I'm sure like many of you, I've lived for years, decades even, without recognising or identifying as trans. I simply didn't know what "transgender" meant or how it applied to my experience.

The moment the realisation occured, my need to transition became almost instantaneously more pressing and my sense of gender identity dysphoria exponentially heightened. 

In following the ups and downs of  current trans advocacy and lobbying, I've noted that our "case" as presented to legislators very much hinges on this acute need.

Still the question remains, where does this urgency come from? 

Gwen, welcome to Susan's Place! 

GID is used to identify the no longer used terminology "Gender Identity Disorder".

The new terminology is GD, for "Gender Dysphoria".

It isn't present in everyone and shouldn't be the criteria for anything, in my opinion.

Hugs, Devlyn

Gwen, welcome to Susan's!  The urgency is an epiphany. I get what you are saying. I've been there too as have many here.

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Welcome to Susan's Place. I think you are asking why do we feel the way we do. The answer is while are brain was forming, the presence or absence of testosterone determining our sexual preference, and gender identity. After we were born, social pressure taught us how to behave in society based off our physical gender. For some, social pressure didn't have much effect and the children knew as early as age 3. For the remainder of us, social pressure suppressed our feelings for far longer. Like Pandora's box, once the box is open, there is no stuffing everything back in. In addition, suppressing our feelings often cause other physical and mental conditions that are misdiagnosed by doctors.

For many of us, puberty is the trigger but there seems to be others that occur after puberty. I am still trying to understand the triggers that happen latter in life as I figured it out at age 13. 

Quote from: Dena on May 26, 2016, 04:32:34 PM
For many of us, puberty is the trigger but there seems to be others that occur after puberty. I am still trying to understand the triggers that happen latter in life as I figured it out at age 13.

While still exploring for me, the answer to my current thoughts is a multi stage process.

1:  I, for fun, one day wore women's undergarments for adult play with my wife because she loves RuPauls drag race, and stuff like that, I really enjoyed were the clothing and have continued to do it.

2:  Even though I enjoy wearing the clothing, I crave more, I want to fit my chest to fill out the corsets and bras, I want to look good in the clothing that I am wearing and be natural with it.  ie no falsies

3:  Walking in heels came very easy for me, and triggered a memory of wearing moms shoes at a young age, that further triggered other memories/fantasies from my youth that I had been suppressing.

4:  Pent up needs are driving me, and now looking/paying attention to my actions/mannerisms, I see several things that I do like a woman, and several that I do like a man.  Also have knowledge of a surgery from when I was very young, supposedly for a hernia(how does one get a hernia at 1YO)

5:  Researching here and there have found several things that other have experienced that I have also experienced, and realizing that I have been hiding in plain site, and not really being me.

The list will likely continue to grow as I progress, unless my fear is true, and the family history of low T is what is making my behavior shift, but then I'm not a doctor or psychologist, so don't really know if that is even possible, and that that is just my fear of going forwards talking.

Simple. It's pressure build up.

Quote from: melissagirl on May 27, 2016, 12:11:46 PM
Simple. It's pressure build up.

Can you expand on this? A build up of what pressure?
Does transition offer effective relief of this pressure or, as has been my observation, does it continue to escalate during transition? If the latter, then why?

Well, I mean internal pressure caused by the growing dysphoria. As we go along our lives without transitioning, it keeps building up. As a survival instinct, we suppress these feelings and even though we don't recognize it, the pressure is still there. At some point it comes to a head, we stop suppressing the feelings and we start transitioning. In order to reduce the pressure, we feel an immediate need to transition, which does relieve the pressure. During transition, it may continue to escalate for some people because of physically being in between genders. It does get much better in the end though.

A good analogy might be like needing to pee. We don't usually realize we have to pee until we need to go really bad. Once we do, we feel immediate relief.

I am pretty much in the same spot. I always noticed This happening in waves. In the past I was able to ignore it for weeks in a row, then something happened and I had another wave hitting me.

Over the past few years the waves did get stronger and lasted a lot longer. On top the waves had different "Themes" - seems like I am mostly past the "slutty" phase of which was followed by the LBD and cocktail party phase.

Now I am in the "everyday" phase where all my shopping goes towards everyday outfits and things I can comfortably wear.

The last phase also started by finally realizing / admitting GD and the desire to give Sarah more space in my life.

So yes, there is a lot of pressure which had built up. Add to that that I joined this forum, I did see so many girls with a similar story.

And yes - now fully understanding what is possible and what path I could go makes me want to do a whole lot of things now. Still don't understand why SRS has so many hurdles, otherwise this would be #1 on my wish list...

Reading everyone's posts, it seems like some of the "pressure" is because of our society. We're taught at a very, very young age to hide our gender identities because they're "wrong". We even hide them from ourselves, convince ourselves that other people feel like we do or just suppress and get depressed and anxious for "no reason". Once we have that realization moment it all floods out because what was suppressed is now welling up.

But what I find so mysterious is dysphoria itself, right? And some of us feel it from childhood whereas others (like myself) get it when puberty hits. Why does dysphoria get worse when you think about it? (I mean, any rumination gets you more depressed, but dysphoria, while driving depression, isn't actually depression in and of itself... I think? right?) Why does it hit so bad when your attention is drawn to it? Why do prosthetics ease and exacerbate our dysphoria at the same time? Why does HRT sometimes ease dysphoria about primary sex characteristics? I mean, isn't that strange? But how many times has an FTM blogged about going on T and suddenly losing a lot of front hole dysphoria, and how many times has an MTF on here talked about stopping tucking or losing interest in GRS after several years of HRT? Isn't that just so weird? It's like our social need to be seen as our actual sex is more powerful (instinctive?) than our collective need to correct primary sex characteristics? I'm not dismissing those for whom it's their biggest source of dysphoria but it does seem like, anecdata, about half of us slow our roll on bottom changes once we're on the right hormones.

I don't think there's any science on gender dysphoria, just some interesting theories like the body map hypothesis. Somebody ought to study it.

Personally I think it's cumulative.

I felt no urgency back when I didn't know exactly what the problem was, just a plodding misery that this was my life and it kinda sucked. It's like being diagnosed suddenly with a problem and being told there is an answer or a solution - and no longer being inclined to plod along in confusion but wanting something done about it. There's the anger and disappointment that comes soon after realizing you didn't have the childhood you should have, and that time is ticking... the best moments of your life may be passing you by while you remain in a state you can't stand. After realization, suddenly tons of mental bricks came crashing down on my head - I started understanding why I may have acted certain ways in the past, why I was miserable and unhappy, why I avoided certain situations and people, why relationships always felt wrong or unfulfilling or competitive... and I was angry most of all with why I hadn't realized this much sooner.

The urgency comes from this, I think. No so much from society because well know it's actually harder and more dangerous to be a trans person than an unhappy cis person. Unless it's the strong desire to have people see you as you wish to be seen and treat you the way you've always wanted to be treated. But there's always a bit of doubt with that because we don't know how people will react and if they *will* treat us the way we want. But there's a sure certainty that if we sit and do nothing we are wasting our shot at a potentially better or happier life.

My experience is different from yours because I was so so so miserable and wanted to die before I learned what FTM transgender is, but once I learned those magic words I was able to exert control over my thoughts and calmed down a great deal. Dysphoria never went away but when it reared its ugly head I knew exactly what it was ... for the most part.

Wonder sometimes too if the pressure has something to do with filling a vacuum. In other words, during times in our lives when we are crazy busy with other things - those other things can be a distraction from the GD.

For me at least, as I've checked the box on many of those hurdles (school, job, finances) - overcoming that hurdle that has been there all the time, the dysphoria, will wait no longer!