Tell me I'm not the only one. Whenever I answer the door (for cable guy or whoever) they always ask me if my parents are home. :\
I'm like, "uh I own the house" and they get all embarrassed and I'm all embarrassed.
I'm going to be 28 in a couple of months. I can understand getting carded still, but when people ask where my parents are and stuff it's a bit aggravating. I guess one good thing about it is if bible-thumpers are a knockin' I can tell em my parents aren't home ;p
I'm tired of looking like a kid! And let me just say, it doesn't have anything to do with what I'm wearing. I usually end up answering the door in my pajamas, (plain t shirt and lounge pants).
I'll hopefully get the go ahead for T soon though. Therapy is going well. *crosses fingers*
I've actually gotten that before. When we first moved in to our house one of the neighbors (total senior citizen) came over and asked for my parents. I said, they live in San Diego. LOL Totally threw the old geezer for a loop!
I attribute some of it to being short ... some of it to what I wear ... and some of it to genes (even my parents still look younger than they really are). However, I usually get clocked at early 20s now (which is at least a decade difference). I try to look at it like when everyone else is all old looking, I won't be! ;)
People think i'm a kid all the time >:(
A cab driver the other day told me I must be doing my GCSEs next year. I was embarrassed so I just said yeah but i'm 19 now i've done my GCSEs.
People think I'm a high school freshman (13/14?) I don't seem to have matured since then (mentally yes, not physically.) Seems to be a lack of testosterone, luckily I will be starting T soon.
Please, dudes,
don't think that you'll mature right away. Testosterone often takes a couple of years to make you look your age, or you will always look a couple of years younger than you are (which is not bad in itself).
I'm 35 now, have been 2 years on testo, but sometimes have trouble to pass as 18 or more (legal age here).
im 23 and most people think im 17-18 it great sometimes..people who know me, but if people see me as a guy they think im a boy as i have a high voice :(
I think the main reason ftm's pass as younger is because either A) your height or B) you have a baby face.. and of course the high voice. Luckily I'm 5'10 so i generally get people thinking I am 21.. which I am...
Most people think I'm 15-16yr old guy so thats only 1-2yrs off. One of the reasons I tend to pass and not look as young is because it looks like I have facial hair and just shave but truth is I don't have facial hair. I also have dark circles around my eyes and they sink in a bit. I need to look like a depressed man with no life, which may be true, but still.
Quote from: Mark on September 15, 2010, 02:09:05 PM
I think the main reason ftm's pass as younger is because either A) your height or B) you have a baby face.. and of course the high voice. Luckily I'm 5'10 so i generally get people thinking I am 21.. which I am...
Okay I'm 5'1" which screams like "not adult" but I think I will get over this in the next couple of years. (Especially in Germany, here people tend to be quite tall.)
Plus I had a baby face and people always thought I was 7 or 8 years younger than I am - before transition.
So add both effects and... well... here I am, the "young" transguy. Aged 35 but presumed to be 16-20. After 1.5 years of testosterone.
Let me tell you, for those of you who have similar physical appearence, you swap the body map dysphoria for a kind of age gender dysphoria (which is less extreme once people think you might at least be 16, I must admit, I can get along with that). Years and years and years of not being taken for serious by "adults" until you drop your age. And then people go like :o REALLY? Yes, really.
But you'll probably outgrow it and end up looking 6-10 years younger than a guy of your age.
You're not the only one. I surprise people when I tell them I'm in college and not public schooling, and I always get asked if my parents are with me when I go to the doctor. Heck, not too long ago I got asked if I was old enough to see the PG-13 movie I went to with my friend who is 2 years younger than me! I'm 5'7" but that just usually makes people think I'm tall for my ("13-14 year-old") age.
I'm 20 and usually pass for about 17.. but just a few weeks ago I was carded and told that I don't look a day over 14. >.<
I'm waiting for the day when this whole "looking younger than I am" thing comes in handy.. just to see if it actually ever happens haha. Things can get awkward sometimes when people ask my age, look at my ID and see a picture of me at 18, then look at my birthname, then my sex.. but oh well, I'm a transguy.
As much as it sucks that we can't always pass.. or that we can't always pass for our age, we are who we are, and in accepting ourselves, we also have to accept the circumstances and situations that we'll almost undoubtedly face. At the risk of accidentally downplaying dysphoria, try to embrace what happens. Each experience is a part of the process, and every day is a day closer to becoming on the outside who we are inside. =]
Quote from: Aven on September 15, 2010, 05:27:26 PMEach experience is a part of the process, and every day is a day closer to becoming on the outside who we are inside. =]
I give you an Oscar for the phrase of the year.
Just embrace your youthful look. I love looking younger than I am. My parents look younger than they are and I love it. Hopefully means I'll look good for a longer time hahaha :P
Quote from: KimberlyJean on September 15, 2010, 07:29:46 PM
Just embrace your youthful look. I love looking younger than I am. My parents look younger than they are and I love it. Hopefully means I'll look good for a longer time hahaha :P
Yeah that's what I say too! Here's to already bathing in the fountain of youth ;)
Quote from: Fencesitter on September 15, 2010, 04:59:54 PM
(Especially in Germany, here people tend to be quite tall.)
God yes! Little old ladies in Germany were larger than my mother; she felt tiny the whole time she lived there.
I probably look like 12, maybe 14 or something, and we'll say 15 when I don't pass. I actually worry this may affect my passing in college; I can pass for a high school boy but one old enough for college? Eh . . .
One thing which makes me worry a bit is with FTM appearing more and more in the media...
If it were general knowledge that many FTMs look much younger than they are even when they've been on testosterone for a couple of years, telling people my real age might be killing my passing some time in the future.
Nice to see I'm not the only one with this issue. A while back, I went to the public library, which is located across the street from a high school. Students from the high school had been skipping classes by hanging in the public library and being loud and disrupting actual library patrons. So, a rule was made stating no high school students in the library during school hours. So, there I walk into that library during school hours. Barely made it through the door, when the annoying library lady said, "Young man, go back to class this instant." My reply: "I haven't been in high school since 1996 (when I graduated) and I'm not about to go back now. It was bad enough the first time."
Quote from: Alex509 on September 16, 2010, 05:02:05 AM
My reply: "I haven't been in high school since 1996 (when I graduated) and I'm not about to go back now. It was bad enough the first time."
lmao nice
There's a kid at work, at least who I *think* is a high school age cis-guy. But he's been there a couple years now, so he should be in college by now, though I don't know him well enough to know for sure. I've been starting to wonder if he just might be trans, lately, though, because normally you don't just stay sixteen forever. (well, unless you're a vampire, but I haven't noticing him avoiding the sunlight and/or sparkling in it...) Of course, people younger than you never seem to age unless you catch them before and after a major growth spurt, so that could be it, too. Certainly don't have the guts to ask him if he's trans, because it's kinda none of my business if he hasn't told me, and it'd be really offensive either way most likely. It'd just be really nice to have someone to talk to IRL if he was, though.
I haven't been carded since I was about 25, but I still present as female, or about as much as I pass at it anyways. The older the person talking to me is, though, the more likely they are to think I'm still in school of some sort...possibly because I don't have a normal, well-paying salaried 9 to 5 job and a family and my own place, those societal markers of "adulthood". I'm not entirely sure I'd mind going back to high school, if I could do it over and be *normal* rather than getting beat up all the time. Aren't some people reported to have enjoyed their youth?
I've always looked younger than I really am, even when I was presenting as female, and now I'm presenting as male its even more pronounced. Last week I was chatting with someone I've only just met, and he asked me about my job, what I do, how long I've been there. I said 7 years and he was surprised, he said I didn't look old enough to have been anywhere 7 years. I didn't tell him that I actually graduated in 1985.
I'm over 40 now but at first glance I think I look about 22. Until you look closer and see the wrinkles and greying hair.
Heh. I was around forty-two and still presenting as female. Went to a campus lecture to hear Famous Author speak. Afterward, I stood around with him, a couple of profs, and a librarian or two. I had brought along a copy of one of his books; after Famous Author autographed it, I turned to one of the profs and said, "Actually, this is the very same copy I bought for your X class at Y school about twenty years ago!" One of the librarians did a bit of a double-take and said, "I have trouble believing you were ANYwhere twenty years ago."
I should have started HRT then, I think; I started just as I was beginning to truly age. Then they would still think I'm in my twenties. Nowadays, most people think I am thirtyish or, worst case, in my thirties. I don't see how they miss the skin that is starting to relax and the gray that is fast coming in at my temples...
Then again, at least I don't have to worry about being carded or banished from the library. And sometimes I want to own my age. It's a bit annoying when people say that I wouldn't know a certain thing or won't have experienced something because I'm too young.
gah it's annoying looking so young. I was told I looked 13 a few days ago.. come on.... I'm 5 foot 9 and not a slender youthful build by any means. Typical is 16 or 17.. but Alas, I'm in my 5th year of university.. sigh.
It's all: So backwards.
When I was 11 a guy thought I looked in my 20's.
Now that I'm in my 20's (and trying to pass off as a guy)
the postage workers tell me I need an 'adult' to sign for some parcels-
which contain cans of MSCflat and junk (Painting stuff).
People tell me I look around 15.
._.'
Yeah, I get this all the time! I'm short, I'm not on T and I usually look like a 14 year old chav, so it's to be expected. It's a bit annoying if I want to go to the pub, but generally I know if I get asked for my ID, they've read me as a young guy and therefore I've passed. To be fair, if I was the barman and saw myself (as it were) come up to the bar, I would ask me for ID too!
I do sometimes feel other men don't give me the respect they would if they knew I was actually 22, and not 14, but hopefully when my weight training starts yielding results, they won't be quite so ready to push past me or talk down to me!
But the worst thing? When twinky teenage guys OR girls flirt with me! And when old ladies in work call me a "nice young man"! CRINGE!