For many years, I knew that I was heterosexual, but I never felt any romantic spark that made me want to actually pursue a relationship. Eventually, I assumed that I wasn't interested, but a part of me always wondered if I was wrong.

One day, I got bored and tried to imagine a hypothetical relationship that would feel wonderful and natural for me, irrespective of societal norms. After hours of roleplaying hypothetical scenarios and writing down what made my heart the most happy, I finally settled upon a coherent vision for a theoretical partner.

She'd be really sweet and loving, but the twist is that she'd often take lead over me. She'd be on the confident and assertive side and would totally break my brain. She would often initiate affection unexpectedly, and I'd get all flustered and totally melt for her. She would adore my softness instead of expecting me to suppress it. She would call me cute nicknames like "Cupcake" or "Pumpkin", and I would feel very comfortable and safe with her.

This blew my mind because it went against everything I thought hetero relationships were. And yet, I responded so strongly to it. I began searching to see if anyone else felt this way and I found "role reversal," a term referring to the inversion of traditional heterosexual relationship dynamics. I found a role reversal community and it had the most adorable art I've ever seen and perfectly encapsulated what I wanted. (Some of this content can be found on Lemmy at !rolereversal@lemmy.ml. I love this post in particular. Honestly, I'm thinking of reviving it and posting content there myself!)

A day later, I woke up with constant euphoria and a nonstop firehose of vivid romantic fantasies. It lasted all day, every day. For 10 days straight. My feelings were so intense that I barely ate anything and only slept for 3-4 hours a night without getting tired.

Those fantasies not only showed me how wonderful a relationship would feel, but also that I myself would want to be very affectionate and adaptive to my partner's needs, not just my own. I was enamored with the idea of being the sweetest, most loving boyfriend I could be for her. It wasn't long before I wanted a relationship like this more than anything else.

In retrospect, perhaps it's unsurprising that my ideal relationship would be nontraditional. After all, I have spent my whole life fighting masculine gender expectations. I'm super outwardly emotional, I love to make people happy, I'm very gentle, I love adorable things, and I make myself look cute, nerdy, and non-threatening. I loved it when some of my female friends called me adorable and gave me cute nicknames, and I was full of admiration and gratitude when one of them physically protected me.

I feel like the phenomenon of role-reversed relationships is likely more common than the actual usage of the term. But perhaps I'm still a bit of a unicorn. So, what do you think? Have you seen relationships like this in the wild? Have you known about these dynamics, or are they unfamiliar to you? I'd like to know your thoughts!

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[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 54 points 3 weeks ago (4 children)

So, I'm not going to speak to the sexual side of it, but I will speak to the gender role side.

Fuuuck gender roles. I'm a male, in my thirties, and fuck gender roles so hard. Truly, just throw them away, everyone. I absolutely love my SO, and neither one of us fit the "normal" roles that society picked out.

She's assertive, she's strong, she speaks her opinion. She works, she goes out with her friends, and she is the one who got me into drinking beer. She introduced me to other types of video games, and she's just all around awesome. And none of those things go with the bullshit "tradwife" heirarchy that society tells us to follow.

People think they want a wife, someone who is submissive and lives to serve. BS. Marriage isn't about one being in charge and the other not. Marriage is about partnership. You're not looking for someone to dote on you. You are looking for a partner, and let me tell you life is much more fun that way. I don't have cute nicknames for her, I don't bring her flowers, I don't do any of that stuff, we spend time together. We go do things together.

I, on the otherhand, am the emotional needy one. We have talked about our love languages, she likes acts of service, like me doing the dishes without being asked, or cleaning up. I like to be the little spoon. Again, both of those gender roles would have a freakout about, but it works well for us.

Hell, when Taylor Swift was coming I asked her to go with me.

Throw out what society tells you to be or tells you what to do. Life gets so much easier when you just be who you want to be. Then finding a partner who matches you? That's all the more rewarding. Find someone who wants to share life with you, not someone who wants to just follow you around.

[–] Bluefruit@lemmy.world 18 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Preach my brother.

I'm almost 30 and i 100% agree. Friends and family thought i was gay because i guess dont fit the normal "male" shit that everyone seems to assume you need to be male.

I like art and music amd cute things like cat bowls with cat ears.

But i also like to build things like my desk and work outside with my hands and fix things like when my girlfriends parents had thier washing machine break. Loved fixing that.

Early on into our relationship, my girlfriend saw me cry and didn't say shit about me not being a man or being weak or whatever garbage people code to "men". She was just there for me. Sat and listened.

So to answer OP, i agree with Scrubbles, find someone you wanna spend time with. The woman you describe absolutely exists but theres also a chance that you find someone completely different and that's ok.

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 11 points 3 weeks ago

Imagine claiming to "love" someone and then literally make fun of them for crying. There's for sure some light teasing, but it's all in good fun, and never serious. She would never say anything like "Don't cry because it's not manly", what a terrible thing to say to someone you claim is your partner.

[–] tiefling@lemmy.blahaj.zone 11 points 3 weeks ago

I'm very queer, as is everyone around me. This is something queer people figured out quite a while ago. Gender norms are overrated and cause more harm than good. Do what makes you happy or comfortable and appreciate others for who they are. Don't try to fit yourself or your expectations of others into a box.

[–] SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

When Taylor Swift was coming I asked her to go with me.

Did she respond, or was she too busy coming?

[–] scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech 5 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Ha, reversed roles my friend. She was like "Sounds fun, I'll go for you". Then it was "You spent HOW MUCH for tickets". Then when I pulled out the temp tattoos she was like "Oh god okay here we go"

[–] SpaceNoodle@lemmy.world 6 points 3 weeks ago

The joke was that the sentence was structured in such a way that it seemed like Taylor Swift was having an orgasm while you asked her out.

[–] VelvetStorm@lemmy.world 5 points 3 weeks ago

I'm the exact opposite of you and your partner. My wife and I fit most the traditional gender roles but I agree fuck gender roles. Throw them all in a toilet, fart on them, and then flush em.

[–] MindTraveller@lemmy.ca 36 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

[–] sprigatito_bread@lemmy.world 15 points 3 weeks ago

I fucking love this thank you so much

[–] TheMightyCanuck@sh.itjust.works 22 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

There is absolutely women like this out there.

Just make it known early on what roles you're looking to fall into and you'll find the one

[–] norimee@lemmy.world 11 points 3 weeks ago

I'm sure there are much more women out there who would appreciate this as you would think.

Strong, independent and confident women learn in this still very patriarchal world early on to mask an assertive character. The same toxic mechanisms that teach boys they have to be manly and masculine, a provider and protector, teach girls that these characteristics are not acceptable for women. If you are not soft, agreeable and demure, you are not feminine enough, a bossy, feisty, bitch.

I'm sure there are plenty of women out there who dream of being loved for their strength instead of having to hide it.

As a feminist, my dream is a world where everyone can just be, without being pressed into expectations their gender dictates.

[–] ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (2 children)

The question is whether there are as many women like that as there are men like OP.

When I was a teenager, I was really serious about computer games and my family didn't respect that. They thought I was like an adult obsessed with children's toys. Then while playing Diablo online I met a nice pair of people who said they were a married couple and really liked playing computer games together. This blew my mind - adults who played video games, and an adult man who found a woman to share his hobby rather than being an awkward loner like me. I wanted to be like him when I grew up, but eventually I learned that there's only one woman who wants to be like his wife for every ten men who want be to like him, and that I'm not in the top ten percent of men (so to speak).

[–] sprigatito_bread@lemmy.world 7 points 3 weeks ago

For me personally, I determined that it was in my best interest to be open-minded to maximize the number of potential partners.

I'm not going to go down the path of defining a million traits that my future partner should have because nobody in the world will match all of them. Instead, my goal is to minimize the number of preferences I have, while still being excited about a relationship with someone within the distribution defined by those preferences. So, for example, I don't care what hobbies my partner has as long as we can make the relationship work. If we share hobbies, great! But if we don't, that's fine too. We can find other things to do together.

Even the fantasy I mentioned is likely not the full story, just a data point. I'm likely to be more flexible. There is probably no label that perfectly describes what I want my relationships to look like. While labels can help me find like-minded people, I also shouldn't let them limit my thinking.

Also, I avoid thinking about aggregate numbers, e.g. "What percentage of people have these traits?" and instead think "Which settings and contexts maximize my odds of meeting someone like this?" It helps me recognize that I have agency to shift the odds in my favor and this isn't a complete lottery.

[–] Tracked@sopuli.xyz 1 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

Exactly, I've NEVER met a woman that is into videogames. They all like social hobbies and going to parties the weekend.

[–] ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works 0 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

There are statistics out there claiming that women are as likely as men to play video games, but I think they include people who occasionally play casual games on their phone and that's not what we're talking about here. I do know a woman who plays Minecraft a lot and another one who does playthroughs of obscure indie games on YouTube. I count both of them, although even the one on YouTube isn't as obsessed with games as many men are. Her style is more "let's talk about games as art" and less "let's use spreadsheets to optimize our strategy".

(I do wonder if that couple I talked to online was actually a pair of gay men. I don't think they ever said that they were a man and a woman. I just assumed they were. I suppose gay people don't have to worry that there aren't enough potential partners who share their hobby.)

But you can find a woman who doesn't play video games and doesn't have social hobbies either... That's more common although I'm not sure it's what you would prefer.

[–] Hossenfeffer@feddit.uk 0 points 3 weeks ago

I’ve met many. Funny thing, anecdotal data.

[–] Nefara@lemmy.world 19 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

More and more people are shaking off the old expectations of women's passivity and men's aggressiveness. There's still a ways to go but it's not as radically rare as it would have been 30-40 years ago. I was the one who proposed to my husband and took the active role in wooing him, and I've told that story quite a bit and only had positive reactions. Amongst our friends, I'm the only one I know who took the lead like that, but there are a lot of personalities that vary dramatically from the classic gender binary relationship. I would say my husband is the kinder and more gentle of the two of us, and he's a tender and loving parent. Our partnership has a lot of quirks and would probably only work for us, but what's important is that it does work.

I'm also going to say that it's good to have an idea of what you want in a relationship, but don't let a fantasy get in the way of reality. What you daydream about might be attainable, but more likely you will need to compromise on some things, and dating and having relationship experiences will be lessons in what those things can be.

[–] sprigatito_bread@lemmy.world 8 points 3 weeks ago

Definitely. I didn't want to make the post too long, but during my daydreaming phase, I began to shift my thinking towards practical concerns. I concluded that being overly idealistic is a hazard; being open-minded and willing to compromise is key. It actually makes me feel warm and fuzzy to think about how relationships are inherently imperfect because we are inherently flawed, but we can still find a way to make them work anyway. I want to compromise for my partner because I would love her so much and want to be a wonderful boyfriend for her. I think making the relationship work is a very beautiful thing.

Ultimately, the fantasy I described is just one data point. I think there are more types of potential partners for me than the one I described. My goal is to minimize the number of preferences I have while still defining a distribution of people I'd be excited to have as a partner because that casts a wide net. For example, I don't think my future partner giving me cute nicknames is a hard requirement. It's just nice to think about.

It's lovely to hear about your relationship! I'm happy for you and your husband!

[–] Libb@jlai.lu 17 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

it's not that uncommon, What you call role reversing is quite normal for many persons and is no reversal at all.

Just don't fall for the trap of thinking people need to be this or that, depending their gender. More often than not, people are a mix. Which make them so much more interesting to meet and learn to know. Imho ;)

My spouse (we're both 50+ and have been together for 25 years) is assertive and not the romantic kind (if you want to get slapped in the face try offering her flowers) but I am romantic (like, really) and ,yep, I do like flowers (I'm the one buying flowers to decorate our place). It happens I'm also as assertive as she is and we both have or had jobs with lots of responsibilities — 'had', because in my case I retired a few years ago from that job and decided to live a much simpler life, whereas my wife still works for a large corporation and still works with a small army of people).

Then, next to that, there is also the more or less extreme version of... let's call it 'gender role reversal' for lack of a better word whereas one should in reality understand a 'gender cliché reversal'. Where the supposed 'male figure' will be a dominant woman and the 'feminine one' will be a weak/gentle/soft male. More often than not, it will err on the side of fetishism eroticism and, that should not be a surprise, there is also a lot of erotica/sex business around that kind of role 'reversal' for the obvious reason that it sells. Which means that enough people are into it to make it a profitable business... much more people (male and female) than will dare to admit it ;)

So, what do you think? Have you seen relationships like this in the wild? Have you known about these dynamics, or are they unfamiliar to you? I’d like to know your thoughts!

If I could give you an advice iy would be to go meet different kind of people. Imho, it would help you realize men are not just 'male' and harsh and women are not just 'soft' and romantic.

Those fantasies not only showed me how wonderful a relationship would feel, but also that I myself would want to be very affectionate and adaptive to my partner’s needs, not just my own.

Isn't it what a (working) relationship is supposed to be for both parties in a couple? Be affectionate and attentive to the other's needs not just one's own?

Don't be afraid of your 'fantasy'. Imho, don't be afraid to not call it a fantasy. The moment you try to meet people for who they are and not who you want them to be you will be surprised how... rich (and understanding) some of them can be. Not all of them.

[–] Lennnny@lemmy.world 15 points 3 weeks ago

Female and married here. I love being strong and protective of my husband. I will protect him and his reputation fiercely, if I hear anyone start to talk shit, I'm the first to shut it down. He's not someone who 'needs' it (by gender role standards) but it makes me feel sexy and strong to defend and care for him. Then there are days where I'm the cute defenceless fawn who needs coffee in bed and cuddles and for him to put on my favorite show. It really depends on our mood, but what is amazing is how effortlessly we move between me or him being the dominant force. Sometimes we balance, and we storm in there like a ragtag police duo in an 80s movie.

[–] boogetyboo@aussie.zone 14 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Tiny woman here with big hulking male partner.

I love his stereotypical masculinity and physical strength. I like him to take charge in the bedroom as well.

But I'm more forthright with my views, with articulating a position, and with taking a conviction through to an outcome. He tends to equivocate or back down or second guess himself in moments of conflict or hardship.

I've stood up for him countless times, or helped him navigate through emotional complexity or points of conflict. I've held him when he's cried through loss. He's come to me in situations not knowing what to do, feeling small and broken.

We have pet names for each other and mine for him are not exactly butch, and he doesn't mind.

I'm no princess and don't mind getting my hands dirty, and I'll take on any physical challenge my little body will allow. But our strengths in our household and our relationship goes beyond our body size and gender.

We enjoy the stereotypical feminine and masculine traits about each other. But our closeness relies on the ability to find the strengths in each other that aren't assigned to our genders by society.

What I'd warn you against in your excitement over this realisation is that there are few women out there who will just want/need those softer attributes from you. To be a well rounded person, let alone an equal partner in a relationship, you need many different qualities. I'm not saying 'hit the gym', I'm saying strength is needed from both sides when things get hard. Strength comes in many forms - don't expect her to be the only one with it.

[–] occhionaut@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago

Eloquently said!

[–] superkret 11 points 3 weeks ago

Congrats on figuring out what you want in a relationship. Lots of people never do and live in unhappy marriages or go through multiple divorces without ever figuring it out.

[–] southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 9 points 3 weeks ago

Rock on, my man.

Figuring out something like that is pretty damn big. I'm glad as hell we live in a world where not only can someone discover this part of themselves, but have a decent chance of finding someone that matches it.

I tend to some moderately atypical gender aspects myself, though not this one (I don't really have a preference about gender roles with partners, I can chill and let my wife drive the boat, share the load, or steer the thing, or any combination of roles), so I get having to figure out why things don't fit right.

Glad you discovered what your happy looks like, and hope you find it soon :)

[–] blindbunny@lemmy.ml 7 points 3 weeks ago

You're not alone homie

[–] Notyou@sopuli.xyz 4 points 3 weeks ago

Shout out to the gentlefemdom community.

[–] clark@midwest.social 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

Lol. I believe this is the male counterpart to this comment I made a while ago.

[–] sprigatito_bread@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

Haha, yep! Sure sounds like it!

I'm guessing that there are many, many people who like reversed roles but suppress that desire because of social stigma.

I had to fight through so much insecurity and confusion to get to this point. I was raised in a deeply conservative environment and harassed by family and classmates for being emotional. As a young teenager, I had to seek outside information (via the Internet) without anyone knowing to free myself from the echo chamber and develop a progressive belief system.

It took many years of deprogramming, self-reflection, and meeting some truly wonderful people to become confident in who I am. I feel like I got lucky and escaped a cult, and I feel a sense of sadness for all of the people who are still trapped within.

I think if the world continues to become more progressive, we'll see a lot more people openly expressing their true romantic desires and attracting wonderful partners who they absolutely adore.

A world filled with cute happy couples of all kinds is a world I want to live in.

[–] feedum_sneedson@lemmy.world -2 points 3 weeks ago

Honestly it sounds like you had a manic episode.