Double identity through transition. Will it disappear?

I have already spoken to some of you individually on EC about this but I am curious to know if the kind of 'double' identity that I have at the moment will disappear through transition.

I feel a new me emerging and this is the person I know I want to become. It gives me a future to look forward to and I can actually think ahead for once in my life. But he is also prone to getting very angry and at the moment, can feel a bit out of control.

But at the same time the old me is still in there are this is my vulnerable side that I don't like to show to anyone. I want to get rid of it though. I guess it's all my history and I don't feel like this side of me is compatible with the new me (ie. becoming a man).

I feel that in a way, the new me wishes to be rid of the old me or at least hide it well away from anyone. It seems that the anger and defenses I associate with the new me is trying to block anyone from getting close. I can't let them know me without them seeing and knowing the fragile me inside which is the person that I was and not the person I wish to become.

I wondered if anyone had experienced this through transition and what to do with the old self that still remains inside you. Do you deny it was ever there and erase every trace of your past identity? Or do you have to come to terms with the fact that part of you will always belong to the 'wrong' gender because you lived that life and were that person, despite it not being right for you?

 

Hi anonym. I have to say that I completely understand this whole "two people inside" phenomenon. When I started going by a male name and male pronouns, I embraced this side of me, the side I wanted to show. But as time passed, I couldn't help but feel vulnerable and like I'm trying to suppress who I had been in the eyes of others for almost all my life. I don't want to be "her" anymore, I want to be "him." But "her" keeps popping up- and it's hard to hide sometimes. I don't know if this goes away as you do more things to change your perceived gender to male or not. I hope it does because it is a really crappy feeling.
I don't want to erase my past because as much as I don't like it, it is a part of me and I feel like if I were to erase it I would be erasing all that got me to this point in my life and that just wouldn't be good. But sometimes I don't want people to know about my old self and only know me as a male. It's just easier and causes less dysphoria that way.

I hope this is informative.

 

This is EXACTLY how I feel Like 'she' keeps popping up when I'm off guard and it makes me panic will I always have to suppress this to be taken for a guy.

 

Well if you think about it, the male in you can, for the purposes of this thought, be treated like a newborn child that rapidly goes through the stages of life to catch up with you, so at the moment, it's not fully developed enough to take over everything all at once, where as 'she' is used to 'dealing' with things, even if you don't think she deals with them very well!

When I've experienced this it's been like I've had a distinct split. So as I've got older, some things I now recognize as Holly have become more obvious, so things like being really mature at times, doing the type of work that I do and being a good student, all those things have got stronger over time, where as my social skills have been left in the dark while 'he' has taken care of those...or rather, avoided them like the plague. As I've been living as Holly the gap has started to close a bit!

I THINK that's normal

 

Well it's the opposite for me. I don't think 'he' could perform well in a job yet so I'm thinking of doing some volunteer work as a guy to get used to it. But on the whole I feel that he is the one who can manage things in a mature way. He is less emotional which does make it hard to connect with people emotionally I find.

'She' on the other hand is more vulnerable and feels like my flaw. A weakness. Only 'she' can love friends and family at the moment. When I am extremely depressed, I am 'her'.

 

I think volunteering as a guy could be a great idea, if you're comfortable doing it!

 

Bang on.

 

I think it's normal, for a while, to feel this sort of divide between your true gender and the gender you've been percieved as for your entire life thus far. When I started coming to terms with my gender identity, it was a lot like trying to pick up all the fragments of who I was trying to be, while trying to learn how to be who I actually am. Think about the qualities you admire, the values you hold. Let him emulate them, embrace them. It'll take time, and some willpower, but you'll pull together alright.

As for the other you, the old you...for me, it was tough. I don't like the old me. But at the same time, I'm not particularly ashamed of where I'm coming from. I don't look back on a childhood of running around in a tiara and cringe. I look back at 13 and cringe, but who doesn't? It kind of sucks not having the same sort of life other guys have had, but I'm kind of happy I didn't. I think it's made me more open, more understanding, and more accepting. And the weird thing is, that I've accepted all that, and don't feel like I'll never be completely my true gender, or that part of me will always be the wrong gender - I am my true gender, all of me is. And I've been my true gender, ever since I started to recognize that I didn't feel like the gender that was designated to me.

Granted, this zen like harmony isn't the easiest to maintain out in a world that goes "WOW LOOK AT YOUR ADORABLE EVERYTHING ADORABLE LADY WOW". God knows I get just as broken and lost and devastated as anyone else...

 

Thanks clockworkfox I think I must be moving forward because I feel less and less like I'm 'losing' me now. It's more like realising this was me all along and I just hid myself away behind the person I was supposed to be and the way I was supposed to feel. My family make me feel so guilty for this though 'taking their daughter away from them' It feels like I'm not allowed to be the person I am because it's wrong. Though in some ways, I don't really know who it is that I am yet I don't know what my values are. I just feel lost.

After a temporary relief I'm having a bad phase of dysphoria again at the moment Every day the first thing that I realise as I awaken in the morning is that I am living in a body that isn't me and disgusts me I think I am struggling with internalised transphobia because I just see myself as this disgusting creature based on the fact I am a guy with a girl's body How do I get over this feeling ? It makes me feel like I'm a biological mistake. I'm worthless to society. I'm nothing. I can't accept other people's love because I don't feel I am worthy of it. I can't allow myself to love my family or friends because I feel that it comes from a disgusting source (me ) and it would be horrible for anyone to be loved by me. Obviously whatever surgery I get I will always be trans so how do I get rid of these feelings about myself?

 

No, you are not all those things. You are simply depressed. And that should be addressed by your therapist.

 

Anonym, this MIGHT help, or it might not, it really depends how your mind works. I know it works for me, but I know plenty of others who would disagree completely so if it doesn't for you, no harm done.

There seems to be within society this idea that the human body has some sort of inherent sacred property and that altering it is a bad thing. It's an argument I most commonly see associated with body modifications such as tattoos, and that is how I am going to explain it from here.

I love tattoos, love them. I only have one because it's all I could afford, but I have it and I wouldn't change it. It's got my gaming clan tag, and anime character and my gaming handle and it takes up my left forearm. I've heard from SO many people how I'll regret it. I hear people saying a tattoo like this is stupid because it might mean something now but what about later? Some say they HAVE to have a meaning. Some say all tattoos are stupid because you won't want them later on in life. This probably isn't making much sense to your problem, but stay with me I promise I will get there.

This idea that the body should remain unchanged seems to spring from the idea that if you alter your body in some way you've ruined part of YOU. Some part of you is gone now and you'll never get it back. The reason I spoke about tattoos is because they are super common, when you get a tattoo some people treat it like you've just signed over part of your soul and you may as well be a different person, perhaps a criminal.

I look at it differently. I think the body is entirely irrelevant. What makes me the person that I am are the things that go on in my mind. If you could transplant my thoughts and feelings into a computer or the body of my friend, I hold that I would be the same person, I would just have a different body.

How does this apply to you? Well in a sense, you are right, we are biological mistakes. We have the wrong bodies currently and it sucks. Does that make us bad or disgusting for fixing that? No! People do it all the time. Almost everything people do in life is to make them look how they think they should. We may need something more extreme than most but that doesn't make us wrong.

Will you always be trans? That's a matter for terminology and self-definition. In the most technical standpoint, yes we will always be trans because of the nature of our birth, but do we have to see it that way? No. Trans is definition but not an identity. I'm not trans, I'm female, that's just how it is.

As for loving others, you are loved by the mind, not the body. You ask most people what they like about you and they won't say your breasts, they talk about your personality. The body is just a thing that carries the person around, you're working towards one you can actually tolerate, nobody should hold that against you.

 

Thanks, I just feel so depressed today. Life SUCKS. :tears: My GP has increased my meds today so I hope that will help me. I am so tired all the time and just feel like crying.

I think my fear is that other people will never accept me for who I am. Never see me as a man. You know these ignorant people that will insist on calling trans people by the pronouns of their birth gender and still refer to them as such? I've known a few of them.

I also just feel less of a person than a cis person. That I am a failure of a human being. Why do I feel like this!? :tears:

 

There's a societal stigma placed on trans people. But, like so many other things out there enforced by society, it's total crap.

I worry about acceptance too. A lot. But at the end of the day, I don't know, it's not as important to me as other things - I feel like the people that do accept me as I am are worth my time, and that's all that matters. If anything, being trans gives me a pretty good method for filtering out assholes.

Try thinking of being trans as a journey - like Ellia said, trans isn't necessarily an identity. Many people identify as trans while they're transitioning, and then simply as their gender once they pass all the time. Some only identify as their gender, and the trans bit is just descriptive.

Just remember that you're not a failure, and you're definitely not less of a person. Your gender is just one facet of you. You're a living breathing bundle of stardust, you have every right to live the way you want to and need to, screw the nay-sayers.

 

"You're a living breathing bundle of stardust": This reminds of Dr. Who:

"Hey, do you mind if I tell you a story, one you might not have heard? All the elements in your body were forged many, many millions of years ago in the heart of a faraway star that exploded and died. That explosion scattered those elements across the desolations of deep space. After so, so many millions of years, these elements came together to form new stars and new planets, and on and on it went. The elements came together and burst apart, forming shoes and ships and sealing wax and cabbages and kings until, eventually, they came together to make you. You are unique in the universe. There is only one Merry Galel, and there will never be another. Getting rid of that existence isn't a sacrifice, it is a waste."

 

Thanks clockworkfox and silenthe.