From A Woman's Perspective

[Ilsa]

After surgery and all the trials and tribulations that are involved in the transition and you have reached your goals emotionally and physically are there any doubts that arise when you realize that you can never bear a child,or experience all the other physical traits that are normally associated with that of a natal woman, or are you relieved that you do not have to experience these, considering what you have already gone through?

Also, do you equate your change in life to that of puberty or the other extreme: Menopause?

As always,

Ilsa

[Kaitlyn Michele]

No doubts. Put another way reading the question doesnt make me think anything at all...they are imponderables and worrying about what cannot be ..

for transition gave me a feeling of not being tortured by my own gender anymore.. that's it. everything else about my life is up to me ..

i come here and chat and support and debate...otherwise i rarely think about it.

when you live according to your true nature, all the questions and doubts melt away..

some people face very difficult circumstances.. i waited until i was older, i saved up my money, i got ffs...i got a lot of blessings from that...i live in the northeast where nobody gives a crap about anybody else so i go about my business...

also i worked out (divorce heh) the relationship issues prior to transition...she didnt want any part of it and it took about 2 years to get over my own feelings...

when i hear stories of doubt and regret i can always trace it back to relationships or circumstances the prevent successful transition..

[stefan37]

Regarding life after SRS. I can't answer that until after Nov. As far as the other issues. I have 2 adult children and have no desire for any more. 58 years and 3 is those transitioning, I don't think much of what if. I can never have the experiences of a Cis gender female growing up. My past is my past including all my life experiences. Experiences I may have never had the opportunity had I been born female, or transitioned at an earlier age. Would my life have been better or worse without those experiences? Who knows. I can't change it. I can only go forward and live life as authentically as possible.

[arbon]

Also, do you equate your change in life to that of puberty or the other extreme: Menopause?


Ilsa

No, I don't. I made my body as feminine as I could through the means available, but I can't say it is the same.

I am sad that I was not born female, I would gladly take all the experience of being female naturally if I could. How many times have women said to me things like "well at least you don't have to have pms or menstruate or other such things...it hurts me every time, reminds me I am forever different.

[Jorja]

I have had no doubts or second guesses. This was right for me 35 years ago and it is right for me today. I have two kids. Want to buy them? They are a pain in the ass but they are really hard workers.:)

[Kaitlyn Michele]

Another way to think of it is this..

Would a so called natal woman that could not have a baby wish she was a man?? regret being a woman?? why would she even think of such a thing?

that's how it goes in my brain... living as a man for any reason makes zero sense, its alien to me, even though intellectually I know this is what I did for 48 years...its as powerful as it is strange...

[KellyJameson]

Even before transitioning you cannot escape being a woman. Children have always "experienced" me as a woman and three times as a mother.

Several years ago a friend of mine with a son and daughter moved in with me to escape an abusive husband. Both children wanted to stay with me and told her so when she needed to return to her home country of Brazil. Their mother was a good person but emotionally distant and aloof. Not cold but certainly not warm and tended toward being intellectual, analytical and logical. They did not experience an emotional connection with her but formed one with me.

This has been a consistent pattern in my life. In general men and women have different values because their brains interpret reality from a different perspective. They experience reality differently so form beliefs and values from and out of this experience and it goes beyond cultural conditioning. It was there before culture. The emotional quality/experience of a woman's inner world is genderally different than a mans but there are exceptions.

Becoming a parent to my own daughter is what made suppressing the truth of my gender identity that had always been there and constantly tried to assert itself "impossible". She utterly and completely rejected her biological mother and replaced her with me "making me her mother" even though I tried to help her biological mother form emotional bonds with our child. People were astounded to see this and it made the biological mother extremely upset taking her down a path of violence which ended tragically for all of us.

Children react to that something in me that is also the source of my gender identity. It is a biological thing as my energy that has always been with me. How my body procreates means nothing to me concerning the experience of being a woman.

I'm a woman because life has consistently confirmed what I always "knew, feared and did not want" about "who and what I am". It feels like you have been cursed.

You cannot go against your nature but sometimes this nature lives in a physical vessel it is "never found in" according to what we usually see in nature.

If you are going to know yourself "as gender" you must be able to perform it or you stay one of undead.

A birth canal and menses does not make gender. Gender is to big of an experience to be limited by the sum of it's possible parts. Gender lives in the macro not the micro.

[Badtranny]

I never wanted kids anyway. I was one of those goofy kids that would always loudly proclaim it too, "well you will when you get a little older", they would say to me. I guess I was right.

Anyhoo, as to all the other stuff, I never give it any thought. I've got my own problems to deal with and since I transitioned in my mid 40's, I'm pretty similar to my post menopausal CIS friends. Perpetually single broads with Estrogen patches, no more Aunt Flow, and little dark hairs on our chinny chin chins. It's a fun club.

[Leah Lynn]

I know a few cis-women, including two aunts, that opted to not have children. I've known quite a few men that did not wish to be fathers, but a few of them sired offspring, anyway. I raised the two that I fathered, and love them without condition, but having been in the delivery room with the second making her grand entrance, I have absolutely no desire to bear a child.

I do wish I could have experienced the formative years of a female first hand, rather than only observing three sisters live them, although I did glean many insights of that magical world. That time also allowed me to absorb some female traits and characteristics.

If I had a choice, I'd have been born female, body and spirit, but now, I'm making the best of the situation.

Leah

[Persephone]

In my age group the most common question when women meet is "Do you have children?', sometimes even stated as "How many children do you have?" Yes, it hurts to be one of the few who have to say, "I never had any." So, yes, not being able to give birth is a grevious loss.

Sometimes I see a little girl all dressed up in a pretty little dress, kinda being the Princess, and I think "I never had that." Or I see a young woman laughing and enjoying life with her girlfriends or on a date and I think, "I never had that."

But then I think about what I do have.

I have a wonderful spouse who loves and accepts me. We travel together and have fun together. We continue to have experiences, every day, that most people do not have in a lifetime, and, most of all, we have love.

I have a fantastic son who loves and accepts me, and who includes my spouse and I in his life.

I have dozens of friends with whom I have good times as "just one of the girls."

I was able to spend 15 years as a homemaker, raising my son, volunteering at his school, and running with a "girlpack."

I have my health, I have a healthy spouse and family. I have been truly Blessed.

So yes, I mourn for what never was, and then I get on with a wonderful life. I wish you the same!

Hugs,
Persephone.

[Angela Campbell]

Already had 3 grown children before I began transition. In truth I rarely think about this stuff much anymore, I just live the life I wanted all along.

[Starling]

I never wanted children, and even lost a marriage because of it, long before I knew who I really was. I must have had a strong intuition that fathering children would be a huge mistake. But now that I face divorce in old age, when I read of transitioners who have children that still accept them and spend time with them, it makes me long for someone in my family whose love would remain constant, and whom I could care for and love in return.

I suppose that's really selfish, but it's how I feel.

:) Lallie

[PretzelGirl]

As far as having a baby goes, never thought about it. I am counting grandkids at this point, so another at my age is not happening. As far as the rest, that is negative physical events. Not exactly something I desire. I desire being my authentic self. That is a sense of being. Not a sense of cramping and being miserable. I have no envy for that.