Susan's Place Transgender Resources

I've never heard this talked about, and it's something that's really hard to quantify but here goes:

Before transition how did you know life would be better, more comfortable, more preferable, etc living as your internal gender? I mean how do you know without actually experiencing it?
And this may be a different thing for transmen than transwomen. I've had all the surgeries I'm going to have, I'm on T and yet I still don't actually 'live' as male because the world still sees a masculine looking female.
I have no idea what it's like to walk the world as a man. So, once I do eventually start passing, I have no frame of reference.
I've been walking around for years introducing myself with a male name and male dress, and people still had no clue. I was just a woman with an odd name. It's ridiculous how far women can go with gender presentation, and still be seen as nothing out of the ordinary.

So, I don't know if anyone is going to get what I'm talking about and that's that I have no idea what it's like for people to gender me male. I have no idea the different daily reactions to me will be once I pass.
So, if there's anyone else out there who had no frame of reference before transition like me, how did you know life would be preferable as your internal gender? Me, I just knew I couldn't stand life as a woman because I'm a guy. But I have no frame of reference or comparison for it.

I didn't, but I knew I was unhappy as I was.  The way I figured, it couldn't possibly be worse.

A good question, Nero.

I've always maintained that what should be the criteria to decide whether to transition
should be your dead certainty that life would be better, not the depth of your dysphoria.

I'm also a bit radical in thought and believe that going full-time and passing don't have to be connected.
For me, that meant changing my name, proclaiming that I was a woman and leaving the cosmetic details for later.

And you know what? Life is better.

I'd say that was an awesome question Nero. And I think it would be the same for Transmen and Transwomen. I have no experience either. I just take the HRT and wait.

I don't know if life will be better or preferable. I know it will be different though. It is all I can hope for is that things will be different enough I can find the happiness I seek. Life as it is now is not bearable. I can only hope that being female in this world will be bearable. I guess I'd rather be thinking "whups" than "what if?"

I'm with Mister.  My mother asked me what if I was making a mistake?  I said living as a man couldn't be any worse than how miserable I was as a woman.

Turns out T totally calmed me down, took away most of my anxiety (that I didn't really know I had until it was gone!), and gave me a much more positive outlook on life.  And that was before I was passing.  Now it's like life is totally normal for the first time in 48 years.  I can't change my past, but I can live as myself for the rest of my life.


Jay

That's a great question, Nero.  I don't think I knew life would be better, but even when I was little I thought I would fit into the world better as a woman than I did as a man.  I remember that early in this process I told my daughter that I was sure I would be happier pretending to be a woman than I ever was pretending to be a man.  (How was I sure?  I don't know.)  I'm still not sure that I will ever "be" a woman, but I am far happier, more open, friendlier - just a nicer person - as Kate than I ever was as whats-his-name. ;D

Quote from: sneakersjay on July 04, 2009, 07:13:21 AM
Turns out T totally calmed me down, took away most of my anxiety

I agree with your post, Jay, even though we are mirror reflections, but I really thought this was funny.  When my T was finally blocked it was like my life had finally been given to me - it totally calmed me and removed my anxiety and feelings of being controlled by an alien force.  Isn't it funny how things work? :D

Nero, I don't know if you can know that things will be better.  Perhaps you only know that things are wrong now and, even with all the problems of transitioning, they are bound to be no worse than what you are going through now.  There's a lot of soul-searching involved in this process.  I hope you are getting good help in that soul-searching.

And bottom line: presenting male or female or whatever, you are still a really neat person! 8)

- Kate

Nero, I can mirror much of what you said.  I had no idea what life as a woman would be like.  I was pretty masculine before and presenting as female would only draw raised eyebrows and criticism.  Unlike FTMs, MTFs can't even get close to the gender line without someone thinking they are weird, so it's all or nothing.  I couldn't take gradual steps to test the waters.  I had to go all the way if I wanted to be taken seriously as a woman.

For me that was very scary.  In fact, I decided to experiment with transitioning two years AFTER my family walked out of my life for being trans.  And it's only now, after FFS, BA & GRS that I'm finally beginning to feel comfortable in my skin.  That is mainly because I am caring less and less how others react to me.  Voice, bone structure, musculature all get me gendered male if someone takes the time to look.

But I did this because I was so terribly unhappy before.  And hearing myself say "I wish I was a girl" countless times throughout my life helped too.

Julie

Quote from: Nero on July 04, 2009, 05:57:28 AMBefore transition how did you know life would be better, more comfortable, more preferable, etc living as your internal gender? I mean how do you know without actually experiencing it?

Because of self-evident, life-long past experiences and behavior? On hindsight I've ALWAYS lived my internal, most natural gender just didn't explicitly acknowledge, refine and express it by consciously following thru to now quite logical conclusions.

My older sister recently told me -> "[malename]! Are you kidding? Get real! We all always knew from day 1 there was something not quite right, different about you!"


Parents feel same way, totally accept me WHOEVER I AM because of THE PERSON and not some orientation "gender", "partner preference", or "appearance" contrary to their idea of "familiar"!

Before I seriously began considering transistion, I was incredibly worried that my life as a male wouldn't be more preferable to living as female, but the more I thought about the more I figured that it couldn't make me feel much worse. So I started experimenting with my gender presentation a little and found that I was more comfortable being 'mistaken' as a sir then being read 'correctly' as a her.

The main deciding factor for me though was my first "official" step after begining to identify as trans - getting a binder. When I got it, a lot of my anxiety and disphoria went away and I suddenly became much more confident in being who I was. I was much more willing to assert myself as male to other people, and it felt just so much more right than being the locked up self-concious person I used to be.

This post calls for "Uncle Teknoir's Story Time! (tm)!"  :laugh:

I was raised with the freedom to present and do whatever I wanted, so the "male life" was never really all that strange a place for me to consider being. I thought I belonged there for as long as I can remember, and I was right - it's felt like coming home. For the first time in my life, I feel like the world has a place open for me to take, and I have a bright future to look ahead to.

My nerves about living this life have been conditioned into me by society. So has the fear of regret - even though I know from experiance the alternative has no future.

However, before I began this path, I did attempt to live the life of female. Right from the outset, it seemed a weird and confusing way to live - but people (even those who said I should be myself) told me that was what was ment for me, and I'd like it if I gave it a shot.... so I did.

When I was persuaded to live as female for a time, I hated it. I was suicidal. Estrogen and androgen blockers fried my brain, making me an overly emotional illogical wreck. My body started changing in ways I hated. I had to dress in a manner I hated, and do all these weird and painful "beauty" routines which took huge chunks out of my time - and I still wasn't able to pass myself off as an even half decent looking female.

The person I was with wanted the whole "housewife and family" thing for the future. I felt as though there was no escape. My future was a fate worse than death - I had to be someone else - and I had to kill myself to do it (in a manner of speaking, or literally... it could have gone either way). I tried to live life as a career female for a while, but that was just as bad. I tried being just female at all... and I couldn't deal with it. It refused to mesh with who I was - so either it went or I went.

I was pushed hard into the female life at that time, and failed at it... badly. This caused many fights. One day in the heat of rage I screamed back "I'm not a effing <w word I can't bring myself to say> you effing moronic f-word", and then punched a concrete wall.  I had no idea where the outburst came from at the time. I am normally a very controlled, quiet, non-violent, downright laid-back person.

Later, with a sore hand , I thought back to the way I used to live. To what I wanted when I was older, who I thought I'd grow up to be, who I really was. And finally, I tried to find a reason I shouldn't chase the dream of being who I am, and a reason I should stay how I was. I found nothing.

So that's how I figured out living as male was better for me than living as female. One was a possible future in which I could be myself, and the other had a future in which I (literally or otherwise) killed myself.

Since I was a kid, I always knew a "sex change" (as it was called back then) was something that was on the cards for me as a possibility. My life experiance just confirmed it. I knew what I had to do...

You know.. I don't "know" that this will make my life better and I avoid to think that this will "fix" everything.
It would be easy to think that..
the depression will just go away.
I'll sleep better and feel better.
T'll strengthen me against my various other body problems.
But I don't, or at the very least... try not to.

This is something I'm pursuing because I feel a deep need to do so and I believe it's the right thing for me to do.
I think it "might" make life easier for me by removing some of the things that I feel drag me down, removing some of the "issues" I have to deal with..
Or at least, that's what I'm hoping for..

I won't "know" what this will bring 'till it's done.

(Look at the skeptic in me go!)

I didn't know. Like everything with gender transition, it was a leap of faith. Or rather, one small leap right after the last added up to one giant leap. But if I didn't take those small leaps, I would be dead by now.

I did not know what my life would be like as a woman, but I knew that I had to try before Death came calling, whether at my own hand or in it own time.  And now I know it will be in it's own time.

It isn't any easier as a woman, just better emotionally.  I still have the same problems and issues.  I am just happier as a woman, not any richer or any smarter, just happier.

Quote from: Teknoir on July 04, 2009, 01:31:38 PM
This post calls for "Uncle Teknoir's Story Time! (tm)!"  :laugh:

I was raised with the freedom to present and do whatever I wanted, so the "male life" was never really all that strange a place for me to consider being. I thought I belonged there for as long as I can remember, and I was right - it's felt like coming home. For the first time in my life, I feel like the world has a place open for me to take, and I have a bright future to look ahead to.

My nerves about living this life have been conditioned into me by society. So has the fear of regret - even though I know from experiance the alternative has no future.

However, before I began this path, I did attempt to live the life of female. Right from the outset, it seemed a weird and confusing way to live - but people (even those who said I should be myself) told me that was what was ment for me, and I'd like it if I gave it a shot.... so I did.

When I was persuaded to live as female for a time, I hated it. I was suicidal. Estrogen and androgen blockers fried my brain, making me an overly emotional illogical wreck. My body started changing in ways I hated. I had to dress in a manner I hated, and do all these weird and painful "beauty" routines which took huge chunks out of my time - and I still wasn't able to pass myself off as an even half decent looking female.

The person I was with wanted the whole "housewife and family" thing for the future. I felt as though there was no escape. My future was a fate worse than death - I had to be someone else - and I had to kill myself to do it (in a manner of speaking, or literally... it could have gone either way). I tried to live life as a career female for a while, but that was just as bad. I tried being just female at all... and I couldn't deal with it. It refused to mesh with who I was - so either it went or I went.

I was pushed hard into the female life at that time, and failed at it... badly. This caused many fights. One day in the heat of rage I screamed back "I'm not a effing <w word I can't bring myself to say> you effing moronic f-word", and then punched a concrete wall.  I had no idea where the outburst came from at the time. I am normally a very controlled, quiet, non-violent, downright laid-back person.

Later, with a sore hand , I thought back to the way I used to live. To what I wanted when I was older, who I thought I'd grow up to be, who I really was. And finally, I tried to find a reason I shouldn't chase the dream of being who I am, and a reason I should stay how I was. I found nothing.

So that's how I figured out living as male was better for me than living as female. One was a possible future in which I could be myself, and the other had a future in which I (literally or otherwise) killed myself.

Since I was a kid, I always knew a "sex change" (as it was called back then) was something that was on the cards for me as a possibility. My life experiance just confirmed it. I knew what I had to do...

wow. are you IS?

I know that I want to live as my internal gender dictates, that side is pretty obvious. We are who we are. I would be happier being able to do that.

But I can't predict the outcome of living my internal gender. My wife could leave me, I could loss my family, my kids might resent me when they are older....it is a risk.

It really came down to would I prefer to do nothing and keep going on in pain, not quite living, or would I take a chance at being able to live. Existance vs being alive. I prefer life over the half life I had, even if it is a miserable lonely life. For me, not living as myself was no life at all. I know life would be preferable because before that I did not have a 'real' one.

I don't know if I can really answer and say that things would be better if I completed my transition all the way through. Maybe they won't be. Maybe it will be worse. All I know is I can't continue on pretending to be something I'm not and looking at myself in the mirror all the time and restraining the urge to break the damn thing in revulsion.

Quote from: Matilda on July 04, 2009, 08:13:33 AM
In my case, to not transition would have meant certain death. 

This sums it up for me.

Honestly I wasn't sure it would be any better/more comfortable until I started hrt, but after a couple months the doubts were gone. Before, I thought life in general was pretty over-rated and was just dragging on; and if I didn't firmly believe I'd just come back again and again and again as a transexual until I sucked it up and faced this, I would have ended it by now.

Quote from: Becca on July 05, 2009, 07:27:48 PM
This sums it up for me.

Honestly I wasn't sure it would be any better/more comfortable until I started hrt, but after a couple months the doubts were gone. Before, I thought life in general was pretty over-rated and was just dragging on; and if I didn't firmly believe I'd just come back again and again and again as a transexual until I sucked it up and faced this, I would have ended it by now.

My biggest fear now is that I waited too long and I won't get any changes.

Decided I wasn't really living my life simply taking up space and air. Things couldn't really be any worse than trying to live as a female so I went with the "it can't be worse than this" theory. Enjoy life a hack o a lot more now.
Myles

Quote from: Nero on July 05, 2009, 05:37:23 AM
wow. are you IS?

I'm not IS... but I do have a glitch in the endo system.

I assume you're asking due to the mention of androgen blockers and estrogen. I wasn't on anything anywhere near as strong as IS or MTF people get, but it was strong enough that I (and everyone else) noticed drastic changes.

I had a partener who was the driving force behind that time. He thought my non-fitting of female parameters in a physical regard may be a danger to my health long term, and convinced me to "fix" the issue. When I reported to doctors the bad reactions I was having, I was told that I was "now within normal hormonal parameters for a female", there is no possible way I can be having a bad reaction - I should be feeling great and all my problems and instability is in my head.

So, I spent a fortune on shrinks and meds to no avail - only to have most of my problems dissapear when I went off the female hormones, and the rest get nerfed by treating GID! *head slap*.

I've been off the stuff for almost a year now, and the "back to normal" physical changes are leveling off. My mother was convinced I'd started T already until I explained the above, but she still thinks it's a bit sus :laugh:.

Today a friend asked me if I was feeling any ill effects from the hormones. I said that I hadn't noticed any.  I've seen some physical changes from the estrogen, but what I noticed was that after three days the anti-androgens kicked in and I felt at peace with myself and the world for probably the first time in my life.  I thought it was odd that an FtM on the forum (Sneakersjay) had said the exact same thing about going on Testosterone as had happened to me going off T.

My friend said: "Of course.  That's the way it should be."

Even if I had any doubts about proceeding, the fact that the hormones have made me feel "right" for the first time in my life, and the fact that I love to be able to participate in the rich, interwoven texture of womanspeak, would erase any lingering doubts.

Before hormones and before being accepted in your target gender, how do we know this is what we want?  I think it happens as we progress slowly toward our desires.  At each step, if it feels good and right, we start wanting to take the next step.  If at any point it no longer feels right, we retreat to where it did feel right.  That's why I think it is good to proceed slowly, one step at a time, testing the waters as we go.

- Kate

Well hun, I have a bit of a different view  ;). There was never a point where I 'knew' life would be preferable as female. In fact, how can I view what I am as not preferable? Here is what I mean: I was always female. I didn't realize it until about a year ago, but I was never male. I've always lived as a female. Sure, I acted like a male at times (mostly the whole military part), but I am what I am. I can't say it's preferable being female since I don't know anything else. Easier or harder, I plan to transition so that my physical gender can match my internal one. Does any of this makes sense? I think I'm starting to confuse myself!  :eusa_doh:

How did I know? By experimental investigation: I started presenting myself as a woman. Even doing so unconvincingly and not nearly to my satisfaction was an improvement. As I started to be accepted as a woman, at least sometimes, even before I did anything permanent (just long hair, makeup, a close shave, a pushup bra, and a few feminine outfits), I found that it suited me well. It has only gotten better.

I didn't "know" as in having some tangible proof or experiences to go by, but I just "knew" because I knew it was who I really was and have always been, just like you know who you are no matter how much others try to tell you that you're something else.  So far everything I have done and everything I do towards my transition has only reaffirmed that innate feeling and increased my longing to complete myself. When you finally take that step from purgatory to paradise, you just know it's gotta be the right thing to do.

Didn't know for sure; I couldn't know for sure, really.  I'd like to say that, in my gut, it just felt right; in a way it did if I thought back to childhood and my first reactions to a female puberty, but I still had nerves... I was still listening to all the people who said that I could enjoy being female, that I was *meant* to be female--all I had to do was give it a chance, get laid (use the hole), show off my body (in their opinion, a very cute curvy body), put a smile on that face (cute, feminine baby-face).  Okay, so I'm seething at the memories of their words.

I gave it a shot, kinda.  Not really.  I put off transitioning for a year, at least.  I was already dressing as femininely as I could tolerate; no way was I trying random sex as a female just to convince myself I was one; smiling was becoming harder and harder.  I just decided to take the leap because after the panic attacks, convulsions, and dreaming my own death every night for several months straight, I figured it really couldn't get any worse.  As it turns out, even if transitioning can be awkward and stressful at times, it just doesn't compare to the stress of forcing myself into a female role.  The suicidal impulses are gone; the urge to hurt my body is gone (hell, I'm even able to refer to it as *my* body); I think that counts for something. 

As for not really knowing what it's like to be treated as male in society, I feel ya.  I'm still not 100% sure what people gender me as.  I think more than anything, they just treat me like I'm very young.  It's awkward; I sort of feel like I am a teenager because that's how I'm perceived.  I guess my problem is more that I have no idea what it is like to be treated as an adult in society; I have never physically (even when perceived as female) been taken to be more than 18.  Once people get to know me they catch on to my true age, but just out in public... I've always been a kid or a teenager, never an adult.  There's a certain uneasiness that comes with never being perceived correctly and it leads to the question: what will it be like once I am?  I expect it will feel just fine (like coming home, as someone said), though it will take a little getting used to.

Quote from: Eryk on July 07, 2009, 12:41:35 AM
There's a certain uneasiness that comes with never being perceived correctly and it leads to the question: what will it be like once I am?  I expect it will feel just fine (like coming home, as someone said), though it will take a little getting used to.

It is a bit strange for me when people read me as your run of the mill straight male. It's weird not to be weird anymore  :D. I mean, for my whole life I've been in this gender limbo where people were never sure what/who I was, but now they think I'm... dare I say it, "normal"! But, part of that is just me being quiet around people I don't know well. If you were to get me talking, you'd see I'm as gay as can be. When that happens, it is pretty cool to finally be read the same as how I actually identify!

Anyway, in regard to the question at hand... My experience is sort of a combination of lots of things already mentioned. Being physically male is something I've wanted since my earliest memories. That being said, I didn't really know what it would actually be like. I figured a desire I've had this strongly for 15 years probably wouldn't go away on it's own, and each new step (coming out, binding, passing) made me feel better about myself. I knew it couldn't possibly make things much worse, so I took the red pill. Turns out I was right.

"Leap and the net shall find you."

--

"If you cannot find the truth right where you are, where else do you expect to find it?"

--

"All of the significant battles are waged within the self."

I didn't know but I suspected. I had lived part of my teens in my psychological gender and felt more comfortable but it got harder and harder to go back so eventually I quit - it was like a tease for something I could never have. (SRS wasn't available then.) I sunk into deep depression in my early 20's and was quite suicidal by 23. I sure knew what I WASN'T but I still wasn't sure what I was. I didn't find out until the following year when SRS became possible.

What amazed me (afterwards) was how I could ever have doubted!

I knew at childhood. Unfortunately it took me about forty years to do much about it  :-\

Quote from: Northern Jane on July 08, 2009, 06:05:30 PM
I sure knew what I WASN'T but I still wasn't sure what I was.

Me too. :-\ 

I think I didn't know what I was because I didn't think it would be possible.  Not being suicidal, I had to get on with my life.  I know I will never be as tall as my brother, as pretty as my sister, as rich as the guy around the corner, or as smart as my friend, so why dream that I am? 

Can you spell REPRESSION? :P

But when I started to let the cage door swing open, all hell broke loose and now I am Katherine. ;D  I never dreamed I could do it. ;D ;D  I feel like I've been given a gift of immeasurable worth.  *happy tears*

- Kate

I'm still very much on the road. But as Cindy I'm at peace. Yes an awful lot of problems, I have no doubts just big issues that I have to cope with. I cannot complete my journey without affecting the very life of my wife. I will not do that.

But after? Peace.

Just blocking T has been so welcoming.
Cindy

YMMV

I'm very glad to have turned control over to Virginia. The angry, frustrated irresponsible devil that was more than ready to raise hell has been benched.
Virginia was always there, and did allot of good things. But she didn't have full control. Unfortunately, it took severe injuries to bring about this kinder and more responsible person who had been there all along but was never allowed to present herself.

Quote from: heatherrose on July 09, 2009, 01:53:05 AM

No, I didn't know my quality of life would be better.
How did an individual born into slavery, in the late eighteen hundreds,
know that the freedom, north of the Mason Dixon Line was better?
From the stories, through the grape vine, of those who had attained their
freedom in the north, perhaps? All That I knew was that I was enslaved within
a facade of my own construction, designed and commissioned by society.
I did not know want kind of life lay in store for me after opening the
"closet door" but I knew it had to be better than living with fear
and self loathing, who where my constant companions.
My life here mid-transition is by no means a
cake walk but it is a dam sight better

great analogy.