Hi everyone,

So, I'm mtf, which a lot of people don't believe, but I am. I'm also 21, and started transitioning at age 20, in early-college. I determined that I had to do this, as years of abusing steroids, as well as trying to embrace the gender I'm expected to be, only caused distress.

I've been through an unbelievable amount of hardship, as many trans women have, solely to be myself. But the thing is, I look gg, and a lot of the unacceptance has come from my then-family. If you're familiar with VICE on HBO, they interviewed me with my story the other day (which will be featured), mainly because I attend a pretty relevant university, fortunately.

And that's the thing -- attending the GLBT-receptive powerhouse that I do, one would think that I'd run into a lot of trans girls, especially considering that I live in their learning community designed specifically for transgender/gender-queer people. But I'm the only mtf here that I've heard about in the learning community, and one of three that I've heard about across campus (47k people). For every trans woman, there seems to be three or so trans men. For every trans man, there's like 2 gender-queer people.

Why in the world are there so few trans women, pretty much anywhere, who are in their late-teens early-20s??? I encounter many who started in their 40s, but I'm feeling pretty lonely unless I'm searching pretty hardcore on Tumblr.

I think that for a lot of people, even if they recognise they are transgender they fight against it because of social and family expectations. Our society is also not very kind towards "effeminate men" and women are frequently seen as inferior. A common story is that many transwomen try to "man up" through various macho activities in the hope they can macho the trans out of themselves. Also at that age it can be difficult to sort the various challenges of transition out unless you have a lot of professional and family support. I started to transition at age 23 but after two years I pretty much imploded due to the lack of both those.

Primary transsexuals are less common than secondaries maybe? Young transitioners often pass as cis. There could be a lot of them at your school but they don't want to waive a flag.

Gracie offers a valid point of view about possible lack of support. I tried to start hrt several times. The first time I requested it, I was about 22/23, I was met with hostility by the health system. I finally managed to start hrt at 29 after several more requests, having been shot down, and even laughed at. Things are different now, and it's less than a decade. I hate to imagine what it would have been like for people 30 years back....

I think there's a few reasons why we see less younger male to females and why it seems like there's more female to males.
The first is I think it's a little easier for F2M to come out. I might get whacked for saying that.
I also think it's because the female brain developes quicker. Which puts them ahead of the M2F in working it all out.
They're also more willing to stand up and shout about trams issues.

Also, I think there's a lot more M2F out there than you think.
I'm 100% stealth, I moved not long after coming out and was young at the time. I've got a few people who know, but all are family or my 2 best friends, I don't talk about teams stuff with people outside of here and on a second Facebook account. I've gone to huge lengths to hide my past and I'm sure there's 1000s of others out there who've done the same. Yes we have teen trans girls like Jazz,but for every Jazz there's another 10000 who hide their past and just live.

Quote from: Jasper93 on August 22, 2015, 03:13:07 AM
Why in the world are there so few trans women, pretty much anywhere, who are in their late-teens early-20s??? I encounter many who started in their 40s, but I'm feeling pretty lonely unless I'm searching pretty hardcore on Tumblr.

Several factors:
* It is very, very hard for a teen to be willing to single herself out. The teen years are times when we put the most energy figuring out where we fit in the world. This is a hard, painful process for most people, even those who are cis and straight. Factor in issues of gender identity and sexual orientation (since these are tightly tied together) and the process can seem terrifying and insurmountable.
* There are a lot of MtFs, but not all of us had the female-in-a-male-body-always-knew-from-the youngest-age-hate-our-body experiences. Many of us just felt uncomfortable as males. It takes us years to figure it all out and then more years to become sure that being female is right for us.
* Those teen MtFs that I do know, tend to be very cagey. They tell no one but their closest friends. When they do transition, they try to move to a stealth footing as soon as they can. They just want to fade into the womanscape.
* And then there's Suzi's theory of natural selection. I think there might be something that has evolved in our brains that is capable of ignoring our gender into middle age (until we can reproduce). Those people that don't have this capability are less likely to reproduce and therefore less likely to pass their genes on. It was that way for me. In my 20s and 30s my motivation was to meet a woman and get married. Once that was in my past, I had the motivational space to work on why I felt so uncomfortable in this arrangement.

I'm 22 and plan, am going to, hope to transition.

Just need to call this person

*profusely starts sweating*

just... call... this person

I wanted to at 16 but my home situation didn't allow it. Not that it's any different now 

I'm poor, my family's poor and uneducated. I think that's the killer for a lot of girls.

They are around, just not very visible.

When one knows, at an early age, and the drive is strong enough, you do what you have to do to make things happen. I started fighting against my gender assignment by age 13, started hormones at 17, and had SRS at 24 before disappearing into the woodwork.

When you have fought hard from an early age, you want nothing more than to just vanish into "normal life" ASAP.

There are a lot of 20 something's here.

You won't find teens here because their support network is different.

And remember widespread transition when young is relatively new. Even publicly transitioning post teen as in your case supported by the medical establishment is relatively newish. Years ago they would be told by their therapists to simply blend in and hide.

Those who transitioned early on years ago self medicated and did lots of dangerous things to get hormones including buying them off the street and sex work (which is still done today incidentally).

I started at around 19 and a half and am now soon to be turning 21. I'm only out to a few close friends but other than that I'm in full stealth. As some of the girls have mentioned, we just live our lives as normal girls and try to think nothing of it. Also, for some young mtf girls, they are pretty young and may not be able to financially sustain themselves if their family doesn't support them.

Less young trans women on this site because different age groups rely on different kinds of online support.  I'm maybe an outlier, as I used forums really similar to this as a teenager.  If you want to find most of the 16-25 year old trans women, go to the tumblr mtf tag

As for why you meet less trans women than trans men in your day to day life?  That's an interesting question.  Maybe trans women transition later on average.  I'd say that realising you're a trans woman takes some time.  I wouldn't have realised if I weren't in the gay community already and didn't meet trans women a lot. 
I'd also suggest that trans men and trans women usually have a set amount of time before they leave the LGBT community to go stealth.  Gay and non-binary people don't have this option (gay and non binary trans people also don't have this option, and they do exist) so they would stick around in those spaces longer.  From what I've seen with trans women I've met who are around my age, once they get to two years or more they start to pass and then they move on. 

If you also consider how terrible society is to gender non-conforming males you can see why it takes some people a while to realise they need to transition.  Cross dressing isn't as socially acceptable for us.  We know that passing as a woman is going to take a lot of work.  All of our media attention is sensationalistic or dehumanising.  That definitely plays a part.  Trans men can avoid these things to an extent.

Young 20s trans girl here but I'm 25 now, living post transition. I started transition at 19/20 (2009) back then I was trying to find other transitioners my age and never did. I just kind of gave up but like you said tumblr is like the only place I've seen us, we're rare I guess. I did find some of us on youtube but I don't think they're active anymore.

well. I'm 20(just kidding). times are different now, when I was walking 10 miles in snow to get to school I had so much denial it was pathetic , now I just want to make up for all that denial so I more willing to be open. Young trans are luckier because they just soak up the estrogen and blend like a cameleon . I guessing the younger ones  most have their groups of friends who know them and feel no need to out themselves. The older ones are looking for friends because a lot have lost everyone , so they are more open to join trans groups.

Look no further than me. I'm 16 and I go to this site at least twice a day.

Great thread!

My theory is we are often raised to think femininity is worse than masculinity which makes us more likely to feel shame and try to hide our inner self than FTMs.

People say "Don't be such a girl!" like that is a bad thing. They don't tend to say, "Don't be such a boy!" you know?

Also dont forget some of us who are now 30 and 40 years post op actually DID transition in our teens or earlier. You meet us now on forums like this and because we are, say, 55 you assume that we transitioned later in life... In my case quite untrue. I once was you... I did transition young even all those decades ago, but I've done a bit of living since that time and so I now look older. Ive had a great life, a topline high flying career, and never once encounted pejudice or hostility, so don't be spooked by any doom and gloom merchants, it was possible be very successful even back in the 1960's 70's and 80's.

They tend to fight it more, at least in my experience. It all depends on your location though, where I live I'm the only transgender person I know of.

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Quote from: Nicole on August 22, 2015, 04:24:50 AM
The first is I think it's a little easier for F2M to come out. I might get whacked for saying that.

I think you're right about that one. Sexism at work.

Quote from: Nicole on August 22, 2015, 04:24:50 AM
I also think it's because the female brain developes quicker. Which puts them ahead of the M2F in working it all out.

Umm, what? The whole point of the condition is that we have female brains in male bodies, running on the wrong hormone, it's true.

I wonder if as society becomes more accepting, young MTF's will become much more visible prompting more young people to have the courage to transition- sort of like a positive cycle.

I'm 26 and would have loved to transition in college. It maybe my single largest regret so far in life. It would have been the perfect opportunity to do so. However, I didn't because I thought two things- 1)that I would eventually outgrow these feelings as I pursued other dreams of mine (a successful job, a wife, etc. 2)I was terribly afraid of being alone and not being able to relate to anyone.

Had society been more accepting of trans women and they were more visible at my school, my mental walls may not have seemed so large.

Quote from: Rejennyrated on August 22, 2015, 03:08:05 PM
Also dont forget some of us who are now 30 and 40 years post op actually DID transition in our teens or earlier. You meet us now on forums like this and because we are, say, 55 you assume that we transitioned later in life... In my case quite untrue. I once was you... I did transition young even all those decades ago, but I've done a bit of living since that time and so I now look older. Ive had a great life, a topline high flying career, and never once encounted pejudice or hostility, so don't be spooked by any doom and gloom merchants, it was possible be very successful even back in the 1960's 70's and 80's.

The same here. I knew what I needed to do at 13, I was able to work at it when I hit 23, had my surgery at 30 and am now 64. I was so early the I couldn't of obtained medical care much earlier but all that time I knew surgery was my only option. I didn't mention it to anybody between 13 and 23 because I knew nothing could be done about it.

Quote from: Dena on August 22, 2015, 03:57:22 PM
The same here. I knew what I needed to do at 13, I was able to work at it when I hit 23, had my surgery at 30 and am now 64. I was so early the I couldn't of obtained medical care much earlier but all that time I knew surgery was my only option. I didn't mention it to anybody between 13 and 23 because I knew nothing could be done about it.

Yes well I guess I was just a bit pushier than you. Transition at 5, brief detransition from 17 to 24 due to lack of blockers, SRS at 25, and in between I never stopped talking about what I "really" was, so of course I got into all sorts of strange situations with people.