I just realized something today...
I've always had the fear of identity death... lobotomy, electro shock, reprogramming, becoming an automaton or a new person with no association to the old person.
Yet all my life I've been trying my damnedest to destroy my identity... and it worked to suppress it for a long time. I haven't changed, I've just become more me. Everything that was in me before is here now... but with extra emotion and compassion, a freedom of motion, a freedom of expression, and a freedom of spirit. For the first time in my life I feel free to be who I'm supposed to be.
This has nothing to do with the gender part of the equation... that's there and I feel that transition is necessary for me... but this is about releasing the chains that bound my soul.