It seems like most people at the latter stages of transition are reaching an interesting state of mind that I am jealous of, acceptance of both their male and female traits.  My question, is this acceptance born from changing the body to match more what they want to look like, or is it more experiential based confidence with who they are as a person?  Besides my facial/body hair, I am pretty much an average of average male and female measurements (well, maybe an inch or 2 taller than the average of male+female heights), right down to my foot size.  When I look at myself trying to see the female attributes, all I see are male "flaws".  When I look at myself as a conglomeration of both, I start to see the feminine, the masculine, and I think my true face.  My philosophical idea is that acceptance of both within oneself is the end solution to my personal (and perhaps others) GID.  Some people just have to fully transition to see and accept their opposite selves, only then can they accept both sides.  Have others found this to be true, or am I traveling a new path?

Yep, that is true for many with GID. You will never get rid of it unless you accept yourself.
The manner in which you accept yourself is personal and different for most.
I tried many different things to try and alleviate the effects of GID.
Nothing worked out for any length of time or very well.
Acceptance came in little bursts that eventually just solidified into complete acceptance.
The many things that I wished I could change? I accepted that it's not going to happen that way.
I took stock in what I felt was me, regardless of whether or not I liked it.
I work on those things that I don't like. But at the same time, I accepted them as a part of me.
I started to shed the layers of facade that I had spent a lifetime collecting.
The charade started to change. It was then that I decided to start low dose HRT.

You really can't do anything much that will have any lasting effect of alleviating GID.
Not until you start to accept who you are, regardless of whatever that gender is.
Even now, there are twinges of GID that sneak into my self, but I'm getting way better at stopping them.
They are just little reminders that I need to be me, not the constructed societal person I was.

I know of some that it's not going to go away without some physical changes to align their body with self.
It may never go away for some, it's a nasty thing to deal with, but it can be dealt with on a level.

You sound like your path is right in front of you. Take the first step.
It has it's ups and downs, but it will get better.
Need a little confidence boost? We do that here, I'm not sure how, maybe just chattering about things works.
It does for me. I love all the glimmers of insight that I have gained from everyone I have met here.

Ativan

Was feeling pretty great all day.  Then I go to lay down to sleep and all these female thoughts start racing through my mind again.  This has happened before, one week I only slept 1 night.  I feel petty crazy atm.  Puzzled as how to make this just go away.  I'm fine with my life, why do I spend nights yearning to be something I am not? 

It's a process. Could be just the beginning of a realisation.
Embrace the thoughts and feelings.
If they are truly a part of you, you'll know.
If not, they will fade as you process through this.
But don't try ignoring yourself, it accomplish's nothing.
Could just be a passing thing that has built itself into something that seems larger than it is.
Embrace it just the same. Even if it just a thing your going through.
Experience will guide you, you'll gain experience.
It's nothing to worry about, it's fairly common.
Many of us have gone through the same thing, you're not alone in this.

Ativan

Atvian is right, it builds by increments and even then,complete and lasting self-acceptance is not a happy-ever-after, it's an unachievable end like perfection. (That said, I think total self-acceptance would be a bad thing to have because then there would be nothing to inspire us to become better people).

Although I am now a rather settled androgyne, there are still times when I feel an urge to be male or female, especially female. Yesterday I ordered some pyjamas with clouds all over them, they are very cool and I thought it was a pity they were going on my male body. When this happens, I find it useful to remember what I am, and also to project myself as a less attractive female. When I do this, I realise that just being female is not enough, I want to be cute too. It then scales down the desire because the desire to be good looking is shared by everyone.

Finally, I have always argued that androgyne transition was chiefly psychological. The acceptance I have so far won has almost all been from my changing attitudes and not my changing physicality. I do now have a wardrobe split about 60/40 in favour of male clothes. I have liberated myself to indulge in my more feminine wishes and I have tried to feminise most of my bathroom routines and such. But these changes from from my acceptance and are not the cause of it. Even for the most physical-change-happy of androgynes, there will come a time when they have to start accepting what they are and not what they could make themselves into.

What would you say a first step should be?  I really respect your opinions.  I dont really know where to go from here, only that I should do something about it.  I am ready to accept myself for who I am, but it hasnt really quieted this struggle within me.

I think (and this is just a theory!) that for us to truly accept ourselves, that has to include accepting our capacity for change - that is, we are never fixed. Some people have wandering sexualities, some have wandering genders. The more you can allow yourself to be who you are from moment to moment, the easier it is for these things to come along and drift away - and in the longer term, it's easier to see what things come along and don't go away. It's all you, so you don't need to fight it, just listen.

(This sounds a bit pompous now that I read it back, but I still think it's true.)

Quote from: Padma on September 18, 2012, 09:26:55 AM
I think (and this is just a theory!) that for us to truly accept ourselves, that has to include accepting our capacity for change - that is, we are never fixed. Some people have wandering sexualities, some have wandering genders. The more you can allow yourself to be who you are from moment to moment, the easier it is for these things to come along and drift away - and in the longer term, it's easier to see what things come along and don't go away. It's all you, so you don't need to fight it, just listen.

(This sounds a bit pompous now that I read it back, but I still think it's true.)

It doesnt sound pompous to me.  I am at peace again today, but nights are long, cold and lonely in the jungle...

P.S. Jungle is my word for this forest.  I call it that because it feels so dense and foreign despite the fact that there are things of extreme beauty, it just feels sooo dangerous and overwhelming at times.

I feel the key is not to try at first. To just drift and see where you're led to.

For me and some others it boils down to when delusion collides with reality and the end result is the final settling in to a place where survival in social settings coupled with an outward expression which is reasonably congruent ones self identity produces an acceptable solution and inner peace.

Example: I knew an MtF from a TG support group who wound up in an amicable divorce from her wife who had become estranged over the fact that she had thought she was marrying a man and couldn't deal with what was happening to her husband. Fast forward through total transition and the MtF woman winds up with an absolutely stellar transformation. She travels to the east coast on a business trip and meets a nice man who over time proposes marriage. Sex was good with him, but something inside her was screaming No, No! She comes back to the west coast and visits her ex and the kids who continue to call her dad because they miss her and it becomes obvious to the TG woman they they are missing and need their dad. The ex then tells her that she also misses her terribly and would be willing to make some concessions and accept her as she is now if only she would come home for good.

     She gets a call from an old guy friend that she grew up with and meets up with him later at the old favorite watering hole dressed in some of her former man clothes, because she is afraid that the visual shock seeing her as a beautiful woman would be too much for his old friend. After several trips to her counselor and another to a shrink, she made a heartfelt decision to return to living at home with the former spouse and the kids and live her life in androgynous mode. Eventually they remarried!

     Sounds crazy, but it happens in various ways and for various reasons as it has in my own life. Interestingly, I get more acceptance from others both inside and outside of my family, and more acceptance by myself than if I had finished my transition and gone on to live full-time as a woman. There is no cookie cutter either male or female only option that can be applicable for everyone.

Quote from: Shantel on September 18, 2012, 06:54:09 PM
For me and some others it boils down to when delusion collides with reality and the end result is the final settling in to a place where survival in social settings coupled with an outward expression which is reasonably congruent ones self identity produces an acceptable solution and inner peace.

Wow, really like that sentence. Analyzing myself from that perspective, I can survive social situations as a man.  Makes me want to puke sometimes, but I can do it and currently the only time I have the need to express the feminine is when I'm lying in bed at night, wanting to have reacted differently.  None of it hits me during the day because I've been portraying man for so long that its just a shell I crawl into around others.  Dont get me wrong, I'm pretty soft and sweet for a guy, but I  desperately need to be more emotive, carefree, and a little vain ( lol, girls have always been jealous of my great hair).  I do want to look more feminine too, but I dont think this is such an overwhelming need for me.  That is why I'm leaning towards androgyny, but it gets so awkward and people shut down when I act the way I want because it doesn't match my outside appearance, so to get by I'm not really living. At least alone with my wife she accepts me all cutesy, but around others, she gets really ticked if I dont act all male and tough.  I guess I get it, if I where as soft to everyone as she can be, I'd want some protection too

Quote from: ashrock on September 18, 2012, 09:06:29 PM
At least alone with my wife she accepts me all cutesy, but around others, she gets really ticked if I dont act all male and tough.  I guess I get it, if I where as soft to everyone as she can be, I'd want some protection too

Cis female spouses tend to have those expectations of us and want to hold us to it. You have to work the cutesy in incrementally so that it becomes acceptable to her in public and social settings just as the film industry has moved up the bar on what's acceptable. Ward and June Cleaver from the series "Leave it to Beaver" would seem like they were from another planet in today's entertainment world. We can move up the bar incrementally just as the film industry has done.

It's a good way to look at it as 'the bar'. Society is always adjusting the bar, and where it is can even be dependent on where you are, geographically. The same thing that has defined mental illness and stability is often in line with gender expectations.
What was once unacceptable is now acceptable, because those concerned, moved the bar in steps. Even those who wish it would move in one big step can see that it isn't going to be accepted that way. The gender bar is moving, in very small and steady steps, almost as if it is in a fluid constant motion, because of the gains made in the last couple years. It will continue to move through sheer momentum, as society has taken the leap from not possible to why not, even if they don't personally like it. Bigotry is hard to get rid of, but when a majority of people are on the opposite side of it, bigotry dissolves to almost nothing. Nobody wants to be on the losing side. Nobody wants to draw a battle line at this point, the scales are tipping.
So it should be in our personal lives as well. Small steps towards a goal of understanding. You can't change a mind by arguing, you only bring up the points of the argument when doing so. Take the small incremental steps that show to others and yourself, that things can be different.

Ativan

Quote from: ashrock on September 17, 2012, 05:41:31 PM
It seems like most people at the latter stages of transition are reaching an interesting state of mind that I am jealous of, acceptance of both their male and female traits.  My question, ..... or is it more experiential based confidence with who they are as a person? 

For me that is exactly what has happened. I think it comes from realizing you are who you are and there is nothing you can do about it. After trying to label and box myself into neat definitions it became a worthless excercise and just plain futile. I am a human. I love I cry I feel and have compassion. I can also laugh at myself. To along time to get there. Life became to short to continue as before. Age may have allot to do with this type of acceptance. Age has a way of grounding you to the realities of life. You perceive and react to things at 20 or 30 years old differently than you would at 50 60 and 70.

Still dont know what I am labeled. I gave up caring. If you find out let me know.  My life long partner tells me I am more female than she is. She wishes I was more manly at times. I can understand that because she married a man or thought she did. She knew I had GID but not a complete understanding. Unfortunately I didn't either till decades later. But ya know life is full of comprimises.   She Often tells me to grow a new pair jokingly and I will occaisionally dress up into a suit and tie for her. She needs this for her mental health on occaision. and thats ok.  But on a day to day basis we dress very similar and appropriate for our age.