Have you ever felt invisible?

[Nero]

Have you ever felt invisible? I do. I feel as if I'm wearing a costume and I can never take it off.
I want to crawl in a hole. Be a hermit. I don't want anyone to see me. I feel trapped. Have any of you felt this way? Ever?

[tinkerbell]

You mean "empty"?  Yes, I have felt like that many times before transition; a zombie, an empty shell who was only existing but not living.  It's a horrible place to be, but do you know the good news, Nero?  the good news is that you can get out of there!  It does seem impossible at times, but I'm sure some here will agree with me when I say that it is up to you to get out of there.  Many people may try to help you out, but if you don't help yourself, their efforts are going to be unsuccessful.

Take advantage of the time you are spending in that black hollow to think about yourself, about what you want to do with your life, use that time to your benefit, decide and act on that decision. 

tink

[Judge Yourself]

Feeling like that a lot of the time - the urge to hide away goes from unbearable to.. acceptable back to unbearable again. i'm in that lovely trapped/limbo state right now and its like fighting myself to get out of it...

[Doc]

Have you ever felt invisible? I do. I feel as if I'm wearing a costume and I can never take it off.
I want to crawl in a hole. Be a hermit. I don't want anyone to see me. I feel trapped. Have any of you felt this way? Ever?

Yes. More or less all the time to some degree or another. Less so when my attempts to change my appearance work and thus partially remove the costume, or at times when gender-status and roles are easily ignored and I can blithely go along forgetting that people don't see me.

I think that's the core of trans-angst feelings. I am not a woman, when people see me and see a woman and interact with the woman they see, they are not interacting with me, but with some persona they have invented, the actual me is invisible and unable to interact or connect with others. It's lonely, and so dehumanizing that it feels like it'd be better not to deal with people at all than to deal with them by proxy through the woman costume/puppet body.

Actually, I use the costume anology when describing what it means to be trans to others. They don't get it if you say, "Well, imagine if you were the opposite sex and were supposed to act like that and were treated like the opposite sex is treated." Most people do not comprehend the full meaning of that and don't suppose that it would be that big a deal to adapt. But if you say, "Imagine if you woke up and you were a Michael Jackson (or any other distinctive familiar famed person that the person you are speaking to is not like) impersonator and no matter how you tried, you couldn't take the Jackson costume off, and everybody who saw you figured you looked like Michael Jackson because you wanted to look that way, and you wanted to act like him and be treated like him, too." That sort of analogy can make people really grasp how horrifying it can be to be trapped in the wrong gender.

[J.T.]

Have you ever felt invisible? I do. I feel as if I'm wearing a costume and I can never take it off.
I want to crawl in a hole. Be a hermit. I don't want anyone to see me. I feel trapped. Have any of you felt this way? Ever?

YES!!  I used to feel this way all the time, until i came here.  I would walk down the street and nobody would pay me any attention, I felt like I was invisible.  I also wanted to BE invisible too.  What was projected out into the world was not what I wanted to be.  I hated it.  I wanted to hide from the world, be alone in my misery up in a cabin in the woods with nothing but nature to keep me company.  Away from society and its labels and judgments.

Now, all of a sudden living doesn't feel so bad.  I don't feel so invisible anymore, because I know there are people like me and that I finally belong somewhere.  I'm no longer alone...

so yes, i've been there... I was there for 14/15 years.

[Shana A]

Yes, I often feel invisible too and find it painful to be invisible, to not be seen as who I am.

zythyra

[Autumn]

Yeah, I do usually feel invisible. I bring it on myself from having avoided social things most of my life. And I guess because for many years I didn't look like the kind of person people wanted to approach. The only people who noticed me were other geeky outcasts who I didn't really want much to do with either. A lot of them acted like I was somehow better off than them, with more friends, and the subtle barbs that it wrought. Of course, I didn't have many friends, and few to none of my friends knew the real me on top of that.

But I second what Doc says. I am tearing away the costume, piece by piece, and feeling better. Shaving is getting easier and quicker, I've found a length to keep my nails at, likewise with my hair (for now.) Last year I went back to glasses after all my female friends told me I looked better with them. I don't talk to those women anymore and they chose other people over me - back to contacts it is and feeling beautiful. Female jeans are fantastic. And by god I will find a pair of boots that works for me.

[Chandra21]

Sometimes. It often feels like no one acknowledges my existance... Its kind of depressing actually. Not so much anymore though, because I'm a born again Christian and whenever I get lonely I feel I just need to talk to Jesus... Mainly because I know he is the one existance in the world that will listen to my problems and prayers no matter how distressful they may be. ^_^

Part of the reason I am so invisible though, is because I don't have much confidence in my body and try to hide it. Things are getting better though because i'm making a plan to become who I want to be, who I need to be. By the end of this summer I am going to be have my name legally changed and my outward appearance will be completely female. And by Christmas I hope to get on Hormone Therapy aswell as look for permanent hair removal methods.

Things are getting better for me... and with God on my side I know I can get through the struggle that I face.

[zombiesarepeaceful]

Yep. I'm a zombie.

Invisible, usually.

[seldom]

Have you ever felt invisible? I do. I feel as if I'm wearing a costume and I can never take it off.
I want to crawl in a hole. Be a hermit. I don't want anyone to see me. I feel trapped. Have any of you felt this way? Ever?

I often say I feel like a ghost.  I definitely feel as though I am possessing some body that is not my own.
I know these feelings will go but I felt like this since as long as I could remember (I remember having these feelings since I was three). 

So you are not alone.  In fact I think many trans people before and early on in transition feel the same way.  I have talked to other transpeople, and the feeling is far from universal, but honestly you writing this made me feel that I am not the only one once again. 

Hair removal has removed a little bit of the mask and the feeling like I am possessing the wrong body.  I am hoping that HRT helps out as well, puts me in my own skin.  I know that the effects are slow, but at least there will be  an end to this ghost life.  At least my chemical hell is starting to end, I just hope the costume is replaced by my own skin.  The better version of me. 

I normally do not do this, but this is part of a song by Rainer Maria called a Better Version of Me...I always think about it when things have looked their bleakest, when I feel most like a ghost.  I don't know, I listen to it to remind me that the Better Version of Me is fighting to get out.  So here are the lyrics:

she wants to beat through all the hell and high water
threatening what she believes
that's when I know I should just drop everything and let her sing
she's a better version of me
I've seen the girl who'll remember what I lost
she has never forgotten a name or a punchline
she is the one that I have chosen
I'm lost but she's found
a better way to get 'round
I tell myself you're not a fool

So that is part of the song I keep reminding myself of.  With that being said, I think all trans people transition because we are fighting for the better version of ourself, be it boy or girl.  Transition is about letting that better version of ourself sing, to become the person we need to be. 

Okay so Rainer Maria is emo.  But songs I relate to this deeply are far and few between. 

[Pica Pica]

I often feel either invisible or too damn visible. Especially at work, people there do not see what I am...they see a doofus who drops plates.
I often feel a desperate need to get away, hide and recuperate. I only feel visible when among very close friends, I don't do anything different around them, but they hear what I mean by what I am saying more often, and they like to communicate in circles and things.

I've always felt alone, but no-ones ever seen it. In (high?) school I felt alone the entire 4 years, i tried to tell people and they pointed out all the friends I had, but they were only good for the odd conversation - i couldn't feel as if i'd connected my self to them.

The weirdest one was my graduation, but that deserves more time to explain...

[Sarah Louise]

I was always invisible when I was younger, I could blend into the walls (like the clay people from the old Flash Gordon movies).

Sarah L.

[RebeccaFog]

Me too.
Invisible for a long time.
Never understood the other children.

Now, am becoming visible through sheer Will
& self knowledge

[Jessica]

Invisible?  Not really.
Like I don't really exist?  Yes, all the time.  Sometimes I feel like I'm really not here, like I am part of someone elses dream... or nightmare... but that I'm not real.  It's hard to explain, but it's bad enough sometimes that it's like, I'm not even sure if I can feel anything because I'm really not here, not physically anyway, although I know I am a physical entity, it just doesn't feel like I am sometimes.