How many of you honestly feel like "women trapped in mens' bodies?"

[dennisGTS]

Like linda, I don't feel "trapped" at all. I was born male and I enjoy being a male and doing the stereotypical male things. The difference is, if my "life" allowed it, I would want to dress as a female all the time. And it would be really nice to be able to switch back and forth from male to female at will...although, I think I'd be female mode majority of the time. After that last comment, as confusing as it sounds, I could live my whole life as a male who loves to CD and never have the feeling of a "woman trapped in a man's body".

[Kathi Lake]

Trapped? No, I don't feel trapped. I chose - and continue to choose - this life. Am I a 'mere crossdresser' or am I closer to being transgendered. I dunno. I don't want to think about it, actually. I like where and who I am right now. I live the blissfully-uncomplicated life of a male most of the time. Occasionally, I get to put on the outer trappings of a woman. Of course, the question remains; am I doing this because I'm really a woman inside? Am I doing this in an attempt to 'put things right?' Am I doing it just for fun? I don't know, and more importantly, I don't care.

Sure, I could put a lot of thought and angst and therapy into this, but as I said, why bother. I'm happy! If I've learned anything in this crazy life, it's this - if something is working, don't screw it up!!

Simplistic I may be, but hey, at least I look and feel damn good while doing it!



Kathi

[Debra Russell]

I dont feel as if I were born in the wrong body, I have told my wife that I would change places with her for a while -- she said to be careful what you wish for, and I probably wouldnt like it. I do feel as though Debra is confined and awaiting parole though.

[Sally24]

I feel much more comfortable as a women but have adapted to the male role for over 50 years. I would probably choose female if given a choice. As it is, part time is usually enough to make me feel comfortable. I'd classify myself as more TS than CD.

[Cristi]

I'm just a crossdresser trapped in a man's body.

In fact, I LIKE being a man and all of these questions of 'would you switch' usually end up with me deciding that I wouldn't want to be a woman full-time.

It is a man's world. I like sports, I like beer, I (mostly) like hanging out with other guys. I'm satisfied with being a girl just something I do 'on occasion'.

[Daintre]

I don't like the word "trapped" as Holly said, I feel like I was assigned to the wrong team. Being a team player, I did my best to make a good thing out of what could have been a great misery. I played the guy "roll" all my life until I just couldn't do it anymore. It cost me a lot, a failed marriage, scorn from "friends" and backs being turned by some family members. The things I hold dearest to myself are the love of my son and little sister, who both know the real me and are there for me. It doesn't matter what I wear, what does matter is what is on the inside. Today I feel like I was traded to a team that I can blossom in.

[Lorileah]

I have been trapped before so I have an idea what that feels like. It isn't anything like I feel about dressing. When I was trapped I saw only one way out. There may have appeared to be other options but I knew that they weren't really there. There was truly one solution. In this situation I have many choices and alternatives. I have the ability to make a decision and although it may not be the decision I would like to have, I have a choice.

The whole label thing is so nebulous. DQ, CD, GQ, TS, RSVP. When does A become B? Or was it always an absolute that using a different formula gives you a different answer? Emotions and feelings cannot be quantified. Life is full of what if's and If-then's. My current mantra on that is don't regret anything you do, you will regret many things you don't do. Wrong body? Even I had been born in a different gender, I would probably still think it was the wrong body unless for the grace of whatever I had perfect shape, face, mind, whatever.

[JamieG]

No, I don't feel trapped at all. I am happy with my male body and my male identity. However, I do feel constrained by societal pressure to hide the more "feminine" parts of my personality. I don't know if this is what Karen was getting at when she said:

I'm not trapped in the wrong body.... My body is trapped in the wrong world.... Or dimension..

but that's kind of how I feel. If I was in an alternate reality where people didn't care if men sometimes wanted to look pretty, dance gracefully, and get out a good cry when needed, I don't think I'd be trans-anything. I'd be happy being my sometimes pseduo-masculine (I'm not particularly macho in drab) and sometimes very femme self. There's nothing wrong with me, it's everybody else that has the problem!

That said, I've spent a long time thinking about the issue and trying to figure out how do I know if I'm a crossdresser or transexual? After talking with many CDs and TSs, I seem to see a common theme. M2F transexuals typically:

- know at a much younger age that something was wrong with their gender (~ age 5), while CDing begins to exhibit itself around puberty

- tend to hate their male organs and get little if any enjoyment from them.

Now I am no expert and this is just my observations, so please take this with a grain of salt and don't flame me (although I would be interested in hearing contradictory opinions). However, if my observations are correct, I am definitely CD and not TS.

[arbon]

I never liked the saying I was trapped in the wrong body. For me it does not sit right - this is my body, it is what I have in this life whether I like it or not, it is what I have to work with and live in.

I think as humans everyone is trapped in their bodies to some degree. And people do all sorts of stuff to try escaping it a bit whether drugs or chanting on a mountain or jumping out of an airplane, or whatever. And lots of people or born different, or with diseases and birth defects or have things they don't like about their bodies that they are stuck with.

Some one suffering severely from muscular dystrophy, for example, that has lost the ability to care of themselves physically is much more trapped within their body then I am.

I know tons of people who are non-trans or CD that talk about not being comfortable in their own skins, with who they are.

And really, I feel pretty blessed that I live in a time when there is growing acceptance of the trans and CD communities and there are medical options like hormones and surgery's that were not around not to long ago - that is a big positive. It is a huge positive.

I like the way this woman articulates it the best:

"I am a human being who is neither in a wrong body nor trapped in a wrong body but a human being who is expressing her beingness in one of the various forms of the human body. I am not in a wrong body. I am in this body just like how you are in your body. I am not trapped by my body. I am trapped by your beliefs. And I want to reclaim this body from those who want it to breathe and be fed by their dogmas." ~ Sass Rogando Sasot


What I was trapped by was my own lack of acceptance and my own fear fueled by negative belief of how others might treat me if I expressed who I was - it was my parents, siblings, friends, community, peers in school, everyone - I was afraid they would reject me and be mean to me and thought they would all believe me to be the worst thing in the world if they found out. Having them accept me was more important then me accepting myself for who I was.

Now I have stepped beyond that fear and the path I am on feels very right for me. I am expressing myself and transitioning and feel great about it.

And after writing all that I think I probably missed the intent of the question in OP. Sorry for getting off track.

Simple answer - I am very happy that I am transitioning, I don't like living as a man.

[ReineD]

I have said it before and will say it again. I have a feeling that a LOT more CDs out there are actuallly TS but for 1000 different reasons (or excusese depending on who you are talking to) choose not to transition.

Or, they are more flexible with their gender IDs than you are. Not saying you shouldn't be ... you were a TS who is now a transitioned woman. There was no flexibility for you. At one point, you came to know without a shadow of a doubt that you were a woman.

But not all TGs have the same black/white gender definitions as cisgenders and TSs. There are some people who are quite happy being dualgender, once they give up the idea they must be either fully male or fully female. There are also others who are happy being androgynous.

You may choose to look at the inability to decide as some form of denial or people using excuses to not fully commit. I choose to believe that the spectrum is much wider than either/or male/female.

[erica12b]

I feel I was women in a previous life, but i am a male in this one, and I enjoy the guy stuff a lot but I have fond feeling for my fem side too

[kimdl93]

I think you're both right. Some of us might secretly hate our bodies as they are and as the original post suggests - feel trapped in a body and lifestyle that they fear they can never escape. Some of us, myself included grew up accepting our male role, but having that persistent dream of being a woman and a deep seated guilt for feeling that way. Denial may come as a response to guilt. And yet others may have adapted quite happily to a self concept and lifestyle that involves a blending of gender roles. And as ReineD suggests, there is a broad spectrum - as I see it, a multi-dimensional universe with each of us simultaneously occupying some point between a number of polar extremes.

[phoebe61]

I also know i have the wrong plumming, and if i hade the money id have it changed. i hate the thing between my legs eventhough the wife would miss it.

[Suzette Muguet de Mai]

I am not trapped because I can visit the parallel universe anytime I want by simply looking into my mirror and applying some make-up and voila I am teleported through a worm hole into a universe that is where I reside as female. I have the best in both worlds although I can get hindered if I sit on a slatted chair in the shower and get trapped by the twins who won't allow me to get out unless I give them some attention. I just hate my masculine parts, they trap me everytime.

[LilSissyStevie]

When I was little, if you would have asked me whether I wanted to be a girl or a boy, I would have said I wanted to be a girl. Why? Because girls got to wear pretty dresses and play with dolls. They got to play hop scotch and jump rope instead of football and soccer. If a girl went out into the field and picked wildflowers, everybody thought that was cute. If I did it, I was a sissy (as if there was something wrong with that!). Girls were pretty and nice while boys were ugly and mean. And girls didn't get beaten when they broke the rules - at least not in my world.

Of course, I knew that boys had penises and girls had vaginas but It didn't occur to me at the time that those were the defining criteria. It seemed like a minor difference to me. In fact, I thought that having a penis was pretty convienient and everybody would be better off with one. Later on, when I found out what it was used for besides going to the bathroom, it was a little confusing since my sexual instincts were "wrong" but I eventually worked that out. The thing I liked about the idea of being a girl was that girls were allowed (but not really required) to be feminine. I identified with femininity much more than with masculinity. I do not confuse gender (masculine, feminine) with sex (male, female) so my struggle hasn't really been with my body. It's that I'm a feminine male trapped in a world that devalues femininity in both males and females but especially males.

[CherryZips]

No I don't feel like a woman trapped in a man's body. But I do wish I was more handsome as a man and more pretty when I crossdress. Body hopping might be nice. I might wish I had the body of a pretty guy that could pass as a pretty woman. In that sense I have "trannie envy." But envy is no path to happiness and acceptance. I need to accept myself as I am.

I like my "bits" as they are I find the contrast enjoyable. Being safely one sex in appropriate clothes would be terribly dull. There would be no kick.

[Avana]

I absolutely feel like a woman trapped in a male body

[Cynthia Anne]

I feel trapped and always have! For over fifty years I wanted nothing more than to be a woman! And it seems the older I get the stronger that desire gets!

[Cheryl James]

I liked what Holly said about being assigned to the wrong team. That might sum my feelings up. I believe that I would have been happier had I been born a woman, but I have learned to be male and, sometimes, was pretty good at it. I don't plan to ever transition, so CD'ing, for me, is about getting to experience what I feel I was intended to be in the first place. It's not the real thing, of course, but is as close as I can get to it under the circumstances.

[joannemarie barker]

I have feminine mannerisms,I Like men and I love to be dressed but I'm still not in the wrong body

[StarrOfDelite]

I sometimes feel like a Gray Person trapped in a World which really would prefer that I was Black or White.

[Debb]

Kate, I'm going to agree with you too. I spent a long time telling myself that CDing was enough.

But it isn't. I have to move forward or live a life of regret.

This is me, too.

With the exception that, as it stands presently, I plan to continue living the life of regret.

It sounds depressing, and sometimes it is ... but like others, I have a few reasons or "excuses" why things must remain as they are. Until I can work through those reasons, I will continue on the path I'm on ... crossdressing as more-than-just-crossdressing.

[Jamiegirl1]

The older I get(I am 52) the more I want to become a woman,I wish I was born a woman!!!!

[carolinoakland]

A cd enjoys the way 'he' feels when he's 'she' and knows the diference. There is no duality with a TS. They are Transexual. The best way to describe GID is this...
Take your shoes off. Put the right one on the left foot and the left one on the right foot. Now look down. No matter what your eyes see you know inside what really is there. Yourself.

[Sharon B.]

I'm with Sarah Jan if I could throw a switch and start over as a female I would.
If I had to depend on what a woman makes I probably wouldn't have what I got as a male.