It's a good question for sure, and one I don't know that I have a well-articulated answer to, but here are some thoughts:
The sexual identity piece was actually first, before we decided to get married, and it felt very easeful, mostly because it was such as "well duh" thing. Meaning: it wasn't like one day I had a shocking realization about being bi (which you will likely understand better than most, given that you're maybe the only reader who knew me IRL when I was chaotically sleeping with women in my early 20s lol), it was more the end result of a prolonged, quiet process of no longer being willing to erase or diminish that part of myself. The cultural conditioning of "oh it was just a phase" was so real for me! And since Gent knew about that part of my dating/sex history, when I was eventually like "hey, I'm not straight" he was lovingly like "uh...of course?" haha. We've had plenty of conversations about whether or not I'm interested in exploring different kinds of relationships with people of other genders since then, and so far my answer to that has been no, so. Who knows about the future, but I trust that we've laid the groundwork for continued conversations about this aspect of our relationship.
The gender thing is still very much in process for me, and isn't something I feel I have solid language for, and definitely felt way more surprising (for both of us) when it first started to show up. My arriving at this current place of more fluidity actually feels like a product of my partnership in many ways though, because of how this particular relationship has allowed me to both interrogate and release a lot of internalized sexism and the performance of a certain kind of femininity that in truth I never cared about but felt socially coerced into for many reasons. The smaller, tangible changes (like pronouns) have been smooth and easeful, as has navigating what has changed for me re: my own relationship with my body and some resulting sex preferences. Other than that, I don't know, really! I supposed we'll see?
Last thing that comes to mind is the way you framed your question about marriage itself, and I think for me/us a relevant thing is that marriage always felt more like an add-on thing that made sense for some practical reasons instead of a thing that fundamentally changed the relationship itself. I could really, honestly take-it-or-leave-it in regard to legal marriage, so the way we've navigated these things doesn't feel any different from what it would be in a non-marriage partnership, if that makes sense?
Not sure if that answers your question, but it's what I've got today :)
It's a good question for sure, and one I don't know that I have a well-articulated answer to, but here are some thoughts:
The sexual identity piece was actually first, before we decided to get married, and it felt very easeful, mostly because it was such as "well duh" thing. Meaning: it wasn't like one day I had a shocking realization about being bi (which you will likely understand better than most, given that you're maybe the only reader who knew me IRL when I was chaotically sleeping with women in my early 20s lol), it was more the end result of a prolonged, quiet process of no longer being willing to erase or diminish that part of myself. The cultural conditioning of "oh it was just a phase" was so real for me! And since Gent knew about that part of my dating/sex history, when I was eventually like "hey, I'm not straight" he was lovingly like "uh...of course?" haha. We've had plenty of conversations about whether or not I'm interested in exploring different kinds of relationships with people of other genders since then, and so far my answer to that has been no, so. Who knows about the future, but I trust that we've laid the groundwork for continued conversations about this aspect of our relationship.
The gender thing is still very much in process for me, and isn't something I feel I have solid language for, and definitely felt way more surprising (for both of us) when it first started to show up. My arriving at this current place of more fluidity actually feels like a product of my partnership in many ways though, because of how this particular relationship has allowed me to both interrogate and release a lot of internalized sexism and the performance of a certain kind of femininity that in truth I never cared about but felt socially coerced into for many reasons. The smaller, tangible changes (like pronouns) have been smooth and easeful, as has navigating what has changed for me re: my own relationship with my body and some resulting sex preferences. Other than that, I don't know, really! I supposed we'll see?
Last thing that comes to mind is the way you framed your question about marriage itself, and I think for me/us a relevant thing is that marriage always felt more like an add-on thing that made sense for some practical reasons instead of a thing that fundamentally changed the relationship itself. I could really, honestly take-it-or-leave-it in regard to legal marriage, so the way we've navigated these things doesn't feel any different from what it would be in a non-marriage partnership, if that makes sense?
Not sure if that answers your question, but it's what I've got today :)