How to tell if you are a transsexual...

[Sandy]

I just took the test again.  It still thinks that I am a woman.

It's right, of course, just checking.

-Sandy

[Sandy]

There is this exercise which everyone who is transsexual should do.  Grab your heart (metaphorically.. ), put it on your right hand, look into the mirror and say "I am a woman or a man (for FTM's)"...if you truly believe that and are willing to transition without any excuses whatsoever...and by transition...I mean the works, hormones, hair removal, name change, RLE, SRS....unless you have a life-threatening medical condition that prevents you from doing so......then you are REALLY transsexual.

tinkerbell

Then, in that case, I REALLY am a transsexual!

[umop ap!sdn]

Thing is, I and many others have felt not entitled to the label of "woman" (I don't know if any F2Ms feel that way about the label "man") because of not having grown up in the female role and not having the anatomy. Maybe there is a divide among us M2Fs between those who have always insisted "I am a girl" and those who always secretly felt "I should have been a girl". Or maybe I was just really impressionable when I was a kid and they told me I was a boy, I believed that real boys were all like me (surprise!). Anyway, if a possible M2F can't quite look eirself in the mirror and say "I am a woman!" I don't think that necessarily should rule out transition.

My $.02

[Melissa]

Hi umop.  Like you, I always believed other boys thought like I did (despite how obviously contrary it was).  However, I now see myself as a woman.  I never was a man.  I don't need any tests to tell me or anything.  Seeing yourself that way is a product of self acceptance.  If it helps, maybe you could view yourself as a transsexual woman for now, but still a woman.

Melissa

[Kate]

Anyway, if a possible M2F can't quite look eirself in the mirror and say "I am a woman!" I don't think that necessarily should rule out transition.

Sure, of course not. "Woman" to me also implies a history, a past earning the label. Like it'd be kinda odd to call yourself a "soldier" just because you "feel like one" without ever picking up a rifle. The label implies a certain experience, not just a feeling. The first thought I have whenever I refer to myself as a "woman" is seeing two billion genetic women, all of whom have endured something of a second-class citizenship all their lives, looking at me and saying, "You MUST be joking? How DARE you claim kinship in our sisterhood without first LIVING it, dealing with it, suffering the pains and the joys..."

My therapist *insists* I have a problem with self-worth, lol... hmmm...

Kate

[Melissa]

The first thought I have whenever I refer to myself as a "woman" is seeing two billion genetic women, all of whom have endured something of a second-class citizenship all their lives, looking at me and saying, "You MUST be joking? How DARE you claim kinship in our sisterhood without first LIVING it, dealing with it, suffering the pains and the joys..."

The thing is, by declaring yourself a woman, you are also say that you are willing live it, deal with it and suffer all the pains and experience all the joys.   Truth be told, many women welcome you with open arms into their sisterhood.

Melissa

[Kate]

How to tell if you are a transsexual...

Another clue: if you're doctor just called you with your first post-HRT blood test results... and they're absolutely *perfect*... and you start to cry uncontrollably and shake so bad with RELIEF and utter JOY after being terrified all week that something would be wrong so you couldn't continue...

You MIGHT be transsexual

Kate

[Sandy]

Sure, of course not. "Woman" to me also implies a history, a past earning the label. Like it'd be kinda odd to call yourself a "soldier" just because you "feel like one" without ever picking up a rifle. The label implies a certain experience, not just a feeling. The first thought I have whenever I refer to myself as a "woman" is seeing two billion genetic women, all of whom have endured something of a second-class citizenship all their lives, looking at me and saying, "You MUST be joking? How DARE you claim kinship in our sisterhood without first LIVING it, dealing with it, suffering the pains and the joys..."

My therapist *insists* I have a problem with self-worth, lol... hmmm...

Kate

I had to work through this myself, Kate.  How could I *presume* to call myself a woman when I had no physical attributes of a woman nor the history.

But for me everything I had done up to the time I took my first estradiol shot was pretending.  I was pretending to be female because I would wear woman's clothes, I was pretending because I would feel *naughty* by wearing panties under my clothes.  I realized that I could no longer pretend.  I realized that I really was a woman in a man's body.  And that pretending would no longer be enough.  I had to be true to myself.  That's when the clothes stopped being the issue to me.  Being who I am became important.

Now for the first time in my life I feel incredibly *normal*.

Also I read a post on another list from a GG that basically said that many born women take their gender for granted.  The trans woman, on the other hand, has to fight and go through hell barefoot to be able to declare themselves female.  Anyone who is willing to go through all that then deserves the designation "female".

Also I don't use female monikers like gurl, or ->-bleeped-<-.  Those to me are terms that also sound like pretending.  I prefer to refer to myself as a woman with a transsexual condition.

Sorry if I got on the soapbox a little bit, there.  And I certainly don't mean to imply that anyone else's approach to their condition is better or worse than mine.  We're all coming at this from different ways.

But I too have my self esteem issues, and this is my way of dealing with them.

-Sandy

[tinkerbell]

However, I now see myself as a woman.  I never was a man.  I don't need any tests to tell me or anything.  Seeing yourself that way is a product of self acceptance.  If it helps, maybe you could view yourself as a transsexual woman for now, but still a woman.

Melissa

This was my point with the little exercise (well, actually my therapist's exercise) It actually had nothing to do with believing that you are a "GG", having a history of womanhood or anything of that nature; as Melissa pointed out, your acknowleging that you are a woman (or a man)  is the result of so many years of living in the wrong body and gender role....the breaking point where "you see yourself"  in the mirror and say: "no more, this is it,", the moment when you accept yourself, the moment when you acknowledge that you have been a walking lie all this time, and perhaps the moment of the beginning of your transition. 

Thank you Melissa

But for me everything I had done up to the time I took my first estradiol shot was pretending.  I was pretending to be female because I would wear woman's clothes, I was pretending because I would feel *naughty* by wearing panties under my clothes.  I realized that I could no longer pretend.  I realized that I really was a woman in a man's body.  And that pretending would no longer be enough.  I had to be true to myself.  That's when the clothes stopped being the issue to me.  Being who I am became important.

Now for the first time in my life I feel incredibly *normal*.

I am happy for you Kassandra.  When the guilt disappears from our hearts and we are just left with that wonderful reality that we are indeed women, that is when the fun starts...



tinkerbell

[Steph]

I seem to have suffered all my life being a woman, not in the sense of GG's but in the sense that I had to fight all my life to be the woman I am today, and even now I know that there are battles ahead.  And lets get one thing perfectly clear, not every woman has a history of being a second class citizen, or even considers themselves to be second class citizens.  Many only adopt that position or claim after being told that they are by feminists or men.  Todays woman is a force to be reckoned with.

Steph

[Sandy]

Todays woman is a force to be reckoned with.

Steph

AMEN to that sister!

-Sandy

[Maud]

When after a few months of HRT you take your top and bra off stare in the mirror and cry.

Cry that finally things are being made right and at that you moment know that everything is only going to get better, words cannot describe that feeling.

[Ms Bev]

Hmmm.....now how did you know what was on my mind just now?

Am I a transsexual?  Like an echo, I ask the same thing all too often....'am.....I.....?'
After enough thought, and pondering just what have I done to myself, and why, my super heroine comes to the rescue.
She says, 'of course you are!  How many times will you question it?  If you were not ts, then you would be the same as you were before.....ready to come out of your own skin.  Would you be happier to go back?'

......Go back?.........a chill runs down my spine.  That's when I know she's right, my super heroine, my wife.

[katia]

if you've lived 35 years of your life in complete agony, that's a very good indication that you're transexual.

[Traci]

Hi there!

I think that most ->-bleeped-<-s experience sexual arousal from wearing female under garments and such, while transsexuals just feel as though they're wearing the proper clothing to accomodate their gender. This is the conventional difference.

Having stated that, I've always felt both!

So what's wrong with being a "transvesexual" or a "transextite"?

Kisses...

[kylie]

Well.....took the test and it thinks I'm a woman. What a surprise. Now all I have to do is become one. So easily said.

But first I need to get over the losses I will incur from my past life and unconditionally accept myself. Every week I get closer through all of your inspiration and in the work with my therapist. I can't wait to start HRT and get some peace.

What a battle we all face. The strength that you all show is out of this world.

God bless,

Kylie

[GoodMorning]

When I took the COGIATI, it was from a link a friend sent me, and I honestly didn't know what it was lol! I thought it was just another personality test (albeit with really strange questions), you know the ones "youre a typical Scorpio, so spend some money this week and try not to brood" etc etc.

When it came back 4, almost 5, I was like

oh

my

god


I understand now that it's not the most scientific of approaches, but for me it provided the push to finally take action. I don't really see a need to further test myself, as I know what's inside better than anyone, and I imagine there will be some tests etc involved later in therapy anyhow. It seems that maybe we are really afraid of not who we are, but of the transition and process that the truth makes us face. It's daunting. Perhaps we turn to tests and quizzes in an attempt to rationalize or prove that it isn't so; and wer'e just sick and need a pill.

Not this girl, no way jose.


Just my thoughts

~Mandy~

[Jillieann Rose]

There is this exercise which everyone who is transsexual should do.  Grab your heart (metaphorically.. ), put it on your right hand, look into the mirror and say "I am a woman or a man (for FTM's)"...if you truly believe that and are willing to transition without any excuses whatsoever...and by transition...I mean the works, hormones, hair removal, name change, RLE, SRS....unless you have a life-threatening medical condition that prevents you from doing so......then you are REALLY transsexual.

Yep I am one too.
Oh and welcome to Traci. She the new girl here.
Would you introduce yourself on the https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/board,8.0.html Introductions Forum so that we can get to know you better. Oh and when I first began to wear female clothing I got aroused but it doesn't happen very often now and I do hate it when it does.
Jillieann