Of course i would.  If I wasn't uncomfortable with having these body parts and feeling like they were pieces of flesh that weren't a part of my body, i wouldn't have removed them.  No one knows what you've got under your clothes if you bind correctly, so the desire to remove things was inherently personal.

I would still get everything done that I plan to.  It would be too much of a hassle to go through physical changes purely for social reasons.

Quote from: Mister on April 20, 2009, 06:22:01 PM
Of course i would.  If I wasn't uncomfortable with having these body parts and feeling like they were pieces of flesh that weren't a part of my body, i wouldn't have removed them.  No one knows what you've got under your clothes if you bind correctly, so the desire to remove things was inherently personal.

I disagree... I don't want top surgery... don't want the cost, or the pain, or the risk. I have to have it, though, because I can't bind forever. 3 years of binding at this point, and I already caused myself a rotator cuff injury. I don't like my breasts, but I'd happily keep them if it weren't necessary I bind in order to pass.

In other news, thanks all for your candid replies.

SD

I have been thinking about this for a while, and as of yet I still have no answer. I pass as female about 60% to 70% off the time. That is all I got for now.

Great question. I think I'd have top and hormones because that's what made me feel most dysphoric. The social stuff has been a definite bonus, being really treated like a guy, but that was the cherry on the whipped cream. For me, it was not being able to grow facial hair, not having a deep voice, and those bags in front that drove me crazy. I didn't have any faith that people actually would treat me like a guy, but I had to deal with those issues.

Bottom surgery is a bit less of a driving need, but if I could get the bits that worked right, I'd do it in a flash.

Dennis

Quote from: Sebastien on April 21, 2009, 01:09:57 AM
I disagree... I don't want top surgery... don't want the cost, or the pain, or the risk. I have to have it, though, because I can't bind forever. 3 years of binding at this point, and I already caused myself a rotator cuff injury. I don't like my breasts, but I'd happily keep them if it weren't necessary I bind in order to pass.

In other news, thanks all for your candid replies.

SD

I get your point, but being on the other side there's no way in hell I'd ever go back.

My best friend asked me this before I started my medical transition. I couldn't give him a definite answer, and I have mulled over the question for months.

Now that I've started T, I feel that it was the right thing to do. And I don't plan to have bottom surgery. But my top half...that's a problem. Unlike a lot of other guys, I became relatively accustomed to the top equipment I have, and I do get sexual pleasure out of my chest. And my partner likes that part of my anatomy. But when people see my chest, they read me as female. I have been hiding that part of my body for years--hunching over, wearing baggy clothes, stuff like that.

So my perceptions of that part of my body are all tied up in society's way of reading me. I wasn't sure I would get rid of the cannonballs if people still read me as male no matter what.

Last week, I came out of the shower one day when the bathroom mirror hadn't had a chance to steam up very much. And I took a good look at my top half. And was sickened by what I saw. "Those just don't belong there," I thought. "They're gross. They're wrong. I don't want those things on my chest. They are all WRONG."

The trouble is, I'm not sure where that perception, that disgust comes from. It seems to me that most or even all of it must come from the way we (in this country, on this planet, in this species, whatever) read bodies. And I have absorbed that attitude over the years and can't just toss it aside. So my loathing of these body parts has been implanted and hugely reinforced by other people. And what if other people suddenly stop reading my cannonballs as female structures? That depends on whether I suddenly stopped interpreting them as female parts, too.

If I had actually been brought up by those same "nonjudgmental" people in that same "nonjudgmental" society, I wouldn't be so judgmental about those body parts. I probably wouldn't obsess over them the way I do. I might want to keep them.

But I wasn't born into such a society. So I do dislike those body parts. And I plan to get rid of them. I will lose something when they go. But I hope I will gain much more than I lose.

P.S. I should add that these chest deformities are a terrible inconvenience because they bounce around and get in the way, and I never have used them and never will use them for the primary purpose they're designed for. More reason to wish them gone, I guess, even in an ideal world.

I think I would.

I feel like the dysphoria I have is hard-wired. It is an internal feeling of wrongness like my circuits are faulty. No matter how I express myself it is not enough, I still feel the wrongness of the body underneath. I don't like how water in the shower runs off my body, I don't like how my body feels under my fingers, I don't like how it feels when I stand still. I close my eyes and I can see it but I open them and it is not there.

Certainly things would be easier if nobody cared. Certain aspects would be much easier, like buying and wearing the clothes I want. But all of that is just icing.

Quote from: Nicky on April 21, 2009, 09:33:21 PM
I feel like the dysphoria I have is hard-wired. It is an internal feeling of wrongness like my circuits are faulty. No matter how I express myself it is not enough, I still feel the wrongness of the body underneath. I don't like how water in the shower runs off my body, I don't like how my body feels under my fingers, I don't like how it feels when I stand still. I close my eyes and I can see it but I open them and it is not there.

Agreed.  That is how it was for me before transition.  Even if society didn't care, even if gender didn't exist at all, I still would have transitioned to who I am today and I probably would do it exactly the same way I did.

I'm pretty sure I'd still take all the steps I've taken so far and intend to take regardless of whether anyone else cared or not.

Emotionally, I feel waaaaaay better on T than I ever did before. I'm sure some of that's psychological, but I doubt it is entirely - hormones are pretty powerful things!

In terms of surgeries, I tried for many years to just ignore my chest, but found it harder and harder to do so - this was before I realised that I needed to transition. My chest now feels "right", regardless of what anyone else thinks.

Hysto is something I've wanted forever - well, slight exaggeration, but for a very long time anyway. The junk that was in there never functioned properly anyway, and it was always at best an inconvenience and at worst a source of agony. How much of that was due to my gender dysphoria I'm not sure - but I'm very glad to be rid of it all! And it was a huge psychological improvement for me also, just knowing that female stuff wasn't there any more.

As far as lower surgery is concerned, that's very definitely something that I'd still want. When I first started transitioning I was pretty sure that I'd never want lower surgery. However, the more comfortable I'm becoming with my body, the more I've realised that I really NEED a phallo in order to feel complete. This is nothing to do with others - I could pass perfectly well without a phallo, and although it will be more convenient for using public toilets etc, that's not exactly my main motivation for the surgery!

I would have top surgery cause breasts always bothered me. Honestly I don't know why women put up with them, they're just so. Unnecessary.

I wouldn't have bottom surgery. Even if it were possible for surgery to help you attain a like-bio penis, I wouldn't be interested. I don't like penises. [penii? lmfao] They're gross looking, and really random when you think about it. I only want a penis because of societal stigma. And even then, really not so much.

I don't think I will be getting on T even with the world as it is, I just don't need it to pass so yeah that portion is irrelevant to the scenario.

Love the "really random", you had me laughing!

Quote from: Asher on April 22, 2009, 06:33:37 PMI don't think I will be getting on T even with the world as it is, I just don't need it to pass so yeah that portion is irrelevant to the scenario.

You might change your mind later, you know. When you start looking too old to pass as a teenage boy, I mean.

Just a thought.

And I was sort of wondering what you meant by "with the world as it is."

I do not care what other people think. I do things for my reasons not theirs.

Well I think of the scenario of being stranded on a desert island with no human contact at all. Would I rather be male or female bodied? With no doubt I'd 10000% go with male. Especially if I somehow lost all my clothes.

I don't know why, I just cannot stand the sight of my body, being female. I don't care if nobody else sees it. I see it, and it is incredibly disturbing to me. and the estrogen dominance, is killing me. I just can't stand how estrogen makes me feel. When it's high (like during ovulation), I feel sick, my entire body hurts, and I get this nasty smell like copper pennies or stale cigarettes in my nose. The high estrogen just sends my mood and my whole physical wellbeing right down the gutter. just unbearable.
So having a male body even if nobody else cared or even saw me ever, well that would just make things so much better. I plan on top surgery some time. Even though my chest is small, the femininity of it is sickening to me. and having a real penis instead of a vag would be amazing.

Since we're talking counterfactuals here, if I were stranded on a desert island, I'd rather have the body of a large cat, like a panther, or some other top level predator. I don't think I'd care much at all how I looked, but only how well I could get food and shelter and not worry about being eaten myself.

Well, I don't have any plans for transition, so I'm not sure the question really applies to me.

BUT things would have been much easier for me if gender didn't matter in society.  It doesn't matter to me and that was a lot of the problem.  It's hard for me to relate to people who do care about gender and who treat a person one way or the other because of their plumbing. 

There's nothing I hate more than being seen as weaker or any of that crap because I happen to have a female body.  I usually feel like I'm twice the man of people who do that.

I probably would still have a surgery. I hate my female parts a LOT, and would do anything to be rid of them.

Another "yes, I want to transition for my own good" voice here. I want the body my mind has been looking for all along.

Though there is something to be said for being a nice big predator if stranded alone.