Hello,

I'm sure this has been covered by many posts and I'm sorry if I'm being redundant but I just wanted to share my own story in hopes that some people here have some good advice.

Without going too far into my life story, I am 35 and born male. Earlier this year I had an event in my life where I very suddenly realized I am trans and after several months of therapy I came to realize the depths and extent of my repression since I was a young child. I began to really WANT to transition and be recognized as female but I have been in a very, very good relationship for 16 years (married for 11, no children) and my being trans has completely destroyed my relationship with her and it is tearing me up inside.

I do not have significant body dysphoria and I am not dealing with severe depression. That said, I haven't known I'm trans for very long and the common wisdom from everyone is that "it will get worse." That said, the thought of losing my partner is far, far more painful to me than continuing to live as a male but I'm too scared at the thought of waiting and only finding myself in this position again several years later (which would be FAR worse than just ending things with her now).

Has anyone made the decision not to transition and successfully lived a healthy life? Am I kidding myself that this is something that can be done? I've read a lot about how people who don't transition "manage their dysphoria" by dressing up or "presenting" as a woman from time to time without HRT/transition but this just seems like delaying the inevitable to me.

Any advice is welcome.

I am sorry to say this but only you can determine if you can survive not transitioning. Dysphoria does tend to get worse the more it is suppressed.
Everyone is different and in the end only you can determine what is right for you.

But I would suggest working with a gender therapist, they are much better qualified to help you with your choices. They are more likely able to help ease you through the tough times if you do become more dysphoric.

I flip flopped about transitioning. I've been lucky so far in regards to the people who know, but I have complications in my personal life that had led me to questioning whether or not I should transition. Then I had a health concern that I thought would keep me from transitioning, and I was quite violently broken hearted. I realized that I couldn't stay in this female body, and keep living a lie. I am living part time, and am happier than I've been in a long time. For me, not transitioning isn't an option. I know some people probably manage okay, but given the experiences I've heard and read about, I wouldn't say that they live completely fulfilled lives.

As White Rabbit says, only you can decide that. what I can tell you from my experience is that it does get worse. Years ago I wished I could transition and spent my first marriage trying assuage the feelings with cross-dressing and alcohol. I realized that was killing me so I went straight, started attending church, found a good wife I loved and had a child. About 8 years ago the feelings started cropping up again with intensity, because of my wife and child I've been trying not to transition. A couple years ago the dysphoria became so intense that it affected work performance leading to a decision to mutually leave their employ. The last few months on the job there I started seeing a therapist which helped immensely, got a recommendation for HRT which I'm still sitting on, not wanting to blow up the marriage. (My wife and child are very fundamentalist Christians and my wife thinks this is some obssevive compulsive disorder that can be prayed away, and I don't think my son would understand.) That said, I now find myself sometimes so depressed all I can do when I get home from work is lay on the sofa and shiver.

I found an interesting read a while back by Anne Vitale called "Notes on Gender Transition" which describes various stages people go through as they age. Her later years stage fit me to a T, depressed, thoughts of wishing to be dead,(that ain't gonna happen because that would preclude any hope of transition), but wishing none the less. She describes the very senior years as being angry, depressed about what could have been, irritable and generally miserable. Will it get worse for you? Who knows?

The best advice any of us can give is to talk it over with a qualified gender therapist. Who knows? Today there are many more stories of wives who are supportive of their husband's transition when they understand what being trans-gender is all about. Then again, you may not be transsexual, but perhaps non-binary and do net need complete transition, but only some deep searching with the help of a therapist will help you sort it out. If you are transsexual and try not to transition, I wish you the best. It may entail a lot of suffering and pain. I only do it because of my teenage son. My hope is to stay healthy enough to transition when he is a little older.

Wishing you the best on your journey of discovery,

Hugs,

Traci

I can tell you was is "working" for me. First off, no "take backs". In a fit of dispondency I told my wife " maybe I' not after all." She rightly told me some things can't be unsaid.

I decided to start with as low a dose as I could manage and to use my coping techniques, shaving legs, etc., as little as possible. I've been on HRT for over five weeks now and found quickly that my dysphoria isn't severe now. Do I want to transition? Of course, but I can wait. Every day with my spouse is precious. If I'm really lucky she'll adjust.

So far, for me, it is, but perhaps only because I did not hate who I was as a boy, especially a teenage boy...so I partially identify as such...and my teenage boy self will always be part of my identity...I didn't ever want to be a man though...

Your situation may be different...but I feel like I am a girl most of the time, and yet I want to make the most of what life has to offer me. Transitioning is awfully expensive, not just money, there's a lot of other costs, career, social, family, and for what? The ability to look in the mirror and see the person I already can imagine I am? Maybe strangers will treat me as a woman, or they might hate me...no thanks...that happens already, with me acting like I'm a woman in my current body...

birdgurhl

As others have said, only you can determine whether you can manage life without transitioning.  I think that most of us find that dysphoria increases with age.  It is also true that pretending to be someone you are not can put stress on you and on your partner.  In some cases you can have both - retaining a loving and supportive relationship while transitioning.  However only you can work this out and this requires you to start your journey.  You may find that your dysphoria is relatively mild and can be managed without hrt, you may find that low dose hrt is sufficient and you may find that you need to transition partially or fully, live part time or full time to authentically express a binary or a non binary identity. There are many possibilities and only you can find out which will work best for you.  If your relationship is strong then you may find that you can transition, be authentic and maintain your primary relationship.

Whatever you choose, remember that you only have one life and it is precious.  I wish you well.


Safe travels

Aisla

Birdgurhl,

If you can live and thrive without transitioning do so.  Yes, dysphoria seems to get worse over time but the  costs to building something entirely new on the wreckage of your current life are huge.  Please be careful, please be sure.  Spend some time over at the non-binary forum.  Some of the people there have found a path which has balance.  I admire and envy them, it is not my story.

If you can include your spouse in this journey, be honest, open, and patient.  She has a stake in your decisions too.  Above all, please seek guidance and do not rush, you are contemplating an existential change in your life and your identity.

Ask yourself what costs, what joys, what loss you are willing to accept.  Living as who you authenticity are is a privilege and a responsibility.  I hope you can embrace both.

Peace,
Julie

there are people on these forums who manage without transitioning, some because of family.
of you don't have body dysphoria, you may find that the strong want to transition lessens as you accept yourslef for who you truly are. you might find yourself able to life a good life without taking the step to fully transition.

in order to live without transitioning, i think it may be necessary that your spouse knows who you are, accepts it as a part of you that can't be changed, and also knows that when you choose not to undergo any surgery or social transition, it is mainly because you love and value her and her needs just the same as you hope she will love you as you are.

not being able to be true and open to your spouse is likely to be very taxing, possibly mentally destructive for you. trying to take back what you said about being trans isn't likely to help at all, but telling her that she is more important than physically transformung into a woman or presenting female in public, might help. you might find it worthwhile. but you won't know if it works until you've actually tried.

many have found that it is easier to cope with low of full dose hrt. this will causr breast growth and other smaller changes, and for aome it has beeb what pushed them into full transition rather than help them cope without any further changes. you will have to talk to your spouse about this if you feel like it is necessary to try.

one of the main reasons for doing hrt, are the mental effects. it can lessen depression and anxiety and give a feeling of "rightness" and peace of mind. but you might not feel a very strong ned for these effects, and if that is the case, things may be manageable without anything other than therapy, or maybe just an understanding spouse.

take care of yourself though. you won't be a good spouse if you are constantly miserably becaus you have to keep hiding who you really are. but home is for man the only place where they really need freedom to just be.

visit the non-binary section to find other narratives, of forms of transition or non-transition that are not typically mtf.

Imagine yourself a 68 year old man, and then an 80 year old man. Consider where you are in life, the wrinkles, the ear hair, the years of life in that role. Then in those spots ask yourself if you okay with not transitioning. 

You just realized your trans and you have no body dysphoria. Sounds like my first day at therapy when my therapist asked about my body parts specifically and I said "oh, I love my penis" two years later, yeah not so much.

Low dose can be pretty remarkable to alleviate symptoms but it can also provide clarity and speed up the process too.

I'm sorry you may be in an either or scenario but I can also say with time to adjust she might come around (not trying to give any false hope here)

I tried very hard at not transitioning.  Came close at age 18 and 22.  I did my best to ignore how I felt. Thought I was everything but trans.  I finally reached a breaking point after turning 29.  I was terrified of aging anymore as a male and did not want to feel regret later on for waiting.  I'm giving up a marriage and a career I was already halfway to retirement in. Sucks losing people and things we cherish, but to me it sucked more losing my mind over this constant inner battle of gender dysphoria.

If you truly feel like you're going to regret never transition later in life, better now than never.  This is how I looked at it, and I'm actually happy for once!

i think the most important step in order to live without transitioning, would je to never try to ignore how you feel.
i feel the way i feeli am who i am, and i know for a fact that i want to transition.
but interestingly i don't feel like i can't have a happy life without transitioning.
happiness lies in making conscious decisions, weighing pros and cons, and knowing that you choose what is most important to you.

Thanks everyone so much for your responses, it's a great help.

When I said I didn't have "significant body dysphoria" I didn't mean that I had NONE but that it's not severe. However, there seem to be too many things in my life now that I can't deny to think that it won't be a problem later. I find myself increasingly dissatisfied with seeing a male in the mirror (as opposed to the past two decades where it was more a feeling of, "is that what I look like?" and disconnection from myself rather than something I realized was related to my gender). Also the few minor cosmetic steps I've taken toward transition (shaving, a somewhat more androgynous haircut, subtle wardrobe changes) have made me very very happy which has left me with the feeling that the more steps I take toward transition the more I'm going to want it (that is, a low level dose of HRT like many of you suggested is likely to make me want more). For instance, now that I've shaved my legs I'm unable to let it grow back. It bothers me.

Despite all of this I'm left with the constant feeling that this new type of happiness isn't worth losing the happiness I had before. It's hard for me to feel like there won't be MORE hardships for me post-transition than by not doing it, yet here I am still sitting here fantasizing about doing it. It's very difficult and confusing as I'm sure you all know.

I just feel like I'm in a very peculiar situation as someone who really had no recognition of being trans until I was 34 years old (as opposed to so many who say they always knew since they were a young child) but now in retrospect I can see that it's been there my whole life and I just couldn't or wouldn't acknowledge it.

Thank you all again for your help.

I tried Not-Transitioning for about as long as you've been on this planet. It took a tremendous amount of emotional or psychic energy. The need for more intense diversions, distractions, and denial affects all aspects of your life and others around you. Since you cannot be you, you turn into a thing. A lifeless soulless machine.

It was also something I needed to do at that point in my life and personal development. I experimented with transitioning twice in my early 20's, stopping both times. Opting for being a "Normal"(ish) guy. I was ill prepared for those attempts and my dysphoria, like yours, was far from overwhelming. Sure since about the age of 4 I felt I should have been born a female, the world and time I grew up in offered no alternative. Just suck it up and get back to work.

Knowing you are TG does not automatically mean transitioning full time is the only route to happiness. In fact, it is far from guaranteed. Many of us need to go full time since the alternative is going to the other side of the grass. Just as gender and all its various expressions covers a broad spectrum between cis-male and cis-female, so does methods for coping with the feelings of being TG.

Six years ago after the excrement hit the air handler in my life, the time came for me to really take on the trans beast. I started with a TG support group, dropped the T-Bomb on my wife, who already knew to some extent I was TG on the CD end of the spectrum. Read a lot of self-help books, got some therapy, some HRT and turned my life around. I still present as male. In an ideal world it would be female. But the world is far from ideal. Right now it is not practical for me to. Right now there is no overwhelming need to. There are other options that are working, that allow me not to just survive but to feel joyous, to feel happy being me, to feel good being in my own skin for the first time in over 50 years.

I can tell you from personal experience that I was born female and growing up I was a major tomboy - always wanted short hair, dressed in boy's clothing, didn't like dollies or princess dress-up or things like that. I played Hot Wheels cars and my friends were guys, I could tell dirtier jokes than most of them and even had some friends who thought I was a guy because my name is suitable for either gender...

When I got older I became suicidally depressed when I got my period, to the point where I would cry and feel really bipolar from my other times happy self. It got to the point where I was put on Depo Provera (progesterone) because the shot makes you NOT get your period. I never wanted kids and didn't like babies, so reproductively I didn't fit the female mold - especially because I was very fixated on sex - something our society tries to pretend is something only boys really want and try to get during those years where girls are supposed to be 'good' and not want to be 'slutty'.

I even thought lesser of women than men - believed they were less capable, didn't have many female friends, preferred the company of men, etcetera. I was basically a misogynist. With all of that, how COULD I be female?

I always wished for a penis and had tried to pee standing up many times, actually with a good bit of success. At one point it came to others' attention that I may be transgender, and remembering and retelling these experiences it seemed like all the evidence was there! I took testosterone, had doctors giving me diagnoses and they for sure thought that I was transgender...

I had top surgery, bottom surgery, felt really into my male identity - I thought it was great to be a man! But you know what? Even as a 'man' I would look at myself and see something that needed changing. Sure I was happy after top surgery, but then a year or so later it was frustrating when I didn't have pecs... I looked at my face and wanted a larger nose and a big squared jaw like the men I admired... dysphoria does not go away. Either we learn to accept ourselves as we are (whether with or without transition) or we continue to focus on and obsess over every feature we don't like.

The grass is always greener on the other side... that's why plastic surgery is such a big business. It's easy to say I would be happy if... I just had someone who loved me... if I could only have children ... if I didn't work at a job I hate... if I had more money ... if I was a guy ... if I was a girl ... but you know what? At some point we have to realize that just like with buying that new electronic or car or house, life is infinitely more complicated than that and either we learn to be happy right here and right now or we keep spinning our wheels and chasing our tails, wasting time and money and suffering until the lesson finally kicks in.

Eventually I realized that I was NOT transgender - yes there were things I didn't like about being female. Yes I had suffered from dysphoria about certain aspects of my body. But those things never go away - if you focus on the bad things about being YOU, no matter your gender, then when the newness wears off, you settle into a normal daily routine, and go back to ruminating on negative things, you will be just as poor off because you'll still think about all the bad things in your life!

I am now in the process of detransitioning, which I began earlier this year. Of course there are still things I don't like about my body, but it's different things than before. Instead of loathing the fat on my thighs, it's the little bit on my stomach from T that I detest, instead of wishing for a 'happy trail' that I always thought was so cool, I am frustrated by the one that is present and the stubble or red bumps when I remove it... instead of wishing for big strong muscles on my physique I am removing body hair and waiting for the hair on my head to get longer.

I learned that happiness is in the mind. You cannot buy it with money nor can changing your circumstances change your outlook. It's something that happens inside, not outside. Realize that there are disabled people much happier than plenty of 'perfect bodied' people and even models! Realize that there are people scraping by with barely food or anything living in the ghetto who are happier than some rich and successful people! Realize that I know single people, infertile people, and people who've lost their partner or child who have a nicer outlook and better lives than some people I know who are wealthy and married with their whole family alive and well!

Nothing can 'make' you happy. When you think a negative thought, change it to a positive one. It's not easy. It seems like work. It's like exercise. But it's the only thing that will ever, ever make a real and lasting difference, otherwise you'll find yourself able to change job, house, partner, anything and still never feel the happiness and content you imagined would be yours once the last problem disappeared - because there is ALWAYS another problem. Life isn't about racing to solve them all, it's about enjoying yourself and your life despite them.

CT

Thank you for your post. Your message that nothing can make you happy is indeed my experience.  But I do think that while being satisfied with where you are, or what you have, may work,  where you are more than mildly dysphoric and experiencing distress then it needs to be investigated and in most cases addressed. Yes, some folk may be able to live without transitioning or even low dose hrt etc but for others this may not be possible.

A good therapist and a determination to find your truth certainly helps.  Good fortune and support will help you find the right answer.   But in other cases I wonder whether only the journey itself will provide the answer.

Do you think that you could have reached the same answer without your journey?  It sounds like the journey changed you or at least helped you better understand yourself.

Safe travels

Aisla

Mutilating myself was not necessary in order for me to come to the conclusion that changing external circumstances will not ever bring happiness. I am under 25 years old, and already I am debilitated - I am dependent upon hormonal replacement, I have scars that I wish I did not have, I have a paper trail that will chase me until I manage to get my records sealed, and unless there is a true miracle I will not be able to birth children. But you know what? I could just as easily have learned this lesson based on the fact that I was not satisfied with my body before, even when I exercised or got piercings or tattoos or changed the way I dressed or cut my hair, when I was not satisfied with the job I had or any of the jobs that I switched to, when I could not be pleased with my life when I was single but kept getting into relationships with people who made me no happier.

It is a tragedy what I did, and what happened to me as a result. If I could take it all back, I would. I absolutely would. Lessons are learned when we open our eyes, stop blaming the world for our problems, and learn to think in a way that makes us happy, successful, and pleasant to be around. They are not learned by blaming society, by thinking a new house or car or job or romance will solve our problems because quite simply it won't.

It is nice to believe that transition will just make people happy, and there may be some people for whom it does, but from what I have seen, on a long enough timeline people want more, they want something different, there is an annoyance in their environment or situation and they feel that it needs to be solved for them to find happiness. It drives a lot of progress, but it does not create lasting happiness. It creates a feeling of success as each milestone is reached, but the drive to continue forward is only there because people are NOT satisfied with where they are at.

CT-
I think your posts almost deserve their own thread. It's really an important story to share.

Did you feel you were pushed into transition? Or was it just youthful enthusiasm?

I'm the older generation where everything was done to not let anyone transition, it was forbidden to even start before the age of 23 if I remember rightly. It was a horror story to be trans 30 years ago. Nowadays, as much as I am happy that people have it so much easier, I sometimes get the feeling that some people get pushed into transitioning out of misinformation or something.

For one thing, we live in very gender conforming times again. Gender variance is not seen as normal variation, but rather it's all "trans(sexual)". Even many butches and drag queens get pushed towards transition at early ages, which is a bit of a 180° turnaround from the situation in the early 1980s (not that that situation was better).

Then, there is no identity for gender variant "straight" people. While you can live as butch or drag queen, without transitioning, there is no such choice if you are "straight", esp. if you are an ftm cross dresser or gender variant. Tomboy is not really seen as a viable transgender identity for adults.
Also, straight cross dressers are in some way much more stigmatized and invisible than gay or lesbian cross dressers.

And all the talks about "trans brain" that you have in the US often gives the impression that if someone has "male brain" or "female brain", this is like a diagnosable physical condition that means you *must* transition, instead of one way to deal with gender variance.

The decision to transition should in all cases be something that we make ourselves, not something that others tell us. Especially not when they feel a person is somehow "different", a square peg, and by transitioning, that person would fit in better with the gender binary.
And we should be really aware that transitioning is only *one* way of being trans or gender variant.

Quote from: birdguhrl on October 08, 2014, 09:46:59 AM
Hello,



Has anyone made the decision not to transition and successfully lived a healthy life? Am I kidding myself that this is something that can be done?

I am in the process of finding this out for myself. After being absolutely convinced the only way I would make it is to go through a full transition my amazing wife and the mother of my adorable child became increasingly less willing to make the leap with me. I literally had the pills in my hand and tossed them away because I didn't want to lose her or what I have. But the cat is out of the bag and my wife understands that things have changed. She's always been really cool with my fluid gender expression so I've been able to bring it into our lives in a far more honest and pronounced way. I think without that and without the friends who have been there for me since I came out socially, the dysphoria would consume me. As is, I'm feeling pretty okay with it. I grew my hair out, I often wear polish on my nails or eyeliner, or lipstick when I'm out and about, I present as female on work outings, around the house, at parties etc. No one really cares and at the end of the day I'm not tortured that I have to revert to a male guise for bedtime. I guess that's sort of the tipping point for a lot of people. Do you need to be a woman when you go to sleep? When you're making eggs at 6AM? If the answer is an emphatic yes then I think transition needs to be considered. But if your lazy sunday could be just as satisfying without defining your gender, you probably can strike a balance and make some tradeoffs in your life that make non-transitioning a possibility. I'm probably oversimplifying things, but I sort of had to as a survival mechanism because part of me will ALWAYS wonder if transition would ultimately make me happier even amidst the abundant happiness that already defines my life in-between.

Curious that you're in your mid-30's and married 11 years with no children. If your wife is roughly the same age as you, her fertility window will be closing up soon, you know.

If that's the main thing holding you back, have a child or bank material then go for it imo.

Have electrolysis. 20+ hours of that to the upper lip will test your resolve. I've found nothing about transitioning particularly easy. There is no glory in having to - only in coming out the other side with great confidence and the potential for better days.