issues

[geri]

hi everyone,
my name is geri and i have some issues.
i've been on hrt since january and my breasts are developing and my male sex drive is gone. my thinking is screwed up and i'm confused.
how do i know who i am? we are all transgender but what makes a person a transsexual, tranvestite or crossdresser. can you be transsexual without SRS?
how do you know for sure if your hetrosexual, homosexual or bi-sexual?

please help me understand.
thanks,
geri

[kay_jessica]

Are you under a doctor, or are you self medicating. If the former then you would have been counselled on all of this before they prescribed HRT. If the latter then you are playing with fire! You should seek counselling ASAP and start going through your GP, hormones will change your mind and not just grow breasts and soften your skin. Your brain WILL rewire to be female. It is irreversible. If you are not sure if you are TS or not then don't mess with hormones you may regret it.

Hugs

Kay

[Traci Elizabeth]

:iagree::iagree: Don't self-medicate if in fact you are.

I think your sexuality can evolve, change with or without HRT and any of those sexual preferences can exist. One no better or less than any other. Perhaps you need to experiment "safely" and decide for yourself what type of sexual desires you have.

SRS is not a requirement for being transsexual. Many of us don't take that final step for 10,000 different reasons. That does not make us less of a woman.

If you don't know your Transgender state of being, then why are you on HRT?

[kellycan27]

Gender and sexual preference are two different things. if you feel the need to label your sexuality just look at how you define the terms of each, and see where you fit in? Do you like boys? Do you like girls? Do you like boys and girls?

We have no way of answering your question in regards to your gender, until you give us more info... For example.. What was your motivation for beginning HRT?

Kel

[geri]

hi,
i'm under a doctor's care for hrt and have been since january. my levels are okey.
my motivation was early crossdressing (teens ). i got married and surpressed my feelings until later. now i have to deal with a wife that is non accepting. bummer...
since others have said that you don't need to have SRS to be transsexual, i guess that's what i am.
i've never had an experience with a male but i think that an expereiment with one would help me decide my sexual pleasures, so to speak.

i think early crossdressing ( teens ) has evolved into todays environment. i have a wife that's non accepting. bummer......... but i will continue.
i may experiment to see what sexual pleasures i like. i think in my mind now that i am bi but throughout my marriage i have been hetro. can hrt do that to you?

i am also seeing a therapist and we, together, think i am transsexual. i just have some doubts as we all do and posting with other girls does help.

expermentation is the spice of life so we'll see on that front.

thanks for caring,
geri

[Karen564]

Geri,

Your still not telling us how you felt inside..
Aside from just the cding in your teens, what brought you to the point of cding...how did you feel about being a boy growing up?
How did you feel about having boy parts, etc..?

[geri]

karen,
to answer your questions is difficult but i'll try.
i feel like a girl most of the time (in my mind ) and then something will happen with memories from the past and i get a guilt trip. that goes away and i'm back to geri.
i crossdressed on and off from my early teens into being an adult. i would travel frequently and buy cheap women's things to wear and throw them away before i got home. so i've had this urge to dress for many years. that urge has intensfied since i'm on hrt. my breasts have become a 44b/c and they feel and look wonderful.
on my boy parts. i have not liked them because they were not, in my opinion, large enough. now hrt is shrinking them and that is really okey. i can tuck real easy.
i hope that helps answer your questions. if not, ask for more information.

hugs,
geri

[kellycan27]

What was your reason for starting HRT?

[Kathi Lake]

now i have to deal with a wife that is non accepting. bummer...Yeah. Bummer. You have a wife that can't accept that the man she married now has B/C-cup breasts, shrinking equipment (that may or may not work at this point in HRT), and thoughts of "experimenting" with men. Bummer, indeed. A wife that just doesn't "get it." Why is it always you that must suffer?!

:eek:

Geri, maybe your confusion and guilt stem from a selfish attitude of how this all affects someone other than you. How does your wife feel about all of this? Is she on board?

About your doctor - why would they ever prescribe hormones for someone who "thinks" they "may" be transsexual?! That seems flippant at best, and criminally negligent at worst.

Guilt for what we do - what we feel - is very par-for-the-course until we accept who and what we are. Many of us totally understand the whole "dress, feel guilt, throw away, lather-rinse-repeat" game. It is one we've played often. What your doctor should be doing is helping you come to a conclusion on who and what you are, and then prescribing (or not) based on your findings. You don't dose up someone with drugs that can lead to irreversible changes while you're poking around trying to figure out what's what. Arrrgh!

Geri, I'm just a mere crossdresser. Therefore, take my advice for what it's worth. Stop the hormones until you, your wife, and your therapist have come to a conclusion, and not a guess.

Kathi

[Kaitlyn Michele]

Geri

First off...make sure you take sexual preference out of this...why do you care if you are homosexual, or what sexuality is called for a transgendered person..just let that all happen.!! its all good! ... spice of life as you say

All these things you are doing and feeling around your gender issues are typical and quite common..guilt/shame/lonliness/depression can all do that to a person....

and also transition is incremental.
you go step by step....you are at a particularly difficult step...you really can try to take a breather...you don't have to continue any of this..lots of women that would otherwise transition DONT for all types of reasons..
if you take a breather and feel even more terrible..that is telling you something important

but if you want to continue, but just doubt yourself and feel guilty and terrible about yourself (like i did!:straightface:), then by all means continue but still you can go step by step

your relationship is going to need nurturing .having an understanding with your wife is really important ..or perhaps you both should consider that breaking up may be a better scenario for your wife ..you can support each other even if you break up..

get electrolysis...this takes hundreds of hours, is very painful, and takes FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!!!.. after a couple hundred hrs you may find that you doubt yourself less!! or you may realize after 4 hrs of that maybe you don't want to take those next steps ..you can stick by her emotionally, even tho you need to do whatever you need to do..

BTW i had very similar specific feelings...i liked HRT shrinking me down there and i tucked easily as well...i was very confused about my youth too..i did the exact same thing after business trips...stop at KMART, buy a Jaclyn Smith or Linda Carter outfit, put it on in my car!!, drive around, and sometimes even walk around outside...and then throw the outfit away and go home...WTF WAS I THINKING!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyway..i hope all this is helpful...it helped me alot to get lots of feedback
:hugs:
kaitlyn

[Allyson Michelle]

well, Transsexual/Transgendered (IMO) are two different things. I feel like a transgendered person is one who feels they were assigned a gender that conflicts what their brain feels. weather they seek HRT or SRS is entirely up to them.

Now a Transsexual is a Transgendered person who DOES have HRT and possibly SRS. SRS is very expensive and only those who are 100% sure and can afford it get it as it is an irreversible procedure.

Transvestite is a whole different story. They are individuals who cross dress either for show, or sexual thrill. Sometimes they may even have surgeries such as FFS or Breast Augmentation.

a cross dresser is just that. they may or may not do it for sexual thrill. they may just do it to do it. we have our own motives

so essentially, you can be transgendered without being a transsexual. and a CD/TV are in a whole other spectrum. But ALL file under the gender dysphoria category. weather they know it or not, they have some issues with their gender identity.


(ONCE AGAIN. THESE STATEMENTS ARE NOT A FACT AND I AM NOT TRYING TO PASS THEM OFF AS SUCH. THEY ARE JUST MY OPINION)

[CharleneT]

You can be a transsexual without ever having SRS ! I am using SRS in its better more general definition - that includes FTM procedures, not just MTF bottom surgery. There are actually a lot of "non-op" TS folks - those who are transsexual, but have no intention to have extensive surgery. Actually, there is no requirement for HRT either. Being transsexual is a condition, the other things just procedures related to treatment of the issues of being TS. All optional.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

Breanne, I don't agree with what you are saying at all...but thats ok

dont worry about the definitions...we argue about that stuff all day!:heehee:

[carolinoakland]

From Transgender San Francisco's Transgender 101...

Transsexual is a male or female at birth who identifies as the opposite gender and begins a process to live as the correct gender.

Crossdresser is usually ( but NOT always ) a heteronormative male who enjoys presenting in the opposite gender. Transvestites are similar but with a sexual conclussion.

Drag Queens are usually ( but NOT always ) gay male's who perform as women as a form of artistic expression.

AND....

Gender preference is about who you want to be with...
Gender Identity is about who you are inside...

[Melissa A.]

[QUOTE=Mizz Breanne;2197709] But ALL file under the gender dysphoria category. weather they know it or not, they have some issues with their gender identity.QUOTE]

ALL???

"I am through being the sacrifice offered up to appease other people's gender issues"

Someone alot more eloquent than I said that, once. I wish I could have verbalized it that way, so many times.

I "know" one thing very well-who I am. And have zero gender identity issues, thank you.

Hugs,

Melissa:)

[sandra-leigh]

well, Transsexual/Transgendered (IMO) are two different things. I feel like a transgendered person is one who feels they were assigned a gender that conflicts what their brain feels. weather they seek HRT or SRS is entirely up to them.

Now a Transsexual is a Transgendered person who DOES have HRT and possibly SRS.

"Transgendered" is a blanket term for those who do not (through thought or feeling) fit into traditional thought that "a {biological} man is a man and a {biological} woman is a woman and that's that!"

[kellycan27]

Now a Transsexual is a Transgendered person who DOES have HRT and possibly SRS.

Although this statement is true in and of itself, it's only part of the definition of transsexuality. What about pre-ops and no-op transsexuals? HRT and SRS are "enhancements", but not the criteria that define transsexuality.


MelissaA

Thank you! I don't think I ever had that inner boy/girl struggle, and I never hated my male self or male parts. My problem was more along the lines of making it right. For me personally I believe that by basically figuring it out at an early age (before being subjected to the societal pressure of how a man should act and be) gave me a distinct advantage in being able to accept that .. I was who I was.

Kel

[Nicole Erin]

So with the gay/straight thing -
When you dig up something to watch and use the hand lotion with, does it involve women or men?

With being CD/TS, I am not much the advocate for lables but will say you need to live as you see fit.

Usually a CD will dance around the bedroom in pantyhose and daisy dukes while listening to songs like Lola, Man I feel like a woman, or some other silly CD'ing song.

A TS on the other hand, is likely to want to live in public as a woman and pretty much hates the hassle of dressing and all that but does so in order to look better and be taken serious.

You could be a trahnny like I am. To be a Trahnny, you have say stupid things on forums and have tourettes. You also have to scratch your privates in public without worry of what others think.

[Melissa A.]

You're welcome, Kelly. The author of that wonderful quote is Julia Serano. Unfortunately, I wasn't as lucky enough to accept who I was for a long, long time. It was a much different world when I was 3 or 4, and knew, absolutely knew. I also had the wherewithall to know, even at that age, that this was something I'd better not talk about. Like so many of my generation, I denied, buried, and tried so hard to be male. In fact, I fought this until the bitter end. Why? seems so silly and pointless now...When you have so much time and effort invested in something, or not being something, it's hard to give in to the truth. I pushed my denial right up until the point where my mind would not stop racing, I was on the very edge of a breakdown, and almost could not function. That might give the impression that I did, indeed have gender issues. But no. The issue was with my culture, and accepting all I already knew, and what I always was, which is female. You can't see what we are born with. Hell, you can barely explain it to many people even after you know what's going on. I couldn't explain it to myself. Our bodies and appearance are what define us to the rest of the world, and I will admit to continuing to buy into that...it's the only way I have found, so far, to be accepted and percieved for who I am. Making sense of, and making peace with my body, while simultaniously working towards changing it, has been one of the biggest challenges in all of this. Yes, it has been a huge conundrum, but one that I, at least, feel has been necessary. I want congruence. I will continue to work toward that goal, but I did not, and do not want to feel hatred towards any part of me. Digging into the depths of my feelings, and decades of willful ignorance has been the hardest thing I will ever have to do. One thing I have discovered is that my issues, if they were at all gender related, were not borne of gender confusion because really, I always knew. They were with so many things outside myself that when inevitabley internalized, will of course lead to all kinds of wrong conclusions. Why do you think so many people are uncomfortable with this? Why when you tell them it's a birth defect, that there's nothing wrong with my head, it's my body, they look at you like you're crazy. They think it's about sex, or about some wierd thing that their culture-based internalized investments and beliefs about their own masculinity or femininity won't allow them to understand, no matter what you say. And we are in no way imune to any of that. When I began to accept me, give up control, so many things I believed I thought and knew about myself, from from socially to sexually to intellectually, literally melted away, and I have never before and believe I never will experience that kind of reawakening. It was painful and amazing at the same time. It took alot of work. And help. But four decades of lying to oneself can do that. finding the strength to overcome that, and unfortunately sometimes desperation, are sometimes the only way to start the long road to peace with oneself. I think those born transsexual can be miserable. They can be liars. They can be blind. they can bury and deny with the best of them. But I don't think that gender confusion, if they are fully and finally honest, is part of their makeup. It gratifies me to no end that it's possible now for you and many of your age group to cut to the chase when they are very young, and not be slapped down or find it so hard to seek peace and contentment, Not that that fight is over, by any means. But it's at least not as difficult as it used to be. It really is a beautiful thing, when you think about it.

Hugs,

Melissa:)

[geri]

kathi,
for your information, my wife is not on board. i was hoping for some half-way meeting of the minds but not yet. time will tell.
my doctor put me on hrt because of my therapist recommendations. it wasn't a guess, as you put it. my therapist diagnosed me as having gender dyphoria with transexual tendacies. so i'm going with the flow and somehow, i'll get there and be okey.
i think we are all selfish in a way but we don't have much of a choice, do we?
geri

[ReineD]

geri, I wish you well in your search for answers. Maybe you just need to do what feels right for now, and the answers will come as you experience life as geri more. It's too bad about your wife. I do understand why it is difficult for her. Why are you still together, or are there plans to end the marriage?





Usually a CD will dance around the bedroom in pantyhose and daisy dukes while listening to songs like Lola, Man I feel like a woman, or some other silly CD'ing song.
That is so not true!



A TS on the other hand, is likely to want to live in public as a woman and pretty much hates the hassle of dressing and all that but does so in order to look better and be taken serious.

CD's do this as well. They just don't want to do it all the time.

Well, maybe I'm describing dual-gender. Or bi-gender. Or co-gender.

[Byanca]

Usually a CD will dance around the bedroom in pantyhose and daisy dukes while listening to songs like Lola, Man I feel like a woman, or some other silly CD'ing song.

A TS on the other hand, is likely to want to live in public as a woman and pretty much hates the hassle of dressing and all that but does so in order to look better and be taken serious.

:heehee:

So the old saying. Difference between a cd and ts is 5 years, or maybe 20 years. A kid vs a grown up?

[Kaitlyn Michele]

not to jump on geri's thread


but Mel i want to give you a huge :hugs::hugs::hugs: that was beautifully said.

[Kathi Lake]

for your information, my wife is not on board. i was hoping for some half-way meeting of the minds but not yet.Hope is the best that we can do. However, for something like this, prepare yourself for the unexpected. Rare is the woman who will stay with her husband while he becomes a woman.


my doctor put me on hrt because of my therapist recommendations. it wasn't a guess, as you put it. my therapist diagnosed me as having gender dyphoria with transexual tendacies.Once again, we're talking "tendencies" not absolutes. The drugs will produce an absolute - a person who is sterile, has breasts, and many of the same issues that they began the process with. If the "tendency" doesn't turn into an absolute, you're pretty much just stuck.


i think we are all selfish in a way but we don't have much of a choice, do we?We don't have much of a choice?! That statement is so false it's not funny. Of course we have a choice to be selfish or not - especially in an issue such as this.

Kathi