Would you have transitioned if you lived hundreds of years ago?

[suzifrommd]

I was thinking back on a book I'd read a number of years ago by Louise Erdrich called The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse. It centered around a transgender man living on the frontier (though that particular vocabulary, of course, was not used). It made me wonder whether I'd have transitioned if I were living in a time where there were no Trans* support groups, no Susan's Place (or Internet at all) to pick up passing tips, and no role model to prove that it was even possible.

I don't think I would. It didn't occur to me I could transition until I started hanging around with other transwomen and saw how they did it.

How about you?

[Dee Marshall]

Pfft! I didn't even know there was such a thing except for Christine Jorgensen and Renée Richards until long after we had the internet. Without the 'Net I probably wouldn't ever have applied it to me. I would have just stayed unhappy, clueless and stubborn.

[marsh monster]

Probably not. The big thing is I likely wouldn't even know it was possible and even then, couldn't medically transition and without that, it wouldn't be worth it to me.

[Jill F]

I would have likely died as a child if it weren't for antibiotics, but I'll bet they would have at least castrated me at age 12 due to the testicular abnormalities that were causing me extreme pain.

[Mariah]

In cases like mine, I'm not sure they would have bothered the trouble of raising me at all. Certainly the surgical abilities we have had in more recent time didn't exist then. So likely transitioning would have been out as a result. If someone those things were not an issue I would probably say I wouldn't have because I wouldn't have known I could.
Mariah

[enigmaticrorschach]

i dont know if i would of or not. its up in the area

[Laura_Squirrel]

Well, considering all of the medical problems that I had. I would have died as an infant had I been born in those times. So, transitioning would have never even come up. Hell, even though I was born in the late 70's, there was no guarantee that I would have lived past six months of age. (and living to 18 was a long shot)

[Mara]

Nope. I'm pretty sure it wasn't a thing in most places back then, and without medical transition, there is not much point for me. I'd just be stuck miserable my whole life.

[mac1]

Pfft! I didn't even know there was such a thing except for Christine Jorgensen and Renée Richards until long after we had the internet. Without the 'Net I probably wouldn't ever have applied it to me. I would have just stayed unhappy, clueless and stubborn.

I must have been about 10 years old when George became Christine. I only heard about it one time on the TV but I don't if it was a news broadcast or other program. My parents would never have allowed me to pretend being a girl or even openly consider the possibility of becoming a girl.

[Dee Marshall]

I must have been about 10 years old when George became Christine. I only heard about it one time on the TV but I don't if it was a news broadcast or other program.

I only heard about it second hand in news reports about Renée Richards. Those are literally the only examples I had at that time and no one made any significant effort to differentiate them from cross dressers or drag queens except that both had SRS. The rest of the things we know of, hormones, etc.? Not reported. They were men who "wanted" to be women, not physical men who were mentally women according to what the papers told us. If Bruce Jenner had gone through with it the first time the world would be very different, or perhaps it wouldn't.

[Ian68]

Absolutely.  Medicine doesn't make the man or the woman at all.  I'd transition socially regardless of when.

[Marly]

In cases like mine, I'm not sure they would have bothered the trouble of raising me at all. Certainly the surgical abilities we have had in more recent time didn't exist then. So likely transitioning would have been out as a result. If someone those things were not an issue I would probably say I wouldn't have because I wouldn't have known I could.
Mariah

Can't agree more. I'm a history buff and one thing I can tell is the harsh truth. In many cases, even CIS babies were killed since they were perceived and weak an unable to contribute to the family. Any sign of an effeminate nature in a boy likely wound up in being ostracized from the community. In eastern Europe, it would likely wind up in castration, making the person a eunuch. Of course, many CIS women were raised, but the romanticized image we have of life back then is a fiction. Imagine a cold stone hole in the wall as your toilet. (and this convenience was only for the elite) Walking in mud mixed of dirt horse urine and feces as well as the urine and feces dumped on the path by your neighbors, imagine the state of your shoes- if you were fortunate enough to have shoes. Potatoes for dinner? how about EVERY meal? That was basically the only plant that would endure the conditions to a point of being edible. Medicine? what medicine?
Now if we go back just 200 years..sure, things were better. But you still walked in that mud, and there was still no reliable medicine. Ever had a sore tooth pulled with a pair of dirty pliers...and no Novocaine?

we are truly blessed. Even if we go back a few decades, (my youth) breast implants were a dangerous experiment, and there was no HRT unless you were wealthy enough...and brave enough to do it.

[Kellam]

I think I would have gone for whatever gender variant behavior was acceptable. Like in medieval Europe I might have gone eunuch. In the Victorian era there were so many corsets and bustles and layers that it might have worked. Or more likely I would not have survived much past my teens.

[katrinaw]

Good question....

Back then we would not have all been in communication, would that have relieved pressure?

Also tolerance was a lot different then, I guess it would depend on pain and acceptance levels...

L Katy

[Tysilio]

The concept of "transition" is a fairly recent one, so it doesn't really apply to what gender-variant people may have done in the past. That said, it was fairly common in Western cultures for people, especially gender-variant women, to "live as the opposite sex."  That would have been me. I only survived as long as I did without transitioning because the range of acceptable gender roles is wider in my lifetime than it's ever been. If I had been born a couple of hundred years ago, or earlier, there is no way I could have lived as a woman, given the available choices: neither motherhood nor nunnery would have been an option for me.

I'm quite certain that I would have ended up living as a man, in complete stealth. It's the only way I would have been able to survive.

[Lady Smith]

I had to choose 'I don't know' as I would have more than likely died from complications due to appendicitis at fifteen if my life was to follow the same track.

[suzifrommd]

Hmm. Interesting. I should have offered poll responses differentiated based on gender. Among the people who posted, all guys said "certainly" whereas the others didn't think so.

I wonder why.

[londonswaves]

I think I might have, depending on what culture I'd live in, pre-imperialist times, and still in many cultures, gender has not been so binary and inflexible as it is now, same with discrimination. A lot of native american cultures, in a lot of indian cultures, african cultures, there's been different genders.. I think if I lived in such a culture I probably would be able to realise that I would belong in the group of the more flexible kind of people - and if in theory it was possible - transition.

[Tysilio]

Among the people who posted, all guys said "certainly" whereas the others didn't think so.

I wonder why.

A person doesn't have to know much history to be aware that before the past 100 years or so (if that), women's lives basically sucked unless they were members of the upper classes, and weren't all that much fun even then. Even ordinary men had a lot more options than women.

[Ian68]

A person doesn't have to know much history to be aware that before the past 100 years or so (if that), women's lives basically sucked unless they were members of the upper classes, and weren't all that much fun even then. Even ordinary men had a lot more options than women.

^Also, there remains much more social pressure, even within the transgender community, for women to modify their bodies, whereas men *can* "get away" with just binding.