Hello, you can call me Croc if you wish. I hope that this is the right place for me because I am in quite a quagmire and this is the first time that I have sought any type of support so please excuse any awkwardness. I will try to be brief, so just e-mail me if you would like more detail. I suppose that I should start by saying that I am still in limbo, In the closet so to speak. I have a decent life and a wonderful significant other and though we have talked at length about the subject of gender identity, they have made it clear that they would perfer me a woman, much to my chagrin. I love them with all my heart and so I try to keep up appearances for family and relationship for the last few years, but my body feels like a prison and it gnaws away inside me every day, with every glance in a mirror, or every gift of clothes [or make-up or some other bull my family is trying to be generous with], or even the simple compliments about "what a beutiful/sexy/whatever woman" I am. I know that this probebly sounds juvinile or ungrateful, and I do not mean or want to seem ungrateful I love my family but it just feels like a twist of the knife. I have researched reassignment, but in the end it feels like a faustian bargin between feeling whole and keeping the love of my family intact. I dont want to lose them, so I try to be me the best i can, and it makes me feel weaker for not being willing to sacrifice that at this point. I do not know what to do and I just want to be able to talk to people who can relate and any advice is appriciated. I dont want to struggle alone anymore. I promise that i am not a downer and can be a pleasent conversationalist, just a trapped pleasent conversationalist.