How would you describe feeling like a man or a woman?

[Kylo]

I wonder where whoever decided David Reimer could be a girl because they'd amputated his penis got their philosophy that male and female are simply interchangeable states. This is the case I always bring up when people insist gender is nothing but a social construct, because if it was, David Reimer's case should have been a shining textbook success instead of a tragic warning not to play around with other people's gender (or to chop at their genitals while babies).

The way I look at it, male and female are different, and they're supposed to compliment each other's strengths and weaknesses, not be at war. They're not so different they can't understand each other, but they do tend to have different ways of perceiving things and different strategies for getting/doing things in life. What people need to remember is not think in absolutes, but also not to think they can force square pegs into round holes.

[Tessa James]

I wonder where whoever decided David Reimer could be a girl because they'd amputated his penis got their philosophy that male and female are simply interchangeable states. This is the case I always bring up when people insist gender is nothing but a social construct, because if it was, David Reimer's case should have been a shining textbook success instead of a tragic warning not to play around with other people's gender (or to chop at their genitals while babies).

The way I look at it, male and female are different, and they're supposed to compliment each other's strengths and weaknesses, not be at war. They're not so different they can't understand each other, but they do tend to have different ways of perceiving things and different strategies for getting/doing things in life. What people need to remember is not think in absolutes, but also not to think they can force square pegs into round holes.

Wasn't that Dr John Money at John Hopkins?  What a tragic failure.  Ideology and hubris can be so dangerous.  I agree that gender identity is intrinsic and deeply individual but suggest it is gender roles that are capricious cultural constructs.  Plenty of cisgender people are also impacted by and reject the dominant paradigms of culture and thank goodness.

[lc100]

To answer your question simply: Feeling like a man feels normal, as many others here said with their gender. I'm not sure if you were looking for a gender-rolesy answer or not. I'm not the most masculine personality wise, really, so I guess I can't really answer this. Idk.

But this made me think of some possibly unrelated things. Kylo mentioned something about male-ID'd brains full of estrogen suffering. This made me think of how I feel on a daily basis. Not because "being trans sucks", rather I just feel like a mess of male and estrogen at once.

There are short times I feel like I can fully feel male, ignoring dysphoria and the fact my body does not "look male" at all. That can either feel normal and comfortable, or euphoric for a short period of time. It's as if I'm so hyped up on finally feeling the way I want to, it's all hitting my at once and I feel great. Both of these feelings almost always only happen when I'm alone.

However, usually around others, I can feel like a mix of things. This is what Kylo made me think about. I don't feel female; I feel as I'm stuck in my normal guy mental mode, but then struggling to act how I should as a girl. It's a mess of gender and public personas and it's terrible. This is very difficult to explain. I believe this is what caused me to be confused about my gender for so long--I feel forced to act hyper-feminine for various reasons, when I'm just trying to be normal.

[BlonT]

For me you should not feel anything else than being human,and be sick,good,lazy,happy,depressed or great To what type of genital we are attracted is directed by ferro moons and look.It,s proven that there are so many (female) hormones in our food,that in our "civilized" world there is almost no pure male thinking and feeling left.
just my 1ct.