Girls will be Boys & Boys will be Girls

[BobbiJ]

In my "New Member Introduction," i mentioned that in the past year, i've learned that i'm not exactly in the classic CD category. Below is the story of when my therapist and i first started to nail that down. It was written at the end of August 2008.

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Monday, i had a session with my therapist. Since i've been telling her that i don't feel as though i fit the classic cross-dresser profile, but am having a hard time understanding exactly who and what i am, she found a survey/test called COGIATI that she thought might help me. COGIATI stands for "COmbined Gender Identity And Transsexuality Inventory," and while it's not "written in stone" proof of anything, taken honestly, it can be an enlightening tool.

Yesterday, i sat down and took the test. It's funny how something that has no right answers can be difficult to do. Since it takes all of 4 questions to figure out that answers with a value of "-10" points are maximum male responses while "+10" answers are maximum female, it's pretty easy to engineer the result you want. Still, i did the best i could to be honest with myself in my responses, and came up with a score of +135, which is just barely into classification 4, "Probable Transsexual."

As you might imagine, the first few minutes felt a little surreal. I wasn't surprised to not be in the "manly man" vicinity, but i started thinking i was a cross-dresser - a guy that liked wearing girl's clothes, but still at the core, a guy. Now i suddenly i was staring at something that was telling me i was a "probable" transsexual. That made my heart race with trepidation, at least initially. "Probable" means more likely than not... better than 50%.

After a few moments, i took a deep breath, and reminded myself that this isn't a be-all end-all, and that like any survey, it has a margin of error. Further, i reflected on the fact that there were a number of answers that i was truly unsure of how to answer, and in nearly all cases, (probably seeking validation for my feelings,) i chose the more feminine response.

Before going to bed last night i reviewed my answers, this time checking the more masculine response in any question i was previously unsure of. My goal was to establish a full range of possible scores that might apply to me. Re-tabulating the results, i came up with a score of +75: classification 3, "Androgyne." Neither male nor female... or perhaps more accurately, both male and female. Still, in the positive numbers both times. Even at my *cough* most macho, i come up on the femme side.

Okay, it's no shock to be in the middle of the male/female gender identity continuum, but i was surprised to find that my entire range of results is on the girl's side of the line (to start being on the masculine side, my end score would need to be a negative number.) I honestly expected to be mainly masculine - maybe not by a lot, but that's where i thought i'd be.

However, i'm strangely comfortable with the idea that i'm more femme than macho. Perhaps because it's a relief to know that there's validity to my self-doubts; that i'm not losing my mind. There actually is something about me that's different from how most men feel and relate to the world around them, and it's not my imagination. "Bobbi" is real.

Given that over 90% of that range is in the androgyne classification, it's unlikely i could ever be totally happy living exclusively in either gender role. It also causes me to realize that my unspoken dreams of having some, though not all, female physical attributes make sense. After all, feeling both masculine and feminine psychologically and emotionally, it's logical that i might have some desire to be the same way physically as well.

Looks like my therapist and i will have a lot to talk about next week. ;)

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Shortly after that was written, i took the Bem Sex Role Inventory test, which basically confirmed the COGIATI's results - my feminine traits are more pronounced than my masculine, but not to a very large degree. At this point, i guess falling into the category of a true androgyne is okay - after all, each gender has good things about it - but there isn't a "middle sex" for me to be, so no matter how i present myself to the world, half of me "isn't showing." This makes my goal of feeling like one whole person instead of two half people a little harder to do.

Oh well, no one said the trip was going to be easy...

[deja true]

... it's unlikely i could ever be totally happy living exclusively in either gender role. It also causes me to realize that my unspoken dreams of having some, though not all, female physical attributes make sense. After all, feeling both masculine and feminine psychologically and emotionally, it's logical that i might have some desire to be the same way physically as well.

...- but there isn't a "middle sex" for me to be, so no matter how i present myself to the world, half of me "isn't showing." This makes my goal of feeling like one whole person instead of two half people a little harder to do.

Oh well, no one said the trip was going to be easy...


But what's the importance of having a defined role in which to present yourself, whether masculine, feminine or 'middle sex'? Most to whom you present yourself don't matter and wouldn't care anyway.

Do you need a physical label pinned to your forehead that says "I'm a middle sex person...just wanted you to know that!"?

What's important is how well you accept who you are to yourself. When that's the case, you can dress or act any damn way you want. You can adopt any physical attributes that please you (as long as you're not hurting anybody else).

[BobbiJ]

But what's the importance of having a defined role in which to present yourself, whether masculine, feminine or 'middle sex'? Most to whom you present yourself don't matter and wouldn't care anyway.

Do you need a physical label pinned to your forehead that says "I'm a middle sex person...just wanted you to know that!"?

What's important is how well you accept who you are to yourself. When that's the case, you can dress or act any damn way you want. You can adopt any physical attributes that please you (as long as you're not hurting anybody else).

Unfortunately, how i present myself is pretty important to my wife, and i presume also to my employer.

I have a friend that has been recently diagnosed as transsexual. Not long ago, she went out in full-femme mode for the first time in decades. As she was walking back to her car from the meeting she had attended, she was struck by a feeling she'd never had before, and had a hard time defining. She later figured it out: For the first time in her life, she felt authentic - that the person she was presenting to the outside world was her real self.

I've never felt "authentic," and i'd like to someday know what it feels like.

[Karren H]

There's a clasical crossdressing profile? Maybe as sterotyped by the medical profession... But look around.. No two of us is alike here...

[deja true]

Unfortunately, how i present myself is pretty important to my wife, and i presume also to my employer.

Then there's no one all-encompassing way that you can present yourself in public that'll satisfy those that you need to satisfy, huh.? Like the majority of us, then, there'll just have to be a number of part-time physical 'avatars' that can bring out the parts of your inner self in rotation. That might not be so bad, for each can emphasize and highlight the part of the 'self' that you can accept.



I have a friend that has been recently diagnosed as transsexual. ...
I've never felt "authentic," and i'd like to someday know what it feels like.

Diagnosed? Are you thinking that you are suffering from a mental disorder? Just 'cos it's in the big book of "craziness definitions" doesn't make it so. Homosexuality was in the book at one time, too. So was female hysteria.
A lot of things that are not in the book should be there...like Chief Executive Arrogance. (That mental illness does get people hurt and killed!)

You'll feel 'authentic' when you can come to terms with the wholeness of who you are, masculine and feminine and androgyne, all mixed up to make your uniqueness. That doesn't really have a lot to do with physical presentation, I'm thinkin'!

:)

[Nadia-Maria]

In my "New Member Introduction," i mentioned that in the past year, i've learned that i'm not exactly in the classic CD category.


Although neither a scientific test, nor even a very good one (several questions are pointless but happily some are pertinent ones), the COGIATI is useful in that it may give you a rough indication about where you may ly at the moment on the continuum TV-TS. It has to be emphasized that differences in scores within a 50-100 point range are meaningless, being obviously not significative at all. :2c:

So that getting 75 or 135 as a result is about the same, and you clearly fit the third category (Androgenous) provided you responded the test without deluding yourself (what I tend to believe).

Most of the girls here, having already taken the COGIATI test , happen to fit just as you this very third category, so that you appear to me as "the standard CDer" rather than the exception to the rule ... :hugs:

Wellcome to the club ! :love:

[kristinacd55]

Did the Bem Sex Role Test, and I'm feminine 63%. What a shock!! :)

[JoAnne Wheeler]

I don't have a lot of faith in those tests because of the way they can be subjectively manipulated
JoAnne Wheeler

[beenherelongtime]

too confusing for me

[Bethany_Anne_Fae]

But look around.. No two of us is alike here...

No doubt about that :)

*hugs*

Zara

[SusanMarie]

Tests are interesting, therapists can be helpful, but...
when we are honest with ourselves, we know how we feel and don't need anyone to tell us.

[Wenda]

I caught part of a very interesting TV special on Sexuality a couple years ago, and wish I knew the title. As I recall, some of the analysts on the show broke female to male sexuality down into about 16 segments, with very few members of the population having all-male or all-female traits. It described a young boy in the USA who was physically male, but was very 'emotionally female', it dealt with transsexuals in other cultures, and investigated the unreasonable rage displayed by western cultures towards transsexuals.
I am 6'1'', 230 lb, and very male to most whom I meet, but friends and family also know the femme side, which isn't neccesarily softer or nicer, but different. w.

[LA CINDY LOVE]

Tests are interesting, therapists can be helpful, but...
when we are honest with ourselves, we know how we feel and don't need anyone to tell us.
If Cindy every needs a therapists I am going to call Dr SusanMarie and Bobbij was is a classic CD category mean to you.

Just what are you trying to find out do you want to know if you may be gay or bi or are you more femininity then masculinity are you just trying to find out why you like to cross dress.


LA CINDY LOVE

[BobbiJ]

...Diagnosed? Are you thinking that you are suffering from a mental disorder? Just 'cos it's in the big book of "craziness definitions" doesn't make it so..

My friend needed to see a psychiatrist because she was also suffering from clinical depression and needed a doctor in order to be prescribed antidepressants. The term "diagnosis" was hers, not mine. And since her psychiatrist is also trans, i'm comfortable that she's in good hands. :)

In any case, diagnosis isn't a pejorative term. One of the definitions is simply, "a determining or analysis of the cause or nature of a problem or situation." And if your brain is wired one way, and your body's built another... as Dixie Chicks like to say, "there's your trouble."

And as for if i'm thinking that i'm suffering from a mental disorder? Yeah, probably. But that's a completely different subject that's got nothing to do with my taste in clothes. :D

Cindy: The CD definitions i've read, and pretty much all the CD's i had met at the time i wrote the piece above, made me think it was all about the clothes, and the sexual thrill of doing something forbidden - and that's not me. I get excited at doing something new, but that quickly changes to a feeling of peace, calm, serenity... pick your word. Suddenly, i feel free to move, talk, express myself in ways that might get me laughed at in boy mode. It's like being let out of a cage.

What am i trying to find out? Who i am really. Gay? No, i like girls too much. Bi? Probably, but since i'm married and am one of those people that doesn't have it in themselves to stray, that's going to forever remain a theory. More feminine than masculine? I think we've got that one figured out already.

Questions i'm still trying to find answers to: How do i be me outside of these bigger multi-person closets i've found? How can i get my wife to understand and accept that this isn't just what i do, but who i am? How can i push back the dark clouds when they start to roll in, making me feel sick, twisted, and broken?

I'm a work in progress.

[LA CINDY LOVE]

Maybe Deja true is on to something cross dressing my just to deep for you to come to terms, with once you find the answer to one question you are looking for answers to other questions, do you ever feel that you can not move on until you find the answer.

what type of CD are you? one who is in the closet or one who goes out...........or you are not sure...........are you having fun cross dressing or do you think you are.

LA CINDY LOVE

[BobbiJ]

Maybe Deja true is on to something cross dressing my just to deep for you to come to terms, with once you find the answer to one question you are looking for answers to other questions, do you ever feel that you can not move on until you find the answer.

I used to, but i'm doing better at that now. I've come a long way in the past 18 months or so. Depression still rears its ugly head from time to time, but it's been a lot less since i came out to my wife and daughters.


what type of CD are you? one who is in the closet or one who goes out...........or you are not sure...........are you having fun cross dressing or do you think you are.

LA CINDY LOVE

I'm just starting to venture out of the closet. So far it's been Tri-Ess meetings and the Tiffany Club in the suburbs of Boston. Next time to Tiffany's, and i think i'm going to go out to the 99 Restaurant with some of the girls afterwards. i still have work to do on my look, but it's improving too. Am i having fun? OMG yes... :love:

[Rachel Morley]

A lot of what you said "rang bells" with me. I too have taken the COGIATI test and got a score of (I believe it was 140) of "Probable Transsexual."

I too think of myself as not being "quite the same" as most other CDers I have met in person. I too wasn't surprised to not be in the "manly man" vicinity and I too am (very) comfortable with the idea that I'm more femme than macho.

So what does this all mean?? I have no idea. I have a label now, of sorts I guess ... at least I do in my mind, but then again, just like others have said, so what? We are all different and so that means ..... ??

I have no clue, but having said all that, I am happy that I appear not to be the norm ... not the norm in society and IMHO not the norm in the CDing community. I am me, I'm different, and I like it. :)

[kay2]

If this is it:
http://transsexual.org/cogiati_english.html
I am far from impressed. Yeah - I scored "Androgyne"
but the test struck me as shallow stereotyping.

[subaru_forster]

The COGIATI pretty much confirmed how I already summed myself up: androgynous.

The fact that a qualified therapist used this as a guideline, and that the person who made it can use the sentence "Most transsexuals are not early onset, sure-from-birth cases such as myself. " makes me want to consider this to be at least more reliable than "stereotyping."

Although I don't like the concept of labeling people (my whole "rationale" for being androgynous is a dislike for being labeled and pigeonholed as a "man", after all!) I must say that I crave the ability to tell people what I am, using maybe a single adjective and noun, and have them instantly understand where I fall in the LBGT spectrum.

Of course, the term "heterosexual androgyne" would probably just confuse people further, so I try not to give in to such vices.:heehee:

[Kelsy]

The tests may be self affirming but they only give you a picture of that moment in time. I believe that Cding etc. is progressive, a moving continuum
at least in the sense that many who begin with a fetish move on to a more encompassing condition.

Some find that they have reached a plateau where they are comfortable, dressing at home perhaps and in secret.
others move on and learn to enjoy the freedoms of coming out and venturing out into public while still others discover that they are truly transsexual and go to the final stage of actual transition.

Now I am sure many will say that be a true TS you have to know you are a girl in the wrong body from the start and No doubt this is true but I also believe that because of the society in which we live there are compelling reasons that many have been in years of denial about who they really are. I also think that it takes years ,against all odds and pressures to conform,for some to uncover and discover the true self. IMO

:)Kelsy