[worknonit80]

My ex who is ftm and not transitioning and is not taking any hormones has contacted me after two months of me having no contact. Says he missed me and and it hurt him more then he thought when Inleft. I fell in love with him... But the more I wanted to spend time ( like 3 times a week) the more he pulled away and treated me as clingy. The last thing I am is clingy. I ended it in June and he contacted me three weeks ago on my bday and stayed over. We have been chilling and enjoying each other without any set dates. He told me last weekend I was his person and that he knows Im into him and he also knows he cant call me his gf. His BFF told me not to wait around that he is talking to straight women. That killed me as I identify as a lesbian. Coukd me being gay be the turn off? Not sure what to do... His ego is very big. Hiw can we share all this intimacy but him not want anything. Im pretty upset. There is an age gap, he is 29 and im 36.... Advice on what path to take would be great... I know he cares a lot about me... But this tells me otherwise

[Skeezyks]

Hello worknonit80: Quite honestly... I doubt I have much of anything to offer with regard to this. But I saw that no one has replied to your post. So I thought I would. I'll just mention here that I'm an older man who has struggled with gender identity disorder (among other things) all of my life. This is my second time here on PC. The first time I was here, I posted in the Transgender Forum quite a bit. Now I seldom post my own Threads at all. There are a couple of things that strike me with regard to your post.

A day or two ago I replied to a Thread, here on PC, posted by a member who wrote that he was questioning if he is a narcissist because over the years he has hidden his feelings of inferiority (resulting from childhood abuse) by presenting a "big-me" sort of image. I could relate to this because I suffered similar abuse & also reacted the same way for many years. (I wrote that I didn't think that made him a narcissist.)

The other thing that came to mind, in reading your post, is how confusing & self-deprecating growing up transgender can be. It certainly has been for me. And, having watched many transition timeline videos on YouTube, I think I can confidently say this is the case for many, if not most, trans individuals. Of course, because of my own situation, my interest has been in the MtF direction as opposed to FtM. But I have to believe it is similar.

So with all of that as background, what I would like to suggest is that perhaps your ex's very big ego is masking a very big inferiority complex. And, likewise, perhaps his pursuit of straight women is a way of trying to validate his masculinity. You on the other hand, as a lesbian-identifying woman are a safe harbor, so to speak, in a world that for the most part still feels pretty threatening despite your ex's apparent big ego.

The upshot of all of this is, from my perspective, that what you are seeing in terms of your ex's behavior may be his attempt to resolve his own personal issues. It's not really about you... although you are experiencing some of the effects. So, assuming that this is the case, I think what you're going to have to decide is to what extent you're willing to continue to be enmeshed in your ex's ongoing efforts to resolve his identity issues. Only you know the answer to that. At least these are my thoughts with regard to your post. I wish you well...