What age did you realise you were in the wrong body?
For me, I never really questioned it until puberty, and even then I was just unhappy without knowing why. People seem to think that because I didn't know from an earlier age (I've read about people who knew from being as young as 3) that what I feel isn't true, and that I shouldn't be acting how I am. What do you guys think?
I had no idea until I was 18 (21 now) - I was actually playing a joke on a friend and was convincing him I was born a man, so I was doing some research on transsexuals to pull it off better, and once I started reading about the FTM stuff I was like "holy crap this is what I am" - if it wasn't for that I don't think it would have ever dawned on me.
before then something was just...wrong....had no idea what it was. I would just have thoughts of "I wish I was a boy" sometimes - It never occurred to me that my body was wrong, just that it would have been nice if it were the opposite gender, I had no clue there was something I could do about it.
I hope nobody takes this the wrong way but...being trans is weird, I can't fault anyone for not realising that's what the problem was. It's not something people tend to be exposed to. The only people in that kind of spectrum I had seen were drag queens.
I always knew I was male inside....or at least wasn't the gender people kept telling me to act/that I "was". But it wasn't until puberty that it really hit me like a sack of bricks. That was when I knew I had to do something about it, but I didn't know what or that anything could be done until I was 15. It's normal to question yourself and be unsure at first, and even at milestones in transitioning. Take it easy. Make sure it's what you want.
I didn't realise till I was 17 almost 18. I knew something was wrong but didn't know what, it never even occurred to me that someone could be in the wrong body, the only transsexuals that I had heard of were MTF and to be honest I didn't know that there was a difference between that and being a crossdresser, I was ignorant to trans issues.
The only reason I realised then was because someone on the internet said they were genderqueer and I was like wtf? So they explained it then I thought that must be what I am so researched trans stuff and I found out I was FTM. Scary thing is it could have been ages till I realised if it wasn't for that.
Quote from: Nathan. on June 07, 2010, 10:34:41 AM
I didn't realise till I was 17 almost 18. I knew something was wrong but didn't know what, it never even occurred to me that someone could be in the wrong body, the only transsexuals that I had heard of were MTF and to be honest I didn't know that there was a difference between that and being a crossdresser, I was ignorant to trans issues.
The only reason I realised then was because someone on the internet said they were genderqueer and I was like wtf? So they explained it then I thought that must be what I am so researched trans stuff and I found out I was FTM. Scary thing is it could have been ages till I realised if it wasn't for that.
heh our realisations are oddly similar :P it's strange isn't it, from not understanding the difference between MTF and crossdressing to realising you're trans. I often wonder how long I would have gotten in life without knowing if it wasn't for my prank research.
I knew from when I was a child I wanted to be a boy all my friends were boys I didn't like girly things, and I now know its not going to go away and its taken me along time to do something about it.
one day in the summer of 06, i found a old sports bra i used to wear when i was 11. I tried it on and it still fit me, and i was so flat chested, and i loved that feeling. ever since then ive been binding and trying hard to look like a boy
Been loads of signs since as young as 5 years old, but I've actually known I'm an FTM since about 15, I'm 20 now.
Realized I was FTM at 15.
I knew I was a boy when I was 4, which is the age when I have my earliest memories, but it didn't really matter much until I went through puberty. That destroyed me, because the body I was cursed with was so womanly. I resisted as long as I could but grew into a titmonster and then I just became depressed, and tried to repress my misery for years.
i don't remember specifically thinking i was or wanted to be a boy when i was a kid, but i do remember knowing i wasn't a girl and didn't want to be a woman. i managed to ignore that when puberty started (that was hell for many many years lemme yell ya). when i would see documentaries on TV about intersex people i thought "omg, i get that happened to me!" since that was my only exposure to trans related things. then my ex and i watched transgeneration together and i pretty much knew then that that's what i was going to do one day (i was 22). it took me 4 years to be pretty sure, call a therapist, go through some crap, find out the local clinic does informed consent, etc. but now i'm good to go :D
it's actually been a pretty quick process since deciding "i have to do this, and i'll find a way" since i was only sure about it last summer. almost a year ago in fact - now i'm hoping to be on T by august. it's exciting!
Knew I wanted to be male? Always.
Knew I was FTM? 17.
Being a boy was just a dream. I didn't realise it was possible to transition.
I knew that I should have been a boy from a very young age but I never had the language to express it until I was about 17. I started really realizing everything when I hit puberty but again didn't have the language for a few more years.
I'm in the "puberty" crowd. I wasn't really that aware of my gender before that, and when my body started changing--in particular my chest--I started realizing something was up. I remember wishing I had been born male past puberty, but I denied that this could mean I was trans.
But I didn't admit it to myself until last year, at 21.
I don't think I ever realized it. It just happened. When I was younger 4-5 I didn't understand gender and all that I was just me. I just wore why my mom put on me but when I got to middle school I started to care and picked the clothes I wanted.
When I was 10 I shaved my head and somehow I switched to male clothes by the time I was 11 I didn't own any female garmets besides a sports bra. When I shaved my head I was instantly read as male any where I went.
hmm , interesting how everyone is kinda similar at how/when they realized
anyway , for me , before puberty i didn't bother much , i just acted the way i wanted , but once puberty hit , i wished i was born a girl , and unintentionally sometimes think of myself as a girl but snap myself out of it since had no clue whatsoever about trans-related issues , other than that there are people who where porn intersexed (and i've always wished to have been born that way) and i didn't really get the T part of LGBT (the only transsexual people i seen by then was drag queens in movies)
only since i joined this particular forum (like 2 or 3 months ago) that i have realized/understood everything
i was in a point where i was too depressed and frustrated by what i feel , and wondering what was it , so i posted a question at yahoo answers and someone threw me a link to here , and that's when i first realized
I don't think I've ever had a realization. I don't even think I was really born in the wrong body. I feel as if I was born with less desirable traits that I can change. I had always been masculine but never associated that with being male. I did most everything as if I were a boy when I was young. Growing up...I remember my first period. Got it right after coming home from a comic book shop. I really didn't know where I was bleeding from and freaked out. I was thinking it was in my urine or from my behind...
I've been shopping nearly exclusively from the boy's/men's section since I was maybe 10 (probably younger). I started experimenting actively with my gender presentation as a drag king when I was 17/18. Started questioning my gender identity at that age too. IDed as gender queer for a bit then as a guy. I still feel as if I'm somewhere between gender queer and a guy but I don't know where.
I originally came out as a lesbian even though at the age I was not attracted to anybody. I assumed that since I wasn't attracted to men I must be attracted to women and since I'm not attracted to men. I also thought that since I was masculine and didn't really have much knowledge about trans men existing.
When my dad suggested it to me.
(Off topic, I apologise-- Would anyone know why my profile option has disappeared from the main menu?)
I was around 3. My Mom agreed with that too.
I've always known I was a boy. I thought I was a boy until I learned that boys peed standing up and I couldn't do that (I was like 6). As far as learning that I was trans, I did that on my own when I was around 12-13 and realized something was different. Kids were teasing me saying "chick with a ****, you need a **** check, or do your balls itch (lol). Anyways, I began questioning my sexuality first and initially thought that I was bi, but I did not want to tell anyone until I was exactly sure what I was. Then I thought I was a stud, then I stumbled upon videos of some FtMs on youtube.com who totally changed my life...and here I am
I realized when I was 25. I don't know why it took so long, I've had dysphoria about my body as long as I could remember. I just never knew there was something that could be done about it until I stumbled across something on the Internet.
I learned the word for it at probably 13. I felt a level of unhappiness with my body that wasn't the normal "I don't like this/that trait" when I hit puberty and KNEW I wanted to be a boy at 12. I forgot how I stumbled across the FTM community but when I did it clicked. Beforehand I questioned my sexuality and just kind of figured the deep-rooted dissatisfaction with being a girl was something I'd get over, or just another personality trait of being a "tomboy." When I was little that was a label I got put on me immediately because I gravitated towards boys clothes/activities and all that. For a while I reveled in the name but the more I heard it, the more it pissed me off because it still insinuated I was a girl.
I think I've mentioned this in another thread, but I did try to pee standing up when I was probably about two and had fits when I found out it just ran down my leg. When puberty hit I tried to battle it via stopping eating, and I wore a sports bra until I was about 14 - real bras just felt so.. awkward. Like they weren't meant to be there. I've always had small breasts anyway, which I've always hated not because they're small but because they're there but I could never get that point across to Mom; she tried to comfort me by telling me they'd grow someday, and that just upset me more. I remember being absolutely HORRIFIED when they started "budding." Eurgh. I was fine with body hair and didn't realize girls were expected to shave it until I was 12 and my friend made fun of me for having hairy armpits.
I came out to my parents at 16 and started binding/presenting as male/going by a more masculine nickname at the same time. This kept up halfway through me being seventeen and then my parents got tired of acknowledging it once I broke up with my girlfriend at the time, so it got put on the backburner and I stopped binding and started dressing more androgynously. Now, I'm trying to push it to the back of my mind by "being a girl" in the hope it'll go away someday but knowing it won't.
Woah guys, that's a lot of replies. :)
Hearing the ages makes me feel a lot better about my situation though, and I've had similar experiences as a child, and through puberty. Reading what you've all said has kind of made me realise that even though I was labelled as 'tomboy' when I was younger, I never really thought of myself as a girl or a boy, I was just me. I don't thnik I realised how much I'd change through puberty either, and it was horrible when it happened.
Nikolai; if you know it won't go away, why are you stopping binding/presenting as a boy? I'm hardly experienced in this kind of stuff, but it doesn't seem like something you'd do if you felt like that for so long, and you also knew you were going to continue feeling like that.
I got into a relationship with a guy, so that presents a bit of a problem in doing much about the dysphoria. Not that he's not understanding, and he's even said he'd try to stick it out with me, but at this point I'm not sure it's worth risking.
And also to make things easier on my parents as of right now. I'm 18 so I CAN, by legal means, do as I like concerning my gender dysphoria. But they're really keen on refusing to acknowledge it, so I can wait until I move out.
Those aren't the only reasons, of course, because if I didn't have some uncertainty I wouldn't sit back and be completely inactive with it. I want to be sure I won't regret it if I do start transition, or that I'd be okay with my breast tissue being broken down from binding. I'm not happy this way, but at the moment I'm not 100% sure therapy/hormone treatment/surgery is what I want. I'm kind of stuck at an in-between (probably from a LOT of self-persuasion that maybe transitioning wouldn't be a great idea), which, in all honesty, sucks more than knowing what I want and being unable to go for it.
Quote from: Jeatyn on June 07, 2010, 10:14:50 AMbefore then something was just...wrong....had no idea what it was. I would just have thoughts of "I wish I was a boy" sometimes - It never occurred to me that my body was wrong, just that it would have been nice if it were the opposite gender, I had no clue there was something I could do about it.
I hope nobody takes this the wrong way but...being trans is weird, I can't fault anyone for not realising that's what the problem was. It's not something people tend to be exposed to. The only people in that kind of spectrum I had seen were drag queens.
This, and also knowing I didn't want to be a girl from the onset of puberty. I had no idea anything could be done about it though until last year, when I was 19. Stumbled on some top surgery videos on youtube and it clicked. I'm taking my time to think things through though and really figure everything out. Learn as much as I can before I do anything (or tell anyone). Hopefully I'll see a therapist before the end of the month. :)
Since I was about 4 I always wanted to be a boy 8) But yeah, I didnt know that I was FTM until I was 14. I first started "pretending" to be a boy over the internet when I was 12-13 years old, and didnt understand how right it felt until a few years later :D
Since I was a child I knew I didn't want to be a woman and had phobias of pregancy and stuff. I hated having periods the moment they started because it made me sick to think I had the equipment to give birth. That felt so painfully wrong. When I was in my late teens I got into slash and yaoi fiction and wondered why I identified with that so much, and enjoyed it in a very different way than the straight females that rule the genre. That turned into proper gay male stuff. Tried lesbianism. Didn't fancy women. Tried being very feminine and getting an attractive boyfriend. Hated the straightness of it all. Started wearing male clothing constantly in retaliation, about this time last year. Slowly, realised I didn't want to be seen as female any more and couldn't imagine growing old as a woman. I found out about ->-bleeped-<- and FtM through the internet about June last year. I stewed on it for a miserable 6 months before making the decision to transition in December. This year I turned 24.
Since December I haven't been happier, not ever in my life. It's not a picnic, sometimes I am terrified of being wedged firmly in the LGBT community when our society is so pro-cis and pro-het. But of course it could be worse; it could still be illegal to be gay or transition! I aim to be through surgery and done with most of the T changes by 30. Life starts at 30!
Quote from: Alessandro on June 09, 2010, 05:29:04 PMSince I was a child I knew I didn't want to be a woman and had phobias of pregancy and stuff. I hated having periods the moment they started because it made me sick to think I had the equipment to give birth.
This.
Big time.
I have nightmares sometimes where I find out I'm pregnant. *shudders*
Ugh. YES. The idea of being pregnant horrifies me to the degree that for a while I was really... I don't want to say hostile because that's not correct, but I couldn't even stand pregnant women and babies.
Now that I know myself better, I have no problems with either, and can even look at a baby and find it sweet rather than having it repulse me.
Quote from: Berren on June 07, 2010, 10:06:24 AM
What age did you realise you were in the wrong body?
For me, I never really questioned it until puberty, and even then I was just unhappy without knowing why. People seem to think that because I didn't know from an earlier age (I've read about people who knew from being as young as 3) that what I feel isn't true, and that I shouldn't be acting how I am. What do you guys think?
I was probably 16 when I realized it, or at least fully realized it. I was always unhappy about a few things in my life, but something that bothered me and got worse was that I just wasn't in the body I should be in--sex felt wrong because I wasn't a male being with a male. I felt I should be male and that I should always have been male.
I never cared for kids, especially since babysitting a 5 month old for two weeks straight, and I still don't want kids because it doesn't feel like something I should be having (I have no maternal extinct, my instinct is more paternal unless it's an animal).
I think it's fine for someone to realize later on, but I'm biased because I realized later (:P)
Quote from: Berren on June 07, 2010, 10:06:24 AM
What age did you realise you were in the wrong body?
For me, I never really questioned it until puberty, and even then I was just unhappy without knowing why. People seem to think that because I didn't know from an earlier age (I've read about people who knew from being as young as 3) that what I feel isn't true, and that I shouldn't be acting how I am. What do you guys think?
I'm in the same boat as you. I didn't know until I got my period, and that day I wanted to cry so bad (I didn't realize completely until a little bit later). Before that I always felt like there was something wrong with me. I've felt this way for many years now (it feels odd saying that), and just because I didn't know from birth doesn't mean that what I'm feeling isn't real. Don't let people tell you who you are or how you feel.
Quote from: Jeatyn on June 07, 2010, 10:14:50 AMbefore then something was just...wrong....had no idea what it was. I would just have thoughts of "I wish I was a boy" sometimes - It never occurred to me that my body was wrong, just that it would have been nice if it were the opposite gender, I had no clue there was something I could do about it.
I was like this XD
I was 18 when I realised. Last year I was reading a transgender thread in a forum and they were talking about their experiences and how they felt. And then I guess something like clicked in my head xD Like I remember wishing I was a boy when I was younger and I've always pictured like my ideal self as male, but I didn't think that was "unusual"? lol. Like I tried to talk to my friend about how I felt but she was like she couldn't relate coz she never felt something like it before >__<.
When did I know I had a birth defect?
About 12 months ago. For something like 42 years before that I just felt like the proverbial "square peg in the round hole", with no real idea of the cause.
I knew I wasn't a poofter because I like(lusted after) girls. All the normal teenage boy hormonal things happened, but there was something that just was 'not right'. Living in a bit of a backwater in the 60's meant there was NO information, and even less help. The past is definitely a different country kids, believe me!
Now I can put a name to the problem, and envisage a solution. So many small things now seem so obvious, that it is a wonder that anyone didn't ask the obvious question.
If there had been the help available then, that there is today , I would have been able to live my life as the woman I should always have been. I would probably even had a swag of (adopted ) kids!
I am really happy for you kids being able to do what we could not. I am not jealous, as I have had a fortunate life in many ways, just want to encourage you all to never give up hope.
You can all do pretty much what ever you set your heart on. Just hold on to the soul of your opponent and never ever let go, you will win.
I think I've always known. I've always felt out of place and masculine. I never had a name for it.
Growing up, I always identified with male characters in stories, and I had no idea why it felt so right, when trying to identify with the chicks always felt so wrong.
Around puberty I think I had the opposite reaction from a lot of guys here. I thought to myself "Thank God!" Maybe once I grow boobs I'll feel like a proper girl. Maybe once I have my period I'll feel like a proper girl. Eventually it became: Maybe when I have BIGGER boobs I'll feel like a proper girl. This spanned from age eleven until about twenty three. This constant feeling of needing to try harder and harder to feel "right."
I would see a pretty, confident girl in a dress... so I would by a dress like that. Not because I wanted to look like her, but because I wanted to feel like her. I wanted it to make sense so badly. Problem is, I would put on said dress, and feel like I was a in a disguise. I would grow my hair long, felt like I was in disguise.
When I was a teenager I got into the whole goth thing. I felt extremely at home because I could dress like a dude, and wear makeup without anyone bitching about my boy clothes. Just about the fact that they were black and "spooky" looking. Sophomore year of highschool I shaved my head. Greatest day of my life. Went to school and everyone ripped me a new one. How dare I, a girl, do such a thing.
Pfft. I still had no word for what was going on with me. I knew very little about anything trans. All I knew was the straight boys made me gag, and the gay ones wanted nothing to do with me aside from being friends. All I knew was that something was very out of place in my world, and nobody could tell me what it was. So I cut, and drank, and did any drug I could get my hands on.
I met a boy in highschool. A boy who, at the time I pegged as gay. I don't think he even knew it yet. He crushed on me day after day and practically worshiped the ground I walked on. I didn't actually date him for a few years, but he's the first non-straight guy I can remember being attracted to me. It was the biggest feeling in the world. I dated a few other guys who were teetering in closet land before him, and always dumped them because I had this weird feeling of being totally inadequate. Like I just wasn't QUITE what they wanted.
Still I had no idea what to call myself, so I just said that I was a weirdo, and left it at that.
Queue many more years of self abuse, depression, confusion, and overcompensation. I met my husband after a long string of unsuccessful relationships, each shorter than the last. The last being a guy who was twice my age who, though he fulfilled my want for a daddy type, made me feel clunky and uncomfortable.
Husband and I have had... our problems. Cheating (him, not me), drinking, drugs, uncertainty. But we've stuck together and talked things out, and all that is about six years in the past now.
Finally, THREE years ago, we were sitting in the living room watching some stupid movie with a friend of ours. We had this little notebook that the two of us were passing back and forth. Writing naughty little messages to each other and flirting like idiots. Finally I grabbed it, and proceeded to write a six page short story involving the two of us, a little consent play, and most importantly, I was a dude. The two characters in that original little story became the inspiration for a year long exploration of myself through writing. It only took a month to figure out what had been plaguing me my entire life.
The rest is messy history. Messier. Uncomfortable crap that I don't feel like going into now. I still feel like I'm drowning inside myself. I still get the odd suicidal urge, but at least I have a name for why I'm so unhappy now.
Woo. >:(
As a 2 year old I would tell strange men, "I've got a penis too" and ask my mum to buy me one at the shops. Earliest sign I guess. Otherwise, "tomboy", always wrote stories and drew pictures of male versions of myself.
When I started going thru puberty I ignored it. People made fun of my armpit hair, but I didn't want to shave it. I felt embarrased by my boobs and didn't wear a bra til I was about 15 tho I needed to. When I got my period, I was gutted. Really didn't think it would happen. I pretended I hadn't gotten it for ages, everyone at school thought I was a freak. I even had an "accident" and still denied it was me. I have this pic of me on the day of my first period, I should scan it. I'm wearing huge shorts and a huge Charlotte Hornets t-shirt and slumping looking miserable as hell. No one even knew what was going on.
Whn I was 19 or so, my friend started transitioning. We had both seen the same doco about a 14 year old trans boy. I felt the same as him, but thought I was too short and girly looking to even bother trying. I was so jealous as he went on T and got hairy and got top surgery. I look at him now and I wish I was there already. I wasn't in a good situation then, and it was impossible however.
So I overcompensated and tried to dress like my straight girl friends. I actually got really interested in fashion, but particularly liked getting cllothes for my male friends. I had really nice expensive girl clothes, but I treated them the same way I did my record collection. I still think I'd make some girl a good stylist!
So after a few more years living wrong, trying to overcompensate, I finally got out of an abusive relationship and was, as Lady Gaga would say, a free b*tch. I saw another trans documentary and the thoughts came flooding back MAJORLY and I knew I had to go through with it. I was staring at photos of advanced trans guys and knew I had to get there.
My first period was kind of weird. It didn't feel wrong as such (I knew it was coming), but it was something I defiantly did not want, and still don't want! :P It's always felt like this unnecessary and certainly inconveniencing process though, because I've never particularly liked or ever even thought about having children of my own.
But my mother even commented on me liking 'boyish things' as a child. I always drew monsters and weird stuff (still do, mind you) and loved dinosaurs and animals and dragons etc. I still love all of that stuff too.
I don't remember ever saying anything about disliking (or even acknowledging) my sex younger than 12 though. I'll have to ask around.
Quote from: justmeinoz on June 12, 2010, 06:36:46 AMThe past is definitely a different country kids, believe me!
If there had been the help available then, that there is today, I would have been able to live my life as the woman man I should always have been.
I am really happy for you kids being able to do what we could not. I am not jealous...
I'll admit it- I
am jealous of the younger guys. But I'm also very happy for them and it gives me great hope for the future. Hopefully things will continue to get better for transsexuals. :)
If I didn't know before, I did after watching TV last night.
I watched "Bend it Like Beckham" for the third or fourth time, as I think it is one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. On TV not the DVD this time.
This time my reaction was very different. In the scene where Jess is explaining to her Sikh family that she has been offered a US College Scholarship, and wants to play soccer there, and if they stop her it would break her heart, I cried.
Her lines about following her dream were absolutley beautiful, and affected me in a way they never did before. Even now I am feeling a bit emotional typing this.
Quote from: Rowan on June 12, 2010, 05:59:51 PM
I think I've always known. I've always felt out of place and masculine. I never had a name for it.
Growing up, I always identified with male characters in stories, and I had no idea why it felt so right, when trying to identify with the chicks always felt so wrong.
Same here. I knew I was a boy no later than age 4, when I had a big fight with my mom about reading "girl books."
Quote
Around puberty I think I had the opposite reaction from a lot of guys here. I thought to myself "Thank God!" Maybe once I grow boobs I'll feel like a proper girl. Maybe once I have my period I'll feel like a proper girl. Eventually it became: Maybe when I have BIGGER boobs I'll feel like a proper girl. This spanned from age eleven until about twenty three. This constant feeling of needing to try harder and harder to feel "right."
This, exactly. I kept hoping that something - some hormonal or biological or life change - would make me feel like a "real woman." I desperately wanted to have kids for the longest time, with this weird sense of urgency, like I had to do it before I imploded. And I don't know if it was that I needed to have kids before admitting I was trans again, or whether I thought having a baby would make me a woman, or what.
(I did have some negative reactions to puberty. I started trying to bind my breasts from the moment they started to become noticeable. I hated them. But I felt ashamed of hating them. Actually, I was ashamed of basically everythign I did or felt.)
Quote
I would see a pretty, confident girl in a dress... so I would by a dress like that. Not because I wanted to look like her, but because I wanted to feel like her. I wanted it to make sense so badly. Problem is, I would put on said dress, and feel like I was a in a disguise. I would grow my hair long, felt like I was in disguise.
I did exactly that. I tried so hard do be a girl but I could never get it right. It was always a ridiculous costume.
I had the same experience with 'trying to be female'. For 6/7 months I wore make-up to school, but it was just a hassle in the morning, and I didn't want to wear it, I just wanted to feel like I wasn't so out of place with all of these other girls. When we hung around together in a large-ish group I'd always get so self-concious, because I didn't feel like I should be in that group with all of these people I didn't fit in with, or couldn't relate to.
I tried that too, I wore make up and wore girly clothes for a while I think it lasted for about a year. Makes me cringe looking at my passport photo because the photo was taken in my trying to be a girl stage. Need to get a new one but can't afford it.
I suppose I've known on some level or other for most, if not all, of my life. But I neither knew there was such a thing as being trans, nor did I have the language to express it. I've been pretty ambivalent about it for the past 2 years or so, most recently IDing as
genderqueer, then finally as FTM. Before that, I was IDing as female, although way back in middle school, I told myself I wasn't a "girl" (which made me sound weak), but not a boy either ("boy" sounded more macho than I felt...not to mention the different body). Instead, I settled for a short time on the term "kid." It was androgynous, so I felt much less pressure to be female or male, weak or macho.
I actually shopped in the young men's department when I was in middle school. I claimed that the baggy clothes were more physically comfortable. I'd always been something of a non-conformist, so of course I wouldn't want to wear the skimpy things other girls were wearing. I've kept up appearances pretty well, though. The difference is that now I see how unhappy presenting as female is making me.
Anyway, I guess I was finally able to ID as FTM, without doubting myself like I have for most of the past two years, when I recalled some fleeting thought I had had years ago. Probably back in 2nd or 3rd year of high school (I'm gonna be 23 this September, so it would've been about 6 or 7 years ago). The thought (which I'm surprised surfaced after all this time) was "I'm gay." I hastily add that I knew - not thought, not wondered, knew - that "gay" was, in this case, the adjective form of homosexual male. When I remembered it, I felt the same conviction regarding the phrase's connotation. I knew all along since that first time the notion came to me (though I had suppressed it back then) that I'm a gay man. The female body just makes it more confusing for others to understand.
It was only a few days ago that I recalled this notion. I've had to dress up for work this weekend, which meant wearing an underwire bra, but believe me, I wanted to wear my tightest sports bra. It's the best I've got, since I neither can afford a binder, nor can qualify for the big brothers used binder program. :'(
Sorry it's so long; I tend to write dissertations when I get carried away.... ;)
~Alex
I don't really know for sure. I know that I've always wanted to be a boy. I used to have lots of male friends growing up, I used to do all the boys things and I got really grouchy when I couldn't do football and rugby at school. I don't wear dresses and I feel so uncomfortable when I'm forced to wear girly clothing. I always thought I was a butch lesbian, but the more I read about things, the more I come to realise that I am male.
It's a difficult question as children vary in their experiences of the same and opposite sex. And I think this determines when one feels ones is "in the wrong body".
So, for example, from my earliest memories (3 or 4) I knew that I didn't like playng the games my sister did, or wearing the clothes (dresses! Long hair! No!). However, my best friend was a boy and I was well aware that my anatomy was not the same as his. So I didn't think I was a boy. I just thought I was some sort of weirdo.
And, as many others have already said, it all went haywire when puberty struck and I knew I really, really didn't want breasts or hips or periods. But I got them all the same. And so I dressed in traditionally male clothing or just clothing that disguised my body. However, I don't think I actually said "I am a (gay) man in a woman's body" until I was in my twenties (20 years ago now. Phew!). I know I implicitly knew it well before then, just never made it explicit. Having acknowledged that, I ended up in a femmy, glam stage which felt like being in drag (which was was fun).
And one thing I have to differ with everyone else on. There is one incredible thing that I can take from having spent so long to decide to do anything about this; my children. No, being pregnant didn't feel "natural" and neither did early motherhood. But, ye gods, they were worth it. And both were experiences I would not have done without. So, now I have used my female body for it reproductive purposes, I am safe to live the second half of my life as me!
I first made the assumption of being trans at age 19, which struck me as more suiting than the person I identified as at the time (gay male). I suppose the 'signs' as they are so called were always there and no one, not even myself, picked up on them.
My father would recall times about how he had to stand in the outfield with me during baseball games (which he enrolled me in because that's apparently what healthy males do when they're young Christian children in the south) to keep me from looking for four leaf clovers when I should be waiting for a ball. I've also always taken an interest to such things as weaving and sewing (currently practicing to finally hone those skills :P).
I suppose those are really kind of "oh, males can do that too" kind of things, but to be honest it wasn't until my first kind of relationship that I knew the whole idea of gay was both right and wrong. It was right in the sense that "Yes, I want to be in a relationship with a male rather than a female," (at this point, hormones could potentially do wacky things to my sexual preference :P) but wrong in the sense that "I want to be in the relationship AS a male."
I never really felt at all attached to my life as a male or my genitalia, and having been in an all-boys school I knew that I was different from the few kids who were gay and indeed the student body as a whole. (Trust me, I cried at night and asked my parents to transfer me to a co-ed school more than once).
So on the whole, I have felt this way for a while, but I never really had a proper definition until I figured out that transgendered people were more than just the stereotypical MTF 'man in a dress' that Hollywood portrays looking like a drag queen caught in the rain. (No offense to anyone I may have inadvertently offended :D )
It's cool to read that so many of the rest of you went through phases of trying to be female. I did that for about a year and it was probably the most distressing time of my life! I tried so hard as well, gorgeous boyfriend, designer handbags, long wavy hair, makeup, lingerie.... When everything that should have been perfect just felt like a big mask I knew I wasn't going to be able to keep that up forever :(
I was about 7 when I first told a cousin of mine that I thought I should have been a boy. She told me I was being stupid and for years after that, I never said another word to anyone, fearing I'd get that same reaction. When I was about 10, I had really short hair. One time this woman came up to my mother and said 'That's such a good looking boy you have'. My chest puffed out and I was so ecstatic about that. But my mother replied, 'She's a girl' And that deflated things in my mind. Later when I was in high school I started to experiment wearing boys clothes, putting a hat on and going to stores that people wouldn't know me to see if I got called a boy. Well, after a bit of puberty though, things just seemed to go the wrong way in how development was and I thought that there just wasn't anything I can do about it, so may as well do the 'girl thing' and make everyone happy. Got married, had kids and all that till one night I was sitting down watching 'Boys Don't Cry'. I looked over at my husband, who knew I was a little different anyway and said, "That's me" Ever since then I have been looking up things about it and started the hormone therapy and such and I've been so much happier since. I'm now divorced with the man that I was married to, he couldn't be with a man, but we're still friends. And my kids have been very supportive...
Quote from: Bones on June 17, 2010, 05:18:07 AMOne time this woman came up to my mother and said 'That's such a good looking boy you have'. My chest puffed out and I was so ecstatic about that. But my mother replied, 'She's a girl' And that deflated things in my mind.
I had similar situations. People would refer to me as male when we'd go out in public to the store or a restaurant. My mom always got offended and corrected them, but secretly I always loved being mistaken as a boy.
My mom never corrected anybody when I IDed as female(ish) and was called he or anything by other people. I went to some clothing store and a guy was taking measurements to figure out what size I would be and he kept saying I was handsome and stuff...my mom just went along with it and after we left she said something about it.
Ahh, you guys, thanks for taking the time to reply so much!
I don't ever remember being called a boy when I was younger though I always had quite long hair (at one point I think it was down to the bottom half of my back/my butt) and plats until about 12/13, so it would be a bit odd if I was, I suppose.
I was raised in a 100% gender-free environment. Actually, my family let me choose my sex - when they bought me presents, they saw which ones I like and which I don't; the same for clothing; the same for everything else. So for example after once sending me to school with ponytails (which made me cry the whole day), they said "Ok, no ponytails" and they cut my hair short. Also in all my child pictures I look like a boy. My grandmother was actually calling me "son". Kids at school called me "man" because I had more muscles than some boys. Even my first poem - which I wrote when I was 8 - includes the sentence "I'm the smartest boy and hero" or something similar :D I was a male character for every single carneval. There were only two occasions in my whole life when I thought to myself, ok, let's express this femininity - for one new year, I put mascara on and 3 guys later hit on me, which completely freeked me out and I never used make-up again. And for my prom, I put the fake nails on. Ten minutes later, they were in the trash and the seeking of my female side was over.
So the fact that I was never bound to the female sex was why I didn't think about the wrong body until I actually started to use it; that is, from the second I became sexually active (with another person; even my masturbation seems more as jerking off than what females are supposed to be doing) I discovered something is really wrong.
Quote from: Berren on June 07, 2010, 10:06:24 AM
What age did you realise you were in the wrong body?
For me, I never really questioned it until puberty, and even then I was just unhappy without knowing why. People seem to think that because I didn't know from an earlier age (I've read about people who knew from being as young as 3) that what I feel isn't true, and that I shouldn't be acting how I am. What do you guys think?
This, exactly this, is what I've been experiencing. It's comforting to know that I'm not the only one who realized something was a bit off during and after puberty.
This is really... reasurring(?)to hear about other peoples experiences, because I too felt that maybe I was wrong since I don't remember having any issues with my gender at avery young age like I thought I was "supposed" to.
But, no, my story is pretty straightforward. Just didn't feel alright about puberty. I remember once my mom got mad that I didn't want to look very girly "You know what? If you hate your boobs so much you can get them cut off!" and thinking 'that's not so bad'. I tried to be a girl for my girlfriend for two years and after we broke up I was able to find myself and understand why I had been so unhappy. That's all not too exciting.
Quote from: Farm Boy on June 17, 2010, 10:12:10 AM
I had similar situations. People would refer to me as male when we'd go out in public to the store or a restaurant. My mom always got offended and corrected them, but secretly I always loved being mistaken as a boy.
I called myself a boy once (several years before I came out to myself) and made my mom laugh. My parents have a picture of me when I was 2 and I was in a hawaiian like top and a skirt (which looked like shorts to me) and my hair had grown in a way that it looked like I had a mohawk and I saw it and asked my mom, "Who's that boy?" and she laughed and said, "that's you." Looking back on it, I guess I should have paid attention to more my feelings...though I still laugh at the story.
I would say always. I didn't even know there was anything "wrong" with me until probably the age of 2 when my parents were potty training me and I remember wanting to stand and asking why the pee didn't come out of my "thing".
I always thought of myself as a "he". I realized that my body was not a boy's body and that I'd have to live my life as a girl between the ages of 4 and 6, and it made me miserable.
I've known since I was 7. My friend asked me if I would ever act or dress like a girl, and I told him no, because I was just an underdeveloped boy.
I actually wrote that same thing in my coming out letter to my mom.
I didn't know I was trans until...this summer, actually. I mean, I had feelings of wanting to be a guy from as young as four, but I thought that was weird so I didn't think about it till I was about 11-13. Then, this summer, I began to get really depressed because I was a girl. I mean, it was there since I was 11 and started crying because, while she was fixing my dress for my Halloween costume, my mother told me I had cleavage. I screamed that I hated it. I've always wanted my boobs to disappear.
My depression of being female got to the point where hearing female pronouns made me want to cut my ears off or go deaf. It was like nails on a chalkboard. It's still like that, but at least I figured out how to make my body appear more male, to calm my conscious.
For a while, I remember thinking I was androgyne around...June or July, and I came to terms with the idea that I am trans. I don't mind. It's just who I am. I'll fix my body eventually, you know? I just have to deal with what I have. So, when did I know? I'd say age 15.
I guess I've always felt different in some way, for as long as I can really remember, but I didn't really know why. I started being really not okay with my body around the time of puberty. At about age 13, I started identifying as a lesbian and I started actively presenting more masculinely. But that never felt quite right, either. I had never heard the word transgender before, or at least I didn't know what it meant. At about 17, I started learning about what it meant to be transgender, and I kind of instantly knew from there that that term fit me.
I never had the 'click' that I was in the wrong body. Just some 'I want to be a boy' and 'I like boy clothes/toys' thoughts now and then. I didn't like girl things, when I played pretend (which I did almost every day with my friends) I was ALWAYS the boy, I told my cousins to call me Mark or Louie. I preferred my Ken dolls over my Barbie dolls. Most of my beanie babies were 'boys' :) But I never put two and two together because I just didn't think about it. I had other things to be sad about, severe depression, suicidal thoughts since before I knew what suicide was, severe anxiety. It wasn't until I was around 17 when I found out what being transsexual meant, and that I felt male. But 'wanting to be a boy' thoughts started around 3 or 4.
Quote from: Morgan on October 30, 2010, 09:36:45 PM
I never had the 'click' that I was in the wrong body. Just some 'I want to be a boy' and 'I like boy clothes/toys' thoughts now and then. I didn't like girl things, when I played pretend (which I did almost every day with my friends) I was ALWAYS the boy, I told my cousins to call me Mark or Louie. I preferred my Ken dolls over my Barbie dolls. Most of my beanie babies were 'boys' :) But I never put two and two together because I just didn't think about it. I had other things to be sad about, severe depression, suicidal thoughts since before I knew what suicide was, severe anxiety. It wasn't until I was around 17 when I found out what being transsexual meant, and that I felt male. But 'wanting to be a boy' thoughts started around 3 or 4.
You know, this may sound strange, but I was always a girl when I played pretend with my friends. I remember my best friend when I was five and I would play Powerpuff Girls and I'd be Bubbles. I played with Barbies, but was embarrassed by it so I didn't let anybody find out and I'd hide them when friends came over.
I think this was what caused me to doubt my trans-sexuality at first because I looked up the symptoms of GID and I didn't fit some of it. I mean, I liked the woodshop thing my daycare had when I was little and I would play that if it wasn't my turn for the video games. Basically, I liked girly toys, but it was embarrassing because I wanted to be a boy.
Well, I fit the whole "refusing to sit down when peeing" and whatnot. It's more like, I had the body issues rather than social issues (being called "she", etc.) because I've always just been a bit of a girly boy.
I don't remember not knowing. I didn't know other people felt this way, or transitioned, until I was 13.
Devyn, I had girl toys that I liked, don't get me wrong. I loved pound puppies, kitty-kitty-kittens (They purred! That was the coolest thing to me XD ), things like that.
I don't think many people completely fit the bill of GID. I never hated my genitals. I still don't. I never asked for a penis, I never thought about things like that at all. I didn't hate puberty, in fact, I was excited because I was growing up and that was a big deal. I never played any sports, I did ballet (Though I didn't like it.) and I was a Girl Scout. Just because we had a normal childhood doesn't mean we aren't transsexual. You know who you are inside, you're more mature now. I'm not surprised that we didn't completely act like boys when we were little kids, not all little kids think about those things! I was too concerned with catching all the pokemon, and hanging out with friends.
Quote from: ~Jay~ on June 07, 2010, 10:50:10 AM
I knew from when I was a child I wanted to be a boy all my friends were boys I didn't like girly things, and I now know its not going to go away and its taken me along time to do something about it.
same.
Quote from: Devyn on October 30, 2010, 08:39:35 PM
My depression of being female got to the point where hearing female pronouns made me want to cut my ears off or go deaf. It was like nails on a chalkboard.
Oh god yes. >:( My native language has a male and female form for every verb and I thought for a very long time I have a serious psychosis because I started shivering and got goosebumps every time I had to use it in a sentence about me. When I write my diary, I write it in masculine form, because female verbs just don't go.
Quote from: Devyn on October 30, 2010, 09:48:08 PM
I played with Barbies, but was embarrassed by it so I didn't let anybody find out and I'd hide them when friends came over.
Haha, I did the same thing XD. But I retooled my barbies (I never liked them that much, but relatives kept giving me them as presents. I never asked for them...) to make them warriors and give them scars. Unfortunately they wouldn't fit into GI Joe size costumes...
I would have liked a warrior Mulan barbie, but since Mattel made only "Chinese beauty style" ones (and the point of the film was that Mulan didn't have to be one, and was more than that!) I never had it sigh :(
EDIT: I also never liked baby dolls (what's the fun of having to take care of an infant? And it's even fake!), I never played house and I was NEVER a mommy in any pretend games.
I realized that something was off Oct. '09. It was a couple weeks before my birthday. By Feb. '10 I realized that I was FTM and I was then binding every day and going by Sebastien in my college courses.
Recalling my youth I had two male cousins who I played video games with. This is pretty neutral because they were my only cousins my age. Then in my neighborhood I hung out with all the guys on the block and played video games. Male comeradery went up, but I was just considered a tomboy. My puberty hit at 9, I hated the blood and the chest. I didn't have the strong hateful thoughts though. I just ignored it really. Several times from here until high school I cross dressed at home, trying things to flatten my chest and gain package, but I didn't think much of it all. When I was about 10/11 I cut my hair short and everywhere I went I was called a boy. I loved it, but my dad would always ruin it. Then feeling I remeber was being neutral, it grew to become awkward and disappointing as I got older. I grew apart from things with depression due to harrassment from other kids since I was "outed" in 5th grade of liking girls...
I feel like I'm just rambling on about my life story. Forget it all.
Yea I remember around age 5 I started praying to wake up as a boy and I never considered myself a girl, i'd ge mad when my boy cousins got to wear trunks and I had to wear a bathingsuit. But it wasn't as bad until puberty hit and I got so depressed I even started the hopeless praying again. But I didn't find out about transgender and the transition process until I was 17.
As far back as I can remember, I thought something was wrong with me. I just though I was a tomboy, or a manly girl though. I never really thought "hey, I'm a boy trapped in a girl's body". I've pretty much always looked like a boy and been called one by strangers. I've used the men's room since I was probably 11, and have posed as male online since we got a computer at around age 10. I have pictures from when I was a kid of me playing all kinds of sports with my boy friends and flexing my muscles. I hated wearing bathing suits instead of swim trunks too, and I begged my parents to let me play on my dad's little league football team. I live in a tiny town though, so everyone knows me as "girl name", the butchy girl. I date guys so everyone just assumes I'm a weird girl. Until I went away to college at age 18, I had no idea what FTMs were. I always felt connected to the GLBT community, but didn't know why. I figured I was just accepting of them, even though the only porn I like is gay men. So when I went away to college, joined a GLBT group, and found out about transguys, everything fell into place. I started binding my chest and using a male name. I started hating when people referred to me by female pronouns and the few occasions when I didn't pass sent me into a depression. I'm 20 now and still working on my transition because of family issues, but atleast now I can explore who I am and I know I'm not a girl.
I've always wanted to be a boy. I've always had some masculine characteristics, too. Even when I heard of transgender/transsexualism, I hadn't considered that might be me. I hadn't really thought of it as being "in the wrong body" until about a year ago, which is when I came out as trans. I guess I was probably repressing my thoughts/feelings, as I had some bad experiences when acting masculine as a child. this girl once called me "it," and I nearly got into a fight for that one. I wouldn't have minded if she had called me he. But through high school, I at least half-attempted to be girly. It never really felt right though.
So I knew at age 19, my second year in college. I feel like I should have known sooner though.
I've always known, to some extent, I've just never put a name to it until about a year ago. Living where I do, I grew up with no access to the LGBT community at all, and while I found out later that my family had suspicions about me, apparently none of them thought to share them with me. So I grew up afraid of puberty, as most people here seem to have been to some extent, and not understanding why it was so important to grow hips and boobs. I also went through the makeup phase in middle school, trying to be girly for a few months before realizing it was a major waste of my time.
The first time I cut my hair into a boy cut was in high school, and I never looked back. From how I see it, from that point on it's just been a series of steps closer and closer to the label of FtM. Now, at the age of 20, I'm in therapy and working my way towards T. :D Life is great.
I've got to say, this board has been really nice to read. I was unsure of myself for awhile because I didn't fit the DSM's diagnosis box for GID, but it seems a lot of people don't fit perfectly, and that's reassuring. :)
My first realization of being trans (well, actually I'm not, but that's a long story...) was when I was 3. My father told me males would become stronger than females and that females made babies. Then, if that's how it was, I wanted to be male too...
(I wonder how different my life would have been if he didn't make that little comment)
Haha, my mother caught me trying to pee standing up while being potty trained. That's the first sign I can think of. Aside from that, I have always lived a fairly gender-neutral life. Honestly, I'm still trying to figure things out. So my answer: always and not yet. ???
Some of my earliest memories are of knowing everyone thought I was a girl and thinking they were strange/silly, but somehow I got convinced to pretend to be a girl. I remember relating more to male characters and having male character costumes, Peter Pan and Mowgli I had costumes of, and I liked pretending to be Wheeler from captain planet and imagine I was shooting fire at people, but I also remember having those costumes taken away and being told I really liked the little mermaid when I was older and had an assignment to ask about how I was as a small child. (I did love the idea of being a merperson, that's for damn sure; I liked pretending the bathtub was the ocean lol) I had a really "gender complementarian" upbringing though so there was a lot of dissonance from a very early age.
I was given a lot of barbies but outside of playing with them when I had friends over and putting clothes on them if I found them naked I wasn't really interested in them, and preferred to wrestle and play/fight my brother and my dad. We all liked wrestling for a while, They liked the Rock and Stone-Cold Steve Austin, I liked Cain (Kane? Kaine? IDK how to spell it I was ten) too.
[*I hope their understand my Post, my English is very bad.]
My first real problems came with 15, because i got my 'red horror'. Then I didn't make a lot of sport, but i never saw or said "Iam in the wrong body". When I look back in time, I wasn't a girl. I have moved in sport with boys in the primary school. I ever played football with guys (until i could no longer exists, because we had boygroups and girlgroups). I had always boys as friends, but there came a time... I couldn't longer go to boys as a friend, because I was a girl. I didn't understand my problem, why I felt bad with a boyfriend. My Stepfather was the first person which sent me a newspaper article on TS 2 years ago. He knew my problem with myself, but I ignored it, because I said to me "I have to have a boyfriend and I am a girl!", but I wasn't a real girl.
In real I sought picture about TS and forums, but I ever I said 'No, Iam not a TM', although I had the desire to be a man.
However, I can't lie longer to me and to other. I am a man (TM) and it feels better as a woman.
I've always known i was a boy :) As far back as i can remember (starting at 2) i hated dresses, i thought girls were yucky, and just was "one of the guys". My friends and i used to play with pokemon cards, beyblades and yu gi oh in our backyards :laugh: I loved cars and planes (still do :P) and alot of other typical boy things :) I wished that i would wake up in a boys body everynight, since i was 10 this issue has been so devestating for me and i used to cry every night because i wanted to be male so badly. I tried to kill myself when i was 13 because i thought i was a freak and no one else was experiancing the same things. I felt so alone. After that i began going to a psychatrist (court ordered ::)) and my doctor diagnosed me with GDD. I had no idea about the trans world, i had no exposure to any of that. I did all the research i could on the issue and that was the first time actually saying that that was what i am, i'm an FtM :laugh: I was never a girl, i just have a birth defect :P I was so happy! I was 15 when i finally came to the realization that i am transgender. I went through the denial period for a few years (from 13 to 15 ::)) then i got on the right track to becoming who i should've been born as. Still waiting for T :'( My mom is still in *her* denial period :laugh:
I knew I wasn't 'right', I suppose, for a loong time before I realized I was trans. I realized I was trans when I read the book "Luna" by Julie Anne Peters (Freshman year; 14). Though Luna was mtf rather than ftm, it opened a whole new world to me.
I was 16. Before that it didn't bother me until I hit puberty. I didn't like my body or acting girly or having to correct people when they called me "he", so I assumed it was just low-esteem. Well, I fixed that and I still felt the same (still couldn't look at myself naked and such), so I assumed it was hormones and put it off. It was pretty much "Ok yeah, I want to be a guy. Now I'll just grow out it and stop being a baby." Then a friend came out to me who felt the same way, so I finally accepted it at 18 with her and we helped each other.
I didn't have any huge signs really. I was quiet, stayed to myself, didn't do much physically. Then I hit 13 and it just upset me to no end. I spent a lot of time angsting in my early teens because I was confused and depressed and had nobody to talk to. It was only at 16 I discovered the term somewhere on the internet and could look more into it.
Wow guys, I haven't checked this thread in a while, and it's accumulated quite a lot of posts since then. They were quite fun to read, and it's nice to know about the different experiences people had.
Thinking about it, I wasn't really aware of my gender or how I was "supposed to act" as a girl until I hit puberty (12ish?).
When I grew armpit hair, I was quite happy with it, but I was made fun of in Primary school so I got rid of it. And with wearing bras, I never thought it was necessary and it never really occurred to me to do so until it was pointed out by this girl me and a friend met in a park.
I went through the make-up stage, but I felt very out of place, and I definitely couldn't relate to any of the other girls. I was quite the loner (Only really hung around with 1-3 people through Primary school and High school, and we never did anything girly together, it was always messing around)
Before the make-up stage I was alone, quite miserable (but I kept myself busy with school-work), I didn't feel like I belonged with the other girls. The make-up stage was still like this, though I probably got a little bit more acceptance from the other girls. I didn't really mind by tits until they got pretty big (C/D) but I was never "attached" to them (on an emotional level, I guess), and I certainly didn't want to make them look any bigger. I always really liked my upper-chest area because it was FLAT, and I thought my boobs just kind of spoiled it. Wanted to have a penis since starting periods? (I never really noticed my downstairs until then, when I kind of had to notice it) In the time that I was really reclusive (after coming out of school) I would always wear this black dressing gown (obviously with clothes underneath), and I would always cover up my cleavage without realising I was doing it. And the tops I used to have, that were kind of skimpy (I mainly wore pyjamas in that time period) I didn't like them at all, because they showed my boobs and everything.
When I would take baths on my own when I was little (about 7/8?) I would often put the bath suds/bubbles onto my face and use the cover off of a razor to "shave" it off.
I wore dresses to school until being like 5? My mum made me, and I think the school made it so girls had to wear dresses at that time though. I don't thnik I was ever bothered by that too much though. But since then I never wore any dresses (hated them) and I would wear more ambiguous clothing from the girl's section, and sometimes I'd wear my dad's jumpers when I was cold. I also remember asking my mum when I smaller if my voice was "boyish", since I thought it was deeper than other girls. Another thing I did when I was little, I think I was playing pretend with my dad in the garden, and I gave him a flower and he said something like "No, it's the boy who gives the girl the flower".
That is about all I can remember right now, and I apologise to anyone reading this, my typing got pretty repetitive (I am sleepy..)
Realized that I wanted to be male when I was about 15 and a friend asked me what I'd want to look like if I was a guy (aparently she'd had the conversation about it in Japanese class, I went to an all girls school). It got me thinking abit, I'd never been comfortable during puberty and I never wanted a huge chest. I only really looked into things late last year. I'm really shy so I'm only just starting to consider therapy cause I'm moving away from home next year. I'm 17 now and I'm hoping a therapist can bring me out of my shell a bit. :]
Farthest back I remember knowing I wasn't right when I was five years old. Told my mom I refused to every where a girls dress because it caused me severe dysphoria (didn't know that word back then though). I always wanted to play with the guys. Ran around with my shirt off whenever I could and was incredibly upset when I learned the difference between my lower half and bio guys. I knew since then but I found the word transgender a little over 4 years ago when ironically enough when my ex asked me if I wanted a sex change. Guess she knew I was trans before I even knew what the word meant. I've wanted to transition since then.
When I was in fourth grade my sister and I would play dress up and she would put on dresses and I would put on a suit and tie. It felt soooo good. I guess that's when I knew I was "different". But when I started to develop breasts that's when I really knew because I wasn't comfortable with the changes to my body. I guess I'm lucky that I never got a period.
Just this past year...at 18.
Sometimes that makes me doubt my transness.
Alex, don't let that bother you too much. I'm 23 and just getting things figured out. There are some people on this site who didn't know until waaay later in life.
As long as I can remember, honestly. I remember being a kid and always wanting to be a knight or something dorky light that, and other kids picked up on it, too. My cousins and few friends used to come over and want to play house and they'd always tell me I was the dad, or the brother, or someone's boyfriend. Then I went into catholic school, and had to wear a dress for 4 years and honestly wanted to kill myself. But that's a huge, long, pathetic story unto itself. I went through this brief phase where I tried to be uber-feminine for...some stupid reason. Convincing myself, maybe. Probably just trying to conform, but whatever it was I hated it. Absolutely hated it. As highschool went on, I dropped more and more of it, stopped wearing dresses and clothes that made me feel like a freak, and shaved my hair into a mohawk. I started telling people I'd always felt male, always felt out of place, and to just treat me like one of the guys. About a year later, I started really thinking about it, realizing that I DO want to fix this, and that's about where I am now.
Damn, sorry for the TL;DR.
Long story short.. I knew pretty early on but didn't have the words to express it. There were always reasons that people gave me that would "explain" why I am the way I am.. As a disorder.. You'd be surprised how many folks confided in me that they considered it when they were younger but how they grew out of it. Then I realized something important.. It's all BS. I am who I am. Took me over 15 years. I'm a little slow I guess lol well in the mean while I got married, had kids and yes I love my husband and don't regret being a mom even if that complicates things, so I figured well maybe I can be happy this way and the trans thing will go away.. So after a couple of years of trying that I thought of myself as being in a nursing home, old, and female and I freaked. Really freaked, that "oh hell no" feeling. Then I knew, time to change. I have a very special husband though who is actually happy seeing me change. Before it's all set and done I will loose him to cancer, and I have no idea how I'm going to deal with that, but I'll do it being who I really am and go from there.
So that's me.
To Alx,
Thanks for sharing. Power to ya.