Quote Originally Posted by Snow White View Post
I understand what you are saying about yourself and your feelings, and I respect that.

But, for you to say, ".....they do not want to be female". This could be taken 2 ways: they do not want to BECOME females via SRS, OR CD's do not want to BE female".

The latter, to me, is an oxymoron. CD's like Tara (heterosexual, non-op, not bi) DO want to be female when they dress. She changes her speech, mannerisms, walk, appearance (of course), and feelings to 'become' a woman in her eyes & psyche......She "wears it well".

But, he likes his masculine 'self', too. He doesn't want to give that up.
You don't BECOME female. You either are or you aren't. Transition, SRS and HRT are just to align your body with the gender that you already ARE.

Just because someone dresses the part doesn't mean the person is the character portrayed.

Quote Originally Posted by sandra-leigh View Post
Exactly! You now know yourself to be a woman. You do not need "reasons" to know that about yourself, you just are.

And my difficulty is that although I now know that I am not "male", I do not know that I am "female". I wish I did know that -- or at least it seems to me in my present state that it would be so much easier to live if I Just Knew I was female than to be as I am, stuck in the middle. (In contrast, I emotionally recoil from the possibility that I am still actually male.)

I struggled for a long time on the question of whether I was "just a cross-dresser" or something more, and I came up with "reasons" that I was one or the other. I was absolutely unable to settle the matter through reason, but one day, between two moments, I quietly knew I was not male. Revelation, if you want to call it that. A step of Faith. A Conversion. A Mystic Experience. However it happened, I didn't know and then I did.

I am intellectually prepared for the possibility that some day I will have another such revelation, that I will know that I am a woman. But I don't know that now, and I live with my agnosticism -- and with the possibility that some day that I will have a revelation that convinces me that I am not really female either. Though, to be frank, my heart leans more towards the hope that some day I will know myself to be female.
Maybe you are somewhere in the middle. Or maybe you just haven't come to terms with who you are. No way to tell but to keep exploring and let time take it's toll.