Phil was fucking maria in return for a roof over his head.
Maria was an older lesbian fucking phil so she could have a child before getting too old.
Neither of them were really into it.
Maria was pretty much blackmailing phil into fucking her in return for junk food and if he didnt he was out on the streets.
Eventually things reached the point were phil punched maria at a book store because she promised him pizza or icecream but she refused to do so because phil wasnt sticking it to her as often as promised.
Now obviously what phil did was wrong but what maria was doing to phil could be seen as exploitation of an exceptional individual.
You can argue if phil is gay or not or if hes trans or not but he wasnt having sex he really didnt want to father a child he didnt want then likely would be curbed when maria got what she wanted.
And according to the Maria mails sex mostly came down to a few seconds of action after phil spent forever getting himself in the mood then crying.