Hi Everyone,
This is the first time I've ever voiced what goes on in my head to anyone, and I'm incredibly anxious as I write this.
I don't know what I'm looking for other than to share my story and hopefully someone telling me I'm normal. I know I shouldn't look to others for validation, but I feel lost at the moment.
I've been questioning my identity alot at the moment. I don't hate being a guy, I don't hate having a penis, but I've always felt an affinity towards women and for as long as I can remember always had a nagging desire that I wished I was born a girl. I worry about what it means to embrace those desires, the impact it would have on everyone around me.
Growing up I was felt different and out of place. I grew up in a religious family with very defined gender roles ingrained in me from a young age. In retrospect, One of the earliest memories was when I was 5 my grandfather gave me a (mens) manicure kit (the irony being he was a southern baptist minister). It was my favourite gift I'd ever been given at the time and I loved taking care of my nails. At 6-7 I remember wanting to steal some of my mother's clothes and dress in them, but being too scared/ashamed to go through with it.
I never fit in or made friends with boys at school, all of my close friends were girls, a trend that's held true to this day.
My first memory of "I think I want to be a girl" was around 11-12, although it wasn't an overwhelming desire, more a nagging in the back of my head. Given the context I grew up in I thought I was just weird and hid the desires from everyone.
I discovered porn around 13 and I found that whenever I watched porn, I aways wanted to be the girl in the scene rather than the guy. This fuelled the idea in my head that I just had a weird fetish.
Sex for me has always been a mental game for me rather than a physical one. I can't remember a time where I've been intimate and haven't been fantasising about the roles being reversed. To this day I've never been able to orgasm while on top.
When I see an attractive girl, whilst there is sexual desire there, my desire to be her.
I've been in a relationship with my now wife since I was 17, and over the years (both jokingly and seriously) my wife has commented repeatedly that I'm more of the girl in the relationship than she is (mainly because I'm more emotional and talk about my feelings more).
When I was 19 we had our first daughter together. This made me do a lot of growing up quickly, and looking after a new born sucked all the energy out of both of us for a while. Once my wife got back to work (she'd work shift work, I'd work 9-5), I started exploring my feminine side and dressing in some of her clothes, which felt good. I was always worried someone would catch me and would go through phases of stopping out of shame (which never lasted more than 2-3 months).
When I was 22 we were blessed with our second daughter, who passed away from SIDS 3 weeks later. This was an incredibly traumatic time for both of us, and my grief at the loss of my child made me numb to everything at the time. My wife, who had a history of self harm and mental health issues, went into a downward spiral and has been in and out of psychiatric hospitals for the past 3 years leaving me to hold everything together at home.
Whenever my wife was away I inevitably ended up exploring my femininity again.
For the past few years I've gone through phases where I buy a whole bunch of new clothes, then my desires turn back into an ache from a stabbing desire and I get worried and throw everything out and keep going on in life as a guy.
At the moment the wife is back in hospital and my desires have flared up from being the normal ache in the back of my mind to be nawing in my head. I feel lost and ashamed at the moment. I've always avoided talking to my wife about how I feel given her history of self harm, because I didn't want to push her over the edge, and I'm not sure who I should turn to.
