Accepting it is hard for me. I mean, I can do it, but it hurts that I'm not and will never be one. I've pretty much dealt with that on an emotional level but it's always going to be there.

I've never been keen on comparing being trans to a woman born without a uterus or someone with any sort of physical ailment or disease. Its really not comparable.  We are biologically one sex and no matter what we do as far as hormones, surgeries, etc., that will not change. But luckily we don't have our chromosomal sex tattooed on our foreheads, so we can present ourselves to the rest of the world as how we feel we are and hope they accept us as such.

My thinking is why I don't buy into the whole "oh they won't date a trans person, they must be transphobic" crap or run around shouting to the world that "I am woman, hear me roar!"  I'm just going about my business and hope they see me as I try to present myself and not get laughed at, groped to make sure or whatever.

Quote from: Noey Noonesson on July 13, 2012, 06:35:00 PM



To answer the question, "No, I do not accept that I will never be a biological woman."  Because it doesn't matter to me.  I know that I am female, I am a woman.  I live a woman's life.  I say what women say and I do what women do.  I don't say what women never say   I don't say what women don't say.   but I live my life, my female life.

You'v answered the question, I don't have an uterus, Im on HRT, but so are many women, oh and hubby says I can be moody, I have bad hair days, then hubby gives me flowers to cheer up this girl UP, I guess Im just a typical woman, hubby rolls his eyes WOMEN! Im 100% a woman, just ask hubby.
p

Quote from: pretty on July 13, 2012, 10:25:27 PM
Hmm, idk.

In a sense I would say that I AM a biological woman because how your brain is setup is a template for who you are and yes I do believe that my brain is arranged in a more female way. It's not that I feel like a pretender as a woman or something. I do think it is my biology that makes me this way in the first place.

On the other hand, I do get normal physical dysphoria thinking I might be prettier if I were cis, and I do have a lot of genital dysphoria so yes I will probably never be happy about that part. But what are ya gonna do? It is how it is. 

I was just about to say this because I feel the same way. What would separate us from "biological women" in the first place? Our brains are womanly. We don't have two 'x' chromosomes. We can't have children, however, many "biological" women can't either. So I don't really see a difference between a transwoman and a biological woman. Not all women are the same.

The fact is that I am not a biological woman, and can not be in my life time. This was sometimes painful to me when I was child or teenager.

Now I am satisifed with my status of transgender. I have some advantages, and also together disadvantages, compared with other orindary women. I am unique. Some women envy my body figure. Adventure to the mainstream society as m2f transgender has been sometimes risky, but usually enjoyable. It has been like a acrobatic performance in public without any coach or teacher. You can enjoy the performance if you have skills and confidence. Otherwise, you will be fearful. It takes time and effort.

Barbie~~

Quote from: TessaM on July 19, 2012, 02:29:07 PM
Cant argue with the fact that our genes are xx or xy or wtv, but our DNA is more complex and holds a bunch of other stuff, including how we see ourselves. I havent trained myself into believing I am a woman. I in fact know I am one. Any attack on me is an attack on woman, ill hold my head up high and dont want to be treated differently from any other woman.
I dont want to call anyone out here but one thing that really bothers me in the trans community is how a lot of us simply view ourselves as "trans" and not proper men or women.

I think it's great that you have so much confidence (or it might be "bull-headed-ness"  ) that you can accept the fact that although you were born with a male body, that doesn't affect the way you see yourself.

Not everyone has this ability, nor should they be condemned for being any less of a woman for not (yet?) seeing what you see. I say "condemned" because you said "it bothers you"...which means you will bother those of us who don't match up with your views on how a transsexual should see him/herself.

For myself, when we talk about "the community", anyone who has gone thru the process (or is about to, or has gone thru a portion of it) of changing their body's sex is a "transsexual." However, when speaking of a particular individual, one should use terminology that they use for themselves.

Just a thought.

NO i am biologically a womyn just i can't have children which many women can't.

womyn = liberated woman free from patriarchy

Hey, the kids at school picked on me and called me a girl, so it seems like it was pretty obvious from an early age.  Pity was nobody explained it to me.

Going through all the nonsense and pain to get surgeries and hormones and electrolysis and whatnot is a little awful. And I wish I didn't have the history that I do. I don't like a lot of my memories. So sure, I wish I'd been born cis. But that isn't really the question is it?

Does it bother me now that I can't become a "biological woman"? Or what people really mean when they say that, "a real woman"? Heh, no. Why should I care?

What is so awesome about nature and real and biological and genetic that we place this great weight on those labels like it's some kind of magic? The truth is nature kind of sucks. It screws up. It mangles peoples' bodies and leaves us with all kinds of lovely genetic flotsam and jetsam to deal with. Real is ugly and pain and cancer and AIDS and every nasty thing. I don't see why I need to envy that.

I used to have a real body. I didn't like it much. So I fixed it. I created something out of it. Out of the tragic mess and waste that I was naturally and really and genetically born with, I crafted something I like, something that's kind of beautiful.

So, no, I'm good with being an artificial female. That is what my body is after all: artifice... art.

Quote from: Sarah7 on July 25, 2012, 09:00:43 AM

What is so awesome about nature and real and biological and genetic that we place this great weight on those labels like it's some kind of magic? The truth is nature kind of sucks. It screws up. It mangles peoples' bodies and leaves us with all kinds of lovely genetic flotsam and jetsam to deal with. Real is ugly and pain and cancer and AIDS and every nasty thing. I don't see why I need to envy that.

art.

Especially this part, because it puts things in perspective.

I am tired of dealing with really ignorant people.  Along with Cancer and aids and flesh eating bacteria there is a HUGE amount of ignorance in the world.  And honestly the only reason I would be compelled to tell people about my medical past would be to wet-nurse their ignorance.  Little babies might get upset if they found out the girl they are attracted to once had contradictory genitals.  Boo %*!@ing whoo.

Things are never about you, they are always about the person criticizing you or evaluating you or mocking you or whatever it is.  The man who isn't manly or secure enough in himself to weather a romance with a woman who transitioned will try to say that his problem is the woman when his problem is with himself and his lack of security in who and what he is.

I have been unfortunate enough to have been put in an area where most of the men only care about what other men think.  Everything they do is to impress other men.  There are people who are born gay but because being gay has such a negative social stigma attached to it they convince themselves they are straight and they really believe they are straight.  And just like you can't teach an old dog new tricks as they get older and the ring count increases (like the rings inside a tree, measuring the seasons) or like the layers of an onion... the longer they exist the more layers there are that would have to be peeled away and most people aren't capable of doing that themselves, that is why therapists exist.  And these people, they have fooled themselves into thinking they are something they aren't but the problem remains though deeply buried.  And something is always wrong in their lives, something is always a little off.  Something is eating at them.  And the first person they will ever blame or take it out on is a woman who transitioned.

A woman who transitioned, perhaps because she is the absolute and perfect example of a self-manifested individual.  Someone who despite all odds and adversity and difficulty and expense manages to be true to herself.  True to herself while the rest of the world nurses it's lies.

But always the ignorant point their finger at the trans woman.

It was for a long time.  I never fully believed that surgery, hormones, and attitude made me a woman.  I can certainly act the part and feel comfortable as a woman in a way I never did as a male.  Nevertheless, a nagging doubt about "really" being a woman persists.  The fact that medicine is unable to explain the transsexual phenomenon doesn't help.  Theories that we have "female" brains and all that remain theories.  I don't doubt transsexualism.  I just wish it didn't look so much like a mental issue.  Belief alone does not equate with fact and this is one of the dilemmas of being trans.  We can believe we are woman and yet those around us can decide that we are not by virtue of birth, genitalia, genetics, etc.  Both views are equally valid.  You can decide that other opinion doesn't matter, unless of course the opinion is held by a spouse, friend, parent, child, prospective employer....

DawnL

Quote from: Beth Andrea on July 13, 2012, 10:29:12 PM
Hmm...never thought about not being an OEM woman. I have enough problems with tolerating my man-junk to give any thought to not being an original, as-born, woman.

I'll let you know some years after my SRS, when I'll have some experience with it.

Owwww! OEM women?  Sounds like something you can send back as warranty to my shop!  Seriously, I did wonder early on what it would be like if I had those functional parts installed.  But observing over the decades of my sisters and friends, I don't think so.  I have seen what can go wrong physically with them and it's usually no simple fix. 
  Joelene

I feel some sorrow at not having been born with a female body to go with the rest of me (though I had no say in this) - but it's overwhelmed by my happiness at doing something about it at last.

Well, everyone was female when they first start out in the womb and only when the male hormones kick in do changes occur, so I was one at one point and that's good enough for me! I frankly don't like bothering over it because it will never happen. On the bright side, girls always complain about their menstrual cycles, but I won't have one, so there's a plus. 

I  have no trouble accepting that I am not a cis-gendered woman.  It is pretty obvious really, but I now say, "so what?"

It has been a pretty stressful and upsetting time for me over the last week or so with both family and lesbian rejection, but I have ended up a lot more secure in my identity than before it all. 
I am now quite comfortable with the label Genderqueer, which didn't feel right previously.
If the women I was looking to for support in the Lesbian community are not comfortable with me using the labels "woman" and "lesbian", then I will consider myself a denizen of another part of the Gender Transgressing community.
A friend who is a counsellor to the GLBTI community has pointed out that there are a lot more people in their 40's and 50's now coming out as Genderqueer.   I feel quite secure in my self-identity, and am simply looking for like minded people to associate with.  I won't push myself in where I am not wanted.

Quote from: JoanneB on July 13, 2012, 08:08:22 PM
On the inside I knew since the age of four I was a girl/woman. How much more biological can you get than that?

It was hard for me to accept that I could never pass, never be accepted, and never live as a woman. It was even harder for me to accept that I can accomplish all that. Being seen as a woman is all I ever prayed for. Achieving that has brought more joy into my heart than I feel I deserve.

Ditto on every single point. That's how I was in every respect.