Hey everyone,
It's been a while. I used to be really active on this site some months back, but I left and threw away the account information when I did. I was questioning my identity and I ended up believing I wasn't trans*. Once I thought that, I felt like I was wasting everyone's time by being active in trans groups online and irl, and quit coming.
I find myself drawn back, because I'm still confused about my identity and it's starting to eat me up. I still don't believe I'm trans, but rather a gender-nonconforming woman. Yet I feel safer in the trans community than in other places, because my situation is so abnormal and frowned upon in larger society.
I identify as female, enjoy having a female form (for the most part) and am more feminine/neutral than anything.
But I admire the muscular form men have and their deeper voices, and envy those qualities. I really want them sometimes, and at one point I seriously considered going on T to have them. I decided against it since my feelings were evanescent and I have health problems, making the risk of regret or health hazards high. Transition was and still is unreasonable.
I experimented and lived socially as a man part time to sort out if I would like living as a man amongst people. This only made it more obvious that I identified as female, and that feminine mannerisms were more natural to me most of the time. So this made me think being trans isn't the case for me, since I didn't identify with any other gender than the one assigned at birth around people or not. But none of this changed the fact that every so often when I see men, I wish looked, acted, and sounded more like them.
So then I started considering myself a Bem (butch/femme) woman. Because if I didn't identify as male, but wanted to be more masculine in body, then that must mean I had a masculine aspect to who I was, making me part butch. But when my feelings come up, I want to look specifically male. So then I thought I might be gender fluid. But I don't actually identify as male at any point, so I can't be gender fluid because gender fluid people have fluid identities, not just how they wanna look (as far as I can tell anyway..)
So today I tried thinking it over and just broke down and cried thinking "I'm just a freak."
And I felt I needed to be around other people who might understand what I'm going through. The trans community is the only place where I might be able to find such people. So, if you could just bear with me I'm kind of a mess mentally right now. I'm starting to feel emotionally numb all the time. I want to change my name legally and my appearance so I can feel more satisfied with myself, but my feelings are so all over the place that I cant make any decisions. I can't be happy like this. Sometimes I just want to give up and it gets so out of control I have suicidal fantasies (Not that I'd actually commit suicide or self harm but its a relief to think that the pain and confusion can end is all).
I just hate myself. Most people in the community seem to have themselves so figured out. The gender therapist I talked to in our first, and only, meeting that I obviously wasn't trans. I felt so stupid and shut down. I've only met a small handful of people who can kind of understand where Im coming from as a cis woman with these kind of feelings. But they arent as miserable or unsure of themselves as I am. I'm really scared that my feelings are just internalized misogyny, but I dont hate being a female....but what the heck else would make a cis woman want to be more like a man?
Anyway! That's enough of that. Sorry, had to vent. I will see you all on the boards, and will try to be more positive.
