My main concern with "I am currently uncomfortable with my sexuality and/or my body and blah blah onwards" plots is that I read enough YA that I am really uncomfortable with relationships in which one person Fixes the other.
I haven't seen a lot where Our Young Heroine Fixes her boyfriend, but that would make me equally uncomfortable. (My dad will hold forth at some length about how People Are Not Fixer-Uppers and how you will indeed change after marriage but not necessarily in ways a partner has planned out, so do not marry someone with the intention of changing them! Etc.! He hasn't been doing this as much now that it isn't a risk for me. But it's still a thing he sees people doing and goes, "Nooooooo!", and also I suspect the I Met A Broken Boy And Fixed Him Go Me thing would give me hives from the condescending even without that.)
What I am seeing an unfortunate lot of, though, is that you are broken and your boyfriend knows how to change you so that you will be Totes All Bettar so you should listen to him and do what he says. And I really believe that healthy relationships should help you grow as a person. It's just that there's a line between that and "you are broken and the other person is not, so listen to them and change yourself to be what they say, whereas your insights are not of equal value to them."
And the "I can't stand him but he's so hot" code often verges uncomfortably close to Fixer Upper territory for me.
no subject
I haven't seen a lot where Our Young Heroine Fixes her boyfriend, but that would make me equally uncomfortable. (My dad will hold forth at some length about how People Are Not Fixer-Uppers and how you will indeed change after marriage but not necessarily in ways a partner has planned out, so do not marry someone with the intention of changing them! Etc.! He hasn't been doing this as much now that it isn't a risk for me. But it's still a thing he sees people doing and goes, "Nooooooo!", and also I suspect the I Met A Broken Boy And Fixed Him Go Me thing would give me hives from the condescending even without that.)
What I am seeing an unfortunate lot of, though, is that you are broken and your boyfriend knows how to change you so that you will be Totes All Bettar so you should listen to him and do what he says. And I really believe that healthy relationships should help you grow as a person. It's just that there's a line between that and "you are broken and the other person is not, so listen to them and change yourself to be what they say, whereas your insights are not of equal value to them."
And the "I can't stand him but he's so hot" code often verges uncomfortably close to Fixer Upper territory for me.