Autoheterosexual Cross-Gender Development

constructing the cross-gender self

Oct 25, 2023

Autoheterosexual cross-gender identities form over time through reinforcement.

The original, default gender identity forms by three years of age. Autoheterosexual cross-gender identity grows alongside this default gender identity.

Moving through life as the default gender strengthens the default self. Cross-gender embodiment strengthens the cross-gender self. Both selves grow in parallel.

Initially, the default self tends to be much stronger than the cross-gender self. The stronger their autoheterosexuality, the faster an autoheterosexual’s cross-gender side tends to form: the cross-gender wish starts earlier, develops more quickly, and is more likely to become dominant in the end.

For the most strongly predisposed autoheterosexuals, wishing to be the other sex is often one of their earliest memories. Their ability to recall these memories later in life signals their continued significance: these memories stood out as important throughout development and weren’t pruned like so many others. They persisted.

Wherever autoheterosexuals are in their gender journey, it’s the result of thousands of gender-related thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and experiences—all of which have the power to alter how they think about their place in the world of gender as well as their relationship to it. In a sense, they are always transitioning.

The cross-gender journey starts before they are even aware of it. In the background, their orientation influences how they perceive and evaluate the worth of different forms of gendered embodiment. Well before they’ve expressed themselves sexually, their orientation is already present, making being the other sex and embodying the traits associated with it seem more appealing.

Gender euphoria raises their mood, while gender dysphoria lowers it. These good and bad feelings are inextricably linked.

Just as the lack of a good feeling feels worse than experiencing that good feeling, the lack of a bad feeling feels better than experiencing that bad feeling. In this way, gender euphoria and gender dysphoria are two sides of the same coin, which is why the authoritatively-titled Gender Dysphoria Bible proclaims, “anything that can be a source of dysphoria has an equal and opposite euphoria”[i].

Gendered aspects of bodies, clothing, behaviors, social interactions, and ways of thinking all potentially hold symbolic power that signifies to an autoheterosexual how they’re embodying gender. The relative significance of these different types of embodiment is specific to each person. It changes over time and varies between individuals.

Initially, more attainable aspects of gender such as clothing and behavior are often enough to satisfy their need for cross-gender embodiment. With repetition, these forms of embodiment may become normal, unremarkable parts of daily life, at which point the less attainable aspects—bodies and social roles—start to hold more significance.

This progression from embodying attainable aspects of gender and later desiring to embody the more elusive aspects may culminate in a longing for gender transition, because medical and social transition allow for the highest degree of cross-gender embodiment.

This developmental sequence—which starts with crossdressing or crossdreaming and sometimes progresses to transgenderism or transsexualism—is the historical pattern. It will continue to occur in autoheterosexuals who don’t want to begin with social or medical transition.

The ascendance of the transgender movement has also opened other developmental possibilities: hormones are more accessible than ever, new ideas about gender have become culturally widespread, and society is more welcoming to gender variance.

In this environment, some autoheterosexuals begin with hormones and only switch to overt cross-gender expression if they start failing to pass as their natal gender. This path is emotionally safer for people who feel highly invested in what others think about them, have paranoid tendencies, or live in areas unfriendly to trans people.

Another increasingly common developmental sequence involves initially coming out as nonbinary, genderqueer, or some other intermediate gender identity. These identities can help autoheterosexuals test the waters by dabbling in cross-gender expression, using nondefault pronouns, and navigating their social environment as a gender-variant person.

After a bit of this experience, autoheterosexuals who have a stronger cross-gender wish may realize that they want to actually be the other gender instead of an intermediate one, at which point they may commit to a deeper level of gender transition.

Even though this process starts with occasional reinforcement, it can eventually culminate in a sort of internal revolution within the self system—the cross-gender identity gains control, with the default gender identity subsumed within it:

The cross-gender identity seems to grow stronger with practice and with social reinforcements…In unusual cases, the end result is a kind of revolution within the self system. The balance of power shifts in favor of the cross-gender identity…[ii]

Later in life, a transfem named R.L. wrote retrospectively about her experience with this cross-gender development. Although R.L. knew she wanted to be female prior to puberty, her internal feminine self expanded over time until her thoughts, desires, and sentiments reflected the desires of her inner woman:

From the age of 8 I have had this desire, which has been continuous, and growing in strength, yet I am not outwardly effeminate, but it is as if the soul of a woman had been born in a male body, and had been engaged in overcoming the physical nature, until now the spirit and mind long for pleasures that are contrary to the physical sex.[iii]

It’s common for autohets on the transsexual path to form the cross-gender wish before puberty[iv]. But with the onset of puberty, the cross-gender development process picks up speed and intensity.

The Puberty Crisis

Once libido ramps up after the onset of puberty, the cross-gender drive accelerates.

For many autoheterosexuals, puberty is a time of crisis, confusion, and inner tension. At the same time their bodies are transforming in sex-typical ways, they want to resemble or simply be the other sex more than ever.

This desire catches some autoheterosexuals off-guard. They may become confused about why they’re thinking about being the other sex and being the people they’re attracted to. The perennial “do/be” question asserts itself: “do I want to do them, or be them?”

Many autohets privately grapple with these feelings and thoughts on their own. Some feel ashamed and inadequate for failing to live up to the societal expectations of their sex. Others dread the ways their body is changing but keep their struggles to themselves, lest they invite rejection or ridicule by revealing their thoughts.

In order to circumvent the existential crisis presented by puberty, contemporary autoheterosexuals increasingly try to circumvent their natal puberty by going on puberty blockers. It’s unknown whether this approach is medically wise, but on an emotional level it’s certainly understandable.

Societal Repression Slows Cross-Gender Development

Until fairly recently, gender nonconforming people often faced intense social sanctions. Depending on the place and time, autoheterosexuals expressing their cross-gender side could face the loss of friends, family, and jobs, or be arrested and caged for public crossdressing.

This legal and cultural environment strongly incentivized repression and secrecy.

For autohet males, crossdressing at home was the norm. For those who couldn’t pass as the other sex, home was the only place they could be their cross-gender self. In the outside world, they had to look and play the part expected of men. At work, social events, and businesses, they had to present in a way that reinforced their default gender.

When these two modes of existence scarcely overlapped, the two selves sometimes grew in a parallel, non-integrated way. This could lead to internal tension and psychological instability, so transvestite magazines and newsletters commonly advised their readers to integrate their two sides as one united whole[v].

In this restrictive cultural environment, it took a long time for autoheterosexual males to develop a cross-gender identity to the point of adopting a feminine name—a milestone that, on average, they reached after twenty-one years of crossdressing[vi].

Today, the outlook isn’t so bleak. Things have improved.

A Brave New Gender World

Autoheterosexuals growing up today face a completely different cultural environment than their predecessors. The rapid ascent of the transgender movement has drastically reshaped the world that young autohets enter as they grow up.

Trans people have formed vibrant online communities with their own subcultures, as well as a shared language that helps them understand each other. They don’t have to feel so isolated anymore.

Now, kids learn about transgenderism in school. The broader population has also been hearing about gender identity and gender dysphoria, so there is widespread understanding that some people feel emotional pain because they’re not the other sex. People have also learned the basics of pronoun usage (e.g., that if they’re not sure of someone’s pronouns, they should ask).

“They” is also gaining ground as a pronoun. The nonbinary identity has shot up in popularity, which has allowed people to feel they’re opting out of the gender binary. Most nonbinary-identified people are female[vii].

Barriers to obtaining cross-sex hormones have also been reduced. Hormones are increasingly available on an “informed consent” basis where patients sign a document saying they were informed of potential health risks, and then they walk out with a prescription.

More people are transitioning than ever before. Average transition age has dropped. Puberty blockers are increasingly available to gender-dysphoric children, and some even get gender-affirming surgeries before they are legally adults. Such practices will be curtailed once the lawsuits start rolling in, but still, these possibilities didn’t exist before.

The gender game has changed.

À la Carte Transgenderism

As a cultural phenomenon, transgenderism has shifted to a more nebulous place. Countless bitter arguments over who counts as “trans” attest to this ambiguity.

Is legitimate transgenderism determined by identification? Social transition? Medical transition?

There’s no clear agreement, and that’s okay. The recent increase in gender freedom allows for more possibilities than before.

In the gatekeeping days, trans people had to endure a “real life test” of living as their desired gender for a year or two before clinics would give them hormones. Now, it’s the other way around: they can start with hormones and socially transition later, after physical changes make such transition feasible.

Psychologically, the “hormones first” approach is gentler because it doesn’t require social transition, so trans people increasingly take this approach.

For example, some MTFs take hormones while still wearing masculine clothes with the hope that they’ll start failing to pass as their birth sex. If they do, they’ll start wearing feminine clothes, come out as trans, and adopt a feminine name. Even if they never start passing as the other gender, they may keep taking hormones. Doing so helps them feel better about their body, and by lowering libido, it also lowers their autogynephilic drive.

For these reasons, some MTFs take hormones with no intention of ever coming out. There are even a few autogynephilic people who only get a vaginoplasty because their genital configuration was their biggest gender issue. No hormones. No social transition. Just a vagina.

With these new possibilities, the path forward isn’t as obvious. The decision-making process is complicated, and the rise of countless new gender identities doesn’t make it any simpler. However, these new options make it more likely that trans people can get where they want to go, on a path of their own design.

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The Autoheterosexual Skinner Box

In the last century, scientists found they could change an animal’s behavior by administering rewards or punishments after the animal enacted a behavior they wanted to change.

If, after an animal behaved in a certain way, researchers did something the animal liked or took away something it didn’t like, those reinforcements would make the behavior happen more often. On the other hand, if researchers did something the animal didn’t like or took away something it liked, those punishments would make the behavior happen less often.

This approach to changing behavior through reinforcements and punishments is called operant conditioning. The chamber that holds an animal during these experiments is informally known as a “Skinner Box”, named after B.F. Skinner, a pioneer in the study of operant conditioning.

Gender-related feelings from autoheterosexuality are themselves innately rewarding or aversive stimuli, so they have the capacity to shape behavior. Gender euphoria is rewarding; gender dysphoria is aversive. These positive and negative mood shifts influence the frequency of the behaviors that preceded them.

Attainment of cross-gender embodiment increases good gender feelings and reduces bad ones, which reinforces the behaviors that lead to cross-gender embodiment. Shortfalls of cross-gender embodiment increase bad gender feelings and reduce good ones, which punishes the behaviors that lead to shortcomings of cross-gender embodiment.

Together, gender euphoria and gender dysphoria tend to make the default gender feel less comfortable and relatable to autoheterosexuals over time. Eventually it may feel aversive, alien, or even actively hostile.

In contrast, the other gender offers sanctuary. This source of comfort and place of inner peace can feel like home, and at a certain point, autoheterosexuals may never want to leave.

Shifting Gender Attitudes and Sentiments

Even if autoheterosexuals don’t start out deeply admiring the other sex and holding their own in low regard, thousands of little nudges over years tend to shift their sentiments in that direction.

What starts out as a pleasant thought experiment can eventually develop into dissatisfaction due to the chasm between desire and reality. As Ellis’s patient R.M. put it, “I began to think that it would be very nice to be changed into a girl for a time, to see what it was like. Gradually this idea became regret that I had not been born a girl”[viii].

These gender attitudes can be present from a young age in those most strongly predisposed to autoheterosexuality. Recalling her childhood self, one transfem confessed, “I would have sacrificed my entire life if only I could have been a girl just for three days”[ix].

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Hirschfeld absolutely nailed it when he wrote about the gender sentiments of his male transvestites: “Everything about the body that recalls masculinity is perceived with distaste; everything, absolutely everything, that signifies femininity is craved”[x].

This statement is just as true today, and it’ll be just as true centuries from now.

Autoheterosexuality tends to make people value attributes of the other sex and devalue those of their own. The other sex rests on a pedestal while their own flawed sex lies in a ditch. They prize, exalt, or glorify the other sex while believing their own is best left unmentioned.

In extreme cases, this dynamic can make existence feel worthless or like a cruel joke. Thankfully, most autoheterosexuals don’t reach such extremes. But left unchecked, their gender sentiments are more likely to develop in this direction.

Transition Decision(s)

Rather than being born already transgender or transsexual, people are born predisposed to developing gender issues because of autoheterosexuality or homosexuality, and they later come to identify as trans or choose to undergo social or medical transition as a way of addressing their gender issues.

Some people are so strongly predisposed to gender issues that transitioning is practically inevitable—they are the ones who became transsexuals in decades past when knowledge of transgenderism was rare and gender nonconformity was heavily stigmatized.

Today, far more people are transitioning than ever. Some people present this rapid rise in transgender identity as evidence of social contagion, but I don’t think it’s the main story—at least not for adults.

More people are transitioning because there are greater benefits and fewer downsides to transitioning than ever before, and gender transition has become much more widely known and accessible. In effect, more homosexuals and autoheterosexuals are choosing to transition after making rational decisions about how they want to live their lives[xi].

But mainstream models of transgenderism fail to account for these two distinct types of transgenderism. This is a problem.

When making highly consequential decisions about whether to undergo gender transition, it helps to have an accurate mental model. Using such a model increases the chances that predictions come true, so actually understanding transgenderism can aid autohets in the decision-making process around gender transition.

By having a basic grasp of how autoheterosexual cross-gender development works, autohets have a higher chance of steering themselves toward the outcome they think would serve them best. Through self-awareness regarding their gender sentiments and cross-gender behavioral patterns, they can sense their gender trajectory and act in ways that improve their odds of attaining desired outcomes.

Instead of asking “Am I trans?” they can ask, “Which aspects of gender transition do I want, and are they worth the trade-offs?”.

For autohets, the single most important factor may be the comparative strength of their autosexual and allosexual sides. If their allosexual side is dominant, then transition might not help them overall. If their autosexual side is clearly dominant, however, then transitioning might offer greater rewards than they could get otherwise.

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There are plenty of other factors too. Depending on their values, priorities, beliefs, social standing, mental traits, culture, physique, finances, and health, as well as other aspects of their personhood and life circumstances, autoheterosexuals will make different decisions about the best path forward.

With so many moving parts and such high stakes, the gender transition decision-making process is often long and complex. This complexity makes it absolutely imperative to have a robust, accurate mental model.

Better models enable better predictions, and better predictions enable better outcomes. Autoheterosexuals who truly grasp their situation will be best prepared to make the decisions that are right for them.

In Sum:

Autoheterosexual cross-gender development is an ongoing process influenced by sexuality, cultural milieu, and personal beliefs. Important sexual factors include libido, the comparative strengths of the allosexual and autosexual drives, and which types of gendered embodiment are desired. Personal beliefs affect how autoheterosexuals conceive of their situation, and cultural milieu affects how safe they feel engaging in cross-gender expression.
The earlier their cross-gender feelings start, the more likely autoheterosexuals are to develop significant gender issues. The onset of puberty increases the desire to be the other sex at the exact same time the body veers in the opposite direction—an incongruence between desire and trajectory that can make puberty a time of great emotional crisis.
Autoheterosexual operant conditioning shifts autohets across the gender divide over time. Good and bad gender-related feelings gradually condition them to behave and think differently. This series of rewards and punishments often makes autohets feel less welcome in their default gender and more at home in their cross-gender.
Autoheterosexuality shifts attitudes and sentiments about gender. Autohets often attribute greater significance to traits associated with the other sex and devalue traits associated with their own sex. What begins as occasional thoughts about being the other sex may ultimately develop into intense regret about not being born the other sex.
Greater awareness and acceptance of transgenderism has made gender transition more widely available and lowered the social costs, so more autoheterosexuals are transitioning to live as another gender. However, many are doing so without understanding autoheterosexuality. This is a problem: decisions made under false pretenses are more likely to be poor decisions. By better understanding their orientations, autohets can make better decisions regarding gender transition.

Speak With Me

phil illy

October 27, 2023

Are you an autosexual person who wants to discuss your experiences with someone who actually understands what it’s like? Are you in a relationship with an autosexual person and want to understand them better?

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