I don't fall into "knew since childhood" category, which is my bane. I don't fall into "crippling dysphoria" category, which is my misfortune. I don't fall into "one hundred percent certain" category, which is my blow. Lastly, I don't know any gender therapists around, and that's my bad luck. Starting from the beginning. I am a FRPG player, somewhat of a writer. That means some people gather round, make up their characters and write as if about them, from their perspective. Role-playing, a different sort. I tend to take male characters since age fourteen. And there is a trend in my city, which is Moscow, where young girls en masse use male pronouns, which is considered a harmless quirk. Now, I am afraid I am not transgender, only a play-pretend, affected both by my games and by "fashion". It has become a thing that keeps me up at night for some time. I don't feel myself female. I don't like my chest. I can't sleep if I don't cover myself with something I try not to look at the mirror after getting out of the shower. I would like people stop calling me a girl. But how can I be sure I am for real?
Well, first of all, not liking your chest and any form of uneasy feelings about your body is usually considered to be body dysphoria. So you do have some form of dysphoria. Can you imagine a situation in which you would like your chest? lets say if it looked a bit different or would you only be happy without a chest? That's really the difference between normal self esteem issues and body dysphoria. (It does actually feel differently, but it can be hard to describe the difference... ) Don't rush into it, be patient and explore your feelings and memories, read about it here and elsewhere and learn everything you can about being trans. I know that a month and a half after learning about what it means to be trans, I'm still figuring out everything. Trying to piece together my past and every small detail that I learn feels great. It can be a hard thing to comes to terms with and it can take quite a long time to be absolutely sure that you want to transition. Welcome to the forums! (*hug*) Yael
Thank you for your reply, Yaeli. Without it. That's it. I have tried some home-made binding, that felt good. Also, I passed as a boy a few times, that felt great. But it still can be that I am talking myself to dysphoria. You know how these things work, a typical example being the Medical Encyclopedia Syndrome, where a person starts feeling every single symptom. I've been scrutinising myself over the past almost-year, and still it's not an inch close to the answer. Again, I tend to overthink. All that reading helps a bit, though I have done a lot. I wonder, is there any way one can become sure?
^Yaeli said it perfectly Make sure you test yourself if you aren't certain. both mental experiments and physical experiments are good... good luck! (*hug*)
I know that fear of deluding yourself so well, I over think everything as well, it did make it very awkward for me when I came out. It's good to be a bit of a skeptic but at times you also need to follow your intuition. 95% of people who complete the transition process are happy that they went through with it. The reason for this is that someone who is not really trans will start feeling gender dysphoria at some point during the process and realize that they made a mistake. Furthermore, transitioning is probably one of the hardest processes that a person can go through, personally, I've made every effort in the world to persuade myself that I am not trans and I always hit a wall, I know that I can't turn back now because I have no real choice to do so. This is something that you need to ask yourself, will you be happy just staying as a woman for the rest of your life? You really are risking everything by going down this path and as such you do need to be sure that this is the right decision for you. Try to prove to yourself that you are not trans, instead of trying to prove that you are. I suspect that the thought will keep coming back to you and your dysphoria will just grow. Until you start transitioning, from my experience, you will most likely notice a steady increase in your sense of dysphoria as your mind starts a process of dissimulation of your old identity. Your defenses that you set up over your life will break down and you will most likely eventually know for sure whether or not this is the right choice for you. No matter what, you are not alone and if you ever need help or advice feel free to message me, (*hug*) Yael
BeckiWoopx, And what exactly do you mean by experiments? I think I have prosected myself in every way that I can imagine by now, with very little results aside "I might be, I might not be". So, if you have any new ways, do tell. Yaeli, I appreciate your advice. Perhaps, yes, only time will tell. But it would be a shame to live a life that isn't even yours, wouldn't it? For some being sure is easy, for me it is a quiet torment, because I understand in all details side effects of transition that can happen and irreversibility of the testosterone. Most likely I will eat myself alive while trying to be sure. If you don't mind, I am going to start telling the details of my sorry life. If you mind, please, just skip to the end. That's what I get for now: - I seemingly was okay with being called a girl all my previous life. My name was fine. I didn't like skirts, so I didn't wear them. - I have never understood that "father-mother-children" play, which some girls played. But my social contacts were quite limited. - Wasn't girlish, wasn't boyish. Had no interest in makeup, had no interest in what girls in class discussed, had no interest in sports... Well, to put it short, I was a very isolated and timid book-lover. And that is unisex. - Around fourteen I began to develop a tendency for male characters of my authorship. - Which is where "male pronouns inside my head" started to appear, as I recall it. And, also, in the World Wide Web, since fifteen. I spoke as if from my character, which was male, and then I realised I am actually comfortable that way. This is the main problem point. I can't know if I made everything up. So I continued. I don't think my few internet familiarities actually doubt I'm a lad, or, at the very least, they can't be certain I'm a lass. - Sixteen was where classic dances classes happened, which I quietly loathed. With a skirt and heels. It irks me a bit to this day. At the moment I just was doing it, putting that loathing inside and down. - In September I was mistaken for a boy, which felt strange, but good. I started to think about it. - That year the depression and anxiety game was strong, so it wasn't a really good year. There was one psychiatrist, who gives me recipes for meds. I tried to talk about it with her, she said I don't look like a trans male, and that even butch lesbians are more masculine. And, ultimately, the "I am not trans" boils to: - I never knew since childhood. - I had every opportunity to just imagine it. - A psychiatrist, who occasionally watched me for several years, told me so.
I can't delete the whole thing to get to last bit but - only 30% know they were trans since child hood. The narrative you know is spread by media as it makes it easier for cis gender people to understand -i think most trans people worry that they are imagining. -go to a gender therapist and to hell with the other one. No one can tell you that you are trans but you. And a lot of therapist would rather flat out tell you that you aren't trans are convince you that you aren't. That is why gender therapist or those who have experience with gender identities is needed. If you physically go to one then use an online one
Ok, I'll try to help you figure this out. How many opportunities did you have to interact with boys when you were a child. I'm 34 and only now I realized that I was trans, looking back to my childhood, I didn't have an opportunity to really interact with girls. I had two brothers and my mother worked most of the time, thus most of the time I just played with my brothers. When I got to school, I naturally befriended boys because that was what was expected of me. Until I was 14 or so I never really had any friends who were girls. Once I befriended the first girl, I learned that I felt much more comfortable around girls than boys and in university all my friends were girls. You might think this is irrelevant, however, being trans, has nothing really to do with acting in a feminine or masculine way. If you read some of the posts by trans women and men on this site you will notice that everyone is different, there are more masculine trans women and more feminine trans men. Personally I'm fairly neutral like you and have very little traits that would clearly point to me being female. What I do have is an innate feeling of connection with girls which I don't have with boys. I feel like I can just understand them and predict their behavior. Men feel like an enigma to me and I often feel uncomfortable being their friends as a result. I wrote a bit about it here: http://emptyclosets.com/forum/gende...erstanding-gender-identity-innate-gender.html Read it over and see if you identify with what I wrote. You seem to be fairly analytical so you will probably find it interesting. Most of the information that you wrote about is fairly irrelevant to judging whether or not you are trans outside of adopting a male identity on the internet mainly because you seem to feel more comfortable identifying as male. It seems as if your psychiatrist had absolutely no idea what it means to be trans. Saying that you don't look masculine is one the more ignorant statements I've ever heard concerning being trans as the whole point of transitioning is to change your body to fit your innate gender identity... obviously you don't look masculine, you have a female body...
Lots of trans people don't know since childhood. Most of the trans narratives in the media show those because it sort of helps legitimize transgender people to cis people that could be skeptical. I've seen many other people (including me) worry that they've somehow imagined it, or tricked themselves. Doubts are pretty common, and I'd say they're good to have, because it shows that you aren't taking the decision lightly, and you're putting thought into it.
As to the "knowing since childhood" thing, which is actually quite uncommon... It's my theory that trans*girls know earlier on, more often than trans*guys do because think about it. Boys are already born with external genitalia, and while they haven't hit puberty yet, it's still there. If they are a trans*girl they will be uncomfortable with it because they noticed it sooner... So their dysphoria could be present since as early as the become aware of it. Girls, on the other hand, have not developed external genitalia nor female cycles until they reach puberty. So their bodies are basically androgynous at first. Would you feel as dysphoric if you were still pre-pubescent and had no boobs or periods? The reason, I think, that the vast majority of trans*guys don't feel strong dysphoria until they reach puberty is because there is a lot less to feel dysphoric about, and so it can go "under the radar." Now in either scenario, there is probably a "disconnected" feeling with the child's assigned gender... often only noticeable in retrospect or - from an outside point of view - not different enough to be considered abnormal. It's also important to take into consideration gender expression amongst children and how this relates to the trans*girl versus trans*boy experience. It is more likely that a biological boy would be frowned upon for being girly or wearing dresses while often bio girls can get away with being tomboys. Thus the preferred gender association for trans*girls is again more evident than with trans*boys, and earlier on too. Though none of this is to discount the "transness" of either trans*boys or girls. Both are just as real, though for various reasons are recognized (or intensify) at different times. I don't know how relevant all of that was to your original question, but maybe this theory of mine gives you something to think about in regards to your own self-searching process. Cheers. -Peter-
Oh, and it doesn't help that you live in Moscow. Your country is not LGBT friendly. And therapist there will clearly say you are making it up or lock you up. I read one article about a person who identified more with men but never thought themselves trans, they even had tran men friends and still didn't think they could be one. It took them spending a year in Russia to figure it out. They said Russia was heavily gendered (again this was years ago so it might not be that way now). They got turned out of a night club because they wanted to wear a suit instead if a dress. In the end they realized that they had been experiencing dysphoria their whole lives and didn't know it because they grew up so gender neutral. As for me I had such heavy dysphoria as a teen that I thought of killing myself, but I didn't know that that was what I was feeling. I would rationalize everything away. I certainly didn't know I was trans till I was 22. I think my mind always found ways to cope. I did gender neutral things, dressed neutral, I acted masculine right up till I forced myself to be feminine for fear of never finding a boyfriend, I liked male pronouns but explained it as that pronouns were just words and some roll off the tounge better than others. And like you I forum role played, my test thread on one site is full of posts I've written and out of the dozen and dozen of characters most are male. I don't think it is random that my depression lifted around the time I started playing boys online. And I constantly worry that I am making up being trans. And I find that I don't want to make it up, I want to be trans. I want to be a dude because I love being dude, because I am dude.
Thank everyone for their input, it is heart-warming to see someone come along while trying to help my sorry mind. CadutiMorte, Let me tell you a horror story about the falling of ruble compared to dollar. It really was exceptional. The ones I have found on Laura's typically charge around 100 bucks for an hour, and that is a big sum. However, if you can fetch me some links and contacts, it would be greatly appreciated. Yaeli, Theoretically, I had them. As if, nobody prevented me from befriending anyone I wanted, aside from poor social skills. Some playground friends, both boys and girls, but the closest I was to the boy. No kindergarten. Later, in school, that playground contacts broke. I have switched schools quite a few times. In the first one, no friends. In the second one, two so-called "friends", but in retrospective it was horrible. Then two more schools, but it's not childhood anymore. In fact, I do. First of all, let me say I have read something similar, only with distinction between the intact "gender identity" and the changeable "psychological gender". Though this article may have been in Russian. So, yes, that makes sense. That makes perfect sense also. Sadly, that is not a criteria for me, as I don't understand much in emotions and I don't feel a strong bond to whichever. Overall, I say I can agree with the main idea of that post, as it aligns with much of the stories I have read and the necessity of psychological transition as well as physical. Even if I would have worded it a bit differently, say "I identify as female, but my outer psychological gender is male because I was raised like this". Acm, All aboard the overthinking train! I guess I really should take it as a positive side and try not to eat myself alive while trying to understand the not understandable. Peter, Somewhat relevant, as it, again, is a common theory that I see going around, and could also be while I have started roleplaying male characters around puberty. CadutiMorte, Locking up is a bit over dramatic. Excluding the cases of a dirty play, bribes to fix a son/daughter to normal and voluntary locking up as to receive a "transsexualism" diagnosis. Things aren't bright and easy all the way, that is for sure, but locking up cases are really rare. I can't say on behalf of night clubs, but in many workplaces dresscode exists, which requires a moderate makeup, skirts and low heels. Churches. Still, things depend on where you want to go. In my everyday life I don't see much examples, asides from stereotyping. Interesting. So it is way more common than I thought, and more common than in Russia, to roleplay on forums prior, during or after realisation that something was wrong. I fear, this is more of a madness mantra left when rationalisation doesn't work. Something little explainable and little comparable. It would have been so easy with some "transness" scale.
