Validating Womanhood as a Trans Lesbian Without Changing Your Appearance

[ainsley]

You Need Help: Validating Womanhood as a Trans Lesbian Without Changing Your Appearance
Abeni Jones on July 3, 2018 at 3:00am PDT

https://www.autostraddle.com/you-need-help-validating-womanhood-as-a-trans-lesbian-without-changing-your-appearance-424036/

Hi Autostraddle family! Love this site! I'm a transgender lesbian (assigned male at birth) and because I am masculine presenting and don't want to have any hormone or sex change therapies and surgeries since I don't believe that these are required to validate my female identity, I'm often mistaken for a cis straight dude and I hate it.

[Maybebaby56]

I'm a transgender lesbian (assigned male at birth) and because I am masculine presenting and don't want to have any hormone or sex change therapies and surgeries since I don't believe that these are required to validate my female identity, I'm often mistaken for a cis straight dude and I hate it.[/i]

Hi Ainsley,

If "validating your female identity" refers to your own sense of identity, then no, none of those things are required.  However if you want others to perceive and treat you as a female, then that is a different story. If you look like a straight cis dude, and act like a straight cis dude, and talk like a straight cis dude, what do you expect from people?

Your self-perception is entirely your affair, but social integration as a female is a transactional process on a emotional and intellectual level.  In other words your social identity is based on a shared perceptual agreement on the part of others, and if you aren't giving them the psychosocial cues they expect from a female, you can't expect "validation" in that way.

As the article you cited pointed out, you're probably best served by understanding and dealing with that.

With kindness,

Terri

[ainsley]

Thanks for contributing, Terri.  I was not posting that for myself.  I just thought it was interesting with all of the efforts of people and 'passing' that here is an article about someone not interested in the aesthetics of passing, but still wanting the results of outwardly passing - without doing the outward presentation.  A real dichotomy, and one that we all face when we say that it doesn't matter what people think of your appearance, you are still a woman or a man, but, yet, still wanting validation from others about our gender identity despite the outward appearance (or lack there of).

[Maybebaby56]

Sorry, I misunderstood.

A real dichotomy, and one that we all face when we say that it doesn't matter what people think of your appearance, you are still a woman or a man, but, yet, still wanting validation from others about our gender identity despite the outward appearance (or lack there of).

I can only speak for myself, but for me it absolutely does matter what people think of my appearance. I have never been able to define what a woman is or a man is because all I know is my own existence, and that I identify as female, based on what I observe around me.

I look at how women act and think and appear, and it strongly resonates with me. It "feels right".  So I don't really know what it's like to be a woman, I only know what it is like to be me living as a woman in society and being perceived and treated as one. I don't have that certainty all cis-genders and some transgenders seem to be blessed with.  They "know" they are male or female. I only know what feels natural or comfortable for me. I also believe my "validation" stems from my appearance and how I act, because that in turn enables my social integration.

With kindness,

Terri

[Devlyn]

I'm genderfluid, I know what they both feel like. Can I put it into words? No.

Mike knows who he is and how he feels.  Devlyn knows who she is and how she feels.

It's just a sense of self, there is no better explanation. 

Hugs, Devlyn