Hello,
I joined this site a few days ago, but I wasn't sure what to write until now. I really feel the need to vent, so let me try it here:
My name is Eris (not legally, alas), a 23 year-old English woman stuck in a clunky male body. Like many other trans women, I first began to externalise my true gender identity, at least to myself, by dressing in the clothes of female relatives whenever I had the chance to do it without being caught. This in itself was still only an occasional practice, because I seldom had the house to myself and always felt guilty about violating other people's space. Also like many others, I was a very timid and shy adolescent. After my older sister moved out, there was no way for me to dress how I felt most comfortable. My mother's clothes were always much too big for my once-skinny frame, and I was too shy and too skint to contemplate buying my own, so I tried to suppress my femininity and live with the frame the gods have granted me. This was more or less "successful" for a while, with my true nature lying dormant, only ever expressing itself partially. I was never a very masculine "boy" and didn't fit in at school.
Fortunately, things are different now. I'm still skint, of course, but I now have enough confidence to venture into my favourite shops when I have money to spare, without having to be timid or worried that someone might recognise me. I am not yet "out", but I don't view it as a secret which must be concealed. When I began to reintegrate women's clothes into my wardrobe soon after moving out for university, I started off by getting some thongs (first online, then in department stores, and then in proper lingerie stores
). For the best part of two years, wearing thongs underneath my drabs was as far as I was prepared to go, thanks to that horrible inner voice trying to make me think there is something wrong with me for preferring women's underwear. I purged my panty collection several times and even tried wearing men's thongs as a compromise, but I find them so ugly and uncomfortable. Anyway, I have been starting to get over this completely idiotic guilt about my "wrong" gender identity in recent months: instead of thinking of myself as a man who likes to wear women's clothes, I have gradually started to understand that I am a woman with the misfortune of living in a man's body.
This struck me harder than ever today, after I came home from a little shopping trip. As I wrote in the last paragraph, I have long had a preference for thongs. I suspect this is because they are so essentially feminine and unmanly, which absolutely conforms with my identity, and also because I used to take them from my sister's room when I was younger. They are just so much prettier, nicer and more comfortable than boxer shorts and the other nonsense I was expected to wear growing up. Today, though, a three-pack of lace hipsters caught my attention when I was shopping in H&M. They looked fabulous and the price tag was within my range, so I had to get them. I'm so glad I did, because the first thing I noticed when I put them on was how good they are at concealing the much-hated bulge, which immediately filled me with the urge to stock up on them. It's not that thongs can't do this, but I find them less effective at it. I was also quick to try on some of my other purchases: a cute set of lace-patterned tights, a striped top and a nice knee-length skirt.
This is the first time in years that I've been dressed entirely in women's clothes, rather than underdressing or wearing a mismatching combination, and it was like an epiphany. All of the nagging doubts about "am I really trans?" and "maybe these feelings will go away over time" seemed to disappear in an instant, as if my true nature had finally been awoken. This didn't last long, of course, because the mirror has a tendency to disspell my fantasies, but this is the first time I have looked at myself and seen potential looking back: the potential to make the long and arduous transition into the person I want to be (or rather, the person I
am, dans le cœur). Being able to transition feels like more than just a vain fantasy for once, in spite of all the things I dislike about the body I'm stuck with. Now I just need to muster up the courage to do something about it. I don't feel ready for that yet, but simply writing about it here, even if it's an anonymous web post, feels like a decent first step in its own right.
