Need some help trying to get help

I'm technically Chris from Olympia, WA although I like the name Stephanie. I'm transgendered and have known it since I was like eight; coming from a military family that is heavy Catholics my parents are pretty unhelpful in terms of me trying to be a girl full time or starting to transition at all. Until I came out to my parents last year I was feeling VERY depressed, not on the verge of suicide because I just don't think suicide is the answer, but so depressed that I just did not want to do anything. I remember my parents telling me that I could not go looking through mommy's closet and I could not cry because "big boys don't cry" (which they have had to tell me so much that it's actually hard for me to cry because my parents will scold me for it). As I came out and my parents said they were going to help me I had some hope, until three months passed and they had done nothing to help and continued to treat me as though nothing had happened. My dad constantly uses the word son and it makes me really sad; I can only imagine getting to wear a pretty dress and put on a light shade of make up and lipstick before going out to a school dance or something, it's really depressing. Since I was around eight I had figured out the whole "girls have cooties" and that rivalry between them. I tried to go onto the girls side, but all the guys would get mad at me and say they would not be able to play with me again since I would have their cooties, and the girls did not want a guy to play on with them because they are disgusting so I just went back with the boys and observed how they played. I remember some years following that I would always look over to where some of the girls were and they would be playing with dolls or house or pet shop and I'd always want to play with them, but everyone I really knew was playing basketball or wall ball and I could not sneak out of the game. Through the years I grew up taking what guys did and trying to fit in with them, but when the whole guys and girls rivalry years ended most of my friends would be girls and I felt more comfortable around them than guys. Of course I knew by this point what girls did and what boys did and I knew that everyone would laugh at me if I did dress up or wanted to be the princess. Now there are so many things that I want to do and might never get the chance to that is only a fantasy for me.
Today in my Early Childhood Education Class I learned about gender stereotypes as if I did not know already and my teacher handed out a piece of paper with some opinion based questions on it; the first one was listing five reasons why you like being a guy (or girl)... I almost started crying (and as I said earlier it is harder for me to cry than I'm really happy with since it's harder to convey my emotion since I am usually told it's a bad thing), but kept my composure and left it blank followed by the question of five things you would like doing if you were the opposite gender... again I had almost lost it, but I some how was able to not cry and I listed many reasons as to why. I realized that (for me) there is NOTHING good in being a guy; I HATE being male and I just wish I could be female right now!
I've wanted to have another talk with my parents about seeing a specialist so that they could decide if maybe I could go out as a girl and take estrogen therapy at school next year and no student could know I was really a boy unless they were perverted and looked at me in the bathroom or something. I just don't know how to approach it, since my parents are hard to persuade I'm not sure what I have to do in order to persuade them and what I should do to get closer to my goal since I feel even more depressed just waiting around and doing nothing to help so any advice out there or commentary, I'd listen to whatever help or comments you could give me

THANKS,

STEPHANIE