Doesn't everyone?

[Dayta]

I was having a conversation with my wife and she told me about an article she read by a woman describing her experience with her transgender husband before his transition.  This woman was somewhat taken aback by his assertion that "any woman would want to be a man, right?"  The woman found this statement to be odd at the time, and probably an indication. 

My wife mentioned a similar conversation that we had years ago, when I asserted that "what man wouldn't want to become a woman, given the chance?"  Funny how I went through this evolution of thinking that everyone was like me, to thinking I was completely different, to ultimately realizing that we're all different and in some ways all the same. 

Did you ever feel like your thoughts, desires and needs regarding gender were just the same ones everyone must have?

Erin

[Deborah]

No.  My parents made it abundantly clear to me when I was 13 that I was unacceptably outside the norm.  It wasn't until I was 15 that I discovered there were others.  I never felt like I was like everybody else.


It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not.
André Gide, Autumn Leaves

[Kylo]

No, I definitely felt like I was the only one who felt like me, and that I must have had a personality flaw, or something. As a kid I realized other people had no problem with things that caused me enormous issues. My parents reinforced this knowingly or unknowingly, by referring to me as "unusual" quite often. I never took that as an insult, because from them it wasn't. I've generally been proud of being different.

I now notice that cis people think everyone is like them, usually, until they encounter one of us.

[Amanda_Combs]

I absolutely used to think that way!  I've always had conversations with my wife about my dysphoria, and I would tell her that I literally hate everything male about me and would feel like a real person if I were a woman.  From that, she figured that I was just a misandrist with daddy issues. 

     But I told her that in the first place because I thought I was talking about regular feelings everyone has.  It's still hard for me to believe that not everyone feels the same way; I just can't wrap my head around a person not feeling unease with their gender.


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[Sephirah]

Did you ever feel like your thoughts, desires and needs regarding gender were just the same ones everyone must have?

At one time in my life, yes. But that was the time I was still trying to work out the "why" of it all. And working through the ideas of "I just want to be someone different, because I hate my life. And other people have it so much better." At the time I was thinking about not so much the personal aspect, but the aspect of freedom. And given the choice to start over, to see if one could make less mistakes and "do a better job of it" if given the opportunity to be someone else. To be treated, in the eyes of someone hurting, so much better than they were. At that time I constantly thought who wouldn't want that?. It was an entirely selfish notion based on looking at something I wished for myself, but didn't understand it.

It was only when I realised exactly why it was so hard to fit into a life not designed for me that I realised that it wasn't the need to be someone else. It wasn't about whether this section of people have it better, or worse, and that my life would be easier. It was understanding that my life would feel like mine. Even if it was hard. And with that came the little voice inside saying "You know, maybe most people already feel like themselves, and for you it's something else."

That was rather a pivotal moment for me.

[Raell]

I was that way. I assumed all women hated being women and wished they had male privilege and strength. I didn't actually wish I was a male; in a way, I assumed I WAS male, although part of me knew I was female.

I never figured it out my entire life because my family is very mixed gender, and my mom would always laugh and say that she was a "tomboy" also when she was little.

But my mom had many male traits; freakishly strong, not afraid of insects, mice, or much of anything, calm and focused, able to parallel park and read a map, run several businesses, fix whatever breaks. My sisters are the same way, except without the strength. Yet they all identify as woman and effortlessly manage their houses, go shopping, prepare menus, have everything organized.

None of them ever expressed wanting to be male, or behaved like one growing up. They dressed in pretty clothes, fixed their hair, played with dolls and sewed clothes for them. Yet I kept assuming they all would have preferred to be male.

[Ms Grace]

Did you ever feel like your thoughts, desires and needs regarding gender were just the same ones everyone must have?

Nope, pretty much felt like I was totally out on a limb, especially back in the 1990s.

[Dayta]

My sisters are the same way

Yes!  It's very curious that my three youngest sisters do all exhibit some traditionally male characteristics: wearing their hair short, very little use of makeup, semi-fanatical about local sports teams (although our whole family is).  It makes me wonder how our development may have been influenced by our parents, as my father was always very distant emotionally, and seemed to have a kind of sad and detached existence.  Or maybe some genetic factor?

[KathyLauren]

I always assumed that other people wondered about their gender presentation.  I just figured they coped with it better than I did.  I always knew that I was was a bit weird.

[Denise]

CIS people, apparently, never even think about gender.  This is what finally convinced my wife that I was indeed doing the only possible to survive. 
I thought about my gender ALL THE TIME, she NEVER did/does.

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[Raell]

Yes, that is curious. The women in my family are very mixed gender-in many ways having more male traits than I do, yet don't question their gender. So, I'm not sure what turns the key to make someone transgender. In a weird way, I didn't question MY gender either..I just assumed I was male. But knew I was female.

My entire family also assumed I was a boy, yet knew I'm female. For instance, my mom lined up me up with my two brothers and told us that we could NOT "hit girls." I didn't argue and say that I'm a girl, but only thought to myself that it was unfair. My friends also assumed I was male, telling me things like "There's a gap on our volleyball team..go stand between those two girls so you can cover the ball." I never argued, "But I'm a girl," I just went over to cover the "gap."

I didn't actually "try" to be girl until I was married, with a family, and people assumed I would do certain things, like hosting events, being social, dressing up to attend church. I tried to force myself to do these things, and that's when I began to suffer from dysphoria. I began getting so sick I'd have to go to bed when told in-laws were coming, or after attending church in dress and heels. I had to learn tricks, like attending only informal church services where people could dress as they liked, or going hiking while in-laws were staying over, to relieve the pressure.

[JoanneB]

For years my wife said "What person in their Right Mind WANTS to be a 50 Y/O Woman?"; followed by a comprehensive laundry list of reasons why women of that age, are well beyond their "Sell By" date.

[Michelle_P]

Hah!  My therapist, early on, wanted to know what my expectations of medical transition would be.  Apparently some older folks expect to come out of transition looking like Hollywood stars, or at least losing 25 years off their appearance.

I told her I expected to be a "Weird old lady."  Ya gotta have achievable goals or you'll just be eternally frustrated.

I'm perfectly fine with transitioning to a 63 year old female.  I'm happy, and as I also told the therapist, "As a male I was a scrawny sad old man.  As a woman, I totally rock this 63 year old body."  Attitude and a little medical help go a long way.


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[LizK]

I told her I expected to be a "Weird old lady."  Ya gotta have achievable goals or you'll just be eternally frustrated.

I'm perfectly fine with transitioning to a 63 year old female.  I'm happy, and as I also told the therapist, "As a male I was a scrawny sad old man.  As a woman, I totally rock this 63 year old body."  Attitude and a little medical help go a long way.


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I would love to see when you think you have achieved a successful "weird old lady look(WOLL)"...it could be the new thing you know, WOLL (weird old lady look), that is...we could make a club...I would definitely join. LOL

Liz

[Michelle_P]

Oh, I'm there.  I confuse the heck out of some of the older men at the UU church who don't realize my exact nature.   

Back at the Thanksgiving dinner, we were all talking about our most unusual Thanksgivings, and I described one held underway on a nuclear sub. That got me a "But, how could you.. ?!??", to which I replied, "Oh, that was back when I was a man."  The double-take was well worth it.

(Note: I don't hide.  I'm not planning a life of non-disclosure.  Many women readily clock me.  I can confuse the male of the species, though, so that's progress, I think. )

[Raell]

LOL! That's funny. Yep, we males are easily seduced by female characteristics. My male side once fell head over heels in love with an old high school friend of mine who turned out to be a transwoman, just through her voice on Skype (no picture). She giggled and flirted and I found myself responding and flirting back, for the first time in my life.

In my life as a woman, I had never flirted in my life, and believed the whole "love" thing had been invented to sell merchandise. Turns out, it's a MALE thing. Until I let my male side dominate, I was a picky, critical female, only selected males who could give me the best advantage..money, status, etc.

But logically, males MUST "fall in love" to cause them to stick to one female and put up with her picky behavior. A female, heavy in male characteristics, who does the same thing, loyally sticking to one partner, excusing bad behavior, loving to the death, etc. is putting herself in danger of abuse.

Although I didn't fall in love as a woman, I was that loyal male type, and yes, the sig. others took full advantage. My women friends would toss a misbehaving guy out, throw his stuff on the lawn and change the locks the moment he became a liability to her, and couldn't understand my own "whatever" attitude.

[zamber74]

Did you ever feel like your thoughts, desires and needs regarding gender were just the same ones everyone must have?

Erin

It still kind of throws me for a loop, I mean, if most people do not think this way, why is it so opposed by others?  It is like most people are fighting some sort of urge, feel that we are a threat, and react accordingly.  To me, growing up, it was just another temptation to be avoided.  Weed is wack yo!  So is the desire to be the opposite gender!

Instead of marijuana madness, just make it transgender madness! 

Ultimately, no one is hurt by us, I don't understand the opposition, and when it comes down to it, those that oppose us often claim there is some agenda at play, as though there is a choice in the matter to begin with, so it would logically to me, be that a lot of people feel this way on some level, and it is a matter of repression to fight it.

But, when I talk to my wife - she has never felt this way.  What I have read from others, they don't feel it either.

So you see, it confuses me.  I know, from an early age, I felt really out of place, and that feeling never went away.  The way people reacted to it, made me feel a lot of others felt in part the same way.  Now I'm just trying to get my head around, why we are treated the way we are, if they do not in some part feel the same way we do. 

Or it is just beer logic running through me right now   More than likely, they just want an enemy to focus on, instead of looking at themselves, that appears to be the usual culprit at play.

[Kylo]

Ultimately, no one is hurt by us, I don't understand the opposition, and when it comes down to it, those that oppose us often claim there is some agenda at play, as though there is a choice in the matter to begin with, so it would logically to me, be that a lot of people feel this way on some level, and it is a matter of repression to fight it.

They think we are going to "spread" it to other people.

In a sense, that has happened as more people have decided to express themselves in the last 10 years and try to change pronoun use, want trans topics taught to young children in schools and so on. Now they probably think they have a legitimate reason to fight us. Which is why I would prefer if they weren't trying to police pronoun use in Canada. We aren't a "movement", but at the moment there is a movement-like quality to trans issues in the media and I don't like the way it's heading because I believe there will be pushback if they try to impose our issues on the rest of society.

[TransAm]

To the OP: Yes, yes and yes.

When I was younger, I was absolutely convinced that everyone wanted to be male by default and some people just got stuck as women. I assumed everyone looked at those huge 6'4", 300lb, muscle-laden, beard-sporting, larger-than-life men with as much intense inner jealousy as myself.
And, because I never really talked to anyone about it apart from my fiancée, I held those assumptions well into my late teens. It wasn't until I mentioned it one day off-handedly that she stopped me with a shocked look on her face and said something along the lines of, "What? Uh... so, I love being a woman...".
Something shifted in my head at that very moment and, for the first time, confusion set in. We had a very long chat about gender in general and she told me she never questioned being a woman or even thought about it until I brought it up. I honestly thought everyone did.

I'll never forget the sensation of realizing that I was the anomaly.

[Dayta]

Michelle_P, you are an inspiration.  Weird old ladies of the world unite!