Susan's Place Transgender Resources

Looking back, did you have a tough time trying to fit in with the other boys?  Were you popular?  Did you engage in sports?  Did you keep to yourself?  Were you outgoing or a wall flower?  Were you confident or afraid?

I was just wondering how much your feminine personality shown through.  Was it something you couldn't hide?  Did you learn to hide it completely?  Or were you somewhere in the middle?

I would imagine that the more feminine you were as a child the more relief you'd feel once you began transition.  If you were pretty much accepted as one of the guys, you probably have more doubts about transitioning because you so successfully led a male life.

What was it like for you then and how does that affect your life today?

Julie

From elementary through to high school, I was often picked on and occasionally beat up for being a "->-bleeped-<-got" or "sissy". I had absolutely no interest in sports, and was always the last one picked for any team. They told me that I threw a ball like a girl, I spent more time on the bench or way out in outer left field. I wasn't popular at all, I kept to myself, practiced music and read lots of books. Adults sometimes mistook me for a girl, and when they apologized, I always wanted to say that they hadn't made a mistake, that I actually was a girl. I had no idea of how to fit in with boys, and in fact, really didn't care to learn how to. I didn't understand guys then, and I still don't :)

Later on, as an adult, I became better at relating to other people, especially able to fit in with other musicians, regardless of gender, after all, we could always talk about guitars, instruments, music, etc. When I came out as transgender, I think that my childhood experiences made more sense from that perspective.

zythyra

Many years ago when I was very Young before I learned how to read I'd ask an adult where the bathroom was they would direct me to the womens room. After that I learned to hide my fem side somewhat but it still would seep through.

I was picked on a bit more than most, but I wasn't flamboyantly effeminate. I DID do and enjoy many "boy" things, but I was also very... passive? non-assertive? It's more that I had a feminine outlook on things, rather than did feminine things. People keep telling me I'm "gentle," which is about as flattering as being "harmless," lol. Either way, it doesn't go over so well in the competitive male social environment. I eventually just excused myself from the game entirely, and withdrew into myself, into my own little world(s).

Kate

Heya Julie,

Am not sure any of those options really apply to me.  I was never that popular although I was accepted as being one of the boys.  I was probably a typical boy, maybe a little quiet and shy, I was always getting in to trouble, climbing on things, playing football, riding my bike, upsetting the neighbours, getting hurt and spending most of my time thinking girls were just stupid.  I was never picked on for being feminine, although I was bullied as I had trouble standing up for myself and didn't like to fight with boys.  All said and done I had a pretty good childhood, life only become a little tough with my gender issues when I started puberty and reached the age of about 16 !!

As you mention, I had major doubts about transitioning for the very reason I was a typical boy.  When I started coming out to the girls I work with I know a few of them said they just couldn't believe it.  Maybe I just did a good job of covering things up ?

I really dont think my childoohd effects who I am today, although there are times I can be with a group of friends and when childhood chat comes up I feel as though my childhood life and my life now dont quite match up.  Sometimes I have to be a bit careful when I am talking about things but its no big deal !!

Becky
xx

I never totally learned how to be a boy.  I was picked on maybe twice and that was in junior high and their only explanation was that they just didn't like me.  It could be they saw the female inside.  Pretty much after that I had learn to defend myself, but still never totally learned how to be a boy.  I had a few friends try and give me some pointers (i.e. don't stand with your hands on your hips), but most just accepted me as just some weird guy and left it at that.

Melissa

In between answers #4 and #5. I suppose I would have been picked on a lot more had I actually had a normal amount of interaction with my peers.

Oh, the boys were into their sports or their playing in the dirt etc and I was always the shy one that didn't do or say much. I also didn't understand them, their thoughts/motivations/actions, and even when socializing one on one I was just kinda bored most of the time. And I also was quite passive and tended to spend a lot of time immersed in my own world. Girls were a different matter - I found it very easy to form close friendships.

I was told I looked like a girl, which I took as a compliment even though I felt I was *supposed* to "correct" people when they guessed that I was. One time in my early teens a boy told me to "talk like a man", which I neither could do nor wanted to, but tried anyway for about 5 minutes just to fit in.

Oh yeah, another thing.  When I was younger, I would makie friends with both boys and girls.  I had 2 male friends I used to play with a lot since it was more acceptable with the adults.  As I got older, the other girls (for the most part) didn't want to really be friends with a boy.  Most of the time I hung out alone or with the few friends I did have.  It just goes to show I learned how to get along with people just fine regardless of their gender.  Even now in the TS world, I have both MTF and FTM friends.  I just have more fun in some of our girl only get-togethers.  Also, the male friend I had before transition, hasn't quite stopped talking to me like I'm a guy and sometimes puts me off a little when telling crude jokes (which I don't really laugh at) and saying things that would be fine between guys.  I'm sure he'll learn eventually, and I'm still curious what his reaction will be when I reveal my sexual orientation (bi, leanign more towards guys).  I think that may force him out of his box.

Melissa

Hmm, well the nice part of being 6'4" is that most of the guys didn't try anything with me. After I put a guy through a window after he was saying what he would do to my sister, they stopped entirly. But other then that one time, I was mostly left alone and didn't interact much with the other students. Maybe thats why I have such a hard time dealing with people as an adult, even if I don't consider myself one.  ;)

I had many friends which were boys and did boy things, sports and fighting but the people I felt more at home with were the girls and still do ;D. But that doesn't mean a thing. My wife maily got on with the boys at school ;D.  ??? ??? ???

I was picked on for a number of reasons, one was that I was overweight. I also had a lot of allergies and in class I was always sniffling and blowing my nose. Allergy attacks all the time. They called me names and I was not good at sports. I had eczema really bad on my legs and that was something to pick on. I kept pretty much to myself and I never socialized with anyone. I think I was in 7th grade when I bought myself a set of weights. It was a cheap set from Sears, 110lb barbell set. I worked out with that for years and found other plates and I swam in our pool and in the ocean and built my body up. I took karate and learned self disipline and was able to take care of myself from 9th grade on. No one picked on me anymore. I was still a loner though. I got into two fights in school and broke a couple of noses and one arm. So I got left alone. I also had a death wish, too. I surfed by myself and would do some stupid things. I never had any goals in my life, just played by the seat of my pants and I still do. I kept to myself all my life, until I found the internet and there were people out there who were like me. I tried to be very masculine, but it was never me. I didn't like it, I like what the girls did, I liked how they socialized, I knew that was me. I liked everything about what the women did. The people who I talked to in my job were women, I never liked the men. I was female and I knew it. As far as I was concerned you could take the whole male gender and drop them off the face of the earth. I hated men and I pretty much don't like them now. There are other reasons why I hate males, but I won't go into that, been over that with my therapist. I'm female now, very happy that I am who I am now.
Sheila

I was picked on a lot from the other boys in my church and quite a bit in grade school. When I got into high school, I was fine.  I didn't have to pretend much, I always had the "I want to be a girl" thougts to fight, but I was accepted as masculine.  I was a loner for the most part.  I was well liked by many but I had no really close friends.  I did like to hang out with the girls a lot.

I went to every dance at the high school.  I loved to dance.  I danced with all the popular girls whether they wanted to or not ;)

I was very immature, partly for skipping a grade, and partly due to the fact that I was just a dweeb.  I wasn't smart enough to just keep my mouth shut.

I don't know that I was popular, but I was well liked.  I managed to not drive people away at least. I was a handsome kid and that helped out where my social skills were lacking.

My parents, adults, and church leaders thought that I was the perfect kid. To them, I was honest, a hard worker, and special in so many ways. I knew otherwise. But then again, most of your reading this understand the never ending string of thoughts running through a GID afflicted youth.

Cindi

I was a misfit for several reasons though I got along ok until junior high when the cliques started forming. I wasn't interested in sports and wasn't welcome with the girls. It just got worse in high school. I was sexually assaulted in my freshman year and nothing came of it. Except for the snickers behind my back and being called queer and ->-bleeped-<-got more times than I can count. I was the butt of every joke and on the receiving end of a lot of stupid pranks. It was the most miserable 4 years of my life.
I stuffed my feelings deep inside, joined the marines and never looked back.
Now, I'm still scarred from my experiences but I'm learning to open up. It's slow work, but my boyfriend helps a lot. He's so good at knowing my moods and when to give me space. One of these days I hope to marry him.
There you go. The short version.


Karen Lyn     :icon_female:

Quote from: beckster on March 11, 2007, 03:10:47 PM
Heya Julie,

Am not sure any of those options really apply to me.  I was never that popular although I was accepted as being one of the boys.  I was probably a typical boy, maybe a little quiet and shy, I was always getting in to trouble, climbing on things, playing football, riding my bike, upsetting the neighbours, getting hurt and spending most of my time thinking girls were just stupid.  I was never picked on for being feminine, although I was bullied as I had trouble standing up for myself and didn't like to fight with boys.  All said and done I had a pretty good childhood, life only become a little tough with my gender issues when I started puberty and reached the age of about 16 !!

As you mention, I had major doubts about transitioning for the very reason I was a typical boy.  When I started coming out to the girls I work with I know a few of them said they just couldn't believe it.  Maybe I just did a good job of covering things up ?

I really dont think my childoohd effects who I am today, although there are times I can be with a group of friends and when childhood chat comes up I feel as though my childhood life and my life now dont quite match up.  Sometimes I have to be a bit careful when I am talking about things but its no big deal !!

Becky
xx

I was going to post what it was like for me but Becky, you pretty much nailed it.  You described pretty much exactly what my life was like growing up.  Even though I always wanted to be a girl, I still did a pretty good job at being accepted as a boy.  My biggest problem was being small.  In 8th grade I topped out at 5'1" and 100 pounds.  There was one other kid about the same height and we competed not to be the shortest.  And my small size told me I'd be stupid if I got in fights, even when the T was raging inside me.  I had to learn to be diplomatic and that helped a lot in being accepted.

I grew to 5'8" and 135 by the end of high school so I was still small but four years of swimming gave me that masculine V shape that helped somewhat in being accepted as one of the guys.  Still, I had trouble thinking and acting like a guy and had to learn a lot of things the hard way, usually through criticism.  What saved me was my sense of humor.  If someone makes you laugh you usually don't feel the need to test them for how tough they are. 

Now that sense of humor makes transitioning easier.  Instead of worrying about how a person will respond to me I find myself kidding around with them.  Once they are laughing I know everything will be okay. 

Julie

*********deleted by Tink*************



tink :icon_chick:

I was picked on.... nearly constantly... by the kids at school, the teachers, the kidsitters... my family... and the list goes on and on.....  My 8th grade year I had it and tried to lock myself off... didnt do that great but I did become kinda popular  but I was still picked on till I exploded one day, then people feared me....
HS same thing though it got better... untill my dad beat the TS out of me (Or so we thought) and then people became afraid of me.... the picking stopped for the most part... but that was because I had a reputation at that point for explodeing when I had had too much... and I was an over all overly confident <ilusion> cocky, smartalleky jerk who wasnt affraid of anything <again ilusion>  I had my mask and I hid behind it for years till it was broken... and when it was I made a new even scarryer one and hid behind that....

I dont like going into any more detail and honestly my childhood was beyond painful so yeah......

Let's just say that until i became the world's worst teenager and started smoking - it was literally years of being deathly and depressedly afraid to even go out of the house in my neighborhood, much less school -which was a daily minefield of constant emotional torture both internally and as bad or worse externally. I dreaded almost every single day of school from age 6 until age 16. I was beat on, picked on, laughed at, and generally abused almost every day in school and/or at home between the ages of 6 and 13 or so, when i finally learned to both defend myself and allow myself to go along with the jokes, in order to diffuse people's interest any longer.

I fell in love so many times - had my heart broken so many times - felt so scared all of the time....of so many things both at home and in school growing up. It was freaking horrible.

The real beauty of it all is that it made me strong. It challenged me to retain any intelligence or compassion whatsoever, it gave me the perspective that cruelty to others is not the answer. It gives me motivation to heal it all and help others in the healing process. I gave me perspective and perception from outside of any norms of the cultural box.

It helped me build highly effective defense mechanisms( some of which were very destructive in my life at different times) and deeply honed my perceptive abilities about other's communications and expressions in general. Gave me a deep hateful dislike of lying, playing unfair games, or being vengeful. Gave me a deep hatred of sarcasm and all other forms of negative, indirect, neglectful, and dishonest communication between people in general, and especially when directed at me -  Helped me to understand the depth of pain that people can actually feel and still survive somehow. Gave me real empathy for all other's thoughts and feelings.

The list of real tragically beautiful benefits and blessings from the same sources of pain is now amazing to me and longer yet still.....Way too long to list if i really got rolling on it here, and started really thinking about it...  It was like growing up in a different country, or even on a different planet - it really was - i lived in the planet of me, and it was a dark and cold and confusing place for many years of my young life -

i was so socially isolated, yet became so deeply enmeshed with it all - in my own negative and violently miserable and destructive ways as i grew older into my teen years....

All in all, it could have been much worse, :) and i'm sure many of you have had worse... I'm still here now, and i am a deeply loving person that is highly motivated to improve things within myself, and thereby also be able to more effectively help anyone else that has ever suffered such unfair and ruthless and brutal things in their own lives, more than ever before in my entire life.

I'd like nothing more now than to help  beat down all the lies and the hatred in this world, all the freaking lies between and about people, and human limitation - and accepted social "norms", "standards", cultures, religions, and races. All this garbage will have to get thrown out so that we dont choke ourselves to death on it.

(she then opens her purse with a very ladylike and rather stoic grace, and gently puts away her little mini soapbox)....
;D 

Sincerely,
Thanks for asking.


Annagirl

#5. Mercilessly picked on and ostracized.

Until roughly, 8 years old, it was somewhat idyllic.

And then after that point, a searing cauldron of agony, confusion and pain.

Here's a story that actually shows the power of our gift.

I was always picked on in grade school. I started 4th grade in a new city and new school. Within the first week I was labeled a sissy and had to fight a boy after school. He beat me up and then the boy's taunted and chased me home almost every day for three years.

We moved again after the 6th grade and I started in a new school. Same stuff. Early fight and got beat up. However, I was growing tall and basketball started. I had spent hours shooting baskets by myself for many years so I was pretty good. So after basketball started and I made the team, the kids just thought I was wierd. The taunting and fights didn't stop but they lessoned.

Then High School started out just like the other two new schools I'd attended. Soon after starting class there was a Junior, a little tough guy wrestling champ, that tried to pick a fight with me. But this time I didn't take the bait and get all fired up. After surrendering to myself the inevitability of the outcome, I calmly said to him in front of his friends that if he wanted to fight all he had to do was follow me out of the school. Then I turned and walked out calmly and slowly. After hesitating, he followed me out and I was sure that I was going to get beat up again. But as I just kept calmly walking out, he finally just gave up and blew me off. The next day I had a reputation for standing up to this guy. And it was then and there that I learned that passivity and quiet confidence is a powerful weapon.

Later in High School I wasn't having any luck with the girls. I just wasn't motivated to experiment sexually. I just wanted to be their friend. One day, I asked a girl I knew what she did to get a guy to like her. And she shared the secret. She told me that all she had to do was act uninterested and aloof from their overtures and that would drive them to want her more. So from that day forward, I did it like a girl would. I would act uninterested and aloof and it worked like a charm. All of a sudden I was dating the Home Coming Queen and most of the other popular girls. But, it never lasted very long as I still didn't have it in me to connect with them sexually. Something just didn't fit right for me.


So these two events taught me how to be calm, quite and confident and how to get people to like and want me by being aloof and uninterested in them. And I carried this off with the best of them to the successes I have had in business, friendships, relationships and life in general.

Ooh, the power of the female mind.

Gwen

Great story Gwen!  I really enjoyed it. :)

Melissa

Quote from: Melissa on March 12, 2007, 06:09:45 PM
Great story Gwen!  I really enjoyed it. :)

Melissa

Thanks Melissa! I'm glad that it brought something to your day. Just as your acknowledgment brought something to mine.

Best wishes,

Gwen

okay this is my story

im the only son in 5 siblings. 4 all sister

my aunty always calls me a girl (damn i hate it)

i dont hate a girl but..

i want to be precise...im a boy, then people call me a girl , i think it was kind of insult

its happen everytime. until im 18 years old. i do looks a bit like girl. i have girly face. no big jaws, very girly face

as times goes by, i think i have a women brains. i cant lie to it anymore, however, im sexual attracted to women.

so thats why i think im a lesbian trapped in man body..hahahahaha

at school, some gay boy were attracted to me, its really suck. i mean, the gay boy that looks like a pure man!!! eww!! but they like a man too..i cant live with that...

i like girl, but girl dont like me, and they often mistaken me as a tomboy girl!! its really sucksss

I've always been picked on, my whole life, for being feminine. At school I had all girl friends, maybe 5 male friends my whole life and I wasn't ever very close to them. I had one male best friend my whole life and that was for two years when I moved to a different town, then we moved back to where we used to live. But ever since I've been in school, kids have been calling me gay or Michele etc. =/ I don't mind it anymore haha but teasing really hurt as a kid.

Thinking of elementary school and junior high, I was a wall flower, very shy and scared, and I absolutely hated sports and gym with a passion and would do anything to get out of them. I don't know how feminine I was, but I sure did not fit in with the guys.  Didn't have girl friends, so really did not fit in with anyone except for a small click of a few guys, but even there I was on the fringe and it was more like they befriended me.  In high school I surrounded myself with church people and put most of my effort into Spanish club. 

Quote from: Julie Marie on March 11, 2007, 09:09:12 AM
Looking back, did you have a tough time trying to fit in with the other boys?  Were you popular?  Did you engage in sports?  Did you keep to yourself?  Were you outgoing or a wall flower?  Were you confident or afraid?

I was just wondering how much your feminine personality shown through.  Was it something you couldn't hide?  Did you learn to hide it completely?  Or were you somewhere in the middle?

I would imagine that the more feminine you were as a child the more relief you'd feel once you began transition.  If you were pretty much accepted as one of the guys, you probably have more doubts about transitioning because you so successfully led a male life.

What was it like for you then and how does that affect your life today?

Julie

never had a feminine personality i was kind of a shy kid with few male friends.  I just felt awkward around guys.  I was average build, average strength, i could play sports when i wanted to, but i would stay away from group sports and just stuck to solitary ones like martial arts.   I was picked on a lot until 10th grade, when i got into a fight with someone on the volleyball team, he had been picking on me for a while, but i was a green belt in karate at the time and decided i would stick up from myself finally.  I was civil about it though, saying i didnt want to get expelled so i would fight him outside school grounds where ever he wanted... he had... other ideas and punched me... Well, about 2 minutes later he ran off bleeding from the nose and with a cut chin.  He was taller then me, but i wasnt hurt at all from it.  After the fight i got some respect (he was stronger and taller then me) and people left me alone, which i liked and wanted in the first, place. 

I always seemed to have more female friends then male, i found it easy to talk to girls and almost instantly assimilated into any female group, however male groups were hard for me to join and become a peer.  I couldn't ask out a girl though, relationships were hard... it was confusing.  I didnt have a thing for men, and liked women at the time, but just didnt have the tools to properly court one, however i did lose my (male) virginity so i wasnt totally inept. I had strongly wanted to be female since puberty kicked in, but i thought of it as a phase... that would go away... looking back at my life, i have always been female really.  Even at 5 i wanted to do what girls were doing instead of guys, i took on female roles in pretend play, I never felt comfortable in groups of all males, and I associated with female role models on TV and not male.... so.. what can i say... i have been this way my whole life... good to finally drop the male conditioning and just be free to feel and act without walls.

I was always a loner, and that in itself got me picked on.   I was called "->-bleeped-<-", "Queer" and every other name that was derogatory.

I learned that I was not like the other boys and girls just seem to gravitate to me as one of their own.

I've been picked on quite a bit quite all my life (even after the "school years" were over) I was so glad when high school ended... I thought I'd get a break from it... But no

I tried my damnedest to act like a guy, but I was fooling no-one and was constantly being questioned about my sexuality and gender and of coarse I've been called every name in the book

So love me or not... Here I am

I always had mostly girl friends and maybe one or two guy friends at any given time.  In elementary school, I had lots of friends who were girls and hardly any boy friends that I can even remember.  I would play barbies, dolls, dressup, and other "girl" play with them.  At home I generally played with Lego bricks but didn't really have any gender-specific toys.  (I wasn't really interested in boy's toys so my parents got me neutral things to play with.) At school, I socialized and hung out with the girls, my best friends were always girls.  I think my parents tried to direct my friendships to be with more boys as I moved into my teenage years (age 10-15) but the boys who I wound up befriending were still rather effeminate, and I never really learned "male" socialization except what I needed to function.  I was part of the Mormon young mens groups and was enrolled in Boy Scouts and even succeeded in earning Eagle Scout, but I always felt like a loner, never felt like I fit in with the boys and usually kept to myself during the camp outs and other activities.

Once I started high school I saw that my best girlfriend wanted a boyfriend.  She asked me to be her boyfriend.  I had no idea what to do!  I went to her house, hung out and we talked about clothes, movies, played board games, and at the end of it she said that boyfriends kissed their girlfriends.  I figured I'd give it a try and was horrible at it.  We broke up (which was fine with me less pressure) and stayed good girlfriends (I was always considered "one of the girls" in our group) till I moved away a few years later.  In High School, I was a nerdy, drama geek, but accepted in the drama club and was what I would consider the "B-group" of the popular kids (not the jocks / cheerleaders, but drama/academic popularity - people knew me and I got invited to parties as long as they weren't the A-group only stuff).  Since I was in drama I had an outlet for my femininity and could act effeminate and "get away with it" - I danced like a girl, dressed very ambiguously andro, had long hair in a pageboy cut, and even when I talked to myself in the mirror, it was a girl talking to me.  Many people thought I was just closet gay.  This was the case for many years and I actually wondered if maybe I was gay but I really just wasn't attracted to boys.  I always preferred girls but was always more interested in an emotional connection versus physical satisfaction, and was happier to give her pleasure than to do anything even remotely related to my own genitals (which I really saw as out of place and in the way).  Thus the cycle of me as "a good friend" to my girlfriends continued.  I got picked on for being nerdy, wearing glasses, got called "->-bleeped-<-" quite a bit but never got physically assaulted for how I presented myself.  I even sometimes got hit on by gay guys to which I'd reply "I'm flattered but not gay sorry...".  A few of those guys said "yea right" and prophesied to me me that one day I'd realize I was.

After high school, I went on a mission for the Mormon church, which was really just a huge exercise in my ability to "stay in character" since I really did not believe it but thought that my family's acceptance of me and future support of my schooling was dependent on me completing a 2-year missionary service.  Once I found that I could stay in character as a "good mormon boy" I could be myself during alone time but suppressed my own needs and personality until I could do the "extended acting gig" as a mormon.  I just continued that role until I met my spouse Jenn (Jennypenny on this board).  She was the first person who I actually started to let the "real me" out with.  We were best friends immediately and went shopping and talked and hung out all the time.  I didn't have to be a "guy" with her nor did I have to put on the "good mormon boy" facade any longer.  She still saw me as essentially male (...I never considered that there was any other way for me to be.) and we wound up getting happily married.   We eventually left the Mormon church together due to many issues with their teachings being incompatible with our own personal beliefs.  Coming out to our families as Non-Mormon was difficult and certainly caused some stresses in the relationships with our parents / siblings, but it was a huge burden that we were finally able to live our lives more authentically and in tune with our own worldview.  I was finally able to shed the "good mormon boy" role and could be myself around everyone.  At that time Jenn had some issues regarding her own sexuality and identity, but I did not - I was still exploring my new freedom to be myself without the overwhelming weight of the church over my head.  Little did I know that I also had gender issues of my own that still hadn't surfaced yet.   The changes in my life allowed me to explore my self and to rediscover and express my new worldview.  But it seemed that there was still something missing.

Having children forced me into the "Dad" role and I did fine playing that role (and still do especially if the kids need big scary dad-monster to reprimand them).  I tried to be the masculine of our relationship - Jenn has been a stay at home mother because we thought having a consistent parent with the children was important even if it was a sacrifice on our funds / choices.  Jenn has always been the more dominant / driving force in our family but generally did the domestic chores and housework and took care of the children while I was at work.  Even so, I was always less "hefty" and always more of a girly guy.  I didn't think of myself as gay since, again i was attracted to women, but I definitely felt more at ease and happier when expressing my feminine side.  I seem to be much more in-touch with the children when I can express myself as a female around them, even using a more feminine voice.  I didn't realize it at the time but these were ways my feminine side was emerging and I was finding that if I allowed myself to express as a female (even if I didn't present as such) I felt more like myself at home with my familial relationships, and in my professional relationships as well.

Jenn got chronically ill about 2 years ago and was confined to bed for a long time and now is basically housebound except for medical appointments.  While she has been sick, I have wound up working from home and taking on many of her domestic responsibilities.  Surprisingly, I felt so much better and at peace when I could be the "mom" and do "mom stuff".  Keeping up the house and taking care of the kids was so rewarding and fulfilling. I loved being a domestic goddess, and was a little sad when Jenn started feeling better and could do more on her own.   The cognitive dissonance got stronger in my identity as being fundamentally male, leading to depression that I was able to overcome by finally realizing that the problem is more that "I'm really not meant to be a male, and have been female all the time."  This single realization suprised me.  I never considered that my gender identity could be something that would ever be an issue.  However exploring these feelings allowed me to see my life in a whole new light and things just "made sense".  The more I explore my memories and past experiences the more and more I seem to think that my entire life has been spent trying to play the role of a male, when it has always been more natural and satisfying for me to express myself as a female.   I can only imagine the changes that I may experience as a result of at least anti-androgen therapy.
 
Anyway I'm not sure if I got too far off track from the OP but once I start sharing my stories, it just starts coming out like a flood.

"I was picked on but never really learned how to be a boy" is the short answer lol.

Cheers!
Rayalisse

For my whole childhood I was bullied, picked on, beat up etc. for being weird and not normal.

Girls would talk and laugh about me behind my back, boys would call me names or beat me up or kick me down if I was unfortunate to cross their path.

And as a result of that I believe I have social difficulties now.  :( I'm very shy and feel uncomfortable when surrounded by lots of people (especially if they are children/teenagers). I don't really have any other friends except my boyfriend, I can be completely relaxed about everything around him as he accepts me as I am, all the good with all the bad. I'm finding it hard to let people get close.

I'm trying to work on this issue.

I was picked on a fair amount but I was a somewhat chubby bookworm with glasses and an overbite - it was bound to happen.

from what my friends say, i never gave off any overtly fem signals, but i was a walflower, shy and quiet...and I spent not a little time socializing with girls

In high school, that turned into being the "crying shoulder" for my girlfriends when they were done wrong (or felt they had been) by various guys and that extended well into young adulthood.

while I was still trying to be a guy correctly, it always infuriated me that these girls would bemoan the lack of "nice guys" but were always attracted to macho jerks instead of me - looking back is think in terms of emotions and passivity and my approach to dating and things sexual, i was a lot more "girly" than I or anyone else realized - we just didn't have a frame of reference for considering a guy to be girlish unless it was very stereotypical "swishyness" that goes along with the cliche for gay men.

Quote from: Tammy Hope on September 02, 2010, 06:19:21 PM
In high school, that turned into being the "crying shoulder" for my girlfriends when they were done wrong (or felt they had been) by various guys and that extended well into young adulthood.

You bring up some of my memories with your comments Tammy!  I don't think I can count how many girlfriends sat and poured their hearts out to me about their issues with jerky guys and also wanted them to be attracted to me instead of essentially being their girlfriend.  Sigh.

Cheers!
Rayalisse

Quote from: Rayalisse on September 02, 2010, 07:18:29 PM
You bring up some of my memories with your comments Tammy!  I don't think I can count how many girlfriends sat and poured their hearts out to me about their issues with jerky guys and also wanted them to be attracted to me instead of essentially being their girlfriend.  Sigh.

Cheers!
Rayalisse

I'll second that *Also sighs*

Quote from: Rayalisse on September 02, 2010, 07:18:29 PM
You bring up some of my memories with your comments Tammy!  I don't think I can count how many girlfriends sat and poured their hearts out to me about their issues with jerky guys and also wanted them to be attracted to me instead of essentially being their girlfriend.  Sigh.

Cheers!
Rayalisse

And I'll third that. I was always trying to be the nice sensitive guy and all the girls thought of my as a friend. They seemed to only like the boys that mistreated them. In retrospect, makes so much sense now, but at the time, very frustrating.

My feminine mannerisms, speech patterns, and interests got me into a lot of trouble both at home with my father and abroad with my classmates and peers.  I was often called names like
"->-bleeped-<-got" and "gayrod", picked on mercilessly, and hated it.  When I reached high school I decided to do my best to "fit in" for the first time and met some friends who took pity on me and taught me to behave more masculine and would correct me when I wasn't.  It worked, I soaked it up like a sponge becoming what I now call, "The Actor" and fit in from that point until before my transition.

Transition was a great relief though from the role of the actor.  If only I'd had more self confidence (as I do now), I might never have needed to transition to learn to be ok with my feminine self.  But who knows?

Gosh Perlita, horrid memories.  :'(

I went to all boys catholic schools. So I was immersed in boy world without female guidence.  It was a pretty miserable time. I hung out with the off-casts - the weird korean guy, the funny indian guy, the fat malaysian dude and the uber android geek. I really liked them though, they were all querky and neat. I fit in with them. But then I did not feel totally in. There was always something not quite right. But none of them really fitted the male ideal so we were all equal in that.

My home life was not that great. My dad is Bipolar and would frequently snap into violent rages, smashings things, hitting mum and me and my sibs. You get super aware of emotions around you, feeling for when he might go. But it would still catch me by surprise, like once I was laughing with my sister and next thing I know I am seeing stars. My dad had taken offense at my laugh. One time I threatened him with a hocky stick as he was going to hit mum. That was one of my worst memories I think.

I was quiet for the most part and escaped into books. I would stay up late reading, read as I had breakfast, while walking to school, at lunch in the library, and on the way home. But I also loved roughing it around outdoors in the weekends, building weapons and traps and forts, often on my own though. Though often I could read a weekend away only coming up for food and bathroom breaks. That was my bliss.

I was often madly depressed since highschool. I would go to school, greasy hair, unshaven, unwashed, unfit, just hating life, filled with this horrid hormone, consumed with vagina envy. They made me shave to meet the school standards. I was short, glasses, braces. I got picked on, teased. One time I got hung by my scarf. Good times.

Early school was hard, I spent a lot of it alone, not doing work. Dyslexia made it hard, I could not spell or concentrate, and the teaches thought I was dumb. But once I got to highschool academic stuff became easy, so that was a nieche I could get into. One of the brainy kids, there was a kind of jelouse respect for that. I developed an acid tongue to help pretect me and could pull people apart with my words. I used the weapons I had, stabbing a bully once with a compass. I hated life. 

There were good times in there. I had a few good friends a along the way. People I got up to mischief with - climbing trees, trying to break into places. I was kind of popular at 11 and 12, cheeky, fast, strangely strong for my size. But people moved on though building their manly lives where I stayed a kid in that regard. I used to play imaginary games with my cousins. And me and my friends at highschool would stay at each others houses in the weekends and watch porn movies, play video games, or make vids of us pretending to fight with each other. I had my firearms and drivers licence at 15 so I would take friends out rabbit shooting.

I escaped to another city when 17 , my childhood was over.

I really do not like thinking about my childhood  :(  I will not get too descriptive other than I had to put up with a load of stuff

It didn't matter... Home... School... Church... There was always a load of stuff to put up with out of several people

There's a reason a kid attempts to hang themselves in the front yard tree at a young age

Ladies,
I have to say, the strength of character and perseverance shown in these posts is truly awesome to behold. Survivors all.

I'm FtM but even I can see from the wonderful stories what strong women you are. :)

You all have my respect.  ;D

Learning the hard way by example that one should always at all costs hide one's true self under threat of severe bodily harm was a wonderful lesson taught me by my parents, one that took me years to unlearn. It becomes a way of life and you just do it naturally, never realizing how sick and unnatural it really is, until one day your true self just has to come forth or else you will wither and die, huddled up hiding inside yourself.

Finally that little girl inside overcame her abusive past and now flourishes in her new body. This is the happy ending/beginning to this story.

I was teased pretty badly in elementary school starting around 2nd grade.  This led to being quiet and withdrawn since I never fit in.  Had plenty of girls as friends until I started getting made fun of for it, at which point I learned to suppress my real personality and adopted a very boring shell personality.  Until college I was severely withdrawn and channeled all of my energy into academic pursuits and reading fictional novels.  For a long time I tried to tell myself the other kids were just jealous because I was so much smarter than them and that's why I rarely got along with anyone.  I ended up representing my elementary school at the county level in 3 spelling bees and my middle and high schools in several math and science competitions.  I think I placed 23rd in the state of Florida in one of them.  Such a spectacular egghead  :-\

In middle school, the teasing was pretty merciless.  I got jeers and insults in gym class in 7-8th grade.  Usually it was someone insinuating that I was a girl or a wimp.  I still cried a lot at that age, which probably added to it.

Somehow, being smart eventually earned me respect and I wasn't teased at all in high school.  I usually just got nods and stuff because people saw my name everywhere.  I got in with the arrogant honors clique (male and female) around 10th grade and mostly hung out with them until graduation.

Overall, I always found it hard to relate with guys on anything more than a superficial level.  I still have that trouble.  I can actually talk to girls though, and most of my lasting friendships are with women.

Looking back, I realize how hard I worked to be accepted.  I suppose many kids did the same thing.  Some got the hang of it, some didn't.  I became very good at it.

I entered kindergarten in 1956 and graduated high school in 1969, not a good time to entertain thoughts about coming out.  (I didn't even know what coming out was!)  Gradually along the way I got the cues from kids around me what was and what wasn't acceptable behavior.  And I also learned what the consequences were for not conforming to the acceptable norm.  During those years I never uttered a word to anyone about the feelings I had inside.  I knew the consequences would be severe.  And it wasn't until I was a sophomore in high school that I first read or heard anything about other people like me.  According to the information in the article, I was one-in-a-million.  Finding someone like me was almost impossible.

Intense fear kept me in line.  Few things scared me more than family and friends finding out I secretly wished I was a girl.  But that thought consumed me.  While my teacher may have thought I was taking notes I was writing acronyms and codes in my notebook about my one wish - IWIWAG - I wish I was a girl.  I must have written that thousands of times.  Practically all my quiet time, all my alone time, I was totally absorbed in this dream.

But once thrown back out into the world, I put on the face and did my best.  Over the years I became so good at it I actually became somewhat popular.  And by then I had convinced myself I could live the rest of my life carrying my secret to the grave.