Nero, I don't really fit in either of your definition, so what I am?
You can be slight girly in childhood, without ever thinking of gender or feeling apart from the other girls (tomboys exist you know); that was me, I was singled out for bullying though, I never understood why until now.
Early puberty, didn't fit in the world of men, slowly drifted away from my female friends, had no real consciousness of gender or sexuality, just felt intensily alone and retreated in being a top student in school/athlete in the country, basicaly being a workoholic to escape looking at my self.
I had basicaly no introspection beyond 14 (when I wrote many poems I look at now with amazement). I was all about doing stuff that required little socialisation. Without socialisation, there is no gender.
I felt different from everyone, and I for me, I meant I was superior to everyone. A coping mechanism.
Anyway, that was me before age 18.
I think the distinction between primary and secondary is bogus.
If we put GID discomfort on a spectrum, those with the highest level of discomfort will not be able to even try to adapt (that's even more the case when adaption seems to be the only option available) or suppress it and will seek help as early as possible.
I never heard of transexuals before the age of 23 (1990), even if I had started to take birth control pills of my sister at 21!! Its only when I had a serie of big panic attacks at that age that led me to a hospital, that I was refered to a gender clinic.
At that time, the support groups mixed obvious CD's with TS's!!!. Even dealing with gender problems was in its infancy in Montreal, they are not well organized and supportive like now. The clinics were more like the Toronto clinic, very judgemental old men with antiquated ideas "evaluated" me (I felt really uncomfortable about that).
The whole messed up gender clinics and my own fear of being seen as a freak made me believe this whole process would lead me to suicide. I didn't feel strong enough to transition. So, in 1996, stopped self-medicating with very low doses of hormomes, and went into zombieland with no emotion and tried living as something (not a man, that's for sure) for 11 more years!!!
In the 90's information (especially late 90's) started to trickle and then pour in and that gave hope to many. The possibility of FFS also gave hope to many others that thought they would never pass (it gave hope to me, although by all standards I didn't need it to pass (to be beautiful, yes I needed it)!!).
I believe that with time, people with a slightly lower level of GID who in the past would have tried to bear it and would have contacted the gender clinics in their 30's and 40's, will transition in their 20's or teens.
If I had proper support, I would have transitioned in my very early 20's, that's a certainty. Society was what it was and I was what I was, I can't go back now!
Those that transition now in their 50's to 70's come from an area of such repression and desinformation that no correct assessment can be done without touching on the cultural environment in which they were brought up.
Why are there more children with GID now, something in the water, or parents more in tune with this. If my parent's had seen me with all my female friends in childhood, seen how I acted (which was different from all the other boys I knew) and had a the resource that exist now, who knows what would have happened?
I was have been an athletic tomboy into my teens, everything I did now look like that in retrospect.
I never felt the cast of gender falling upon me, until it impacted my social interactions, from
then on I dreamed of being with the girls, of being able to follow them, without any notion that
it was in any way possible (I thought it wasn't). If I had more of a notion of the existence of
TS and treatment, I KNOW I would have started self-medicating in my teens (like I did at 21).
