Some thought provoking questions

[cindybc]

Yes, everything you said makes a lot of sense. I certainly don't have any plans anytime soon to being anything else then who I am. Took to long getting here, and I love here, because it's me. I can wear a dress, a skirt, trousers, or a farmers coveralls, a truck drivers drabs, a fireman's uniform, or drive a truck in my bikini if I want but it's still me inside all of them.

Cindy

[Valerie Elizabeth]

Thanks for everyone answering these questions.  I really loved reading these answers.

I felt the same for a lot of them, and it's nice to know that others feel the same way.

Thank you!

[cindybc]

Well they are thought provoking questions, especially on how do you define a woman in this day and age. I still say, draw a line around yourself and just be the woman you see in your minds-eye to the best you can be. A persona that reflects your inner personality whom you have known to be female for as long as memory goes back to.

Cindy

[luna]

1) I have no particularly thought-provoking answer to this. I have met very few people in the world that I can get along with on a regular basis, but the one person I've always admired is a woman -- my sister. And she has a lot of masculine traits that I do not have (she's aggressive, inspired, sportsy, outspoken -- all traits we don't share). But I don't define womanhood or femininity around her, either. At the end of the day the only answer to this I can really give is... I don't define a woman as something particularly different from that of a man, although this may have to do with growing up around a lot of strange, vulgar people (who were all strange and vulgar regardless of gender). I'm sure my difference in general from most people I was around was shocking enough, anyhow. What it means to me to be a woman, well... it means I'm defining myself by my own terms, and not by anyone else's. When growing up, everyone else got to determine who and what I was. And I'm an internal person, so I lived with my own thoughts and just went with the flow, it was easier than being who I am, so that's what I did. That's what a lot of children do.


2) I don't have an idealized version of a woman. I sometimes wish I did, but I think in doing so I'd be objectifying myself, which I don't particularly like to do. I've already dealt with some online objectification due to being OUT on several forums I visit, I'm certainly not going to do it to myself. I am who I am and all of my little quirks, whether considered "masculine" or "feminine" by regular folks, are feminine by my own personal definition of femininity. I don't see anything particularly odd or wrong with that, although I'm sure this answer might raise a few eyebrows.


3) Well, no, but it would certainly affect my behavior (reasonably most people should probably say the same thing). If you're living in a 3rd world country where they'd kill you and members of your family for being different or perceived in a light of general "inferiority", what do you do? You suppress these things or find a way to move to a more accepting country. Surely there's brainwashing (religious or not) that happens to TS children in these countries, too, and who knows what kind of long-term effect that would have on anybody. I believe what we go through is entirely nature and not nurture, but surely the method of nurture can determine a lot of the outcomes of our decisions to carry on or not. In countries like you're describing, I firmly believe that this is what happens.

[Michelle.]

Here goes...

1) What do you define a woman as, like what does that mean to you to be a woman?   

More in-touch with feelings and emotions. Caring and nuturing. I guess in the motherhood. Not the ability to have children but rather to mother them.


2) If you have an idealized version of a woman what does that entail? What is she like? Is it in the essence of being a female? If so, how much of that essence are socially expected roles/traits/appearances (for example there is a really great documentary series called killing us softly about objectification of women in media - you should check it out if your interested in the topic)?

The best answer to this part: I know it when I see it, but I keep in mind that outer beauty is no real indicator of inner beauty. As far as social expectations/roles go? The expectations of the fashion world would be deadly to most women. Modern- feminism has opened the doors of so called gender roles...its her decision to walk thru that door or not. The "essence" of feminitity...I have an inner girlie-girl.


3) Do you think you'd feel the same way if you were in a different country? American society has very different gender expectations of females from other countries, villages, tribes, etc...so the definition changes. I guess what I'm trying to ask is how much of what your going through do you relate to nature-that is the biological makeup of sex and nurture- the socially acceptable traits/behaviors/attitudes of a woman that you are consciously planning on adopting in your transition? Both are heavily debated when it comes to gender as to what is more influential but not one is considered to be the only factor.

All peoples have the right to freedom, the pursuit of their dreams and the obligation to answer for their own transgressions.
Societies that deny women equal rights and equality before the law are in violation of the Western Worlds, God-given, concept of the Social Contract.

Take care...Michelle.

[Ashley315]

I just don't buy into the stereotype that a woman is all dresses and hair and makeup and showing all these emotions.  Women can be the exact opposite of that and be just as much a woman as someone who is the essence of that.

For some reason I think a lot of "trans" (those not born the way they feel they should have been) people tend to glorify their desired gender in very stereotypical ways.

[Steffi]

(I'm not arguing per se, just throwing a couple of points into the debate )

I just don't buy into the stereotype that a woman is all dresses and hair and makeup and showing all these emotions.  Women can be the exact opposite of that and be just as much a woman as someone who is the essence of that.

Hmmmm..... you may well be right, but how far can a female go along that road before she starts to become a caricature man? We are all familiar with the stereotype tweedy dyke who in effect IS a man but has a vagina.

For some reason I think a lot of "trans" (those not born the way they feel they should have been) people tend to glorify their desired gender in very stereotypical ways.

I agree that is often the case but isn't that the same in any field? Golfers aspire to be Tiger Woods, they don't idolize some semi competent part-timer who knocks in the occasional birdie.

Women have been wearing make-up ever since stone-age maidens started daubing their faces with mud and berry-juice.
If two women of equal raw beauty walk into a room and one is in jeans, flats and no make-up and the other is well made up in a plunge-neck evening gown, heels and a little tasteful bling, have you any doubt which would be getting all the attention?

Yes, to be a woman one needs little more than a vagina, but surely to be feminine takes something else?
- I know several extremely feminine pre-ops and a several very un-feminine genetic women.

The real debate is "What constitutes femininity?"

[placeholdername]

I have maybe a different take on this...

I don't really believe in a 'female essence' or 'essence of a woman' which I have despite my anatomy or something like that.  For me it's more like this:

The way I want my body to look is considered feminine by society
The way I want to dress is considered feminine by society
The way I want to socialize with other people is considered feminine by society
The way I want to be sexual with other people is considered feminine by society
etc.

So for me it's not so much about being a woman trapped in a man's body and how do I fix that, but rather about, how do I be best true to myself despite what society thinks about it.

[Ashley315]

If two women of equal raw beauty walk into a room and one is in jeans, flats and no make-up and the other is well made up in a plunge-neck evening gown, heels and a little tasteful bling, have you any doubt which would be getting all the attention?

Depends on a persons tastes I guess.

As for the tweedy dike being essentially a man... I bet they would beg to differ.  Why don't you ask one.  Good luck as they are not known for taking that sorta thing well.  Hope you can walk away from that one.

I just wonder why so many trans women put such an emphasis on clothing and makeup......I mean, I put on makeup if I'm going out, and get dressed up in nice jeans and a nice blouse, but never if I'm just running to the grocery store or down the street.  Some won't leave their house without getting all dressed to the nines.

[cindybc]

As I did in my previous life I wore men's slacks, dress shirt and sports coat and oxford shoes. I never liked genes and sweat shirts and flannel shirts, "yuck" If I wore such clothes it was for working with a shovel digging ditches, painting a barn of working out in the yard, hate dirt!

Nothing had changed much in my formal wear except that I wear women's slacks and different tops of varying styles and colors, I love colors. It is nice to have the privilege to wear a dress or or a skirt, for a change and other women's apparel that is so much more comfortable during the warm weather. Nothing much has changes except the variety and colors.

I wear what suits my mood. I wear my hair the way it suits my mood.  I feel I have more pride in myself and I feel more independent and self confident then I ever have before. I knew how to dress and I new how to present before I even came out.

Cindy 

[K8]

The way I want my body to look is considered feminine by society
The way I want to dress is considered feminine by society
The way I want to socialize with other people is considered feminine by society
The way I want to be sexual with other people is considered feminine by society
etc.

So for me it's not so much about being a woman trapped in a man's body and how do I fix that, but rather about, how do I be best true to myself despite what society thinks about it.

+1

[imaz]

1) What do you define a woman as, like what does that mean to you to be a woman?
It's not a set definable thing.  I can express being a woman in an infinite amount of ways.  But as for how it feels and what it means, it's an intangible feeling of satiated comfort.  When my gender presentation was a boy, even though i was presenting as a boy, i knew that the presentation didn't match what I felt inside.  I was constrained in the expression of my identity.  It's not so much that I'm a girl.  So much as i'm me.  Whatever this ball of shocks and jolts that makes up my identity is--it is a girl.  The clothes, the hair, the hormones--that's all cosmetic expression of who I am on the inside.  Transitioning implies a movement between two points, but I'm not moving.  I am revealing.

2) If you have an idealized version of a woman what does that entail? What is she like? Is it in the essence of being a female? If so, how much of that essence are socially expected roles/traits/appearances (for example there is a really great documentary series called killing us softly about objectification of women in media - you should check it out if your interested in the topic)?

I don't have an idealized version of a woman.  I have things I like in some women that I don't like in others.  thinks i like in myself.  things I don't.  But I don't have a version of femalehood that I measure others by.

3) Do you think you'd feel the same way if you were in a different country? American society has very different gender expectations of females from other countries, villages, tribes, etc...so the definition changes. I guess what I'm trying to ask is how much of what your going through do you relate to nature-that is the biological makeup of sex and nurture- the socially acceptable traits/behaviors/attitudes of a woman that you are consciously planning on adopting in your transition? Both are heavily debated when it comes to gender as to what is more influential but not one is considered to be the only factor.

I think so.  Because again, my conception of what is female isn't tied to cultural signposts at it's most intrinsic level.  if i were in a diffrent culture and the fashion was diffrent, teh role of women was diffrent--all of that--I'd just being doing that.  Those elements are my gender expression--not my gender itself.  If my gender was tied to my gender expression in such a concrete way, then i would always be wearing the same skirt.  But I change my fashion with the seasons, with what's in, with what's out.  So if I lived in another culture, I would do diffrent things, look completely diffrent, probably act entirely diffrent, but I would still be a woman.

I could be disguised as a bearded construction worker with huge muscles, and very masculine expressions--and I'd still be a woman.  If that makes sense.

Excellent post Sarah, fully agree.

[Ms.Behavin]

For me It's more just being me and not trying to fit the square peg into a round hole.  I had the hardest time shaking hands before.  I really had to work at shaking hands as a guy.  about 1/2 the time it was opps girl handshake.  Gee Don't need to worry about that one anymore.  So to me it's just far more of just letting me be me.  As my former partner told me once to be female just be myself for that was how I appeared when I was relaxed. 

I think over half the battle of appearing female is just appearing and behaving female or as myself which is the same thing.  I guess for me it was more like stop acting guyish and just be me.

So I'm no longer trying to be something I'm not and that makes life just so much easier. Of course going to the salon (yeah tomorrow!!) getting the nails don't and a 1000 other things are just icing on the cake.

Not sure I'm answering the question, but it's how it seems to me. It was more not so much learning traits of a woman, but too stop pretending to be guy.  Mind you it takes a little time to unlearn habbits, but once the inner girl pops out watch out.

Beni

[cindybc]

"Bingo!" That's it exactly, the traits, or instincts, are already there just need to let them surface over all the guy stuff we were conditioned to think and be. Having had 11 kids in my care through the year I didn't have to learn how to nurture...

"Hee, hee." I never liked the hand shakes either felt to impersonal.
It was such a wonderful experience to be able to hug both other women and men, a sincere hug showing emotion.

Cindy

[Julie Wilson]

What I never realized was that I never knew what it was like to be a male.  (I am "M2F" btw.)  I thought I would mention that because it seems like everyone posts replies to everything around here.  Anyway.. Like I said, I never really knew what it was like to be male, I thought I did but I didn't.  My experience of "male" was what I thought being male was and most early transitioners make the same mistake (based on my own experience actually) and think to themselves that they know exactly what it is like to be a woman, because they have come to the conclusion that they have always been one, albeit one "trapped in a male body (or whatever)."

Really most of us tend to be pretty clueless.  I think most women who transition will never really learn what it is like to be a woman because they won't ever allow themselves to have female gendered experiences.  Instead they will tell friends, coworkers, lovers (etc.) that they are transsexual and they will have an experience based upon what they represent themselves as.. based on what they introduce themselves as but because they have come to believe that they have always been "female".. they will tend to assume that they are having the experience of being female.

I know I fooled myself into believing that I was experiencing life as a female.

But life kicked me in the ass and showed me how delusional I was.  I started having a female life by accident.  It caused me to begin to believe in myself as a woman without the transsexual baggage.  It wasn't because I was special, I was just lucky I guess or it was a fate thing.  I am as clueless as a person can be, I just stumbled into a female life by accident and luck and I decided I needed more of it because it was the only life worth having (for me).  It changed me, it changed my perception of life and the world.

Being a woman is pure freedom (to me).  Pure liberty and the price of that freedom is constant vigilance.

[Northern Jane]

I like your comments Julie and they have a certain resonance with me.

I spent a lot of my early life wondering why I didn't fit, why everything was so hard, and to avoid being labelled 'gay' or 'odd' meant watching everything I said, everything I did and the way I did it. Life was like trying to figure out a new game without ever having seen the rules.

Through my teens, I wondered what the hell I was. I didn't fit with the boys and I was excluded from many of the girl things. I wasn't sure what I was but I was certain what I wasn't. In the times I was able to live en femme, everything seemed to fit much better, life was easier, so I thought maybe being a girl was where I needed to be.

At 'transition'/SRS at age 24, I didn't consider myself trans anything - just a naive young woman out to learn about herself and her place in the world - all of which came remarkably easily. Some years later I looked back and realized that I was, indeed, a girl. The understanding came from the way I interact with the world and the way the world interacted with me - all easy and natural, without having to think about every action, every phrase, just being me. (I don't think anyone can really understand what being a woman means until you have lived it for a number of years and found comfort in it.)

Over the following 35 years of 'just being me' I came to understand that being a woman isn't about things (clothing, makeup, mannerisms) - it is a state of being - just BEING without doubts, questions, or second thoughts. Being a woman is about the dynamics of day to day living, living as yourself and knowing who you are.

JMHO

[K8]

I have always resisted the idea of being a woman trapped in a man's body.  I have a man's body, but I don't think I am a woman.  I always thought I was something else - neither and both - but that I would be happier as a woman.  When I was little, I wanted to be a girl so I could relate to others as a girl.  When I was a little older, I dressed in girls' clothes because I didn't feel I fit the role my body forced me into.  But I never thought I was a girl.

I am still very early in the transition, and I have no idea how far I will be able to go, but I have already found the clothes are less important to me than they were.  If I can be me - whatever that is - I will be happy (I think).  I hope to be able to present mostly as a woman, because I think women have more latitude in their expression in this society.  I also hope to be able to be as much of a woman as I can be, with women friends who relate to me as a woman.  (I am very lucky in that I already have one friend like that and two more who are trying to teach me how to do it.)  I have no idea if I will ever get to the point where most people treat me as a woman.  Sure, I'd like to be able to still wear a skirt sometimes, but it is finding that place on the gender spectrum (or in the gender universe) where I am finally comfortable that is important to me.

That's the road I'm trying to take.  If it turns out I need to change physically and legally to a woman, then so be it.  If I can finally find where I fit without the surgery and legal redefinition, I'll be fine with that.  Or so I think now.  It is just nice to have the freedom to finally try to find where I fit.

- Kate

[Saraloop]

  I have a theory about gender which I'll try and explain.. just maybe it might not be liked, but oh well;..
  I think gender identity only develops throughout life experiences, since gender roles only pertains to social behavior. I think if the human race wasn't so easily influenced, there'd be just as many boys that would want to play with 'girly' stuff as girls. I think humanity's influencability also explains how society could have come to develop gender roles as they are now. The fact that women become pregnant easily develops to establish a setting of the men having to take care of providing food and shelter because of women's temporal incapacitation by pregnancy. Since the man develops the expertise to provide through this, it is the most simplest outcome that he continues, and because of this the woman stays with the child. Just that is enough to develop a good part of the societal roles. Not only that, but simple things like the woman noticing her body become something that looks beautiful when growing up, as well as other small things, is enough to influence certain aspects of the societal role's becoming. Think about it, if you have something beautiful to work with, you're more inclined to work with it, and other aspects apply in different cases with different people.
  I think in today's modern society, gender roles aren't just not needed, but they're also outdated. Every human, be it male or female, has its own personality, its own desires, and I feel everyone should be allowed to act anyway they desire as long as it doesn't harm others.

  I think that throughout the influence of seeing the gender roles enacted, whether it's just seeing your mother put on make up, or your brothers play with army men, it triggers a response in your mind according to your personality and desires, and subconsciously associates your mental representation to those roles you see enacted... and this mental process deepens itself as you live more and become even more influenced by the societal doings, and deepens your mental representation into those roles as well as deeper attachment to that representation, as we become more in tune with our desires. For typical people, the mental representation will change as they change, but for other people, like tg, their personality and desires, if strong enough, will make it so their mental representation develops on its own, especially if the body seems to be developing contrary to it.
  So as you develop, and your body seperates itself more and more from your mental representation, until the contradiction is just too great, and a great sense of division and contradiction manifests due to this. The person's attachment to their ideal may or may not be very great depending on the mental developments that person goes through, and if it's very great, that person may conclude that their body is wrong, and may or may not suffer greatly from this, depending on how much importance is intergrated/perceived in the body and mind synchronicity. Sometimes it's so great that it's virutally un-changeable, and the person needs to change their body in order to feel like they do have that synchronicity.

.. so..yeah, the theory is that basically there's no such thing as gender beyond gender roles(which are now obsolete) and the mental representation developed by one's mind through experiencing life and its influences, when experienced in contrast to one's personality and desires.

..

[Julie Wilson]

Sorta in reply to Saraloop and sorta something I just felt like typing into a box..

I think "gender" is bunk.  My understanding of gender is that it is something that is part of being either male or female but somehow "trans" people (for lack of a better word), tend to view it as separate, as constructed as pick-apart-able.  Because, I guess many "trans" people have the experience that their gender is at odds with their birth sex.. so apparently many "trans" people begin to see gender as separate from sex and they begin to attribute aspects to it that are socially based or culturally based such as "gender roles" and clothing, makeup or not, long hair or not, types of toys played with as children, types of movies to watch or not, types of video games to play or not.

I didn't transition because my gender was at odds with my birth sex.  I transitioned because my brain sex was at odds with my genital sex.  I suppose some would question me and ask me how could I possibly know that my birth sex was at odds with my brain sex?  Well.. It is quite the conundrum and it took me years to sort it all out but essentially the cure (transition) was what helped me to realize that my brain sex was absolutely at odds with my genital sex.  Life was completely wrong for me before transition.  I felt like a nothing, like a no one.  I felt absolutely invalid and I had no life.  After transitioning and going full-time one of my first realizations what that I finally had something worth dying for.  I finally had an actual life and everything was right.  Before transition no matter where I was and no matter what I was doing.. I didn't belong and I felt out of place but after transition it was like reality became my home and I no longer felt any need to try to distract myself or to live in my own little world.  Suddenly life was welcoming me with open arms and the world expanded and became larger.  I felt like a human being, like I mattered, like I was worthy, like I had value.  It was a night and day experience and how do you just explain how suddenly everything that was wrong and could never be fixed was suddenly so right.  I guess you have to experience it for yourself.

[K8]

I agree, to a certain extent, with both Saraloop and Julie.  I think gender is based on the social structures that grew out of physical differences (women give birth, men don't).  Many of those gender differences have less meaning now than they did.  I grew up in a time when gender differences were rigidly enforced.  Things are much more fluid now.  I think we are working in the right direction but aren't there yet.  Gender still has meaning in this society.

I also believe that male (testosterone-based) sexuality is very different from female (estrogen-based) sexuality and that those differences are not just societal but have helped form the societal concept of gender.  I always found my male sexuality to be like the Invasion of the Bodysnatchers or something - an alien intelligence was controlling my body.  Now, with androgyn-blockers and estrogen, I finally feel "right".

I never felt I was a woman in a man's body.  Since the age of 4 or 5, I felt I would be happier and fit better as a woman.  If society is free enough to accept me as a human with womanly characteristics but in some ways appearing male, then I don't have to change my body that much.  But if society insists I choose one or the other, then I choose woman and will change my body to fit.

Life is a journey of discovery.

- Kate