Would I have been an Extrovert if I wasn't trans?

I come from a homophobic/transphobic family, so being trans* for me was essentially being sentence to a life of shame and loneliness. I won't go full on here, because I want to get to a point that my brother brought up.

He says he think I'd have been extraverted if I had grown up in a different way, and been accepted like this, not conditioned to hate myself and be so reserved. This was a really interesting point that I hadn't thought of before. Do you guys think this is true?

This is how I consider it: Your personality is fluid, and changes throughout your life. As a child growing up to the late teen years which I'm in now, I've always been very reserved. Well as a little kid I suppose I was more open and free since gender expectations weren't yet shoved on me.

But it seems that the more I learned about what is was to "be a girl" and the older I got, the more cold and distant and hurt I became. I wasn't happy being that, but didn't want anyone to know. I hid that part of myself because I was ashamed of it. Deep down, I knew I wanted to be a boy - that I was a boy - only I could never say it. My father is another factor. I have always looked up to him so much, and my siblings claimed that I was his favorite. He's a really reserved, intelligent type but is also very judgmental and decisive. And he hates gays, and trans*people. And that just kills me.

For this reason I think that I tried to force myself to be his daughter, but it got so tiring. It came to be that I started presenting two versions of myself. The mask: a quirky, quiet daughter who was everything my parents wanted. And me: a struggling young man who hated himself for who he was. I pulled every true bit of myself inward. Never told anyone. Became alone and friendless. When I looked around at other people - I saw no reason to interact with them. I was an alien and they would never understand me, so why bother? And that mentality - along with other pre-existing factors - became cemented into my personality, creating one of the most introverted people possible It's funny, on personality tests I think I scored 80-100% Introverted.

But all of this is to say: would I have been extroverted, or at least ambiverted, had I been conditioned differently? Will my personality change once I start transitioning? As I look at myself now I think I'm too far gone to ever be a peppy extrovert, and am proud of my introvertedness. Just a thought though...

 

Good points.

I am for all intents and purposes extremely introverted. Both of the reasons you mentioned do apply to me.

Social situations are very draining. I don't have any friends so I cannot really answer how I would feel with any size group of friends...

Another thing which frustrates me is this: Socially I am alone - so no deep or even superficial relationships (unless you count online ones). But in reality I am constantly surrounded by people. My family is huge and there is always someone doing something around me, or coming into my room, or forcing me to talk to them. It's suffocating. I want to have some actual alone time but it's nearly impossible. So I wake up at 4:50am so I can sit outside, alone, with a cup of coffee.

I got on a bit of a tangent there but yeah...

Do I behave in an introverted way to avoid feeling unhappy, rejected, or hated? Yes too, but less so than the first question. I both enjoy being by myself and also do it because I fear opening up to people. I don't know them well enough to gauge how they will react, and struggle with reading people (and trusting people) in general. Me talking usually leads to misunderstanding so I just don't. And obviously I don't want my family, whom I love, to hate me.

I guess it all boils down to one thing... I just want to be understood, and recognize that I won't/cannot be, and thus subject myself to aloneness. This results in mixed feelings of happy independence as well as depressed isolation. This got really personal, I realize... But it's the truth.