Is this my OCD, or am I trans?

[chadperry2468]

I have OCD. Its called purely obsessional OCD. What I do is find some sort of thought and completely obsess over it. I run it through my head over and over again in a cognitive ritual until I just can't even take it anymore. I can be completely aware that my thoughts are illogical and irrational, but I still worry about it and obsess over it by performing mental tests to see if the thought is true. I have done this in the past with a fear of being a pedophile (even though I knew I had no attraction to children what-so-ever. And I have done it with cancer/stds/you name the disease.

The concerns feel very real (even though I know they might not be) so sometimes it is very hard to decipher whether or not what I'm feeling is actually ME or just something I'm paranoid about.

Right now my current kick is that I'm afraid I might be a transsexual. I'm afraid that I feel like a girl stuck in a boy's body. (I am physically male) This all got really bad when I took a class on gender diversity and we learned about all types of hermaphroditism, all kinds of gender identities, and all kinds of cultures where gender is thought of in different ways than it is here in the U.S.

The worst part is I am gay and somewhat effeminate so I already have some points to rationalize that I AM trans. I know sexual orientation has nothing to do with gender identity, but for some reason I feel like I might like guys because I'm a woman inside. I also always felt different growing up. I've attributed this to my being gay in the past, but now I'm afraid it is because I'm trans. When I was younger I can remember instances where I would gender bend. When I was about 4 I would wear my mom's high heels and try to walk in them, but I think it might have been just because I thought it was fun to walk in shoes like that, not because I wanted to be a girl. I also used to pretend to be this girl character from a movie I watched, and I would attach a t-shirt to a ball-cap and pretend the white shirt was her blonde hair. I remember an instance where when I was wearing this hat I tried to lie to my father's friend and tell him I was a girl because I thought I was tricking him and that I was funny. I have no idea if I did this to feel like a girl or just to be tricky like I said. I have also always been friends with girls growing up because I never got along with boys that well. Well, not with straight, hyper-manly boys.

Because of my OCD I keep "testing" myself by imagining what it would feel like to be a women vs. being a man. If I see any attractive, well dressed women I TV I'm instantly wondering if I would be happier if I looked just like her. When I do imagine this, I don't feel happy or relieved like I've read a lot of trans people feel, but I pretty much feel indifferent. And THAT'S what worries me the most. Shouldn't I feel completely oppressed and terrified if I imagine living my life as a woman?

When I think of my OWN identity (instead of trying to shove myself in someone else's) I feel like a man, but I feel very feminine at the same time. There are masculine things about me that I love, and there are feminine things about me that I take pride in too. As far as my anatomy goes, I am six feet tall, have large hands, and large feet. I'm pretty skinny, but that doesn't bother me at all. In fact I kind of like it but that may just be because I used to be 100 pounds overweight. I also like my most masculine features (height, large hands, feet) although sometimes I feel weird about my really broad shoulders. That has never bothered me until I started analyzing my gender identity.

I have no affliction what so ever towards my male genitals, and when it comes to sex I feel very weird imaging taking part in it as a women. However, since I have been obsessing so much about this, at times I find that I have a hard time imagining myself having sex as man which I never used to have.

I know that transsexualism is a lot less about your BODY than it is the role you want your life to lead, so sometimes I try to just imagine living my life solely as a woman. I feel indifferent to this, and like i said that scares me. I feel like I honestly could deal with being a woman and it wouldn't mean the end of the world, although I might miss some parts of my male body.

So do you think I'm making a mountain out of a mole hill, or is there something that needs to be explored?

As a closing statement I just want to add that I have nothing against trans people, but the way society treats them has me feeling TERRIFIED of being one. I struggle enough with being an effeminate gay man, it makes me so anxious to think that I might be trans.

[Alyx.]

I'm gonna say... probably not. Go see a psychiatrist just to make sure if it bothers you.

[anibioman]

i dont think youre trans the fact that you like your body makes me think its just your OCD. im not sure how everyone else felt as a little kid but i knew it even back then. i would wish i would goo to sleep and wake up with a dick.

[chadperry2468]

I think it's just my hypochondria/neurotic-ness/OCD too. Tonight I suddenly realized that the fact that I feel feminine can't mean that I'm trans as long as I don't hate my body and feel like I would be happier with a woman's. I enjoy my body, but I also enjoy being quite feminine at times, so I need to stop the OCD extremeism and thinking "Wait... I'm feminine!?!? Then I MUST be trans!!!!!" That doesn't make any sense at all haha.

This isn't to say I won't find a new aspect of this to obsess about tomorrow or even tonight, but for now I'm good, and I just need to cement into my head that I don't feel like transitioning will make me any happier than I am right now.

[JoanneB]

and thinking "Wait... I'm feminine!?!? Then I MUST be trans!!!!!" That doesn't make any sense at all haha.

I don't know how many times I thought "Wait... I am masculine!?!? Then I CAN'T be Trans!!!" 

I knew since I was like 3-4 y/o I should have been born a girl. As Popeye say's "I yam what I yam"

[Artemis]

Given your attitude towards your body I don't think you have GID?

I hated the stuff between my legs from the moment I became aware of it. Aaaaarrrh!

My penis has always been tiny? It really never crossed my mind I might want something bigger! Not ever! Even when all the boys where teasing me about it. All I can remember (at many times) is that I wanted it gone. That I knew that it just did not belong. I dreamt about losing it. Often I wished to wake up one good day and it would be gone.

And this was way before I knew anything about being trans*, GID, etc.

I still want it gone.

[Amazon D]

hey i use to have OCD. i would have to walk around a pole the opposite direction to balance it out.. I had many many quirks like that. I finally ran away from home and hitchhiked to N. Calif and hung out with hippies and smoked herb etc and well that OCD went away pretty fast.

I eventually did use the good things i had of the OCD which was being a hard persistent worker and i did well. I eventually left the pot smokers and joined NA and went back east and have left the OCD behind.

It seems to me OCD comes from living in a home where yo can get away with whatever you want to do. You need to be forced to survive in many places and find yourself.

thank god i don't do that OCD stuff and i have a much more normal life.. Yea i was put in a mental hospital for it and other stff like wearing womens clothes back in the 60's so i would hope you would break that habit and get out of your comfort zone becase it can become a lifelong habit and wow what a hell that would be..

[Stephe]

im not sure how everyone else felt as a little kid but i knew it even back then. i would wish i would goo to sleep and wake up with a dick.

Like you said, I'm not sure about others but as a small child I would pray every night that when I woke up I would be a girl.

[Kelly J. P.]

 There is nothing wrong with being a feminine man, or a masculine woman. Be as feminine or masculine as you want, for those traits do not decide someone's gender - merely their preference of behaviour.

[Padma]

You may not be a typical binary male, is all. Or you may have gender dysphoria. Don't worry about the labels, devote your attention to finding out how you feel comfortable being yourself, and just be that. It's okay to take your time with this, you probably have a history of feeling persuaded by society there's something wrong with you, so just give yourself time to undo that and find out how you feel right being you. And that in itself is allowed to change too, it's not like gender presentation has to be a career move, you're allowed to play with it and see how that makes you feel. It sounds to me like you need some time and experimenting to find out who you are (and not who you "should be"), so have fun doing it!

[patstar]

 Interesting.  Let me first say that I too have OCD; I have had it all my adult life.   So, the explanation of what the condition is and is not was unnecessary for me.  I understand the beast entirely.  I think that you have some soul-searching to do.  I would also bounce this off as many people as possible.  The issue I have with merely seeing a psychiatrist is that I have found that not a lot (quite possibly very few)  psychiatrists or their staff still to this day truly understand OCD or at least how the symptoms function.  I know this from the reading I have done and the lengths I've had to go to explain myself to my doctors and nurses.  (The misunderstanding going as far as believing that OCD alone would enable quite disturbing behavior.  No, no no!)  What you may need is a psychiatrist who has a total grasp of our condition and who is also transgender or a gay feminine--if such an individual can be found.

For me the realization that I was transgender (not transsexual which I consider to be much more restrictive) came after I had OCD for many years and was able, to a certain extent, to put it on the back-burner.  For me the realization was: I would be much happier, much more fulfilled and complete as a female persona.  There was no confusion for me: I have always been bisexual with my preference being for genetic females, trans-females, and feminine or androgynous men--and everything in between.  Yet I was motivate by, inspired by, and identified with women.  Who do you identify with?  Furthermore, starting out as a broad-shouldered man it was not such a natural choice; and, I do like some gender identity guy things too, like sports.   Almost no one is all one way.  There's no law that says how far you have to go with transitioning either.

Also, how do you know positively how you will feel as a female until you try it.  Thinking about how it will "probably" feel won't do it.  Try it in some "safe zone"; and see how the whole experience inter-acts with/effects your illness.  Come to think of it (!), I can't remember one time that my OCD has reared its ugly head while being my female self.  Now, I think that's some kind of clue.

The whole thing is an unending process anyway--like life itself.  If you're looking for the perfect choice, I don't think there is one.

Those are my thoughts and feelings.  I really hope that this is of some help to you.   

[Felix]

I think whether it's OCD or trans-ness it wouldn't hurt to play with it. Imagine yourself as a woman. Does it feel right? Experiment if you want. If you aren't trans, dressing up or doing thought exercises or whatever isn't going to make you trans, so it can't hurt. Exploring in talk therapy is good too. I honestly think you're just a little gender nonconforming, and not trans, but it's ultimately your call.

[Kyyn]

I have the exact same OCD. The obsessive thoughts and paranoia. And I understand, I'm often paranoid that I'm not really trans.

But don't like my female form. And long before i knew TransBoys were even possible, I used to get depressed to my very core that I wasn't male.
It's these things that happened long before I started my obsessive train of thoughts that help me believe that it's not just the OCD

[Catherine Sarah]

Oh Dear Alex.
You are more trans than trans. Lots of your thoughts and feelings expressed in previous post are exactly identical in every way, shape and form to my thoughts and feelings, but in the other gender.

Doubt is a good thing to have. It keeps us honest, to a degree. Just like any other emotion/feeling, it needs to be kept in check. If not, that's where the OCD syndrome kicks in.

Trust me, you are doing fine.

Be safe, well and happy
lotsa huggs
Catherine

[Katelyn]

Just like there is a "homosexual ocd"  (where straight people fear that they are gay when they are not) there is also a "trans ocd". 

I have mild to moderate regular OCD and a lurking but potentially strong Pure O type OCD.  It's the reason why I've been in gender limbo for almost 5 years.  My issue though is that I want to be a woman but my OCD makes me doubt that I am one (or make me feel that I would like being a guy and masculine, which gives me a lot of stress) or basically its like my mind going against me and thus makes me frustrated and disheartened, leading to stress and other ways to feel like I'm "not male" and closer to women.   Pure OCD is terrible IMO as it makes life extremely confusing as you don't know what is real and what isn't. 

BTW, my Pure OCD was so bad as to make me feel like I was a killer, a cannibal, and made me feel like I would kill my mom (complete with a feeling on my left hand as if I was going to take a knife or strangle her).  It made me think inappropriate sexual thoughts with family and others .   Pure OCD made me doubt where I was located and made me feel like I was in an entirely different place (in another city or state) (until I had a GPS, which convinced my mind that I was where I was), at one point it totally disoriented me and it was like I was in the twilight zone or something for about almost 2 hours (this was late at night though.)  It made me feel terrible feelings for a woman that I was dating, disfiguring her looks to make her look repulsive, and making me feel at one point to kill her.  Pure OCD basically can take any negative or dreadful thought that pops up into your mind and latches onto it (especially if you resist it), expanding it and making it stronger, affecting your thoughts (and to me, my feelings), and makes what you dread and makes you believe that you are it or it is what is real, and basically takes over your mind, destroying anything it latches onto until you either stay away from it or anything that can trigger the thought, or find a way to just "accept the thought" or what it is telling you to make it go away, as hard as it can be.  Also, pure OCD really does discourage one from being curious, as curiosity will trigger it.  But someone with OCD, its habitual to obsess with thinking things, so its in our nature to obsess when thinking.

Maybe the best thing to do is as someone else on this thread put it:  become busy and stay away from home, so you don't have the time or ability to be thinking too much. 

[Femmeforlife]

I was hetero- for 40 years with 3 disastrous marriages to show for it. I grew up in the 50s and really wanted the Ozzie & Harriet thing. Just not to be. Then, since I determined I'd never pursue a woman again, I figured I must be gay, and I certainly do like their sex organs and mine, and I was lucky and found a large, warm, cuddly, softie or a guy, who was willing to allow me to be and feel whatever I was. This led to my gradually dressing more femme as I found it comfortable and he was OK with it. I was up front with him that my feelings were feminine, and I wanted the feminine role in the relationship, which was OK. We made a very soft, slow, sensuous kind of love, and insidiously I realized I wasn't particularly gay, I wanted to be a woman to this man. On looking back over my life it made a lot of sense given my patterns of attractions--never interested in women, always interested in the boys/guys. Much more sensitive and sensuous than macho, much more into my head and ideas and exploring feelings than the guys. Since I've become aware of this it's been like a wonderful plunge into a new life that finally makes sense. I don't care how I appear to the rest of the world, and I'm not interested in surgery, but I want to hang on to this guy and be his and be all the woman he can handle. While it's all quite odd, it's settling out in a way that makes powerful sense and is alarmingly simple. This is just to say, maybe you are trans. It was like that for me. But everyone's different. I hope you find your way.