Hope this is the right place to post this. I have heard that many transwomen report having a for lack of a better work, a "moment of clearity" when their path became clear. I would be interested in knowing if anyone has had that experience.

yes. i've been thinking about transitioning since about the age of 15. then about 8 months ago a light bulb went off and i knew i was in it to win it so to speak. now here i am with my hair 6 inches longer, attending a local support group, and starting my first laser treatment a week from today. mostly everyone i know "knows" without me telling them. i see no real reason to freak them out and once i have a few more things in order (hormones) i'll be officially coming out and planning on going FT in november : )

Yes, it is the moment that you accept who and what you are, and at that moment you know what your path must be.

I started feeling weird when I was about 10. I later became obsessed with the idea of wearing female clothing and was caught by my parents several times. Each time it meant a new therapist and me trying to "quit the habit". This went on for about 8 years when I was researching why this "habit" of mine persisted.

Well, I could never really get it out of my mind when I came across the topic of Transgenders (This happened about 1-2 months back). I could not believe myself when I read how they defined a transgender and I was a little shocked at how many of those things applied to me. I didn't understand what I was feeling at first but after I had a couple of weeks to think about it I knew what I wanted.

Mine came when I stopped trying to figure out why and gave up fighting it.

But I don't recommend waiting six decades like I did!

After literally decades of denial and insisting I was a crossdresser, seven words changed my life forever.  I asked myself:

"But what if you ARE a transsexual?"

And as they in eastern philosophies; "... and then the student was enlightened."

-Sandy

Mine came after a transsexual group therapy session.

I sorta, kinda knew I was transsexual at the time (thus me being there). But I had a hard time even contemplating how transition would ever be possible. There were others there who could never transition due to their life circumstance. For all I knew, I was like that too. I certainly had no active plans to transition.

Then at the end of one of the meetings, I wanted to talk to someone from the group about something she said that really struck me. I don't even remember exactly what she said to prompt me. But when I spoke to her afterward I related my own thoughts from several years earlier about why I needed to stay male. It was because, I had told myself, I was born male and I had to "play the hand of cards I'd been dealt" the best I could. She smiled and told me I had been wrong about that hand of cards, because I wasn't actually born male. I was born transsexual.

If there is a single "road to Damascus" moment in my transition, it was that one.

Lets see... a friends 7th birthday party, I was the only "boy" there and fit in perfectly so there's that...  never really had a singular moment where I knew I had to transition, just something my life has been leading up to I guess.

My moment was more like about a couple weeks.

I had always known what I wanted to be, and I semi-told my friend when I was 5-7, I completely told my mum when I was 7-10, I told other people when I was 13, but when I was that young I didn't know anything about transition or anything. When I became a teenager at some point I learnt about the whole transgender thing, but by that time I had so internalized my feelings as part of a wide range of attempts to fit in, the idea of me doing something so unusual seemed out of the question, additionally I didn't really know anything about hormones or the concept that someone could actually fit in and be perceived as female if they weren't born that way. I had this mindset of 'well, ok, in my mind I'm female, but I'm trapped in this male experience and there's nothing I can do so I'll just go with it. So I ignored the problem entirely.

Then when I was 19 I found out through randomly stumbling on a news article that it really was possible, what happened between that and realizing that I actually WAS one of these transgender people and that I COULD have done something about it YEARS ago, and that I was SO CLOSE in the past, I don't exactly remember. It took a few weeks, maybe a month, to truly come to realize it.


So yeah, no lightbulb moment, just stumbling across what I knew but didn't accept (i was transgender), and that it was actually possible to do something to correct the situation.

I think it may be when you realise there is no option. OK it's still a struggle but the struggle is less. I've just spent the afternoon, shopping again. Only bought a few things but no one was rude, in fact I was served by females and they were just wonderful. I ended up buying some jewelery and we had a great chat, trying stuff on, finding matching ear rings, etc etc, It was a small one person shop, and there were really only women coming in to browse, a few guys with their partners also. No one as much blinked a eye, except the credit card which fell into its usual screaming hissy fit

Life is feeling good. And it should do. We have no reason to feel bad about ourselves.

Cindy

There have been several times in my life when I wondered whether my lack of success in relationships was a sign that I was not cut out for the whole "man" thing. I knew I wasn't gay, so just ended up being depressed and alone for a long time.

Once I worked out that I was actually bisexual these feelings disappeared for a few years, but came back about 6 months ago.  After trying to decide where I fitted on the spectrum of gender, and considering all the pro's and con's I tentatively concluded I was Androgyne, and decided to see where this would lead.

I started to grow my hair, and had also stopped picking my nails, an old bad habit. While I was at work a couple of months ago I was doing data entry, and with my nails clicking on the keys had one of these "light bulb " moments.  I realised that I would have this sensation for the rest of my life.
I felt a sense of clarity and knew right then that I was a woman who had been trying to pass as a man for far too many years.

Since then I am generally happier than I have been in years, and enjoy getting up in the morning.  I still suffer from depression, but it is now solely my reaction to the things going on around me, not coming from inside.
Life is short and I have spent the preceding part putting other people's needs ahead of my own, with in many cases little return.

I know where I want to be, all that remains is to work out the best way to get there.  That is something I realise I have not had in many years either.

My light bulb moment was back in march when I realised that I couldn't keep on pretending it didn't exist and that now was the time to do something about it...so I told a friend and haven't looked back since.

Mine was about a decade and a half ago when i was watching a documentary on tv. I knew that was me.

my lightbulb moment came when I realized I had run out of excuses not to transition, and I no longer had any reason not to. I had tried being a gay man, tried marriage, tried religion, tried running from the truth, and not a single one of those things gave me any relief. Once I realized that the road lay wide open ahead and there was nothing to hold me back, I knew what I had to do.

I've always known who I was, took me a while to realize that other people didn't know and couldn't see. It was only a few years ago, like.....15? that I even heard of transsexual. Only 7 years ago I knew it was possible to transition. I then chose to wait til kids were out of high school and here I am.

The moment of realization for me was a little different. It was late summer in 1957 when I was 8 years old. You see, I was a little dense - I always thought I WAS a girl (though I knew I was physically a little unusual) and I figured adults were a little slow in not figuring that out. 

On a hot August day a cousin and I were laying in the hay loft of the barn after doing chores, just chatting as children do, when my cousin said "You should have been a girl." very matter-of-factly. I said I was. He said "No you're not, not really." and it finally sunk in that I had a BIG problem! 

I struggled with the gender thing for many years after that, not knowing what I was (other than a freak). Puberty pushed me toward girl but my body betrayed me. More and more I knew what I WASN'T but I still didn't know what I WAS.

The second moment of clarity was the first time I held my newborn niece (age 23). In that single moment maternal feelings hit me like a ton of bricks and I KNEW what I was, what I HAD to be. That started a rapid downhill slide leading to deep depression and attempts at suicide before SRS finally became available the following year.

Quote from: Northern Jane on April 20, 2010, 04:27:35 AM
The moment of realization for me was a little different. It was late summer in 1957 when I was 8 years old. You see, I was a little dense - I always thought I WAS a girl (though I knew I was physically a little unusual) and I figured adults were a little slow in not figuring that out.

Exactly!!!!!

I kinda had a clue what a transgender was at age 16 or so and had been unusual from age 11 but I denied it. "I want to be a girl and hate begin a boy but I don't think I'm transgender, because X Y Z"

I finally accepted and admitted to myself after I very nearly castrated myself age 20, backed out at the last minute realizing I would kill myself in this attempt.

I thought about my future... As a male my life would be strewn with insanity like this and I would kill myself one way or another I couldn't see myself as a middle age man successful or not. Middle age woman however... yeah I could live with that.

It was then I just surrendered "I'm Trans... I get the message."

I haven't had a lightbulb moment yet because I move back and forth between moments of knowing where I am going in this transistion and moments where I am still trying to make deals with the dysphoria. If I could hold at one spot in this process, I would do that as I have a long marriage and two grown children to consider but my fear is that this may be a losing battle and I am just putting off the inevitable.