Hello from England!
My name is Ashley and I've been lurking on these forums for a good few months trying to find answers and similarities from other posts. I've been questioning my gender identity for a couple of years now, though I've felt like something has been off for much longer than that. Anyway, let's talk about my interests so you can get to know me a little better.
I'm in my early/mid 20s and I'm an avid gamer, usually role playing games and first person shooters. I also enjoy reading a lot, leaning more towards teen fiction. I'm afraid that's about it for hobbies, I don't get out much. <_< When I'm not working I spend most of my time on my PC. I guess you could say I'm a bit of a loner.
Now that's out of the way I guess I can tell you a little more about how I feel, if that's possible to put into words... I'll try my best anyway.
I feel wrong? Like something isn't right, since my teenage years I've always felt like I'm searching for myself, which in a way is usually the case throughout life, but this seemed different. I've never had any specific role forced onto me as a child, I recall liking power rangers and playing with action men but I also played with prams and dolls, when I was 8 I even used to go to a friends house and we'd play with her barbies. I don't recall any strong emotions or feelings towards any of my toys in a gender specific way, they were just toys as far as I can remember.
As I got older, I discovered online games, it started with games like Diablo and RuneScape. This was around age 12-13. I guess you could say I got addicted to RuneScape. I totally ignored everything else and dived into this online world, I preferred it because I was free to be whoever and whatever I wanted. I used to change my characters sex whenever my friends weren't online with me, and would continue to switch between. I guess I was embarrassed if my friends knew. After a while I permanently changed it to my preferred sex and proceeded to "pretend" to other people that I was this specific sex "irl". I wasn't even sure why I did it to be honest, I just enjoyed the feeling of people seeing me that way, using those specific pronouns. If my friends ever asked, I always gave them the excuse that it's better staring at this all day. It was at this age I also started to dream about becoming a girl, I had a brief period of about 6 months or so where these dreams were frequent. I even went as far as to borrow one of my mother'a bras and put it on under one of my t-shirts and look in the mirror. I used to stare into the mirror and just look into my eyes asking who I was.
When I was around 21/22, my feelings of wrongness grew, I had spent sometime away from my computer after it died on me. I started thinking, looking more at myself. It was only really around this time I started to think something was wrong relating to gender. I felt like I wanted to have a girl's body. I didn't know why I just wanted to be a girl and as soon as that thought popped up, it was like opening Pandora's box, the thoughts didn't stop. I started googling thinks like "why do I want to be a girl?" And similar questions. I then came across the word transgender and transsexual. I think I had heard of them before but couldn't remember when or where. I started researching, looking for answers, looking up whatever I could find to do with being transgendered. I got even more confused at this point as some things seemed to fit, while others were totally different. I just knew my feelings where growing stronger as a result I was becoming more desperate. Endless searching on the net and within myself.
This searching carried on for some time, I found Susan's and would lurk looking at posts of people questioning themselves, read up about HRT, gender therapists and so on. I decided to go see my doctor at the age of 23 and speak to him, he started me on the whole process of getting to the therapist. It took about 8 month but I had my first appointment about a month ago, not much happened. Just lots of questions! My next appointment is with someone else who I'm told will help me learn more about myself and figure this while thing out, or at least try.
That's about it I think, sorry if this is a little long! I may have gone off topic for an introduction... Oops?
Oh and just a quick addition, I've had depression for a good few years, I'm not sure if that's because of this or something else, maybe a mix of lots of things!
Anyway, if you have any questions you'd like to ask feel free to do so.
I look forward to getting to know so many lovely people!
~Ashley~
