In which clan/side are you?
I've noticed many here decide to reveal OPENLY they are trans, may I know why and what's your reason?
Me I decide NOT TO REVEAL and DENY TO DEATH for my own sake as max as I can. 1. Main reason is NOT TO BE REJECTED by strict straight men. 2. To be accepted by the society as a real WOMAN and not as a 3rd gender or dunno what crap else and 3. Not to be discriminated in all forms as job etc...
So please tell us which side are you and WHY did you decide to REVEAL or NOT TO REVEAL.
I'm not exactly open, but not exactly stealth. I only tell people whom need to know for one reason or another. I see no reason people I don't know, or are just friends with to know my complete medical history. If the subject matter comes up, depending on the person I may or may not tell them. Personally I believe it's no ones business but my own. ;D
I can't answer points 1 and 3, SG, but as for point 2 you are a woman. And Tyler is completely right.
I'm FTM, so I have to tell potential sexual partners and will for the foreseeable future - they'll find out eventually, and it's less humiliating to be rejected with your pants on than with your pants off.
As for other people...well, I don't go around broadcasting that I'm trans. It's not the end of the world if someone finds out or guesses, though. At some point, I won't even have to think about it anymore.
At first I was rather open about it but after some of the responses I've gotten, now I just don't talk about it.
Full stealth to the end, definitely. I haven't spent my life living as a "girl" only to have to spend it being "the ->-bleeped-<-" to everyone I meet. I didn't even tell most of my friends/family when I started medically transitioning.
The important people in my life know. As for the rest, I really don't care one way or the other.
Honesty is really an essential part of life really.
But I think it was Ben Franklin who drew a distinction between honesty and not saying what isn't strickly relevant.
There will come a time, with any of our relationships, when we need to give information that is relevant. But I can't see why we need to say things about ourselves, which aren't. When you first meet someone, you don't know everything about them. As you get to know them, you learn more, but a little mystery keeps relationships interesting.
As others have said though, as for your medical history, when it becomes relevant, you can discuss it. If someone, after getting to know you as an individual and developing a relationship with you, changes because of something that is past, then they probably weren't worth it in the first place.
kyril makes reference to an interpersonal relationship. This is a good case in point. If your relationship has deveoped to the extent that you feel comfortable about being intimate, then what you have is surely superficial.
In the case of casual sex, what you have is quite important. But equally, the whole point about casual sex is the pot luck element. Sometimes, you pull out a bar of chocolate, sometimes a steak dinner. But if you're not ready to take the chance, (the other person as well of course), then don't try the pot luck.
I really do understand your position SadGirl. I might have the same approach, in a similar situation. Though it seems to me that we have nothing to apologise for, no reason to ask for permission. I will keep those aspects of my life private that I choose to, because they are my business. But I have no reason to feel any shame for being me.
I'm not hiding anything. My past is just a part of me as my present and I'm not ashamed of it. Will it limit me in terms of who I can be involved with? Yes. But something tells me those to whom it would make a difference wouldn't have been worth the time anyway. I'm not an open book by any means. And if I try to fill in the details, it usually takes some convincing. But I like educating people. I let them ask questions and hopefully I have good answers.
My body is my own my surgeon gave me something to behold
I do no buy no in to I am somehow dishonest I except no cv in return and my past is wiped clean.
I fully understand why some of you do though but it is not high in my agendas I had a defect it was corrected
The way I see it I'm just living my life, and there are numerous situations where it's just not relevent to revel about my past. The same goes for other things that I've done in my past and indeed do now (not everyone wants to hear my warble on about longboarding for example). If talking about my history is relevent to a conversation I will, but i'm not going to tell everyone I meet. However with relationships I would disclose, because for a relationship to last it needs to be built on trust.
What Helena said... unless relevant, I keep my mouth shut. And I can't wait until my name change gets finalized so the subject will become a bit less relevant than it's been lately. ;D
I never tell anyone I don't think it's anyone's business really & I don't want it to define who I am, I told my husband after we got serious, but I never tell any of my friends & don't intend to ever. But I guess it's all about personal choice.
im in the NOT REVEAL CLAN :D
Why?
1.because it comes very easy to me, I have always been a private person, i do not give out any personal information, unless i have to. The one time I revealed was when I came out to my family & friends, strictly because i wanted them to respect my new name and use male pronouns.
2. the moment you tell people who know you as a guy (FTM), at that moment everything changes, all of a sudden they begin to imagine you as a girl , start using the wrong pronouns, feel uncomfortable, exclude you in guys only event. To cut the story short, they start seeing you as you were before transition and the relationship changes. I dont want to deal with this, if i don't have to.
3. I have a way of dismissing history, to me what happened in the past stays there, its no longer relevant. I start on a new clean slate everyday.
* With intimate partners though, revealing is a must IMO.
I am open about my past, but in the same breath I don't reveal unless I have to. Will I be stealth after SRS? At this point I really don't know.
I feel that not revealing is just keeping family secrets. I will cross that bright when I get there. For now, I am basically stealth.
It is only mentioned when in an intimate relationship or with doctors. Otherwise, I don't talk about it nor do I bring it up. So more, non-revealing than anything else.
After transition/SRS in 1974 I went 'deep stealth' simply because I didn't see my medical history as being relevant to anything.
My first husband found out after we separated and was very angry that I "didn't trust him enough to tell him" (his words) so I realized that even though it wasn't important to me, it was to him.
I told my second husband while we were dating (actually after the first time we made love - NOT the best time but things got away from me LOL!) and he was very supportive and we moved in together. It turned out to be a good thing I said something because six years later an employee at a medical facility made my medical history the subject of common gossip and my husband was my greatest defender and protector. He kept the crap away from me so effectively that I didn't even know about the rumours until years later. I learned that:
#1 - stealth is never 100% secure, and
#2 - forewarned is also forearmed
Though it has cost me a few promising relationships in the years I have been single again I would never consider an intimate relationship with someone who didn't know. It is a fact and because it matters to some people, my lover should know.
P.S. With so many years behind me and being totally secure in my own womanhood, I have shared the details of my early life with a number of my close friends. I particularly like the reaction - TOTAL disbelief! The look of incredulity and their inability to reconcile 'the me they know' from my beginnings is very gratifying LOL! Some of them simply refuse to believe me.
I think the difficult thing here is, that going stealth makes things quite much easier for yourself. There is a lot of discrimination and hostility around against transpeople. You'll be able to live a pretty normal life and only have to explaim things to people that are close to you. But the downside: if we all hide this and don't make a scene and put up a fight nothing will change and future generations will have to face the exact same problems as the ones we are facing now. It is something people will have to consider.
Quote from: Kaisa on April 25, 2011, 08:46:17 AM
I think the difficult thing here is, that going stealth makes things quite much easier for yourself. There is a lot of discrimination and hostility around against transpeople. You'll be able to live a pretty normal life and only have to explaim things to people that are close to you. But the downside: if we all hide this and don't make a scene and put up a fight nothing will change and future generations will have to face the exact same problems as the ones we are facing now. It is something people will have to consider.
I feel like this. I feel that instead of being ashamed of our past we are pretty well allowed to be proud of succeeding under conditions like ours. I feel that my past gives me an insight and life experience which not many people are allowed to have. I also feel that if people only accepted me for *not* knowing I'm transgendered they are only showing skin accept. I feel that by hiding my status I would fall victim of internalized transphobia - I feel I conquered it instead. Claiming the right to be who I am!
I hid a vision impairment for too many years only to discover that the hide resulted in me not getting the necessary support and not developing my full potential. I am not going to do that regarding my gender.
However I am required to stealth at work to avoid shifting focus away from my patients. This, however, turned out to be very good to me too, because this meant that I'm fully confident in my femininity and passability now making me more confident both when stealthing and not.
Quote from: Kaisa on April 25, 2011, 08:46:17 AMBut the downside: if we all hide this and don't make a scene and put up a fight nothing will change and future generations will have to face the exact same problems as the ones we are facing now.
The point you are missing is that as soon as you publicly identify as transsexual (even if you are post-op) the general public no longer sees you as "just a woman" and your point is therefore considered biased.
I transitioned in 1974 and in the first year or two I was outed a couple of times. People who had known me as a woman were astounded and found it (my medical history) hard to believe - they really understood the idea of always being a girl but in a different body.
I believe a whole lot of damage was done by the media - parading "men in dresses", acting like men and demanding to be treated as women. But that opens another nastier debate ....
You can reveal for example with relationships.
Nobody want to start a relationship with a lie, but how far will you go? friends, co-workers anybody else?
There is always a chance for disclosure.
People you meet, who are knowing you before transition, it happends to me while I was working in a hospital in another city.
This person was moved to that city and was dying to tell everybody who wants to hear what was going on. so, disclosured.
I don't want to advertize with it, I just want to have a life and beside the one who is getting intimate with me, it's nobodies business.
But in real life things always went different than you want it.
The opinion about T's thanks to shows like Jerry Springer for example is not so very good, so most of us keep their mouth about it.
But, it looks that we do have such a secret that we are like serial killers or something, while we did nothing wrong.
There isn't something right about that, we are no criminals, and we don't have to be ashamed for being T.
hugs
Annette
For now being as I'm in a job and have friends that already know I can't be entirely stealth. My next job and any new friends once I'm passing constantly have no need to know. I plan to be entirely stealth with the exception of my partner, my doctor, and close friends that I choose to tell. Nothing against those who choose to tell, it's just not what I want
Quote from: Northern Jane on April 25, 2011, 03:35:57 PM
The point you are missing is that as soon as you publicly identify as transsexual (even if you are post-op) the general public no longer sees you as "just a woman" and your point is therefore considered biased.
I transitioned in 1974 and in the first year or two I was outed a couple of times. People who had known me as a woman were astounded and found it (my medical history) hard to believe - they really understood the idea of always being a girl but in a different body.
I believe a whole lot of damage was done by the media - parading "men in dresses", acting like men and demanding to be treated as women. But that opens another nastier debate ...
Well what I see here is a different world view, one I have some understanding of as 1974 was the year I was born, but times have changed. No I wont go out as I presently am overmuscled, non-lasered, pre-hrt etc. But really the world should be tolerate of people who are NOT "men in dresses" but CANNOT "conform to a stereotype of womanhood". Heck there's every type of woman out there already and well blow me down that includes women who have masculine features. You've confused all masculine featured women with men in dresses who act like men but demand to be trated like women, the two are NOT the same.
Quote from: Sophia on April 25, 2011, 07:32:31 PM
Well what I see here is a different world view, one I have some understanding of as 1974 was the year I was born, but times have changed. No I wont go out as I presently am overmuscled, non-lasered, pre-hrt etc. But really the world should be tolerate of people who are NOT "men in dresses" but CANNOT "conform to a stereotype of womanhood". Heck there's every type of woman out there already and well blow me down that includes women who have masculine features. You've confused all masculine featured women with men in dresses who act like men but demand to be trated like women, the two are NOT the same.
This is why she said it was a nasty debate, because many who do not fit this so-called stereotype of womanhood are nonetheless sensitive about it; the misunderstandings multiply and soon abound. I saw nowhere in Jane's statements where she said all masculine featured women were really men in dresses who act like men, and there didn't appear to me to be any confusion as to who is to blame for it. You must admit those people exist, paraded by the media like a circus sideshow precisely for the shock value it produces. I agree it is a perception problem, as the general public does not draw those fine distinctions- to many of the unenlightened, as soon as you say "transsexual" these are the first images that come to mind for them no matter how feminine one might be, which makes it all the more an uphill battle for anyone who doesn't conform to that stereotype of womanhood, transsexual or not.
"Should be" tolerant and "are" comprise not only two different worldviews but two very different realities, unfortunately. Our indignation should be directed towards those who generate and exploit those false stereotypes in the first place, not towards the ones who point them out.
Quote from: Valeriedances on April 26, 2011, 06:12:59 AM
The one good thing I have learned from it is to be careful who I disclose to, be mindful in who I date. Recognize that my own need for acceptance caused me to say yes to date people not right for me, a mistake I repeated over and over. Knowing this about myself now, I can work on breaking that pattern by being more aware of that persons needs and ability to accept my past. To not force the issue, just because of my need.
I'd agree with this - I think a decent guy (or gal) won't have a problem with it. I can't imagine dating someone who hated people who had a past in common with me, and, thus, forcing me to hide my past. Of course dating decent people is a lot harder in practice--I get that. And there's a difference between finding good people and telling them all your secrets - you don't have to do both.
As a cis-male, I am very glad my wife told me her history (before we even started going out, but when she felt things might be serious and progressing that direction).
When she told me, I could see how scared she was that I would reject her, or that I would somehow see her as someone other than who she was. I can't even begin to imagine what that's like - which is why I won't pretend to give advice beyond stating my own experience as an outsider. I can't imagine the risk that it involved. But I can understand that it was immense, and the act of telling me showed that she was willing to risk a lot to build a real relationship with me - even the relationship itself. It showed a real love, one that I can return by showing her that my heart knows the truth and authenticity of her heart.
That said, she didn't need to tell me. And I'm sad that people are in this position where society basically gives no good choices to people. The act of trust and the risk she took has had a lot of impact in my heart. But her history itself doesn't change our relationship - I would love her every bit as much if she was identified by others as a woman her whole life. But I am very honored by her trust in me, and the risk she took for our relationship to be as full and complete as possible. She's an amazing person!