I've been lurking around here for the past couple days sorta taking it all in, more or less understanding myself but trying to figure out how to put it into words. I wrote most of this off-line and just realized I forgot to mention I'm 32 and an aspiring MtF, I think.
I think what I'm most, at least at the moment, is a gender refugee. Maybe I can explain that so it makes sense to more then just me.
I've more or less known I wasn't a boy since at least five or six, maybe sooner. I'm sure the thoughts had always been there, it was just a matter of how to express them. The few things I swiped from my mother, on a dare, proved to be the outlet I needed. Eventally I was caught, I'll spare the details to keep this post short and its not like we don't all know the routine anyways. For the longest time, I thought that was the end of it and it didn't resurface until I was 11. Truth is, it just drove it underground, broadened my horzions if you will. My mother's thing's were off limits to me, but I had female friends and a female cousin. I passed the time trying on their things when I could, sometimes with their permission, sometimes without.
As for the rest of my childhood, my memories are scattered as to when they happened; in terms of before I started crossdressing or after. I do remember my female cousin and I painting our nails together, it was the peel off kind of nailpolish so we had to be quite young. I was never afraid to wear it home or otherwise out in public and my mother was always kind enough to let us paint her nails. I played equally with my cousins, they were the same age as I was, but I got along better with my female cousin. Oddly enough, when my boy cousin and I played games that required a girl, I played the girl. I do remember once in third grade sleeping over at my cousins house, I'd forgotten my pyjamas, somehow I talked my cousin into letting me borrow one of her nightgowns. Keep in mind I paraded around in the nightgown in front of the rest of her family as well.
I first told my parents I wanted to be a girl when I was 13. Their response was to shop me from therapist to therapist in order to cure me. I can't blame then, they thought they were doing the right thing and this was the late 80s. Every now and then, I'd get caught crossdressing in high school. I'd tell the therapist again about how I wanted to be a girl, and they'd promptly tell me I was just confused and didn't know any better. Despite everyone's best efforts, I held firmly on to the belief that I was better off as a girl throughout most of college. I started going to the GLB, there was no T back then, group at my college, with a friend of mine, as a "supporter". As far as anyone knew it was just a social outlet. It didn't take too long before I openly identified as a gay man. It seemed like most of my thoughts and feelings finally had an outlet. I was sure of myself becuase my crossdressing stopped all together.
I was happy with my new found identity until about 1998. All my old feelings hit me like a ton of bricks in April. I promptly got myself to a therapist, said all the right things and had hormomes by October. The next year of my life was a disaster. I spent money I didn't have on clothes I rarely wore, a therapist that I finally realized saw me as a cash cow and an MD that followed an archaic HRT schedule; I worked through my transition with all the grace of a bull in a china shop and generally made a mess of myself. My attempt at transition finally ended in January of 2000. I'd like to think it was anything but the fact that I was just impatient with myself The truth is, I look back at pictures from that era of myself and see how easy it would have been to go full time if I'd just tried a little harder. The truth is I was afriad.
I entered the next phase of my life, I refer to as my "gender indifferent" years. I didn't try to be much of anything, male or female. I went back to identifying as a gay man and promptly fell in love with my best friend, who unfortunately for me happened to be straight. Mostly my life for the past six years has been phases, I've gone through crossdressing phases, I've even gone so far as to take hormones in two seperate phases. Truth is as I write this, I can't say I've ever been upset about the effects the hormomes have had on me and my body. I know there are those of you who cringe as I talk about my rather recreational use of hormones, but its my past and I can't change it, I only hope you won't judge me for it.
Near as I can figure I act like a boy and feel like a girl. I never would have imagined the course my life would have taken, but I have alot of "boy" interests. I work as a Paramedic, a rather masculine job. I love hockey, the outdoors, the list goes on. I like who I am, I dont' know that I like the way the world sees me. One thing that came out of my aborted transition was a strong sense of identifying myself as a tomboy. I think that, to me at least, explained alot of my struggles and my feelings. Not being a boy was the answer, but I didn't see myself as the girl I was trying to be either. For better or worse, I think being a tomboy kept me from transitioning earlier, I could some how manage to survive as a boy if only for so long.
So how do I get from "gender indifferent" to "gender refugee"? I thought my attraction to my straight best friend was just a fluke and besides I'd pretty much reassured myself he was just a closet case anways. Nope, near as I can figure he really is straight. If my straight boy attraction was just a one time deal, I could write it off that way, but its not. I've more or less lost all interest in gay men and most of the gay culture. Straight boys, I'm perpetually attracted to. Maybe its just another phase, but I'm tired of being attracted to someone who's not attracted to me. I don't live in a fantasy world that says I'm going to come through this and score a boyfriend and live happily ever after. But if I don't at least make sense of this, there will always be a part of my life I'm not living.
