1. Yes, did you ever think that? That you weren't 'trans enough'? In what way?
For how long? What made you think that? What were some attributes in you that made you feel you weren't trans (enough)?
2. What changed your mind? How and when did you accept yourself & the fact that you were 'trans enough' indeed, :D?
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1. YES. Even though I've been identifying as male since 13 - yes I've been very much feeling that.
For following reasons, for example:
- That I wasn't allowed to be in any way 'boyish' as a child, so was like a 'typical girl' until that 13 (though always felt uncomfortable inside)
- Coz my mom told me that I can't be trans coz I was always 'so girly indeed' as a child. Those words (so girly indeed) stuck with my mind & made me question myself a lot.
- Because some mental health professionals were trying to convince me that I was insane because of it, at 14
- Because I couldn't transition at 16-18 when I wanted to and was planning to - so felt like a failure & 'not trans enough'
- Felt even more like I wasn't trans enough when I didn't/couldn't do anything about it after that (I felt that if I had been trans enough, I'd have transitioned at 16-18 like everyone else. And coz I didn't - I wasn't really trans.)
- For not having very 'masculine' interests
2. Just recently when I signed in at this forum & started talking with people & doing these threads & realized I had similar experiences like everyone else, and wasn't a freak.
Weren't trans enough for... transition? Surgery, HRT?
Early on I did wonder if I was suffering enough to justify expensive treatment. Time has a way of teaching you all you need about suffering, though.
Weren't trans enough for some other reason? I'm not sure I understand the concept.
I did happen to be one of those who did show "all the signs" from a very young age. My ex said there were signs, relatives, etc Nobody who knows me at all can deny it, it was obvious I had complete disregard toward being female, from ignoring mention of it, to how I looked, dressed, moved, talked, the sort of roles I would take up in the playground at school, the things I would get up to after school, I got my share of comments about it from other people, even if they had no idea themselves that I wasn't "just a tomboy" or "just a very strange kid".
Not that I was someone who declared myself to be a boy in front of others. I never did that. But I did always completely walk away from any overtly female role or presentation. There was no interest in it for me - that part of my brain didn't light up, like it seems to in little girls and women when they find something feminine interesting. I just don't have that part in my brain. That stuff doesn't light anything up except in the sense I can look at a girl or woman being feminine and appreciate it from across a sort of mental gulf. Which is I expect how most men are. They don't much understand female things and ways, but they do appreciate them from a distance. Most guys actually idolize the feminine in a certain sense (not me, though, oddly enough I just see it as the other side of the coin. There's nothing wonderful and mysterious about it to me).
I suppose the information I found later in life about how the symptoms and behaviors I had were very typical of trans-men crystallized the basic visceral understanding I had into a more practical one, and I was then able to match up dysphoria to particular events and situations and understand why I was experiencing it. Because of my habit of dissociation, it took a while, even though I was "highly typical" according to my psychiatrist. I was so used to removing my sense of self from the skin I inhabit that it meant a year or two of going back over those memories and putting the pieces together in a way I was satisfied with. I had to be satisfied that this made logical sense according to my own history and situation before acting on transition. I developed some kind of issue with self-image in that I wouldn't look at myself, or even bother to try to compensate for the condition as some other trans people do, demonstrating to peers or to themselves the sort of identity they have inside - mine was just hidden and wrapped in complacency for my own life, and I didn't feel like sharing who I really was with the world.
So I never did think I wasn't trans enough as such, but I did have to carefully weigh up everything before I decided to seek out some sort of treatment. I do remember specifically - at a young age - hearing about "sex changes" and thinking that they would only do that for someone in the worst possible cases, like the person was literally dying or something like that, and as I never considered myself mentally or physically ill, this image I had of the extremely ill endangered transsexual didn't gel with what I thought I was. In that sense I didn't "measure up" to being trans enough to think I had a problem - not for a decade more.
Trans enough? I think lots of us have asked ourselves that question. I know I did. Once. It was as I contemplated my pending meeting with a psychiatrist? psychologist? Heck, I don't know what she was. I did hope she would answer that question. She was to evaluate my mental state and if in her learned opinion I was stable enough, she would either pronounce the verdict herself or she would pass me on to a gender therapist for further evaluation to answer the question. Mind you that by this time I had already taken 5 weeks of HRT which I had obtained myself. This was before I came out to my GP who was qualified to proscribed my hrt from that point on and and who had set the VA ball rolling to get this evaluation. and then there was the 6 weeks or so of hrt while waiting for the appointment to arrive. Still I worried about that question. After all this time I nervously answered her questions for about an hour. At the end of the hour she told me the words I had worried to hear. I even saw it in print! I was suffering from "Gender Dysphoria" and was therefore a transgender transsexual. There it was in black and white I was trans enough!!
Because I was mentally stable I was also referred to a psychologist for gender therapy a month or so later who also confirmed the diagnosis. I have never considered the question again. Prior to November 2016 when I read about gender dysphoria I had never even though I was transgender. I believed myself to be a cross dresser not understanding that it too falls under the transgender umbrella. Once I discovered gender dysphoria I was on my way to obtaining and taking HRT on December 4, 2016.
As far as question two goes I think I answered it in the above. However accepting myself as a transwoman is still a work in progress with my therapist. It's caused me quite a bit of problems. But it is only one of many and at the moment it needs must be left simmering on the back burner. Hopefully it won't have burned by the time we can get back to it, If we ever do.
I've lost count Mr Wolfie. How many is this I've responded to now?
Hugs,
Laurie
I've felt I was non-binary from a young age. But because I was non-binary, there was a long time where I felt like transitioning, especially medically, would be kind of pointless. Even if I could find a doctor who'd write me the letters as a non-binary person (which was almost unheard of back when I first accepted I was trans), would it actually be worth the cost and side effects and potential discrimination? Would I just be trading being mistaken for a woman for being mistaken for a man? Would I be taking resources from "real" trans people who needed them more?
I eventually ended up making several friends who are trans men, and I found myself getting extremely jealous of the steps they took in transitioning. I decided that that being able to hear my own voice or see my own reflection in the mirror without feeling something was horribly wrong was still really important for my mental health even if it didn't get strangers to gender me correctly.
Now I'm so incredibly glad I went through with it. I can go out in public without feeling like I'm cross-dressing. I feel like my body is actually part of me and not some alien being. I know I'm still not "trans enough" in some people's eyes, but I'm now a happy, functional member of society and that's what matters.
Yes, I went out with girls, drank heavily, rode & rebuilt motorbikes,drove muscle cars, got into fights (usually won when I found out drinking & fighting don't work together).
Still get told I'm not because I don't wear make up, dresses, heels, ride a Harley Sportster all year round, listen to mainly punk & metal & go to the punk festival each year & have a tattoo (butterfly upper right shoulder)
I still think I'm not trans enough. I avoid makeup even though I don't present without it. Lately I've been wanting to "pass" dressed andro even though I most likely won't.
I told myself I was just a gay boy for a while. It seemed okay at first and it was.. so now I'm doubting why I can't just ignore my gender anymore.
Lately I sort of feel resentment for being a girl and trans. I'm choosing this now and I see my family in a couple days- they might disown me for it.
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Honestly, I had never even heard the term "not trans enough" until AFTER I started transitioning! I was on tumblr, and had joined some FtM blogs when I started reading about people asking "am I trans enough?"
I also heard it when I started going to my local support group. So I've never had that feeling of "not being trans enough." I guess I'm lucky.
Ryuichi
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I had never heard "trans enough" until I joined this site. Is that supposed to mean am I feminine enough to pass? Absolutely. Is it a question of how strong the desire to transition? Mine was all consuming. Or is it a question of transitioning young? I transitioned at 17. But I know that's not really typical. Either you're trans or you're not. I think the question is more about the level of dysphoria people experience leading up to transition rather than if "your'e trans enough".
No, because I do not believe it is something that others have any right to an opinion on. I don't question whether someone else is themselves enough to be themselves, so I don't expect others to do the same for me. And if they do, that isn't my problem. It doesn't change anything.
I am who I am. And I am the only person who needs to own that.
No. I don'y care what others think of me. Never have, never will. If I never 'pass" I'll still be happy as the me I need to be.
Holy cow, did I feel this when I was first wrestling with the idea of being trans.
Most of it came from the idea that I had to be miserable and dysphoric 100% of the time. Whenever there was a day where I could look in the mirror or hear my voice and just think "...fine" suddenly that would overwrite all of the depression and pain that I'd felt over living as male and the giddiness that I felt at the idea of transitioning with this idea that I wasn't meeting the qualifications to be a girl. I thought if I feel okay about this now then all of this must have been a crazy phase or delusion and I need to stop coming back to this idea that I'm something else. For a long time, no matter how intense my emotional reactions to thinking about my actual identity, these sudden """good days""" or positive thoughts toward my more male characteristics would just invalidate all of those feelings for me and for a long time it kept me from coming to terms with who I am.
What's helped me a lot is thinking of the idea of gender as a spectrum. Like, I don't think I'm non binary. I like being "she" and "a girl" and I don't really even think I'm gonna bother trying to find a proper label beyond that, but just knowing that I can be trans but maybe not 100% female helped me feel a lot more comfortable with my level of dysphoria
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Quote from: Ava LJ on December 25, 2017, 09:13:01 PM
Most of it came from the idea that I had to be miserable and dysphoric 100% of the time. Whenever there was a day where I could look in the mirror or hear my voice and just think "...fine" suddenly that would overwrite all of the depression and pain that I'd felt over living as male and the giddiness that I felt at the idea of transitioning with this idea that I wasn't meeting the qualifications to be a girl. I thought if I feel okay about this now then all of this must have been a crazy phase or delusion and I need to stop coming back to this idea that I'm something else. For a long time, no matter how intense my emotional reactions to thinking about my actual identity, these sudden """good days""" or positive thoughts toward my more male characteristics would just invalidate all of those feelings for me and for a long time it kept me from coming to terms with who I am.
THIS!!!
This has never been something for me like a judgement on someone else. I never thought I was trans and perhaps at a young age I was not trans enough to successfully transition. I had so much guilt and crazy hormonal activity that I might have failed to do it. I will never know. I know now I am trans. I am very happy with everything I have done and there is no thought of going back. In the period of time of my torment, my limbo, I was not successful as a man, as a cross dresser, or possibly as a trans woman. I understand why people ask this question for sure. I think the only way to answer it is by exploring how you react to things in your preferred gender and maybe seeing a therapist. I was always jealous of people who at an early age knew they were trans. Of course, their lives were probably no picnic either.
Moni
Such an odd question, not sure how to answer other than a flat... No
No, I've always felt I was too trans. Seriously though. I never thought I needed to be a certain level of trans to be trans.
Bari Jo
I definitely felt I wasn't trans enough. Even when I joined this site, it was one of my big fears I had to deal with in my first few therapy sessions. My encounters with trans had always been media stereotypes, and people with such extreme dysphoria they were driven to suicide or "self correction". What I felt seemed like nothing in comparison. If you have a splinter and the person next to you was just stabbed with a broadsword (those gangs of roving medieval knights have gotten bad lately), and someone asks the question "Who here is injured?". Well, technically the splinter is an injury, but if I raised my hand while the other person was trying to keep from bleeding out, I would be a complete jackass. That is how I thought about being trans, as my inner dialogue amounted to "what right do you have to compare your paltry gender issues to the 12 year old trans child who just attempted suicide!". Essentially, I was operating on a mindset of wants not needs, and wants weren't enough in my head. (Though I've since come to accept that I was completely ignoring quality of life as opposed to simply being alive or dead. This isn't something I need to do to survive, it's something I need to do to live.)
Quote from: Roll on December 26, 2017, 09:49:19 AM
I definitely felt I wasn't trans enough. Even when I joined this site, it was one of my big fears I had to deal with in my first few therapy sessions. My encounters with trans had always been media stereotypes, and people with such extreme dysphoria they were driven to suicide or "self correction". What I felt seemed like nothing in comparison. If you have a splinter and the person next to you was just stabbed with a broadsword (those gangs of roving medieval knights have gotten bad lately), and someone asks the question "Who here is injured?". Well, technically the splinter is an injury, but if I raised my hand while the other person was trying to keep from bleeding out, I would be a complete jackass. That is how I thought about being trans, as my inner dialogue amounted to "what right do you have to compare your paltry gender issues to the 12 year old trans child who just attempted suicide!". Essentially, I was operating on a mindset of wants not needs, and wants weren't enough in my head. (Though I've since come to accept that I was completely ignoring quality of life as opposed to simply being alive or dead. This isn't something I need to do to survive, it's something I need to do to live.)
Exactly! Great, ;)!
1. Yes, I have used those exact words with my therapist many times. Actually, I probably used them at my last meeting. Almost every time it has been in regards to bottom surgery. My biggest fear is that I won't be able to get it because someone doesn't think I am trans enough or am not feminine enough for it. I'm not into makeup, hair, or fashion. Didn't want breasts in the beginning.
2. What changed your mind?
I still think I'm not trans enough. I'll probably think that until I get the approvals for surgery.
Yes.
By taking a slow and incremental process to my transition, I gradually established I was; or more precisely, it doesn't matter, rather finding your way to being happy in yourself.
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Quote from: Roll on December 26, 2017, 09:49:19 AM
I definitely felt I wasn't trans enough. Even when I joined this site, it was one of my big fears I had to deal with in my first few therapy sessions. My encounters with trans had always been media stereotypes, and people with such extreme dysphoria they were driven to suicide or "self correction". What I felt seemed like nothing in comparison. If you have a splinter and the person next to you was just stabbed with a broadsword (those gangs of roving medieval knights have gotten bad lately), and someone asks the question "Who here is injured?". Well, technically the splinter is an injury, but if I raised my hand while the other person was trying to keep from bleeding out, I would be a complete jackass. That is how I thought about being trans, as my inner dialogue amounted to "what right do you have to compare your paltry gender issues to the 12 year old trans child who just attempted suicide!". Essentially, I was operating on a mindset of wants not needs, and wants weren't enough in my head. (Though I've since come to accept that I was completely ignoring quality of life as opposed to simply being alive or dead. This isn't something I need to do to survive, it's something I need to do to live.)
Yup, this is how I've felt too. For a long time I just dismissed it as some fetish and it was just about the clothes, I thought that maybe if I ever got a girlfriend it would fix me and it would all go away. I still never got a girlfriend but over time I realized that a girlfriend isn't what I need to try and justify myself. Just because I never felt things as much as other trans people doesn't mean that I never felt it at all, I wasn't being fair to myself. I think one thing that helped me decide was one youtube video with the questions you should ask yourself, like if you could make it all go away and live as a cis male, would you? no. if you could have chosen to be born a woman, would you? yes. Aside from dressing in secret, I never really had a girly personality or anything, I guess I was just afraid to, I was even hiding from myself! It has shown up a lot though ever since I started coming out to friends, and even the people I haven't told yet are onto me now lol.
In one of my old bands I had 2 songs about my dysphoria, and the lyrics are pretty brutal. I was just listening to one song and it gave me goosebumps. "others in my shoes have slit their wrists 'cus they couldn't spill their guts. I have yet to find my voice so for now I'll bite my tongue"
Maybe for like a few hours, at the very beginning. But I went from completely unaware egg to out to family/friends and on hormones in the space of 3 months. I didn't give myself much time for second thoughts or measuring.
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For most of my life I felt I wasn't trans enough. I had heard of famous trans women like Christine Jorgensen or Renee Richards. I knew that I wasn't famous or notorious, nor did I want to be, so I couldn't be trans enough to follow their path. For all the years and decades of my denial, that was how I thought.
That's how I talked myself out of doing anything about my dysphoria, or even recognizing it for what it was. Since I wasn't like them, what I felt couldn't possibly be dysphoria, not that I even knew the word. Instead, I must just have been some kind of pervert.
What changed my mind was seeing a real live trans woman in person. I didn't actually meet her, but I was in the hall where she delivered a fascinating lecture. I thought, wow, this woman isn't a freak. While she is undoubtedly well-regarded in her field, she isn't famous, and the tabloids have had nothing to say about her. So a trans person can be a perfectly normal professional person and transition. HMMMM!?
I over think being trans a bit, i'll spend all day grinning like a loone, loving my life then somehow get it in my head that i might regret transitioning into the happy woman i am rather than the miserable violent "man" that i was.
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Quote from: LadyGreen on December 29, 2017, 12:03:09 AM
I over think being trans a bit, i'll spend all day grinning like a loone, loving my life then somehow get it in my head that i might regret transitioning into the happy woman i am rather than the miserable violent "man" that i was.
I'd wager we all do that to a degree. I have to constantly remind myself "stop being an idiot, you are just forgetting how unhappy you were for so long and how much you wanted this since you were a child". I still have this picture in my head of me having to sheepishly announce to everyone I've come out to "oops, never mind".
Quote1. Yes, did you ever think that? That you weren't 'trans enough'? In what way?
For how long? What made you think that? What were some attributes in you that made you feel you weren't trans (enough)?
2. What changed your mind? How and when did you accept yourself & the fact that you were 'trans enough' indeed, :D?
1. YES. As a child, I used to play with girl's toys as well as boy's toys; I would play with princesses and doll houses, but I also had a fascination with dinosaurs and would beg my mother for boy's shirts with dinosaurs and scorpions on them (I wish I still had the scorpion shirt, it was so cool!) My mother told me I couldn't be trans, because I had 'never shown any interest in boyish things prior to coming out'. This wasn't true - there were definitely signs that I was trans as a kid, but even so, the way she put such emphasis on how GIRLY I was as a kid bothered me and made me question myself a lot :( I've thought about it a lot, and I've realised that it's probably not me at all, and that it's just my mother's way of trying to justify not realising I was trans, or trying to come to terms with the fact that I'm not a daughter but rather a son. Someday she'll come round fully, I'm sure of it :)
2. The thing that truly helped me accept myself was time. I had to cut off all my hair and bind (message to baby Verny - PUT DOWN THOSE BANDAGES) and change my name and pronouns before I realised that being male made me happy and comfortable. I don't have to fit other's definitions of transgender to be transgender, and everybody's experiences are different, so I should just go with what makes me feel good!!
Quote from: virtualverny on December 29, 2017, 12:11:11 PM
1. YES. As a child, I used to play with girl's toys as well as boy's toys; I would play with princesses and doll houses, but I also had a fascination with dinosaurs and would beg my mother for boy's shirts with dinosaurs and scorpions on them (I wish I still had the scorpion shirt, it was so cool!) My mother told me I couldn't be trans, because I had 'never shown any interest in boyish things prior to coming out'. This wasn't true - there were definitely signs that I was trans as a kid, but even so, the way she put such emphasis on how GIRLY I was as a kid bothered me and made me question myself a lot :( I've thought about it a lot, and I've realised that it's probably not me at all, and that it's just my mother's way of trying to justify not realising I was trans, or trying to come to terms with the fact that I'm not a daughter but rather a son. Someday she'll come round fully, I'm sure of it :)
2. The thing that truly helped me accept myself was time. I had to cut off all my hair and bind (message to baby Verny - PUT DOWN THOSE BANDAGES) and change my name and pronouns before I realised that being male made me happy and comfortable. I don't have to fit other's definitions of transgender to be transgender, and everybody's experiences are different, so I should just go with what makes me feel good!!
Awesome, ;)!!!
As for 1) - can relate 100% ;)!
I believe the whole trans enough idea has more to do with the beliefs of CIS people rather than being a trans issue. You're either trans or you're not. There's no kind of trans, sort of trans or a little bit trans. Many CIS people think someone has to have been feminine or masculine at an early age to be trans. Though they get more publicity trans people who transition very young are rare. CIS people say " well you weren't feminine/masculine as a child so you can't be trans. From the stories I've read here most of the time the person was punished or shammed for expressing their true gender. Because of that I think the whole trans enough idea is ridiculous.
Yeah, back when I thought I was some kinda flavor of genderless/agender/neutrois. Turns out, I wasn't trans enough... because I wasn't that kind of trans! It was several years of wondering to myself if I was doing it "right", or looking ambiguous "enough", or how I should go about trying to talk about neutral pronouns I didn't even feel quite comfortable with using and yadda yadda yadda.
Last month I woke up one day and said the words to myself: "I'm a he, aren't I?" and everything clicked into place. Since then I've known for a fact that I'm "trans enough". Now it's just a matter of trying to get what I need without blowing up my life.
On that note? Gender euphoria is a great rubric for self-gauging and certainly saved me a ton of heartache.
Tbh no.
I discovered I was trans during the beginning of the more progressive times.
So if I did feminine things it did not really reflect how much of a man I was on the inside.
My brother played with dolls.
My dad has long hair and goes to the salon.
And I had a gay cousin.
Nothing really made me feel less trans. I have however since really transitioning felt like less of a man if i talked alot or hung with the ladies or if I didn't understand sports.. which I don't apart from martial arts and basketball and some soccer.
Nothing serious though.
Hm... Not "trans enough" good question.
I had to transition.. I was assigned male and had that upbringing. It wasn't accurate though. Most of my insides are girl. My outsides are certainly girl (a few pieces fixed). I never ever considered myself trans, more intersexed if anything until I knew certain I was.
In the end though, you do you. I still have certain 'male' activities and 'female' social interactions & activities. Just be yourself, whatever that special something is :)