How do you determine where you fit in the transgender spectrum?

[Postopadmirer]

I think the subject explains it all. Wonder where I fit in. I thought I was transexual and maybe I am. But if I am where is the uncontrollable drive to transition that I had as a repressed youth?

I didn't think I was primarily a cross dresser but after spending some time In fem last weekend it felt great and sad at the same time. I loved it but I realize how much work some of you ladies go thru (2-3 hours) to look passable, and I know that would be me and I think am I ready for all that work? I know it is, and should be enjoyable at least at first, as a voyage of self discovery.

I tried to search for past threads on similar topics and found threads like this.

http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/showthread.php?165432-A-bit-confused...

I read where the main advice seemed to be, talk to a therapist.
Is that really the only best way?
Is there no set of activities I can go through (short of the benjamin real life test)
That can help me determine for myself where I really rest (at least right now) I realize like much of life we live on a spectrum that shifts a little left and right over time. But I'm betting a real crossdressers has different needs than a real transexual.
How can I determine where on the line I fall?

Wendy

[JessHaust]

Try to think of how you feel about your male self. Im pretty confident Im a transgender cross dresser and I know that because I still enjoy being a boy. I also enjoy being a girl, but I can live either way. If your desire to be female is accompanied by a dislike of your male self, if you feel like you are living a lie when you present as male, then you are transexual. If not, welcome to the varied, sliding scale of transgender. There are so many variations of transgender that it's hard to keep track, go out, stay in, undredresser, partial dresser, the list goes on and on.
The only one who can tell you for sure is you, think long and hard on what it is you want.

[Barbara Ella]

I am going to chime in with some thoughts even though I am so new that I will not provide much in the way of useful answers, just conversation. I dont think we know where we fit until we are there., and then it is a done deal. I do not believe I can anticipate and plan for the moment I will reach a certain point "on the line." I dont even think i can pinpoint exactly where I am at the present time. Every moment feels different. I am a cross dresser. i love to get into full femme at times. I love to just dress without going full bore. I feel comfortable wearing female clothes 24/7 but doubt I would want to go full makeup and wig 24/7, but love it so when i do. So, where do I fit? Not a clue, and plan on remaining way too busy to worry about it. When I get there, I will be there.

Babes

[Eryn]

Wendy, your position on the spectrum won't reveal itself instantly, but it will become more apparent as you gain knowledge and experience. Unless you have a desire to something damaging to yourself you probably don't need counseling but it probably wouldn't hurt anything beyond your pocketbook. Remember, being TG isn't a "limited time offer." You have an entire lifetime to explore yourself and your place in the spectrum.

[noeleena]

Hi,

Where do i fit in. well first off as a person. 2 nd as a woman who is different, my name or names refer to who i am no-el & noeleena. it has given people an idear of two sides of myself, some male & some female or just a mix of both,

I belive we need to accept our selfs first before any thing else starts to happen as to wether we dress or have surgery, or other changes, because if we dont & you wont / need acceptance from others ,
we really do need to be sure of our selfs because if we dont how or why should we wont others to accept us & who we are if we dont know our selfs,

You know its the cart before the horse so sorting out our selfs first really is the matter to be looked at, before we run let alone crawl its allso about this lovely word ....growing .... that seems to be lost along the way,

Myself,

iv had to grow. just to be myself let alone being a woman, being a woman was a major part of my growing, it helped me in so ....so .... many ways, it had nothing to do with watching other women or copying them it was this is who i am . so be who i am

thats, what this is all about,,

its not about clothes make up how you walk or being femm its about .....GROWING... in to being who you are, wether male or female.. its a part of whats missing for many people getting to really know who you are .

As to clothes make up walking & being femm yea thats cool or neat thats not the issue,

...noeleena...

[Kaitlyn Michele]

No set of activities..no guides

I think you are right that crossdressers and transsexuals are completely different...but that is very complicated because many ts people crossdress for many years as a way to dress the woman out of us..and many crossdressers have fantastical notions of "going all the way" and living "24/7"....most crossdressers i've met personally are pretty certain of who they are after minimal exploration btw...and when i meet people cd or trans, its pretty obvious "who is what" most of the time..

Its all on each person individually. We debate terms/labels/who/what/why all the time because that simple question "what am I?" is so difficult, and there is no known way to determine the answer except self reflection and experience.

[lady di]

i don't try to determine if i am trans or a CD. i just want to feel good and girly i know some of you think is to simple but it is so much fun.

[Karren H]

I don't want to "fit in". I want to stand out. I want to walk the other way.... backwards.. Swim upstream...

[whowhatwhen]

Hey there!
We appear to be in the same boat so I'll just say I think it's going to be better to talk to a therapist with experience in this area.

I've found those internal questions to get more intrusive and pushy to get themselves to the foreground of the thought process, it seems to only get worse.
That's just me though, is it the same for you?

[Laura912]

Suppose, for purposes of discussion, that you never could find out where you fit till you died. Would that change what you are doing?

[Kaitlyn Michele]

Suppose, for purposes of discussion, that you never could find out where you fit till you died. Would that change what you are doing?

This is an interesting question...

Being transsexual, i can report that i began to feel like i had no life, nothing could generate feelings of belonging or meaning, the more i tried to continue my male life, the more i sank (sunk?)...
desperation was a huge factor...i felt i was fighting for my survival

My own decision to transition was finalized when i had the image of being on my deathbed and regretting that I ever lived. I know that will never happen to me now, and i risked everything to know it..

So the short answer is yes..

If you are not transsexual, then you are blessed with the knowledge that in alot of ways , it doesn't matter what you call it.. its a personal choice that seems valid no matter what others say..


btw...great legs!

[Aloha Jayne]

Last summer I had a thought. I have heard of transgender, transsexual, bisexual, LGBT, etc. But I had never heard the term bigender used. Even my TG therapist had never heard of it. So I googled it. No, I'm not the first to use it, but it is a relatively new term and is not even fully accepted by the TG community. But it is exactly what I feel like. I know some CDs just like the clothes and could care less about being a woman. For me, and what seems to be the common thread for most on the forum, sometimes I feel like a woman, sometimes I don't. I identify with both genders. There are lots of arguments that there are many genders, but I'll stick to the two most common. I am not transgender, meaning that I don't want to become a woman. I like being a guy and doing guy things. But somewhere in me is a woman that likes to do her own thing too.

In reality, everyone has their own place in the spectrum, and it is as fluid as the ocean. But sometimes I think BG would be a more correct term than CD. Crossdressing implies that it's about dressing. And that is a big part of it. But an actor dresses in a costume just to become the character he is playing, and it never becomes about the costume. For me anyway, the dressing is just a way of expressing the woman within.

[ArleneRaquel]

I guess that I classify my place as TG, I have lived as a woman nearly 24/7 since 2004, actually 2003, but I purged before going 24/7 again in the Summer of 2004. I love living as a woman, I adore dressing enfemme, but I have never desired to transition, but I plan to live this way for whatever time I have left on Earth.

[carhill2mn]

IMHO as you learn more about yourself and more about the "transgendered world" you will discover where you "fit". Where you "fit" is not really as important as being able to accept yourself for who (what?) you really are. Actually, very few people are always at one place on the "spectrum". "Labels" can be very tricky and difficult.

[Anna Lorree]

I'm trying to figure that out, too. I know I don't really enjoy being a man, but I'm not filled with self-loathing or a desire to cut Mr. Willy off or commit suicide or anything. I just don't enjoy "being a man" as it tends to be defined. I like how I feel when I tell myself I am a girl or a woman, even though the parts don't match (trust me, I have checked). All that said, am I TG or TS? I guess that depends on how we define these things. I define TG as being anybody who acts as the gender that is opposite their biological sex. I define TS as anybody who alters or tries to alter their body (permanently) to actually BE the other sex in order to make sex and gender match. Figuring out which we are is something many of us are still in the middle of.

Anna

[Michelia]

Postop...
I really think you are over thinking this a bit. Just live your life. Get out there and do what you want and you will find your path. You will find what is right for you. Not all of us know what we are right off the bat....and many of us change and evolve as we go along. I get asked so much whether I plan to transition. I say "no" because that is the way I feel now. But I know better. I like my life the way it is, but my feminine side is ever widening. Not just in the physical attributes but my mental and emotional state. If you had asked me 10 years ago if I would have a smooth body and trimmed eyebrows and long hair and pierced ears (and a few other things) I would have told you "no way!"

Think of it like school. Some people know they want to be an engineer when they are in grade school. Some of us go to college without having a clue and get exposed to many things and then decide. Some of us change careers quite a few times, too.

Part of the fun is experiencing your journey and your growth and finding your way.....Don't agonize over your choices or your lack of choices before you have had a chance to confront them. Sounds like you have spent very little time dressed. And no....you do not have to spend three hours before you get out there. Once you get good at putting yourself together you can spend minutes if that is what you want. But you will have to go through the work and practice to get it that way.

[Kate Simmons]

Knowing who you are is 95% of it Hon. The rest is mainly (no pun intended) "window dressing".;):)

[Ari333]

we are all so different dear, there are so many levels of transgender, like snowflakes. I wondered the same, but then decided I didn't have to fit in that spectrum. I'm blazing new territory!

[NathalieX66]

What Ari said.

I would like to chime in here and say something about the word transgender. There are some transsexuals who claim ownership of the word transgender.....as if crossdressers, particularly those who venture out of their front door don't deserve the namesake.
OK, yes, someone who has gone through or going through the process of transition (hormones, hair removal, surgeries, etc) is transgender, but in reality they are cisgender......they just happen to be the gender they were not born with.
Secondly to the same point about ownership to the term transgender, and the CD'ers who attach themselves to the term, transsexuals have their own term. it's called transsexual. Maybe transsexuals don't like the sound of the word, but it is what it is.

And for folks who dress up at home, or in secret are just trans-curious, no?

[GBJoker]

Oddly enough, after posting that thread, I did some meditation in my free time over the next few weeks and realized the test was some what accurate (Like jumping around the line between male and female as much as possible... Suitable, for my name), despite being another dumb internet quiz thingy. Of course, one data point means nothing, so, salt grain.

And that leads me to my answer. I say that going to a therapist has the POTENTIAL to be a waste of money. There's too many variables; monetary cost, time cost, whether the therapist is even good at their job or not, etc. So, I say to do some hardcore meditating, but I doubt most people can do the type of meditation I do. Also, I might suggest pushing the boundries. Instead of being fem for a whole weekend, do it a whole week (if possible), or a whole month. Do all your normal daily routines and chores and junk in fem, and see how it goes. Good? Keep pushing, try two months, or do something different, like hit a restaurant or movie theater or whatever.

Since both of those suggestions are subjective and the results vary from person to person, then my final bit of advice is what is repeated throughout these forums on an hourly basis. Research. The more you know, etc.

[Marleena]

Wendy all of us MTF's are transgender. That's where I'm gonna put myself. I don't care if anybody is an underdresser, fetish dresser, CD, transsexual, or any other category in between. I will treat you all the same, with respect.

We have all have seen some teasing and put downs of the sub groups by other groups and this really bothers me. We all are struggling in this in different ways and are all looking for acceptance or at least tolerance from the general public. On the plus side I see people on this board coming around to accepting we are all in this together, attitudes are getting better.:)

[docrobbysherry]

Postop, you've answered your own question! And that is, there's USUALLY NO POINT in figuring out where u r! Because wherever that is, tomorrow it will probably be different!

U started out thinking u were trans and now you're a CD. I started the same way about 16 years ago. Wanting real breasts and fantasizing about becoming a female! I've BECOME a hardcore CD just the last 4 years! Will I REMAIN a CD?

I DON'T HAVE ANY IDEA! But, I'm not spending a second thinking or worrying about that! I prefer to waste My energy wondering how and why I started this silly hobby in the first place!? Lol!

[Joanne f]

First of all i want to point out that i am no expert on this it is just an opinion, where does one fit in , well there are two distinct ends of the spectrum that are quite easy to understand but then there is a whole lot in the middle that can be a lot more difficult to identify with as to knowing what you are and maybe the higher end of the TG spectrum is one of the hardest to understand or even cope with until you hit the TS side of things ( i am on about understanding what you are and not trying to cope with it as far as TS is concerned as that is way out of my deft ).
It may be all very well to go to a therapist but you may be going for the wrong reason do not go for them to tell you what you are , in my opinion you do not aspire to be a TS you have an overwhelming desire in that you are TS but also think that there is a grey area in the lets say the top end of the TG spectrum where though different types of repression you may not know or accept that you are TS so in a way the only way out of that is to let you mind go and stop fighting your self in what you think you should be and just decide on what you are and go from there .