Quote from: kabit on September 28, 2013, 05:35:30 PM
You sound like you could use a girlfriend (BFF, that is) or two to help affirm who you really are... a beautiful young woman who just needs some love.
I don't know your current situation, (I've been reading this, but I get confused off all the threads) but can you find some open people around your age who will be friendly? I admit, I don't know how to do this. College was where I met people... everything else was family. My sister, brother, and his wife are great support, and I try not to load too much on them at once.
I'm also interested in learning to find friends, again. My sister is totally awesome, but has little time for 1-on-1 time (I'm aiming for once a month). I won't be able to do much of this until my wife and I are separated, though... and I have no idea how! I'll be on HRT by then, though.
I know and understand how you write such long posts.... this was supposed to be short and to the point! Sorry! 
I have friends, but they are few in number and quite busy. Besides I don't want to be a bother and throw this stuff on them. However, I am fairly shy and would love new friends. I wish I could find more girls my age to socialize with, but I'm afraid to get out and expose myself. Hopefully in the future.
Quote from: Sephirah on September 28, 2013, 05:49:27 PM
First of all, hon, if I could give you a big hug right now, I would. You sound like you need one.
Secondly, I haven't commented in this thread because I've been watching how it unfolds and how you express yourself.
I don't really want to say too much just yet, because mostly I'm going on intuition and a gut feeling, but I would like to ask you a question, if that's okay.
How much of your self esteem and self confidence do you think stems from your identity as female?
To be honest, I have hardly any self confidence or self esteem; therefore, I can't really answer the question. Nonetheless, I will make an attempt. I'm giving you a long answer in hope that it will explain who I am and how I feel. Plus, I want to do whatever I can to help anyone else struggling.
My identity as female has always been a source of comfort and pain. It's never been one or the other. As a child, I really enjoyed my gender bending. I loved dressing up, playing with makeup and experimenting. My earlier childhood was almost bigender in some respects, but as I got older, I was encouraged to stop these things. When I turned the age of 10, I began to feel frustrated and awkward. I began to compare myself to my female peers and began to believe that I was going down the wrong path. This is when I realized that I really wanted to be more like a girl and actually become one. At this point, I would never have said I "was one" because I knew nothing about being trans. Therefore, I began to dress independently and in secret. It was a big source of comfort during a period of jealousy and sadness when I started to realize how different I was and how I wished I could be female.
However, it's also been a source of pain. I hated the fact that I was different and seen as a freak in the eye's of god (very Catholic upbringing). Clearly, it's not normal for a 10 year old "boy" to wear "his" sister's clothes in secret. Most people get to be normal and not worry about their gender. When I was a teenager, I got very depressed. I made it a point to isolate myself and hide away as much as possible. I really didn't want to make friends with most of the guys because I didn't relate and besides I was bullied often by jokes and the like. As for the girls, I was completely different from them despite my desire to be one and join them socially speaking. To be honest, I didn't know how to socialize. It felt fake to try to be a typical guy and it felt unnatural for me to want to be female and attempting to embrace those feelings. In many ways, I hated myself for having those desires and did my best to suppress them. I avoided dressing up, but would occasionally do so in private. Partly, I withdrew from socializing as much as possible and hid within myself. I found other ways to express myself outside of facing myself and putting the potential rejection of others (mainly music and unfortunately the occasional usage of drugs). In many ways, my ability to express myself could only come out in song, never in my words (besides poems and lyrics).
After high school, I began to embrace my feelings a bit more. I learned more about the lgbt community and felt comfortable embracing my attraction to guys despite my long fear of admitting it. However, I knew saying I was gay was a lie. In some respects, being gay allows more liberties to express oneself in a feminine manner, but it clearly isn't the solution for someone who identifies as trans. After some brutal honesty and exposing myself to the trans community, I came to admit that I didn't want to be a girl, but I was really a girl. I started to feel more at ease and comfortable with the fact that I was trans. A big part of this was that I made a trans friend and saw that she was able to live a happy and successful life. At this point in my life (19-20 years old), I started to embrace my identity and expressing myself around friends. My best friends where aware of my identity and always called me the correct name (at the time Jenny) and pronouns. It's was lovely in many ways and there was less pressure on me. Still, I had so much guilt and self hatred that I couldn't allow myself to make the final step and overcome my social anxiety and fears. As much as I wanted to transition and made small steps to prepare myself, I wasn't ready. I had a bit of a breakdown and decided to not transition. At this point, I went into denial mode. I cut my hair, stopped wearing my more fashionable designer clothes and took up a more business causal look, took up as many activities in college, did volunteer work outside of it, and absorbed myself in my studies. For this reason, I did really great in school and was very proud of it. I was respected by many of my professors and had the jealousy of some of my peers. Yet, I was never happy with myself on a personal level or fulfilled socially. I still hated myself and regretted the fact that my internal desires never went aways despite my efforts to ignore them. In many ways, I was finding things to do to take my mind off of myself and my feelings, but it wasn't working. Whenever I had down time, I would crash pretty hard. At this point, I found bad ways of dealing with the pain rather than addressing them.
After college, I worked a very busy job. I loved it and was quite good at it. It was in my field and exciting for someone that graduated with my major. But as it was a temp job, it came to an end. This is where my rock bottom was reached. Unemployed and riddled with dysphoria, I tried to cope with opiates. I kept hoping some of the promises made to me would come true and I'd have another busy job to absorb myself in, but I never got anything. As a result, I was depressed and down for multiple reasons and continued my self destruction to avoid feeling. I just didn't want to feel anything and focus on my demons. I simply wanted another distraction and way too take my mind off of the pain. So, I spent 4 months getting high every day. Wasting my potential and throwing all my ambitions out the door. I can't say exactly when I reached my epiphany, but I had enough. I knew I had to stop destroying myself and find a way to reach true happiness instead of avoiding it. I gave up the drugs, started searching for a job, and began to take the steps to begin my transition. As of now, I'm happy to be on the hormones. Each day that I develop is another good day. Yet, my life still hasn't taken off and I still have the same fears. Things have improved in my life (I'm 7 months clean, on hormones, in therapy, will be working as soon) but the transition that I wanted and desired is on standstill. It's soo slow and it kills me to continue living another day without the ability to truly embrace myself. In many ways, I'm delaying it as much as possible as I did in the past, but I'm killing myself as a result. I don't know how to overcome this and spend most of my time wasting my day away (when I am not studying or reading) to avoid thinking about this stuff.
In many ways, I'm still that little kid wearing her sister's clothes and looking in the mirror. Desperately wanting to be something, but afraid of rejection from society and worst of all herself. And without knowing how to overcome this, she crys and latches onto misery, only finding alternative ways to express the things she always wished she could get out. At heart I'm still that 11 year old girl, not knowing what to do and where to go. She may be grown up (I'm 24) and more experienced, but she's still just looking into the mirror not knowing how to be herself and live the life she dreams about. So, my gender is very much a mixture of pain and comfort. I like being a girl and enjoy being seen and treated as one. However, I hate being trans and always feeling the pressures and fears that come with it. The fact is I don't like being trans even though I don't mind feeling female.
Besides my gender, I get a lot of self esteem through others. I really like to help other people and be a part in their development. Most of my work and volunteer experience has had me in a mentor or peer leadership role. I've had so many roles where it was my responsibility to help others and motivate them to improve or learn a new task or subject. As such, I get great pride for assisting others and watching them succeed. It's something I've always been good at and makes me feel happy. Sadly, I've never know how to help myself and find myself fumbling everytime I do try. It's not that I don't have the answers, but I fear them. This is probably why I give so much of myself here. I truly want to help others and in the process help myself. Despite my lack of ability to save myself, I do have something to give others because I realize what the answers are even if I refuse to accept them for myself and fear working on these things.
I'm rambling at this point, but this is perhaps the best explanation I can give. Hope it helps.
P.S. I've always loved your writing style and the thought you behind your posts. Just wanted to say that I admire you and think you're an excellent Moderator.
@Jen, A, and Heather.
Thank you for you encouragement. All three of you have been very sweet to me throughout my time on this board. I do appreciate it and it means a lot. As for the content of your posts, I agree that much of what you say is probably true. If I were rational, I would embrace those posts as I would probably say the same to another poster myself. Yet, I am not able to embrace logic at the moment and have allowed fear to overtake me. I hope I'll find a way to overcome it and find happiness.
