My specific event that was the catalyst was the lost of my job of 20 years. A few weeks before I knew I had no job I had gone to a therapist because I was tired of being alone and then as things seem to happen I lost my job the company went down. thus, the rebirth. I wouldn't of even of tried probably if I would of just kept moving on like a zombie with that job.
I was doing webcam whoring for fun, which led to youtube videos. I saw how many men complimented me, so I gave it a go. Sadly, I now realize, it's women you have to please, not men. :(
I'm so sick of their dirty looks and death stares.
Things going bad with my wife, overall, made me reconsider the question. Both sexual and life-choice problems (children..), as well as being overall tired of it all. :P
I met up with two post-transition transgender women from Susan's. We spent the day together in a public place. No one stared. No one gave us a hard time. It was a perfectly normal day.
It helped me understand that I could live as a woman without being seen as a freak.
I woke up with yet another hangover. I decided to have my third attempt at killing myself, I was going to walk in front of train. I had a medical appointment and I went to it; I was not able to hurt the train driver.
I confessed.
Mea Culpa.
I transitioned.
I saved the train driver and I saved me.
Short story, long journey.
One morning I woke up and looked at myself in the mirror and I just knew to the core of my being that I couldn't keep on with living a lie.
I came out to my wife by accident after watching a documentary on transgender children, telling her something to the effect of, "I used to be trans, that's what was wrong with me all those years."
Two days later I was like, "holy crap, I didn't USED TO BE trans, I AM trans..." ::cue the thunder, lightning, and organ music::
And I started gobbling up info, making plans, and telling close friends almost immediately.
My whole life has been the turning point.
Specifically though:
I've always wanted an extended wardrobe
my stepfather, angrily, asked me why I just don't go out to a dancing in a dress and high heels?
& that was the turning point of discovering the issue runs much, much deeper.
A heart attack last april definitely was my turning point.
I know in my case it was the imminent threat of homelessness that made me realize that why live in pain with absolutely no purpose. I have a purpose now even though the purpose is to excel in being a woman.
Yes, it was the realization that "he" was in the process of dying.
Not the body, the soul; his existence was painful, mine was joy.
My life is not full-on joy like it was, adult responsibilities take their toll, but the pain of the shattering is gone.
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I was slowly going downhill, and then there was a drastic boom at eighteen where I sunk deep into depression.
Shortly after I began researching the term transgender, when I was not afraid to identify with it. From then on I began to feel happy and found a sense of purpose again.
When I was young, I was tampered with by an older guy. That started the ball rolling. After it happened I made a concious decision to never be like him (a man) when I grew up. I already knew that I was different from them anyway and found it soothing being in girls clothes, doing things with the girls, being identified as a girl ect. It was ment to be.
Turning 30. I did not want another decade of living a tortured existence.
Hmm a bit dragged out but it was probebly a mix of things. my 50th or so near scare with self harm/badness. which happend at the same time i was reading a web comic (RAIN) the presentation of the transgender teen main characters therapist made me give therapy another shot. that helped and led to me seeing a doctor and starting HRT but it was not the real trigger for being out there. at that time it was all hush hush I told family and a few friends and made vauge far off plans I would likely push back more and more. Then for my birthday I made a crazy decision to go to therapy presenting as myself. it was my first time out as me and it was supposed to be a one off a short trial run one afternoon out, and things went well. Better than I could have thought and then I was talking to a friend I had come out to and I made a joke about the falsies I made for that one day and they thought I meant I was going to show up to a public gathering full of people I know but dont know well as serena. It seemed crazy I could never do that...but I was still on a high from that one day out, and the support friends and therapy had given me plus too much icecream cake...so I did it. Nothing happend, no one freaked out no one called me names, people took it in stride.. so long story short 2 weeks later was the last time I presented as male. Last saturday I heard back from the court, my name change was offical and today I changed my name and gender on my social security records.
it has happend so fast I wake up some mornings and cant remember if it was all a dream or not. :-)
Serena, Who's story starts with wanting to die and ends with a Smile.
One night I was engaged in my nightly drink-a-thon session and I realized that if I kept going I had a future date with a pine box in a hole 6 feet under. I knew that I had to do something. That's a very sobering realization.
I scheduled my first appointment with my therapist soon after, and the rest is history.
quite an interesting mix of things. I'm just glad it happened for myself. It's pretty messed up, I wanted so badly to do it , but never able to take that first solid step . I've been wondering a lot lately if the first psychiatrist I went to back in college would of shown me the path if I would of been able to take it. Mentally I've been through a lot in my life with this being an incredibly powerful undercurrent . I find it just so cool that I'm here though.
For me it was realizing that the lie I kept trying to live was falling apart. I knew with my depressive cycles and self-harm risks, eventually it would kill me. The house of cards was collapsing.
I particularly remember a moment that really stood out to me with my therapist shortly before HRT when I was doubting myself. She asked me two questions: "Where do you see yourself in 10 years as a woman?" and I was able to give a hazy answer. She then asked me "Where do you see yourself in 10 years as a man" and my reply was ".....I can't even answer that question." It became increasingly clear after that.
I also asked myself the question "Would you regret your life at your death bed if you never tried to transition and never knew what it would be like?" and my answer was a startling yes. Knowing that life can be taken at any time for any reason, I realized that while I am young, there is still a chance such as situation *could* happen. I didn't want to take that risk of regret of not living my life fully.
And here I am, today. More alive than ever because of it.
I presume by transitioning is meant to seek medical help.
The event that initiated my desire to seek help is that I understood benefits of hrt. I lived uneducated.
I spent a couple of years living on internet chat, pretending to be a real girl.
When even that life felt so much better than the one I came from - you could say the penny dropped.
Yes, and attempted suicide.
Rachel
Attempted suicide.
I guess for me it was simply to fact that my depression (aka dysphoria) got so bad that I wouldn't get out of bed? I was running for a very long time, trying really hard not to admit what I knew as a fact - I am a girl. But it just got to a point where I had no life. I had to start my transition.
yea, I live in a small suburb and everything closes at 9 pm. That's how it was for me sitting in an outdoor café one night after losing my job. the streets were being rolled up and I had no more brick road to follow.
Due to low testosterone my doc put me on Tshots. Boy was that a crazy ride. after the first month my mind was screaming TRANSITION Over and Over again. I started Estrogen therapy and my mind stopped screaming and has been a very Happy place to reside in. I basically transitioned to quiet my mind
My wife walked out, for the third time. We disagree on what happened, but the day I accepted that she wasn't ever coming home, I decided to see if this is for real. That was three months ago, and I still love every minute I spend in "girl mode". I am meeting a successful MTF this week - I knew her when "he" dated my sister many years ago. Then, I think it's going to be time to see a therapist and get this train rolling. The only thing holding me back is my 12 year old son, and fears of losing custody over this. Or worse, that she'll poison him against me since she is a conservative republican.
My life was folding in on itself no matter how hard I tried to repair it. Sobriety, coming out asexual. I knew I would have to face my transexual feelings soon. Then last Christmas Eve I had a seizure, brought on by stress. I had been healing from terrible ulcers, brought on by stress. I was scared as heck. Then Leelah Alcorn left her note. I got mad at first. My head swam with trasnsphobic hate. But her final words "fix society, please." haunted me. I had seen myself in her. I had tried to die at her age for similar reasons. I knew that all I could do to change the world was live my life honestly. So I moved onward to self acceptance.
Attempted suicide.
Combat tour, survived, motorcycle crash in California. Brush with death, you know.
Audree
The event that pushed me to transition was when I caught my older bro smoking weed with my best friend. I know it sounds silly, but it pushed me because up until then, I always thought of my bro as a saint, a respected role model that my parents wanted me to follow. The fact that he could do something that my parents wouldn't approve of, yet still be a successful professional, blew my mind. For all 24 years of my life, I was told that it was wrong and a sin to do something my parents wouldn't agree of, which included weed, sex, expressing myself, long hair, Seth Rogen, pretty much anything LGBT, et cetera. Words cannot describe what I felt at that moment. I was angry at myself for wasting so much time following my parents orders, yet excited because I knew that transition would soon follow, and that my life would finally begin.
Quote from: Abby S. on September 09, 2015, 01:06:47 PM
I guess for me it was simply to fact that my depression (aka dysphoria) got so bad that I wouldn't get out of bed? I was running for a very long time, trying really hard not to admit what I knew as a fact - I am a girl. But it just got to a point where I had no life. I had to start my transition.
Same here. I would stay in bed for over 12 hours like 2-3 times a week. My parents would yell at me to get out of bed because they thought I was lazy or that I liked sleeping. I would lay there because at least in bed I could dream/fantasize about what my life would be like if I had transitioned. So many wasted years.
The first thing was probably finding out presenting as a girl online was more comfortable than my actual life. I had a lot of counseling at school due to depression and the root cause surfaced.
Saw doctor and got the process started. I was officially diagnosed and everything. Then nothing happened for years due to a mess up at the doctor. However I was too scared to go ask.
What made me go back and start pushing transition again was a suicide attempt earlier this year. It gave me a wake up call that I can't wait anymore. Went back to my GP and the referrals got sent and we began my journey.
Quote from: stephaniec on September 08, 2015, 12:30:57 AM
My specific event that was the catalyst was the lost of my job of 20 years. A few weeks before I knew I had no job I had gone to a therapist because I was tired of being alone and then as things seem to happen I lost my job the company went down. thus, the rebirth. I wouldn't of even of tried probably if I would of just kept moving on like a zombie with that job.
I've always had a problem with being a workaholic. It was a lot worse before my transition. I couldn't survive unless I was working 80 hours a week. It was good for my paycheck but not much else. The thing with being a workaholic is that it wears me down and eventually I get tired and start losing my ability to focus on my work. When that started to happen, my gender conflict started to get worse and worse. Eventually it consumed me. I would show up for work, skin and bones but no mind, and would sit there like a zombie unable to think clearly. It worked for a long time but not forever. Eventually my gender problems came to a head and I knew what I needed to do. I can't say I wasn't scared or thought what kind of future am I making for myself, but I did work to overcome new obstacles learning from others who came before me. How I handled the changes and adapted are part of my survival story :)
I had always felt that I wasn't 100% male but didn't know what or why.
One day I was challenged to attend a fund raiser dressed as a woman. Guess what? I did and right away once I got to the venue I knew what was missing. I attended a therapist to "get cured" at the insistence of a lady friend and found that there was no "cure" and I was who I was. She says she never should have gone along with the challenge but I told her that sooner or later it would have happened.
Love,
Clare
This is going to sound incredibly shallow, but in my case it was... losing my hair. I could barely stand to look myself in the mirror as it was, but the thought of going bald was just too much. My thick hair was probably the only thing about the way I looked I actually liked, and it had helped me to have an at least somewhat androgynous appearance. It was really just the last straw in a long list of things though. When I was researching treating hair loss I also ended up reading a lot about male hormones and there various effects on the body. And then I started to think to myself, wait a minute, do male hormones actually even do anything I would miss? I mean, couldn't I just get rid of them altogether and be a happier person? The rest, as they say, is history. But it did take a few more years of soul searching before I really started to seriously consider the idea of a full transition. What finally convinced me to give transition a chance was visiting this place and seeing that a lot of my preconceptions about what being transgender meant were just plain wrong. That not only did I fit in with other transgender people better than I ever had anywhere else in my life, but also that I might not be quite as hopeless in terms of transitioning successfully as I thought I was. And I have all the people here to thank for that. :)
I had a job where I worked three or four days each week, then I was home four to three days. Increasingly more of my time away from work was spent as a woman. I developed an entire social network of people who were either very supportive and would keep their mouths shut, or who had no clue about my past. By the time I took all my male clothing, except one outfit for family emergencies, to Goodwill, I saw nothing that would prevent transition. All my co-workers were at least aware of what I was doing. There was a lot of negative talk, but no negative repercussions.
I got my name changed then approached management with a request to change my gender on the job. We haggled over the details for a couple of months, the primary objection seemed to be which restroom I would use. We eventually came to an agreement; there was no turning back.
Other people's transition stories are great reading. Thank you all for sharing them.
Yes it was a specific event. It was April of 2013, on the 19th I woke up and my heart was hurting. Spent 4 and a half days in the cardiac unit at one of our local hospitals. And while laying in that bed I couldn't help but think of how much more comfortable I would be, if I could just be myself. I learned then that it was the high levels of Rheumatoid in my system that had caused my Acute Pericarditis. I also learned that Rheumatoid doesn't just attack your joints, it attacks all your other organs as well. So I could wake up tomorrow in the hospital, or I could just not wake up at all tomorrow. I decided then and there that I was going to be happy, as a woman, till I died. When I got released I started doing my research and started HRT in January 2014. Spironolactone on the 12th and Estradiol injections on the 31st. Approaching 2 years HRT and a little more than 2 years living as myself every day. It does get better if we can just hold on for a little while.
My Dad passing on was a big factor for me.
Before he died, Dad spent his last couple of years in an assisted living facility. He was happy and loved by the staff, and I couldn't help picturing myself in the same situation.
But when I did, the idea made me feel panicky, and the feeling got worse over time. I couldn't get it out of my head, and started losing sleep and having some pretty depressive thoughts at 3 AM.
This made no sense to me. Dad was just fine, why wouldn't I be happy in the same situation some day? I finally realized that it wasn't his situation that was scaring the hell out of me - it was the idea of living out my final years as a old man.
I couldn't avoid the obvious question, "What about as an old woman?", and was shocked to find that alternative very appealing. It's amazing how quickly things fell into place afterward, and I began my transition only a few months later...
My divorce helped me realize that transition was something I wanted to do. Also, this might sound trite, but watching the Caitlyn Jenner interview with Diane Sawyer was a specific catalyst and helped me realized I was trans and that transitioning was a real possibility despite my age. I was literally in the middle of watching the interview and I started thinking to myself "Holy crap I am trans too - not just a crossdresser". So despite all the crap that Jenner does that I disagree with (like vote Republican), I will always have a special place in my heart for her because of how she helped me come to self-acceptance.
I always knew i should have been a girl.
al trough my early life, the abusive father trying to beat the male part in me -.-. the rather playing with girls and there toys then the boys.
then came my mid school period and i was in a nursing class where i was the only boy i thought about transitioning there, and even my class picked up on my signals and kinda accepted it but yet again i didnt go trough with it.
then after school i fel in depression i wondered countless jobs always losing them to the same reasons i am to depressed and no self asteem.
and then 7 months ago at my final job function discussing i got the same your selfasteem is to low and your depressed i am sorry but we have to let you go.
disgusted with my lie of a life and how much i was failing at the male part, i finaly tried to commit suicide -.-.
before i could go trough with it a friend came by to talk about what happened.
and the most simple of questions and a even simpler awnser turned me, What whould make you realy happy, Then why dont you go for it.
next week i told my work , my friends, and my parents what i was and what i was going to do.
and now finaly januari 4th is my appointment with the genderclinic here in the netherlands
well i was young and fell out of the closet on accident. once that happened i just went with it until my parents gave in. had i not been caught i dont know how long i would have kept that secret?