I am assuming that it is appropriate for me to do this. I'm 56 and on Estradiol and Spiro for a few months. I figured out that I am transgender 6 years go, or so. Before that I felt like someone who dislikes what they see as male traits, in themselves. When i was young, I cross-dressed as a daily thing, outside going about my daily life. From childhood, I can't remember a time when I felt anxiety about whether or not I or anyone else are "gay" or "a sissy". I think that is why I never felt like I suffered from not having a female identity. I did feel like I suffered from having a male identity and wanted to distance myself from that.
The kenned doll
My realization, unfolded over several years, and the most dramatic was around the time that my sister died. It's difficult to explain, but I had a metaphorical fantasy about "the one she" and how she divided into male and female so that it would confuse predators in her various manifestations. I praised a goddess and an emissary of hers blessed me with greater awareness for some time, as thanks. Preceding that in facts, the one she created a doll and from her vulva she flicked with her fingers a substance that stuck crudely on the outside of the doll and it was the reproductive apparatus.
So, flash forward to me finding I come from this doll and I awakened (became kenned), within another fantasy I was struck on the head with a ken doll and said to be rendered male, by a bad magician who would fool no one, since my name is Kendall, it resonated. The kenned doll saw that it was of the breeding stock, how more obvious could my function be, with this thing hanging off of me. If I were to be breeding stock, that might be suitable but I identify with her and feel empty without feeling her manifesting in me. So, I have started a ritual of transformation and how it changes my body matters least of all.
It's easy for me to find positive examples of women and how "the feminine" might be manifest in women that I see. I have had a lot of trouble finding out what "the masculine" is, in the expression of men I see. How good I feel about my gender identity has related to how natural I feel it matches a masculine and a feminine aspect of the goddess or any other way there might be to symbolize the human animal and it's relationship to it's environment. If there were a sacred masculinity obvious to me, I might not mind using that identity.
So, figuring out I was transgender meant that I felt it would be easier to find my place by embracing the identity of woman rather than man, even though conceptually I reject either identity. It's a choice of framing, for me. What makes me feel the least disgusting.
Life on urf
My transition is not about appearance. My impression is that this doesn't go over well when i say it. I don't think my appearance shows where I am in transition as I see it, so what could people think?
Noticing traits in myself are where my dysphoria is strongest. Whether or not a therapist would agree that I am a valid transgender person, based on how I felt as a child, I don't see how any history of feeling like a girl could have got me what I would have got from half a lifespan viewed as and interacted with as a woman. As an aspiring feminist I am keenly aware of negative traits and their privileges in the world around me. And I hate it when I find myself exhibiting those traits. Having traits or not having them isn't a choice. Deciding that I will live as a woman can't allow me to just decide not to have male traits, since they are there, much to my horror. I can't just decide to reject gender roles, because I don't adopt them by choice.
I find it hard because, so far, I have not had anyone say anything similar, except TERFs say some of what I say. So, they are essentially digging at what hurts the most for me and I have to watch out because I can offend people who take my language to mean I agree with the transphobes. I was on a twitter block list for a while.
Anyway, I want to study gender differences in language as a way to find the demons hiding behind each sentence I speak, betraying me and making me feel ill. I want to get rid of traits where I find I think I have a right to a voice, where women are used to not having that. I want to git rid of an expectation of approval that male children get from the reaction to "look at me mommy", the special attention they get when they speak and the allowance that are made because "boys will be boys".
Meanwhile, for appearance, I'm finding what feels right as it comes to me. When my hair is longer, I expect it will feel better to try to learn how to apply makeup that looks like how old woman are beautiful, not how old women can resemble a young girl. When I see something that feels right, I expect that I would want to adopt that change.
Probably I will look like a man wearing women's clothes, which is ok with me, so far. Maybe I will look like a man trying to look like a woman who is trying to look like a man.
I call myself asexual, but my attraction is to strong women and I want to be swept off my feet by a tall and dark woman (short and light is okay too). The likelihood of that ever happening, I don't want to think about.
I'm starting volunteer work at an LGBT center, tomorrow. I moved to Oregon to transition. So, for me,those are big steps forward in my transition.
