What it feels like to be transgender???

[Jayne01]

Hello,

I have a question for the significant others out there. Today my wife asked me to try and explain what it feels like to be transgender. I had absolutely no idea how to even begin to explain it. I'm still trying to come to grips and accept myself. I think my wife accepts me more than I accept me. However she cannot understand why there is this desire within me to be female.

Have any of you had it explained in such a way that you can understand what the dysphoria feels like? My wife really wants to understand. She loves me and is sticking by me. I just do not know how to explain it to her. I'm not very good at putting my thoughts into words at the best of times, let alone trying to explain this!!

You're input would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you for reading this.

Jayne

[cheryl reeves]

trying to explain why we have this desire to be female is a hard one to explain to someone outside of the loop. ive tried for 16 yrs now to explain it to my wife and im no more closer to a answer now then i did back then..i wish someone could explain this to me maybe i could finally have a understanding to a question that has plagued me for 45 yrs now.

[warlockmaker]

Its always difficult to describe feelings,  try describing what is the feeling of being "in love". If you read some of the "Introductions" there are some that are really well written and maybe you can see some similarities.

[Deborah]

This is what it felt like for me at the worst times when I was overwhelmingly projecting the image expected of me.  I can't really explain how I know I I'm trans except that it's a sense of self.  But I do know what it feels like when the self has to be imprisoned solely at the whim of everyone else's sensibilities.

I open my eyes and it's dark.  I'm in a box, dark, cramped, very small.  I feel around with my hands and its sealed.  There are no openings and there is no escape.  It's completely silent and as I begin to beat on the sides of the box the sound is muffled and I realize the box is buried underground and there is no escape.  I scream and nobody can hear, nobody can help.  Deep dark despair embraces me with its icy arms as I realize I  am trapped . . . alone . . . for eternity.


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[LizK]

i describe it as having a continual intrusive thoughts and feelings that make you feel like everything about you is wrong...a knowing deep inside that things are wrong and you are not a male.....in the very deep part of you that no one else gets to see I know I am female. So then the male part of me sets up a roaring protest in my head...this at its worst, leads to anxiety, depression, pain, and general difficulty to function. the more I explore the dysphoria the more i realise how much it impacts me.

[chuufk]

I have a question for the significant others out there. Today my wife asked me to try and explain what it feels like to be transgender. I had absolutely no idea how to even begin to explain it.

I can only speak for myself....


-- Pre transition --

It was a never ending sense of despair. There were happy times and fun times and things I enjoyed but the despair was always there. Knowing I was not right, knowing from dawn to dusk that I was unhappy to be me. Nighttimes were the worst. Lying in bed in the dark, my head going round and round and round thinking about how much better my day could have been if only I was female on the outside. Even talking to other women and being "rejected" by them because I was not a woman in their eyes, being excluded from their fellowships and circles and social groups.

So I threw myself into things. Do, don't think, just "do". Do something. Do anything. Stay busy. Work, work, work, work. Stay busy busy. Volunteer for anything. Get tired. Get exhausted. Go to bed so tired you cannot stay awake. Got a spare hour? Fill it with something. Never stop. Never take a break.

Have no friends - friends might ask things I dare not utter or reply to. Friends might make comments I cannot respond to. I might even tell friends the ONE FACT THAT MUST NEVER BE MENTIONED. Better to be angry. Better to be short tempered. Keep people at a distance.

For most of my life I made do with 4 to 5 hours sleep every night. By 45 I looked 55 and felt like I was 65 and every time I looked in the mirror I never saw my reflection, I saw my jailer. I saw the raddled, burnt-out husk I was becoming and I really began to hate myself and despair.

Eventually I cracked. I could no longer keep it up and the truth was obvious. I was going to die as a man, in a male body. I was never going to be me.

So I sat in a corner, curled up in a foetal position and cried for two hours until my wife came home and found me. We talked, decided how to proceed and I went to the GP and started the process of transition.


-- Post transition --

Five years later, I like myself. I sleep 7 hours a night. I have friends and those who knew me from before tell me that I am a far, far nicer person to be around. I have a sensible work/life balance and the hammers in my head have stopped. I no longer despair and I now longer hate myself and we are still married and more in love than before.


What does it feel like to be transgender? I never felt "transgender".

I felt wrong and now I feel right.

[Jacqueline]

My personal observations.

Uncomfortable, angry, an outsider, with little hope. I have never felt worthy of much of anything. Great self loathing. Guilty. Depressed and anxious much of the time.

I was in denial for my whole life. I am 50. Only 7 months ago did I come to the idea of being on the transgender spectrum because of the dark secret(cross dressed privately since 7 or . I do not recognize myself in mirrors and dislike what I see, when I realize that is me(not sure if that is dysphoria related, or just some mental thing unrelated). I am married, with teenage daughters. Like stated elsewhere, I have experienced happiness, love and joy for periods of time. I did not feel I deserved them. However, I was always expecting the other shoe to drop. I could see lightness in situations and others but saw none for my future.

Even now, 6-7 months after starting therapy and realizing I am transsexual, I have problems liking myself. I came out to my wife but still feel embarrassed, guilt and shame. She has been fairly accepting. I have become a nicer person to be around. However, it is a long road ahead. Now I feel jealousy over: cis women; sister trans folk who started very early or just pass so easily. I feel regret for not finding out(or just denying?) till so late. I feel guilty for having that regret when I have a loving wife and three great kids. I feel greedy for having lived and experienced all I have yet wanting to transition. I feel trapped when it all seems impossible, overwhelming and it is taking too long. I still feel depressed and anxious, however it usually doesn't get as intense or last as long as before. I also have had problems sleeping for
years(still have it some nights, but not as much).

Okay. That's a lot of feels. I have a bad feeling(see what I did there) that I could keep going. All that and I am only just stepping into this journey.

I hope it does not overwhelm, trigger or seem like whining. Just trying to put it all clearly.

With warmth,

Joanna

[Obfuskatie]

You aren't choosing exactly, you identify as female. It's probably one of the reasons your SO was drawn to you, your femininity under the surface that made you more approachable in their eyes. I don't have anything to back this up, but it's likely you have more mirror neurons than men, since the transwoman brain mirrors the female brain, this would make you more sensitive/empathetic to others emoting. And there are a lot of people, ken and women, that would value that natural affinity in a partner.
A lot of women I know understand what imposter syndrome is like, you could equate it to that but in a personal setting instead of professional. You work hard to police your gender expressions to fit in, without being able to be comfortable being entirely genuine.
Forget the nuts and bolts for a minute, you are always going to be you. You just want to be validated in important and emotionally fulfilling ways. If they really want to know what it's like to be trans have them cross dress convincingly in public, afterward you can tell them being trans is like not being able to take that costume off because it's your skin and body and hormones that aren't right.


     Hugs,
- Katie
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[barbie]

I was born as a woman, but I have have grown and been educated as a boy and a man. I wished to grow up to a lady even after I was 4 years old. Sometimes I could forget that desire, but the feeling sometimes strongly came back, staying in several month. Now it is nearly impossible to go back to a man. I am now both a woman and a man.

Yes. The self-image is critical. Everyday I watch the mirror. I know it is vanity, but I love my self-image, thinking how to enhance it.

barbie~~

[Jayne01]

Hello and thank you all for your replies. It's I there sting how everyone experiences dysphoria differently but still there are similarities between everyone's experience.

For me, I never really felt that I belonged in female social circles and calling myself a woman out loud didn't quite sound right. However, I really don't like my body hair, my head is enormous and my general body figure is just wrong! I often have that missing limb feeling about not having breasts and further down, other than using public toilets seems to have no useful purpose. I don't always feel that way, but on bad days I do. I get this inexplicable jealousy if I see a woman in the street that may be of similar age and height to me and think why can't that be me?

Telling these things to someone has not experienced gender dysphoria sounds like something that makes no sense at all. I tried explaining it to my therapist (he has no gender experience, I'm just seeing him as a temporary measure until I can get to see someone else). He can't even begin to imagine and he deals with all kinds of people and has studied the brain, etc. if I can't make him understand, how could I make my wife understand who doesn't know how the brain works and until I came out to her, men were men and women were women. Transgender was more of a lifestyle choice than a medical condition. I also used to think the same way by the way, which is probably part of the reason that it has taken me until age 43 to start accepting my new reality.

I will try and take bits of each of your replies and see if I can give my wife an explanation that make even just a little bit of sense to her.

PS. I'm still interested in hearing from SO's if you have had dysphoria described to you in a way that made some kind of sense.

Jayne

[cindianna_jones]

I just tell people it's like holding your breath under 20 feet of water for 15 minutes every hour of every day. They get that.

Cindi

[Kylo]

It feels like being outside in the snow watching a family inside a house enjoy Christmas or something. You are outside the window looking in on the lives other people are able to have, but you will always be outside in the snow, unable to properly join in.

There is an invisible barrier, like the window, between you and the life you want. In my case, I just had to give up looking in at the party and get used to walking by myself in the snow. For the rest of my life, no doubt.