Good evening folks,
I am...well I'm not exactly who or what I am. For the past seven years now I have spent a great deal of time pondering my own identity, not just in terms of gender but in character. I am all too familiar with mental illness, having combatted anxiety and depression most of my life and have recently taken it under control. In fact, I have been taking control of every aspect of my life as of late, approaching each new challenge with new ambition and renewed vigor, just recently I finally slipped out of my awful retail job for something that I actually want to do.
Yet...in addressing these issues with continuing success I have uncovered old wounds.
Now, I was born a genetic male, yet from a young age, I have always been perplexed by the intricacies of gender. I remember days as early as when I was four being fascinated by my older sister's dresses and the principle of men in women's clothing all through grade school. By the time puberty came around, a hurricane of emotions pummeled me, but something morose stuck with me. I remember for Halloween one year, one of my classmates came into school dressed as a cheerleader and in doing so highlighted certain insecurities of mine, which would only intensify through high school. That was the time I became obsessed with the concept of breasts...which at the time I figured was a normal, hormonal teenager thing. Yet my curiosity was not steeped in my sexuality, it was far more intimate than that. You see, what triggered this initial flare-up was the fact that the classmate in question wore a bra stuffed with socks...which held a certain allure. I began to wonder what it felt like to wear the garment, what it would feel like to have breasts of my own, and that's when my descent into uncertainty truly began.
My body began to feel...underdeveloped if that makes sense. There was a looming sense of wrong which accompanied my actions, and I began to become afflicted by very dubious dreams. These dreams ran the gambit of myself crossdressing or turning into a woman, often paired with an intense rush of euphoria followed by crushing disappointment upon awakening. My heart will race, and my forethought would be crippled for days and even weeks with this terrible dread as I pined for this strange reality.
It was in my junior year of High School I finally began to research gender dysphoria. I had been taking psychology at the time and did an entire project on the subject in a quest to sate my curiosity. Later that year, a close personal friend came out as transgender, and I took my opportunity to share these feelings which I had suffered with in silence. From there I began to reach out to many of my friends, who of which were and still are supportive. Eventually, I came out to my parents with the same result.
As college rolled around I began to see a therapist for my dysphoria and it was during this time that I began to cross-dress for the first time. I felt a great amount of both shame and excitement doing so and carried on with this habit until this very moment. I love wearing dresses, skirts, blouses and the like. Wearing breast forms just looks right and overall aside from that persistent shame it seems like a clear solution to the enigma.
Since then I pursued solutions to this issue with...mixed results.
Twice now I have set appointments to start HRT, as twice I concluded it to be the next logical step in my search for answers. Twice, I canceled.
What complicates matters is an intrinsic lack of confidence I have in myself to make decisions mixed with periods of doubt. What seems to occur are periods, lasting days, weeks or even months of intense dysphoria followed by similar periods of apathy where doubt is able to accumulate. These periods are not exactly euphoric, but I am able to dismiss the notion in a self-debasing manner such as accepting it as a fetish, a phase or some sort of fluke. Yet it always comes back, as if it were some sort of curse.
I'm not particularly masculine or feminine as far as personalities go, but this incurring wrongness seems to continue unregulated and remains as the sole obstacle in my life presently. I have explored the possibility of being non-binary or genderfluid in some way, yet I always seem to come back to the desire to change my body, because during those intense periods it is what feels right.
I have a hard time accepting this as just some sort of sexual fantasy as I'm personally not invested in sex. I consider myself asexual and do not actively pursue arousal of any type.
Yet i feel lost, and I hope that you good folks could help provide me with some insight going forward.
Thank you for taking the time to read this rather lengthy post,
~Faith
