on this and then a plastic surgeon if it needs plastic surgery.
Good luck.
Regards
RainbowMan
P.S. There are a lot of myths regarding breasts. You should visit a qualified doctor who can explain candidly.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)