I don't even know what to do. I ranted most of this out to my best friend so I can at least manage to say this all without swearing up a storm.
My mom wanted me, her, and dad to all talk. Naturally I was anxious/nervous and my anxiety was warranted.
It was pretty much terrible. My father kept throwing the whole 'you're a female/girl because you're born a girl'
and kept asking me what I was trying to gain from wanting to become male
And a bunch of other crap(oops that wasn't crap before I caught myself), leaving me having been crying for two freaking hours now, wondering if I'm just delusional.
If I'm just making this all up
If I'm not actually trans but just being impulsive and crazy with seeing this therapist(whom my dad and mom think are trying to push me too fast, even though she's not pushing me)
They(my parents) denied my referral to an endo because they think it's all moving too fast and they want me to go see my GP first for i don't know. talking? blood work?
mom thought my mysterious anxiety was going to be solved, but I'm fairly convinced half my problems are from my dysphoria.
It's just hard to get them to understand. I don't want to move too fast, but I don't want to waste my life. I'm only 18 and I've barely lived, but I've also /barely lived/. My whole teen years have been spent being depressed because of school, only to finally be out of school and have all this other crap shoved on me, including my gender identity confusion.
This probably makes no sense, i'm just upset and can't stop crying and confused and think I'm going crazy, but every time I picture myself happy, I picture myself as a male, not a female.
I dont' know what to do. I'm seeing my therapist tomorrow and having mom talk her concerns to her. Idk what i'm going to do. I feel so lost.
I understand the feeling of treatment so near but yet so far. When I was your age, I had much the same feeling and couldn't do anything about it for different reasons. You may already know about this but the contents of this link might be useful in countering some of your parents arguments. I also hope your therapist can help your parents understand as well.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_transsexualism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_transsexualism)
Thanks. I'm pretty sure my dad would still be sceptical about it. I tried to tell him that there are differences and I told my mom that there are difference in the physical brains.... My mom is more understanding as well I guess
I'm just exhausted. All the time. Especially now since I've only now, after three hours, sort of stopped crying. I'm not really looking forward to tomorrow but whatever. i'll deal.
I'm just still confused on whether I'm just... making this up for some reason, but I doubt I'd do all I have, post here as much as I have, and go to a therapist for gender identity confusion(which she hasn't challenged... just taken my word for it really) if I was just making things up
I just wish I wasn't handed, as I like to call it, the 'queer hand of cards' in life. things would be easier.
Whatever you do, don't ever think you are making this up because you aren't. People who believe they are making this up end up delaying treatment to a much latter date. It is real and you are perfectly sane but you have a birth defect that requires a different form of treatment. The words you think don't make sense to us do. We share the same feelings and have had to deal with many of the same problems you are currently dealing with. I look like a finish product here but you have seen little of the 10 years I waited for treatment to become available and then another 8 trying to find the right treatment. You should have seen the Endo and been put on blockers as soon as you therapist said you were ready but your parents lack of knowledge is delaying treatment. If they would be willing to come to the SO side of the board, I would be happy to talk with time but I don't think they will. Your best hope will be with your therapist.
Something you can't see now because of all the pain you are in is that this will make you a far better person. The personal strength you will gain will help you deal with life better than the average CIS who has never had to deal with problems like this. One of the reasons I spend so much time on this board is the difference in the people. People I meet day to day seem to be 2 dimensional while the people I post with here are 3 dimensional. The people understand themselves better, they are more open and to some degree are more intelligent.
If you're 18 I presume you are now legally your own person. They may not want you to see an endo but they can't physically stop you. Sounds like they're using a lot of tactics to emotionally stop you, and maybe they are still controlling the purse strings so that might make it difficult if you need them to pay for therapy and HRT. It's not surprising that they would do this, it's part of the bargaining process in coming to terms with grief where basically they try to talk you out of it.
Hi -
Please know you aren't making this up. To really get the matter sorted will require some therapy and probably some for your parents (that may be tough to do). The family unit is in real stress now; that's not your fault or anyone's for that matter. It'll take some time for the clear positions of everyone to settle out. You've known far quite awhile and they probably are just coming on board. Whatever you do, retain your ability to love them despite how things are and may be in the future. For you, love is the answer. That doesn't mean being treated poorly is OK; it isn't and you may to take steps at some time to deal with that. But as time passes love is the only thing matters. I'm an old lady and speak from many decades of experience.
OTOH: Being boneheaded and lacking an understanding of the possibilities here is as a trial for your parents - from different perspective than yours. That doesn't make their behavior OK, but it does explain it for a while.
Keep in touch, share as often as you think you need to.
You are a beautiful person who has an amazing gift. Though you don't know many of us, you are special and loved more than you can imagine . . .
TTFN,
Rachel
Hey everyone. Thanks for the replies.
I still wasn't feeling good today after I woke up and in the car to therapy, mostly because my eyes are all irritated and I have a wonderfully painful headache from crying so much yesterday(I don't think I've ever cried for like 3-4 hours straight and I'm still teary on and off today... cried through all of therapy too).
But after talking to my therapist and having her reassurance, I feel less crazy than I did yesterday. I don't feel like I'm deluding myself and we talked a lot about the issues surrounding my dad-- the fact I don't have like anything in common with him and he's a very authoritative/dictator type of parent, where I'm more independent and I value my freedom. A LOT. To where, when it's suppressed, I get horribly sad and depressed/feel hopeless. Felt that way through school, am avoiding getting a job that isn't freelancing(I freelance pet sit mostly right now) to avoid being completely restricted.
My therapist assured me that she wouldn't suggest hormones for me if she didn't think it was what I needed, and she said she's never had any transmen regret taking hormones through her guidance, but then she did admit that I could be the first, you know, on the chance I did end up regretting it. Also the endo she's referring me to has worked with a lot of transmen under my therapists' guidance and she assured me that he(the endo) would also be able to judge whether or not hormones would be good for me.
Anyway... I guess it's just frustrating not to have both my parents on the same page(my mom wants to please the both my dad and I) but I do have all the support of you guys and my friends 'in real life', so I'm just going to keep having my friends use male pronouns and call me Colin like I like(it makes me happy when people call me Colin =') ) So yeah... stuff will work out I'm sure.
It will just take time and energy. Thanks all again
I've been through a similar loop with my mom. Except, in my family my mom was the authoritative call the shots one where my dad was basically the submissive absent one.
My mom and I had several fights from the time she first found out into the time where I was up to getting my testicles removed. It was basically a conflict of interest. She's so preoccupied with her job and all the other crap that is somehow more important than me not being depressed and suicidal; go figure.
Though, these days it seems like she understand my perspective much more than when we started out, which is good. I think alot of this is just about time. I got so frustrated with my parents/family not automatically being on the bandwagon from the time it was diagnosed for me. Now, I am learning that that doesn't really matter and at the end of the day the only person I really have is myself.
I wish you the best of luck on your journey, because it sure can be a rocky one at times! :-)
Yeah, my mom is definitely the more submissive one... She just wants people to be happy and I feel bad for her. I know she's doing her best, and she's so worried she's making me feel alienate and stuff, but she's the least of my concern, like I'm really patient with her trying to grasp it all and stuff because she's at least trying to see my side of it and understand what I'm going through.
She did tell me she feels like she needs to talk to someone and she doesn't know who she can talk to, in regards to her friends/people she knows.
I /do/ want both my parents' approval, but I CAN live without my dad's. I was joking with my therapist that he might feel threatened because he's used to being the only man in the house lol
Quote from: MeganeRei on August 29, 2015, 02:10:05 PM
Yeah, my mom is definitely the more submissive one... She just wants people to be happy and I feel bad for her. I know she's doing her best, and she's so worried she's making me feel alienate and stuff, but she's the least of my concern, like I'm really patient with her trying to grasp it all and stuff because she's at least trying to see my side of it and understand what I'm going through.
She did tell me she feels like she needs to talk to someone and she doesn't know who she can talk to, in regards to her friends/people she knows.
I /do/ want both my parents' approval, but I CAN live without my dad's. I was joking with my therapist that he might feel threatened because he's used to being the only man in the house lol
Well it's pretty amazing that your mom wants to talk to someone/get help, because neither of my parents wanted to. They basically just dumped me off at the therapist/psychiatrist wanting a miracle.
My mom especially being very stubborn and hard headed, nothing I said to her got through to her until I brought suicide into the equation.
Many of the therapy sessions involved reeling my mom/dad into the room. Then when my brother was also going there were some issues there too.
Therapy is definitely not something that doesn't involve the entire family/household, so it's great that at least your mom is on board. You would probably do well in encouraging her to get the help she is looking for.
Yeah, I don't know who I could suggest mom talk to unless she actually talks to my therapist more/without me in there.
Not sure if I'd be able to get dad there, if anything, I'd want him and mom to go see my therapist without me LOL less pressure. Dad would probably get mad at her for calling me Colin and using him/he because he already thought that was weird that she did that during our first session(though during our first session, I was using my birthname nickname)
Aside from my emotional crap that I'm dealing with, I think for now I AM okay with not pushing forward too fast with testosterone or anything, even without my whole family referring to me as male, because I've got a wide range of friends online(who I can see IRL if I stop getting anxiety about hanging out with new people) and they're supportive of me, and more importantly my best friend who is by my side no matter what(and today's our 1 year 'anniversary' from when we met =') She's great and a lot of people think we're dating because that's how close we are haha)
But on topic. I still feel bad/confused/guilty for putting my family through stress and I still go back and forth on whether I feel crazy or not. I'm certain I'm trans, but I definitely hover between male and neutral, but when I picture myself with more masculine traits, I feel a LOT happier.
My dad doesn't understand no matter how much I tried to explain. I do agree they might be in the bargaining process of grief over my transitioning...
I'm going to be patient for them.
And for me, I'm going to try not to panic about the future which I do a LOT because my parents really want me to get a 'real' job, but I realllly need a full year or two to cope with everything and get on my feet while still doing art and pet sitting, especially after the trauma and stress from school which I just finished. *sigh*
Move away from gender, when trying to sort out your life, and your feelings.
Why?
Because we all have our own very personal idea of what gender is, and this is why it is confusing, you dad will have his idea of what man and woman are, and so will your mother, any divergence in this, is tolorated on a CIS scale, the being, had a vag from birth so, having a beard means beard lady? but still lady.
Your not trying to argue this, your trying to exsplane why making changes to your life are possibly for your benifit. Changes with a gender perspective, but its the foundation of these changes you need to get across.
Baiscaly we tend for the most part to argue about what we want to do, and WHY we want to do it gets overlooked.
So when possible move away from gender, its a little more paletable. Its the difference between saying.......
I want to dress like this, because I feel like a man or woman.
And I need to dress like this, because not doing so causes me to feel like this, regardless of wether im a man a woman or a green haird dog, not doing said thing means I feel like this, thats is why.
At first my dad didnt aprove, because I'm not a woman, or that thats for girls and im a man. And placed upon me HIS interpretation of gender. This argument went on and on, and would of continued to go on, because we both had very different ideas or gender. So making it about gender was going nowear.
He couldnt accpet that I was a woman, but He culd accept that I had feelings, he knew what sad, depression, and emotiones ment.
So for me, and I hope for you, talking about yourself as a person and how, not doing and/or being exspected to do certian specific things was making me/you feel.
One of the things I could say to my dad was,
Would you continue to do somthing if you felt like this? (they might start up about boys and girls)
You need to get it though to them your not talking about boys or girls or even trans, and that your talking about you a person and an individual, and how you as that individual FEEL.
Took me a few reads to understand what you were saying, but yeah, makes sense I guess.
I'm still trans, but I'm not sure if I want to do any FULL transitioning, because I've always leaned more neutral... and it's kinda fun to have people confused on what my gender is. The point i'm at right now, I can dress as and pass as male if I try. Eventually I might go on just a lower dose of T(whatever low is for me) to take things real slow/get the effects slower/see what that's like. Mostly looking for the psychological effects+voice deepening(+and tmi, i'd be happy with downstairs growth if that happens) but I'll have to talk to my parents and my therapist about it at some point.
Too tired right now, but at this point I'm relaxed... My friends call me he/him and Colin, my family's been using she/her and 'Mel'. I'll just try to be nice to myself, not stress, enjoy my anime convention next week, and then see where life takes me.