I like stories, personal stories. For me there is something wonderfully evocative in engaging another's tale of how they came to be. There is also something tremendously affirming, deeply healing in sharing stories of my own.

Over the last couple weeks, I have been reading a lot of 'Introductions' and getting much out of each and every one. The bravery! The difficulty! The nakedness! And the side by side existence of similarity and difference. It really has been stunning. Many thanks to all!

In the process of doing this, I have become very curious about people's 'moments' - those instants in which you knew you were... What, exactly? Transgender? Female? Male? Neither? Both? Different? Let's just leave it at this: I am curious to know when you knew you were...and you can fill in this blank. I would love to read these stories!

For me the moment came when I was eight. I had found a Playboy magazine somewhere. Secreted away in the downstairs bathroom, I stripped off all my clothing, opened up the centrefold, and turned both of us toward the mirror. The issue was May 1973. The Playmate was Anulka Dziubinska. She had long blonde hair and a curvaceous figure. Her hands rested one on each thigh as she stood on her knees, eyes to the camera. She seemed surrounded in the shot by a world of colour and depth and warmth and rightness. I can feel and smell it even now; it is delicious.

For several minutes I let my gaze move side to side on the mirror before me. From her to me to her to me... I was shivering slightly; I must have been cold. I still remember the feeling of my chest sinking when the realization erupted. It was like a weight had been suddenly placed right in the very centre, right over my heart. My ribs seemed to collapse beneath the pressure. Breathing became difficult. Blood pounded in my ears. I felt such longing and such despair. We seemed so different, the two of us. Her so full and rich; me so pale and thin and not.

This was when I knew: On that day, in that bathroom, standing naked before that mirror.

And this is what I knew: I wasn't her. And yet, in some strange way, I was.

Hello Tanya!

Thanks for a very well written story!

I will guess that many of us had more than one moment of certainty and for me it was a series of clues and emerging awareness, sometimes without benefit of language.  I am told that as a 3 yo my older sister "adopted" me as her sister and renamed me Tessa.  My older brother confirms this and apparently warned me if I kept at it I would be a girl.  I had no real recollection of these events but was told I did keep at it for years.  I found that out after coming out to my older sister last year.  She had teased me about that throughout adulthood but i could strangely never remember that name until I finally accepted myself as transgender.  Hmmm, repression is a powerful force?  My fecund mother had 15 children and my most loving memory was of helping her breast feed.  I somehow had this "crazy idea" that I would grow up to be a mom and take care of babies too.  Gender confirmation training the hard school yard way ensued and puberty caused me to give it up and become an early cynic about life.  I did my best to be what was somehow expected of me.

Your story did remind me of one pivotal event as a 11 yo when I fell in love with Lee Remick, a popular actress of the 60's.  She was playing a tearful and tragic role and I was both alarmed and thrilled to acknowledge i was just like her or somehow I was her.   Again there were no words or any references to help me sort this impossibility out.  But I knew it and feared it at once and locked myself in a bedroom so I could hug her magazine picture to my chest and just feel her/us.  I have never been able to tell that last story in person to anyone and even as i type this tears are full on.  It's a good cry.  Thanks again for an evocative invitation to tell our true story.

My life was rather odd in this regard because I started life with a strong sense of gender it seems. I am told that even as an infant I was greatly disturbed by my genitals and used to hide myself with a washcloth and not let my mother bathe me there. As a child I played with neighbourhood girls and was definitely on the feminine side, even for a girl. I had chosen my female name by age 4 (because the other one wasn't "right") and when I started school at 5 and encountered gender-specific washrooms is caused quite a stir because I would not use the boys room and the teachers tried to stop me from using the girls room.

At age 8 I realized that the problem was my genitals, that my body didn't match ME! It was VERY confusing because in the 1950s there wasn't even a term for it. Puberty was a bit of a split (breasts and some facial hair) and I became desperate for things to be made right - I totally rejected being "a boy" and stole birth control pills (estrogen) whenever I could. The offending bits were so despised that they were in danger of being cut  off (at my own hand). When I first heard the term transsexual in about 1965, I figured that must be it, that must be what I was. Even if that wasn't quite right, it was close enough and I began fighting for medical help.

For most of my teens it was a fine line between pushing for medical help and being institutionalized for the "delusion" that I was or should have been a girl but by 16 I was diagnosed as transsexual and by 17 I found a doctor to  begin HRT. IT was 7 more years before SRS became available but when it did, I had NO hesitation.

There was no "ah-ha!" moment for me, just a waffling back and forth between absolute certainty and not being so sure.

SRS/transition just proved that I was right all along. Life post-transition was a piece of cake and nobody would have believed that I wasn't a normal girl from birth. It wasn't until my late 50s that I found out I have a uterus and that made me laugh. I thought "See! I told you!" 

(Warning: Possible triggers)

I knew other people thought I acted atypical when my sister and cousins got My Little Ponies and I cried (and then had a tantrum - i have Asperger's Syndrome, so I did that a lot) because I didn't get one, too. My parents tried explaining (kindly, they were sweet like that) that they were girls' toys. I kept crying, so they bought me one anyway . I knew my teachers were worried about something when I kept insisting on jumping ropes, hopscotch and playing family with the girls instead of pretend fighting with the boys - I couldn't understand why they kept telling me to join the boys, though. I also think my friends knew something was off when I had tantrums because I never got to play the mother or daughter roles.

I knew something was wrong when nothing worked as I thought it would during puberty. I had read everything about puberty - but just female puberty. I knew I was biologically male, but it never occurred to me there was a real difference. I thought I was completely crazy when I tried building the courage to castrate myself at age 14-15. And I knew the doctor thought I was a hypochondriac when I kept visiting him because I was convinced something was wrong with my genitals.

I knew exactly what I was when I first read about SRS at age 15-16. But I realized that was "bad" before even completing the article - people around me commented how "sick" that was, and that it "should be illegal". So I kept my mouth shut, and went into denial for a decade. I still kept visiting doctors to find out what was wrong with my body, though. Most of the tests came back negative. I also knew people didn't view me as completely male when a female friend of mine told me I should start looking for bisexual girls, since women instinctively see me as female and hence aren't attracted to me if they're straight. That's a cruel thing to say of course, but it's probably the most helpful word of advice I've ever received - I don't think she realized exactly what she was saying, though . Around that time (two to three years ago), the feelings started to resurface. I still tried to stay in denial, but with decreasing success. Until less than two weeks ago, when I decided to acknowledge the obvious, since the only other option was suicide, which I was dangerously close to committing less than two months ago. Most of my problems (eating disorder, suicide contemplation, depression) were gone virtually overnight.

Instead I have anxiety related to coming out to close friends and family, but the list is getting shorter, and the reactions so far have been better than I could have ever imagined. I still have my family left though - my sister, in-law and niece (who doesn't understand "adult talk" yet, thankfully - I hope to transition soon enough that she never will have a memory of me as anything other than her aunt) are coming to visit tomorrow, and my parents next weekend. I'm actually starting to look forward to it - I initially planned on not telling them until I start HRT, but I see now that waiting that long would be torture.

When I was 14 one of the older boys at school rode past a friend and me on a BSA motorbike with his girlfriend  on the pillion.My friend wished he was the boy on the bike,I wished I was the girl with her arms around his waist,long blonde hair flying out behind.

I'm sure I can't remember the actual time... I can remember my first inkling of it.

I still have the book that clued me in. My name is written inside in red crayon and I can't possibly be older than 8, based on the scribble (maybe 10... maybe). The book isn't a good one. It's called "Wish Come True" by Mary Q. Steele and it's about a boy, Joe, and his sister, Meg, who find a wishing ring. Early on in the book it's revealed that Meg's greatest wish is to be her brother. I remember thinking she's crazy... and that I'd happily change places with her. I think I read the book 20 times (again, it's NOT a very good book -- even for a 6-12 year old).



I really wish I knew exactly how old I was... 6-12 is definitely the range... I taught myself to read by age 3 - so god knows where in that age range I fell.

While I've always wished I had been born female, I didn't actually know this meant I was transgender until a little more than a year ago at age 51. Over the past several years, I've been coming to the conclusion that "part of me is female", but it wasn't until after I found Susan's and did a lot of exploring that I understood that I'm MtF.

It started out because I was tired of not fitting in socially, and I had an inkling that it had to do with the fact that I didn't relate to males, only females. A parade of therapists had all kinds of theories (my relationship with my father, fear of being gay, not wanting to compete...) Oddly, none of them considered transgender. It was only when I coupled that with other aspects of myself (love of media and books intended for women, fascination with all issues having to do with women, etc.) that I began to think of myself as "part man part woman".

I googled that phrase one day, and that led me to Susan's.

Which in turn led by to me becoming who I really am.

One of my earliest childhood memories is me wearing my mother's shoes, declaring I wanted to be a mother when I grew up.
From puberty onwards I spent 20 years telling myself I wasn't trans-anything; surely everyone wished they were born as someone else, right?
In my early thirties, after a suicide attempt I felt forced to take time to think about life and who I am. And when I started peeling away all the layers I'd added over the years I was somewhat surprised to find at the core a scared 12 year old girl who never got to grow up.
After a few years of trying to find my place along the trans spectrum I found the answer on YouTube. While watching Eddie Izzard videos I couldn't understand why someone as wealthy as him wouldn't have surgery. And that made me realize that I'd always seen surgery as something obvious, and that my childhood dreams of being born with a different body could, to a certain extent, be realized.
And today my driver's license says Emma, my friends accept me for who I am, and I've started HRT. And I've never felt better

I've been thinking about how to answer this.

The truth is, I've always known. I was three, in a head start pilot program when I realized that no one else knew. They were taking pictures to show how successful the program was. they told us to grab our favorite toy for the picture. I grabbed a big tonka firetruck. They took it away and gave me a doll that I had never played with. I just kept looking at it and wondered what the heck was i doing with this doll. their comments clarified their thinking, however erroneous it was. That  was my first clue that how I saw myself was not how I was perceived by others.

It took me a long time to realize I wasn't a man.

It's not easy to realize you are a lesbian, if you're in a male form eh.

All those years liking women, and well of course I like women, I'm a lesbian.

But then you get cis female lesbians pissed off sometimes when you say you are one of them, but you don't need the strap on.

Well it's not all easy eh. I don't need the strap on, but at least their breasts are real. And most lesbians don't have their hair fall out either.

So it took me a long time to finally realize all my preferences all my actions, everything about me, isn't actually male.

I have some male parts, but the person running this show isn't a man.

What a wonderful way to start the day - reading people's stories! I have been laughing and crying, my heart soaring and sinking.

I love how for some of us there's an 'always knew' quality evident, for others a gradual awakening. For some a clear sense of moment, for others something else. I love all the similarities, all the differences. Many of the images and experiences are so striking - that book! Seeing it right here in front of me, I can feel it being held in tiny hands, read over and over again... And some of the words! I can hear then being thought: 'What the heck am I doing with this doll!?!'

So much power in this, for me at least.

Many thanks for posting, all!

Around 3 or 4 years old. I was watching a Marilyn Monroe movie on TV and thought, huh, I should look like that and dress like that. I think I may have mentioned it to my mom and in a manner of speaking, she said that is not the way to be. 

Speaking of Playboy, from the time I saw one around the age of 10, I thought as I did before, "hmm, I should look like the women on those pictures."  I did and still, of course, appreciate the beauty of the female form. 

It was slow and subtle and not all that exciting for me.

I never felt like anything. Puberty and genitals annoyed me. I wanted to grow up to be a dragon, a wolf, a pokemon, a cat... anything, really, but an adult human. I had my first experience of intense and psychologically crippling dysphoria a few years ago with a pregnancy scare. I realized that I hated the word "mother" being used in reference to myself, even if just calling me a "kitty mommy". Sometime thereafter I realized I didn't like being called a "woman" either. I was already at the AVEN forums at the time, but decided one day, for the hell of it, to go check out the gender forum. As I read some people's explanations of what being nonbinary felt like, it seemed to match my experience pretty well.

Now I know why I couldn't imagine myself being a grown-up as a kid; or at least, a grown-up human: because being a grown-up meant being a man or a woman with such an intensity that I couldn't even grasp the concept. Aging, adulthood, and responsibility, it felt like, were going to be withheld from me for some reason.

I've been having some repressed memories surface lately since I've become more accepting of who I am. I don't know the exact moment I realized something was different about me but I do recall a lot of moments in early childhood where I felt very discontented with my body and wished I were/felt more like I should have been a girl. It wasn't until this year, age 37, that I learned what transgender and transsexual even meant, and it obviously struck a cord and brought me here.

The repressed memories are interesting to me because I was very much the opposite of what one might assume a TS preteen/teen would be like, (the key word being "assume.") I was rebellious and angry and very, very male! Although even then I had trouble with those unwanted thoughts and feelings, but I didn't put two and two together back then. I was too busy overcompensating. The fact that my brain would go as far as blocking certain memories is terrible. No child should ever be made to feel such shame about themselves.

Just this week in therapy I remembered something I hadn't thought about in probably 20+ years. I used to steal my mom's underwear out of her dresser and lock myself in the bathroom and try them on. I'd be so afraid of getting caught I'd make a mental note of exactly how they looked in the drawer, so when I put them back there was no evidence that they'd been removed. Wearing her underwear felt good but I never got into dressing fully. I remember staring at my girlfriend's clothes in her closet and wishing I could try them on, but hating myself for having such unacceptable desires. The few times I did try on women's clothes it didn't make me feel good at all. It just reinforced my hatred for my body, and left me feeling like a pervert.

When I was little (age 3-7) I played with girls mostly, and we'd often take off our clothes for one reason or another. Just innocent childhood curiosity, but it was so confusing for me. I couldn't understand why I had to have this thing instead of the thing she has. Why does mine stick out? It's gross! Hers makes so much more sense! I doubt I had those thoughts verbatim, but the feeling was the same. I felt like my boy parts were a mistake. I saw both of my parents naked fairly often as a child and I distinctly remember feeling like my dad's anatomy was NOT what I was supposed to have! It was shocking and scary to me. But my mom's was just what moms look like. She just looked normal to me. Of course I had no way of making any sense of any of those feelings, and even at that age I knew to keep thoughts like that to myself.

When I was about 5 or 6 I was at day camp at a community center/club, changing into my swimsuit in the boy's locker room. I remember looking around at all the naked boys and feeling so awkward! I can't really describe the feeling other than it just felt wrong. Like I was in the wrong place. Like I was invading their privacy or something. I knew in my head that I was a boy so this is where I'm supposed to change, but it just felt all wrong. Of course I knew I couldn't change in the girls locker room either, so it was just another taste of a feeling that would become very familiar as I grew up: feeling like I don't belong anywhere. Not with the boys, not with the girls. Always feeling different.

I think the first time I ever actually wished (upon a star, prayed to God, etc) that I could be a girl was when I was playing house with the girl across the street and dreading her brother coming home and catching me playing girly games with his little sister. I was supposed to be his friend but I always wanted to play with her. It made me so jealous that she could be so overtly girlish and I had to pretend I thought that stuff was stupid girl stuff, which is exactly what I did once her brother showed up. I'd act like I was just killing time until he arrived, but inside I was sad that I couldn't keep playing with her.

I always struggled with the shame. Boys aren't supposed to want to be girls! Being a boy is better, so they tell us. Maybe not in so many words, but that's the message they send. At least that's the lesson I learned. So it wasn't until my early twenties that I finally admitted to myself that I really do want to be a girl. And it wasn't until age 37 that I finally told someone.

(Warning: Possible triggers and really long...)

I'm not really sure where to start. I think, for me, it was the clues I left for myself over the years. I don't really remember much of my childhood, a lot of it is in a fog and I try not to remember the parts that seem to be locked away since I believe there is a reason for that.

When I was turning six years old, I did not really mind playing with dolls, but I wanted much more to be outside, climbing trees, fighting pirates and digging for gold. So, due to that, I ended up playing with the boys more then the girls and it was not till I started the first grade, that I realized I was not a boy. I remembered just how hurt I felt. Later on, I just told myself it had most likely been the fact that I was in a new country, and that I just had felt hurt because the boys did not want to play with me anymore because I was a girl.

It was about two months or so into the first grade, my mom became really ill and was diagnosed with cancer. So, every other weekend we spent time with our dad, and the other weekends we would go to a farm, since some places take in children like that to ether help out in cases like mine, or take in children full time. At that farm were mostly boys, and I spent the days doing what any farmer would. Milk cows, chase chickens, collect eggs and so forth. But, there was another boy there, somewhere between the age of 16-18 that I looked very much up to and I wanted to become just like him. It did not take him long to notice that, and he took advantage of that.

Long and not such a fun story short. He reminded me every other weekend for about a year, that no matter what I wished to be, I was born a girl. After that, I tried my best to leave those times behind, and everything that came with it. But, when I was about eight years old I seem to have fallen into the same thing. I got hand me down clothes from a cousin of mine who was about a year or two younger then me, but because he was a boy he grew faster then I did. That was when Dennis was born....

I got dragged into playing house, but I only did with one exception. That I could be the boy, the dad or anything that was not a girl, and my name would be Dennis. Which was not often... I spent most of my time I spent climbing trees and up to roof tops, and running away from older guys who bullied me. Somehow, the fact that they always mistook me for a boy still felt great. But, going to school was the hardest. That time I started to pretend to be sick so I would not have to go to school. I was bullied for being different, for being strange and that I just could not be one of the girls.

Around that time, my mom became really ill, and her cancer was getting worse and we ended up moving again. This time, I tried really hard to be one of the girls. I pretended to love, listen to and know who the spice girls were, tried going to school in a dress (which I shall add was only once) and I suppressed everything once again. Now, today, I wish I could have told my mom that I was always a boy since I can't today. When I was nine years old, my whole world crashed and my mom passed away after a long fight with cancer.

Well, a few months after my mom passes away we move in with another family since my dad met this woman with six kids. The two dated for about three and a half years, and long story short, not a very pretty time. But, when I was not in school and not at home, I sometimes used to go to a friend of mine for a visit, which was about 45 min bus ride from where I lived. And there, I was Devon, a crazy little dude who was not scared of getting hurt. Did stupid crazy stunts, once again started climbing stuff... Jumping off things, close to breaking a few bones, but always landed really well. I never went to the pool in a swimsuit, I always just went in shorts. Which I did till I was almost 13 years old or so, I was a really late bloomer. But then again, when I lived in that house hold I was pretty much starved so I did not go past 30 kilos (66 pounds) til after 13 years old. So, even in girls clothes, strangers always mistook me as a boy (which I loved, and got mad at my friend when she used to correct it...)

And yet another time skip! This was when my dad moved us to the states, and on my thirteenth birthday his friend had taken him shopping for my birthday gift. According to her, I was a girl and I needed to become one. So! I got a lot of make up, a short skirt and a cute top for my birthday, which I had to use and wear the day after to school. I felt like a clown.... But, that was when I once again started to repress everything, and tried very hard to be a girl (which, most of the time I failed at...)

Oddly enough, perhaps the biggest clue, is one dream I have always had. In the dream I would ether start out as a boy or a girl until I would open a door and walk into a new room. And the dream went on like that, something seeming to always chase me out and into a new room. But each time, I would try to stay as long as I could in the room that I was a boy in. Strange dream, but I have not had that dream since I came out to myself.

But! I have not seen a gender therapist yet, and my one of my friends still likes to claim I am just a confused female. So, we will see where I go

Quote from: Lo on November 15, 2013, 04:43:12 PM
Now I know why I couldn't imagine myself being a grown-up as a kid; or at least, a grown-up human: because being a grown-up meant being a man or a woman with such an intensity that I couldn't even grasp the concept. Aging, adulthood, and responsibility, it felt like, were going to be withheld from me for some reason.

This is definitely something I have struggled with also; I wonder if it is common? I feel like, at some point in my life, some part of me just stopped growing. As a result, adulthood and aging - and all that comes with these territories - seem strangely remote to me. I cannot imagine them in some ways. I often feel like I am doing more painting by numbers than actual living. 

For a while I have thought this was because I had addiction issues arise around twelve. A common recovery maxim is that aspects of our development stop when the addiction starts. True enough, methinks, but this is not quite everything for me. Twelve was also the age at which many of the girls around me began to develop. That I did not was so confusing. I felt left behind and, to some extent, feel like I'm still back there waiting for the next phase of my life to kick in.

Quote from: Jillian on November 15, 2013, 05:39:46 PM
I've been having some repressed memories surface lately since I've become more accepting of who I am. .

I, too, have experienced this as I have become more accepting of my addiction, abuse, and gender sense over the last five years. I suspect this is part of the power of this thread for me and of story telling more generally. This gives me a chance to revisit, explore, and express memories/experiences that have never seen the light of day. It seems not to matter whether I am telling (i.e.: the never before shared 'Playboy' in the mirror) or receiving the story (i.e.: KAT's Tonka truck), there is a sense of healing in the process, of wholeness being rediscovered.

Finally, I want to thank you specifically, Dalex, for your post. Here's an embarrassing admission: I have long scratched my head when considering the male-identified among us. I mean, you would give up that for this? Reading your words I again and again felt this head scratching stop. You have showed me something I have never seen before: our experience is way more similar than different. You have helped me grow a bit with your offering, helped me see beyond my limited sense of how things are. I am moved and humbled - still more than a little embarrassed - and so appreciative.

Quote from: Lo on November 15, 2013, 04:43:12 PM
It was slow and subtle and not all that exciting for me.

I never felt like anything. Puberty and genitals annoyed me. I wanted to grow up to be a dragon, a wolf, a pokemon, a cat... anything, really, but an adult human. I had my first experience of intense and psychologically crippling dysphoria a few years ago with a pregnancy scare. I realized that I hated the word "mother" being used in reference to myself, even if just calling me a "kitty mommy". Sometime thereafter I realized I didn't like being called a "woman" either. I was already at the AVEN forums at the time, but decided one day, for the hell of it, to go check out the gender forum. As I read some people's explanations of what being nonbinary felt like, it seemed to match my experience pretty well.

Now I know why I couldn't imagine myself being a grown-up as a kid; or at least, a grown-up human: because being a grown-up meant being a man or a woman with such an intensity that I couldn't even grasp the concept. Aging, adulthood, and responsibility, it felt like, were going to be withheld from me for some reason.

Oh wow... thank you
I kind of remember pretending to be a cat for my sister... but I did not remember cocooning myself in blankets and pretending to change into something else (anything else... I think there were a lot of different fantasies) until I read your story. These were when I was very young. I think it was that sense of wrongness that I couldn't pin down specifically.

Quote from: Dalex on November 15, 2013, 05:59:09 PM
(Warning: Possible triggers and really long...)

This whole thread is trigger happy!! It's the good kind, though... the sort of dysphoria triggers that are self affirming and help me explore my own past.

Quote from: Tanya W on November 15, 2013, 06:41:03 PM
I, too, have experienced this as I have become more accepting of my addiction, abuse, and gender sense over the last five years. I suspect this is part of the power of this thread for me and of story telling more generally. This gives me a chance to revisit, explore, and express memories/experiences that have never seen the light of day. It seems not to matter whether I am telling (i.e.: the never before shared 'Playboy' in the mirror) or receiving the story (i.e.: KAT's Tonka truck), there is a sense of healing in the process, of wholeness being rediscovered.

This is exactly what happened to me too... coming out of the closet brings up all the repressed memories that were hidden because I was in the closet!! They are fuzzy memories, though... and one of them got denied categorically by my parents (their own denial... I am 100% certain about my coming out back then... because YES it happened and hiss to them!)

Quote from: Tanya WFinally, I want to thank you specifically, Dalex, for your post. Here's an embarrassing admission: I have long scratched my head when considering the male-identified among us. I mean, you would give up that for this? Reading your words I again and again felt this head scratching stop. You have showed me something I have never seen before: our experience is way more similar than different. You have helped me grow a bit with your offering, helped me see beyond my limited sense of how things are. I am moved and humbled - still more than a little embarrassed - and so appreciative.

I like this... it's not unlike how I felt when reading that book (Meg wanted to be Joe... weird to me and good for her... she can be me, happily).

I doubt I'll ever fully understand it... I certainly understand it more than any cisgender would, but at the same time I could never ever want to be male. I now think I finally hit the critical mass of wishes. Every birthday wish (literally as far back as I can remember... single digit ages, probably). Every 11:11 wish. Every first star... has been to be a girl - whether I was naive, closeted, or knew who I was (again... ~15yo and now at 35). Eventually that wish had to come true... and now it has a chance.

♥ My love goes out to all of you -- our stories are all different, yet we've had such similar experiences.

Thank you all for opening this up to me. I've had such limited imagery from before age 12 or so... and I think I might be able to see more of it now.

I first started realizing I was trans a couple years ago, but I have a lot of memories that make me wonder how it could have taken me so long.
Right before I started puberty, I remember thinking that I would somehow turn out to be a boy. I didn't know it was possible at the time, but I still thought that somehow it would happen.
There's also the fact that, when I think of myself (in terms of personality and who I want to be), I always think of someone male. I know very well that a female can be all I am and do all I want to do. I just can't imagine myself as female without feeling upset.

Quote from: Tanya W on November 15, 2013, 06:41:03 PM
I, too, have experienced this as I have become more accepting of my addiction, abuse, and gender sense over the last five years. I suspect this is part of the power of this thread for me and of story telling more generally. This gives me a chance to revisit, explore, and express memories/experiences that have never seen the light of day. It seems not to matter whether I am telling (i.e.: the never before shared 'Playboy' in the mirror) or receiving the story (i.e.: KAT's Tonka truck), there is a sense of healing in the process, of wholeness being rediscovered.

I feel bad now for leaving something out because I was embarrassed. Of course there's so much more that I could have shared -- look around in your closet and you'll always find more boxed away. But I did second guess myself in sharing one particular story. But you're absolutely right about the power of opening up and sharing our experiences with one another. It really does help!

So...

When I *ahem* discovered myself at age 11, I was a girl in my very first sex fantasy. And pretty much every other time thereafter. And I didn't learn the "right" way to do it for a long time. I did it like a girl. I won't describe the mechanics of that, but if you use your imagination I'm sure you can figure it out! Whether I was using my hands fingers (seriously) or a pillow or whatever, I was always in a distinctly receptive position. An odd habit for a "straight male." Especially considering I had no real concept of what I was doing. I certainly didn't know how girls do it! It just sorta came naturally to me that way, I guess. My copulation instinct (masturbation instinct?!) seemed to be pretty clearly tuned to the female channel right from the start.

When I was questioning whether I'm really trans or not, I'd remember those days with a facepalm and think, "oh yeah. That."

I'd point to that as the first time I knew, but I really didn't know. I was only doing what felt good, the way it felt natural to do it. (It still does feel more comfortable that way.) It didn't clue me in to my gender issue until years later.

TBH, even at 23 when I was curled up in a ball sulking over the fact that I was forced to be male and wishing I could get a "sex change" I STILL didn't know! My own ignorance was literally killing me, and probably would have eventually if I hadn't gotten curious and googled the difference between transsexual and transgender, only to discover that I had googled my own salvation.

Wow. I hadn't thought about it like that before! O.O