i was bullied all through my school life and i believe this was detrimental to my education and now career.
i have always loved medicine and science and i would love to train as a doctor or midwife but i keep applying for university (college) but keep on  getting turned down due to not having enough qualification although i already have 14 a-c grade gcse's, a nvq level 3 hairdressing, national btec level 3 in anatomy and a degree in chemical therapies within hairdressing.

so if had not been bullied at school i would of probably stayed on and done my a levels got some good grades and gone to university and not be sitting here unemployed on anti depressants and applying for any job i think id be comfortable doing

Yep.
Combined with ADHD and OCD that go untreated (because I'm "too old" for the former and "too clean" for the latter) I've pretty much been kicked out of college for poor performance. Trying to move to Europe in a year or so to reboot it after I've finished a large chunk of transition.
It's possible it's affecting my hiring prospects for minimum wage part time jobs, which I need two or three of, and can't even get one, since I haven't legally changed my name yet, and I literally have no rights on the issue in my locale.

oh god, i have a meeting with my new guidance counselor at school. i'm going to have to tell her -.-, but no, because i'm not working, thats a plus really since i wont have to come out lol

Well, over the past couple years the only way being trans has affected my education is the use of bathrooms. I've had to fight a lot with administrators and I nearly sued one with the help of Lambda Legal.

I was planning on dropping out of my culinary school due to the principle not wanting to let me use the mens rooms.

i got sacked from a job working in a pub kitchen because my boss (the head chef and kitchen manager) is sexist and discriminate so i decide to head but him (oops not very lady like of me what was i thinking ) him in the middle of the kitchen and i also had a mental breakdown and im now on long term sickness benefit. 

Hi Elanore,

Wow.  Your question is so huge that I barely know how to respond.  To be honest, I hardly ever passed as a boy.  Not to suggest that I'm some stone fox or exceptionally feminine in appearance, only to say that I never integrated well as a boy.  For the most part when I was young people assumed that I was gay.  I tried really hard to fit in, but could never really get there.  I finally gave up trying in my early 20's and became extremely androgynous to the point that people who didn't know me couldn't be sure if I was a boy or a girl.

Did being trans effect my education or career path?  Being trans has dramatically effected every single solitary aspect of my life from my earliest memories.  I was an angry barely functional teenager, bored at school and rageful with the world.  I did have a small posse of girlfriends who knew that I cross-dressed, and we would get together and play dress up sometimes; that was fun.  Perhaps my little girlfriends were the only thing that got me through my teen years.

If you really want to know how being a trans woman derailed my early life in a big way, well, I joined the US Army when I was 17 years old.  I thought it would make a man out of me.  Soon after arriving in Germany, I sought out a therapist and told her that I wanted to be a girl.  For 2 years I met her twice a week and we talked about it.  She was awesome.  Then I got sent to Texas where I sought out a new therapist.  This one was not so awesome.  He outed me.  Word spread quickly throughout the base, and a very serious attempt was made on my life.  I ran for my life and evaded the FBI for the next 10.5 years.  (I eventually turned myself in and escaped with a general discharge and my life.) 

Those 10 plus years that I spent hiding from the people who wanted to kill me (just because I'm trans), well, I just can't fully express how far off the rails my life went from what I had expected I would become and accomplish.  Nothing about my life has really been what I expected it would be since.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining.  I love and adore the woman I've grown up to become.  I would not have missed the wild and crazy adventure of my life for anything.  In the early years of my life as a fugitive, I learned from a very wise man that success is measured by the joy we achieve.  I learned that lesson well.  And I have devoted my entire life to the pursuit of joy.  I have made every effort to eat well, to think well, and to focus on the positive aspects of my life and of everything around me.  Focusing on the positive aspects of everything has become a habit and my way of life.  It has served me very well.

To quote John Lennon's song "Beautiful Boy", "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."  Life is always going to put obstacles in our path.  Those who suffer the most are the ones who either ignore or willfully run into life's obstacles and then cry "poor me!"  Those who have the greatest shot at living a happy, joyful, fulfilling life are the ones who learn to go around the obstacles and relish whatever it is that they discover around the unforeseen corners.  Or so it seems to me.

May the adventure that stretches out before you exceed every expectation for how you once believed your life would turn out.

Quote from: Miharu Barbie on June 08, 2014, 05:55:22 PM
Hi Elanore,

Wow.  Your question is so huge that I barely know how to respond.  To be honest, I hardly ever passed as a boy.  Not to suggest that I'm some stone fox or exceptionally feminine in appearance, only to say that I never integrated well as a boy.  For the most part when I was young people assumed that I was gay.  I tried really hard to fit in, but could never really get there.  I finally gave up trying in my early 20's and became extremely androgynous to the point that people who didn't know me couldn't be sure if I was a boy or a girl.

Did being trans effect my education or career path?  Being trans has dramatically effected every single solitary aspect of my life from my earliest memories.  I was an angry barely functional teenager, bored at school and rageful with the world.  I did have a small posse of girlfriends who knew that I cross-dressed, and we would get together and play dress up sometimes; that was fun.  Perhaps my little girlfriends were the only thing that got me through my teen years.

If you really want to know how being a trans woman derailed my early life in a big way, well, I joined the US Army when I was 17 years old.  I thought it would make a man out of me.  Soon after arriving in Germany, I sought out a therapist and told her that I wanted to be a girl.  For 2 years I met her twice a week and we talked about it.  She was awesome.  Then I got sent to Texas where I sought out a new therapist.  This one was not so awesome.  He outed me.  Word spread quickly throughout the base, and a very serious attempt was made on my life.  I ran for my life and evaded the FBI for the next 10.5 years.  (I eventually turned myself in and escaped with a general discharge and my life.) 

Those 10 plus years that I spent hiding from the people who wanted to kill me (just because I'm trans), well, I just can't fully express how far off the rails my life went from what I had expected I would become and accomplish.  Nothing about my life has really been what I expected it would be since.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining.  I love and adore the woman I've grown up to become.  I would not have missed the wild and crazy adventure of my life for anything.  In the early years of my life as a fugitive, I learned from a very wise man that success is measured by the joy we achieve.  I learned that lesson well.  And I have devoted my entire life to the pursuit of joy.  I have made every effort to eat well, to think well, and to focus on the positive aspects of my life and of everything around me.  Focusing on the positive aspects of everything has become a habit and my way of life.  It has served me very well.

To quote John Lennon's song "Beautiful Boy", "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."  Life is always going to put obstacles in our path.  Those who suffer the most are the ones who either ignore or willfully run into life's obstacles and then cry "poor me!"  Those who have the greatest shot at living a happy, joyful, fulfilling life are the ones who learn to go around the obstacles and relish whatever it is that they discover around the unforeseen corners.  Or so it seems to me.

May the adventure that stretches out before you exceed every expectation for how you once believed your life would turn out.

that is an amazing story you have, i looked a joining the British army as this would of been a way of giving my dream career of medicine a kick start but fount out at the recruitment office that trans people that are "out" are not aloud in any of the armed forces for health reasons along with them not able to provide suitable areas to live when being post like they couldn't tell me that i have to be in the mens quarters but then the women may not be happy having me in their quarters.

Yep, and not just because my dysphoria made my teenage years such a nightmare and made it difficult for me to concentrate in school.

But also due to downright sexism: my parents would only send my brother to university (because he was a boy, of course, who would one day be a man who would be expected to provide for his family). But I was denied the opportunity because my parents believed that girls didn't need an education; they should only get a 'little job' to keep them occupied for a couple of years whilst looking for Mr Right, and they should then retire from the workforce to raise babies with Mr Right supporting the family. 

The real irony is that my brother squandered his opportunity at university and eventually dropped out because he was more interested in spending time in arcades than in concentrating on his studies... and I've spent many years of my adult life doing part-time university courses whilst doing exactly what my parents presumed my brother would be doing: being the chief bread-winner for my family.

Despite going to a boy's high school for six years I managed to avoid bullying by learning the minimum I needed to do to blend into the testosterone infused background. When I went to university I did an Arts degree and the courses were full of women and I had an interest in social studies. I probably would have done better if I hadn't been depressed out of my skull for the first two years.

Almost all my working life has been in the non-government charity/community sector, again about 85% women where I work. I've been able to fit into where I wanted to be. I guess if I had been more driven by whatever drives cis men I'd be somewhere else in my life and "career" but I'm more than happy where I am.

Quote from: kate on June 09, 2014, 07:40:37 AM
See this really annoys me. I also work in the NGO/Charity sector and having worked for a few different charities, I've noticed that the workforce is comprised predominantly of women.

True, and it is annoying. I once worked at a charity where the entire workforce was female, and to be honest it was run like a bunch of competing cliques. Everyone was buddying up in little groups, and they tended to hire new staff based not on their skills and qualifications, but on whether they thought the candidate would be a good fit for their clique. I found it horrendous.

Yup. not going into detail cause I haven't the time or inclination.

For the worse big style.I dropped 20 places in class and never made them back,got into a ton of fights and didn't give a rat's ass about anything or anyone.I thought i would be in jail,the loony bin or the cemetary so what was the point of trying at school?I went straight into a crap job in a factory,the duller the job the freer the mind!Although a bad job the money was good so I had lots to spend on bikes,muscle cars and booze and dope!

Not really, but I was lucky that I fell into hospitality/gaming while I was still in high school, (an idustry that I love). The hardest battle I faced was convincing my parents I was happy doing what I was doing and not pursuing further education.
Being transexul has helped me in giving me determination to succeed and a view of workplace politics.

Full time in six months (hopefully) if all goes south where I am now. My reputation is strong enough and I have the contacts and friends to make sure I have a softish landing

Being trans, yes ina noff hand way, not being see as trans but the internal depression and lack of enthusiasme definatelly played a part in that. What the point in working towards a future you cannot have? It wasn't realy apparent antil later in school when you get to the what do you want to be stage, and all I could say was. Haven't thought about it. When the truth was I thought about it every day. I wanted any number of futures all of which I was female. I thoguht about this job or that job as male with a what's the point mentality seeingas I knew I would be transitioning and probably couldn't cope with and or knew I'd be fired.

So yes I had no enthusiame for a life I didn't want. And it seriously affected my education. I got bullied too, be everyone and this didn't bother me as much as nobody helped me. Everytime I hoped the day would come when sombody would help, it never came. But I got so used to being bullied it became normal. And eventually it stopped. Andnd others got bullied, but you know what sombody helped those people me.

I dont know if it have infected my career plans but it have infected my life when we speak of Education. I was diagnose as a Child as autistic-udspecified and groning up i had alot of problems to be accepted and felt very depressed. When i began to transition alot of the problems i had disapeared, i have gone to normal School and hanging out With non-diagnosen People for years now and it havent been a problem. In fact i feel Many of the points in my diagnose dont fit me at all and i am unable to Get any support from the governmen With my diagnose because thye say i have become "too normal". I do wonder if i was not trans or Queen and in general this person who dont following the stream, i May not had been put in special class but sure we never know, i did not Get very good grades because i was very depressive and also because going special class into normal School are diffrent systems, so things which was not demanded in special School was highly demanded on normal schools and it Can be troublesome to Explain.

Beside that i had trouble getting diskriminatied on diffrent schools or had to limit myself not to cause trouble. In one of my schools i was offeret to study some extra time in Africa but i had to refuse caise Being trans that could be dangerous for me. I also worry abit since i consider to work With tourism that it Will be a problem cause theres so Many distinations Where Being lgbt is dangerous.

It hasn't affected my career so far since I haven't had a job since I started transitioning. (I'm a university student with an autistic child in a city with very few jobs.) It may have affected my mental health in high school, but there were a lot of other things contributing to that. It hasn't affected my university studies. People are pretty accepting where I am.

Not really, no. At least not that specifically. The mental anguish I suffered was more down to being unfortunate enough to be around a group of reprobates and ignorant bullies who felt so insecure within themselves that they thought it the best option to take it out on me rather than examine themselves. I refuse to give them the power by admitting that it was my fault, or anything I may have been going through at the time. I will not justify it. The behaviour I was subjected to in adolescence was by people who did not know I was trans. And I didn't know enough to put a term to how I was feeling myself. They just happened to be not very nice people. And I don't think that the way I felt about myself caused them to act any differently than they otherwise would have.

It's taken me a long time to realise this, but the way I felt about myself was a much less contributing factor than how I was treated. And the way I was treated was not my fault. I was just myself. I tried then, as now, to be a good person, and to not hurt anyone. However it did lead to lasting effects on me, which may or may not have affected the things I did later on in life. It did have a lasting impact on my mental state, that's for sure. But I will not say it was a result of who I am, or what I am, that caused it. People are responsible for their own actions. They chose to behave in a cruel and confrontational way, and they will have to live with that mindset.

Did growing up male affect my career? Most definitely, since I entered into an area of work where women are not allowed to serve. But I think that's a different thing to the intent of the thread, so I'll leave it there.

my being transsexual did have many effects on my education and career, growing up in the 50's and 60's hiding my feelings and living a repressed and reclusive life my school days and childhood totally sux. with little regard for life I placed my self in many very hazarous situations for employment which gave me some amazing experience. now that I am full time, my position at work as a project manager / technical planner would likely never of happened. I was a total azz as a male and constantly at risk of losing one job and another. an anti social drunk or doped up idiot does not get to play or hold a position that requires full and focused detail. so typical childhood stuff and a very positive effect on my career post coming out and living as me