I've always found this a great question, how would you describe feeling like a woman/man?

It's not thinking about it. Getting dressed because you need to wear clothes and not because they help you feel more comfortable with yourself. You might want to get dressed up to appeal to somebody else but you are comfortable in your own skin. Going through the day and never thinking about your gender identity being wrong or distracting you from the task at hand. Just taking joy in the simple things in life like a nice day.

It may not sound like much but freedom from pain is a wonderful feeling.

This is a question that always makes me feel stupid answering because it's super subjective.

But feeling like a man to me is quite closely tied to certain feelings of physical independence and competence. And also to being shown the correct respect. It is also not being or feeling ashamed, as I have done for ages, of many things. It is not being scared. It's also to enjoy being competitive, and to want to beat out the competition. 

If you took my traits and stuck them in a man, you'd have a man. A bit of a driven silent type, but a recognizable man. Stick them in a woman and you have someone others are a little afraid of, others feel is strange and aggressive, and anti-social, and self-centered, and all of the various things I've been called down the years for doing little different than others around me were doing.

It's hard to say how just being my natural self feels because I've nothing to decently compare it to. But I can say people have resisted me every step of the way, all my life. Quite possibly because it didn't come in the right flesh suit.

I'm not sure in either instance.  Gender as per being a social construct, has not been something I have ever fit in to very well.  Trying to fill the role as a man, has left me more of an introvert, that shy's away from others due to the fact that I can not fulfill the cultural expectations put on men. 

I've never had the opportunity to present as a woman, so it is eludes me.  I do know, of the women friends I've had in the past, I liked being part of the group, I liked the conversation, I enjoyed just hanging out and I miss it a lot.  I always felt most comfortable around my female friends, more at ease, and they enjoyed my company. 

I don't know if I will ever know what it is like to be a man, or a woman.  I have lived outside of both for so long, that I can only make guess work.  I think even if I were to somehow be transformed into a woman, at this moment, I would always have my past conditioning, creating barriers so that I will never really know to the full extent.  In short, I was cheated from my youth, I was raised as a male, I am missing the fundamental portion of my life, to ever know.

I may know what is expected from both, but I will never have that absolute certainty from either.

Not to sound depressing, people will never know what it is to be like me either.  Unfortunately, outside of this site, I don't know many others who I can connect to in that way.

In my own mind I have simplified this answer to its most basic component.  For me it simply feels like not having dysphoria.


It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not.
André Gide, Autumn Leaves

Quote from: Jane Emily on January 13, 2017, 10:32:40 AM

I like this one!

If we're talking about what it's like post transition... I don't know yet. I only just started.

But generally feels good to have the right hormones in me. The other ones made me... ill.

I felt like a fake man and now feel like the right, authentic and real me

I don't know how to describe it but feeling a man feels like a fact, less like an emotion.  it's just is.


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When I was doing the "man" thing, a constant thought was, "Do they see me as a man?" To achieve this, I made sure to walk (think "marching"), talk (loud, authoritative, decisive) act (strong-willed, knowledgeable to the point of arrogance), and wear manly clothes (at least, according to my perceptions of "how to appear as a man").

Needless to say, it was very nerve-wracking. I also got no feedback from men other than ridicule or silence. Straight women would talk briefly, then suddenly recall an appointment and have to leave. The only people who would talk and interact with me were lesbians! But they too, gave no feedback or suggestions.

OTOH, even when I first began my transition, it was such a natural feeling to wear capris, women's sandles, earrings, and nail polish that no thought was needed. I also no anxiety about wearing this, even when teens would point and giggle (which was always a crushing feeling "as a guy").

It was literally like night and day. In fact, once I changed my name and went full time, the only change I did was to stop "acting" like a man, and just "be".

As in, be myself.

This is definitely what I have focused on. It's about that feeling of being me and whole not anything else. How does it feel being a woman is easy respond to and that is normal. Hugs
Mariah

Quote from: Beth Andrea on January 13, 2017, 12:26:14 PM
As in, be myself.

As a man I felt like Houdini. Stuffed in a bag, with shackles and drowning. Nowadays I feel absolutely wonderful as if the Estrogen that I just recently started taking had somehow been missing all my life. It wasn't as my brain formed on estrogen. It was a return back to normal. The fact that I could jettison all the baggage of remaining silent for 60 years took most the weight I had been carrying on my shoulders away. I now have the time to be human instead of worry.   

Although there are people out there at the moment trying to discredit the studies that claim cis men and women have sexually dimorphic brain structures (and that trans peoples' brain structures correlate more closely with their mental gender ID) when both males and females talk about the mental effects of their HRT being positive I'm more inclined to believe the studies... and the idea a male ID'd brain flooded with estrogen suffers, and a female ID'd brain flooded with testosterone suffers since the hormones have effects that probably 'work against' their general brain organization. It can't just be some placebo effect or coincidence that so many people feel literally less ill or more relaxed the moment they start correct hormones.

It also goes to prove in my case anti-depressants were a total waste of time, just as I thought. All I needed was T.

Mostly just right.

Proud.

Relief.

A weight off your shoulders.

Being a man means you dont have to wait for people to get to know you, they will see you as masculine right away.

Being a man feels more powerful and satisfactory. I dont know how to describe it but there's that spark of enthusiasm and completion whenever someone uses the right pronouns.


...I hate to be an evil sexist person, so it's not my intention to bring down the opposite sex, but growing up thinking about being a woman sounded appalling; I felt less confident, less attractive, and unmotived. Women and womanly things always seemed "off" and very weird, I would always look to male figures, or masculine female figures, and be more in awe of these traits than women. I used to be a terrible person, I hated the stereotypical girls and all their girly ways, it made me uncomfortable and angry and I would steer clear of them, and think less of them because theyre interests are awful.

So when I transitioned...I guess I learned to understand and respect that there are different kinds of people, and different things made them happy. Since I wasnt one of them at all, it didnt matter to me anymore, Im just me.

I doubt I can go back now, I like my life

As I explained to my (very conservative) father, I feel like me.

I was happiest as a child being one of the guys. In my adult years I was one of the guys.

I felt like myself. There are no other words to describe it. I am who I am, and that's all that I am.

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Now I am fully socialised, happy and content as me, I no longer even think about being male or female. I'm just me, a female.

How does it feel? Just normal.

And very nice.

Quote from: WolfNightV4X1 on January 14, 2017, 12:52:39 AM
...I hate to be an evil sexist person, so it's not my intention to bring down the opposite sex, but growing up thinking about being a woman sounded appalling; I felt less confident, less attractive, and unmotived. Women and womanly things always seemed "off" and very weird, I would always look to male figures, or masculine female figures, and be more in awe of these traits than women. I used to be a terrible person, I hated the stereotypical girls and all their girly ways, it made me uncomfortable and angry and I would steer clear of them, and think less of them because theyre interests are awful.

So when I transitioned...I guess I learned to understand and respect that there are different kinds of people, and different things made them happy. Since I wasnt one of them at all, it didnt matter to me anymore, Im just me.

I doubt I can go back now, I like my life

Yeah that's an interesting thing... I could say much the same; it makes all the difference. If someone dressed a cis boy up in girl clothes, called him a girl, treated him like a girl, he woke up with female anatomy one day... he'd be off the rails too no doubt. Just like I was. If that could actually happen to a cis person it'd be up there with the height of abuse.

I don't believe it has much to do with "social constructs" and I don't believe men and women are identical mentally like some people like to think. If that was all it was, it would be much easier to solve this problem with a little psychotherapy, and it's not. I started to feel better in some ways as soon as I fully realized the nature of my problem - I stopped hating when I didn't have to belong mentally to that side any more and that there were options to go over the correct one. It's taken away a lot of negative feelings and defensive behaviors. It's a strange feeling to have been wound uptight your whole life and then to just loosen the strings.

As a man, I definitely felt like a square peg in a round hole.  I didn't fit at all.  I never felt like I was free to be me.

I have limited experience as a woman.  I dress at home and for support group meetings and appointments, and it feels natural.  Like I am just being myself.  I am still at the stage of being fairly self-conscious and hyper aware of my surroundings and people's reactions.  But the more I go about my business with no one reacting at all, the more relaxed I am becoming.  This is just who I am.

When I go out in boy mode, I am even more conscious now of it being a costume and a role that I put on.  Not being much of an actor, I get fed up with it pretty quickly.

Quote from: Kylo on January 14, 2017, 07:57:23 AM
Yeah that's an interesting thing... I could say much the same; it makes all the difference. If someone dressed a cis boy up in girl clothes, called him a girl, treated him like a girl, he woke up with female anatomy one day... he'd be off the rails too no doubt. Just like I was. If that could actually happen to a cis person it'd be up there with the height of abuse.

I don't believe it has much to do with "social constructs" and I don't believe men and women are identical mentally like some people like to think. If that was all it was, it would be much easier to solve this problem with a little psychotherapy, and it's not. I started to feel better in some ways as soon as I fully realized the nature of my problem - I stopped hating when I didn't have to belong mentally to that side any more and that there were options to go over the correct one. It's taken away a lot of negative feelings and defensive behaviors. It's a strange feeling to have been wound uptight your whole life and then to just loosen the strings.

Now that you say it, that's exactly like an effed up social experiment done on a boy named David Reimer: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer

Short version, they botched his circumcision and a research scientist said the parents should have him live as a girl. The experiment by clueless scientists was deemed a success but little did they know the child lived an awful life, only later did he become a male, and even later still after the damage had been done on his life he later committed suicide.

Conservatives and transphobic people like to use this case as proof that its evil for someone to change their gender, but what it shows is exactly the experience a transgender person goes through in the life of a cis boy.David Reimer did not have male genitals and lived as a girl, nothing should have made him question that unless he internally felt that way regardless of obvious physical traits. The exact same thing happens to transgender people. The similarities between David Reimer and Transgender people are both were forced to live as something they knew internally that they were not, regardless of if unethical medical intervention was taken or not. Both are cruel amd abusive to the sufferers.


That said...I dont like thinking too much of the sexual dimorphisms between males and females, sometimes people hinge in the gray area of the spectrum and that leaves them out of place, besides all our sex traits humans do share a lot of similarities regardless of gender. We're different. we can compare and contrast, but we shouldnt be divided based on some of those differences, as has been an issue in most of human history based on numerous different qualities.