Not really sure how to start this. I have known since I was 7 that I was different. I loved playing with makeup and dressing up with my girl cousins. However, when I was 11 my family and I moved to a new town and I decided to stop "playing" around and grow up. I put my focus into doing boy activities like playing sports and helping my dad work on cars. My sexual encounters in high school were all heterosexual.  When a wrestling match with a buddy sorta turned a little erotic I realized deep down I was a subservient girl on the inside. I hid from these feelings for years. When I was nineteen my father was killed in an accident and I decided to live how I wanted; or so I thought. I began dressing again in private to work on my look before coming out. Unfortunately, my mom caught me one day and things when horrible. She made me feel dirty and sick, and used the memory of my dad against me.  Roughly a month later 9/11 happened and I decided to enlist in the airborne infantry. I figured if my family did not want me to live like the girl I was on the inside, then I would go die like a "man" they could be proud of. In the months between signing up and shipping off to boot camp I met a wonderful girl who I fell in love with.  15 years later we are still together. I feel like the inner girl in me will never go away and I know I need to share this with my wife, I just don't know how.

Hi andipanti, welcome to Susan's. Sorry that your family wasn't excepting. So many for reasons like that enlist as you did. You might want to check the roll call thread in the forums too. I can only hope in time your able to share this with her your wife. I know it isn't easy holding it back from someone you care about a lot. You might try looking into a therapist sometime. They may be able to give you tools to help you do that, when your ready to share it with her. I look forward to seeing you around the forums. Good luck and Hugs
Mariah

Site Terms of Service & Rules to Live By	Standard Terms & Definitions	Post Ranks (including when you can upload an avatar)
Reputation rules	News posting & quoting guidelines	Photo, avatars, & signature images policy

Welcome to Susan's Place. Telling a spouse is always complicated and tends to divide the marriage about half the time. It's best to come out as soon as possible and reassure your spouse that this will not change the person you are and you will continue to love her. You will also need to decide what the transition means to you because you may not desire surgery or even living full time. You will also need a gender therapist and often it's helpful if for a few meetings, both of you go at the same time so you wife will understand what is involved. If you want to learn more before having the discussion, let us know what you need and we will do our best to find the information you need. If there are any questions I can answer, feel free to ask me.

Hi andipanti 

Welcome to Susan's    Glad to have you here, join on in the fun

Hugs

V M

Thank you,

I have no idea where I'm headed. I hid from the real me for so long trying to please a family that in the long run cast me aside anyway. I no longer care what the world thinks of a person like me; however, I just don't want to hurt my wife. I am afraid that she will think I never loved her and that because I self-identify as a girl I'm not sexually attracted to her. I hope I can find a way to explain that I feel like a lesbian trapped in a boy's body - if that is even a thing. Anyway, I am so glad I stumbled onto this site. I think sharing my feelings here is my first bit of constructive "therapy" in my confused life.

Hi, I think that love is something beyond sex.
Sexuality may be involved in a loving relationship, of course, but love is something more, it's a heart affair. But i can understand that a woman may feel somehow "betrayed" in knowing that the "man" who loves her feels to be a girl inside.
I love a woman right now, we are not married but we are in a relationship.
I tell her many times that nobody is completely a "male" or a "woman", every human being is both, even if biologically there are obvious differences.
She already know i'm am different, i'm sweet and love tenderness... from a certain perspective "she" is more "male" than me, even if she is a biological woman.
I do not have suggestions for you, we are all different and the way we move into life is unique.
By my side i share what i feel trying to be sincere and caring for the sensitivity of my partner, but also keeping the attention in don't forget my own sensitivity.
Anyway, love is love, i do not love her just because is a woman, i love her as a whole individual... sex is somehow marginal, it can be beautiful, but it's something that is beyond gender.
Someone may not understand this, but if she\he does not understand that i'm first of anything an individual (therefore not a male - not a female but a human being)... well that's is a her\him problem.
Love wants that the person we love can live a happy life, if someone says to love and do not accept her\his way to feel happy and free to be what she\he is... well, in such case that is not Love... it's something else.

May be that, first of all, we have to be able to completely love ourselves accepting us as we are.


Aly

A hearty welcome to Susan's, Andipanti.

Hi Andipanti, welcome to Susan's Place! I'm from Boston. Thank you for your service. Here's a link to that Roll Call! thread that Mariah mentioned. We have a lot of veterans here. See you around the site!

Hugs, Devlyn

It happened yesterday. I was out running errands and when I came home my wife was standing in the kitchen upset and looking hurt. With tears in her eyes she ordered me into our bedroom. For the first time in years she decided to do my laundry and found one of my bras and a pair of my heels. Her first words were who is she and how long has it been going on; she thought I was having an affair. With tears in my eyes I told her "she" is me. I felt exposed, but Decided i would rather her know the truth then think I was cheating. To my surprise, she was relieved. She said she thought she would have to be one of those girls who would have to be one of those wives that put up with an unfaithful husband. She also said this was easier to accept. She says no matter what she loves me. I feel like a weight has been lifted off my soul.

Quote from: andipanti on February 14, 2016, 08:13:12 AM
She says no matter what she loves me. I feel like a weight has been lifted off my soul.

That's great news! Just keep the lines of communication open with her, as I'm sure you'll both have a lot to work through.

The cat's out of the bag now, isn't it?    Best wishes for the moving forward part.

Hugs, Devlyn

I am happy to see you have taken the first major step in your transition. You now are ready to face therapy in order to learn about yourself and put the years of pain behind you.