Mixed feelings about opposite-gender stuff

[Asche]

Does anyone else have mixed feelings about taking on too many (or the "wrong") things that your sex isn't supposed to do/have or even want?

I'm born male.  I have a yearning for a lot of things that are supposed to only be for girls (I'm not being sexist in saying "girls" -- I do mean "young female human", since grown women are supposed to put away a lot of these things.)  Things like pretty clothes, or being taken care of (I don't mean full-time or like a child), or enjoying physical affection, or showing (and feeling!) "softer" emotions.

On the other hand, I have always had this terror of somehow going "too far."  That I'll somehow go beyond the point of no return, or fall off the cliff, or -- actually turn into a girl.  I don't know why that's so frightening; the idea of being sort of like a girl wouldn't be bad, as long as I didn't get mistreated for it.  And it's not that I think that being female is bad; I assume if I'd been born female, it wouldn't bother me (though I might resent all the things boys can do that I wouldn't be allowed to.)

Does anyone else have this sort of push-pull feeling?

[Lo]

Not really-- I've always been pretty "hedonistic" I guess you could say, about the things I pick and choose from gender to participate in and enjoy. I use the things I like and trash the rest and that's that. The only mixed feelings I have about this stuff is when I feel like I'm being disingenuous, if I feel like there's something inauthentic about what I'm doing. Some people have a very concrete sense of self, but I've always had a tendency to mold myself one way or another based on perceived expectations, and it takes me a long time to even consider that I might not be happier that way. I was heavily bullied as a kid so it's mostly a bad habit for me, and it's something I'm learning not necessarily how to counteract, but just recognize at this point. I mostly get bothered by going too far in any direction, at which point I have to slow myself down and think real hard. "Is this me, is this an extension of me, or am I playing and just wearing a costume here?"

A lot of people are afraid of being wrong, of being fluid, and that's ok. You just have to accept that the possibility is there that you might one day wake up and discover that, no, you're X, not Y, and you're going to stop being Y for a while. I don't think anyone can say for certain that they are X or Y now and forever; the best we can do is say that yes, I am 100% certain that I am X today, I was X yesterday, and I feel like I will be X tomorrow.

[Kaelin]

It'll probably help if you can surround yourself with open-minded people who will allow you to explore and figure out the true you.  Even if you can't do it all the time (because you probably can't, at least not now), it'll help if you can find a group you can be with semi-regularly that is "open" and will let you feel what it's like to express different ways in a fairly normal setting.  It can be a trans group, or a welcoming congregation (inclusive of gender identity/expression) -- whatever you can find that you can function with.

Being super girly doesn't make you a girl any more than being ultra-masculine makes anyone a man.  But if you are?  Well, you've gotta embrace it anyway.  Just do your best to figure out who you are, and let the chips fall where they may.

[Natkat]

being honest I think alot of men feel like that.
theres this pressure to be manly and all that kind like for girl theres presure to be femenine to e certain degree. so we kinda get used to those parts who seams femenine or typical for girls but not for guys being shamefull.

I don't think you make you anything than human.

[ativan]

It's pretty normal, I think to have mixed feelings about it.
You have been told all your life in so many ways, to be one or the other.
Binary thinking is to blame for much of that.
But that line of thinking has been taken to extremes over the years.
Commercials revolve around them.
How many products are really the same thing for either sex, yet are marketed to each group differently?
How many products wouldn't even exist, if it wasn't for the message they carry about making you better at being one sex or the other?
Yep, it's normal to have mixed feelings, but you don't need to.
Take a step back from the hype about differences and embrace that we are all pretty much the same, regardless.
*And if you're lucky enough to be non-binary, all the better to step away from it altogether. 
Ativan

[Kaelin]

Yeah, we do get mixed feelings when a gender-specific message is on display -- we question it, and if we see it enough, we're more likely to question things.  It gets kind of weird after a while, especially if you disengage with TV/etc for an extended period of time and start watching again (especially when the ads pop on).

In a way it is a good thing, to better appreciate the truth.  And you can appreciate the problem isn't *you*, but the social norms of a crazy world.

[Lo]

It gets kind of weird after a while, especially if you disengage with TV/etc for an extended period of time and start watching again (especially when the ads pop on).

Commercials are the most bizarre, creepy things ever. o_O

[Asche]

Where I'm confused is that I don't know if my fear of "turning into a girl" is because in my heart of hearts I feel I'm not a girl, not even in spirit, and I'm afraid of being forced into that box by people who will say, "if you're going to act like a girl, we're going to make you one."  (BTW, a common trope in forced feminization stories, which I also have a love-terror relationship with.)

Or if in my heart of hearts I really wish I were a girl, but am afraid of being found out and having inconceivable but unbearably horrible things done/happen to me.

Or something different.

Or some or all of the above.

It's hard to know how to be more honest with/about myself if I don't know what is me and what is internalized gender (or transgender) policing.

[Lo]

I think the only way to figure out what is and isn't internalized (socialization and internalized -isms and -phobias are, at the end of the day, part of our identities, unfortunately) is trial and error, tbh. Just take things one day at a time, one outfit at a time, and see how you feel in the aggregate a month from now. Two months from now. You'll probably be making small adjustments along the way, whether you're aware of them or not.

Who, exactly are you afraid will say these things to you? Is it "society" you're afraid of more than any specific person, trans* people who get a little overzealous about transition and passing, or your own perceptions of what a girl "ought" to be?

Maybe start keeping a gender journal?

[Asche]

It'll probably help if you can surround yourself with open-minded people who will allow you to explore and figure out the true you.  <snip> it'll help if you can find a group you can be with semi-regularly that is "open" and will let you feel what it's like to express different ways in a fairly normal setting.  It can be ... a welcoming congregation (inclusive of gender identity/expression)

I'm attending a Unitarian congregation near me, and they've been pretty accepting of how I like to dress.  Gender hasn't come up in discussions much, so I don't know how they really see me or to what extent they pick up on any gender variance beyond the clothes.

(Edited to add: the congregation went through a program and has a formal designation as a "welcoming congregation", rainbow flag and all.)

Interestingly enough, I spent many years in a Quaker meeting nearby, and left for several reasons, one of which was that I seemed to get the "side-eye" pretty much whenever I opened my mouth.  I started wearing modern kilts (not even skirts) about the time I was easing out and got a lot of semi-accepting, semi-rejecting remarks that left me feeling not safe to show any more of myself.  Not saying that all Meetings are like that, but the ones in my area were.  I've been away for about 4 years, and no one ever asked me why I wasn't coming any more.  tl;dr: this is how not to be a "welcoming" congregation.

Oh, one more story:

I decided to join a local chorus, partly to sing, partly to meet more people.  (A good lesbian friend of mine said, "you need to get out.  Join a chorus, they always need men and you'll meet lots of single women."  When your lesbian friends tell you you need to start dating, you know it's time!)

Anyway, I've been wearing Utilikilt clones as a compromise between my dislike of trousers and not wanting to confront people who don't know me from Adam with my gender-variant fashion sense.  Last night, with great trepidation, I wore a skirt and tights.  Non-issue.  The only indication I got that people noticed was that the person responsible for choosing the "look" for our Christmas concert asked if I had black tights, since the men were going to be wearing all black for the concert.  I said I did, but had assumed I would just wear black pants like the rest of the men.  She said she'd never seen me in pants and assumed I wouldn't be willing to wear them.  Wow!  Not what my ante-bellum Southern upbringing had led me to expect!

[Asche]

...Just take things one day at a time, one outfit at a time, and see how you feel in the aggregate a month from now.

That's pretty much what I've been doing for the past 8-9 years.

Who, exactly are you afraid will say these things to you?

I don't have anything/-one in mind.  It's more just a fear that I'll go beyond some sort of point of no return and find I've doomed myself forever.

I used to have a recurring dream of a sort of underground train with various stations.  I'd decide I wanted to go back, get off, but no matter how long I waited, somehow there was never a train going the other way.  I'd realize there never would be and I had somehow "blown it," because I'd left where I belong (friends? family? love of my life? joy?) and could never, ever get back there.

Maybe start keeping a gender journal?

What's a gender journal?

[Lo]

That's pretty much what I've been doing for the past 8-9 years.
I don't have anything/-one in mind.  It's more just a fear that I'll go beyond some sort of point of no return and find I've doomed myself forever.

I used to have a recurring dream of a sort of underground train with various stations.  I'd decide I wanted to go back, get off, but no matter how long I waited, somehow there was never a train going the other way.  I'd realize there never would be and I had somehow "blown it," because I'd left where I belong (friends? family? love of my life? joy?) and could never, ever get back there.

Have you talked to a therapist or been to a support group? Someone more knowledgeable or who identifies with your situation more probably has much better things to say than me, but these seem like anxieties that are sort-through-able with some outside help.

At the same time, this sounds like regular-old commitment anxiety to me. I felt the same way as I shipped myself off to college, and I'm feeling a little pressure as I prepare to make the move to another country. I have my way of ignoring those voices, but it's not a universal tactic by any means. That is, of course, assuming that "committing" to this one or the other thing is meant for you. Some people are just meant to be fluid.

And a gender journal would just be like a journal for writing down thoughts regarding gender things in their minutiae. Might help, might not. Journaling helps me have a sense of continuity with myself; I don't necessarily go back a re-read what I've written, but the act of writing itself raises my self-awareness and my ability to remember impressions and thoughts.

[Taka]

I used to have a recurring dream of a sort of underground train with various stations.  I'd decide I wanted to go back, get off, but no matter how long I waited, somehow there was never a train going the other way.  I'd realize there never would be and I had somehow "blown it," because I'd left where I belong (friends? family? love of my life? joy?) and could never, ever get back there.

that's the train i considered taking for a long while. and never could decide to get on, because i got panicked every time i thought about how there was only one station, the end station, and i wouldn't ever be able to return.

reading the stories of people here who have gotten all kinds of different individualized treatments gave me hope of finding some place where i can be as fully as at all possible. maybe i'm really a guy, but in denial. maybe i never was trans. but i believe that if i walk into this without any assumptions about who i "really" am, and take things one step at a time, the answer will find itself.

find someone who's willing to try different approaches with you. make only small changes medically, reversible ones at first. see if it feels right. that's what i plan to do. try something and see if it feels better, quit if it feels wrong. i'll do this with the intention to jump off any train that turn out to go in a direction where i don't want to go. there might not be any train back to the starting point, but i'm sure there will be many that go in other directions, and some could end up near the place i came from.

[Dreams2014]

To be honest I think so many of our gender stereotypes today are products of society and not nature. I mean notice how in one society something may be manly but feminine in another?

It's all just gender stereotyping, and I think it can actually make a lot of us feel repressed and then confused as individuals.

[ativan]

try something and see if it feels better, quit if it feels wrong.

*Waiting for the effects of caffeine to kick in...

Most of the people who comment in this section have lot's of questions about where their gender is taking them.
Focusing on what you think is going to be the end result is fine.
So long as you have that focus pretty well set in your mind.
But the focus should really be who you are now, not where you might end up.
Like with most things in life, it's the journey, not the destination.
All the things you can do, things you think may be you, just ideas that pop into your head...
See if they fit. Take them out for a test drive.
You'll find out a lot more about yourself and maybe where you might be headed.
What works today is not always going to work for you later on.
Even what doesn't work, it may be something you might be more comfortable with later on in your journey.
Try stuff out. If it doesn't fit, at the least you'll have some idea of what it's about if you want to go there some other time.
Some things like full dose HRT and surgery are pretty much physically permanent.
Lesser things are really the details of where you might want to be, so try them out.
Whether in private or in public, you'll find out where your comfort zone is for now.
Which is more important than where you'll end up at.
The combinations are endless, but you already have a good idea of what is right and works for now.
There are many paths in the forest for you to travel on.
None of them are any better than another and if you don't like one, try out another one.
You don't have to take the well worn paths if they don't feel right.
Sometimes the path less traveled is the one you have been wanting to explore.
It's about getting there, not about what's there.
Personally, I'm still wandering around.
Exploring makes for the best stories, not where I've been, but how I got there.
Maybe someday I'll find that place I'm really looking for.
But before I settle down somewhere, I want to know about what's on those paths that look so enticing.
You never know what you'll find out about yourself until you go exploring.
I can't think of anything more boring than to take the path of least resistance.
Finding out just what I'm capable of being, doing, learning.
That's what I want to do, not using my time and efforts on a focused end or destination.
I'll get to where I'll be soon enough.
But in the meantime, I want to go look over the edges, peek around the corners.
It's the only way I will know for sure where it is I want to be.

*Time to go fill my cup back up...
Ativan

[Lo]

*Waiting for the effects of caffeine to kick in...

Most of the people who comment in this section have lot's of questions about where their gender is taking them.
Focusing on what you think is going to be the end result is fine.
So long as you have that focus pretty well set in your mind.
But the focus should really be who you are now, not where you might end up.
Like with most things in life, it's the journey, not the destination.

I think this is a place where binary trans* discourse fails us nonbinaries in a pretty critical way... the focus on getting from point A to point B, the assumption that to be trans* there has to be a point B to get to, that doesn't help a lot of us. It sets up expectations of what "should" be and limits our vocabulary so that it makes it hard to talk about the reality that being nonbinary isn't a one-way ticket from here to there. It's often a dialogue that never ends. And the town that we might otherwise get off the train to live in, the point B, hasn't been built yet.

Not being M or F is a wibbly-wobbly place to be, OP. And it's ok to not like it, it's ok to realize that you actually are M or F after all.

Maybe go read some threads in the non-op board and see how the women there go about their day-to-day without those permanent changes that are the typical hallmark of being transgender?