I had a little fear at first, but soon moved on from that. I've never had any shame or guilt. Why should I? I have a fairly straight forward medical condition for which I've received the appropriate treatment..

Quote from: elkie-t on June 22, 2017, 02:53:45 PM
Absolutely. She wanted a discussion about her feelings of shame, and I shared mine. Acknowledgement of those feelings is very important step in self-acceptance.

Do you think a standard vanilla 'you should not feel ashamed of nothing' instead of honest exchange of personal thoughts would help anyone deal with this problem?

You expressing your experience, yeah, that is fair. The only thing is you really didn't make it clear that that was your experience. You said, "

Quote from: elkie-t on June 22, 2017, 01:24:46 PM
Should you feel shame for hiding some important information about your internal feelings for so long from the people who love you and who you love?

Should you feel at least some inconvenience for playing the system (gaining good education and job, then turning around - and saying I want to be feminine and taken care, but I still want my job, and my salary and my nice house, and community support - but I don't want to deal with negative parts of day-to-day of women's experience)? Last one was targeted mostly at part time cross dressers like myself, not to those who are out...

Maybe I have it wrong but it seemed like you were aiming it at her. It seemed like it  had a fair amount of anger behind it. I'm not trying to fight with you here. Really not! I just think if people come on here with an issue of feeling shame, they aren't helped by loading them up with reasons to be ashamed. The people who are trans  and ashamed are terrified to tell anyone. Look at the atmosphere we live in. No one wants to hide this. What do they gain? I lived in terror for 50 years that someone would find out my secret. No one can say I was selfish in doing that. What you might call "playing the system," I called surviving.
Well, I wish you well. We may have to agree to disagree. You have a right to your opinion.
Moni
Robin, I hope you be able to shake that feeling. You deserve to be happy and be your genuine self.

Moni nailed it.  shamed and terrified someone would find out my terrible secret.  Until being a secret agent becomes such a burden I just don't care anymore, and i can begin to imagine a life living true to myself.  and once that idea takes hold, and it's not some crazy fantasy, but actually quite plausible, the idea of not living that way eventually is worse than the idea of not living at all

Quote from: HappyMoni on June 22, 2017, 09:49:38 PM
The people who are trans  and ashamed are terrified to tell anyone. Look at the atmosphere we live in. No one wants to hide this. What do they gain? I lived in terror for 50 years that someone would find out my secret. No one can say I was selfish in doing that. What you might call "playing the system," I called surviving.
Well, I wish you well. We may have to agree to disagree. You have a right to your opinion.

I said earlier in this thread, that there is no reason to be ashamed for who you are - medical science says it's not a choice, legally one doesn't break any law no matter how he/she dresses (and even if does, those laws have no moral ground at all), even religiously if you believe in god - neither Jesus nor Mohammed said anything against it.

But hiding who you are is not really survival (although I knew a trans girl kicked out by her family to live on the streets after coming out). Still most of us have no reason to fear for their life, but do fear to lose career, social status, are afraid to be ridiculed. These things are all real, but by hiding who we are, especially from those who we love, is hurting them, and the longer you hide, the bigger the hurt is if you decide you cannot bear secrecy any more.

I feel bad for not hurting my parents 30 years ago, I feel bad for marrying twice (I thought I disclosed second time, yet she claims she's not a mind reader and my disclosure meant something else to her than my transgenderness), I feel bad for bringing 4 children into this world and abandoning 2 of them.

That sort of happens, when you build your life on a sand of secrets and lies.

What would I lose would I tell 30 years ago? Probably my good college education. I'd still more likely than not have some, and even if I didn't I was fairly solid on my career path - I'd still write computer programs, and I was good at that before college. I might start working somewhere else though - it was tough getting a job as a guy after the college, might be unable to find any without degree and being trans, I might end up doing some low wage job and being a subject to demands for sex from the boss (been common thing 20 yes ago in my country - you want a job, and your boss wants to have sex, you are either let him, or look for job somewhere else). No sexual harassment laws and no enforcement of any laws at all. I got a job in USA, and have 15 years of career here. Would I come out at any moment, my company probably won't fire me, but I would not have support from my colleagues (most of whom came from the same old country as me), and without their support - I'll probably still sit in some cubicle writing test plans and executing them countless times without any hope for promotion.

So, did I played the system?  Oh yes. Did I gained something? Definitely.

The dean of my college once said - we don't have no sexual discrimination here, but girls have no place in our industry. And this was a liberal place in a liberal city...





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QuoteI said earlier in this thread, that there is no reason to be ashamed for who you are - medical science says it's not a choice, legally one doesn't break any law no matter how he/she dresses

That most definitely wasn't the case when I was a kid.  Back then, you'd have been considered mentally ill.  And there have been many laws back then that did make cross dressing illegal too.

Quote from: AnneK on June 23, 2017, 08:02:55 AM
That most definitely wasn't the case when I was a kid.  Back then, you'd have been considered mentally ill.  And there have been many laws back then that did make cross dressing illegal too.

And many thanks to those of you who lived then and fought those laws (any little bit helps, even if just by not contributing to those). Our generation (and younger ones) should be thankful for where we are now. (Although I reserve a right to think I contributed a little too by being proudly out many times in the past)

Shame followed by Guilt, are my two oldest friends. A manifestation of the internalized transphobia. From an early age we are taught boys are this, and girls are that. We all grow up wanting to please our parents. We also feel guilt and shame when we know not being X or Y will disappoint our parents. SO we stuff the feelings as best we can. The stuffing is best done by burying it under a mountain of shame.

I wonder if a survey was ever done here asking if there was a time you felt ashamed about being trans? Y/N?

A funny thing happened along my road to recovery, a good portion of shame disappeared. The biggest guilt I have is rightfully earned, the pain of me taking on the Trans-Beast has inflicted upon my wife.

I said nothing about my gender dysphoria for decades because I was ashamed.  I never even mentioned it to therapists whom I trusted implicitly, because I was afraid they'd laugh at me.  I thought my dysphoria was laughable because Nature, that ***** goddess, decided that I needed a body that has extreme female secondary sex characteristics.   In my mind, it was all about being able to pass for cis.  If you could, then maybe transitioning was worth a try.  If you couldn't, then you were just stuck, and too bad for you. 

I finally got to the point where I just didn't care what people thought of me anymore, because the dysphoria was making me so very miserable.  Ironically, abject misery led me to a much better place of just not giving a damn what other people think of me.  I don't have to go home with them.  I don't have to give their voices rental space in my head.  The person I have to live with is myself, and I'd rather make me happy than appear "respectable" to others.

I can tell you that I am very prone to feeling shame.  I don't know if I inherited it up from my mother's catholic upbringing or from my Dad's alienation from his adopted family.  I just know that shame is a strong motivator for me, and it hurts deeply.  I have to manage it in my life on a whole. 

I think shame leads me to repress other feelings, including happiness!  I can feel that push and pull of emotion when I contemplate my womanhood.  Part of me feels effervescent and I want to float away on a cloud of joy, but another part feels afraid, and ashamed.  Like I'm being selfish.  And one of the worst parts is that these feelings kick in even before I've taken any real action!  Like I think I'm selfish just for having thoughts and feelings! 

My best take on shame and other emotions is that I have to let them pass through me.  This is very much a part of the fabric of who I am, and if I fight too hard, I think I will hurt myself.  I can have my shame, and I can let it go.  And I hope it will eventually get the hint and stop coming around