Quote from: JoanneB on November 06, 2011, 10:48:55 PM
I often think I am the ultimate chameleon. How I present as a male vs female is a universe (At least one planet Venus vs Mars) apart. I can build a 500+ HP engine, gen a Linux kernel, design circuits that work 24/7/365 in life saving applications, hang with steel mill workers or corporate mucky mucks, and from what my wife says, look snazzy in a great suit. In guy mode I am FAR from feminine. Hell, no way I want my cover blown! I worry more about about being clocked pretending to be a guy then I ever had in my entire life going out presenting as a woman!
My senior year of college was the beginnings of my first serious consideration of transitioning. School is all done, a new "grown up" life awaits, just which life? You get a job offer as XY but now how do you tell them....? Oh yeah, lots of pressure from yourself, forget parents, grandparents and siblings. When you are suddenly facing adulthood sometimes you think, being a guy really sucks. All the expectations, all the must dos, responsibilities, all the pressure just makes you want to escape. If not for just a few hours.
IMHO, I perceive a TON of black and white thinking. ie: if I fantasize about being a person of the opposite gender. I must be a TS. At many points in ones life, especially adolescence with raging hormones we all wonder what if. Maybe I've always been way too analytical. Even as a teen I could not make that definitive leap of I must be a TS. Even knowing for as long as I could remember praying to be a girl.
Being a TV is a lead pipe cinch compared to being a TS. As a TV you get to escape into a fantasy world for a few hours, no different than any other fetishistic escape or going crazy at a football game. Which is absolutely great if that is all you need. Actually planning to live 24/7 as a woman is work and a lot of pain.
It is good to seek knowledge as it is good to question yourself. But the key is to answer those questions completely and as honestly as you can at this point in your life and apply that knowledge learned. Which is often difficult to accomplish. Humans love to see what they want to and ignore the rest. Don't ask my wife what it's like at times talking to me 
A good therapist, if you access to one at school, can help.
Joanna, what you and Mahsa says resonates very strongly with me. Being a woman for a few hours, and usually in a sexual manner, is a fantasy that I often have, but at the end of the day, I doubtful that I could see myself going through the steps necessary to become a woman, and when I deeply consider the idea of doing so, and becoming one
permanently, it actually slightly unnerves me. Like you said, being a guy can suck at times, and I not exactly a huge fan of the high libido and anger=hulk smash feelings that testosterone brings for me, but becoming a woman won't make all of my problems disappear.
And besides, there isn't anything wrong with being a crossdresser!
