For sure under 6.

Somewhere in the region of 7 - 12. Can't really remember anything before age 7 and by age 11, I was already going by my male name online so.. somewhere in there!

Quote from: Zacharias on January 03, 2011, 07:34:05 PM
Somewhere in the region of 7 - 12. Can't really remember anything before age 7 and by age 11, I was already going by my male name online so.. somewhere in there!

Yeah, I was also going my a male name online around that age, even though it was long before I actually realized I identified as male.

Age thirteen.

Up until then, I had a very neutral view on gender. I never really thought about it or cared for it.

I've never had the "typical" feelings that a lot of transgendered people feel. I was just awkward around girls, but then again so are a lot of girls.

I identified strictly as a girl until I was eleven or so when I subconsciously began identifying as androgynous. I had a few signs of being transsexual in my childhood, but I thought I was a boyish girl or bigender.

Quote from: Flam on December 19, 2010, 08:12:56 PM
Same here. I only realized the differences between me and my male friends when i had 10 years old, when my mom didn't allow me to sleep in their houses anymore and people started to press me to wear female clothing and act like a little girl  .-.

Wow, that's pretty much exactly how it went for me.  I'm glad to see some others on here answering in the 7-12 range or older, 'cause I think I've had a bit of insecurity about feeling like I should have noticed something earlier (that whole feeling like I'm not a "real boy" thing).  I was a rough-and-tumble kid, but I also had My Little Ponys and Care Bears and Barbies along with my G.I. Joes, Voltron, and He-Man figures.  If someone had introduced me to the concept of fluid gender, I would have called myself a tomboy.  As it was, I identified as a girl as long as the only difference between me and any boy was purely genital in nature.  I played on a boys' soccer team, skated with the boy down the street, and nothing was really wrong.

Then there came this seemingly arbitrary point in time when being a tomboy was no longer okay with either my mom or the larger world, and people (actually, women) kept trying to get me to change.  I never understood why it was around 10 or 11 that I had to start "acting like a girl."  Then puberty hit, and I was completely shocked.  I had managed to have this amazing cognitive dissonance, where I believed that I was a girl, but that I would grow up to be a male, even though I was a pretty smart kid and had a reasonable understanding of biology!  :O   Cool to know that it wasn't just me.  My therapist did mention that it's not uncommon for the FtMs she works with to report similar things, but I think it's different to actually read people's accounts firsthand; glad I found this message board.

On that note, I couldn't see the buttons on the poll to vote.  I also can't do many other things, so I assume that's due to my newbie status?  So to the OP, you might want to manually enter a 7-12 vote for me because I couldn't. 

Eli

I'm really sorry, I answered wrong :/ I thought about it, clicked, hit submit, and just as I was about to make a post suporting my choice I realized I used to wish I'd one day wake up as a boy when I was 7-9, and once I put this plastic Mr. Potato Head hat over my *down there* area and tried peeing out the hole at the top like a boy. And I remember trying to stand while peeing when I was like, 5 or 6 and my mom was in the bathroom for whatever reason and told me to sit, and I got all upset told her I wanted to stand.

So while I may not have consciously realized something was wrong, I've always had these strange curiosities and tendencies similar to boys and often actually wanted to be a boy.

I told my mom when I was 4 years old that I wanted to be a boy... She freaked out... So I pushed the idea from my mind.... The next thing I remember is having a sexual dream around the age of like 11 or 12 where I was a guy. I just remember wanting to keep having more dreams like that. It continued on with with I was on vacation with my family we'd go boating and while I relaxed in the from of the boat I'd day dream about moving away and being a guy or being born male.

Quote from: Ryan D on February 03, 2011, 09:50:55 PM
I'm really sorry, I answered wrong :/ I thought about it, clicked, hit submit, and just as I was about to make a post suporting my choice I realized I used to wish I'd one day wake up as a boy when I was 7-9, and once I put this plastic Mr. Potato Head hat over my *down there* area and tried peeing out the hole at the top like a boy. And I remember trying to stand while peeing when I was like, 5 or 6 and my mom was in the bathroom for whatever reason and told me to sit, and I got all upset told her I wanted to stand.

So while I may not have consciously realized something was wrong, I've always had these strange curiosities and tendencies similar to boys and often actually wanted to be a boy.

This.  I did the peeing standing up thing too. I even tried to use a urinal once lol.

I put 18+ because I thought the question was supposed to be answered like "when did you know you were trans."

But in reality, as long as I can remember, I've wished I could just one day wake up and be male. As a child I saw no point in dolls or the like. I was more of a toy car kind of kid. I've also always preferred male-styled clothing. I remember being something like 6 or 7 and my ma took me shopping for clothes, and I found something I liked. She said I couldn't have those clothes, because they were boy's clothes.

At 6 I'd cry myself to sleep and beg God to please wake up right, to wake up as a boy.

You know, it's funny how I didn't know anything was wrong as a little kid. When a girl wants boys' toys and boys' clothes then you're just a tomboy and you're allowed to have the boys' stuff. It must be harder for MtF's as little kids because most parents won't let their little boys have the girls' stuff. 

6 and below I would say

Quote from: Alex201 on February 04, 2011, 11:25:52 AM
This.  I did the peeing standing up thing too. I even tried to use a urinal once lol.

How did you manage to use the urinal?

I knew before I was 6. After watching my older brother pee I started trying to pee standing up. I got spanked a couple of times for that cause I ended up peeing on the floor and on myself. I hated my clothes and would wear my brothers whenever I could. I'd play with his toys too. I never played with my girl stuff except for breaking the heads off the Barbie dolls. I also got in trouble for sticking hot dogs in my underwear. And this is kind of nasty but remember I was only like 7 years old. I would try to stick a hot dog in my private area and pretend it was a Dick. When I was 10 I remember having some of my mom's friends going on about what beautiful hair I had. So I gave myself a haircut. Man did my mom spank me for that! When I was 16 I tried suicide. That got me a nice stay in the nuthouse. My whole life was full of crap like that until I transitioned.

Quote from: Sean on December 16, 2010, 09:37:27 PM
I just picked over 18. Maybe that's because of  the phrasing of the question. I didn't know what trans or FTM was when I was growing up, because it wasn't something people knew about or talked about, and I had no internet.

I didn't feel like a girl, but I just thought I was a weird geeky tomboy. And since people accepted me (for the most part), it wasn't like something was WRONG.

Did I have problems with aspects of my gender or puberty? Hell, yeah. I just didn't view it as "wrong" or get that this was a trans thing.

Also, while this poll is interesting in a casual way, I dont think it demonstrates the validity of the idea that MTFs or FTMs "knew earlier." We are skewed by the fact that younger FTMs are more likely to hang around message boards and forums compared to older FTMs, while MTFs of all ages seem to participate in these kinds of forums.

Thirded.

Though growing up in the 90s with the whole AOL internet stuff I was all over the internet. Even saw an article once in TIME or some other magazine in middle school that had a piece on transgender individuals with pictures and little blurbs about each. It didn't click with me until I was 18 in my first semester at college and I really looked into the feelings I was having.

For a bit I thought maybe I could just have breast removal and be happy as a butch lesbian, but I fell deeper into the information hole and saw that this was not what I was seeking. I wanted to be a man.

I voted Over 18 because I'm only just realizing there is a HELL of a lot more to what I'm feeling than just being a tomboy.

Growing up, I tried to be a girl, but there were some things that made me REALLY uncomfortable and just wouldn't do.  Or I'd do things to MAKE SURE I was seen as a girl, because hey, that is how I grew up. I've felt stuck in between the binary for some time, more on the masculine side, but until I got married, it really didn't make me uncomfortable.  I was okay with being this ... whatever... But when my periods started going on strike, and when I couldn't easily get pregnant, then I just wanted to be 'normal'... Some days it was, 'I want to be a normal girl,' but most of the time it was, 'Why the bloody hell am I not a guy.'

Didn't realize there was a name for it though... or rather, didn't really comprehend the meaning of trans, or even that there was a term 'non-binary' until the past couple years.

I'm on my phone so I can't see polls...
I would have to say under 6. The biggest clue was that I hated being called a "girl" and loved being called a "boy". I hated being asked to do any tasks that were generally considered feminine. I never wanted to be seen as girly.

I realized as a teen that I wasn't a straight girl but since I knew nothing of transitioning and a lot about homophobia, I figured I was better off taking the secret of being a gay guy to the grave... I just didn't expect to live this long. I avoided thinking about gender most of the time but then I had a daughter... who loves being a girl. It blew my mind and forced me to deal with myself...
So I knew before 6 but didn't do anything about it until over 35.

Sent from my SM-G870W using Tapatalk

I knew by the time I was about 4.   I used to beg my mom to pretend I was a boy and use a male name and pronouns for me, which she actually did, bless her.  I loved being mistaken for a boy by strangers, and was sad as I got older and that happened less often.   All of my TV and movie heroes were male, and my make-believe personas were pretty much always male too.  I was one of those kids who thought I was somehow going to end up with a male body "later."  I was embarrassingly old when it finally hit me that my female body was forever.  I was not happy when reality hit.   

This is a hard question for me, officially I didn't decide something was "wrong" and that I was transgender until about 18 or 19, when I actually started to learn what that was (I was very sheltered from "bad" things in my childhood). I had to look back into my youth and find those signs to determine whether I was truly validated in being transgender or not.

That said the reason I questioned to begin with was very obvious, I was never comfortable as a female or in any female roles. The earliest memories I have is when I started to form some semblance of individuality, I didnt play with dolls and girl toys (even though my parents got them for me), I instead played with stuffed animals. I stopped wearing dresses when I was an older child, I hated them. I liked videogames and action movies and "boys" cartoons, when I learned girls likes shopping, makeup,  shoes, and were all pretty and dolled up like in movies I disliked it very much, I liked bugs and lizards and snakes and fantasy movies, I liked scientists and warriors and smart people in the media who were most often guys, and was really annoyed when girls were grossed by those things when I wasn't. I had a younger brother I grew up with, so I knew the whole time I was obviously a girl physically, but I rejected all things girly, when I earned the title "tomboy" I was very happy with that because it fit me. I was always very boyish for a girl and didnt fit in with girls much.

Puberty was when the discomfort phase started to get worse. I don't think I ever thought of growing up, it hadnt crossed my mind. I was just a kid. The idea of being a "woman" someday filled me with dismay and I knew I would never grow up to be a woman.I hit puberty late, but when my breasts first started coming in, I felt miserable, I remember looking in thr mirror being confused and unhappy realizing my life is going to change forever and there's nothing I can do about it. In middle school for a female I always had tiny breasts, I was never a "normal" girl, and I had a phase where I wanted them to be bigger because it was weird to not be a girl, I even started to worry that I should get my period because normal girls do that. Eventually I had to get over it and move on, though. When I finally started bleeding, I actually immediately despised it, but it was another thing I had to get used to. Bras, leg shaving, makeup, etc. were all girl things I didnt particularly like but had to do anyways because it was "normal". I still wore a lot of t-shirts and jeans and flannel at this time because I honestly hated to wear frilly girly clothes and the older I got the more types of girl clothes I rejected. My adolescent years were filled with apathy and indifference of my physical appearance, I didnt feel good looking, I was just there, a person. On top of that my mother would force me to be feminine most my younger years and it sucked.


My high school and teen years were filled with me trying to find a style of femininity that suited me because I hated being female so much; went through dark clothes, band shirts, the idea of being scene crossed my mind but never happened. eventually the length of my hair started to bother me, I thought long hair was awful for some reason, I cut it midlength for the longest time because it was the shortest I could get.

Around high school on the internet I learned about a comic (called twokinds) which featured a male character who was actually a female, and that clicked with me so damn much. I was like "Yes!!! This is like me!", I didnt learn until later that it was an allusion to being transgender. I learned about genderbending, which is taking the gender of a character and making the character as if it were the other gender. That was really interesting and I decided to do it with my persona character. I eventually decided I preferred the male persona, in a way changing my persona eventually changed myself.

The idea that I may be transgender started to sink in the more research I did, the most defining moment being when I repeated the phrase "x makes the man" in my head, I was going to change it then paused, realizing why should I? It actually felt good using that gender pronoun for myself. Since then I mentally realized I was male.

I was raised fairly gender neutral with very 'boyish' cis (afaik) female friends and a lot of brothers (read: a tiny dirty kid with really long matted hair climbing hills in a skirt pretending to be Robin Hood ;) ) so it wasn't until i was a teen & facing spending the rest of my life as an adult ~female that i really realised

i imagine it would have been different had i not been very ambivalent about clothing in general (when i was 7/8 no clothing was the best choice lol) and if i'd had different parents or friends