So how long have you felt that you had GID?

[VeronikaFTH]

While there were hints throughout my childhood, the first clear one was about age 12, when punerty began. I saw myself in a mirror and was horrified, but resolved that whatever was wrong, nothing could be done, so I'd accept I had to live in a deformed body, hide it away, and try not to think about it. Throughout my teens, I wished to be a girl, dreamt about it, etc., but because I didn't know about trans stuff, I thought it was a creepy and perverted sexual thing (being asexual and knowing nothing about that either, I figured there had to be some sex stuff up there, and identified the trans stuff as such), and was ashamed of it.

I only realized the truth when I connected the dots between all the different issues I had and found that they corresponded to the stuff I saw trans people write online. The shock was bad enough that I couldn't eat a bite for a week. I was 22.

This is my history almost exactly, except I didn't connect the dots until I was 35. But the rest could be taken word-for-word from the storybook of my life.

When I was younger I didn't really think about it at all. I just did what I wanted. Puberty was the first time I started to have problems with my gender.

People who say they were 4 or 5 and thinking about gender, I can't sypathize with. I honestly didn't care either way. I played with who I wanted, did what I wanted. I even did "boy" things like riding motorcycles/dirt bikes and playing with cars. However I was also a very emotional and feminine child.

I just chalk all this up to me mentally being a tomboy growing up. Since I was interested in some boy things, I never felt any GID until the bodily changes came. 

[Michael Joseph]

I remember since age three really wanting to be a boy and not understanding why I had a girls body. For a few years as a teenager, I tried to fit in as a girl, but it didnt work, an about 2 years ago I realized I had GID.

[Medusa]

I never felt good among boys, but I also dont think about gender until late puberty
I was always girly, crying at summer camp, wearing cute things until others starts to laught at me

[Emmanuelle]

I never named the feelings I had in childhood. they just felt awkward and it felt like I had to really do my best to be a boy. It's only much later when I realized that I'm a woman that all these feelings from back then started to make sense. It was like a puzzle being solved

[V M]

I remember feeling dismayed when my mom and sisters pointed out that I was different and that I had to start acting like a boy just before I started elementary school

Then I was constantly jealous of my sisters because they got the princess treatment while everyone was going to toughen me up and make a man out of me in some way

It was the 6th grade when things started to really heat up though... People commenting and making fun of how girlie I was and calling me a ->-bleeped-<- and trying to beat me up

I didn't have any idea what GID was yet but I knew even though I liked girl stuff I had better start "acting" like a boy as best as I could

So that's what I did... But the comments and name calling and general harassment never did stop really until my step dad started teaching me the martial arts he'd learned in Viet Nam

[rejennyrated]

At the risk of being thought a troublemaker I am not sure that I ever really did - in the terms that it is defined by your DSM anyway, and certainly since the mid 80's when I had my surgery I haven't had it.

But if you are asking when did I start my journey of transition that was in 1964 or 1965 aged between 4 and 5.

[Janet_Girl]

I have suffer off and on for years.  Even since puberty.  Before then I was just being a kid.  Elementary school began the separation between boys and girls, and I always wanted to go with the girls.  That was when I began to learn what bulling was.

[E]

I have suffer off and on for years.  Even since puberty.  Before then I was just being a kid.  Elementary school began the separation between boys and girls, and I always wanted to go with the girls.  That was when I began to learn what bulling was.

Apart from public bathrooms and changing rooms, there was no separation between boys and girls over here, so that may have contributed to why it took me as long as it did to figure out.

[Janet_Girl]

not in a physical sense.  More in that they did not socialize together.  girls would go off and so would the boys.

[E]

not in a physical sense.  More in that they did not socialize together.  girls would go off and so would the boys.

Ah, I see. We had that, yeah. However, since I was always the moving force behind the games we played, and I'd include everyone, that part didn't apply to me - girls and boys alike played the games I made up.

[Joelene9]

I'm about the same age as Janet. Back the late 50's and early 60's when Janet and I went to elementary school, there was a separation of boys and girls during the lunch recess on the playground. There were some interaction during gym. Even though I felt more girl-like, I tended to like boys' activities anyway. This manifested during puberty when the girls were developing breasts and I was wondering "where was mine?", even though I knew that boys just don't have breasts. Age 6-7, before my parents had their D-I-V-O-R-C-E!
Joelene

[Emmanuelle]

A bit younger, but back in the 70ies - when I was in the elementary school - everything was separated: there was a girls-school and a boys-school, girl-scouts and boy-scouts shared the same venue, but when the boys were there the girls were elsewhere so our paths basically never crossed. The only thing I remember that was mixed were the swim-team trainings, but I suspect that was only because they didn't have enough trainers for our age group. But even during the training, the boys would swim first and the girls would follow.

Come to think of it... no wonder I felt lonely as a child

[michelle.ch]

I was thirty-five when I first felt like that. Up until then I had never been particularly satisfied with myself as a male, but had no idea why. I remember I wasn't pleased about the changes occurring in my body in puberty, but I had no idea why. I had never even heard of the word transgender, had never seen a ->-bleeped-<- or drag queen (I thought Edna Everidge was a woman!).

Even though it seems most people realise by their early teens, I know at least two others like me who were not crossdressers earlier and who hadn't thought of themselves as anything other than male (though again, not completely satisfied in the role) until later in life. 

[spacial]

I just knew that I was a girl. I suppose I first put it into thought when I was 4 years. That's when I first realised that I really was a girl. You know how, sometimes, you feel you are a twin or something like that? It wasn't like that. The possibility of having a lost twin was always a fantasy.  I just knew I was suppose to be with the girls and not the boys.

I spent many years, trying to think of why. Nothing really made any sense.

In adulthood, I've found ways to come to terms with it. I accept that the world precieves me as a male in the same way as i accept the world precieves things that may not be true. But I know I'm female, even though I look male.

It would have been nice if the world was a bit different when I was younger. The opportunities there are now, while imperfect and difficult, are so much better.

[Ribbons]

Since I was ten. It was just simple things like how I preferred to be called a "him" rather then a "her" online since it left me more gender neutral. Then it slowly esceladed once I turned twelve, when I began questioning my gender. The dysphoria didn't begin until I was thirteen.

Now that I think back to my childhood, the 'tomboyish' behavior of mine seems more like male behavior.

[Michelle.]

Probably around tween/teens. I started raiding my Moms closet. A few years later I was involved in what he thought were gay encounters. I though figured out that something was  wrong, with me. Not wrong, wrong. More like I was in the wrong body. I wanted to be more than just a Fem bottom. It was than that I began to think about just how one changed their physical sex.

So I guess I have known for a fairly long time.

[N.Chaos]

I was always weird as a kid but the actual "I don't feel right" probably didn't sink in all the way until highschool. I didn't even know there was a name for it until a few years ago. Growing up my huge dream was to be a night, lol. I wanted to save princesses and everything. I remember beating down a guy for picking on a girl I liked in third grade, all sorts of stuff like that. I still liked my hair long though, I played with action figures AND dolls, and pretty much anything appealing to me. My parents never forced me one way or the other and let me pick out clothes until I got stuck in a private school. Throughout highschool-I don't remember much of the time in private school beyond some horrible memories, I've actually got a bit of brain damage-I always felt I had to explain to people "I've got a male brain, I'm a guy trapped in a girls' body" but I guess I never realized how serious I was about it. I felt disgusting in dresses, felt like I was wearing a costume that didn't fit right. I tried to force myself to be ultra-feminine and be a "normal girl" and it nearly killed me. I tried to hang myself twice in high school and kept myself so doped up on painkillers and uppers that half the time I didn't know my own name until I had no money and no way of getting it. I got angrier the longer I was sober, I started to feel how I used to.That feeling of wrongness got heavier and heavier, my rage at myself and at a lot of women got bigger and darker and a lot more vicious.

Eventually, I crashed. I thought about being an old woman some day, about being buried in a dress, about having to check F on every legal form I ever filled out again, and things started making sense. I realized why exactly I hated my full name, why it felt like such a harsh insult. I realized why I felt natural liking girls but odd about liking other guys. There's bits and pieces I don't remember well, and probably some parts I screwed up, but that's more or less my five minute explanation.

[regan]

My therapist gave me a worksheet to complete while we talk about HRT, here's my answer to that question...

I struggle to answer the question of when did I first become aware that my gender identity was different from other people.  As a young child I openly engaged in crossgender behaviors with my female cousin such as painting our finger nails and engaging with her as my primary playmate on a number of occasions.  I had a doll, complete with stroller, but I also played with action figures and a variety of "army" style games.  Privately I began crossdressing about age 6, and did so off and on until about age 11 when it became a much more regular activity.  I don't know that I fully questioned my gender identity before then, as I look back on it now, I recall periods, prior to 11, wondering what was wrong with me – recognizing that most boys didn't do the things I did, or rather didn't enjoy doing the things I did though I'm not clear I associated it with expressing my gender identity until later on.

As for the stock "my whole life" answer, that's a throwback to when that's what it took to please the gatekeepers.  That's not really true for anyone, at least not anymore.

[eshaver]

I'll be 61 this year ............. I can honestly say I have had these feelings since I was at least five . I finially came out and went full time as of 1994. I'm not looking back and I'm looking at the future and trying to teach the ill informed and the closeted as to who we are . Ellen

[lancem27]

Forever...it was relatively benign as a child. I was pretty comfortable in boyhood, I never truly believed I would grow up to be a "woman" one day. The idea of me being a girl was just to surreal; it never truly sunk in until puberty. Puberty involved a lot of tears...followed by a backlash of overcompensation. I felt that God made me this way because I was meant to be a servant. To not be myself, just to work for the benefit of others. Be the quiet girl who never spoke back, be feminine because it was the best thing for everyone around me. Being masculine, being myself, being the boy meant hurting others.

that lessened when I came out as liking women. Now I feel a lot of anger and resentment to those who contributed to my feeling that way. That I should just be a silent backdrop in life, that everyone else should have their dreams, be who they are and not me. F-ck.