Hi all!
I'm a 23 y/o gender confused person from the netherlands. I have had issues with my gender ever since I was a brat, although it really started to kick in when I hit puberty and I realised I was changing from a boy child into a grown up man. For some reason I never believed that would happen when I was young until it finally did, haha.
As a child I guess I was gender dysphoric in the sense that I was jealous of girls from time to time. Often I wanted to be like them. But it didn't dominate my life. I was very much distracted by other things though, stuff that went on with family and other personal issues. Perhaps if those things didn't went on I would've focused a lot more on myself and those feelings.
However, I've always felt a strong manly side to me as well, that was always (and still is sometimes) ashamed my femininity. Because of that I was often showing off, acting really guy like, but kinda failing at it because more often than not I made a bit of a fool of myself. And I also got into trouble because I always acted way too friendly. I didn't shut anyone out and tried to bridge differences between other people in a gentle, kind way. When you're a guy, at least where I went to school and my neighbourhood etc, this was not the conduct one would expect from a guy, so it got me into trouble quite often. I guess the guys saw it as a weakness. As a result I was bullied quite a bit, although there were other reasons for that as well.
Anyway, during my teen years I got fairly lonely. And more and more I thought I wanted to be a girl. I learned about transsexuality and things first from a program on tv; then I started investigating online. However, the more I researched and tried to confront my feelings, the more I became ashamed and violent towards myself. Because like I said, I also have a guy side to me, and some parts of that I enjoy, so it just got very complicated. But as I progressed, I became convinced I was meant to be a girl and that this wasn't going anyway. I dropped out of high school and started working for a time. And I decided to do something with my feelings. I came out to my mum, who reacted calm and supportive at first but then suddenly changed her outlook and said she didn't believe I could be a girl and that my feelings must've been the result of some psychological trauma from the past.
This hurt me and I wasn't strong enough to just ignore what others would think of me, especially my mother, and I tried to please other people by trying to pretend those feelings didn't exist and by going back to school.
School went fine now, but those feelings, of course, did not pass at all. They just got stronger again and I felt like a weakass for always finding ways to go around them or try and pretend they weren't there.
But then, when I was 19, I finally went to a doctor. I finally mustered the courage to do something with it all and then at the last second I again chickened out. I had been single for a few years and now I had just been with a new girlfriend and I realised I couldn't do it. I felt as if though I might be able to live life as a guy if I met the right person to be with. Maybe all of this could be solved by having a nice girlfriend.
This worked, for a time, and then the feelings returned again. After I broke up with her, even more.
The last few years I went to university, and I started playing with hormones on my own, despite knowing what the risks were. The main problem I think is that all my life I've done things on my own. And I always find excuses to avoid help in any way.
Then I found a new girlfriend again and I stopped using hormones. This one knew of my feelings and overall seemed to accept me as I am, although that was of course hard to define with me. But she didn't mind my feminine side, although it was pretty obvious that she wouldn't accept me as someone who's on hormones transitioning to become female. So, after some stuff happened I broke up with her and that was a few months ago. And now I feel like I can no longer dodge the issue. It's time to wake up, smell the coffee and do something with this.
So yeah, I've decided to do that. And trying to get into contact like this with people who know what this feels like, is a step I consider pretty important.
I also intend to now finally go to the doctor and get into contact with a gender specialist(s) or psychologist(s).
So, we'll see what happens. I hope I'll be able to get things into clear contrast soon, instead of always seeing things blurred. It gets frustrating!
Tl;dr: Hi, I'm new here, a confused mtf transgender/transsexual (I'm still not sure what it is I am, haha).
And nice to meet you all, of course =)!
