Go back to when you were very young, say 5-10 years old. Old enough to remember your life back then but young enough that you were still very reliant upon your parents for survival.
What would you have expected them to do if they knew you had transsexual tendencies, that you wanted to live in the gender opposite what your birth certificate stated?
I think my dad would have rushed me off to a psychiatrist. He would have picked out one who thought the same as he. If his first pick didn't tell him I had a problem that needed to be corrected, he would have looked for another one. And, if after the professionals couldn't 'cure' me he probably would have sent me away to a military school.
Oh, wait! He did send me to a military school! :police:
My mom would have worried incessantly about what the neighbors would think.
Julie
My father would have probably left a couple of years earlier, and my mother would have had a nervous breakdown.
My mum probably would have completely ignored it. She's good at that
Well I don't have to consider "what if" only what they DID do.
Nobody ever heard about such things in the 1950s so my mom figured I had to be "mentally" unbalanced when I started getting pushy about at (around age 13). She found a shrink who suggested testosterone - I said I would rather take cyanide! (End of that discussion!). In my mom's eyes, doctors were gods!
My dad had it all pretty well figured out and was as supportive and kind as he could be. When I found doctors on my own who knew of such things, my mom called them quacks.
But not all parents let their kids down. I knew a couple of girls in a nearby city who's parents were actually SUPPORTIVE! I used to love to go there whenever I could because there we could be just regular, normal teens without getting berated, beaten, or put down.
My parents did know and rushed me off to a child psychiatrist before the age of eight! Found out years later that he thought my mum was crazy, not me. A very decent man back in those days.
The biggest hassle was my mum explaining to my teachers about me which made my life at school hell.
Doctors back in those days were real bastards and just treated one like a pervert. Nowadays things are much better but even as recently as 1993 I suffered extreme transphobia from an A&E doctor in a London Hospital. Tried to file a complaint but it got buried in their bureaucracy.
I think my parents would have shrugged and gone "okay, you don't have to wear a skirt".
Always easy to be clever in hindsight..
Deep denial. Maybe divorced, since they nearly did anyway. Try to get me to go to a shrink (which they did eventualy anyway, and I told him to go to hell).
The more interesting question to me is: what if I had know that you could successfully transition, and if I'd grown up in a family where I felt safe to talk about deeply personal matters? (It's not that my parents were abusive, but that they were hardcore nerds, and unable to talk about anything personal.) What if I'd grown up in a world where being transsexual was not stigmatized?
I'm sure that I would have been on hormone blockers and avoided the hell of puberty. I almost certainly would have transitioned in my teens. I might even have had a happy childhood.
Quote from: Jeatyn on February 27, 2009, 11:58:33 AM
My mum probably would have completely ignored it. She's good at that
Same here.
I am pretty sure that I used to tell my parents that I wanted to be a boy when I was around that age anyhow.
Yeah they ignored it thought it was a phase!
well, i was just seen as a little girl with masculine interests who always liked to pretend she was a boy. that was okay with them, except that i was forced into a skirt every morning for school and dresses for church.
if i had declared i really was a boy, i probably would've been punished severely (i was severly punished for one word out of place, so yeah).
i definitely would've been shuttled to a shrink sooner than i was. as it was, i wasn't taken to shrinks until about 14.
My parents were blue collar types with only minimal education. Very old school types.
Any kind of mental illness was considered a huge humiliation. I *was* told on more than one occasion that it was better for someone to die rather that have to go to a shrink.
My dad would probably get drunk and try to man me up. My mom would cry a lot and try to keep it a secret and not let the neighbors find out.
Then the two of them would fight.
Every one around me thought I was gay. As I found out much later, so did my parents, though they never said anything. I was introverted and had few friends and didn't date until I was a junior and then only infrequently. My brothers were rough and tumble types and I was the geek.
My dad did try to man me up by taking me to porno movies. If he only knew that I wanted to be the women in those movies...
I didn't start my transition until they had both passed. It just worked out that way. But had they still been alive when I transitioned, they would have stopped speaking to me.
They weren't bad people, just ignorant, as so many were. I certainly didn't have any answers.
-Sandy
Julie Marie, I'm very happy to be here. You make me laugh. I've heard "cure", "fix". "Oh, well, we can cure that." Were you in military academy? Army brat, Navy brat? Your comments gave me new idea. I'll be back soon. Genevieve. Oh, nearly forgot, You're very beautiful. Hugs
Post Merge: February 27, 2009, 02:52:23 PM
I think maybe they did know but did'nt approach the issue. My mother does know and my famliy loves gossip so my crossdressing is probably a common conversation or taboo depending on who is present. Oh well we can "cure" that. You're fun. Hugs, Genevieve
They knew something was odd. Hello psychiatric tests and such and later aversion therapy.
Huzza!
Cant blame them but it made things more complicated.
Quote from: Genevieve Swann on February 27, 2009, 02:43:30 PM
Julie Marie, I'm very happy to be here. You make me laugh. I've heard "cure", "fix". "Oh, well, we can cure that." Were you in military academy? Army brat, Navy brat? Your comments gave me new idea. I'll be back soon. Genevieve. Oh, nearly forgot, You're very beautiful. Hugs
Why thank you, my dear! A girl can never get enough compliments. :D
I guess I was an Army brat, Army ROTC for all four years in high school at an all boys boarding school owned and run by the Jesuits, well known as strict disciplinarians. "Give Campion a boy, get back a man" was the motto of the school. My dad was obsessed with making a man out of me.
And then there was the little charcoal black mystery pills my dad had me take when I was in 8th grade. I had no idea what they were for, only that he took me to a doctor because he was worried about my 'development' and the doctor prescribed these pills. ???
Julie
My dad would have tried to beat the girl out of me probably.
Probably mostly verbal abuse, but he probably would have tried. "Stop crying or I will give you something to cry about" was a favorite mantra of his.
My parents did know something was up, they chose to ignore it. It worked, for a while.
other gems...
"you're always so passive, you aren't like the other boys"
"Why do you insist on long hair?"
"Why do you want long hair"
"why do you cry when you get a haircut..."
I think when you are more scared of getting your hair cut than you are getting a cavity filled, there should be alarms going off somewhere.
I could probably come up with a ton of these.
Hum....Well I was put in a dress at age 5 and walked around the block for playing with the girl next door toys. Gee barbies were what I really wanted then. It was not acceptable to say the least. Oh if I had only had a sister, I would have been out so long ago.
Beni
Quote from: Beni on February 27, 2009, 09:28:50 PM
Oh if I had only had a sister, I would have been out so long ago.
I think that might also have been true in my case.
When I came out to my mother a few years ago, she said in a letter something like she knew I was different and that it explained some things (just paraphrasing). I think she had an idea but that she chose to ignore it. Back then (50's-60's) there just wasn't very much exposure. My father wasn't home much, so I don't really know about his reactions, but I'd guess he would have tried harder to "man me up". As it is, my mother is actually very supportive, as are my sisters. I have no brothers.
At I guess my father would of made my mother deal with it and she would of insisted on something to do with medication (it is the answer to eveything right) nothing like a good bandaid to hide the truth.
I used to sleepwalk and talk when I was young around the age of 5 when I first delved into my mothers wardrobe. Last weekend we were talking about this subject and she told me I used to come in to the front room sleep walking/talking looking for 'shoes'. It clicked that it was no doubt my mothers shoes I was looking for, I was quite fond of them at the time.
By the sounds of it they never put two and two together. But in hindsight the more we talk about it the more it makes sense/adds up.
I've never been into male things and I've never acted male so to me it's obvious.. yet I never had the guts to say anything, I figured I'd get in trouble or something worst. I truely admire those that can figure it out at a young age.. and yes having sisters could help.. having someone to relate to. I had two brothers that would of beat the sh!t out of me if they found out. :-/
It's hard to say, our family dynamics have changed a lot since I was younger. I guess my mom would have told me I was wrong (not brought me to therapy; in her opinion, nobody in this family needs therapy for anything ever - even my little brother who was threatening all of us with knives at the age of six) and thought that was the end of it (and thrown fits when it wasn't). My dad would have ignored it, or tried to. Luckily, our family has changed a lot...my dad's a lot more open to everything, and my mom is less certain that she controls all of us (but still thinks she SHOULD control all of us).
When I tried to convince my mom to let me on hormones at 14 is about when my dad sent me to an inpatient care setting in Salt Lake City. I was there for three months that summer and diagnosed with asperger's. I didn't think doctors could honestly be that ignorant in the 2000's.
My mom has pretty much always known and is still extremely supportive. I'm still not in a rush to tell my dad since I rely on him financially for college.
If only my Mother knew sooner, I would have transition sooner, my parents didn't find out till I came out at 16, then they fully surpported me 100%
If they realized say when I was 5 or 6, they would have rared me as a girl, but they didn't know, when I was 16 my Mother was thrilled to bits I was to become her daughter, it was my Mother who suggested that I eventual have srs, which I did. My early childhood was so unhappy, if only my parents knew then, anyway fast forward all these years, with my parents 100% surpport, Im now really a woman at last.
p
Much as my mom says now that she wishes she had known sooner, that she would have helped me and supported me, I doubt it. I'm glad things have changed since the early 90s in the world, in my family and in my body :)
My parents would just ignore it.
They are good at that too...
Yeah, and you would think something was wrong with a boy who wanted long hair, wore his mother's shoes and pretended he was a cheerleader... :o
"Reparative" therapy. Mood stabilizers. ECT. Nothing good. :(
Wow. I guess my mom is rare. She always let me be who I was - the little girl with short hair and Star Wars-themed clothing. I know that she would have taken me to a good therapist and let me live as I wanted to. (Did I mention that she bought me a new shirt when I told her, then paid for my hormones and surgery?) My dad would've flipped, but she always got her way with parenting, and I'm sure this'd be no different.
My father would have beat me. He liked to kick while he whipped with his belt.
My mother would have screamed at me non stop.
That's what would have happened.
As it was, my dad did say something to the effect that I'd better not show up in a dress or else. Mom was out of her mind and pretty much wrote me off and told me to leave the state.
It was harsh. So, I'm very glad that I didn't get caught when I was a child.
Cindi
It seems interesting.
This is a generalization, it's hardly scientific, nor can any statistics be gathered, but;
The older of us seem to have either expected or received very harsh treatment from their parents.
While the younger of us seem to have been met with less severe responses.
Could it be that there has been a change in the mental makeup of the populace between the older generation and the younger?
If so, could there be hope for us as a species?
-Sandy
My dad back then was so wrapped up in work that I didn't get to know him all that well, so I don't know how he'd have reacted, though positively, I think. My mom would have blamed herself quietly, looking for what she did wrong or what happened for me to be like this (that's been kinda her reaction to it now). I think initially they'd have been opposed and tried to get me "fixed", but they're both understanding, rational people and I believe they'd have come around after not too long.
Mina.
Quote from: Sandy on March 01, 2009, 06:59:14 AM
It seems interesting.
This is a generalization, it's hardly scientific, nor can any statistics be gathered, but;
The older of us seem to have either expected or received very harsh treatment from their parents.
While the younger of us seem to have been met with less severe responses.
Could it be that there has been a change in the mental makeup of the populace between the older generation and the younger?
If so, could there be hope for us as a species?
-Sandy
I certainly hope so. From what I've seen, I'm optimistic; I even hope that most of the next generation of transgendered (and gay, etc.) individuals will only have to deal with mild discomfort from their parents, and no worse. Fingers crossed. ^-^
Quote from: Sandy on March 01, 2009, 06:59:14 AM
It seems interesting.
This is a generalization, it's hardly scientific, nor can any statistics be gathered, but;
The older of us seem to have either expected or received very harsh treatment from their parents.
While the younger of us seem to have been met with less severe responses.
Could it be that there has been a change in the mental makeup of the populace between the older generation and the younger?
-Sandy
There's no doubt this is the trend. But consider the available information back when we were growing up to the information today.
I was 16 when I first saw the word "->-bleeped-<-" in a TIME magazine article. I calculated from that I was one in a million. I had no hope of ever finding happiness. And it took another 27 years before I met another TG person.
Prejudice is overcome through education. Today's parents have some level of knowledge about LGBT people. My parents only "knew" homos were perverts and a transsexual was that freak (Christine Jorgensen) who went to Sweden a man and came back a woman. But no matter how you sliced it, they were all dregs of society.
While there are still plenty of parents stuck in the past, there are many more who won't stick their heads in the sand and pretend nothing is wrong.
To all you "younger" TGs, realize how lucky you are growing up in a time when ignorance isn't the order of the day.
Julie
I think they knew something was wrong. In fact I know they knew something was wrong, they were in complete denial. I had a couple of surgeries right after being born and I can explain one scar but not the other. When I had GRS, I had some scar tissue in places where it didn't go with the surgeries that I was suppose to have. I overheard my grandparents talking with my mom that I would be OK and that my grandfather would teach me things. My dad kind of disowned me and stayed away then divorced my mom or I should say she kicked him out. I was caught, not directly, by my mom, crossdressing. Was told to stop that. She has denied that she has ever said that. My sister caught me a few times. Mom overlooked it and then I needed to play football. They taught me how to kill animals, I got use to that then had a nevous breakdown at 45. My grandmother and other aunts all said I should have been a girl, but I was a big kid. Why would they say such a thing when I was big. They bought me weights and books on how to take motors apart. Everytime I got into a motor, I broke something or screwed something up. I hated oil and gas on my hands, let along dripping down my arm or it squirting into my face. I never understood how the whole motor worked but I did like the muscle cars of the 60's and early 70's. I love to drive fast and could drive and still like to drive fast and hard. It is like an orgasm to me.
So, I really think they knew something but didn't want to say anything. My mom was not surprised when I told her my transexual status and going for surgery. Either was my sister, she was a year younger.
Quote from: Sandy on March 01, 2009, 06:59:14 AM
It seems interesting.
This is a generalization, it's hardly scientific, nor can any statistics be gathered, but;
The older of us seem to have either expected or received very harsh treatment from their parents.
While the younger of us seem to have been met with less severe responses.
Could it be that there has been a change in the mental makeup of the populace between the older generation and the younger?
If so, could there be hope for us as a species?
-Sandy
I hope so. It certainly looks that way. Of course, there will always be other factors at work such as religion and strictness of parents.
There are more religious groups that are accepting people on who they are. They are trying not to be judgemental anymore. They are letting "God" be their judge and not them.
Quote from: Sheila on March 01, 2009, 05:18:01 PM
There are more religious groups that are accepting people on who they are. They are trying not to be judgemental anymore. They are letting "God" be their judge and not them.
that's good news.
I do a lot of work with people age 14-25, their attitudes are much different than they were when I was growing up in terms of how accepting they are and their parents are. There are still teh hard eggs, but it is much different. In just the 7 years I have been doing it there has been a changes even.
My parents did know. They just didn't say or do anything = _= Which lead me to believe they'd hate me, so I let it boil until I was 18. Biggest mistake of my life.
I think mine did know, ever though they say they had no clue. I don't see how they couldn't have known. I didn't hide things much when I was under the age of 10.
I used to think it would have made a difference. But then my sister told me my parents confessed to her that they had two sexual specification surgeries perfomed on me when I was 3 months old and 6 months old. So all that business about not recalling the conversations we had when I was 4 and 5 years old about how I felt more like a girl or wanted be a girl, that was all rubbish too. Parents can be very strange. I haven't seen or spoken to mine in about 17 years.
I try not to think of the past...
Just to painful...
Maybe my mother did know and just ignored it. Father was hardly ever sober long enough to notice. Someone must have seen there was something different when G.I. Joe and Barbie kept crossdressing.
Quote from: Genevieve Swann on March 13, 2009, 04:46:56 AMG.I. Joe and Barbie kept crossdressing.
I'm pretty sure that waaaaaay more Barbies and G.I. Joes have crossdressed than Mattel would like to let on. Then there are all the Barbies with buzzcuts like a marine. >:-)
When I was around ten years old, 1955 on into my mid teens I use to dress up when I didn't think anyone would know and I enjoyed playing with my sisters dolls and other toys just as much as I did the boy toys I had. No one seemed to pay attention although my dad did wonder at times at my odd behaviour but it never went any further then that. In my early teens I met this girl she was a outcast just as I was and this was in the hippie era, I had long hair and we both wore unisex clothes, I passed well as a girl to alot of folks in town.
I don't only suspect my mom knew, I am quite certain she did. She caught me on occasion dressing u but never breathed a word to anyone about it. Back in the fifties and sixties, who would she go to talk about it to. I believe my mom would have accepted me, bless her soul. But uncertain as to how the folks around there would have reacted.
Cindy
I think that both of my parents would have worked to find ways to be sure I was the boy they had, not the genderflux person I am in reality.
Theirs is a very binary world, and only the birth or genetic binaries are valid. MtF or FtM would not have been acceptable, gender-fluid even less acceptable.
Age 9 they found me sleeping with my mom's nighties .Mom went berserk and did so every time they caught me lounging in the house in her clothes.Dad couldnt understand why i wanted this . Took me to a psychiatrist who asked me all the wrong questions to which i gave no answer whatsoever . I thing they would never understand back then , the same way that my mom , i think, wont understand now . Still, i could be wrong and my life could have been a lot easier and a whole lot less hellish.
Ive given up asking my Mum. She knows I was different but her stock standard answer is "Little boys experiment". Mum is living in denial and I dont think she will ever change. Dad is a lot more accepting
Quote from: Genevieve Swann on March 13, 2009, 04:46:56 AMMaybe my mother did know and just ignored it. Father was hardly ever sober long enough to notice. Someone must have seen there was something different when G.I. Joe and Barbie kept crossdressing.
Quote from: Alyssa M. on March 13, 2009, 02:18:03 PM
I'm pretty sure that waaaaaay more Barbies and G.I. Joes have crossdressed than Mattel would like to let on. Then there are all the Barbies with buzzcuts like a marine. >:-)
Oooh, have you seen my new Buzzcut Barbie?!?! I got the one with the camouflage make-up kit and the M15 assault rifle!!!
Not to mention that G.I.Joe and He-Man got to attend an awful lot of tea-parties. ;D
Mina.
Hi Cindi, hon I knew you had a bum deal when you came out to family and I empathise with you on that. It appears that we are both orphans when it comes to family. I didn't know about the physical abuse though that is so sad. there is no need for such treatment. I didn't get it from my parents but I got my share of it after I left to live on my own.
Here is a little scenario about transitioning from back in the, or what would likely have been the result in transitioning back in the 50's
I must warn there is a lot of humor in it, but it is the truth.
That's about it, when the biological clock starts to wind down and you know that time is running out and GID is nipping at your heels you get more desperate to do something. Thinking gets irrational and thoughts of suicide creep into the back of your mind and you get more desperate and you sweat a lot and feel panic creeping in, until you either do something or.......
Well so it was with me. Now according to statistics if you are truly transsexual and you continue trying to repress and deny the symptoms of GID few will make it past the age of 30. This is due to the fact that testosterone levels will start dropping steadily starting from your thirties and continuously up into your forties increasing the intensity of GID.
Fortunately with the abundance of information on TS'sm and the support and resources at our disposal we have out there now a days does greatly facilitates the process of treating TS individuals seeking to transition, *much* sooner then in my day.
Remarkably It appears that some of us old times from the 50's generation have gone beyond the thirty year mark, well into fifties and sixties was simply the luck of the draw...hmm four leaf clovers? Na, it was because the the knowledge of this dysphoria was unavailable for the most part, actually nearly unknown back then. We just survived not knowing why we felt like we did and there was no where to go to find out, "heaven forbid!" who knows what the reaction would have been if one did tell anyone.
So for my generation to tell anyone, especially a shrink or a therapist it would have been admitting insanity and a trip to the bug house. Heck maybe they still used Oglan's swamp to dispose of bodies back then, or tar and feathers, or most possibly in the same rubber room as the alien abducties and those who proclaimed to be Jesus Christ waving a sign over their heads, "The end is here!".
Certainly wasn't much of a choice unless you joined the French foreign legion, or train to be Kamikaze pilot. "Gee!" I did fly bush planes, raced hot rods and drove in the demolition derbies and stock care races. Think I might of been looking for the Pearly Gates? But in the end I chose to continue to be the town mouse with my bottle of hooch under my arm instead. Anyway It is by the grace of what ever higher power of your understanding that I survived until 53 years old before I learned what transsexualism and it's unrelenting runner upper friend GID meant.
I finally went storming the doors to transition, flailing my little fists against the doors as hard as I could. It was like being released from a dungeon, of course complete with the thumb screws and the skeletons hanging in chains on the stone walls opposite the body stretching rack.
Cindy
Quote
I finally went storming the doors to transition, flailing my little fists against the doors as hard as I could. It was like being released from a dungeon, of course complete with the thumb screws and the skeletons hanging in chains on the stone walls opposite the body stretching rack.
I apologise if this comes across as an English literature analysis :P, but I love your use of imagery, Cindy. So amazingly vivid, it's wonderful. :D
I can't believe how hard some people's lives have been. I am really so amazingly lucky in my parents and friends, I've never had to face any of that (and sincerely hope I never will :-\). If my parents had known earlier, I think they would have done everything to help me. They were both high school teachers, and they both have multiple degrees (and are therefore very well-educated), and because their own parents were (generally) fairly close-minded and didn't get on well (both sides of the family had marital issues), I think they were aware of what it was like to live in such a household and so went in the opposite direction. (And it worked - they're not like their own self-centred, uncaring parents at all ^-^). I don't know that they would have necessarily understood at the beginning, but I think they would have been supportive and tried to do their best and learn as much as possible anyway. So yes, I think, had they known, they would have been wonderful about it, and done everything necessary for me to be happy.
:icon_hug:
Will
xox
Quote from: Julie Marie on February 27, 2009, 10:53:13 AM
What would you have expected them to do if they knew you had transsexual tendencies, that you wanted to live in the gender opposite what your birth certificate stated?
Julie
I asked my Mom this a few weeks ago. They are both really supportive of me. She said that she honestly didn't know, that they probably would have taken me to a psychiatrist or something. She went through this whole self-blame thing for a while, but I think my parents see me in a much better place now and they know I'm much happier now. I don't think it would have been so much of a surprise to them if I was 5 - 10, but once I got to be like 21+, I think they would have been REALLY surprised about TS. When I was younger, I was definitely more feminine, more emotional, etc. and my Mom especially wouldn't have been surprised that something was going on in that little, confused head of mine. Good question Julie :)
My parents knew and chose to be in denial about it.
My parents are outwardly supportive, but mainly because they have to be (for risk of losing their grandchild). When I was a kid, my dad wasn't around a lot because of shift work...
...but he's one of the most decent, kind people I know. He truly does not understand me or what I'm going through, and I don't think he wants to. I don't want to pressure him, either. He does, however, side with me that the way my marriage ended was not my fault at all -- something I can't get out of my mother who sympathizes far more with my ex for giving up her daughter than she does with me for trying to be a decent single parent and still transition.
Way back when I was a kid, I was sick constantly. Basically, everything revolved around me -- from where we could live, to when we'd go out of town, to what foods we could eat, and so on and so forth. It was absolutely maddening, like being raised in a cage. I couldn't fathom making myself further the center of attention by declaring that I'm a girl. Seriously, though, I didn't figure it mattered anyway -- I kept being told that I wouldn't live another 10 years, and when that came, another 5, and when that came, doctors were scratching their heads in disbelief. I could see, though, how unhappy it would have made everybody, and it isn't in me to cause familial strife for selfish purposes, like having an unusual personal identity. They now know who I am, though, and I can't change my past decisions. I can only imagine how they would have reacted back then, and I guarantee whatever I can come up with would be different than anything they would have actually done, anyhow.
Quote from: Leslie Ann on February 27, 2009, 07:40:17 PM
My dad would have tried to beat the girl out of me probably.
I told my dad I was really a girl when I was 7, I did get a beating.....
^ I was a fast little twerp back then.
He would have been out of breath trying to catch.
When I was like, six, I used to try peeing standing up. Can't remember what gave me the idea. my mum caught me, and told me to pee like a girl. She scolded me, so, being the momma's baby that I am, lol, I never tried again. But I was always bouncing between being girly and being boyish. I was more boyish though. But my mum never cought on. Dad was never home to know, lol. Truck driver.
anyways, they never found out, but, whenever I did anything really boyish, (like trying to pee standing up) I'd be scolded.
I think my mom did know, to some extent. When I was 6 and 7, I told her I was a boy... though what I remember is that I'd pretend I had a twin brother, and would pretend to be him. My mom thought it was a phase, and pretty well glossed over it, despite my tendencies toward male-oriented activities throughout childhood. Guess she figured it was normal that I preferred playing with cars and insects to dolls (though I did play with Barbie dolls... probably a little messed up, though, that I always made them have sex).
Honestly, when I look back on my childhood, it seems that while my mom was pretty tolerant of what she saw to be tomboyish behavior in me, she was constantly trying to reinforce in my mind that I was a girl. She never even brought up seeking psychiatric help for me, but she wasn't the person she is now.
I think, back then, if she'd known what a transsexual was, she might have encouraged me to just be androgynous. If she had been the way she is now (overly religious and set in her binary-promoting ways), she would have had me in an institution in seconds. Guess it's a good thing she waited to get into all that... though it doesn't help me now.
SD
Interesting topic. I had to really stop and think about it.
My first response was "yeah, they'd beat the crap out of me" because of what happened when they caught me at age 14. But I thought about it while reading other post and Honestly I think if I had been upfront and just told them they would never have even raised their voices at me. My parents loved me but the shock of catching me walking the streets wearing girls clothes and a wig at 3:00 o'clock in the morning made them snap.
I can't say they would have supported me and I know they would have very forcefully tried to change me but they would have never hurt me.
They are coming around more lately and I think they are looking back and feeling just a bit guilty for how it all went down.
Quote from: Cami on March 28, 2009, 08:35:29 PM
My parents loved me but the shock of catching me walking the streets wearing girls clothes and a wig at 3:00 o'clock in the morning made them snap.
That is completely normal.
You could have been beaten up, or kidnapped. It's pretty odd if someone's child is out at 3 in the morning with the opposite genders' clothing.
My father would had screamed in my face: I did raise you as a man.
or actually wait, he already did that.
My parents knew, routinely called me sissy and ->-bleeped-<-got, my mom secretly painted my nails and let me do her hair, this was in the 90s, maybe things are different now. whatever.
My mom was the first person to dress me in drag. She never did again but I liked it so much I made a habit out of it.