I knew a man who's gay and he told me that after his partner's mother died, his partner's father came up to him after the funeral, and said, "I was only pretending for your mother. I don't want to see you, again."

When I was diagnosed with ankylosing spondylitis, which was how I met this man, there were two gay men in the group, and when I was in the car with my mother (I was driving), she asked me if it worried me. This was a question that I found odd, and I asked her what she meant. And she replied that so many men who have the condition seem to be gay. I said, "Why should it?" Of all things, my mother defended the right of the gay man's father to distance himself from his son! That is what fills me with dread about coming out to her as a transgender lesbian. I said to my father, in a roundabout way, that if I wanted a partner, I would need a bisexual autistic woman. Why I feel that way is this. I am autistic, for starters, and I give the example of a Chinese man marrying an Irishwoman, in 19th Century Australia. One of things that caused consternation amongst the Whites, was that so many of the Chinese who came to Australia in the 19th Century were men (never mind the fact that the First Fleet hand mostly male convicts) and a number of them were polygamous. Australian Kylie Kwong's great-grandfather went to Darwin with his four wives, but it was not that uncommon for a Chinese man to come to Australia unaccompanied, leaving behind a wife in China, and staying in Australia for around seven years and having a European or Aboriginal wife or partner and then returning to China. Many of the Irishwomen who co-habited with Chinese men were viewed negatively by the Europeans. It also needs to be remembered that some Irish in Australia were hardline Catholics who lived by the division of Orange and Green, and would only marry Irish-Catholics, but some of these Irishwomen escaped from domestic violence into the arms of Chinese men or didn't care what faith their partner was. I digress, but a relationship between an autistic and a neurotypical would be a cross-cultural relationship. I am reminded of an episode of A Country Practice where an Irish-Australian Catholic woman went on a cruise and had an interlude with a Vietnamese man, and she fell pregnant. Her father was prejudiced, and when the man's mother said, "Please, Mr. O'Connor, we are Catholic," he reluctantly agreed to the marriage.

Why I would want a bisexual woman is because I reject traditional gender roles. I had a girlfriend who wanted them, and we used to fight. She hated the fact that I liked cooking, for example.

I am a bit concerned about coming out to my family, but I say, at 48, I know myself better.