Wow! What fascinating responses to an important question. Pretty much the same story for me. First feelings at 4 or 5, experimenting at 7 and 8, told my mother I wanted to be a girl. Got denied (it was 1953). Went into denial and suppression for almost 60 years with a secret second side of me I went to when seriously dysphoric. In 2012 decided I could no longer fight her and came out. Hellish at first, but then settled into a comfortable pattern with an agreeable DADT pattern between my wife of 50 years and me. She allows but does not want to see me fully dressed, which I rarely do anyway. But my bits and pieces approach is acceptable so long as it is not strongly evident.
The pattern that all the folks here have expressed is exactly what the psychologist have found to be true of nearly all CD/TG people. Late bloomers are rather rare. That evidence for this being some kind of predisposition that once triggered, usually as children, can never be turned off completely. Pretty typical predisposition pattern. No mental illness or perversion - it is just the way some people are constructed. You are all so wonderful.
